Blood Born by Linda Howard Read Free Book Online Page A

in front of another vampire. Let them think he was invincible; it made his job a little easier if his prey went into the fight expecting to die. He removed his sunglasses and slipped them into his pocket. Jasper flinched from the clarity of Luca’s pale gray eyes. His eye color would have beennoticeable in anyone, but given his dark hair and olive skin, the contrast made them particularly piercing. There was no power attached to his eye color, but other vampires were never certain whether there was or not. After all, with a blood born, anything was possible.
    Jasper turned to reach for a phone but hesitated as his keen hearing picked up the sound of someone hurrying toward the entrance. Luca had already turned to face the newcomer, recognizing Enoch’s tread. Enoch had either been monitoring the security camera himself or someone else had been, and had awakened him.
    A door opened at the end of the hallway and Enoch appeared. “Mr. Ambrus! I’m sorry, I wasn’t notified you’d be arriving.” He flicked a quick glance at Jasper. “That’ll be all.”
    Jasper looked relieved at being excused from Luca’s presence, and withdrew into the small room off the foyer where he monitored the security cameras.
    Enoch was large, bald, and efficient. He was old enough and strong enough to remember Luca, and he was a powerful fighter, but by far his most valuable trait was his efficiency. He oversaw the running of the Council building, which essentially meant he made certain everything was as the Council members desired it. Despite being caught unaware, at a time when most vampires were sleeping, he was dressed in an impeccable Italian suit that had been tailored to fit his bulk. His dark eyes revealed a hint of wariness, as if he knew Luca’s unannounced visit was going to cause an uproar. The Council members didn’t like surprises, especially in the form of their own paid executioner.
    “No problem,” Luca said. “I’m here to see Hector.”
    Enoch blinked in astonishment. “Hector?” he echoed blankly, then recovered himself. “I apologize, it isn’t any of my business. I’ll call his quarters.”
    Enoch’s surprise was understandable; Hector wasn’tthe Council member whom Luca dealt with on official business; that was Theodore, another Greek, but not one Luca liked—or trusted, come to that.
    He could have called Hector’s number himself, but instead waited while Enoch stepped to an old-fashioned corded phone and dialed Hector’s extension. There was a reason for the land-line phone; vampires were as electronically savvy as the general human population, which meant the Council was also very security-conscious. They all had cell phones, for convenience, but cell phone calls were easy to intercept unless they were encrypted, so for communications within the building they used a private land-line system. The calls weren’t registered by any phone company, the phones worked during power outages, and the security measures needed were all passive, to guard against any eavesdropping from outside the building.
    The idea of someone spying on them wasn’t ridiculous; everyone in D.C. seemed to be obsessed with secrets, security, and espionage—and with good reason. What kept them mostly invisible was that vampire concerns ordinarily weren’t the same as human concerns, though with three vampires in Congress, that line was beginning to blur.
    Luca didn’t agree with vampires getting involved in human politics; with the intense media scrutiny these days, no secret was safe, and deliberately making oneself a target of that scrutiny was opening the door to disaster. In the matter of congressional vampires, the Council was divided. Some of the members thought it was a good idea to have friends in high places, while others thought as Luca did, that it was inviting trouble. He just hoped he wasn’t one day called on to permanently remove a sitting member of Congress, because that could get nasty. He could make the member