Minda Webber - The Remarkable Miss Frankenstein

"Aha! I have it!" she announced joyfully, her eyes dancing with both pride and excitement. The vault room was exactly as she had pictured in her overactive imagination: dark, dank, gloomy, with a hidden treasure… her treasure! Some might consider it hideous, but not Clair. She found the coffin absolutely, magnificently marvelous. She was a genius. But then that was never in doubt, with her Frankenstein genes, she thought cheerfully.

Clair grinned. It felt like Christmas morning and she could hardly wait to open her gifts. Except this time her gift was in the form of a marble crypt.

"Eureka! You're mine, all mine," she cried.

But the best-laid plans of mice and women sometimes come crashing to a grinding halt. Unfortunately for Clair, this was one of those times. A deeply compelling voice interrupted her self-congratulation.

"Beg your pardon, but just what is yours?"

Clair spun around, almost losing her balance. Stunned, she took careful stock of the owner of the voice. He was holding a five-stemmed candelabrum, the candles' dancing flames revealing a strong, formidable face. His cheekbones were high and well-defined, as was his nose, indicative of his Welsh heritage. Clair noted that his brows and hair were so dark as to blend in with the night, and his hair was long, the edges curling several inches past his collar. The intruder was tall and sturdy, with wide, muscular shoulders filling his broadcoat. His cravat was loosely tied, and he was attired entirely in black and gray. In essence, he was a study in shadow.

Wide and sensuous, his lips gave the parody of a smile, with gleaming white teeth. Big white teeth, Clair thought, gasping, which stood out in sharp contrast to the darkness surrounding them.

From somewhere deep within her a scream rose, but Clair managed to swallow it. She was standing face-to-face with a real, live vampire.

Well, perhaps not live, she reminded herself.

"Hmmm?" Now that was an answer, she noted dismally. She was finally rendered speechless. Uncle Victor would be stunned. Somewhere in the back of her mind, Clair knew she should be running for her life. But no, that was too melodramatic. Instead, she stood her ground like one of the Elgin statues all London was agog over.

Should she apologize for dropping in unannounced at his bedtime, or should she pretend to faint? No, fainting was too dangerous. The sly baron might decide a midnight snack was in order, and she would be the main aperitif.

Peeking up at him from beneath her eyelashes, Clair felt her adrenaline surge. Her morbid curiosity seemed to be overcoming the worst of her fears. Her mind, a steel trap-like device, was already compartmentalizing facts. She was in the presence of a vampire. He could be centuries old. Who knew what secrets he had learned over the years? It was utterly terrifying, utterly illuminating, and utterly bloody remarkable. Clair was spellbound. Her host had a powerful, predatory air, a wild energy about him that was almost primitive. If he was centuries old, he was well preserved. Hmm, very well preserved.

"Madame, and I use the term loosely, I am waiting for an answer!" Baron Harold Ian Huntsley's voice was clipped, the evident rage enough to release her from her bemusement.

As nonchalantly as possible in the presence of the Baron and his very predatory glare, Clair took a tiny step back—an infinitesimal step. When the attractive aristocrat remained absolutely still, she took another step backward, putting as much distance as possible between herself and the threat of danger.

Clair had the strangest sensation that the baron was stalking her, even though he hadn't moved a muscle. "So this is what a mouse feels like," she muttered.

"I beg pardon," he asked arrogantly, watching her with blazing eyes.

Clair blinked. The man radiated hostility, and most of it she feared was directed at her. "This isn't what it looks like. Not at all. This is a mission of science," she explained.

"Science?" Baron Huntsley snarled, once again revealing sharp white teeth. He studied her with a hard glint in his eyes. "You look as though you are standing in my basement uninvited."

"Well, I am. I mean, I obviously am here in your basement uninvited. If I weren't here, we wouldn't be having this conversation. Not at all," she protested, biting her lower lip nervously, wishing she were in India right now, or even the London stews, that hotbed of thieves, murderers, and prostitutes. She wished she were anywhere but here. Baron Huntsley would be a frightening figure even if he were not part of the supernatural world. Quickly she recited to herself again, "The truth at all costs."

Ian, Baron Huntsley, stared at the woman who had dared interrupt his solitude. He asked, his tone icy, "So, why have you broken into my basement?" He didn't know her game, but he would find it out. No one stole from him. Still, this five-foot-three-inch bit of bluster and bravado didn't look like a thief. Actually, he surmised as he studied her, with her fraying black cape, she looked like a reject from the London stews.

Clair dramatically waved her hands in the air. Baron Huntsley was truly formidable. "Broken in? Appearances can be deceiving," she said with a false smile.

Slyly examining him from top to bottom, Clair began compiling scientific facts, wondering if the devastatingly handsome baron could turn into a bat. She wondered too why he was back so early from the party. She wondered if he was going to bite her neck, and if he did, would she mind terribly? He was a rather handsome dog for a vampire. And he had such broad, strong shoulders. His legs were very long, his thighs heavily muscled. She wondered if he ever got cramped in his crypt.

"With what were you planning to make away? Just what in my basement would interest a thief?" the baron asked.

"I was not stealing anything. I could never be a thief. It just isn't in my genetic makeup," Clair answered honestly. She hesitated a moment, then added, "With the exception of a corpse or two." Although Clair really didn't consider it thievery to rob graves—at least of their bodies. The dead were generally dead—unless they were the undead or her uncle Victor had gotten hold of them.

The baron raised a brow, his aristocratic features sharply delineated by the flickering candlelight.

"Medical purposes… the corpses," she explained.

She's insane, Ian thought sadly. Such a beauty. She didn't look like a lunatic.

Staring right at her, he thought of another reason she might have come. He asked, "Are you here to compromise me, then?"

Clair was shocked. "No! What a ludicrous thought. I value my blood and my bloodline too much to do such an unladylike thing as that. No, I am here to compromise your coffin. But since you seem rather in a hurry and appear to be in a bleak mood, I think I'll just take my leave now," she went on in a convoluted manner, hoping to dazzle the wily baron with a profusion of words, allowing her to slip away unnoticed. She took a step around him.

Ian blocked the woman's route with his muscular body, his eyes widening in surprise. He was momentarily speechless, a first for him. He had seen and done many things in his jaded lifetime, some things he would carry to his grave as scars upon his soul. But he had never seen anything like this small Amazon standing quite proudly, although quite stupidly, in front of him.

In spite of his shock, he couldn't help but notice how pretty she was, what with her tawny gold-brown hair and her huge eyes. They were gray, the color of the rain-streaked skies over his beloved Welsh mountains.

"My coffin?" He finally processed what she'd said. "What coffin?"

"Baron Huntsley," Clair started, then stopped. "I assume you are Baron Ian Huntsley of Yorkshire and Balmoria in Wales?" He nodded, so she continued. "That dog won't hunt, Baron Huntsley. You are not going to play that old game."