Page 98 of Blood Stone

“Winter’s people. The Curandero.”

Patrick leaned forward to look around Nial to her. “I thought you didn’t know what you were?”

“Not anymore,” Sebastian answered.

Garrett stretched out his long legs. “I believe Winter is still figuring out if the answer has made her any happier or not.”

Winter shot him a glance. Garrett had seen a lot for a man who had been so wrapped up in his own miseries, lately.

She pressed her bowl into the sand so it was stable, and walked around the group to meet the pair walking toward them. “Vicent, you’ve returned. And with a friend. I thought you had no friends.”

He blinked. “I do not.”

Winter looked at the woman. “Then this is a relative of yours?” She smiled at the woman. “Hi. I’m Winter.”

The woman’s smile was warm and friendly. “I am Iona, Winter. Vicent thought you might find your lessons easier to absorb if they came from one such as myself. I am considered to be more flexible-minded than some Curandero. Vicent…is very old. He has trouble adjusting, at times. He was disturbed by what your husband told him, even though he faithfully reported it all back to us.” Iona’s smile grew. “I, on the other hand, found it very interesting indeed. I can see the…possibilities.”

“I’m sure Nial will be pleased to hear that.”

“Vicent wishes to speak with your husbands and the other vampires, if you will permit it.”

“Of course. But you are not to harm them, or wipe their memories.”

“You are very kind,” Vicent said. He moved past her, heading for the group ranged on the sand.

Iona’s eyes twinkled with good cheer. “He means you aretookind. Removing memories of us is as automatic as breathing. We’ve been doing it for as long as we remember.”

Winter side-stepped that. “When do you want to start these lessons you mentioned?”

“We just started,” Iona replied. “You have much to learn about the ways of the Curandero.”

“So do you,” Winter said. “It’s about to be a brave new world. I’ve got as much to teach you about living in it as you have to teach me.”

* * * * *

Garrett appeared barely three minutes after Kate sent the tweet, a silent tall shape moving through the dark that had fallen over the set.

“You said you needed me?” His tone was neutral, even wary.

She stood up. The chair was incredibly uncomfortable, but after a hundred years of tradition, no one was about to change the design now. “Adrian is totally pissed at me.”

“I’m sorry.” He sounded like he meant it, too.

“That just puts him in agreement with everyone on the set,” she added.

Garrett cleared his throat.

“Everyone but you.”

Silence. Far away, she could hear people talking. Laughing softly among themselves.

“It took me a few minutes to clear my head and really start thinking,” she said. “Adrian being angry and him being pissed atmewere two novel concepts that blurred my focus. And I did the female thing and stamped my foot right back at him, so I had to take time out to calm down, too.”

“Kate, this has nothing to do—”

“You phoned him.”

Garrett sighed.