“And, to my dismay, you’re in love with her,” Moldavi said. He pulled something from his pocket. “You hid it very well. I wasn’t certain at all, for you seemed immune. I had hoped—” He shook his head, pressing his lips together in dismay as he cut off his own words. “This is what confirmed it for me.”
He held a long, slender gold chain with a single feather dangling from it. The one Giordan had removed from Narcise and tossed to the floor of his parlor the night she’d seduced him.
Moldavi’s smile was a bit crooked. “If you didn’t love her, you wouldn’t have noticed or cared. Nor,” he added, “would you have visited her disguised as Monsieur David.”
Giordan couldn’t keep his eyes from flickering in surprise. “You knew of that?”
His host’s lips twisted in reluctant admiration. “Not at first. You fooled everyone. Not until after I found this—” he gestured with the feather “—and began to suspect. But when I went into her chamber and scented you in there…” His voice trailed off, his eyes settling heavily on him. “I’ve become quite familiar with your scent.”
Giordan kept his face blank despite the increasingly uncomfortable churning in his belly. He was emotionless, feeling not even the animosity or affront he should. He tried to picture how Dimitri would respond in this situation: cold and lethal. But Dimitri had not lived through what Giordan had.
“I suppose I could consider myself flattered, but I do not,” he replied coldly. “You understand, I have interest in only one member of the Moldavi family.”
“I was afraid of that, Giordan—ah, forgive my informality. I’ve long thought of you that way. These last few weeks have been rather difficult for me, not knowing for certain. Particularly the time we spent in here after you fought with my sister that night.” His dark gaze settled meaningfully on him.
Giordan realized with a start that that night, he’d been sitting in this very chamber dressed only in breeches, and likely smelling of arousal and maleness after the session with Narcise. His mouth dried and he realized now what he’d scented beneath Moldavi’s cologne of cedar and patchouli. It was the essence of desperate desire that he’d found unpleasant.
Moldavi continued. “I had held out hope that you might be of the same mind as Eddersley—albeit much more subtle and reserved about it. After all, no man could resist Narcise and you appeared to do so.”
“A man who doesn’t force himself onto a woman isn’t necessarily a molly,” Giordan said with disdain. “He’s a gentleman.”
“Despite your protestations to the contrary,” Moldavi said as he moved away from the sideboard and closer to Giordan, “I happen to know you’re no stranger to buggery, particularly from your teen years.” His eyes burned red and hot.
Giordan went cold, and for a moment he couldn’t breathe. “The correct term would be rape,” he said from between numb lips. He tried to summon the dark rage that he knew simmered deep inside, but somehow Moldavi’s words and knowledge had catapulted him back to those dark days and evil memories. They’d grabbed hold of him and smothered his instinctive response, setting him off balance and out of sorts. He felt as if he were swimming deep in a very murky pond: half-blind, sluggish, breathless.
Moldavi seemed to realize this, and he was now standing very close to him. His scent rolled off in heavy waves, thick with lust. “Why are you here, Giordan?” he asked, the sibilant hiss very pronounced in his voice. A fang flashed, the gold chip in it winking coyly as he looked up at him.
“You know why I’m here. I want Narcise.”
“Hmm. Yes. I wonder what you’re willing to do to have her.” Moldavi reached up as if to touch him, and Giordan knocked the man’s hand away with a sharp, controlled movement.
“You overstep,” he said with a calm he didn’t realize he currently possessed. The anger simmered faster and harder now, nearer to the boiling point. He stepped back and took a large sip of his drink. When he raised his arm, the weight of the stake shifted in his sleeve, reminding him that he did have a chance to end this now.
“You want Narcise, but so do so many other men, Giordan. It’s really quite a quandary for me. She’s very valuable in a variety of ways—you understand why I cannot give her up. Because, of course, if you fancy yourself in love with her, you’ll want her with you—at least for a time. Decades perhaps. And then what would I do?”
“You can have the ship,” Giordan said. “All of it. Two ships if you want.”
“Shall we make it three?” Moldavi asked with an intimate chuckle. “No, no, I don’t want that. Although from what I understand, you can afford it.” He clicked his tongue, his eyes dancing with pleasure. “Forget about the stake you have hidden on you, Giordan. You can’t murder me. Do you think I’m that much of a fool? What do you think will happen to Narcise the minute you attempt it?”
“Why should I believe you?”
Moldavi sighed. “For an intelligent man, you’re being tiresome. Have you not learned that I don’t make mistakes, nor do I make empty threats?”
Giordan could hardly disagree. All along, he thought he’d been clever, but it appeared that Moldavi was a step ahead of him. “What do you want? My house in Paris? Four ships? Access to my bank accounts? You can have it all.”
The other man continued as if he hadn’t spoken. “She’s perfectly content here, Giordan, truly. We’ve come to an arrangement after so many years and I rarely have to discipline her anymore. She’s kept in comfort, like a princess, dressed in the most fashionable of clothing. She has everything she could want. And she hasn’t lost a fencing match for years—except to you.” His voice dropped and his eyes heated again. “I did particularly enjoy watching that.”
“She’s a prisoner.”
“I prefer to think of it as house arrest,” he replied with a smile that showed a tip of fang. “I have something else I’d like to show you. Something special I’ve had made for Narcise.”
He walked over to a table. On top of it was a box, and Moldavi turned to lift the lid.
With a sharp jerk of his arm, Giordan had the stake through the loose cuff and into his hand. He launched himself across the room, and in a half breath he had Moldavi against the wall, slamming the slighter man there with his hand, the stake poised.
“By the Devil, you are magnificent,” said Moldavi in a rough, breathless voice. His eyes burned with an orange glow.
“I want Narcise,” Giordan said from between tight jaws.
“She isn’t here,” replied Moldavi, his gaze growing hotter. “I took the precaution of removing her from the premises.” He looked up into Giordan’s eyes, his lips parted slightly in a provocative show of fangs. “There’s only one way for you to have her.”
Revulsion and fury took hold, and Giordan slammed the stake down into Moldavi’s chest, propelling himself closer with the effort. The man jolted, grunted against him but something stopped the pike from penetrating fully. Armor.
His adversary looked up at him, his pale, beringed hand suddenly fisted in Giordan’s shirt, holding him still, leaning into him with his own vampiric strength. His fangs were fully visible, his breathing rough.
Luce’s black soul.
Giordan pulled free and spun away. His heart was pounding, his stomach roiling, the stake useless in his hand. “What do you want?”
“Don’t be a fool. You know what I want.” Moldavi’s voice was hard, and yet sensual at the same time. The words hung there for a moment.
He stepped away from the wall where he’d remained after the attack, and adjusted his waistcoat. “Perhaps you’d like a bit of incentive, Giordan? I wanted to show you what I’ve had made for Narcise. What she’ll wear when I give her to Belial if you and I don’t come to an agreement.”
He turned back to the table and finished removing the top to the box. As Giordan watched, his host removed a lacy, filigree object that looked like the same black lace of Narcise’s gown. It was a cloak or cape, and it shivered and flowed as Moldavi shook it out, holding it by the collars.