The Accidental Vampire (13 page)

"I can help," Elvi protested.

"You can help most by going out and sitting with the men and leaving me some room to work," Mabel said firmly, her expression pointed. It was only then that Elvi recalled that she was supposed to be getting to know these men and possibly picking a mate. She'd been so wrapped up in food for the last little bit, she'd quite forgotten that embarrassing little tidbit.

"Here." DJ moved to the wine rack, selected three bottles, and handed them to the men, then fetched wineglasses and a corkscrew as if he'd lived in the house for a week already. Passing out the various items, he waved them to the door. "Go sit by the fire and get acquainted. I'll help Mabel with the tray."

"I don't need any help," Mabel growled.

Ignoring her, DJ began to herd them toward the door. "Go on."

An odd smile tugging at his lips, Victor took Elvi's arm and steered her to the door. "Shout if you need help."

DJ just grinned as he watched them leave.

"This is nice," Harper commented moments later as they were finally settled around the metal fire pit in the backyard. The fire had been dying out by the time they'd collected chairs from the garage and set them up around the fire. Harper and Alessandro had brought it back to flaming life while Edward, Elvi, and Victor had tended to opening the wine and pouring the glasses.

"Yes," Elvi murmured, staring at the fire through the red wine in her glass.

Mabel and DJ came out moments later with a tray piled with every one of the six cheeses Elvi and the men had picked at the grocery store and at least as many types of crackers piled on a tray. There were also small paper plates for each of them. The group tried the various offerings, commenting on what was good and what was not and various other things.

When the tray was empty, Mabel picked it up and stood.

"I'll get that, Mabel. Sit down," Elvi said as she turned away.

"That's okay. I'm heading off to bed anyway," Mabel said. "You should probably too, soon."

Elvi frowned and glanced at her watch. It was after five A.M. The sun would soon be up, she realized with some surprise, and then acknowledged that she shouldn't be. The restaurant didn't close until two A.M. because of the bar, and then there'd been the house tour, the collecting of cars, and the hour at the grocery store before they'd settled around the fire. The time had seemed to fly by.

Sighing with regret that the first interesting night she'd had in a long time was coming to a close, Elvi collected her wineglass and moved to the fire to dampen it down.

"I'll get that," DJ offered, urging her out of the way.

"Thank you," Elvi murmured, then glanced at the other men to offer a goodnight before slipping away to follow Mabel.

"Well?" the other woman asked as she entered the kitchen.

"They seem nice," she admitted wryly, then laughed and said, "but what did you do, pick the wealthiest and best-looking only?"

"Only the best for my Elvi," Mabel proclaimed.

"What would I do without you?" Elvi asked with a laugh and gave her a hug. "Now, go to bed. It's well past your bedtime."

Nodding, Mabel started out of the room, then paused suddenly and turned back. "I didn't get the chance to tell you…"

"What?" Elvi prompted as she opened the dishwasher and bent to place her wineglass inside.

"'When we were at the restaurant, that Argeneau fellow touched my cross," Mabel said quietly. "And nothing happened."

"He did?" she asked with amazement. She hadn't dared enter a church or touch anything religious since her turning for fear of bursting into flames or some such thing like in the movies.

Mabel nodded. "You might want to ask him about that tomorrow."

"Yes," Elvi murmured as Mabel continued out of the room.

Closing the dishwasher door, she made her way upstairs. It was late, or early as the case may be, and she knew she should go to bed, but instead found herself wandering through her room to the attached sunroom. Leaving the lights out, she moved to the window and peered down at the half-circle of men around the dying flames. Their voices drifted up to her through the night as Elvi stood watching them. One of them might be a mate for her, she thought with disbelief, and still wasn't sure she was ready for another relationship. It had hurt so much to lose her husband and daughter…

On the bright side, she supposed she wouldn't have to worry about being widowed again with any of these men. They, like her, were already dead.

Grimacing, Elvi moved to sit on the wicker couch. Drawing her feet up under her, she closed her eyes and savored the best day she'd had in five years.

She could eat.

She would no longer feel like an outsider at social functions. If nothing else happened this week, Elvi would be grateful for that.

A tap at the sunroom door made her start and Elvi glanced over sharply to see Victor standing outside the glass door. Her heart immediately started hammering in her chest and she could actually feel her hands growing sweaty. Squeezing those hands closed, she forced herself to take a deep breath. This reaction to the man was beyond disturbing. She'd like to blame it on some chemical reaction to special pheromones put out by a male vampire, but she didn't seem to have this reaction to the other male vampires now in her home. Elvi almost wished she did. She was too damned old to be acting like a love-struck teenager. Unfortunately, while she was sixty-two years old, she looked twenty-five and he made her feel about sixteen.

Shaking her head at herself, Elvi stood and moved to open the door. She managed what she hoped was a politely enquiring expression and waited for him to speak, afraid that if she opened her mouth it would just be to blurt out something stupid.

"You forgot your ankle bracelet." He held out one hand, opening it to reveal the belled anklet cradled in his fingers. Elvi had taken it off by the fire when the constant jangle had finally got to her. She'd set it on the ground beside her chair and apparently left it there.

"Thank you," she murmured, blushing when she saw the way her fingers were trembling as she took it from him.

As she slid the anklet into her pocket, Victor raised his other hand, revealing two wineglasses and a half-bottle of wine. He had the bottle by the neck and the two delicate goblets by the stems, all caught in the fingers of one hand. "This is all that's left. It seems a shame to waste it. It should be just enough for two glasses, I think."

Elvi almost said no and closed the door to avoid the discomfort she felt in his presence, but there were so many questions she wanted to ask… besides, as uncomfortable as she was with her attraction to him, it also made her want to be near him. Relieving him of the two goblets, she moved aside for him to enter.

"This is nice," he murmured, peering around the sun-room.

Elvi followed his gaze over the wicker furniture in the dark. The only light came from the open door to her room, but she expected his eyesight was as sharp as her own. This soft glow was more than enough to see by. She supposed it was how he'd known she was up here.

"How are you feeling?" Victor asked, settling on the couch and holding out a hand for the glasses.

"A little woozy," Elvi admitted quietly as she handed them over. "I haven't had a drop to drink in five years, and it went straight to my head. In fact, I suppose I really shouldn't have any more."

"One more should be all right," he said quietly, pouring the wine. He handed her a glass, picked up the other, and sat back to peer at her.

The silence that filled the room as they sipped their wine seemed to dance along Elvi's nerves. She was terribly aware of his nearness and the delicious male scent of him. She didn't know what aftershave he wore, but she'd like to buy some and sprinkle it in her coffin so she could bury her face in the satin pillow and breathe it in all night long while she slept.

"It seems obvious that you haven't been trained properly in what you can and can't do. Why is that?"

Victor's sudden question sent Elvi's ponderings of his aftershave flying and she stiffened as she took in his words. It was obvious she hadn't been trained? There was
training
for vampires? Like a vampire boot camp or something?

"What do you mean?" she asked finally, and then sat up a little straighter as she realized he was saying she appeared as ignorant as she felt. "What gave me away?"

Victor arched an eyebrow. "For one, you thought you couldn't eat food."

"Oh, yes." Elvi flushed. She supposed that was an obvious giveaway, but really, how was she supposed to know what she could and couldn't do? None of the vampires ever ate or drank anything but blood in the movies and television shows. At least not the ones she and Mabel had seen when Elvi had first turned and they'd done all their research.

"And," Victor added solemnly, drawing her attention back to him, "you obviously don't realize it is against our laws to bite mortals."

Elvi stiffened with alarm. "What? We have laws?"

Victor nodded solemnly.

Elvi sat still, her mind whirling. Laws suggested some form of organization. It also seemed to suggest there were more of their kind than she'd thought. Questions began to whirl through her mind, but were pushed aside in favor of this business of breaking a vampire law. Elvi hadn't ever in her life broken a law. She'd never even so much as jaywalked. It didn't sit well that she'd unknowingly broken one.

"I didn't realize it was against our laws," she said quickly. "In fact, I didn't know there were laws. I wasn't even sure there were others like me."

"I was afraid of that," Victor said, then cursed under his breath.

"You said 'laws'. Plural," she murmured. "What other laws are there?"

Victor opened his mouth, and then shook his head. "There's no sense telling you now. You've been drinking for the first time in years and I'd probably just have to repeat them in the evening when you wake up."

Elvi opened her mouth to protest, but he assured her, "I'll tell you all about them after you've slept."

When she settled back in her seat with resignation, he smiled faintly and added, "Speaking of which, I should probably let you get to bed."

Victor stood and moved to the door. Elvi followed, her gaze dropping of its own accord to his behind. She managed to force it back up as he stepped through the door onto the top step and turned back to say, "Before I go, though, I do need the answer to one question."

"Yes?" she asked curiously.

"Who was your sire?"

Elvi frowned. "What exactly is a sire?" she asked with bewilderment. "Both you and Alessandro have mentioned that word and I haven't a clue what it means."

"It means the one who made you," he explained. "The one who turned you into an immortal."

"Oh," Elvi smiled faintly. She had a feeling she'd heard the phrase before this, probably when she and Mabel had been researching vampires right after their return from Mexico, but as it didn't apply to her, she'd let it slip her mind.

Realizing he was waiting for an answer, Elvi shook her head. "I didn't have a sire."

Victor stared at her nonplussed. "You had to have a sire… unless…" He paused, then asked doubtfully, "You weren't born an immortal?"

Elvi laughed at the idea. "No, of course not. Five years ago I had gray hair and wrinkles," she assured him. "But no one sired me."

"Someone had to," he insisted.

Elvi peered past him at the lightening sky, her mind automatically going back to the period around her own death. It was a time she didn't like to think about, and in truth was a terrible blur. All she remembered clearly was that she'd bitten Mabel and nearly killed her while out of her head.

"Mabel and I went to Mexico," she said finally. "We were in a car accident and I woke up several days later like this." Elvi forced a smiled, shifting uncomfortably when he stared at her with incomprehension. "I guess you could say I'm an accidental vampire."

Forcing a smile, she murmured good night and pulled the door closed before he could say anything more. Elvi didn't like to think about that time in her life and liked even less to talk about it.

Slipping the lock closed, she turned and entered her bedroom, grimacing at the sight of the coffin waiting there. She had a bit of a headache, and her tummy was uncomfortably full, but she was relaxed for the first time in years, thanks to the wine, and she was feeling a little less like a freak with so many of her kind around, yet had to sleep in that blasted thing.

Muttering under her breath, Elvi ignored the dark wooden casket and moved into the bathroom. She wanted a bath before bed, but it was late enough that she'd have to make do with a quick wash. Afraid of collapsing into the semi death that daylight was supposed to bring vampires, Elvi had never risked being out of her coffin after dawn. She wasn't taking the chance tonight either. But tomorrow she would ask Victor what else she could and couldn't do.

Frowning as she rinsed the soap from her face, Elvi realized it hadn't even occurred to her that she could ask her questions of any of the men in her home, that all of them would know the answers. She simply automatically thought to ask Victor. She wasn't sure if that was representative of a comfort level with him she hadn't reached with the others yet, or a simple preference in dealing with him, but suspected it was both. That knowledge was enough to make her suddenly reluctant to ask her questions of him, but it was becoming woefully obvious that despite being a vampire for five years, she was terribly ignorant of what she could and couldn't do. Who knew there were laws and so on? No, she had to ask her questions, and if she was going to ask anyone, it would be Victor.

She'd ask him about coffins first and then move on to things like the ability to slip into others minds. The conversation she'd overheard between Alessandro and Harper had her curious. Could she read minds and control others as Alessandro had suggested Edward may have done with Mabel?

Mabel had insisted Elvi try to read minds and so on when she'd first changed. After all, Dracula could apparently do it, but Elvi hadn't been able to manage the task and had decided that only he, as the king of vampires, could do it. But if Edward could do it too, maybe she just hadn't tried long enough.