The Darkest Colors Read online

  “What’s wrong?” Brenna asked.

  “I need to do something,” Raina said softly.

  “Like what?”

  Brenna tensed a bit as Raina awkwardly closed the distance between them, closed her eyes, and pressed their lips together gently. Brenna immediately gave herself to the kiss, closing her eyes and humming with approval as she savored their first kiss, their first real, mutual kiss. There was nothing weird about it at all. It was beautiful. It was magical. Raina kissed her as she had always wished she would, opening her mouth to hers and pressing against her with passion that was only held in check by Raina’s lingering uncertainty and unfamiliarity with the act. She was no stranger to kisses, surely, but with someone of the same gender … and a vampire, to boot … it was entirely a new game.

  It wasn’t until Brenna heard Loki inside the SUV exclaim softly, “Holy shit,” that she became aware of the fact that she had actually begun to pin Raina against the side of the SUV as she pressed the line of their bodies firmly together. She broke the kiss abruptly and saw Raina with her eyes still closed for a second or two after the fact, her eyes heavily-lidded with passion when she did finally open them. For an instant, Brenna was able to accurately picture for the first time ever how Raina would look in a bedroom setting. Whether things ever went any farther than this or not, it was an image she would remember forever.

  “That … that, ah … that was nice,” Brenna finally managed to say.

  Raina came to her senses at last, smiling a bit and looking suddenly embarrassed as she realized they were being watched. She nervously ran her fingers through her hair, getting them tangled awkwardly in the strands as she struggled to find words of her own.

  “I … I’m sorry,” she said at last, “I just thought … y’know … it’s about time that I just … well…”

  Brenna silenced her with a finger to her lips. “Don’t explain. I already know.”

  “Oh,” Raina said with a heavy sigh. “Well, that’s a relief.”

  * * * *

  Chapter Seventeen

  To say that his initial impressions of Raina were less than favorable were an understatement. What had the Grand Duchess been thinking? He knew she had been desperate, and her orders had been vague, but surely there had been better options available, especially in a city as large as Phoenix. Honestly, he had half expected her to have chosen a celebrity figure, a human of political importance, or at least someone with wisdom and experience in life so as to be a valuable asset to the High Court, if not its future leader. Instead, the Grand Duchess favored choice had been a young woman … no, a girl, and a terribly neurotic one, at that. He had thought that her to be wiser than this. Over these past few days, however, he seemed to be finding that he knew even less and less of the House of Fallamhain than he had ever originally believed.

  Worse still, she seemed inseparably bound to Brenna Douglass, whom he immediately found to be far too brash, undisciplined, disrespectful, and uncultured to even be considered for inclusion in the House of Fallamhain as a servant. One Yankee was bloody foolish enough to bring into the bloodline, but adding a rude little tart of a Commoner to the deal was surely going to bring nothing but woe to the Grand Duchess and the High Court, as a whole.

  The Grand Duchess had made it a point for him to regard Brenna with almost equal importance as Raina, though. He could not quite see what she saw in her that was worth protecting, but he was in no position to openly question her motivations. He was to see that her orders were carried out exactly as she wished. Though he did not understand or agree with the wisdom of bringing a mouthy harlot like Brenna into the fold of the House of Fallamhain, he would not dare to defy the Grand Duchess. Perhaps the Grand Duchess only wanted Brenna to be safely delivered to her so that she could deal with that attractive but unruly individual in person, herself.

  Of course, as a Commoner servant to the House of Fallamhain, William was not privy to all of the political specifics of the High Court, even as personally close as he was to the Grand Duchess. He was still not even quite sure why Countess Wilhelmina von Reichenbach was so suddenly and adamantly motivated to destroy the House of Fallamhain in the first place. He had heard of her only once before, mentioned rather casually in passing as though she had been dead and gone for years, and now suddenly she had become a severe threat to the very existence of the House of Fallamhain.

  Still, he knew the Grand Duchess well enough to expect that she would in no way approve of Raina Delgado becoming her sole remaining heiress. Raina was too young, too emotional, too unstable, and too … well … too bloody American. Previously, he had witnessed the unpleasant outcome of situations where her consorts had selected and created bloodspawn of their own that were not to the Grand Duchess’s satisfaction. Neglecting to obtain the Grand Duchess’s prior explicit consent for the inclusion of any individual into the House of Fallamhain as an extension of its true bloodline was a grave offense with dire consequences … more so for the new bloodspawn than their Maker. These events were rarely spoken of, and barely known by the outside world, but they did happen. This was not an exclusive tradition of the Grand Duchess by any means; all members of the High Court were expected to abide by the same strict conditions, as it was so written in the Code as to be their binding law.

  There was little he could do about this now, especially with Raina’s Change having already been mostly completed. What happened now with Raina’s life was entirely at the Grand Duchess’s discretion. It was written in the Code, after all – the very document of vampiric chivalry that the Grand Duchess, herself, had penned. Any Maker was within their rights at any time to take back the gift of eternal youth bestowed upon their bloodspawn, quite literally for any reason they saw fit. Of course, killing one’s own bloodspawn was a terribly unpopular deed that was always frowned upon by others in the High Court, particularly those of the IVC. It certainly would not bode well for the Grand Duchess’s reputation amongst the humans for her to cut down Raina after going through so much trouble to protect her from Countess Wilhelmina.

  At any rate, as undesirable as she might be as an heiress, it was obvious to William that the Grand Duchess needed Raina. As long as she had at least one bloodspawn still drawing breath in this world, her legacy would live on. The blood of a Fallamhain was precious in more ways than were obvious to most, and William had seen as much with his own eyes. An undesirable bloodspawn was still better than none at all.

  Following the directions offered by the in-dash GPS navigation computer of the Lincoln, Loki had them at the doorstep of Brenna Douglass’s apartment in forty-five minutes. The Grand Duchess had specifically requested that both Raina and Brenna be allowed an opportunity to make themselves presentable for their first face-to-face meeting. As per the Grand Duchess’s wishes, Raina and Brenna were asked to bathe and dress in their best attire – she was, after all, presenting herself for a queen’s review – while William and Robert kept watch over their safety. It was early enough in the evening that time was not especially a factor, so the girls could take their leisurely time in primping and perfuming themselves.

  Of course, being that Raina had only just been discharged from a hospital, and having spent the past two days in a vampiric coma during the completion of her Change, Raina was the worse for wear of the two. A mere change of clothes was the least of her needs, but a bit of a complicated issue without having much of anything in the way of clothing at Brenna’s residence that would suit her, much less adequately fit her.

  However, William had no intentions of allowing Raina to visit her own home anytime soon, as it was surely being watched just as closely by the paparazzi as it was surely by the Countess’s accomplices. This was of little concern, as he was certain that Loki, in spite of (or perhaps because of) his appearance, could make his way inside without arousing much interest and gather a few necessary items from Raina’s residence. Although he loathed to rely upon them for much because of their inherent unreliability as frail and whimsical creatures, William wa
s aware of the occasional advantage of his human associates. He would much sooner place one of them in harm’s way than dare to risk spilling the blood of any vampire. After all, it was the law of supply and demand in a world chokingly thick with a human populace. A human was easy to make, but a good vampire … not so much.

  With Loki dispatched to Raina’s home, William and Robert were temporarily without a mode of transportation of their own, although they could resort to using Brenna’s personal vehicle for an escape, if such a need ever arose. At this time, an attack from Countess Wilhelmina seemed highly unlikely. She was not an assassin, or at least not in the classical sense. Rather, she was a public executioner. She had made it a point in almost every instance of killing a Fallamhain to engage them in swordplay in a public setting – a party with many guests, the front lot of a large hotel surrounded by cameras, and even the halls of the International Vampiric Council, itself. She did this because she clearly wanted everyone to know that she was, at least technically, abiding by the Code to the very letter. She wanted the IVC to know that she was not simply murdering the House of Fallamhain one consort at a time, but rather that she was challenging each to a fair duel and besting each of them by skill, all alone. Most of all, she wanted the world to know that she intended to beat the Grand Duchess at her own game. If the Countess had her way, Duvessa would be forced to die by the very rules that she had written.

  Excluding himself from the area of the bedroom in the loft-style apartment, William afforded Raina and Brenna as much privacy as he could safely allow by posting Robert in the den area on the opposite side of the dividing wall. Meanwhile, he excused himself to step out onto the deck to place a call to the Grand Duchess to give her another update on the situation.

  He briefed her on what the situation had been in the hospital, particularly the fact that they had needed to use a secondary exit route. It had seemed that the Countess had either anticipated or learned of their initial plan to exit through the south tunnel of the hospital rather than the main entrance, and she had positioned herself accordingly to meet them. It would still have been in a public setting, but not in such a way that the media would have interfered with her violent intentions. He wished that he had been given an opportunity to see her with his own eyes, aim his Sig Sauer P226 at her, and end this whole charade in short order. Alas, he was only authorized to use such force if Raina’s life was in imminent danger – not truly the Grand Duchess’s will, per se, but rather that of her Code. Unless she challenged him directly or posed an imminent threat to his mistress, he could not simply shoot the Countess on sight.

  As he finished relating to her the details of their current situation, the Grand Duchess surprised him by asking for his honest opinion of Raina thus far. As the individual more highly trusted by the Grand Duchess than anyone else in the world with regard to security matters, even more so than Duke Sebastian had been, she had long shown an emotionally intimate bond with William. She had, in fact, bedded him on numerous occasions, which was quite a high complement in that love was cheap amongst the High Court, but rarely (if ever) shared with any Commoner or other race beyond their own. It was only because the Grand Duchess insisted that her consorts be of the High Court race that he was not one of her men, but beyond that, he was as close to being a consort as anyone could. The Grand Duchess valued William’s opinions on matters beyond security issues more often than not. With all of her lovers by blood now dead and gone, William was among the last of men to know her in both bed and heart. His word now meant much more to her than perhaps anyone else’s.

  “To be quite frank, your grace,” he replied, “I do not fancy her at all.”

  “Is that your personal or professional opinion, my dear?” Duvessa asked softly in that silky, bedroom tone of voice he rarely heard from her.

  “Which would my lady prefer?”

  “Both, actually.”

  “Professionally,” William responded, “I feel that she will be more of a liability than an asset to the House of Fallamhain. She is uncultured, immature, and incapable of bearing the responsibility of being a potential heiress to your legacy, your grace.”

  He heard her cluck her tongue dismissively. She ascended to her more formal tone in saying, “Those are issues which can be resolved with time and effort, Mister Santiago. Culture is a matter of education. Maturity comes with time and greater responsibility. And through both of those things, she may well come to be a worthy heiress. I do not expect to live forever, of course, but I will not die anytime soon, either. I will see to her development in earnest.”

  “I see, your grace,” he said with an unconscious nod. He paused, waiting for permission to speak further.

  “And what do you really think of her, William?” Duvessa asked, again returning to her sultry tone of voice that seemed moist with carnal knowledge. “Is she perhaps not the sweet and innocent young thing you expected her to be?”

  “If I may be so bold as to be blunt…?”

  “You may, dear.”

  “She’s a neurotic mess with more issues than a year’s subscription to a daily tabloid,” he replied, “and her companion, Brenna Douglass, is an overprotective and foul-mouthed Amazon whore.”

  She chuckled softly. “I must agree with your assessment of Brenna. I do admire her bravery and her loyalty to Raina, but I feel that her attitude will require a great deal of adjustment … the kind that may only be possible at the edge of a blade.”

  “I fear, your grace, that she is close enough with Raina so as to make the option of doing away with Brenna an impossibility without compromising Raina’s loyalty,” William explained. “It would seem that they are lovers.”

  “How so?”

  “I have already seen them kiss as though they were trying to find air in one another’s lungs,” he mused with a smirk.

  She laughed softly, saying, “Well, then it would seem that Raina has allowed her Change to sway her preferences. That is, of course, unless Brenna had simply been lying to me about the nature of their friendship.”

  There was a pause. “Are you not concerned about Raina’s mental state, your grace?”

  “She has been given quite a shock, I’m sure,” the Grand Duchess said after a moment’s hesitation. “As I understand it, she has been torn from her ordinary life and thrown into the very center of our world. She has been raped, Changed, and…”

  “Raped?” William blurted.

  “Do not interrupt me.”

  “My apologies, your grace. But … did I hear you correctly? She was raped?”

  “By Sebastian, yes,” she confirmed. “Why do you sound so surprised? You knew as well as I did that he had a nasty penchant for preying upon women in the ways of old. Of course, this was not exactly what I had in mind when I had asked him to evaluate her as fully as I would in choosing a bloodspawn. But it appears that, once again, Sebastian surrendered to temptation when he was given the opportunity.”

  “I see,” he sighed, feeling like a fool for having asked.

  He had cleaned up after more than one of Duke Sebastian’s indiscretions. Usually, they were foolish young things, starry-eyed fans … vampire groupies or “vampies,” as they were known, as they worshipped those with fangs rather than those bearing guitars. They would give themselves to him, and he would take far more than they meant to offer – sometimes sex, sometimes a bit of blood, and a couple of times, their very lives. It was not that Duke Sebastian had never learned to control his urges. Rather, the Grand Duchess had allowed him to become spoiled in his indulgences. And yet in spite of this, William knew that Sebastian had not truly been evil or wicked. In all actuality, it was the fact that power corrupted, and absolute power corrupted absolutely. Being free to commit certain crimes with impunity proved far too great a temptation for him to resist (especially as a vampire). It was to that end that the Grand Duchess and her bloodspawn had not been entirely different, at all.

  “As I was saying,” the Grand Duchess continued, “Raina has been raped, Changed, an
d is now a subject of global interest. Any one of those details would be overwhelming to most people, so I would be more surprised if she were to emerge from being immersed in all of that without showing any degree of distress at all.”

  “Yes, but her issues go back farther than anything that’s happened in the past few nights,” William said. As briefly as he could, he relayed Raina’s story of how her parents had been killed, and how it seemed that she had been more disturbed by watching a rogue vampire die than in losing her parents to the actions of that same individual. “She has a strange sort of tendency to fancy a reversal of roles between victim and victimizer.”

  The Grand Duchess responded to his concerns with soft laughter.

  “I am already familiar with Raina’s history, William. You forget that it was I who recommended her to Sebastian. I can assure you, her loyalty will not be a concern,” she stated confidently. “Given her state of mind as you have described it, I’m even more certain now that she could find no reason to sympathize with the likes of Countess Wilhelmina. If anything, her neurosis could serve to better secure her loyalty to the House of Fallamhain.”

  Dubiously, William conceded, “If you believe so, your grace, then I shall expect as much to hold true.”

  “Do you not have faith in my wisdom?” she asked, clearly sensing his doubt in spite of his effort not to allow his voice to betray it.

  “Only a fool would doubt the wisdom of one such as you, your grace,” he said diplomatically. “I am merely curious as to how Raina’s mental instability could benefit your bloodline.”

  And so, she told him. And, again dropping her formalities to address him quite personally, she explained to him how crucial his role was in the matter. Of course, it was yet another example of the political and strategic genius that had made Duvessa Fallamhain the Grand Duchess of the International Vampiric Council for the past thirty years. Smiling a bit with sudden reassurance that all of this was not one big folly in the face of an otherwise imminent doom, William agreed with the Grand Duchess’s words and they soon after ended their conversation.