Page 31 of Bite at First Sight

Unfortunately it was too late to turn back and take her home. Already the scent of prey teased his nostrils, inflaming his blood thirst to a fevered pitch. He needed to feed now. Giving Cassandra one last look, he stalked his victim, praying she wouldn’t muddle up this hunt.

As Rafe’s shadow passed over the vagrant hunched against the wall, the man looked up and gave him a toothless grin. “I say, guv’nor, could ye spare a shilling or two?”

“Of course.” Rafe immediately captured the man’s gaze, pulling his waking mind under a sea of unconsciousness. With a gesture and mental command, Rafe made the man stand.

Just as he bared his fangs and prepared to strike, Cassandra whispered, “What is wrong with him?”

Rafe turned to face her. She was far more preferable to the filthy unfortunate before him. Like comparing claret to rotgut. Forcing his attention back to the matter at hand, he explained, “I have taken his mind under my power so that he will neither feel nor remember this moment.”

“How?”

Grinding his teeth in impatience, he fought off a growl. “How am I to know? It is just the way it is done.” Before she could interrupt again, Rafe seized the man by the collar and sank his fangs into his meal.

As anticipated, the blood was tepid and bland compared to Cassandra’s heady vintage. Rafe continued to drink until his hunger was sated. Then he released his victim and turned back to Cassandra. She did not recoil in terror or even flinch. Instead, she continued to jot down her observations in that infernal journal.

Now she peered at him over her quill as if he were a specimen in her laboratory. “How much blood did you take?”

Rafe sighed at her clinical tone. “A trifle more than a pint. Now I shall release him.”

The scratching noise of the quill returned as the man’s eyes regained awareness. Rafe handed him a guinea.

“Bless ye, guv’!”

Rafe stepped back before the man could grasp his lapels and grovel.

“Fascinating,” Cassandra said as he led her out of the alley. “You do this every night?”

He nodded curtly, exasperated with her tenacity. “Usually twice. Do you think you could handle doing this every night for the rest of eternity?”

Her eyes widened before she quickly looked away. At last he’d cracked her composure. “I am…uncertain. I suppose I would have to do whatever is necessary…and…it doesn’t seem as if it causes lasting harm.” She fidgeted with her journal and quill. “In fact, it’s much like bleeding a patient, which doctors have prescribed for centuries.”

Irritating though it was, Rafe admired her rationality in the face of such dire prospects.

She looked up at him with intensity that stole his breath. “Do you mean you’ve decided my fate?”

Something raw and harsh knotted in his stomach. “I have not.”

God help him, but he was already resigned to the fact that he didn’t want to kill her.

* * *

Cassandra’s curiosity rose with every new detail Rafe revealed about his world. “How did you become a vampire?” she whispered after making certain the streets were empty.

For a moment he looked as if he wouldn’t reply, but then he answered. “My tío, my uncle, Changed me…or rather, my great-great-uncle, three centuries ago. He wanted a wise Villar to always be around to watch over the family while he had to be away from the country.”

“You still have family?” She gasped, feeling a twinge of envy at his nod. When he didn’t elaborate, she asked, “How were you Changed?”

“He drank my blood until I was nearly drained, then he cut his wrist and I drank it back.”

She stoked the feather of her quill against her chin. “So the catalyst is in the blood. Is that what you will do to me then?”

A dark, chilling expression crossed his features before he spoke. “We will discuss that later. It is time for me to present you to my people. Remove your scarf. I must blindfold you.”

Cassandra froze with her journal half stuffed into her reticule. “How am I supposed to make my way through these dark streets? I can hardly see as it is.”

Rafe gave her a long, considering look. “I will carry you.”

“But your arm—” She broke off as pained anger slashed across his harsh features.

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