The Dancer and the Dark: A Paranormal Romance Novella (Elemental Legacy Book 7)

Gavin Wallace has a problem, and her name is Chloe Reardon.

For years, Gavin and Chloe have built a life together, skirting the vampire world as much as possible. Chloe has continued dancing, and Gavin has continued building a business empire.

But for a vampire in love with a mortal, nothing about the future is certain.

When an unexpected loss compels Chloe’s return to her childhood home, she’s forced to face the reality of her mortality and decide what her future will hold.

Will she turn toward humanity or follow her lover into the dark?

The Dancer and the Dark is a novella set in the Elemental universe and the second in Gavin and Chloe’s story by USA Today best-selling author, Elizabeth Hunter.

Chapter One

Gavin Wallace sat across from the two vampires glaring at each other from either side of the elaborate Russian tea service he’d ordered. He poured the fragrant tea into a delicate blue-and-white cup.

“Tatyana,” he said, “how much sugar would you like in your tea?”

“No sugar,” she said. “A spoon of honey only please.”

“I take my tea black,” Oleg said.

“He didn’t ask,” Tatyana said.

“Neither did you,” the gruff Russian answered. “And yet your caravan encroaches on my territory.”

Gavin swallowed the sigh that wanted to release. So they weren’t making room for polite conversation. At least that would save time. He’d come to his tearoom in Paris for this meeting, and when it was settled, he could return to the States.

Tatyana bit out something in Russian and Oleg started to reply, but Gavin interrupted them both.

“Cake?” He held a plate of petit fours in the center of the table. “I cannot tell you how delighted I am with the new pastry chef here. You both must try them and tell me what you think.”

Tatyana didn’t move her eyes from Oleg’s, but she reached out, took a delicate pink cake, and bit into it, baring two long, slightly curved fangs as she tasted the pastry. “Exquisite.”

Gavin didn’t react when the two immortals began to argue; neither did any of the silent servers near the doors.

His businesses were known for being discreet and neutral. Gavin never had a problem starting a new property in a city because vampires in charge of large cities where immortals might clash appreciated an impartial meeting place where they could be assured of safety.

Gavin took the opportunity of a pause in the arguing to gently intervene. “If I may…?”

The glaring subsided slightly, and both vampires bit their tongues.

“Excellent.” This was, after all, the reason Oleg had negotiated this meeting via his manager in Paris; it wasn’t solely because Tatyana was in Paris for a wine-marketing convention. They had a border dispute hanging between them, and it threatened to upend both vampires’ businesses.

Gavin cajoled and maneuvered the conversation until both combatants were forced to acknowledge the other’s perspective. He revealed nothing of his own thoughts on the matter. His own thoughts were immaterial. And two hours later, he leaned back as business secretaries and contract writers were introduced and terms began to take shape.

In the end, Tatyana and Oleg’s confrontation would be settled with gold instead of lives, a preferable outcome for all. This was why Gavin was so careful to cultivate a neutral position. Conflict was hammered out over tea and cake, not blood and iron.

Did Gavin play host to some truly horrendous people? Undoubtedly. But he never let his disdain be known, and he treated everyone as a guest.

His mentor had offered him a proverb when he’d started his first vampire club, and he’d never forgotten it: never back a cat into a corner.

Every immortal needed an off-ramp, especially the most hot-tempered. Every conflict needed a release valve. Unless there was a place to talk, every immortal dispute would end in violence.

Fortunately, this one ended with dessert.

-------------------------------------

“So your meeting went well?”

He smiled just at the sound of her voice.

“It did.”

“Are you bringing me some of Michel’s petit fours?” Chloe Reardon, his human lover of nearly five years, yawned over the phone. “You better be.”

Gavin glanced at the small refrigerator in the plane he had boarded in Paris. “Of course I am. They’re not going to be fresh though. Michel wasn’t pleased when I told him it would be a few days before I saw you. He was protesting that you needed to come taste them in Paris.”

“Obviously I need to do that.” She groaned a little.

Gavin detected an undercurrent of pain. “Is your knee hurting again?”

“I’m just a dancer turning thirty this year, O kilted one. Nothing to worry about.”

Well, that was impossible. “Do you need to see a physician?

Would a steroid shot help?” Prior to meeting Chloe, Gavin had little knowledge of the dancing world. After meeting her, he had the utmost admiration. Chloe, in addition to being a phenomenal artist, was also an athlete in constantly peak condition. She had no downtime and no off-season. The wear on her joints was brutal.

“I promise I’m fine.” She yawned again. “As soon as this show is over, we should go to Paris.”

“Now that we have the plane, it’s a matter of a few hours.” As a wind vampire, Gavin’s nature had rebelled against a private plane for years until Veronica, his longtime assistant, mentioned that it was far more secure for her and his other human staff and security to fly privately.

And sadly, not even Gavin’s immortal speed could match the five to six hundred miles an hour that the converted cargo jet could fly.

Eventually he gave in and started a shared charter company with other immortal clients. Within a year, it was turning a handsome profit.

Owning anything in partnership felt like being tied down—something he’d resisted for over 150 years—but times changed, people changed, and the world turned.

He looked around the near-empty passenger cabin. “It feels strange flying with only Veronica and Semis with me.”

“Oh, how did Semis like Paris?”

“He liked it, but he had to duck under a lot of doors.”

“Oh yeah. I can see that being a problem for him in Asia too.”

“He’s accustomed to it there.”

Gavin’s new day man was a massive Samoan footballer he’d met when he renovated his club in Hong Kong. Semis had been working his way up through the security arm of Gavin’s organization and had requested a move to New York the year before to be closer to his sister at NYU.

Chloe was the one who picked him to guard Gavin personally. He trusted her read on the quiet man, and he hadn’t been disappointed.

Gavin felt dawn beginning to tug at him, so he secured himself into a small chamber at the rear of the plane.

It wasn’t unheard of for vampires to own modern aircraft, though because of their amnis—the electrical current that ran beneath their skin and connected them to their elements—the planes had to be specially fitted with nonconductive insulation.

Modern electronics and vampires didn’t get along. Most of his peers were attracted to classic technology and transportation for more than aesthetic reasons.

He was currently using an old traditionally wired phone with a speaker attachment that ran through the pilot’s cabin. It was like something fitted into planes in the 1980s, but Gavin didn’t care. Most of the vampire world had converted to Nocht, a vampire-friendly software owned by Patrick Murphy, the vampire lord of Dublin, but Gavin had issues with Nocht.

As in privacy issues.

He was paranoid and he wasn’t shy about it. This current trip to see his mentor in New Orleans, long overdue, was partly for personal reasons but mostly about business. There was an opening for a Nocht competitor, and he was going to get his mentor to back him in the project.

Marie-Hélène did love upsetting the apple cart.

He heard Chloe yawn again. “You should go to sleep. I’ll call you when I land.”

“When will you get to New Orleans?”

“At four in the afternoon local time,” Gavin said, “so Semis and I will be waiting in the hangar until after nightfall. Veronica will start briefing Marie-Hélène’s people as soon as we land.”

“Okay.” She sighed. “I miss you.”

“I miss you too.” He missed her like mad, but she had a life, and it wasn’t following him around to business meetings. She had friends and work in New York. She danced in the space between the vibrant theater community and the dark vampire collective. For now it was a balancing act she gracefully walked.

For now.

Gavin knew that eventually Chloe would have to make a decision. And for him, the thought of her following a human life grew more and more fraught with dread.

He loved her. He hadn’t loved a being more than her in over 150 years. To him, she was eternity.

And Gavin had no idea what he’d do if she didn’t choose him.