Chapter 1
Raine St. Albans, known as Lord Norringford—Viscount of Norringford, Lareford, and several other small properties hardly worth mentioning but that certainly contributed to the bulk of his purse—back in the civilized world of London, had gotten himself into a bit of a fix.
It wasn’t even his fault.
In fact, in no way could anyone logically blame Raine for the events that caused him to be secretly stowed away in the dank, musty bowels of a bloody damned pirate ship—a pirate ship captained by the most alluring, fascinating, and sexy woman he’d ever met.
And yet…here he was. Hiding out. Lurking in the shadows of the Black Lass’s cargo hold. Huddling among rats and other vermin. Breathing in the stew of every unpleasant scent ever collected on a ship.
All of that, however, was mere discomfort and inconvenience.
What really gnawed at him, what truly made him growly and annoyed and frustrated beyond all Hell was the fact that the delicious, ambrosia-scented, spark-eyed Captain Arial Bonny was a mere fifteen feet directly above him… and he couldn’t get to her.
Well, it wasn’t that he couldn’t physically get to her—there was very little that could keep a vampire of the Dracule from getting what he wanted. It was that he didn’t quite know how to get to her…how to woo her, he supposed was the correct word.
Woo?
Raine snarled to himself in the smelly damp darkness.
Lord Norringford never had to woo anyone.
The women of London, Paris, Vienna, Rome, Prague…
they all lined up for a smile or a dance—or something far more satisfying—with the handsome, rich, and powerful Norringford.
Widows, harlots, and even bold married women (and occasionally a virginal unmarried one) offered to “meet” him for a “walk” or a “ride in a carriage.”
And if he happened upon one of the more stand-offish type—a female with fair, creamy skin, lush curves, but also a demure attitude—he simply turned on his charm, lit up his eyeglow, and enthralled her into his arms, beneath his fangs….
Then into his bed.
The problem with one Captain Arial Bonny was that none of the above had any affect on her. Including—unbelievably, inconceivably—his vampiric thrall.
He didn’t understand it. He’d never failed at coaxing or enthralling someone before. Certainly not a woman!
And it wasn’t as if this pirate captain was immune to the special sort of hypnosis used by the vampires—for by her own admission, Arial had felt the effects of the thrall by at least two of Raine’s Draculia peers.
It seemed only he was unaccountably, strangely ineffective as a vampire around her.
The very thought made his fangs spring out fiercely in frustration.
It had been three nights since he’d been forced to hide down here once breaking out of the ship’s brig after being unjustly imprisoned, and Raine was out of patience with the entire situation.
The Dracule did not hide. (Except from the sun; and even then, each had a different tolerance to the burning light.)
He was done with the cold and damp and loneliness—and blast it, he hadn’t fed in days. Sampling two of the rats did not count.
Raine shuddered at the memory.
He was ready to throw what little caution he possessed to the wind and take himself above deck…when suddenly he felt the slightest shift in the air. And he smelled someone approaching.
Such was the blessing—and the curse—of a Dracule, for the ability to smell and discern an infinite variety of aromas superseded even that of their other, just as powerful senses.
In this case, Raine definitely considered it a blessing, for the scent overriding that of brackish water and damp rodent leavings was a waft of sweet, lush woman: fresh, tinged with sea air and night time…and beneath it all, something feral and untamed—but definitely, wholly, deliciously female.
He caught his breath and drew in the perfume of the tantalizing pirate captain, almost forgetting to wonder what in the devil she was doing down here in the cargo hold.
Almost.
Watching and waiting, Raine edged into the shadows, aided by his ability to see quite well in the dark.
Everything was frosted with a strange greenish hue, but he could see nearly as well as in the light—though he didn’t really need to, for his sense of smell and the bare shift of the air told him exactly where she was and how she was moving.
And that she was alone. Without a light.
In the bowels of the ship?
What the bloody hell was she—
“I figured I’d allowed you to stew down here long enough, St. Albans.”
Raine smothered a laugh and stepped out of the shadows. “It is rather damp, and my only choice of sustenance was quite lacking any sense of refinement.”
He looked down at her—partly because the ceiling was too low for him to hold his head upright—and saw that she was dressed in her normal pirate captain attire: loose brown breeches tucked into tall boots, a billowy white shirt that tied at the throat, and leather straps criss-crossing over her torso then buckling at the waist to hold various weapons and accoutrements.
Arial’s hair was in a long, loose braid, and though he was looking at her through the greenish tinge of his night vision, he could still pick out some of the different shades of color: black, nut-brown, amber, and a streak of white.
She barely reached to his shoulder, and though she was slender and small-boned, he knew she was stronger and quicker than she appeared.
The intriguing woman looked up at him with bright, dark eyes that, he realized, could see him just as well as he could see her even in the darkness. Of course. Her kind wouldn’t need a lantern any more than his did.
He folded his arms over his middle and leaned against one of the support beams so he didn’t have to hold his head at an uncomfortable angle. “So you knew I was here? The whole time?”
“Where else would you be?”
She leaned back against her own beam, facing him while putting more space between them.
She wasn’t smiling, but she wasn’t glowering either.
She merely assessed him. “You broke out of the brig—where you most definitely belonged, St. Albans—and we’ll get to the why of that in a moment.
After gaining your freedom, where else could you have gone?
“The Dracule don’t drown, but you sure as hell weren’t going to try and swim to some island in the middle of the ocean because you’d fry in the sun before you got there—if a shark didn’t get you first. Even you might not be victorious against a shark,” she added drily.
“And besides that, you wouldn’t go far because you need me. ”
You’re right about that.
“My help,” she amended, with a stubborn lift of her chin and the barest flicker of levity in her gaze. “You need my help.”
“You were right the first time, Captain,” he murmured.
Though he wore his normal insouciant demeanor, Raine was mortified that inside, he seemed to be fighting a losing battle to keep his fangs, cock, and a rush of hard, intense pulse from ruling his thoughts.
“But about me being thrown into the brig—”
“Any violence on this ship is cause for incarceration,” she said in a prim voice that just made him want her more.
“What you did to my man—to Fergus—was—was…” Her voice shook as it trailed off, and he sensed—smelled—the horror rolling off her.
What little warmth she’d had toward him evaporated. “You tore him to ribbons.”
“He was not a man, Arial. He was a Dracule.”
She hadn’t known that; he felt the slight shift of surprise though she quickly masked it, so he pressed further: “I was fighting for my life.”
“Then you have no business bringing your—your demonic, immortal wars onto my ship,” she snapped. “I won’t have it, and I’ll tell Corvindale to go to the devil before helping you and your kind if you don’t keep your infighting off my vessel.”
“Your mate Fergus attacked me and he had…well, he had a weapon that made it clear he was here specifically to assassinate me. I was merely acting in self-defense,” Raine replied calmly.
“It was either him or me who was going to end up bloody dead. Surely even you can appreciate exceptions to your rules, Arial.” Her name rolled so beautifully off his tongue.
She began to speak, but Raine went on. “So the biggest question in my mind—which I’ve had ample opportunity to consider during my self-imposed exile” —she snorted and he saw her roll her eyes, but he kept talking for she was no longer horrified by his actions— “was whether you knew who Fergus was and why he was here, or whether he was here for some other reason.”
Her eyes narrowed dangerously, the heat and challenge in them spiking his lust even higher. “You’re suggesting what, precisely? That I’d arranged for an ambush? Of you? On my ship?”
“If you didn’t,” Raine went on smoothly, “then that could only mean he was here secretly—a Dracule, on your ship—to keep me from completing my mission. So which is it, Arial? Did you unknowingly take a vampire onto your crew, or did you bring him aboard to kill me? Because that was clearly his objective.”
“How do you know killing you was his specific objective, and he didn’t just decide to do so once he realized what an arse you are?”
Raine choked on a laugh. “Well, one certainly can’t accuse you of beating around the bush.”
She was watching him closely, and even in the green-limned light, he could see the calculations running through her head. Then she spoke. “He had your Asthenia, didn’t he? That was the specific weapon he had. And that’s how you know you were the target. Or at least—that he knew you’d be here.”
He inclined his head in acknowledgment. Not that it wasn’t a simple conclusion to draw. The bigger question, however, was who had revealed Raine’s Asthenia to Fergus in the first place.
Each Dracule had a sort of Achilles’ Heel; a strong aversion to some object from nature.
This aversion—which was rather a mild term to describe the profound effect of an Asthenia on an undead—caused the strength to leech from the vampire when it was nearby.
For obvious reasons, the nature of each Dracule’s Asthenia was a closely-guarded secret.
Raine’s weakness was pine needles, and as there weren’t many spruce trees growing in the Caribbean—nor was it common knowledge that he was weakened by them—it could be no coincidence that Fergus had been in possession of a small branch of pinery when he attacked Raine.
No coincidence at all.
“And, incidentally, it’s Captain to you, St. Albans.”
“As you wish…Captain.” He stepped away from the beam, bringing himself close enough that their booted feet were only a shoe-length apart.
He drew in a subtle breath of her essence and allowed the faintest glow to warm his eyes.
“And now that you’ve discovered my hiding place, what are you going to do with me?
” He turned up the glow subtly and extended his fangs behind his smile.
“Still trying to enthrall me, are you, St. Albans? I can’t decide whether I’m flattered or furious.”
He allowed the glow to fade from his eyes and gave her an irascible smile. “The fearsome Captain Bonny, indecisive? I’m stunned.”
“Now that you mention it, I believe I’ve settled on furious, St. Albans,” she replied tartly.
But he noticed she neither eased away, nor appeared all that furious. Yes, her eyes flashed, but the warmth and scent of female musk wafting from her told a different story. He could even sense the unsteady, accelerated beat of her pulse.
Then in the next moment, he realized Arial hadn’t asked him what his Asthenia was. Nor had she made any attempt to guess it, or wonder how Fergus had known of it.
His eyes narrowed a little and his fangs retracted as he considered that thought. She had no curiosity? Or she already knew.
Or perhaps she was just being polite and circumspect.
Or perhaps she didn’t bloody care that someone had come on board to assassinate him.
Raine realized it was the last possibility that bothered him the most.
“As to what I’m going to do with you,” she said, “I’ve come to a decision.”
“Another decision? That’s more like the Captain Bonny I’ve come to know. Do you care to tell me what it is?”
He edged closer to her, flaring his nostrils slightly so as to draw in a deeper breath of her essence. And at the same time, he discovered he’d curled his fingers into two tight fists in an effort to keep from reaching for her.
“I suppose I ought to,” she replied. “Since I’ve decided to take you topside. To my chamber.”