Page 59 of Lair

“Adrian Voper?” a voice calls, and we both turn. Down the hallway beyond the open library door, what must be the host has spread his arms in the gesture of a nightlife impresario. “What on earth are you wearing?”

Adrian sighs and turns to me, brushes my bottom lip with his thumb. “Hold that thought?”

I grin. “Okay.”

I watch him walk down the hall as I tug my dress back in place. What am I thinking? I must be really falling for him, to so quickly—

“He’s a lucky man,” says a calm voice behind me, and I jump. A man reposes in a plush armchair in the darkness behind, a vague shape amongst the looming bookshelves. He rises and drifts into a slant of light coming in from a tall window. European, perhaps, or Eastern? Tall, at any rate, with a broody mass of black curls. What was he doing there, sitting in the dark? Was he high on something?

“Is he?” I finally reply, glancing toward the light and safety of the hall.

“He is,” the man avers, seeming amused by this. “And so am I...” And his lips lift in a smile, giving egress to sharp points. Sharp teeth.

It is in this moment that I notice the form of a woman slumped on the floor by the recently vacated armchair. She is not moving.

The man follows my gaze. “Oh, she just overdid it.” He turns back to me, teeth glinting. “Hard not to in a place like this, isn’t it?”

And he looks me directly in the eyes.

I take a careful step back. “I—I gotta go,” I blurt out.

The man frowns. “So soon?”

“My friend—I should—”

“He wouldn’t have left you if he’d wanted you.” A pale hand lifts, up and up, toward my face. “Why don’t you stay, where you’ll be appreciated?”

I jerk back so suddenly I trip and fall on the carpet. The man is frowning down at me as I scramble up, black horror lodged in my throat, and grope away down the hall. Back into light and sound, the blaring music assaulting my senses. I glance behind—just a dark doorway onto the library. No shape following me. No vampire.

Everywhere, though. They could be everywhere—anyone—in this haven of jet-setters.

Why did Adrian lie to me?

A sob catches in my throat. Where? Where is Adrian?

There. The host, in a showy damasked suit. I clutch his arm. “Have you seen Adrian?” I gasp.

The host frowns at me as if I were a crazy woman. “Honey, look around. There are plenty of other sugar daddies here to take care of you.”

I stumble back, feeling lightheaded. Of course. Of course he would say something like that.

How else would the super-rich think?

But then Adrian slips out of a door, shutting it behind him. His eyes find me. “There you are,” he says, taking my arm. “I got turned around. Are you—what’s wrong?”

I’m trembling all over. I grip onto him. “Please get me out of here.”

His face falls as he takes me in, and without a word he grabs my hand.

Down the stairs, but there’s a firebreather spouting gouts of flame to oohs and aahs in the lobby, so we duck out a side door onto a stone patio overgrown with ivy. The pulsing music cuts off as Adrian shuts the door behind us, and then he’s gripping me by the shoulders. “What’s wrong? What happened?”

I unleash a wrathful glare on him. “Why did you lie to me?”

His face drops. “What?”

“You said there’d be none of your kind here—”

“There isn’t.” He turns grim. “Why do you say that?”

---