Chapter 6 Gideon #2
“I’m surprised to see you here.” I set down my glass. “I didn’t think there was much money in courtesan-ing or horror burlesque in Argleton, although I did hear something about a pole-dancing studio opening…”
“I’ve been out of that business for some time.”
“What do you do now?”
Her eyes narrow. “Am I required to reveal this to get my keys?”
“I’m making conversation, Arabella. An activity you once relished.”
“Only because it gave me easy access to a man’s purse.” She sips her drink. “I have my fortune, so I don’t need to indulge men like you any longer.”
That one stings.
Why do you care? I chide myself. You left Arabella in the past, remember? After she tried to have you killed. Or are you done lying to yourself?
“I am in finance,” she volunteers, looking as though the information leaves a rancid taste in her mouth.
I raise an eyebrow. “Finance? You never struck me as a numbers woman.”
“I am a money woman. I sell off those useless trinkets Upyr have hoarded over the years and provide them with the funds in usable currency to maintain their lavish lifestyles. Few others do what I do, and I am the best because I understand the art of discretion. Some of your members are clients of mine. I thought you should know this since I’m to be…
” Her lip curls back as if she’s tasted something foul. “Residing here.”
I lean forward, interested. “Our members will be grateful for your services. Accessing modern cash is a real issue, and the courts have never been much help. Even the estate itself has issues…”
I think of the Sanctus safe, stuffed to the brim with bags of gold, Merovingian coins, Sumerian tablets, family swords, and my private safe that contains something even more precious. All that treasure on hand that I’ve no clue how to convert into the cash I need. Perhaps Arabella could—
“I’m not here to be of service to anyone,” she snaps. “I choose my clients. I applied to live at Sanctus because I value privacy, security and discretion. I want to live outside of the courts, unbeholden to anyone. Is that clear?”
And I might believe her sharp tone, if not for the tug in her eyebrow that gives away her interest. Still the same Arabella.
If I want her to help me, I have to make her believe it’s her idea. So I change the subject. Unfortunately, there’s only one other subject to discuss with her.
I clear my throat. “If you’re going to be living here, we should talk about Paris—”
“I don’t see why. Unless you’re planning to return my property.”
“The collar is gone. It’s at the bottom of the Seine.”
I watch her carefully for a reaction, but she gives me nothing. She fingers the stem of her glass. “You seem uncomfortable, Gideon. You needn’t be. What passed between you and me was over a century ago. A mere fling.”
It was never a fling to me.
She adds, “I’m certain you’ve had dalliances since Paris.”
“A few,” I admit. “A few hundred.”
“A few hundred?” A slow smile slips across her lips. “How lax you’ve been. I’m pleased that once again, I come out on top.”
Raw, cold jealousy snakes its way through my veins, a sensation that takes me back to those warm Parisian nights, watching every eye in the audience entranced by her as she moved around the pole like a panther stalking its prey, knowing that more than a few of them would pay handsomely for the privilege of a night in her bed.
I may be a modern man who believes in a woman’s right to do whatever she chooses with her body, including sex work, but I’m also a beast. I like to possess.
And Arabella has always been elusive. You sense that she’s playing a game with you, toying with you like a cat with a mouse before the cat slits the mouse’s throat.
That’s what makes her so enticing.
I glance down at my tablet, where Sinead has sent me Arabella’s documentation and a map to her new home.
She’s purchased one of our newest executive treehouses – these residences are right in the heart of the estate, surrounded by centuries-old woodland and overlooking the soon-to-be-opened-once-Alaric-stops-being-a-bloody-perfectionist-and-finishes-a-sculpture Midnight Garden.
Her home is completely private and sheltered from the sun.
Unlike the others, she didn’t pay in treasure but in cold, hard cash.
Arabella must be doing well to have amassed enough wealth to buy into Sanctus and receive the approval of at least one of our residents. Alyra Maythorn has vouched for her on her application, and Alyra is of the Blood Kincaid, a prominent Midnight Court family.
I want to know everything about Arabella’s life, every detail from the moment I left her curled up in her golden silk sheets to meeting her by the watermelons, but she’s giving me nothing.
I stand, straightening my lapels. Arabella’s house key jangles in my hand.
She eyes it hungrily. She wants this. I remember that same hunger in her eyes when she stood on the VIP balcony at her theatre, watching the artists, bohemians, courtesans, and criminals beneath her, transfixed by the enchantments she created.
A wicked streak sizzles down my spine. The trickster in me wants to see her suffer, to unnerve her the way she’s unnerved me. I am going to drag this tour out so long, Taylor Swift will be playing at nursing homes.
“Follow me, Ms Lestrange.” I gesture to the door.
Arabella rises from her chair with the grace of a ballerina and shimmies out of my office ahead of me. I try so hard to be a gentleman, but my gaze drops to her glorious, perfectly sculpted legs in her tailored suit trousers as she shoves past me.
Worse, when I raise my eyes again, she meets them with a mocking glare.
“A lot of things change in a hundred and fifty years, Gideon,” she purrs. “But not the fact that you’re a scoundrel and I’m a motherfucking goddess.”
I let her have that one because really, I can’t argue.
First, I show her around Sanctus House, which is our amenities building – a towering structure of Norwegian larch and Patrick Stock’s specialist glazing.
Arabella does not indicate that she’s impressed by our covered tennis courts, state-of-the-art gymnasium, luxurious spa, or onsite coffin-repair shop.
She pauses at the shelves in the temperature-controlled cellar, where members are welcome to imbibe from our curated blood selection as part of their membership fee.
Her red-painted nails caress the bottle of a seventeenth-century Friar as a slow smile plays across her lips.
“I never imagined you as a vintage drinker,” she purrs. “I thought you’d prefer direct from the source.”
“You imagined me as a vampire?”
“Sometimes.” Her gaze flicks to me. She lets slip a little fang as she smiles. “Mostly I imagined you as my prey.”
This woman will be the death of me.
What game is Arabella playing?
Why am I so excited to be played?
I lead her across the hall into the donation room with its private soundproof booths arranged with luxe furnishings and well-stocked medical kits.
“Members may book these rooms for use with their personal Thralls if they prefer not to drink in their own homes,” I explain.
“You are also welcome to use our Thralls if you don’t have your own. ”
Arabella studies the Yves Saint Laurent amenity kits. “What kind of selection is available?”
“My secretary, Sinead, has a woody, smoky flavour. Giovanni the tennis instructor has a summery peach bouquet. I prefer Floyd, the masseuse. He has a slight vanilla aftertaste.”
“Every member of staff is a Thrall?”
“Every permanent member, yes. It’s a requirement of the role. We have several un-Thralled temporary workers through our site, most of them human by necessity.”
“The Conclave would say that’s far too risky.”
“The Conclave has never tried to build something like this.” I lead her through another door. “Welcome to Brimstone.”
Arabella’s eyes flicker with interest as she takes in our largest bar and entertainment area.
The decor is 1920s Hollywood glamour – mirrored surfaces, luxe fabrics, gold everywhere.
It’s early in the evening, so there are very few members using the facilities – a couple share a blood cocktail beside one of the windows, and three male vamps converse at the bar.
Lilac, our bartender, waves at me before returning to wiping down glasses.
“Our bartender mixes more than blood cocktails,” I say.
“As well as mocktails for those of us who prefer our blood without the tang of alcohol. Lilac is ex-Dusk Court and far too good at her craft to be pulling pints at the Rose & Wimple. If a human is not interested in working for us after they discover our true nature, she’ll create a draught that can make them forget everything they’ve seen here.
Of course, it sends a few of them a little doolally, but it’s better than the alternative.
” I make a slicing motion across my throat.
She narrows her eyes. “If the Conclave finds out you’ve been giving humans a potion instead of following the rules—”
“Don’t tell me that you care about following rules?” I grin.
“I don’t. I want to know what kind of drama I’m buying into.”
I swim in her gold-rimmed eyes. “I’m not going to blindly follow rules I think are stupid, and I’m not the only one.
That’s why Sanctus has been so popular. We shouldn’t go around killing humans just because they see something they shouldn’t, especially when humans are so useful.
Upyr have been lucky so far to avoid notice, but that won’t hold forever, especially not with everything caught on camera and posted on social media.
The Conclave rules are cruel and outdated, and the vampire community is open to change.
They simply need someone to show them a new way. Alaric and Winnie have proven that.”
Her eyes soften at the mention of her friends. “You almost sound serious, Gideon Blake.”
“Deadly serious. Especially when it comes to my friends.”
Arabella turns away without comment.
So Arabella Lestrange does have a heart.