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Chin up, Solon’s voice sinks into my head. You’re the queen of the night.
His grip around my arm tightens and I raise my chin, faking the confidence that I don’t feel.
We walk into the club, vampires in their suits and tuxes and cocktail dresses part way for us, like they’d catch a disease if we stood too close. Normally even those that aren’t fond of Solon would be approaching him, paying their respects, but this time everyone seems to be staying away. Can’t say that makes a girl feel good, knowing it’s all because of me.
“I feel like a party crasher,” I whisper as Solon leads me toward the bar. It says a lot when Ezra is the only friendly face.
“This is your party, my dear,” he tells me. “You have to think of it that way. Your house, your party. And I’m your vampire. Just tell me what to do.”
I give him a wry look. “You’d let me boss you around?”
That gives him a pause. “Maybe just for a moment. Wouldn’t want you to get used to it.”
That sounds more like it. Solon likes to be in control at all costs, even if it hurts him in some way. We stop by the bar and Solon gives Ezra a nod, which means he’s going to pour us both some expensive scotch.
“So how come I smell blood?” I ask Solon as Ezra takes out a bottle. “Like, human blood.” Normally when there’s a big party, the vampires don’t feed. They don’t like to get their best clothes messed up, and apparently it’s messy fucking business. Dark Eyes operates as a feeding zone three other nights of the week, so usually the vampires go to those, and these parties are just an excuse to socialize with their kind away from the paranoid eye of humans.
He looks impressed. “Your sense of smell is really sharpening,” he says to me. Then he shrugs lightly. “I noticed Wolf by the door to the Dark Room. Perhaps some humans showed up, wanted to donate blood and there were some takers.”
I think that over as Ezra slides us both our drinks. I grasp the glass and raise it to Solon. Even with the vampires still watching us every now and then, it does feel like we’re in our own little world sometimes.
“Cheers, then,” I say to Solon, and he clinks his glass against mine, his eyes turning warm as he takes me in.
“Cheers. To your first real night back,” he says. “To new beginnings.”
We drink the scotch, the dark liquid burning beautifully, making my chest glow with fire, all while our gaze stays locked on each other.
“Absolon,” a deep voice says from behind us.
We both turn away from the bar to see a thin, dark-skinned man with bright hazel eyes, dressed in a burgundy tux, his hair long and black. I don’t recognize him, but he seems amiable enough.
“Onni,” Solon says in surprise, and the two men quickly embrace, Onni at least a foot shorter than Solon but still commanding in his own lithe way. “I didn’t know you were in town.”
“Just for a couple of days,” Onni says, his accent sing song. Maybe Finnish. Onni then looks to me. “This must be the infamous Lenore,” he says, but he punctuates my name with a bright smile, just a hint of fangs at the corners. “It’s a pleasure to finally meet you.”
He holds out his hand and I put mine in his and he places a quick, cold kiss on the back. I’m rather taken aback by how friendly he’s being, considering.
“Onni is an old friend of mine,” Solon explains, and I’m sure he’s selling the old part short. “Normally he’s in Estonia. And normally he would call first.”
“You know I like my surprises,” he says with a laugh. “Listen, there’s a lot of people I have to see, but let’s do dinner in a couple of days. I’ll be starving once the jetlag wears off. Such a bitch that we have to suffer through jetlag along with the rest of the world, isn’t it?”
Solon slaps him on the back affectionately. “I’ll have the Dark Room waiting for you then,” Solon tells him.
“I look forward to it,” Onni says, his pupils briefly turning red, before he nods his goodbye and strides across the club to talk to a couple seated by a teak backgammon table.
That red look of hunger in Onni’s eyes flares up something inside me. Not quite hunger itself, but the feeling of being in the dark about something, of being left behind on the fringes.
I lean in close to Solon. “I want to go into the Dark Room,” I whisper to him. He turns his head toward mine, his nostrils flaring delicately, eyes sharp. “I want to watch the feeding.”
3
Lenore
Solon stares at me for a moment, then blinks. “You want to watch the feeding? Tonight?”
