“That’s nine other people,” Matthew said with a scowl, looking at the guest list. “You promised it was going to be small.”
“Ten, if you include Baldwin.”
Matthew groaned.
“I couldn’t very well leave him out,” I said.
“Fine,” Matthew said hastily, wanting to stem any additional invitations. “When are they all coming?”
Just then a towheaded young man with long, gangly legs and wide shoulders walked in.
“Hi, Mum,” he said. “Hey, Dad.”
“Jack!” I said, surprised. “We didn’t expect you so soon!”
Jack was, in many ways, our first child. Matthew and I had taken him into our household in Elizabethan London, hoping to give him a life that was not filled with terror, homelessness, and hunger. When we left in 1591, I had put him in the care of Andrew Hubbard, who ruled over London’s vampires—then and now. We had not expected to see Jack again, but he had chosen to become a vampire rather than succumb to the plague.
“Something wrong, Jack?” Matthew’s expression registered unease as he picked up on unspoken signals of distress coming from Jack.
“I’m in trouble,” Jack confessed.
The last time Jack had been “in trouble,” he ended up in the newspapers as the mysterious “vampire murderer” who drained his victims of blood before abandoning their corpses.
“Nobody’s dead,” Jack said hastily, guessing the direction of my thoughts. “I was feeding—on Suki, Dad, not some stranger. I took too much blood too quickly and she ended up in hospital. Father Hubbard told me to come straight here.”
Suki was the young woman the family employed to watch over Jack in London and provide him with sustenance when he could no longer make do with animals and bagged human blood. Vampires needed to hunt, and there were humans who were happy to oblige them—for a fee. It was a dangerous business, and one that I thought the Congregation should be regulating. My proposals on the subject had been met with resistance, however.
“Where is Suki now?” Matthew’s mouth was grim.
“Home. Her sister is with her. Father Hubbard said he’ll check on her twice a day.” Jack looked and sounded miserable.
“Oh, Jack.” I wanted to give him a hug and comfort him, but the tension in the air between Matthew and our son made me reconsider wading into something I didn’t fully understand.
“Suki is your responsibility,” Matthew said. “You shouldn’t have left her in that state.”
“Father Hubbard said—”
“I’m not really interested in what Andrew said,” Matthew interrupted. “You know the rules. If you can’t put Suki’s well-being before your own, your relationship will have to end.”
“I know, Dad. But I wasn’t—I’m still not—I don’t even know what happened. One minute I was fine, and then . . .” Jack trailed off. “When I left her with Father Hubbard, I thought I was looking after her.”
“There are no second chances, Jack. Not with blood rage.” Matthew looked regretful. “I’ll settle things with Suki. You won’t have to see her again.”
“Suki didn’t do anything wrong and neither did I!” Jack’s eyes got darker and his tone more defensive in response to Matthew’s disapproval. “This isn’t fair.”
“Life isn’t fair,” Matthew said quietly. “But it is our obligation as vampires to do what we can to take care of creatures who are weaker than we are.”
“What will happen to her now?” Jack asked, miserable.
“Suki will never want for anything. Marcus and the Knights of Lazarus will see to that,” Matthew assured him.
This was the first time I’d heard that some of the brotherhood’s accounts covered payments to humans for services rendered. It was undeniably creepy, but it certainly explained why there weren’t even more sensational stories out there about vampires feeding off warmbloods.
“Let’s get you something to eat,” Matthew said, putting his hand on Jack’s shoulder. “And you’ll want to meet the newest addition to the family.”
“You got Mum a dog?” Jack brightened. He loved his four-legged Komondor companion and was a firm believer that there was no such thing as too many dogs.
“No. The goddess gave Philip a griffin,” Matthew said. “It seems he’s a weaver like his mother.”
Jack didn’t bat an eye at this announcement, but gamely followed Matthew into the kitchen. After he’d had something to drink and we’d caught up on Jack’s less alarming news, we went in search of Agatha, Sarah, and the twins. They had been playing outside in a brightly colored tent that Agatha made by draping old sheets over some chairs. The four of them were huddled inside, playing with every knight, horse, and stuffed animal that could be found.