Enter Louis-Cesare and I, on a good will tour to hand out largesse and compliments in equal measure, and try to keep the allies allied.
So far, it wasn’t going great.
I didn’t know whose brilliant idea it had been to send a dhampir, the traditional enemy of vampire kind, on a diplomatic mission, but it wasn’t working. I made the locals nervous simply by being in the same room, which was fair. You spend five hundred years bringing back their heads in a bag and it tends to cut into the general sense of goodwill.
I’d noticed that whatever display case I was standing by suddenly got very lonesome, and when I walked through a room, people tended to step over each other to get out of the way. I’d smiled at one woman, whom I’d mistaken for a human servant, and she'd passed the hell out. I’d retreated to my corner after that, allowing my famous, gorgeous spouse to take over the schmoozing, which seemed to be working better.
Maybe a little too much better, I thought, eyeing the admiring throng.
And then eyeing him, mostly because I enjoyed it.
His fashionably pale skin—or fashionable for vamps, anyway—was as flawless as the mane of burnished auburn hair that fell half way down the muscular back and was currently being limed with fire by the setting sun. It had been leashed tonight, as much as possible, by a tortoise shell clip at the base of his neck. It was a popular compromise by the men in the family, who understood that styles had changed but were damned if they were going to wear the short hair of a peasant. In Louis-Cesare’s case, the sleek style only served to highlight a profile that would have made an ancient Greek sculptor weep, and was accompanied by the rest of the Greek god package: broad shoulders, long legs, and the best butt in memory. And I had a long memory.
Damn, I hated being the ugly one.
I glanced at Ray, who was scowling even more furiously. “A scar?”
“You know.” He drank champagne. “Something to give his face some character.”
“It has plenty of character.”
“Yeah, if male model is considered character.”
“You’re just jealous.”
“Damned right, I’m jealous. I’m five foot seven; he’s six four. I look like a penguin in this get up; he’s Mr. Universe. Plus, I got hair on my ass, and I bet his is silky smooth—”
“Don’t start about your ass.”
“I was just making the point—”
“Well don’t.”
“—that I gotta shave to get my trousers to lay right, while he—”
“I’m not listening.” I walked out onto a terrace.
Unlike most vampire courts, which tended to be underground, cramped and inward looking, this one was wide open, with the sand colored terrace outside almost as expansive as the ballroom within. I took my champagne over to some stone benches that looked like they’d been looted from an ancient temple, and prepared to try to enjoy myself. Of course, Raymond followed.
“Why aren’t you in there, anyway?” he demanded.
“Needed some air.”
“No, I mean in there. At the front of the room, smiling with the bigwigs.”
“When I smile at people, they tense up.”
“That’s ‘cause you don’t really smile. You grimace, and half the time, you show fang.”
“You show fang.”
“Yeah, but I’m not a diplomat.”
“Neither am I.”
“Ah.” Ray settled down on the organically curved piece of granite, which was high enough to leave his legs dangling. “Then you know.”
“Know what?”
“That Louis-Cesare married one woman, but he wants another.”
I felt my hand move instinctively to the stake I’d shoved into the top of my thigh high. “Oh,” I said nonchalantly. “Which one?”
Ray rolled his eyes. “That’s not what I meant. If there was a rival here, do you think I’d tell you? What, am I crazy?”
“Then what did you mean?”
“Look,” Ray said, and his face in the odd, pinkish light was earnest. Which meant that either I was about to get played, or he was actually serious. “I don’t want to tell you your business—”
“Since when?”
“—but you’re a killer, and we’re at war. What the hell are you doing here?”
“Getting more well-rounded?”
“I’m serious.”
“So am I. At least, that’s what I was told.” I drank champagne.
“And you believed it?”
“I believed I was going to get divorced if I ran off on another errand for the senate. Remember what happened last time?”
“That was not our fault.” Ray looked indignant. “And we saved a city!”
“It’s never our fault, and we almost got killed. Louis-Cesare thought I was safe at home, only to