Page 47 of Bewitched By a Vampire

Night liked a little chaos now and then.

He opened the cupboard beside the appliance, where Bastian usually kept his cooler.

It was gone.

He found a used glass in the sink and an empty canister in the rack beside it too.

His brother had been here.

Recently if Night had to guess. Bastian didn’t have servants at his apartment, but he did employ a cleaning service run by and for vampires. They came every week without fail, whether Bastian was here or not, meaning Bastian had been here this week, between their scheduled visits.

He stalked through the living room, the sound of his shoes striking the wooden floor loud in his ears as he headed for the bedroom. The panorama beyond the wall of glass to his right drew his eye to it. It had taken him over an hour to get to Bastian’s apartment. If he couldn’t find him here, then he would have to check elsewhere for him before he could return to the mansion.

To Lilian.

In only seven hours, the sun would rise, forcing him into hiding for the day.

Gods, he couldn’t bear the thought of leaving her alone that long.

The soft part of him he had shut down and killed had resurrected itself during his drive to London, coming back with a vengeance and possibly stronger than before. He had been ready to let her leave, but now he wasn’t willing to allow it. He needed to find his brother and get back to her, before she disappeared forever.

He reached Bastian’s bedroom, where his brother had carried the black and gold theme through from the rest of the apartment. Gold material formed the canopy of the black four-poster bed that stood against the wall to Night’s left, facing another bank of windows.

For a vampire, Bastian had a lot of windows.

He froze as his eyes landed on the built-in wardrobes beyond the bed.

One of the doors was ajar.

He strode to it and opened it, and frowned.

His brother had definitely been here, and judging by the fact half of his clothes were gone, he had received Night’s messages and left.

Night reached for his phone and pulled it from his pocket. He hadn’t checked it since he had messaged his brother back at the mansion. He woke the screen.

And growled.

A message from Bastian stared back at him.

His brother had been in Geneva until this evening and had only just seen his messages. He had packed and left immediately, and was now asking Night to meet him at London City airport as he had the private jet fuelling up to take the two of them to Norway.

Thetwoof them.

The urge to hurl his phone across the room was strong, but Night mastered it and fired back a message.

Send it back for me. Something I need to do first.

Namely, get Lilian.

He had just enough time to get to his apartment and get his things, and then return to her and drive to the airport before dawn. They would have to wait for the jet to return, but Bastian’s hangar had a secure room where the sun wouldn’t be a danger and they could wait out the day.

Night used all his preternatural speed to get back down to the parking garage, feeling as if he was racing against the clock now. He couldn’t believe his brother had decided to just leave without making arrangements for his staff.

No, he could.

Bastian probably viewed them as expendable. As long as he and his family were safe, everything was all right.

There was nothing expendable about Lilian.