The Mammoth Book of Vampire Romance 2 by Trisha Telep

Author:Trisha Telep
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
ISBN: 9780762437962
Publisher: Running Press
Published: 2009-09-21T22:00:00+00:00

Crimson Kisses

Diane Whiteside

Annapolis, Maryland, 31 December 1865

“May I have your blessing upon our marriage, sir?” Edmund Devereaux injected a coaxing tone into his request, rife with hope and a nervous suitor’s eagerness.

Silence echoed on the other side of the room, bitterly suspicious. The room was like a banker’s boardroom rather than a relaxed family parlour.

For the first time during Edward’s long-rehearsed speech, terror pricked Sarah’s spine and her smile thinned. Was Edmund’s request more than her father was able to grant? Certainly not. Besides, he’d given his word to listen and Edmund, normally so cavalier towards the opinions of others, was trying very hard to be humble on this all-important occasion.

They stood in the library, the very heart of her father’s power at the family plantation outside Maryland’s capital. A single chandelier focused all attention on her father – the great estate’s lord – where he sat enthroned behind the immense desk, its mahogany gleaming like old blood from decades of polishing. Inlays of ebony and swirls of brass accented more mahogany climbing the walls to meet the enormous collection of medieval daggers, their blades a veiled warning.

The gaslight from the library’s chandelier lovingly burnished her lover’s dark hair and lit flames in his blue eyes until he seemed an angel come to earth. Tonight he wore American-made evening dress, not his native London-made clothes, and he stood before her father’s desk as politely – if not quite as meekly – as a political crony, come to buy a favour from Maryland’s mightiest broker of votes.

Only an expert eye could have discerned the knife hidden up Edmund’s sleeve and George Calvert, her father, had always hired that type of skill.

Sarah tilted her chin just a fraction higher, denying the demons of fear and doubt. She smiled at her lover even more warmly, to deliberately, silently, unite his request with hers. The crystalline music of a Chopin waltz whispered through the door, inviting them to better places.

“No,” said the Calvert patriarch and folded his arms across his chest, arrogant with an assurance that came from generations of never losing a serious fight. “My daughter is far too young to settle down.”

She gaped at him, unable to speak. He regularly lied in political circles but he’d never reversed a family pledge before, let alone one given as recently as a few months ago.

“You promised us last spring, sir, that if we waited until after Christmas,” Edmund began, diplomacy shading into anger in his deep voice.

“I said I would consider your suit.” Her father’s thick beard folded over his crisp shirtfront like a pagan sanctuary’s veil, concealing wisdom only its initiates cared about. “She has seen too little of the world to know her own mind.”

“I am nineteen, sir.” Sarah forced herself back from an angry retort. “By the laws of this state, that is more than old enough.”

“You asked for my permission and I will not give it. More than that, I insist on protecting my daughter from a misalliance with an older man.

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