A Stone-Kissed Sea
Page 19

“Oh, I do.”
He didn’t seem in a hurry to go, so Makeda left Lucien admiring the art she’d hung. It was a personal quirk. A house didn’t feel like home to her unless there were things decorating the walls. In her mother’s house it was family photographs and crosses. In her own house, it was the art collection she’d taken so many years to acquire.
She walked back to the kitchen only to have Lucien appear in the doorway before her.
“Please don’t do that in my home,” she asked. Not prey. You are not prey.
“How do you do that?” Lucien asked.
“Do what?”
“Regulate your heart rate so effectively. You have very few pulse spikes, even during emergency situations like we had with Carmen tonight.”
“Increased heart rate does no one any favors,” Makeda said. “It makes higher brain function less effective. During an emergency I have to think, not revert to primitive impulses like fight or flight. I learned how to control my heart rate during my emergency medicine rotation.”
“And you still use the technique now?”
“I don’t forget lessons.”
“Ever?”
“No,” she said. It wasn’t a point of pride. There were some lessons she’d prefer to forget. “I don’t forget anything.”
Lucien stepped toward her. “What was I wearing the night we met?”
“A black or dark blue dress shirt. It was too dark to tell. And a pair of light brown slacks. They looked a bit like chinos, but with better tailoring. There were three buttons undone, though you normally only unbutton two buttons at work. Perhaps you were trying to subconsciously gauge my reaction to you. Black walking shoes. Black socks.”
“The shirt was blue. So were the shoes and socks. If you were a vampire, you’d have been able to tell the difference.”
“Perhaps. But as I don’t ever want to be a vampire, I’ll have to live with that slight disability.” She paused and tried to remember her manners even if she wanted him gone from her space. His presence was unnerving. “Would you like a glass of wine? I was just about to pour one.”
“Yes.” His answer seemed to surprise him. “I would like some wine. What were you doing tonight? Did I interrupt you?”
“No. I was going to cook and drink. Not very exciting.”
“Who are you cooking for?”
“Myself. And I freeze some for during the week when I don’t want to cook.” She poured two glasses of wine and tried to understand just how Lucien Thrax—a vampire she didn’t particularly like who clearly didn’t like her—had come to be sitting at her bar watching her cook. She pulled out the garlic and onion from the refrigerator, setting them beside the jar of berbere spice and shiro powder.
“You’re making shiro?”
“Yes.” She handed him wine. “You know shiro?”
A smile touched his lips. It was the first time she’d seen a smile from him. “Yes, I know shiro.”
“Clearly, you’ve spent time in Ethiopia if you know Lalibela and shiro.”
He sipped his wine, and Makeda could feel his eyes on her as she worked. “My mother is Ethiopian.”
Makeda glanced up. “Not your human mother.”
“No.” His eyes almost laughed. Almost. “My sire. She lives in the highlands around Chencha.”
“It’s beautiful there.”
“Have you been there?”
Makeda shook her head. “Only seen pictures. My mother and father have friends who live in Arba Minch.”
He paused and took another sip of wine. “Why did they move? Your parents, I mean.”
Makeda looked at him from the corner of her eye. “Academics were not always so welcome.”
“True in too many places,” he muttered. “So you came here?”
“My father had a friend under vampire aegis in Addis Ababa. This friend knew my family wanted to leave—needed to leave—so he wrote to people who might have need of a translator. My father is highly educated in ancient languages. One thing led to another…”
“And he came to work for Katya.”
“Yes.” She poured the chopped onion into a bowl with the garlic. “And he has worked for her ever since then. He’s very loyal.”
“Who was the immortal in Addis?”
“I don’t know.” She wiped her hands on a dish towel. “There are some things a child is not permitted to know. By the time it was appropriate to ask, it didn’t seem important anymore. We’re American, my sisters and me.”
“You’ve never felt the urge to go back?”
A sharp stab of longing. “Of course I have,” she said. “But how could the reality of a country live up to my childhood dreams of it?”
“Maybe it would be better.”
“I doubt it,” Makeda said, reaching for the knife without looking. “That’s why”—she sucked in a breath when she turned and Lucien was standing inches from her, his hand clutching her own—“they’re dreams. What are you doing?”
He held her hand inches from the knife. “You were about to cut yourself.”
She glanced down to see that yes, she’d been careless. The blade was pointing toward her, and her hand was poised to grab the blade and not the handle. “Thank you. I was distracted.”
He didn’t let her hand go. Makeda had the distinct impression she was being analyzed in an entirely unclinical way. Her heartbeat picked up even as she willed her breathing to slow. She tipped her head up and watched Lucien’s eyes.