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“I agree. It’s the only lead we have.” Holding the box in one hand, Peri reached out to close the door of the armoire. She heaved an impatient sigh as she noticed that something had dropped on the floor when she’d pulled out the box. Bending down, she plucked it off the wooden planks and straightened, glancing down at the piece of paper. “Oh.”
Valen swiftly moved to peer over her shoulder. “What is it?”
“This.” Her voice was strained as she held up the paper.
Belatedly Valen realized that it wasn’t paper, but a photo of a young man with reddish-gold hair and dark blue eyes. He wassmiling directly into the camera as he stood on the edge of a boat with a large lake shimmering behind him. “He has your eyes.”
“My father.”
Valen studied her rigid profile and the tension in her fingers that clutched the photo. “Do you have contact with him?”
“I’ve never met him. I don’t even know his name. My mother refused to speak about him.” Valen felt the shiver that raced through her, as if she were suddenly cold to the bone. “This picture was the only proof that he ever existed.”
“Did you ever try to find him?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
Peri dropped the photo back onto the floor. As if it bothered her to touch it. “Because I don’t want to know.”
Valen could sense her intense emotions, but they were too tangled to decipher.
“You don’t want to know him in general or as a father?”
“In any way.” She closed the door of the armoire with a snap. “My mother was a cold, distant woman who never once said that she loved me. Probably because she didn’t.”
The more Valen discovered about Brenda Sanguis, the more he wished he’d been the one to drain her. He would have taken pleasure in punishing her for the pain and fear she’d caused her daughter.
“What about the rest of the coven?” he asked.
“They resented my power.” Peri shrugged. “Of course, in the beginning we didn’t know that I possessed the magic of a mage.”
Valen at last understood why Peri had avoided searching out the man who’d given her life.
“And you feared your father would be equally indifferent?”
Peri nodded, turning her head in a futile attempt to hide her vulnerability. “When I was a child I would lay in bed and pretend that my father didn’t know I existed. That if he did he would rushto rescue me and make me a part of his family.” Her lips twisted. “In my dreams I had a dozen brothers and sisters along with grandparents who doted on me. It was stupid.”
“Why is it stupid?” Valen demanded. “Most creatures have a need for the sense of belonging.” He could have added that vampires had created the Cabal not only for a power base, but to give them the illusion of a family. “Why didn’t you contact him?”
“The fantasy of him gave me courage.” She tilted her chin, turning back to meet his searching gaze. “I couldn’t bear to have it shattered.”
“And now?”
“Now I have a family.” Dropping the box and receipt in her satchel, Peri turned toward the door. “I think we’re done here.”
Valen agreed, following her across the cabin. He would send one of Gabriel’s servants to collect the laptop and have it sent to Renee. His secretary could uncover any other secrets that might have been hidden. Even if they’d been erased.
He wanted to know everything there was to know about Brenda Sanguis. And why she’d been spying on her daughter.
* * *
Peri floated in the space between sleep and consciousness. She was vaguely aware that she was snuggled on a soft mattress in a darkened room that smelled of cedar and…
Raw male power.
The fuzzy fog was blasted away as she wrenched her eyes open and stared at a shadowed form in the corner of the vast room.
