“I didn’t say for certain that she wasn’t. It’s impossible to know for sure, unless she telepathically communicates with us or she shows off her wicked canines. She wouldn’t answer the telepathic question I put to her. But she did heave that heavy-looking bag over her shoulder as if it weighed nothing,” Stasio said.

  “If she is an assassin or a hunter, she’ll probably call for reinforcements,” Levka said. “She couldn’t hope to take all of us down at once.”

  “More money for her, if she doesn’t call for help.” Stasio hoped the league hadn’t learned of their arrival, and he really hoped they didn’t have to leave this soon. Most of all, he prayed they wouldn’t have to eliminate the girl, if she thought to do that to them. For whatever reason, he was really stuck on her.

  “Or else others are already in place or on their way here. What do you think?” Levka was a born leader and often decided what they would do. They were all just used to it. But sometimes, if he was unsure about a situation, he asked for everyone’s opinion.

  “I would love to stay,” Caitlin said, “but only if it means all of you are safe.”

  Though if Stasio and the other princes were arrested, the league would take Caitlin in also, as one of their partners in crime.

  “If she works for the league, we will know soon enough.” Stasio was disappointed. He thought they would have a chance to stay here a long time before anyone might catch on that they were here.

  “I’m willing to take the risk.” Ruric climbed out of the van.

  “I fear we’re in for real trouble.” Arman followed Ruric out of the vehicle. Of all of them, he was the worrier of the bunch.

  “Okay, everyone remains on high alert,” Levka said. “Stasio, since you’ve already spoken to her, I want you to compel her to do something to learn if she’s human.”

  Not that they themselves weren’t human. The way they liked to look at it was they were enhanced humans with special abilities.

  But he was glad Levka gave him the mission. Stasio also wondered why he hadn’t thought of trying to compel her to do something to prove if she was strictly human or not before. That was even a better way to learn the truth than telepathic communication that she could ignore.

  They headed inside the lobby and Stasio couldn’t believe all the changes the new owners had made.

  “It isn’t so bad,” Ruric reassured him.

  “Has it changed a lot since you were here last?” Caitlin sounded so sympathetic, Stasio appreciated her concern.

  “Some. Though it generally feels the same. I…do feel at home. Except that I would be in charge of everyone on staff here.” Stasio motioned to the staff at the desk. “As soon as we walked in, they would have hurried over to welcome me home and accommodated us immediately.”

  “Because you are a prince and owned the castle. Sure. That must have been cool. What does everyone else think of the changes?” Caitlin asked.

  “It has wonderful improvements,” Ruric said. “Internet connections, Wi-Fi, television, hot showers, bathrooms in each of the rooms.”

  Stasio shook his head. He would never have imagined perfect strangers coming and going in his castle. The check-in counter would never have existed if he’d had any say in it.

  Arman checked them in and handed out room keycards.

  The dark-haired girl had already checked in apparently and left to go to her room.

  “I’ll stay with Caitlin while you all do what you need to—” Levka started to say.

  They saw the girl walking toward the great hall that had been turned into a restaurant.

  “Stasio,” Levka communicated telepathically to the group, “Go eat lunch with her and learn what you can.”

  “Will do.” Stasio hoped that he didn’t look as eager as he felt to learn the truth and headed after her.

  3

  The blond-haired guy was cute, Jasmine thought as she took a seat in the castle restaurant. He was a vampire—which she knew because he’d telepathically communicated with her. His companions were probably vampires too.

  She was ready to take down the next target on her terminal list, most likely tonight or the next night, return to the airport, and be on standby to get a flight out, but right now, she was enjoying being at a castle, her first time ever. Actually, being in Wales was a totally new experience also. Normally, she only took down rogue vampires in New York, so this was a special case where she had been able to track the rogue all the way to Wales and get permission to take him down.

  She couldn’t imagine what it would have been like to live there at the castle when some noble family had ruled over it. Jasmine presumed she would never have been invited to enter the place in ye old days so she was glad it was open for the common folk to enjoy now.

  It was a shame that she finally got to leave New York for a trip across the ocean, and all she was thinking about was returning. Maybe she could take a day to see the sights and then return. She loved that Gareth, her target, had come to this castle to stay and that she was able to also. She was used to having to break into the vampire’s home and eliminate him or her in that way, though sometimes she ended up facing off several vampires at once. Not a great way to take care of one. But at a castle? That was a first time for her.

  What she hadn’t expected was for the teens she’d seen getting the rental van drive from the airport and then went shopping at the same places she went to before they ended up at the castle where she was staying. They must have felt she was stalking them. She felt like a stalker. Even though she didn’t ever mix pleasure with business, she was hoping she would see the cute blond-haired guy again. He had been so polite and so cultured—for someone his age, which was another reason she knew he was a vampire. But also, he’d telepathically spoken to her and that had cinched the deal.

  Then she saw her target: a dark-haired teen, hundreds of years old. His blue eyes widened as he stared in the direction of the entryway. She turned to see who it was and saw the blond-haired guy entering the restaurant, his gaze sweeping the room—until he saw her. And he smiled. He had the most charming and interested smile she’d ever seen in a guy.

  He waved the hostess away and headed straight for Jasmine's table. He was confident and knew just what he wanted, if nothing else. Maybe he would be a good cover for her as she attempted to take down Gareth, her target on her terminal list. Gareth slipped into a booth across the restaurant from where she was sitting.

  "Are you alone?" the blond guy asked her.

  "Like before." She didn’t smile. She didn’t want to appear…easy to manipulate.

  He smiled and motioned to her table. "Would you mind some company?"

  "What about your friends?" Jasmine arched a brow. The four men and one woman looked like they were close friends.

  "They weren't hungry yet and are getting settled into their rooms. I'm Stasio, by the way." He was still standing, waiting for her to ask him to join her.

  "Jasmine," she said, not bothering with a last name either. “You’re hungry, I gather.”

  “Ravenous.”

  She motioned to the seat across from her. “Join me then.”

  He quickly took his seat as if he was afraid that she might change her mind and take the offer to join her back.

  The waitress came and took their drink order—glasses of water—and left menus with them.

  “Since you’re so ravenous, what are you having?” Jasmine studied his aristocratic features. Stasio looked like someone who belonged here. He had an accent that sounded similar to some of the friendly Welsh people she’d spoken to at the airport. She figured she looked like someone who did not belong here—a tourist.

  He was still looking at the menu, then closed it. “Prime rib, baked potato, and broccoli.”

  “Hmm.” She read over the description. That sounded good to her. “Are you paying?” Jasmine earned good money as a rogue vampire assassin. She didn’t need anyone buying her meals, which was just the way she liked it. Normally. But she wouldn’t turn him down, if he chose to pay for her meal. Then it would look like they were really together, if Gareth should see her sitting with Stasio. Besides, she liked it when the guy paid for her meals as long as he didn’t automatically believe he got anything else out of the deal.

  “I thought you were the kind of girl who would insist on paying for her own meal, no strings attached.” Stasio cast her a hint of a smile.

  “If you paid for my meal, would there be strings attached?” She liked his humorous banter.

  Stasio imparted the most devilishly, wicked smile with her.

  “I’ll bite.” She hadn’t lived this long not to want to play with a vampire who appeared to be her age. “I’ll have the prime rib too.” She waved her menu to catch the waiter’s attention. Once she’d decided something, she was ready to get it done.

  Stasio settled back against his bench seat, studying her, while she was glancing around at the tapestries of knights fighting knights on horseback, great battlefields in the surrounding lands, and shields and swords decorating the restaurant walls.

  Once they gave the waiter their orders, Jasmine figured she had to pretend to take an interest in Stasio, partly because he seemed to be a decent guy and was buying her meal, but she needed to watch Gareth and not tip her hand so if he saw her, she would have to make this look good.

  Stasio’s cell phone jiggled, and she smiled and shook her head. Was it his girlfriend checking up on him? What would she think if he was buying another girl a first-rate meal?

  Stasio glanced at the phone, then said to her, “Excuse me for a second.” Then he said to whoever was on the phone, “I’m busy. I’ll text you.”

  Too bad. Jasmine was curious as to who it was and what she, or he, wanted.

  Jasmine sipped from her water and took a look in the direction of Gareth. His back was to her where he was sitting way across the restaurant, but even so, she knew he was a real danger to humans and vampires alike. Despite having been turned by the Black Death, which changed their lives forever, they had learned to cope with what they were. There wasn’t any reason for their kind to kill like they did when they first had been turned and didn’t have any other way to maintain their strength. They couldn’t die if they didn’t have blood. They would just wither away until they were emaciated. But once they had blood in their system again, their cells would inflate with the precious life source, and they would look just like they would normally.

  “Sorry.” Stasio tucked his phone in his pocket. “My friend’s girlfriend was asking what I had ordered for dinner.”

  Jasmine listened to his heart rate to monitor it to see if it had accelerated, indicating he’d told her a falsehood. But he hadn’t.

  “Where are you from? You sound like you’re American. New York, maybe?”

  “Upstate New York. What about you?” She had to admit thought she detected a Welsh accent, he had—maybe a Texas twang? Maybe a little Floridian in there? She just wasn’t sure.

  “All over.”

  Okay, that would make sense. He’d traveled some, probably had lived in different places for decades and would pick up new accents. “Where, most recently?”

  “Florida.”

  Again, not a lie. Her distrust of anyone was a hazard of the business she was in. She hated that part of the job, though it paid well, and she knew she was doing a great service for both humans and vampires alike. Some leagues didn’t like to police their own kind; some preferred hunters to terminate the rogue vampires. The hunters had been changed like they had, but didn’t have the whole drinking-the-blood issue—and most vampires didn’t care for them as a whole. Not when they could end up on one of their target lists, and who was to say the hunters didn’t make mistakes? Still, it was their calling. Some vampire advocacy groups were calling for a change in the ways things had been done for centuries. Specifically, vampire assassins would be hired to take out the vampire rogues. Let the hunters deal with their own rogues.

  Not that the hunters were in agreement. Sure, they would take care of their own, when it suited them. But if they didn’t have contracts to terminate rogue vampires, what else would they do?

  “Are you in college?” Stasio asked. “Or do you work at something?”

  He would laugh if she told him what she really did. “I’m independently wealthy, good with investments.” His eyes widened almost imperceptibly. That gave her pause. Maybe he liked that she was wealthy. That he thought he’d hit the jackpot with meeting her. She shrugged. “I’m still trying to decide what to do with my life when I grow up. What about you?”

  “Same.”

  She frowned at him, then sipped her water, her whole body chilling a bit. He hadn’t lied, yet she was disturbed by his response. His comment was a typical response from a vampire, who hadn’t established a better alibi. She realized her mistake. As a vampire, he could have regulated his heartbeat so that he didn’t appear to be lying to her. That sure changed things between them. Then the thought occurred to her. What if he and his friends were vampire assassins too? He said he moved all over. Often, they did, looking for new contracts, looking to end a rogue vampire’s existence.

  She sure didn’t need any competition. Gareth was her job. She was certain Stasio was Welsh, or had lived there some time ago, and so he could very well have gotten a contract locally to take Gareth down, even though he said he’d been in Florida most recently. That could be his cover.

  “So you’re here just to see the sights?” Stasio asked.

  “Yeah. I’ve never been to Wales before. What about you?”

  “Me too. First time for everything.”

  Again, she was sure he wasn’t telling the truth. His heart rate was calm and consistent with speaking the truth, but his slight Welsh accent was telling her a whole other story.

  Their meals were served then, and they ate mostly in silence. She was glad she could still enjoy meals and make it appear she was still human. Especially around vampires on her target list.

  Stasio couldn’t believe that his cousin Gareth was here. The guy was a total screw-up, furious still that he was a vampire and not a hunter, even after all these years. If he was on anyone’s terminal list—which, knowing him, he could very well be—that meant a hunter or vampire assassin could be looking for him also. That’s all they needed—was for one to be after Gareth and find Stasio and the rest of his friends here.

  Stasio wasn’t surprised Caitlin had called him on his cell phone though. She was trying to get the word to him without telepathically communicating it to him. He would have to remind her to text messages because a vampire close by could hear both their voices on a cell phone.

  Gareth was as bold as they were for staying at Stasio’s castle. Unless he was just passing through. He used to live here too, with two of his brothers, but they’d become hunters and hadn’t been turned into vampires like Gareth had. Which had instantly put them on opposing sides of the battlefield.

  Not too many knew they were brothers, Gareth being the youngest. They’d kept their distance from him all these years and Stasio knew that had to hurt. Stasio figured that was why Gareth kept getting into trouble. Stasio wondered if Gareth’s hunter brothers ever thought about him. Stasio knew Gareth thought about them. He’d been close to them before the Black Death had taken its toll.

  Stasio finished his medium rare prime rib and sat back in his seat. Jasmine was still working on hers. It was just as rare as his. Not that humans didn’t eat their meat that way too, but it just made him consider that she wasn’t strictly human.

  “You sure put that meal away fast,” Jasmine said.

  “Yeah. It’s a bad habit. I’m always eating on the run, so I have to do so quickly. Do you like the prime rib?”

  “Hmm, yeah, and being that it’s free, it’s even better.”

  He smiled, thinking about the strings-attached comment. He really would like to take her out, to show her the countryside, but not if she was a vampire. Not that he wouldn’t love to have a vampire girlfriend, but being on the run all the time made that difficult. He certainly didn’t want to get a girlfriend into the same mess he was in.

  “Maybe you would like to take in some sights with me,” he ventured. Okay, so her comment about being independently wealthy was a vampire saying, though some humans actually were. He couldn’t assume she was a vampire for sure. He’d been listening to her heartbeat, every time she’d answered his questions, and not once had it accelerated. Which meant she could be controlling it, like he was controlling his. The only time hers had increased rapidly was when he’d said he had the same kind of income.

  When he’d finished texting Caitlin back, he’d noticed Jasmine was looking at a place behind him. He’d caught her glancing in that direction a few times. Nowhere else, as if she was watching someone. He didn’t want to make it obvious that he had noticed, so he didn’t want to look over his shoulder to see what had stolen her attention from time-to-time.

  She finished her baked potato and was about to take a stab at her broccoli, saying, “Sightseeing? No, I don’t have the—” Her gaze rivetted to the same place behind Stasio, and he fought looking over his shoulder to see what the matter was.

  Her heartrate had accelerated, and she quickly set her fork down on the plate. “I hadn’t realized how late it was.”

  “You haven’t looked at a watch.”

  She pointed to the wall behind him. “Beautiful grandfather clock.”

  He glanced over his shoulder and saw the clock his grandfather had purchased centuries ago. Stasio was glad it was still there.

  “Sorry. Thanks so much for dinner, but I’ve got to go.”

  He stood, trying to use his human movement, rather than his much speedier vampire movement, and cupped her face before he kissed her. It was a sweet kiss, yet he felt his blood stirring for more, and both their hearts were pounding.

  When he released her, her cheeks were full of color. “No strings attached. Truly. Enjoy your stay in Wales,” he said.

  She just stared at him, as if she’d forgotten her urgent mission.