“I would have said something if I had any reason to suspect her motives.”
Kind of rich, considering his motives —easy sexandfreely offered blood. Yuck.
“Any idea who she’d been with in Paris before coming here?” Mina asked.
Henrik shook his head, slowly returning to a vampire’s normal, “healthy” hue. Another yuck.
“I don’t know, and I didn’t ask. But I can travel to Paris and make some inquiries.” His eyes glowed red, hinting at how final thoseinquiriesmight be.
I couldn’t bring myself to be appalled. Anyone who had used or abused Claudette deserved the worst.
“Okay, that’s one theory — Celeste masterminding all this. But it’s iffy, at best,” I decided. “Any other possibilities?”
Everyone looked at Henrik, then Marius, and both growled.
“No…uh…enemies who might be after you?” I asked Marius carefully.
Marius looked pained. From what I’d heard, he’d managed to make quite a few. Enough to have put a major monkey wrench in his recent trip to London with Mina — the deadliest kind.
“Enemies, yes. But no one organized enough to pull all this off. No one but Celeste.”
“What about you? Any lovely lady vampires who might take offense to you being here?” Bene asked Henrik.
I thought of poor Delphine, his human lover, and the woman whose pendant he’d given me for safekeeping.
Henrik scoffed, then went very, very still.
“Uh-oh,” Bene murmured.
My heart rate spiked. Now what? Was it not enough to have a conniving succubus like Celeste after us? Was there someone else? A ruthless siren, maybe? A vampire-naga cross?
“Leonora,” Henrik whispered.
I pictured a shape shifting Catwoman-lookalike in a tight leather outfit and a lot of feline sass.
Roux groaned. “Leonora? Let’s hope not.”
“Who?” I demanded. God, I hated being the newest kid on the block.
“A woman Henrik turned without coven permission,” Bene supplied.
When Henrik gave him an icy look, Bene backpedaled. “I mean,unauthorized conversion.”
“She begged me to.” Henrik shrugged.
I stared.
Mina sighed into my mind.Told you we have to watch ourselves around these guys.
Yes, I was catching on to that. Fast.
But if Leonora begged him, why would she be his enemy?I asked Mina privately.
She shot me a look.I don’t know, and I don’t want to know. And whatever you do, don’t ask.
I didn’t plan to.
Henrik mulled over the possibilities a while longer, suggesting a very long list of candidates. Finally, he shook his head. “Celeste is the most likely culprit.”
