Page 77 of Be Still My Unbeating Heart

“I think it was the mayor’s husband.”

“Her husband is a vampire?” Whitby spat. “That actually makes a lot of sense.”

Bastian soothed De Luca’s shoulder. “She said she wanted me to meet him. Maybe she thought we’d have something in common. I suppose we have an idea why she wants L.O.V.E. to be a thing in Vernazza. It’d certainly make it easier for her if vampires were accepted here.”

“Where—” De Luca said, his gaze rolling to the bedroom door, and Bastian understood what he was asking.

“He ran. Or scurried. He’s gone. I think—”

Screams.

Horror-stricken screams came from below their feet.

“The vampire isn’t gone,” Whitby said.

“Downstairs,” De Luca grunted. “Gala.”

Whitby scampered to the door. “We have to help them! There’ll be a massacre!”

“But De Luca,” Bastian said.

“I’m…fine…”

“Yes, you arevery fine, but you’re currently hurt, as well.”

“Just help me—” De Luca winced as he used Bastian’s arm to try to pull himself up from the floor, but he was too weak to support himself.

More shrieks echoed up through the floorboards, and Bastian knew he couldn’t waste another moment. He checked De Luca’swounds—still bleeding, but less so, more of a trickle now than a flow. Good thing, because he needed to get De Luca moving. No way was Bastian leaving him up there alone. What if the vampire circled back to finish him off?

He put De Luca’s left arm around his shoulder, then slipped his own arm around De Luca’s waist and lifted him up. The inspector weighed so little. Bastian hugged him to his side, and the inspector’s feet swung freely as Bastian crossed the room and went into the hall.

“Strong…” De Luca said.

Bastian clucked with amusement. “You’ve barely eaten a thing all day. A toddler could pick you up.”

Whitby led the way back downstairs, her body low to the floor, tail curled between her legs. The screams grew louder, more frenzied with each passing second, and Bastian shuddered at the knowledge of just how close De Luca had come to death.

The rage pounded in his temples, fainter than before, but still there. It surprised him, that he could still feel anger like it. He had thought he had got a handle on the flare-ups. He tried not to think about the real reason for it. He got angry because De Luca was hurt. That was all.

The main room was in chaos. People ran, tripped, and howled as they attempted to escape the ballroom, eyes panic-glazed, masks slipping.

“Wait here,” Bastian said, leaning De Luca against the ballroom door.

“What are you…”

“No time, love.”

Bastian sped into the ballroom, pushing against the tide of people going in the opposite direction.

He scanned the room for the vampire, seeing only guestsscrabbling to get free. Some were even making a bid for freedom through the windows.

Then, as the room cleared, he saw a different kind of movement.

Legs twitched against the polished floor. A person was laid out on their back at the center of the ballroom, a skeletal form hunched over them. The vampire had caught a man.

Bastian heard the ravenous gulping, the slowing of a heartbeat, and he smelled fear. Sweaty, heavy and thick with death.

He seized the vampire’s shirt collar and dragged him away from his victim. The vampire mewed and struggled, swiping the air with sharp claws. Bastian refused to let go, but then the shirt tore, and the man was free. A second later, he was in the chandelier, clinging to the glittering crystal like a spider in a web.