Part 14 (1/2)
”C'mon, Lys. You always tell me your secrets. I never spill them to Marius.”
Elysia winced at the mention of their older brother. The last thing she needed was for Marius to find out about the flowers. Not that Colin would tell. She always confided in him and he always kept it to himself. If not for Colin, she probably would have died of stress years ago. She had difficulty keeping her emotions bottled up inside her. This time, what bothered her was something Marius would want to know... and exploit. And since it was something intensely personal, Elysia didn't want Marius to have even the tiniest inkling.
”Lock the door,” she muttered grimly, turning the small cream-colored envelope over in her hands. She recognized the florist. They were the best in the county. ”I can't have Marius walk in on this conversation.” Colin shot out of his chair with lightning fast reflexes that were a blur to human eyes.
Fortunately, Elysia was no more human than Colin. In the blink of an eye, he returned to his chair, his mouth quirked in a grin that showed off the white points of his fangs. He must really be excited to hear her gossip if his fangs were out.
”So where were you last night?” he asked. ”Is it related to the flowers?”
Elysia nodded. ”I went to the Undertaker's Ball.”
Colin's dark blue eyes widened. ”You're s.h.i.+tting me. You really went to that thing?”
She sighed and ran a hand through her long honey blonde hair. ”Yes. Marius bugged me about it for a solid week. I agreed to go just to get him off my back. I don't know why he couldn't have sent you. I'm sure you would have enjoyed it much more than me. You like dressing up on Halloween.”
Colin laughed. ”Of course, I do. I find it ironic to dress as Dracula or Nosferatu on Halloween.
Last night, I did Nosferatu. I was scarier than Max Schreck, but that skull cap thing itched. And I had trouble getting the makeup off.”
Elysia c.o.c.ked an eyebrow up as her brother ruffled his dark blonde curls. She noticed tiny little bits of latex and glue in his hairline along with faint smudges of grey white makeup. ”You've still got some on your face. Go upstairs and use that stuff Callie has in the prep room,” she said.
”That will take it off.”
Colin nodded absently, his envious eyes on her coffee cup. ”Yeah, I planned on it, but I had to stop here first to find out where you disappeared to last night. It's not like you to miss my Halloween party.” He shook his head. ”I can't believe you went to the Undertaker's Ball. For one, it's an industry thing. You don't like industry events. For another, I can't believe you caved in to Marius. You never do.”
”I know. I know. Believe me; I hadn't intended to give in.” Elysia sat back in her chair, placing her hands flat on the leather blotter on her desk. She stared at her long fingers for a moment, their plain unadorned expanse, short oval nails, uncolored, unexciting... except that last night they had been excited... in a frenzy of touching...
She jerked her mind away from those thoughts and looked up, meeting her brother's eyes.
”Declan Antaeus was there.” She said the words casually and watched her brother's eyes widen.
”Really?” Colin sat forward a little. ”Did he talk to you about business? Marius said he's been angling for a meeting for six months.”
”We didn't talk about work much,” she mumbled, thinking they hadn't talked much at all.
”So what did you go as?”
Elysia rolled her eyes. ”Elvira. I know, I know. Predictable and boring, but you should have seen Declan. He was worse.”
Colin began to laugh. ”Oh, no. He didn't. Tell me he didn't.”
Elysia nodded. ”He did. It was an obvious choice for a man of his height, but still, coming as the Grim Reaper was totally predictable and dull.” She smiled at her brother as she recalled Declan stalking through the crowds dressed in the long black robe. ”He was the only Reaper too.”
Colin snorted derisively. ”Of course. Everyone else had more creative costumes, didn't they?” ”Yes. He and I were probably the most boring costumes there, barring Alfred in a white sheet,” she told him with a reminiscent smile.
”You're kidding. Alfred Stone wore a white sheet?” Colin's eyes danced with laughter at the thought of the head of the Funeral Director's Guild dressed as a ghost in a plain white sheet.
”He did. And he had that same s.h.i.+ny black suit on underneath. You know, the one you call his undertaker's suit.”
The two of them laughed at the old-fas.h.i.+oned way of dressing that Alfred Stone of Stone Mortuary Services had cultivated. Alfred was a techie. He loved all things technology based, but when it came to clothes, he always looked like an undertaker from 1900. Elysia usually loved talking to Alfred because she was the computer geek at Granville Cemetery and they had a lot in common. However, she didn't like industry events. At least, not since she'd been rather spectacularly dumped by Alfred's brother Austin at the Darkworld's annual Funeral Director's convention three years ago. That experience taught her that the immortal world was just as hungry for gossip as the human world. Their hunger meant no one ever forgot the most humiliating and painful moment of her life.
Colin let out a sigh, his eyes meeting Elysia's. ”So the tulips are from Declan Antaeus?”
”I think so.” She opened the card that lay on her desk.
You are so much more beautiful than these flowers, but the texture of their petals reminded me of your skin. Dinner tonight? You and me and that gorgeous skin of yours...
I'll call you.
Declan Elysia sucked in a shaky breath. The man definitely had a way with words. Her heart pounded so hard that she wondered if Colin could hear it.
He stared at her with an arrested expression. ”Holy s.h.i.+t, Lys. Don't tell me you slept with Declan Antaeus!” he said in a low, astonished voice.
Her lips tightened in annoyance. ”Okay, I won't.”
Colin flopped back in his chair, his expression concerned. ”What possessed you to do such a thing?”
”Oh, I dunno, Colin. Hormones?” she quipped, her words just a touch angry. Her irritation grew. Colin acted as if she'd done something completely out of character. Declan Antaeus wasn't the first man she'd had a one night stand with, and he probably wouldn't be the last either.
Although, as far as Colin knew, he was the first man she'd been with since Austin had dumped her three years before. Maybe that was what had Colin's briefs in a bunch. Luckily, the two other quick encounters she'd had in the last year hadn't been with anyone her brothers knew. ”Declan is a good looking man,” she admitted with a nonchalant shrug.
”He's a freaking s.h.i.+fter, Lys. A dragon. Not one of us.” Colin's words were exasperated.
She gave him a sour look from her violet eyes. ”I never realized what a prejudiced sn.o.b you are,” she said stiffly, still wondering where her brother's weird att.i.tude came from. She'd never noticed that he disliked dragons before. Colin ran a hand through his hair, ruffling the golden curls. ”I'm not! I swear I'm not. It's just that Marius has this f.u.c.ked up notion that the reason Declan wants to meet with him is that Antaeus International intends to suck us up.”
Elysia's eyes widened in surprise. Antaeus International was a huge conglomerate. They bought all of the little mom and pop mortuary and cemetery operations they could get their hands on. Afterward, they turned them all into highly profitable cremation based ventures.
Granville Cemetery was very old and catered to the elite in the vampire world. They offered cremation, but vampires tended to not go that route. There was something about being reduced to a pile of ash that vamps didn't care for. They were influenced by too many cheesy movies about the undead, Elysia thought wryly.
”So Marius thinks AI is after us?” she asked aloud.
Colin nodded. ”He said the only reason Declan would want a meeting is because AI wants to buy us out.”
Her brother frowned ferociously. Obviously, Colin didn't favor the idea of being bought out.
She didn't either, but unlike Colin, who rarely stuck his head into anything related to financials, she knew that the company's fiscal strength would withstand any buyout attempt by AI. However, she now wondered if Declan's plans for Granville Cemetery had fueled his easy acquiescence to her come on last night. She bit her lip.
Colin, seeing her expression and knowing her better than anyone, leaned forward and grabbed her hand. ”I'm sure that's not why he slept with you, Lys,” he said gently. ”Every man in the Funeral Director's Guild, married or single or gay, wants to f.u.c.k you.”
Elysia smiled. Colin exaggerated, but not by much unfortunately. It was one of the reasons Marius dealt with industry stuff instead of her, even though finance was her area. The fact that men didn't take her business ac.u.men seriously had always been annoying in the past. For some reason, last night at the Undertaker's Ball, she just hadn't cared. She'd wanted to find someone who could take away the ache in her gut and Declan Antaeus fit the bill perfectly. Now, however, she had to figure out what to do about him. Obviously, he wanted to continue on from where they'd left off, but Elysia just wanted to forget it happened.
”It's hard to fake a hard on,” she joked. ”I'm pretty sure he wasn't thinking about mergers last night.”
Colin let go of her hand and sat back, looking at the tulips. ”Did you go to his place?”