organization, and cleaning products.
I forced my mind away from the innuendo he’d introduced and ham-handedly attempted to redirect the conversation. “You said the vampire empire wasn’t based on bloodlines. Does that mean the werewolf empire is?”
He nodded once again.
“So who’s the king?” I asked.
“I am.”
It wasn’t Mark who had answered.
Chills erupted over my arms and scalp, riding down my spine as I whipped around to find an unfamiliar figure standing in the doorway. Tall, broad, silver-haired. He had the face of a sea captain—tanned and weathered, creased like an intimately rendered map of adventure.
I knew his eyes. A shade of golden amber shot through with whisky.
“Joseph.” Mark folded his arms against his chest and kicked his feet to rest on the desk, defying my earlier admonishment.
Joseph smiled, the action deepening the good-natured crinkles at the corners of his eyes. “Son.”
Chapter 3
Son?
At second glance, this man was absolutely Mark’s father. Though he was a few inches shorter than Abernathy, his build was nearly identical in a dark pinstriped suit and crisp, tailored white shirt. I suspected he, like his son, might be a customer of Allan’s, as they were old friends. Looking at his face, I began to sort out what of Mark’s features had come from him. They shared the same strong, straight nose, same hard-cut jaw. Mark’s mouth was softer than his father’s, though his eyes perhaps not as kind. Joseph Abernathy had the look of a man who’d spent more years laughing than fighting.
Not so for his Mark.
I took their extended silence as a personal invitation to insert my own questions.
“This is your dad?” I asked. “I thought he died in Germany.”
“It would appear not,” the man observed, directing a look toward Mark. “No thanks to my son.” He massaged his jacket in the place above his heart.
“What happened in Germany was between you and Katherine.” Mark answered.
Without particularly wanting it to, the details of our first international excursion returned to me. On my second day as Mark’s assistant, we had flown to Germany under the guise of his meeting with a fellow antiques dealer. In fact, my boss had come to meet with his father, who had recently been stabbed through the heart with the silver spoon. A rather Freudian gesture on his sister, Katherine’s part, I thought. Katherine was still first on the super-fun list I’d recently begun compiling titled: “People Who Want Me Dead.” My ex-husband still occupied the third slot, the twatmuffin.
“Four hundred and thirty-one years old and you still have the manners of a meat goat.” Joseph shook his head. “Perhaps you should introduce us,” he suggested, his eyes flicking over me.
Mark sighed beneath the weight of the inevitable. “Hanna Harvey, this is my father, Joseph Abernathy. Joseph, this is Hanna.”
Abernathy Senior’s eyes were like kerosene lamps, alight with a sudden, vivid flame.
“Hanna,” he breathed. “Hannelore Matilda Harvey. Of course you are. I would know you anywhere.” He closed the space between us and took both of my hands in his. They were warm and smooth like well-worn leather. The pressure they applied to mine left me feeling surrounded, protected. His eyes read the volume of my face. “How you look like her,” he whispered.
It took me a moment to recover speech under such intense observation.
“Like who?” I asked.
“Your grandmother. Marion Matilda Goebels,” he recited. “The one you are named for.”
Indeed, it had been my grandmother who had brought me into Mark’s orbit by asking his father for protection when she was yet pregnant with my mother. According to Mark, the task had fallen to him, as his father was a useless wastrel who spent his time chasing human skirts.
And was very likely pretty damn good at, from the looks of him.
“You remember her?” I asked him.
“Remember her? My girl, I would challenge a man to forget.”
On this point, I understood him perfectly. My grandmother had been a severe betty. Platinum blonde hair, bright green eyes she accented with jet-black liquid eyeliner, lips shaped by matte red lipstick. The posture of a queen. Every man in the seniors’ group of her Lutheran church had tried, failed, and tried again.
“Of course, she was no admirer of ours,” Joseph continued. “Particularly after what happened to your brother. We certainly could have done a better job with that.”
This word, brother, still felt awkward within my vocabulary. I’d grown up as an only child, never knowing I had a brother until Mark revealed his existence to me under duress.
Amazing how being naked and handcuffed to a bed