A Flickering Light
Auguste stayed for three more nights, spoiling me with rich foods—although he had a better grasp on how much to make now—and alternating whose turn it was to drive the other absolutely mad in bed. He said he wanted to teach me patience, but I was pretty sure he was learning that he liked it when I lost my patience completely.
Vampires heal up nicely from carpet burn.
“I don’t want you to go,” I said as we stood out by the loch, the waning moon hanging like a frown above us.
Auguste nestled me back against his chest, taking my hands and crossing them with his arms to hold me tight. “I’ll be back before too long to take you to London with me for a spell.” I smiled a little at that. He said we could visit Dr. Underwood and drag him to the theater with us. Auguste squeezed me gently and added, “And you’ll have new callers in the meantime.”
I snagged my nails over the buttons on his coat sleeve. A week ago, I’d be desperately impatient to meet as many men as I could and enjoy each of them in turn. Now…
“What is it, mon coeur?” Auguste whispered into my hair.
“I’ve never had this much time with a…” I hesitated.
“Lover?” Auguste supplied, kissing behind my ear.
I laughed a little but nodded. “Yes.”
“Mmm, and you’re not sick of me yet,” Auguste said, his lips trailing farther down my neck and making me shiver.
I wiggled my way around to face him, and he wrapped the coat over my back as I twined my arms behind his waist. “Not very sick,” I teased.
Auguste snorted and pinched at my ass as I leaned in for a kiss. I stopped as something caught my eye at the manor. A flickering light through one of the upper story windows flashed like a warning. Auguste’s lips grazed my cheek, running into my ear as I stood up on my tiptoes to look over his shoulder.
“Is someone in my bedroom?” I looked back behind me and then up at the window again, lights still tripping on and off through the curtain. It looked as if it could have been my room, sitting three stories above the patio.
Auguste released me and turned, taking a long look up at the window before scanning the darkness around us. “Ah…it’s time for us to go inside,” he said, raising his eyebrows at me.
“But…” I stared blankly back at him for longer than it should have taken for me to understand. The wolf I had seen my first night, or something like him, was waiting in the wilderness behind us. Auguste tugged on my hand, and I skipped quickly to follow him back onto the patio and up to the door. “But who is in my room?”
“I think we should go find out,” Auguste said. When we stepped inside, one of the other girls of the house, Danielle, was on her way out. Auguste tipped his head to her as she and I grinned at one another.
“Someone’s waiting for you,” I said and she blushed and hurried out the door.
When Auguste and I made it up to my floor, the hall was empty except for one figure.
“Booker!” He was standing outside my door facing the hall like a sentry, and when I greeted him, he turned and bowed a little, eyes landing briefly on me and Auguste. “Were you in my bedroom?” I asked.
Booker’s forehead faintly knotted as he shook his head.
Auguste looked between us and turned to Booker. “Was anyone else in her room? We saw the lights flash.”
Booker’s forehead tightened again, and he looked at the door. “Saw no one,” he said after a long pause.
Auguste’s own expression tightened as he glanced at the door. “Go in with us, if you don’t mind, Booker.”
Booker was difficult to read, but I had never seen him move faster than he did, the door swinging open and him striding inside as if he’d only been waiting for someone’s permission to act.
“It wasn’t him,” I whispered to Auguste, just in case he was suspicious of my golem friend.
“No,” Auguste agreed, moving in front of me with a squeeze to my hand. “I didn’t think so.”
The lights were still on when we walked in, bright and calm without a hint of flicker. Booker was standing in the heart of the room, turning in a slow circle. In front of me, Auguste was breathing deeply, face lifted as if he were scenting the air. His nose wrinkled.
“Someone was here,” Auguste said, “They’re gone. Smells like…campfire.”
I would take his word for it, although how he could distinguish campfire from the fireplace that was burning in the room, I wasn’t sure.
“Booker, would Magdalena let you stay with Esther while I’m away?” Auguste asked. “She’ll be safe with her gentlemen, but until we know who made their way in, I’d rather she wasn’t alone.”
I kicked at Auguste’s heel, and he spun to me. “I issue the invitations, thank you,” I said primly. But I looked over Auguste’s shoulder to Booker and asked, “Please?”
“Yes,” Booker said, without any of his usual pause.
“Thank you,” I said, nodding to him and stepping aside as he left us and headed out to the hall. I raised an eyebrow at Auguste and resisted the twitching smile that wanted to spring loose.
“You’re right,” Auguste said, nearly ruining my stern resolve with his damn dimples. “My apologies. You’re going to have a hard time keeping us all in line.”
My eyes widened at that, and I pushed Auguste backward toward the bed with slow steps.
“So you know about the others?” I asked.
“A little,” Auguste said grinning with just the faintest flash of fang. I didn’t care what he said about teaching me lessons in bed, he liked when I bossed him about. “Dr. Underwood is a friend. His…companion has a special talent for sniffing supernatural folk out of the woodwork. He found me hunting one night.”
“Hunting? You mean for blood?” I asked. Auguste’s eyes shifted about the room for a moment. “You didn’t have another girl like me before?”
Auguste froze at that and, after half a beat, scooped me up in his hold, eyes wide and brilliantly blue. “Mon coeur, how many ‘girls like you’ do you think there are? No. I had little affairs, but not for blood. And I’ve had blood, but not with affection. I’ve been waiting for my invitation to a house like this for almost two centuries.”
My heart stuttered in my chest at that, and Auguste settled us both down on the bed against the headboard, his face nuzzling into my neck.
“I am grateful it took so long,” Auguste murmured, kissing my neck. “Magdalena knew what she was about.”
“Dr. Underwood too,” I said, twisting myself onto his lap and stretching my throat for his attention. “He found me.”
Auguste rumbled his agreement into my skin. “Yes, he’ll be unbearably smug now.” I scratched my nails over the back of his neck, and he added, “He has every right to be.”
“And the other men?”