“You don’t keep your valuables in your apartment? You hide the wealth of Sanctus down here with the…” I point at a dark shape dangling in the corner of the doorframe. “Spiders?”
“Idohave a safe in my apartment, but that contains the heart of Sanctus – which, before you ask, is not a garish diamond necklace lost on theTitanic– as well as my personal treasures. This safe is for the regular, boring old treasure.”
Gideon picks the spider from its web and holds it out for Cleo VII, who gobbles it up in one bite.
“You’re just trying to butter her up.”
“I don’t need to. Unlike you, she’s unarmed.” Gideon pats Cleo’s head. “Ladies first.”
I descend the narrow stairs, every moment becoming more aware of how trapped and vulnerable I am down here, and how Gideon’s body behind me blocks my only means of escape. He may claim that he’s given up his crime lord ways, but he still exudes beautiful danger like a Valentino sample sale. Perhaps I should have told my friends where I was going tonight.
But that’s ridiculous. Did I expect that Isis and Dora would drop their tarot cards and come to my rescue? Or that Winnie and Minawould give up spending the evenings with their lovers to skulk around a dusty basement with me?
But telling the others would mean questions, so many questions, especially from nosy Isis. And I might let slip that my purpose for accepting this job is to find what I need to ruin Gideon.
I don’t need them. I have my knife strapped to my thigh and nearly two centuries of carefully honed vampire instincts. I can look after myself.
Even when you’re alone with Gideon Blake?A dark voice in my head taunts me.
Especially then.
At the bottom of the staircase is a low-ceilinged corridor stretching in both directions. To the left, I see a loading dock and storage area. Gideon leads me right, past a series of locked rooms, to a heavy steel door. A sensor scans his fingerprints and retinas, and the door clicks open. He drags me inside.
I suppress a gasp as I take in the chaos. The vault is large – over twenty square metres – and every inch is crammed with furniture, rotting wooden chests, stacks of gold bars, and pyramids of hessian sacks. I touch one of the sacks and it topples over, sending a cascade of twelfth-century gold coins across the concrete floor.
This isabsurd.
Why is Gideon trusting me with this treasure?
Surely he knows he’s handing me the keys to his undoing?
I’m used to dealing with, at most, a few sacks of gold or random collections of religious relics.
This job doesn’t require a financial advisor. It needs a vampiric Marie Kondo.
Good thing I know one of those.
I mentally revise the plan in my head. If I let Winnie take care of the sorting and cataloguing, that leaves me free for the scheming.
Gideon clasps his hands together, his eyes widening. He looks sotrusting. “So, can you help?”
“Of course.” I step over the pile of coins and inspect a stack of chairs. They bear the mark of Chippendale on the bottom. My mind swirls with all the possible ways to use this treasure hoard against him.“But this isn’t as easy as holding a jumble sale. All of this needs to be sorted and catalogued before I can start converting it into cash, and it can’t hit the market all at once, or you’ll have the authorities sniffing around. I need Winnie.”
“Consider it done.” Gideon whips out his phone and taps out a text message. “She says she’ll be here in six minutes.”
“How? Black Crag is fifteen miles out of the village, and she’s got to navigate a precarious turret staircaseandAlaric’s desire to keep her in bed forever and ravish her body until she’s a quivering mess.”
I mean it jokingly, but my words sound harsh in the brutalist basement. As if I’m jealous of my friend and her happiness. As if I secretly long for a man with a cock like a one-eyed anaconda who could keepmesatiated. As if such a man existed.
Gideon’s eyes flash with heat. He steps towards me, his body caging me in so my back presses against the stack of Chippendale chairs. His gaze sweeps over my face, the colour of his irises deepening to a striking cobalt as he digests my words.
“If you ever need someone to turn you into a quivering mess—”
I snort. “I’d like to see you try.”
That was supposed to be dismissive.
It came out like a challenge.
