All Souls' Night - Renee Rose Page 0,314

getting your access programmed into the security system as well. That’s one of the things you and I will do while Theo is gone.”

“Holy cow, so high tech.” She steps with me into the passage that leads to the elevator and stairwell.

“Elevator for ease. Stairs for emergencies.” I press the button, calling the elevator back down from where Theo has just used it.

She wraps her arms around me and buries her face in my chest. I can’t help but stiffen, expecting the worst. But she snuggles, and holds me tight. “Am I really going to be with you two forever?”

I accept her embrace. “For as long as you’ll have us, my love.”

The elevator dings, and the doors slide open. We step inside and I use my thumbprint and code once more. The doors glide shut and we ascend. I’ve got her tucked under my arm.

But I can’t help the troubling thoughts of her condition. New vampires are usually ravenous upon waking. They tear through their sire in a desperate attempt to devour them. And yet Karina is calm, almost normal. She had a mild thirst. Nothing more. She was conscious of her actions of feeding from Theo and was remorseful, not ignorant of it. I remember when I was first turned. I was a mindless beast and had to be chained. The thirst for blood consumed me, as it does every new vampire I’ve ever known. Overcoming and controlling the bloodlust takes years and careful supervision.

And she’s fine.

Wonderful, but a mystery.

We step out of the elevator and into another short corridor, where I enter my print and code again. Can’t be too careful with a vampire’s lair. The panel in the wall opens, and we emerge from behind the row of utility cabinets with Theo’s tools and storage in the four-car garage of the house.

“How clever!” Karina grins and twirls, her satin pajamas clinging to her lovely figure. “Alex, I feel more alive than I was when I was… What was I? Mortal? Is that what you call it?”

“Yes.” I open the door from the garage into the hall just off the kitchen. “Why don’t you get dressed, and I’ll break open a bottle of wine?”

She throws her arms around me and I bend to accept her eager kiss. “I’ll be right there.” And she sashays across the foyer toward the master bedroom, casting a playful wink over her shoulder.

Such a puzzle.

I pop the cork of a sweet Riesling, set up a plate of crackers and cheese, and wait for her at the breakfast bar. When she enters the kitchen, her brow is furrowed, her eyes thoughtful.

“What’s on your mind, love?”

“What happened to Big Tony?” She holds her wine glass in trembling hands and her heartrate rabbits against my ears.

“Theophilus killed him. We arrived just as that monster was about to defile you.”

Her wine glass pauses halfway to her face, and she gasps. “The wild animals I heard as I was blacking out. That was Theo?”

“Yes. He was mad with grief and, quite frankly, ripped that bastard’s throat out, cupcake.” I take her hand in mine. “That asshole brutally murdered you, my love.”

She hitches her breath and grips my forearm. “You said Zoe was okay. What happened? Did Armando save her in time?”

“Actually, Phil had the same intentions—to kill Zoe. Armando arrived at the warehouse and found her near death, so he turned her as well. And then Armando hunted Phil down and killed him. You girls will never have to run again.”

Karina gawks for several moments, her eyes searching as if absorbing all the news. With a trembling lower lip, she sets her glass on the counter and rises from the stool, stepping between my thighs and slipping her arms around my neck.

I stroke her hair as she sobs, releasing all the tension that has surely built up over the last few days. Over the relief of the nightmare finally being over.

“Thank God.” She sniffles. “And thank you both. Those two were horrible men, and I think justice was done. I don’t wish death on anyone, but if there were ever two people who deserved it, I think it was them. And I’m so happy Zoe is a…”

I huff a soft laugh and pull back from our embrace. “It’s okay. You can say it.”

“A vampire?”

I nod.

She sits back onto the barstool and gazes at me in wonder.

“Well. As Theo suggested, I need to tell you about what it means to be a vampire. Your strengths, weaknesses, dos and don’ts.”

She