Lover's Bite

“Good.” Rebecca nodded. “Good.”

It was, Topaz sensed, the end of the conversation. She would get no more information from Rebecca tonight. She got to her feet, and Jack rose with her. “Thank you,” she said simply.

“It was a pleasure meeting you,” Jack added. He reached out to take Topaz’s arm, then stopped himself, she noted, just before making contact. He really was trying to live up to his end of their bargain. It was slightly amazing to her. He was actually trying to keep his word.

They walked around the house, through the backyard and out to the front, where Jack had parked the Porsche. Topaz didn’t say a thing until they got in. And then she said disbelievingly, “I can’t believe she knew who I was just by looking at me.”

He started the engine but didn’t put the car in gear. Instead, he turned in his seat to look at her. “Well, her eyesight clearly hasn’t gone the way of her memory.”

“But I don’t look anything like Mirabella.”

He laughed. Just a soft sound, very short and more surprised than amused.

“What?”

“You look a lot like her, Topaz. You have the same bone structure, the same high cheekbones and delicate, angular jaw. The same little nose, the same full, sexy lips. Same milk-chocolate-brown eyes and thick lashes. Her skin tone was a little darker, her hair, too, but beyond that…”

“That’s ridiculous. My mother was called the most beautiful woman alive.”

“Yeah,” Jack said with a firm nod, then put the car into gear and began to drive. “Exactly.”

She shot him a look, but his face was unreadable. He focused on the road, not looking at her, intent on his driving, as if it were some challenging task that took every bit of his concentration.

“What are you trying to pull, Jack?” she asked softly.

He frowned, sending her a quick glance. “What do you mean?”

“Do you think flattering me is going to get you back into my good graces? Or my wallet?”

“I’d settle for back into your bed, but—”

“You never said shit like that when we were dating.”

He shrugged. “I didn’t want you to get a swollen head. And maybe I was thinking like those men of your mother’s. If you knew how beautiful you were, why wouldn’t you go out and find someone a hell of a lot better than me? I sure didn’t want to encourage that.”

“No. At least not until you got what you were after.”

He sighed, his head falling forward briefly. If she hadn’t known better, she might have thought she’d hurt him, just a little.

But that was impossible, of course.

You couldn’t hurt someone unless they cared, and she knew all too well that Jack didn’t. He never had.

That thought hurt a little too much, so she distracted herself by picking up her phone, glancing at the time and dialing Reaper’s cell.

He picked up on the first ring. “Topaz?”

“Yeah, it’s me,” she said. “How is it going? Are you still in Virginia Beach?”

“No, we’re already moving on. Still heading north. I’ll let you know where we decide to hole up next when we get there. How are things with you?”

“Fine. Everything’s fine. The others?”

“Roxy and Ilyana are at Roxy’s place.”

“Really? Interesting. You think Ilyana will open up to her at all?”

“If anyone can get her talking, it’ll be Roxy.”

“She has secrets, that one,” Topaz said. “How about Seth and Vixen?”

“They haven’t checked in yet,” Reaper told her. “Have you, um…Have you heard from Jack?”

She hesitated and glanced Jack’s way. She got the immediate impression that he was listening closely to her conversation. He wouldn’t have any trouble hearing Reaper’s end, given all vampires’ heightened senses. “Actually, he’s here with me.”

“Tell him I said hi,” Jack said.

She didn’t. Reaper could hear the greeting for himself. He sighed, and said, “Be careful, Topaz.”

“Believe me, I am.”

4

“Oh, hell.”

Jack rejoined Topaz at the checkout counter of the 7-Eleven, having ditched her just long enough to place a call of his own. She was handing the cashier a wad of bills to pay for her shampoo, conditioner and the dozen other beauty supplies she’d insisted she couldn’t get along without for one more night, things she hadn’t packed because it was “so much easier to just buy them here.”

At Jack’s muttered curse, Topaz shot him a quick look over her shoulder. “Anything wrong?” she asked.

He didn’t speak out loud, because he didn’t think the checker had made the connection just yet and he certainly didn’t want to encourage her to. Take a look at the tabloid in the rack—upper left slot, he told Topaz mentally.

Frowning, she glanced at the rack of magazines and newspapers standing beside the cashier. Jack had no doubt that the banner headline and side-by-side photos of Topaz, back in her mortal days, and her mother, caught her eye just as quickly as they had caught his. When her eyes widened, he knew for sure.

DAUGHTER OF LEGENDARY ACTRESS RETURNS FROM THE GRAVE TO AVENGE HER MOTHER’S MURDER

She blinked in shock and quickly grabbed the issue, folded it over the sensationalistic front-page headline and dropped it onto the counter. “This, too,” she said. He thought her voice seemed to quiver. Not so much that a mortal would detect it. Maybe not even another vampire. But he was more attuned to her than most—than anyone alive, he imagined. And that realization bore some further thought, but not right then.

The cashier nodded and snapped her chewing gum. Looking bored, she continued ringing up purchases and stuffing them into a bag.

Topaz gripped the plastic bag by its handles and hurried out of the store. Following, Jack hit the key ring button to unlock the car before she got to it, and by the time he slid behind the wheel she was in the passenger seat with the newspaper unfolded on her lap.

“Listen to this,” she told him as he started the car. “‘Tanya DuFrane, daughter of the legendary actress Mirabella DuFrane, vanished a decade ago. It was rumored at the time that she had been very ill, and most of Hollywood assumed she simply wanted to die in privacy. However, a reliable source claims that Ms. DuFrane is alive and well, and has returned to L.A. determined to learn the truth about her mother’s death.’” She looked up at Jack. “It goes on, sensationalistic blatherings about how Mirabella was shot and—” She lowered her gaze to the paper, scanning it again. “A half-dozen crackpot theories as to who did it and what became of her body. The fact that an eyewitness has seen me, and that I appear to be in ‘the pink of health.’The pink of health. Do I look pink to you?” As she asked the question, she ran her fingertip over the pale skin of her forearm.

“Does it say where you’re staying?”

“No, but it’s implied.” She ran a finger down the column of text. “Here. ‘The younger Ms. Du-Frane appears to be retracing her mother’s steps on the final night of her life.’” She clenched her jaw and muttered “Idiots” through her teeth.

“Do you think Rebecca Murphy…?”