“Then perhaps you might wish to tell me what was so necessary that you had to kiss my grandfather in order to send the message?” These last words came out sharply.

Victoria shoved his hand away before it closed over her shoulder. “Don’t try to play the jealous lover, Sebastian. It rings a false note. And the reason I needed to speak to you is in regard to something of my aunt’s. You must have seen her…seen her…” Blast. Her voice was rough, and her eyes began to tingle with tears. “You sent me her vis bulla. But there was a bracelet she wore, an armband. It’s very important. Did you see it…when…”

“Silver? Wide at the top of her arm?” he asked. “Yes, I took it also. It was the only jewelry she wore, and the only other thing I could do for her.”

“Where is it? What did you do with it?”

“I didn’t realize it was important to you. It’s…I put it here to be safe from…behind Catherine Gardella’s portrait. Apparently she liked jewelry.”

A wave of relief, followed by annoyance, rushed over Victoria. “But why didn’t you send it to me when you sent the vis bulla?”

His eyes flickered away, then came back to hers with a hint of chagrin in their expression. “I…ah…didn’t think it would have quite the same…flair,” he said with a discomfited expression, “to send both. The vis…well, it was more intimate.” He quirked a smile.

Then, shrugging off whatever bit of discomposure he’d had, Sebastian reached for her again, and this time he caught her upper arms with both hands. “Besides…what if I needed a reason to contact you again?” he murmured as he pulled her close enough that her skirt swished against his trousers. “I’m not one to leave all my cards on the table.”

His grip was strong, surprisingly strong. Victoria was tempted to twist away and send him sprawling to the stone floor, perhaps clipping his head on a table on the way down—but at the same time, looking up into his face, she found herself focused on his mouth. It was close, and she well remembered how it felt sliding and fitting sensually to hers. Warm and mobile, slick and coaxing.

Perhaps it would be prudent to put him off guard. Prudent and enjoyable…and then she could change the subject back to a more pertinent one.

But apparently, for once Sebastian had other ideas; for he sobered, the flirtatiousness fading from his face, as if he’d just recalled something important. “Victoria, you must take care. He’s made it clear that he wants you for himself,” he said, maintaining the distance between them…yet looking at any moment like he might change his mind.

At first Victoria didn’t know who he meant. She looked away from his lips and their eyes met.

“Beauregard,” Sebastian said, his voice tight and without its normal light edge. “I’m speaking of Beauregard. Although from what I understand, you’ve wasted no time in finding other, less dangerous men to amuse you, such as that redheaded Scot.”

Now she shoved hard at his solid chest, and he released her, stumbling back a step but easily remaining on his feet. “You are playing the jealous lover. How can that be, Sebastian, when you’ve been no lover at all these past months? When, in fact, our attachment was of the briefest kind?”

His expression changed, the annoyance easing into a knowing smile. “So you have missed me.” Triumph colored his amber eyes, and he reached for her a third time.

This time she let him bring her so that their bodies were flush: breast to chest, thigh to thigh, feet mingling. Her skin warmed, the flush traveling from her face down to her neck and beyond. It was good to touch him again, to feel the warmth of a man’s body and the strength of his arms about her.

“Hardly.” They both knew she was lying.

She shouldn’t have missed him—she couldn’t trust him, for his loyalty was to Beauregard—but she had missed him, and she did trust him…after a fashion. It wasn’t as if he could replace Phillip and the love and regard they’d had for so brief a time, but she was human.

And she was a woman. A woman who’d grown up cuddled and petted by Melly and her two friends, a woman who liked to be touched, who enjoyed being reminded that she was desirable, and who had made choices that kept her outside normal societal conventions so that she was a lonely outcast.

He made her feel. He’d brought pleasure to a life that had once been so simple, so normal and easy and bland, and had become stark and dark and violent. With his irrepressible charm and unabashed flirtation, Sebastian had made her heart beat faster and her body reawaken from the grief-imposed stupor resulting from Phillip’s death. Even now, as they faced each other, her belly flipped deep inside, knowing there was more to come. And she was ready for it. Her heart rammed in her chest as she remembered the way his hands would glide over her bare skin….

“Believe me, I didn’t want to stay away, Victoria,” he said, his mouth hovering in front of hers, his lips twitching in a racy grin, and the clove scent on his breath a light brush over her skin. “I wished only to keep you safe.”

“Safe?” She reared her head away from him so she could look directly in his eyes, knowing that her own were narrowed in annoyance. “What did you mean to keep me safe from? The vampires I hunt every night? That is a poor excuse and another false note. Can you not even once be truthful?”

“From Beauregard.” His voice had chilled, and eyes that had been soft and coaxing a moment earlier had flattened. “You have no idea—”

“I can protect myself.”

“I am fully aware of your Venatorial qualities, for you see fit to remind me of them—as well as my own shortcomings—at every opportunity.”

“I am who I am,” she told him. “I told you this last autumn—I made the choice, and if it’s too much for you to bear, knowing that I’m stronger and faster than you, that I have no need for you to protect me, that I’m not like other women who will sit at home waiting to be taken care of by the men in this world, then begone with you, Sebastian. I need you no more than you need me.”

She realized suddenly that she was crying. My God, crying! Victoria, Illa Gardella, who’d not even squeaked in shock when her beloved aunt was killed in front of her, had tears rolling down her cheeks.

Now she was angry—at herself, at Sebastian, at the choices she’d made and the losses she’d endured—and she tore herself from his hold, turning away to focus her attention on something else…anything else. Anything.

The sparkling water of the fountain caught and then mesmerized her, soothing in its rhythm, beautiful in its clarity, comforting in its holiness.

And then…the realization came…a suspicion that must have been buried deeply suddenly came billowing out. She whirled toward him just in time to see Sebastian reaching to gather her back into his arms.

She went willingly, meeting his mouth with all of the angst and anger that had built inside her since she’d had those five dreams that called her to her duty as a Venator.

Their mouths slipped and devoured as though released from a great restraint. His hands slid around to pull her hips sharply against his; then one moved up her spine, pushing her closer as he moved his lips from her mouth along the edge of her jaw, murmuring her name against her skin.

Victoria felt the dampness of his wet shirt seep into her hands, the warmth of the texture of fine linen molding to his chest under her palms, and then the direct heat of flesh beneath her fingertips as she slipped them under the hem of his shirt.

Sebastian caught his breath and tried to shift smoothly away, as he’d done every time in the past, but she was too fast for him. She’d found what she sought.

He froze and stepped back. Looking down at her, his face arrested and still, he said nothing.

Victoria’s hands fell to her sides. “So, will you tell me why you wear a vis bulla in your navel? Or will it be more lies and prevarication?”

To his credit, he hesitated for only an instant. “I’m born to wear one just as you are, Victoria.”

Her throat crackled as she swallowed. “You think I’d believe that you—a man who refuses to kill vampires—are a Venator?”

“If you don’t believe me, ask Pesaro. He is well aware of it, as is Wayren.”

It was true then. Max didn’t lie, and Sebastian would know she’d ask him.

Victoria sank down into the chair on which his coat hung. She had so many questions, such a swarm of emotions, that she didn’t know where to begin.

He must have understood, for he stood over her, abashed and sober, so uncharacteristic of the brash Sebastian she knew that Victoria nearly softened. He was like a young boy who’d been discovered swiping biscuits from the kitchen, ashamed and hesitant.

She almost smiled, but her growing disappointment and anger held it back. There were so many thoughts barreling through her mind, so many things that suddenly made sense. But she seized on one. “That was why you never undressed when I…when we—”

“I didn’t want you to know,” he said simply. The fingers of his left hand closed and opened, closed and opened as he looked down at her, still unsure, still caught.

Why? Why would he hide such a thing from her? Then she thought maybe she knew. “Beauregard. He doesn’t know either.”

But Sebastian shook his head, still sober. “He does know, and, as you might imagine, he appreciates the irony of it—the grandson of one of the most powerful undead in Italy is a vampire hunter.”

“You don’t hunt vampires because of him, even though you’re a born Venator?”

“It’s not that simple.” Then, as if shaking off the discomfort of the moment, he bent toward her, resting one hand on each of the chair arms to bring his face closer to hers, a provocative grin lifting his lips. The charmer had returned. “But you need not fear, Victoria, that we’re too closely related by blood to carry on with our…previous activities. The Gardella name hasn’t been part of my mother’s family for centuries, if not longer.” He shifted to one hand, lifting the other to brush it over her cheek. “You and I are only distantly related. And for that I am immensely thankful.”