A Kiss of Blood (Vamp City #2)(30)

As he strode through the gaming room, dodging the poker and billiards tables, regret washed through him for all that had changed and all that had been lost. Most of all, he regretted that his once-beloved friend and master had become the enemy, though Cristoff could never know.

Above all, Quinn must be protected. She was the sorceress who must save their world and with it the lives of some of his very best friends. But his need to protect her went deeper. Far deeper. From the moment he’d first come upon her, she’d confounded him. He’d been drawn to her from the start, ensnared by her beauty and her courage even as he’d tried to tell himself she was simply a means to an end and meant nothing to him. For a time, he’d believed that. Ultimately, her safety was all that had mattered. She was sunshine and light, strength and vulnerability. And she’d begun to awaken his dormant honor, igniting within him emotions he hadn’t even realized had died, and a craving for a softness that had long eluded him—her smile, the touch of her hand, the sweet music of her quiet and all-too-rare laughter.

He thought constantly of taking her into his arms, of laying her down and sinking into her lovely body. But he refused to cajole or seduce this time. She’d changed since he saw her last. She’d become more sure of herself, more wise to the ways of his world. And too wise to his own ways to trust him easily again. If ever.

But she’d changed him, too. He no longer felt like the male he’d been before. Perhaps, as Micah believed, she’d merely reawakened his conscience.

Arturo stepped through the open doors onto the deck, stopping beside the pool, where Cristoff swam laps. On his next turn, Cristoff spied him. Two laps later, his master pulled himself from the water and took the towel a female Slava rushed into his hands. Cristoff’s shoulder-length bleached hair was slicked back from a strong-boned face, the small black beard that fell from his chin, like a duck’s tail, dripped with water.

Pale blue eyes pinned Arturo. “Have you found her, my snake?”

“No, Master.” The lies ran easily from his tongue. “But I am following a lead. Ivan has escaped with her into the real world and hidden her well, but I will find her. I vow it.”

“The equinox nears.” Cristoff turned and snapped, “Monroe! Morgenstern! Attend me now.” A moment later, two guards came running, one from inside the house, the other from the yard beyond the pool. Both, Arturo knew, had been loyal to the deceased Ivan. “Kneel before me,” Cristoff growled, wrapping the towel around his waist.

The two guards fell to their knees, their faces betraying their confusion.

“Where is Ivan?” The question was quietly spoken, but Cristoff’s tone and eyes were hard.

“I do not know, Master,” Monroe stated. Morgenstern echoed his compatriot. And Arturo knew they told the truth.

Cristoff’s mouth compressed into an ugly line and he reached for them both, pressing his palms to their foreheads.

As one, the two guards gasped, then began to scream.

Arturo stared, stunned. Cristoff was using his mind blast, one of the most powerful weapons known to vampires, one gifted to very few—the ability to slowly pulverize his opponent’s brain with a simple touch of his hand.

“I don’t know, Master!” Morgenstern cried. Blood began to leak from his ears.

“I haven’t seen or heard a word from him since the sorceress disappeared,” Monroe swore.

His face a mask of fury, Cristoff pulled away from them and the pair slumped, gasping for air.

“Go,” Cristoff snapped. “Get out of my sight. If I discover you’ve lied to me, I will kill you.”

The two guards struggled to their feet and hurried away as the other vampires around the pool stared in stunned silence. In all the centuries Arturo had known him, Cristoff had never used his mind blast against one of his own. The old Cristoff never would have, not unless the vampire had directly challenged him.

But the attack had not quelled Cristoff’s fury. He grabbed the Slava who’d handed him the towel, threw her down onto the hard pool deck, lifted his foot, and brought it down hard.

“Where is that bitch? Someone find me the sorceress!”

The crack of ribs accompanied the woman’s agonized screams.

“Where is she?”

Slavas would heal most injuries quickly enough. The words Arturo had told himself a hundred times flowed through his head, but this time found no purchase. There was no excusing such barbarity, such cruelty against not only an innocent, but one of his own.

Arturo clenched his fist against the need to do something, and struggled to keep his face a mask of indifference. How had he remained complacent in the face of Cristoff’s brutality for so long?

His pulse thundered in his ears. It was Quinn whom Cristoff attacked in absentia, Quinn who would suffer his rage if he ever got his hands on her again.

“Find her,” Cristoff said, turning to Arturo, his voice more plea than demand. “If anyone can, it will be you, my snake. You’ll find her, and you’ll return her to me. You’ve never failed me, my loyal one. Never.”

For a moment, Arturo saw the echo of the friend Cristoff used to be behind the mask of the monster he’d become. Could he be saved? Was the old Cristoff still in there?

He prayed, for all their sakes, it was so.

“I will not fail you, Master.” And he wouldn’t. Quinn would renew the magic of Vamp City, saving them all. Then she’d disappear back into the real world before Cristoff discovered that his snake was also his traitor.