Barbara Hancock - Brimstone Seduction

Severne clenched his fists against the damnation looming so close to his father. The sun had gone behind a cloud, and Levi Severne had called for his nurse in a small voice that seemed to come from the boy he’d been so very long ago.

He’d done his part. He’d hunted daemons for decades. He’d taught his son how to fight. He’d shown him how to handle the terrible burn of Brimstone in his blood. He’d taught him to look away from the walls of l’Opéra Severne as the burden of years and souls began to weigh him down.

He’d tried to teach him how to hope. Levi had always been an optimist. He’d met and married a beautiful Southern belle, thinking he’d be free from the contract before they had a child.

He’d been wrong.

She’d died in childbirth believing his promise that her son would be saved.

Severne didn’t believe in hope. He’d never allowed the softness of hope. He believed in perseverance, determination and pain. He would need all three things to save his father before his mortal body failed.

And maybe one day he’d be graced with the ability to forget all he’d done.

The nurse had come to check on her charge. She must have rushed out as soon as she’d heard him call. John was pleased by her quick response. The best that money could buy. Her tone was kind and patient as she responded to Levi’s fear of the darkened day and the shadows that stretched toward his seat from the bushes, which had given him pleasure only moments before.

The nurse helped his father up with the aid of his cane, and the two slowly made their way toward the house. He resisted the nurse, though, forcing a pause beside the hydrangea bushes. Severne watched his father reach out and take a cluster of blossoms in his hand. Levi Severne pressed the bloom to his face and inhaled, but then he dropped the crushed flowers, and John could tell by the nurse’s consternation that the old man cried.

The nurse urged Levi to come with her. She soothed him with soft assurances of safety. Severne knew from experience that inside, many lights and lamps waited to be turned on. All Levi’s caretakers knew the house needed to be aglow during a storm.

His father’s fears would fade. His tears would dry.

To be sure, John waited and watched until light after light came on. Even as fat droplets began to fall and sizzle on his skin, he waited. His temperature dropped, but he ignored the chill. He paid no attention to the wet seeping into his hair to run in rivulets down his face. He waited until he was sure the house was lit and his father snug inside before he turned and walked away.

* * *

Kat should have known she couldn’t be quicker on the draw than John Severne. She’d thought she would return the opera glasses before anyone missed them. But the next day when she climbed the stairs to the third-level balcony and quietly approached the box corresponding with the number on the porcelain handle, she found the opera’s master in the seat she searched for.

She tried to halt her entrance in time to go unnoticed, but he rose to turn and face her. He’d heard her steps, or he’d felt her approach as she suddenly felt him. She’d tried to tune out the pull of his Brimstone blood, which followed her wherever she went in the opera house, but rather than helping her avoid him, it had placed her in a compromising position.

He was both everywhere she walked and here, where she least expected to find him.

“Where did you find those?” Severne asked.

The box was small. It held only two seats. And the opera glasses were obvious in her hands.

He didn’t seem to mind the close quarters. As the curtains she’d parted closed with a whoosh in her wake, he moved even closer while she tried to think of what to say.

Was this his box? Were the glasses his? Why had they been in Victoria’s room?

All those questions assailed her along with his nearness and the unusual appearance of his rumpled clothes. He wore a white oxford shirt and black pants, but his jacket was missing, his sleeves were rolled up and his tie was loosened.

“They were on my sister’s bed. Left on her pillow,” Kat said. “I thought I should return them. She must have accidentally carried them away. I assume they belong to this box.”

Below, dancers practiced for the ballet often omitted from performances of Faust by other opera companies. At l’Opéra Severne, the ballet was a favorite of fans. It represented the temptation of Faust by the greatest and most beautiful women in history that had been offered to him by Mephistopheles.

So far, from what Katherine had seen of rehearsals, this version was suggestively choreographed while still seeming subtly playful in its eroticism.

“This box is like the other boxes in the house. Elite patrons own them all. Some families have kept them for generations. Politicians, celebrities and foreign aristocracy all float in and out in relative anonymity. To be honest, I thought this one was abandoned. Many seats are kept by the elderly and passed down to heirs who prefer sports arenas or video games,” Severne said. “I’m here only temporarily. Captivated by the view.”

So she’d found the stoic yet sensual master of the opera house looking down on his lithe dancers? Her cheeks warmed. “They are captivating,” she agreed.

The dancers practiced with an old stage piano more suited for vaudeville than opera, but they were talented. Once their moves were paired with costumes, lighting and the full orchestra accompaniment, the ballet would be sublime.

“I’m proud of every aspect of the show, but I do enjoy this dance—the temptation, the resistance, the surrender,” Severne said. It was almost a confession. He was a daemon professing his fascination with the dance of damnation.

He leaned toward her and her breath caught, but he was only reaching for the opera glasses. She released them from her fingers at the same time as she released a—she hoped—unnoticeable sigh. He didn’t turn back to the dancers. He held the glasses and continued to look down at her.

“These levels are closed until performances. Performers don’t enter the boxes or wander around. I’m not sure why your sister had these,” he said.

“You don’t know who owns this box?” she asked.

“There are records you could search, but they haven’t been computerized. I’m afraid our offices are Victorian by today’s standards,” Severne said. “Decades of papers and dusty files are an immortal’s prerogative.”

Behind him, several stories below, the dancers writhed and undulated for Faust’s pleasure as Mephistopheles pretended to hold their strings like they were marionettes. Kat felt a little bit like her strings were being tugged by a fate that would have her dance for John Severne.

How would she ever find her sister in the purposefully ambiguous atmosphere of l’Opéra Severne? The owner of the box might have nothing to do with her sister’s disappearance. In spite of what Severne had said, the boxes were curtained, not locked. Anyone might have slipped in and out of them unseen.

Severne had stepped lightly to the side. He was offering her a seat. Because she didn’t want to seem intimidated or afraid, she took it, and he sank down beside her. Thankfully, the dancers were now separately working on individual elements of the ballet so the overall suggestive effect of the piece was lost. Unfortunately, the only suggestion left was the full force of her affinity for Severne, closed in the curtained-off box where her seat and Severne’s were so close that his arm brushed hers.

He moved to place the opera glasses back in their slot. He had to lean across her body to do so. She couldn’t will the affinity away. This close, it was impossible to ignore. Even if she could, his natural magnetism would have called to her with or without Brimstone in his blood.