Darkyn - Midnight Blues Part 2

At first Donatien had not believed what he had read in the old journals. Le Chevillard had been a madman, and his ramblings (while vastly entertaining) could hardly be called reliable. Donatien had consoled himself for a time by playing with the savages, all of whom proved to be vigorous and in remarkably good health. Then he had seen it for himself, first in the scars of horrendous wounds on the bodies of his playthings, then by listening closely to the babbled tales of miracles.

The Hand of G.o.d had not saved them. A girl had.

They had tried to protect Cristal by denying she existed, denials that Donatien had quickly reduced to pleas and sobs. The girl had been clever, too, hiding away at night and resisting his lures. The entire matter had wasted a great deal of Donatien's valuable time, during which someone had summoned that Catholic c.u.n.t, Sister Marguerite, to spirit away his Cristal.

The years of searching did not sting as much as the nun who had deceived him. She had sworn he would never touch Cristal or her, and had settled the matter by setting fire to the convent where he had found them. Fool that he was, he truly believed the old b.i.t.c.h and his pearl had been consumed in the flames.

Reading of Marguerite Aretino's actual death years brought tears of hope and joy to Donatien's eyes, or would have, had his tear ducts still functioned. Further inquiries confirmed that she had not, in fact, killed herself or Cristal. She had faked everything in order to escape to America. Learning from an old Kyn ally that the Spaniard lived in south Florida as well, serving as seneschal to the newly-appointed suzerain, had been Fate's dessert course.

Arranging for the Spaniard to meet Cristal had been a simple matter. Doubtless in the short time they were together, Donatien's old love and his new would become fast friends. Donatien preferred his toys to have feelings for each other, at least for as long as they could feel something. It brought out displays of heroism and sacrifice that he always found touching.

The Spaniard had honor, and Daniela compa.s.sion. It was a match made in h.e.l.l.

Donatien did congratulate himself for maintaining around-the-clock surveillance on the convent. Such a terribly modern thing to do. Waiting for her to emerge had been boring, but he had been there to see her being carried out in the arms of Richard's former emissary, the angel of light with the h.e.l.lfire eyes.

Now he would have them both. His angelic demon and his demonic angel.

"ID's,' the large, fat man dressed as an evil clown at the entrance to the fetish club said as they stopped before him.

Donatien patted non-existent pockets. "Dear me. I do believe that I left mine at home." He urged his accessories forward. "Of course, my friends will vouch for me."

The bouncer gave his companions a cursory glance. "We don't admit perverts or their underage friends."

"Fortunately I am a libertine, not a pervert," Donatien said. "My companions are much older and wiser than they were a week ago."

"Look, moron, I'm not-" the bouncer reached out to grab the front of his jacket.

"Mind your bowels, young man," Donatien said, placing one hand on the bouncer's frilled sleeve. "One never knows when their contents are about to exit in a decidedly explosive manner."

The bouncer's hand dropped to clutch at his abdomen. A low, wrenching groan crawled through his clenched teeth as he doubled over.

"We'll see ourselves in, thank you." Donatien guided his accessories to the door. The gruesome atmosphere and dangerous-looking members of Club Dominion never failed to cheer up Donatien, who led his accessories to the best table in the house. The occupants, clad as they were in various rigs of leather and chains, rose from their seats as soon as they spotted him. Donatien felt pleased at the automatic deference, and graced them with an approving smile, and a round of intense migraines.

Now to find the last p.a.w.n.

The a.s.sistant manager of the club, a fellow named Butcher, whose body had been pierced as often as the Virgin Queen Elizabeth's maidenhead, appeared with two waitresses and a staff dominatrix. All were dressed in ghastly costumes and makeup.

"Your Excellency," Butcher said, and bowed. "You're early tonight. We are honored."

"You are likely missing a doorman, however," Donatien advised him. "Bring my young friends mineral water."

Butcher dispatched one waitress with a snap of his black-nailed fingers, and sent the other staff members off to supervise a flogging exhibition. "Your Excellency, may I ask if you have seen the club's owner, Erik? He was the young man who left with you last week, and no one has heard from him since that night."

"Erik decided to move on to a better place," Donatien said. "He did sign over this establishment to me before he left. Would you care to run it for me?"

"I am honored." Butcher hid his surprise by bowing deeply. "I will not disappoint you, Your Excellency."

"No one ever does in the end, dear boy." He scanned the surrounding tables. "Now bring me a blonde. Something young, nubile, and as untouched as possible."

"Would Your Excellency wish a blonde girl or boy?" Butcher asked.

"I never discriminate," Donatien said, quite truthfully. "Either will do."

The band onstage played something as unpleasant and ungainly as the dancing being performed on the floor in front of them. Donatien didn't mind the ugliness of the music or motion. One had to be born with elegance; it could not be taught, bought or otherwise acquired. Seeing humans behave like the pitiful apes that they were merely reinforced his notions of evolution.

The waitress delivered drinks for his accessories and a young blonde female dressed in a too-tight merry widow and leather skirt. She had applied fake blood and adhesive scars to much of her exposed skin. Beneath the cheap cosmetics he could smell a trace of fresh blood, likely from some self-inflicted nonsense hidden under her clothes. The ennui in her eyes beckoned to him like dying candle flames.

"This is Tragedy," the waitress said.

"Of course it is. Do sit down, dearest," Donatien said, indicating the chair across from him.

The girl moved with all the grace of a sack of root vegetables, and immediately propped her elbows on the table. "My name is Tragedy." She had a dreadful overbite, and ears that had been pierced in the most unlikely spots. Cheap, weighty jack-o-lantern earrings were pulling her earlobes into taffy, but her hair appeared to be natural, and under her heavy makeup lay somewhat dewy skin. "You're very pretty." She made it sound like a criminal offense.

He inclined his head. "I am Donatien."

"I've heard about you. They say you're a bigshot new master around here." She fiddled with her spiked vinyl bracelets, miming boredom. "Whenever you come to the club, they say other girls have cat fights just to talk to you. I guess 'cause you're so pretty."

"Bigshot, yes, new, no, cat fights, I cannot say. And please, do think of another word with which to describe me. I know you can, dear Tragedy, because you are not like other girls, are you?" She had the voice of a fishwife and the manners of a gutter cleaner, but he smelled no chemicals or alcohol on her breath, and along with the hair and the skin that was all that mattered to him.

Tragedy preened. "I'm not like anyone you've ever had."

Youth, freshness, clean blood, functioning nerves, and misplaced pride and arrogance.

What more perfect clay could be found? "Tell me why you come here, to such a terrible place."

"It's something to do." Her shoulders moved out and back into her slouch. "I'm free, white and twenty-one. I bottom and top. No cutting or bathroom games." Her glance flicked with studied indifference to his redhead. "I do girls sometimes."

She wanted his toy instead of him. She, who had called him pretty. For that, he would make her beg him to kill her long before the night's games concluded.

"If I permitted you to play with my sweet little strawberry shortcake," Donatien asked, stroking his hand over his redhead's shoulder, "what would you do to her for my amus.e.m.e.nt?"

Interest finally enlivened the dull eyes. "Biting, licking, twisting, spanking. I'll use vibrators, whips and clamps, whatever you like."

Dear G.o.d, would humans ever abandon these pedestrian desires? Where was the imagination in this century? They could land s.p.a.ce craft on Mars, but in matters erotic, they were still as infantile as the Saracens and the n.a.z.is. "That's all?"

The blonde's bottom lip protruded. "What do you want me to do?"

It amused him how the humans of this era wished everything spelled out for them in advance. One had to almost hire an attorney and strike a contract to arrange a proper liaison. "Give me your hand."

Tragedy did not. "I don't like you."

"I don't require you to like me." Donatien rested his hand on his boy's shoulder, noting the slight jerk his touch produced. "I asked you to give me your hand."

His brunette struck without warning, clamping onto the blonde's forearm and dragging it across the table. The girl opened her mouth to shout, only to find herself being kissed by his redhead.

Donatien folded his hand around Tragedy's as his redhead broke off the kiss and inserted her slim hand down the front of the merry widow to fondle the groaning girl.

"Show me your pleasure, mademoiselle."

Chilled air enveloped the table as Tragedy's mouth went slack. Her eyelids drooped over dilated pupils. A ghostly copy of her own face, much younger and decorated with small cuts and artful bruising, masked her features for a moment before it faded.

"Who?" Donatien prompted.

"Caroline," she whimpered. "The babysitter."

"I gather she was a redhead. How terribly apt, that you named yourself for what she made of you." Donatien released her hand. It was near dawn, and he had so much more to accomplish before the night's work was finished. "You will do."

Her lids lifted a fraction. "You'll mean, you'll let me hurt her? You'll watch?" "I regret that she is probably beyond your limited abilities to inflict suffering, Tragedy. Fortunately, I am willing to serve as your tutor." Donatien gestured to Butcher, who had been hovering within fawning range. "We will need to use the former owner's private playroom for a time. While I am occupied, lock the doors and don't permit anyone to leave."

The club's new manager looked confused. "We close at five a.m., Your Excellency."

Donatien smiled. "Not tonight, dear boy."

Lucan resisted the weariness that dawn had draped over him and listened to Samantha breathe. Accustomed as she was to working all night and sleeping through the day, even as she had during her human life, she still fell asleep quickly and rarely stirred.

He propped himself up on one elbow to stare down at her. His long, tall G.o.ddess had a magnificent body, and used it to give him an outrageous amount of pleasure, but her face equally fascinated him. The first time he had seen Samantha, he had been dumbfounded by the striking resemblance she bore to his long-dead love, Frances. It had taken time for him to see past the face and come to know Samantha for who she was, and by then he had forgotten the ghosts of his past.

Frances had been a lovely, feminine woman, all soft curves and gentle colors as befitted a female of her time. Samantha's toned, disciplined body sang of the beauty and self-control of a modern-day female warrior. Lucan had yearned after Frances from afar like a lovesick boy, never acknowledging her indifference to him. He had been shattered by Samantha's selfless love for him, and had done his best to destroy it only to discover its strength and resilience.

That Samantha had survived their courts.h.i.+p was a miracle; near the end of it she had been shot by a determined stalker. Ending that vermin's life had been one of the few joys Lucan had ever derived from his own lethal gift. Then he had done something even worse to save the woman he loved.

Alexandra Keller, the only person to survive the transition from human to Kyn in six hundred years, had been furious when Lucan had used her blood to save Samantha. It should have poisoned her, but the terrible gamble had paid off, and miraculously Samantha had become, like Alexandra, an immortal.

That such a brave and selfless woman would choose to spend that eternity with someone like him... that was the true miracle.

"Are you done inspecting me?" Samantha asked, her eyes still closed. "I've got to pull a double s.h.i.+ft on this case, and I'd like to get some sleep before noon."

A miracle that often turned and slapped at him when he least expected it. "Allow me my harmless diversions, love." He ran a fingertip over the curve of her chin. "They keep me out of trouble."

"You're not the one being ogled while you sleep." She turned her face away. "Is it really that much fun to watch me snore?"

"You don't snore." Lucan sifted his fingers through her dark chocolate hair, admiring the way the silky strands clung to his skin. Only with Samantha did he dare leave off his gloves. "You do, on occasion, drool a bit."

Her head turned, and hazel-green eyes glared at him. "I never drool."

"Shall I show you the wet patches on your pillow tonight?" He grinned as she pushed him over onto his back and straddled him. "Well, perhaps not." Lucan ran his hands down her arms, watching the reaction on her face as his talent played along the nerves beneath her skin. Samantha's transition had been, like Alex's, unusual. Kyn talent still affected her, and she was slower to heal. Although an unusual psychic ability from her human life the power to read the past through the blood of its victims remained intact, she had yet to show her true Kyn talent. She also had an annoying habit of routinely placing herself into harm's way.

He could not allow her to do so with Donatien in his territory.

She nudged his ribcage with her knees. "h.e.l.lo. Aren't you tired yet?"

"Not with you." Since they both slept naked, he only had to lift her hips to work his c.o.c.k into her. She made a soft sound as she surrounded him in damp, tight heat. "Never with you."

Lucan sat up, holding her in place with his arms, so that they were face-to-face and he moved deeper inside her. Her hips jerked as the soft heat of her melted around him, clasping and caressing him at the same time. He had taken countless women over the course of his long life, and not one of them had felt this good, this right. No one could make him feel this safe.

If he lost her, it would be the end of him.

"Hey." Samantha brought his hands to her b.r.e.a.s.t.s, covering them with her own, her eyes darker now. "I'm not going anywhere."

"Yes, you are." He flipped her onto her back, keeping himself lodged high inside her as he urged her long, strong legs up and up. When the back of her calves pressed against his shoulders, he withdrew almost to the point of disengaging their bodies, and then teased her a little with the head of his c.o.c.k. When she tried to counterthrust and force him back inside her, he spread his hand over the faint curve of her lower belly and pinned her.

Samantha's body began to shake. "Not fair."

"Love rarely is," Lucan agreed, and kissed her, sliding his tongue between her lips as he pushed slowly back inside her body.

Making love with Samantha was something he preferred to do with a decided amount of leisure, but he sensed the quivering of her muscles was not solely due to pa.s.sion. He took her quickly to a hot, hard climax, and then drew her back down, stroking into her gently until they came together. She whispered his name as she drifted off, her body going limp with satisfaction.

When Lucan felt sure that she truly slept, he eased out of their bed, dressed and went down to his office.

Herbert Burke, Lucan's tresora, sat at the desk sorting through the night's sales slips.

He looked up as Lucan entered. "Master, is something the matter?"

"Not for long." Lucan closed the door. "Where is Rafael?"

"He called from Miami about thirty minutes ago," Burke said, retrieving his note pad to read from it. "He said to tell you that he has the young lady from the convent, and will bring her to you tonight."

"He must have had trouble with her." Lucan paced for a moment. "Contact Cyprien and make him aware that the Marquis is alive and hunting in America."

"The Marquis." Burke paled under his new tan. "Surely not, Master. The historic accounts, they all say that-"

"I know what the books say, and they are wrong." Lucan saw a crack divide one of the lenses in Burke's spectacles, and put a tight leash on his temper. "Forgive me. My concern is for Samantha. Kyn talent still affects her. If he came here, if he touched her..."

"He would not dare." Dark color flagged the smaller man's cheeks.

"We must see to it that he does not." Lucan went to his wall safe and took out a small aluminum case. He handed it to Burke. "While Samantha is sleeping, replace all of the ammunition in her weapons with these rounds." He selected a .44 Magnum from the safe and carefully loaded it. Copper bullets wouldn't kill the Marquis, but they might slow him down. He put the gun back in the safe. "Cancel the Halloween events, close the club until further notice, and put everyone on patrol. If they see the Marquis, they are only to call in his location. No one is to confront him or go within his sight. Make that very clear to the men."

"I will advise them immediately." Burke removed his cracked gla.s.ses and replaced them with a spare pair he always carried. "Master, you should not go hunting by yourself."

"I work better alone, Herbert." He checked the cartridges for the tranquilizer pistol Alexandra Keller had left behind for him. He had no idea if the drug she had invented to sedate the Kyn would work on Donatien, but he would take it as well. "Wake me before sunset. I will track him from the convent."

"Master." Worry etched Burke's mild features. He glanced at his hands. "Can you stop him?"

Lucan had promised his sygkenis he would never again use his talent to harm anyone.

He had no more stomach for the work, either. But Donatien had been a walking plague for too long, and it was past time to bury him. "I will try, Herbert. I will try."

Four.

Rafael often found his double life a tribulation. Being both cop and seneschal, human protector and Kyn servant meant that his duties ate up nearly every moment of his waking hours. Now in addition to solving a murder and catching a madman, he had to protect a young nun who had tried to jump through a third story window to escape him.