Carpathian 01 - Dark Prince

Rudy longed to touch her skin to see if it was really as soft as it appeared in the moonlight. Her voice was a gentle whisper, sexy, soothing, reaching into his mind to calm and heal. He cleared his throat. "My father murdered my mother a couple of nights ago. If only I had come home sooner. My mother called me, telling me some nonsense about him murdering a woman. He had delusions of vampires preying on people in the village. My father had always been superstitious, but I never thought he would go completely crazy. Mother said he and a group of fanatics were hunting vampires and marking prominent members of the community for murder. I thought he was just talking big, like he always did." He glanced down at his hands. "I should have listened to her, but she admitted that no one else seemed to know of the murder. I assumed he'd lied about killing a woman, that it wasn't the truth. Hell, maybe it wasn't, but he was nuts. He strangled my mother. She died with her rosary in her hands."
    Rudy wiped his eyes with trembling fingers. Somehow, he had no idea how, his mystery lady was in his mind, providing warmth and understanding. The illusion was so real his body stirred to life, and he became acutely aware that they were very much alone. Unbidden, the thought came to him that no one knew she was with him. The thought was disturbingly exciting in the midst of his grief. "I stayed one more day at the university to take a test I thought was really important. I didn't really believe my father would kill someone, least of all a woman. My mother was a midwife. She brought so many lives into the world, helped so many people. I told her I was on my way home and I'd take care of things. She wanted to go to the priest, but I talked her out of it."
    "I wish I had known her," Raven said sincerely.
    "You would have liked her; everyone liked her. She must have tried to stop my father. The night of the storm, he went out with a group of outsiders. That's when he must have killed my mother, right before he left the house. He probably was making certain she didn't tell anyone or try to stop him. He was caught under a tree that was hit by lightning. He and the others were burned beyond recognition."
    "How terrible for you." Raven swept a hand through her hair, a slow tunneling of her fingers through the heavy fall of silk, pushing it away from her face. Sexy. Innocent. A potent combination.
    Mist streamed through the forest toward the house set back against the cliffs. It filtered through the iron gates and poured into the courtyard. The mist stacked into a tall, thick column, shimmered, connected, until Mikhail, in his solid form, stood in front of his door. Lifting a hand, murmuring a soft command, he released the safeguard and entered. Immediately he knew she was gone.
    Eyes darkened to black ice. White teeth bared, gleamed. A low growl rumbled, was suppressed. His first thought was that someone had taken her, that she was in danger. He sent out a call to his sentries, the wolves, to aid him in his search for her. Taking a deep, calming breath, he allowed his mind to find hers, to zero in on her location. It wasn't difficult to track her. She was not alone. A human. Male.
    His breath caught in his throat. His heart nearly ceased beating. His fingers curled into two tight fists.
    Beside Mikhail the lamp exploded, burst into fragments. Outside the wind rose, whirled in tiny tornadoes through the trees. Mikhail stepped outside and leaped into the air, spread giant wings and hurtled through the sky. Far below him the wolves howled to one another and began to run in tight pack formation.

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    Mikhail glided silently to the heavy branches above Raven's head. She was pushing her hair away from her face in her curiously sexy, very feminine way. He could feel her compassion, her need to comfort. He could also feel how cold and exhausted she was. The human was grief-stricken, no doubt about it. But Mikhail could smell his excitement, could hear the pounding heart, the flow of blood surging and pooling.
    He could easily read the man's thoughts, and they were not all innocent.
    Furious, more than a little afraid for her, Mikhail launched himself into the air, then settled on the ground a yard away, out of sight. And then he was striding toward them, a tall, powerful figure appearing out of the night, out of the trees. He loomed over them, menacing, formidable, the hard