Chapter 4
Sorcha
I bit my fingernails for the hundredth time in the last hour.
Most nights, I didn’t sleep well, which was why I heard Davlov crunch over the gravel drive, his footsteps light and fast. A few seconds later, the mechanism of the garage doors whirred and an engine purred to life.
I hurried to the window and glanced out, watching as Dav expertly manoeuvred one of the armoured SUVs out and sped off into the night.
My heart rate ticked up. I was alone in the Count’s castle.
Elliot was on guard duty patrolling the corridors, but no one else was around, not even the creepy-assed butler.
It would be easy to leave, to run from the powerful supernatural who’d basically kidnapped me from my last vampire household and deposited me in his.
Most of the time, it felt like he’d taken me out of one gilded prison and put me in another.
My huff echoed around the silent room. Yet that wasn’t true at all.
He was more my saviour than my gaoler. Being left alone when I could easily escape said it all.
I wasn’t really a prisoner—I just had nowhere else to go, and he knew it.
I stared at the scars that peppered my bare arms, my fingers running over the raised skin.
It was ugly. I was ugly. Marked in such a way that every supernatural would know what I was, or at least, what I had been.
A human blood slave. Vermin. The lowest of the low, not even considered a part of vampire society.
I’d thought I was a vampire, and that my loving parents had arranged a high society wedding for me to a vampire lord.
I’d been groomed for it since I was a small child.
Bitterness coated my tongue. My husband had soon disillusioned me.
I was one of many human females, taken at birth, kept ignorant of the real world, and groomed for vampire society as a blood and sex slave, but not a common one.
No, an exclusive one whose blood wasn’t tainted by alcohol, drugs, sex, or fast food.
I had been ‘pure’, and he had taken great pleasure in making me impure in front of a room full of vampires.
Once he’d taken his fill of my body and blood, he’d locked me in a room and only brought me out on special occasions to do his bidding.
Occasionally, he’d let a chosen few of his upper-class friends feed from me, too.
He hadn’t shared my body at first. No, he was selfish enough to want to keep that for himself.
Until his attention was caught by yet another unfortunate girl who’d been lied to her whole life.
I hurried out of my room to the window that gave me the best view of the long, winding driveway.
In the darkness outside, the SUV’s red taillights disappeared between the avenue of large trees and into the night.
Stinging from where I’d bitten my nails to the quick distracted me from wondering where Dav was going.
I sucked on my fingers to ease the discomfort, not that it worked for longer than a few seconds.
The alcove I stood in was situated directly above the front door and gave me the best view of the driveway that led from the castle to the main road.
I plonked myself on the window seat and brought up my feet, sitting with my back against the old oak panelling as I studied the view.
It must have looked grand indeed when horses and carriages were the transport of the rich and powerful.
Don’t get me wrong, it still looked grand, but I couldn’t help but conjure pictures of those long-ago times.
It was what this place did; it fueled my imagination, mainly because the atmosphere in Balthazar’s castle was old and full of ghosts and memories.
I suspected most were his. The shiver that ran through me had nothing to do with the cold.
How many people had been imprisoned, tortured or killed in Dundean?
How many bones were beneath its foundations?
Balthazar Rossi had never been cruel to me, but I was under no illusions that he was a kind vampire.
Such things did not exist. I had no idea how old or powerful he was, only that even my rich and influential ‘husband’ had been scared enough to not challenge him when he stated he was taking me.
I sighed and dropped my head back against the wood.
It was one of my favourite things, sitting in the various window seats of Balthazar’s home.
Seeing the hills rolling away on one side and the forest on the other gave me a sense of freedom that I’d never had before.
Even if it was an illusion, I loved it. But I couldn’t sit here letting the minutes of my life tick by, waiting for the Count and Shane to return.
As much as I didn't want to, I missed them, both of them, even moody Balthazar.
My days were mostly quiet, and with nothing to do but explore the grounds and the old castle, I’d mapped it out until I knew nearly every blade of grass and bump in the walls. Well, all except the dungeons, which this castle had to have. There’d been no sign of an entrance anywhere.
Still, I had nothing else to do at the moment except look.
I usually worked in the Count’s club on the weekends, but he’d not taken me there since Shane had arrived.
He’d ensured Shane’s survival in his own coolly detached way, and I definitely saw a spark of something other than ice in his eyes when he studied Shane’s efforts to walk independently.
When Shane had first made his way downstairs, I’d been scared of him, but he steadily grew on me.
He was a giant, and I knew he could crush me in one big hand if he wanted, despite being so weak, but he’d been nothing but kind.
It broke my heart to see the shadows that lingered in his eyes. Shadows I recognised.
Around me, the silence pushed in, broken only by an occasional creak.
Dundean seemed filled with a creepy kind of energy and had been deathly quiet for the past twenty-four hours since the Count and Shane left.
It was as if all the ghosts trapped here pushed against the veil of invisibility that concealed them.
I hadn’t been invited to the shifter party.
It was ridiculous to be upset by that, but I was.
Not because I felt left out of the celebrations.
I didn’t really know Owen or Selina, but I hated this emptiness.
Feeling abandoned was irrational considering the Count owed me nothing, and Shane was barely able to look after himself, let alone consider my needs.
I’d overheard Connor telling Balthazar that it wasn’t a birthday party but a surprise handfasting.
I sighed, wondering what it would be like to go to an event like that as a guest. It wasn’t as if I’d ever been to parties as one, only ever as part of the entertainment.
I wasn’t even sure I knew how to behave when I wasn't being paraded around as an aperitif.
I shifted my weight on the window seat and stared out into the inky night.
Guards patrolled the grounds. I couldn’t see them, but I knew they were there.
I shuddered. Guards had been present all of my life, and I’d just accepted it, never questioning why my home was protected in a way that most people weren’t.
I’d always believed I was a vampire and never for a moment suspected my parents were lying.
I’d been groomed to be subservient and well-behaved.
From the age of thirteen, I’d been paraded around in front of vampires when they visited my parents’ estate.
I’d understood I was destined to be the wife of a powerful vampire.
I’d even looked forward to it. My parents had told me I’d be treated with great dignity and respect; that I would be loved and cared for. And I’d believed them.
As always, I was unsettled by thoughts of my childhood and how I’d been lied to.
Before I knew it, I was marching down the winding stone staircase and into the most ancient part of the castle, heading towards the library.
My bare feet slapped against the stone floors, echoing eerily, my toes soon stinging with cold, and making me grimace.
Slippers would have been a good idea, but I’d rushed to see who was going into the garage, and not even considered them.
Goosebumps erupted over my skin, a shiver skittering down my spine. It felt as if the ghosts that haunted this ancient building walked by my side, brushing against me. I giggled at my fanciful thoughts, shaking off my fear.
“Let’s go to the library,” I told my imaginary companions. “I want to see it again.” I must be going mad, speaking to the dead.
With Bal and Shane away, and Davlov out, now was the perfect time to take another peek at the tapestry I saw a few weeks ago.
It was beautiful enough to capture my whole attention, but the Count had closed the door to his private room far too quickly for me to see it properly.
I wasn’t typically quite so inquisitive, but something about that ancient work of art had seeded in my brain, and I needed to see it again.
My heart started thumping against my ribs.
Part of me knew this was wrong. The Count trusted me in his home, let me roam freely, and I was betraying his privacy by trying to get into his private space.
I swallowed hard, my heart racing at the thought of even breaking the rules, let alone getting caught.
I knew Johnson, Balthazar’s creepy butler, was away at the moment.
I had no idea where, and I didn’t care to ask.
All I knew was I had an opportunity to indulge my curiosity, and I wasn’t going to waste it.