“Madame,” he said, his voice rumbling and powerful. “I am sorry to learn of your circumstances. You will be safe here until we can arrange for your passage home.”

“Home,” she repeated softly. Her brothers were the only home she had. Their parents had made them immortal and then turned on them, believing that their own children had become monsters—that saving their lives had been a terrible mistake. What kind of home could she build with that shadow constantly hovering over her? In truth, she was even more adrift than the character she was playing for the captain.

“We will search for your family and your late husband’s,” he clarified. “Or we will find something else. Please don’t worry about all that now—you have already been through so much this evening.”

“Thank you,” Rebekah said.

He smiled again, as if weapons and death didn’t surround them, but his eyes flickered to her hands as if he was looking for something—and then she realized that she had forgotten to take that damned woman’s wedding ring, and her daylight ring sat on her right index finger. The ring allowed her to be in sunlight, and she dared not take it off even though the sun was already beginning to dip below the horizon. She chided herself for being so careless, and hoped that no one would wonder that bandits had left such a striking gem on her hand. “My name is Captain Moquet,” he told her. “But call me Eric. Do you mind if I ask you a few questions about your attackers? I think that they have stolen your ring?”

“Yes,” Rebekah replied with deliberate eagerness. “I feel so strange to suddenly be without it.”

“I understand, Madame,” Eric assured her with such conviction that she wondered if she had inadvertently compelled him without realizing it. Then his hazel eyes turned to the dead wagoner, and every trace of softness—everything human—disappeared from his face.

He approached the corpse, and the soldiers stepped back. He leaned down, his long fingers tracing the wounds Rebekah had inflicted without quite touching them. “Bandits, you said?” he asked, pointing toward the short blond soldier without looking away from the dead body.

A few of the men glanced nervously at Rebekah and then away again. Some shifted uncomfortably. She had heard one of the men refer to him as “the new captain.” How well did he know his new post? She decided it was best for her to say nothing and wait.

“No,” Eric said at last, bringing one fingertip down on the edge of the long slash across the dead man’s throat. “The marks are almost hidden, but they are here. This is not the work of any man.” He looked up finally, his eyes burning into Rebekah’s so deeply that she couldn’t possibly look away. When he spoke again, it was as if the words were meant only for her. “There are unnatural and cursed things in those woods. You were lucky to escape with your life.”

CHAPTER FOUR

KLAUS MOVED ACROSS the cobblestones, grimacing at the chattering roar of hooves and carts passing by. When the Mikaelsons had arrived in New Orleans, there had been nothing except dirt tracks, but civilization had not left their grimy little French outpost alone. In addition to the elegant manor houses and villas that seemed to spring up like weeds, there was now a bona fide town center, with cobblers, jewelers, a surprisingly up-to-date milliner, and a few taverns.

Progress marched onward, Klaus supposed philosophically, but not everything was an improvement...especially not after the dizzying, skull-shattering night he had just spent on the town. New Orleans may have grown more sophisticated, but its whores were just as raunchy and wild as they had ever been. And the brand of whiskey served at Klaus’s favorite brothel, the Southern Spot, was almost enough to drive the residue of discontent from Klaus’s tongue. Almost.

There had come a point when he could no longer see her glittering black eyes, when her mocking smile no longer broke in on his every thought. But, to his intoxicated vision, every neck he had tenderly bitten had looked like her slender and marble-white throat; every drop of blood had tasted of her. Niklaus drank because oblivion could not come too soon and, given his headache this morning, it had probably come far too late.

The sun was high and the locals were bustling. He kept reflexively touching the daylight ring on his finger, willing it to somehow work more. Everything was too bright and too loud—until suddenly it was perfect. He didn’t need to glimpse more than the merest sliver of her profile to know who it was. With the way she fit into her white muslin dress, she might as well have been created with Klaus alone in mind.

Her. She glowed; she pulled the light in. It was as if he’d made her appear. No matter what people whispered about the cursed fate of vampires, at that moment, he felt positively blessed.

Luckiest of all, she was unchaperoned. Vivianne stood alone at the side of the high street, gazing into the window of a couturier, who boasted of having just arrived from Paris. There was no one to interfere in their conversation, unlike at that miserable engagement party.

Klaus took a moment to brush off his coat and smooth the collar of his loose white shirt. She didn’t need to know how he’d spent the night. As he approached her, he could feel the whiskey mixing treacherously with the blood in his stomach, but he would have bet his never-ending life that she would not be able to tell how deeply their first meeting had shaken him.

“Mademoiselle Lescheres,” he purred, trying to keep his voice from rasping. His throat felt sore and hoarse, which was hard to understand given how many hours he’d spent lubricating it with food and drink. “You are even more radiant in the sunlight than by chandelier.”

She did not bother to conceal her shock at the sight of him, but it was unclear how happy the surprise was. “Niklaus Mikaelson,” she said formally, as if demonstrating a true society girl’s gift for memory. As if he’d made no real impression on her at all. “I would not have thought to encounter you here so early in the day.”

Because sunlight was poison to his kind? Or because she could see the previous night’s excesses written on his face? Knowing that she had bluffed her way politely through several dances without mentioning the blood on his mouth, it was difficult to guess what else she might choose to leave unspoken.

He felt an almost overpowering need to check his coat for telltale stains or tearing.

“My lady Vivianne,” he replied instead, with what he knew was a winning smile, “had I known that you would be here, I would have arrived even earlier so as not to miss a moment of your company.”

Her answering smile was perfunctory, but she seemed distracted. A cart piled high with crates of produce rattled by, and she watched it go as if even carrots were more interesting than Klaus Mikaelson. “That would have been unnecessary,” she explained in a clipped tone, “as recently I can’t seem to turn around without meeting you.”

Impossibly, she didn’t sound pleased by this coincidence. Had his first impression on her really been so unremarkable? It was understandable that the sight of blood might upset a young woman. But in Klaus’s considerable experience with women, upsetting them did not tend to make them any less intrigued. Yet Vivianne’s face showed no fear, no disgust, no curiosity. Could it be that he was drawn to her because of her disinterest?

He ached to gently brush back a tendril of black hair that had snaked free from under her cap and coiled along her collarbone. Then, perhaps, to throw an arm around her narrow waist, pull her to him, and kiss her. And maybe bite her, just a little, as well. Surely she would have to feel some real emotion toward him then.

“Speaking of unexpected pleasures,” he recalled, “I have not yet had the opportunity to congratulate you on your engagement. You must be deliriously happy.”