She shook her head and struggled to find her footing in the sinking sandpit in which she had found herself. She swallowed down her fear. She refused to let herself devolve into panic. Raising her chin, she met him head-on. “No. Pay me any unkindness that you wish, Count Dracula, but do not mask your cruelty behind a guise of kindness.” She swallowed and forced herself to take a deep breath. She knew she was to die someday. If it came now, like this, it made no difference to what waited for her at the end. “I have seen and felt a thousand deaths as if they were my own. I have felt far more than my life’s share of tragedies. Do not think me so naïve or fragile. I assure you I am neither.”
Dracula bowed his head to her. “Forgive me. I am accustomed to dealing with those of a far less…pragmatic demeanor than what you possess. And, may I remind you, my dear…” His crimson eyes caught hers again, making her heart stick in her throat. “To you, I am only Vlad.”
He snapped his fingers.
And with that, the room sprang back to life as if someone had released the gears on a wind-up toy, letting it resume its actions without any knowledge of its pause in time. Maxine let out a breath.
“Please.” He gestured to her chair. “I ask you to entertain my invitation to dine with me, a ruse though it may be. It was not my intention to scare you. Quite the opposite, in fact.”
“Are you certain you wish to dine with me and not on me?” It was meant as an insult.
He certainly did not take it that way. Instead, he took the barest step toward her. “Patience…” The sound was barely more than a low rumble in his chest. It seemed to resonate inside her, and she shivered. “Now, sit. Please.”
Overwhelming. There was that word again, the one that sprang to mind in his presence. What would she prefer, to fight with him? To be shackled and chained? Kidnapped by his cohorts and thrown at his feet?
Was dinner not preferable?
She nodded weakly, not truly having any other recourse. Turning, she sat in the chair. He pushed it in for her as she did. He took his seat at the corner, choosing not to sit across from her but close. It was intimate. It put her nerves even more on edge than they should have been. With a simple beckon of his finger, a waiter came forward and poured them both a glass of wine.
Red.
Naturally.
“Before we go too far, I must ask you something.” She picked up her glass of wine and sipped it. She was glad for its presence. It would make this all that much more tolerable.
“Of course.” He was holding his wineglass in such a way that he could watch the light of the candle on the table reflect off the surfaces. His thumb ran along one of the ridges in the cut crystal stem, and she found herself entranced by the motion. He was graceful and dexterous for someone his size. She had to snap herself out of it and turn her focus away from him and out the window to the people crossing by instead.
After gathering her wits again, she looked back to him before speaking. “Tell me—how did you manage to keep a straight face while I not once, but twice, attempted to save you from your own creations?”
Whatever question he was expecting, it had not been that. Perhaps he expected something banal or predictably related to her current situation. His moment of surprise turned into mirth, and he laughed. A real, authentic sound. One that seemed as though he had not done such a thing in a very long time. After his laughter faded, he watched her with a tender look in his eyes. “I found it immensely endearing. I do not think anyone has come to my rescue in many thousands of years. You must forgive me, for it was a rare fantasy that I could not stomach to shatter in the moment.”
“And I don’t believe anyone has ever described me as endearing in—” She stopped talking as her mind pulled to a full stop. “Pardon me. Did you say thousands of years?”
He nodded. “You sensed this when you went rummaging about in my mind uninvited.”
“To be perfectly clear, you were the one responsible for that, not I. I warned you of what I was