“Oh, don’t you worry about my feet.” I grinned at him. “They’ve been through some puddles.” For one, the seedy club in Greece.
Brando gave me a mean look.
“There is another issue.” Donato stood taller. “Nemours sends me the headcount before we arrive, as you know. Tonight it is off.”
“Off,” Brando repeated, cocking an eyebrow up.
“By a few hundred. He has, ah, allowed two, ah, vampire covens—” at this, Donato’s face pinched, and he almost looked incredulous, like he couldn’t believe he had uttered those words aloud “—to attend. They are enemies. There is also a powerful group of American businessmen in attendance. Also another group that he will not speak of. I do not feel the situation is safe for your wife. We should leave.”
Nemours usually kept the number of entrants to my show small. He wanted intimate. Close enough to feel the air move around me but not close enough to feel my warmth. Since his “guests” were paying a pretty penny, he felt the close proximity was worth it. It seemed he decided to up the ante tonight. Greedy bastard.
One of Lothario’s men cleared his throat. Ciro. “We move forward.”
Lothario had been ushered to another section of the club—he was curious about the building—until my performance began. This man worked as his mouth.
Brando met my eye. We had previously discussed that if we needed to communicate, we would do so through sign language. It was the least likely language to be understood. He signedstay close to me. I nodded, squeezing his hand, inching myself closer.
Back outside, we moved through a bricked courtyard, overgrown with algae and moss, and covered in snow. I paused for a moment, stopping Brando, looking up. The sky lacked stars. Only wisps of cold flakes sprinkled from above. It seemed as though some hand shook salt down from heaven, and the stars had all gone into hiding. Closing my eyes, I felt them land on my face in cold pulses, coming to stick on my uncovered lashes and lips.
Brando tugged on my hand. We moved again, following the courtyard to a separate entrance. The inside of the castle seemed colder than it felt outside, even with the many torches lighting our way. Above, the ceiling curved and reminded me of a tunnel. Running my nails along the jagged texture of the stone, I could feel the beat of the music in the next room. The scent of black licorice slithered through the air, heady and exotic, melting with fire and freezing with ice.
Our group drew closer together. Brando’s grip on my hand grew tighter—my wedding rings bit into skin—as we entered the main club. Bodies reacted to the sensual throbbing with skin-to-skin contact, moving in ways that were sometimes obscene.
Donato said that the club was too dirty for my feet. What I really thought he meant was my eyes. It was the sort of place made for the end of time.
Women were dressed as queens, but some only wore crowns atop their heads and diamonds to cover the hard nubs of their breasts. Men were in leather pants, their bare chests exposed and gleaming with oil in the flickering light. Perhaps it was the trick of the lighting, but I was pretty sure a few of them were having sex. Some people seemed to be watching.
Dancers were hanging from above, like sensual birds, or perhaps angels, complete with feathers, hanging over their perches and using their bodies in ways that were not all that unfamiliar to me. Some of them were in locked, gilded cages.
Whatever the fantasy,I will deliver,Nemours had said on more than one occasion.You, angel, are the most tempting fantasy of all.
A man somehow broke through the fortress that was my entourage. He was dressed as an Aboriginal, sans loincloth to cover his privates. He was so small that I retracted my first impression. He didn’t break through anything. He probably slipped right under their noses, doing the limbo.
He blew a ring of smoke in my face at the same time that I inhaled. I blinked and then choked.
He smiled at me, the tattoos on his cheeks neon under the glow of lights. He skedaddled when Brando turned and another one of the men went to remove him.
A wave full of expectancy seemed to move through the crowd. Murmurs were starting to rise, almost as loud as the music around us. More pushing. More shoving.
Donato pushed through the front line, coming to stand beside Brando, whispering something in his ear. Whatever he said caused Brando to curse. His body vibrated with an urgency to move.
“Regina Della Notte!” The crowd started to chant. It started off as whispers among a hundred or so, and then rose loud enough to shake the walls around us.
“What are they saying?” I yelled in Brando’s ear.
He put his mouth to mine. “Queen of the night.”
I grabbed Livio by the scruff of the neck when he started to follow a scantily dressed blonde costumed as Eve. Romeo grinned in the wicked lighting, catching the move.
“Why?” I yelled even louder, and then was shoved into Brando, almost going down. The cloak was heavy, and people constantly stepped on it.
“You!” his voice boomed. Right after the word had been released, he and Rocco made a sandwich out of me, keeping me in between.
Donato started to shove harder, throwing the occasional throat punch when the recipient didn’t get the message the first time. Louder shouts called forRegina Della Notte.Then the crowd became incorrigible. We were caught up in a tidal wave, not able to make it to the door.
I grasped Donato by the back of his jacket. He almost turned on me. When he realized that it was me, his eyes cleared, his mouth relaxed, and he moved closer, putting his ear to my mouth. He nodded and then disappeared after I told him my idea.
The DJ stopped the music, and his voice shushed the crowd for a moment. “Regina Della Notteis HERE!” he bellowed. “She will perform! But you must allow her through. If you touch her, you will DIE!” I thought this last statement was a threat from Donato, but they took it as part of the legend and my persona.
