Chapter 35
Chapter Thirty-Five
Harriet
Ilie awake for hours, staring at the ornate plaster molding on the ceiling of my bedroom at Kingston Manor, replaying the same images over and over.
Alexandru’s elegant hands gripping KC’s hair, cufflinks glinting in the light, his torn suit jacket falling in perfect lines across his shoulders.
His beastly fangs plunged into KC’s neck, lips red with blood. The growl he’d made as he began to feed—low, guttural, satisfied.
A dangerous predator sating itself.
I press my palms against my eyes, but the images don’t stop.
Those same hands I’d watched gesture with weary aristocratic disdain and sexily don gloves. Those lips I had kissed so eagerly.
I couldn’t look away.
It was like a Renaissance painting—all gore and gorgeousness.
And what did he do with the body? Will KC mysteriously go missing like the last murderer we caught?
Somehow, I drift off. I wake at seven in the morning feeling like a shell of myself.
I wander into my office where I take a couple gulps of yesterday’s coffee, because no way am I going in the kitchen or even leaving my wing.
Maybe I’ll never leave. I don’t know how to face Alexandru. I don’t know how to even look at him.
What I saw last night…
I roll my chair over to the sturdy table against the far wall of my office, the smooth white expanse and the half-finished quarter pyramid.
It feels like a lifetime ago that I started it.
I grab the bowl and continue working on it. I lose myself in arranging the coins, sometimes making micro adjustments with toothpicks to get them to perfectly line up.
It’s helping.
I’m making progress, getting to the top, feeling hopeful. This old house is so thick and stable and I’m on the ground floor. Back at the antique store, I would build these and inevitably a truck would roll by, or a door would slam and the thing would come tumbling down.
The higher and stronger I build it, the calmer I feel. I have this one thing perfectly under control, coins in perfect order.
So pointless, but I just need it. I need this one thing to be perfect.
I need that right now.
My phone buzzes. A text from Josie.
OMG did you hear about the fire at that house on Miller Road? They just confirmed the body was KC Hawkins. Dental records. So horrible.
I stare at the pyramid, shining in the morning light.
Alexandru set that fire. He’s been feeding on people for centuries. He knows how to deal with bodies.
I should feel something. Horror, maybe. Guilt. Alexandru killed a man and then he burned down the house to cover the evidence, and now I’m sitting here building a coin pyramid like that’ll solve things.
I carefully set another quarter on top.
I’m back at the funeral home, remembering the confidence of his hand as he lifted me to the table. The feel of his hands in my hair, his lips on mine.
I am the worst. Do not forget it.
I got a firsthand reminder last night at KC’s. And I couldn’t look away.
Well, people rubberneck at all sorts of awful things, like accidents on the side of the highway. It doesn’t mean the person likes looking at it.
I pick up another quarter and force myself to focus. Line it up. One and then another.
There’s a soft knock at the door.
“Come in,” I say.
Gregor enters, carrying a coffeepot and cup. His movements are careful and precise as he sets the tray on the corner of my desk.
“Thank you, Gregor. Is everything okay?”
“Yes.” His eyes flick to my coin construction. “You are building again, milady.”
I stand back and smile, feeling halfway serene. “What do you think?”
Gregor shows no emotion. “Impressive, milady.”
“I don’t know about impressive, but it saves my sanity to look at it.” I turn to him. “You’ve been with Alexandru for what, five hundred years?”
“Around that, milady.”
“Do you ever imagine doing anything else? From what I saw the other day at the antique store, you could have a pretty amazing livelihood as a carpenter or something. People were impressed with your knowhow.”
“I would not wish it.”
“So this is what you wish? Serving Alexandru?”
“This and nothing more.”
“But no one deserves to be treated the way he treats you.”
“Milady is kind.” He starts backing toward the door.
“I mean...just think about it.”
He nods and leaves, and I turn back to my coin tower.
I work for another hour, building it higher than I’ve ever built a coin tower before. Finally it’s done.
I dig in my drawer and find a silver disk I sometimes use for these things and set it on top and then I put a tiny little owl figurine on the very tip-top.
But even a perfect pyramid made of quarters doesn’t blot out the memory of our kiss. And the feel of his eyes on mine as he fed.