She’d begun to straighten a pile of books on one of the tables. “In my mind,” she said, pulling out a French translation ofThe Iliadand placing it atop its counterpart,The Odyssey,“it never hurts to be prepared. One never knows when one might be caught unawares.”
“I’m never—” He stopped abruptly.
She looked up at him and their eyes met. And held. Something hurt, in his chest, something sharp and hot as if he’d been stabbed. Or staked. Yet, while unexpected, it wasn’t wholly unpleasant.
Her lips twitched, that full, luscious upper one curving into a hint of a smile. “Is it possible you’re learning, Corvindale? That you aren’t always right?”
“What do you want, Maia?” He forced steel into his voice, forced his expression into stone. His heart rammed hard inside.
Her face changed, the affection fleeing. “That night with Mr. Virgil,” she said, “The Incident…I had a dream about it tonight. About things I don’t remember happening. The whole night, almost, is blank in my mind.”
Dimitri raised a brow. “That’s not unusual for a traumatic situation, Miss Woodmore. People often forget what happened to them.”
“Yes, and sometimes with a bit of help from a vampire and his thrall. Is that what happened? Did you alter my memory?”
“What makes you think I’m capable of such a thing?” he prevaricated. His glass was empty and he put it on the cabinet.He had a feeling he was going to need all of his faculties. “And if so, why would I do that?”
“Don’t be absurd. You know you are. You’ve attempted it. You said I’vebecomeimmune to your thrall. Did you manage to do it that night?”
“It was best that way.”
“What happened?”
What didn’t happen? Dimitri drew in a deep breath. “Your Mr. Virgil wasn’t taking you to Gretna Green for your elopement. He was taking you to an establishment in Haymarket that…well, Miss Woodmore, if you found yourself offended by Rubey’s place, you would have been beyond frightened at this place. A marketplace of sorts for young, virginal women. You wouldn’t have been able to leave.”
He watched the disbelief and then horror filter over her delicate features. She’d stopped rearranging his books and now stood as if frozen. “And then what happened?”
“I followed you when I recognized you. Of course, your brother had pointed you and your sister out to me in the past.” And the impression she’d made on Dimitri had been strong and unforgettable, even then. Even from a distance. Especially when he passed by and breathed in the perfume that was her. “I was able to extricate you from the woman who owned the establishment with little fanfare. Then I saw that you were taken safely home in a hack.”
“Did she have a mustache?” she whispered, and he nodded in response. “I dreamed of her.”
The hypnotism was weakening; which was no surprise, as he’d been unable to inflict it upon her recently. Something had happened since that night in Haymarket that made her immune to his thrall.Histhrall. He felt a little uncomfortable niggle in the back of his mind when he recalled Voss telling him he couldn’t enthrall Angelica, either. Was it something about theWoodmore sisters that made them indifferent to a Draculian thrall?
But no, for Lerina had managed to ensnare Maia when they were trapped. He didn’t understand it.
Maia was talking slowly, pulling things out of her memory. “I have a recollection…in the hack. We… You were there. You had a cut on your cheek, and one on your hand—I remember now. You weren’t wearing gloves.”
He held back a snort. “Even in the midst of such a harrowing experience, whilst you were clothed in boy breeches and a cap, you commented on my lack of gloves with your nose in the air. And a little sniff of disdain.”
“I did not.” She gave that same little sniff, lifting her pert nose.
He found himself hardly able to keep a smile in check, and raised his brow instead.
“I…We were discussing herbal poultices for your cuts,” she said slowly, as if unraveling the memory like a thread. “You were promoting the benefits of dried woad.”
“You were under the impression that Dioscorides’s recipe for slippery elm and comfrey was the best treatment. I confess, I was amazed to learn you were not only familiar with his writings, but that you’d read them in their native Greek. And so I commenced with a discussion to see if it was possible.”
“You,” she said, the corners of her mouth tipping up a bit again, “were singing the praises of John Gerard, simply because he was a native Englishman.”
“Aside from the fact that he was a friend of my father’s, the benefit of having a medicinal written only about plants native to the local soil, my dear Miss Woodmore, is much more efficacious than one written by an ancient. There is always the problem of translation.”
“Not if one does the translation oneself,” she reminded him. “As I did.”
“That was precisely what you said that evening.”
Their eyes met and he saw the clarity back in hers. She remembered it all now.
He’d never forgotten it.
