Page 4 of Dawn Caravan
She was gone.
“Sir?”
Ben looked up to see the server standing next to him. He gestured to the woman next to him. “She needs tea.”
“Of course.” The server held out a tray. “The lady left this for you.”
A cream-colored linen envelope sat on the tray. On the front was written a single name.
Vecchio. Not Rios, the name he was currently traveling under.
Ben snatched the envelope from the tray. “Thank you.” He unfolded his legs and rose to his feet. “I’m finished here,” he said to the woman. “Have a good night.”
“You’re leaving?”
Ben walked away without answering, the letter burning his fingers. He walked to the center of the courtyard where the fire was burning and opened it. Three words were written in the center of the page in thick blue ink.
Answer your mail.
No name. No address. No way of contacting the sender.
Ben read it again, looked at the paper through the light of the fire, and held it up to the heat, feeling a surge of satisfaction when the fire revealed a hidden message.
Seriously, Mr. Vecchio. Answer your fucking mail.
A smile threatened the corner of his mouth. He looked at the handwriting and committed it to memory, then threw the envelope and the letter into the fire.
* * *
“Cara,what’s the time in New York?”
He didn’t need to shout for his digital assistant to hear him. Cara was an artificial intelligence program designed for vampires who couldn’t use more delicate human technology without shorting it out.
“It is 12:46 in the afternoon,” Cara said.
“Place video call.” He sat on the chaise next to the bed in his reinforced room and opened the heavy cover of his tablet.
“Encryption on?”
“Yes.”
He missed the sleek electronics he’d used as a human, but vampire amnis was electrical in nature, a current running beneath the skin of vampires that connected them to their elements and interfered with modern electronic signals. For vampires to use technology, heavy cases and voice controls were essential.
“Video calling with encryption activated.” Cara’s smooth tones were as familiar as a friend’s. “What number?”
“Chloe, mobile.”
“You want to video call Chloe on her main mobile device. Is that correct?”
“Correct.” He kicked up his legs and stretched.
The vampire body was different from the human one. On many levels, it was far more sensitive, but in other ways his nerves felt dulled. He no longer felt any soreness from a hard run or physical exertion. His muscles did not experience the minute tears that broke them slowly to be built up stronger with recovery. He was frozen in the exact physical state he had been two years before.
His lungs didn’t pump when he climbed the side of a building or lifted something heavy. In fact, he didn’t need to breathe at all.
But the brush of a callus against his skin could be excruciating. The temperature of the wind cut through his body like knives or caressed him like warm silk.
An electronic chime told him the call was connecting. He carefully arranged his face to speak to his assistant in New York.
