Demon Blood

having a party of some sort. But it struck him that there was only one way that Camille could have known he’d returned to Paris—and on the slim chance that Rosalia might be somewhere around, too, he went through that door.
    Camille was the first to greet him. She bussed his cheeks, and shoved a flute of champagne into his hand. “We can’t become drunk, and we can’t taste it—but the bubbles are necessary to celebrate life. Now, come with me.”
    She led him through a room bursting with vampires, refusing to let a single one stop them. At the balcony overlooking a quiet, tree-lined street, she shooed a couple of vampires back inside.
    They wouldn’t have privacy, but they had the illusion of it.
    She turned to him. “When I woke up today, I found an insulated drink cooler in my home, packed with dry ice, units of blood, and a message to you in it.”
    Deacon didn’t dare hope. “What was the message?”
    She produced a folded note from inside her bra. His heart pounding, Deacon took it.
    The message wasn’t from Rosalia. In Irena’s clunky block letters, she offered to deliver demon blood for as long as he needed it, wherever he needed it.
    His throat closed up. Deacon stuffed the note into his pocket, feeling Camille’s gaze on his face.
    “I expected Rosalia here with you. Did you leave her in Rome to clean up after the mess?”
    He didn’t want to get into this with Camille. She knew him too well. To stall, he threw back a swallow of the champagne—tasteless, but fizzy. Hardly a celebration.
    But it gave him an idea of how to answer. “She’s busy planning a wedding for her son.”
    “Her son?” Camille’s eyebrows shot up. “Oh, Rosa. Good for her.”
    Deacon frowned at her. That was a little more relief than the revelation seemed to call for.
    “It was the reason I left, ninety years ago. I didn’t want to be like her: three hundred years old, and never been loved. In any sense.” She paused. “Although I suppose now that you and she are—”
    “I’m not. We’re not.”
    “Oh.” Her brow pleated. “You smell like her perfume.”
    “It’s soap.” And hours and hours of Rosalia beside him, under him, over him. He hadn’t yet washed her off.
    “Ah,” she said, but her confusion seemed deeper than it should be.
    What was the mystery here? “Just have it out, Camille.”
    She took a few seconds, and he knew she was framing her words carefully when she began, “For two hundred years, she prevented Lorenzo from taking over every community in Europe and ruling us all.”
    “I know she did.”
    “And yet, here you are—and you’re now the de facto head of every European community.”
    He shook his head. “If that’s what everyone is thinking, just tell them I don’t want any of their positions.”
    “I won’t tell them. And we aren’t expecting you to rule; we’re expecting you to protect our communities. This is what you have brought upon yourself by saving us. Will you shun that responsibility?”
    His jaw clenched, and he realized this was the reason Camille had requested his presence. She could have delivered the blood. But she’d brought him here, showed him the vampires celebrating—and if he denied his responsibility, he’d have to look each one in the face and essentially tell them they didn’t matter.
    He wouldn’t. He couldn’t . When a threat showed up, they’d look to him. He couldn’t turn his back on them.
    Finally, he said, “No. I won’t shun it.”
    Camille smiled as if she’d never had any doubt, and patted his hand. “You won’t be locked into a community. In fact, I think it’s best if you aren’t a part of one, so that you seem impartial. You’ll be the one we can all go to, if we need your help. And if ever again another Lorenzo comes to power, you can do what the Guardians— all of the Guardians—neglected to do, and slay him.”
    Shit. He didn’t want that responsibility—but he knew that if someone like Lorenzo took over a community, waged the same reign of terror over his people, Deacon would destroy him.
    As if Camille saw his acceptance, she gave a satisfied nod. Her tone altered, became pensive. “When I heard that Lorenzo had been killed, I called Rosalia up to congratulate her—or to console her. I didn’t know which it would be. But I thought, She’d finally done it —because no one knew about the nephilim yet.”
    Not for weeks after Lorenzo had died. And even then, no one knew how the hell an entire city had