Page 78 of Be Still My Unbeating Heart

Bastian prepared to launch himself, but then a female voice cried out behind him.

“Signor Emerson!”

He turned to see Mayor Moretti hurrying into the ballroom. She had removed her mask and her face was tight with horror.

“He just needs his tonic,” she said frantically. “He doesn’t want to do this.”

She clasped a familiar green bottle. More olive oil? Bastian remembered the olive grove woman—Kerstin Grönberg—saying that the mayor was a fan of her treatment. She’d failed to mention that it was herhusbandwho was being treated, and not for something so innocent as insomnia.

“He attacked the inspector. And he killed this poor man,” Bastian said, gesturing to the body at his feet.

The mayor looked crestfallen at the sight of the dead man, but there was defiance in her eyes, too.

“It’s not his fault,” she said. “He can control it most of the time. We just have tohelp himcontrol it.”

Bastian stared at her in disbelief. “Is that what you’ve been trying to do? Is he the one who’s been killing people?”

“No, it wasn’t him, I swear,” she said, but it sounded like she was trying to convince herself as much as Bastian.

“Did this happen when Luna died? He got free and killed her? Did the same thing happen with Emilio?”

“No,” the mayor insisted.

“He killed them both, didn’t he?” Bastian said. “And you tried to cure his thirst by feeding him olive oil. You must realize how insane that is.”

“He’s my husband!” the mayor shouted. “I would do anything for him! Anything!”

“Including allowing him to commit murder? How many more dead people would it take before you admitted he was a killer?”

“You’re one to talk!” the mayor spat. “As if you haven’t killed.”

He opened his mouth to shout back, but she was right. He was a vampire. But he was one of the lucky few who had figured out a way to live without the need for violence. He knew it didn’t come easily, but he’d made the effort.

“I’m atoning for my crimes,” Bastian said. “Not a single day goes by where I don’t think about the people I hurt before I swore off human blood. But you knew this man was killing the very people you were elected to protect, and you did nothing to stop it.”

The mayor’s eyes shone with tears. It was difficult, being confronted with that kind of truth. Bastian should know.

“Please,” the mayor said, clutching the bottle tight. “You have to help him.”

Her gaze switched to the man hanging from the chandelier. She called to him in Italian. The vampire snarled at her, mouth splashed red, teeth glinting like needles, and seeing that insatiablerage made Bastian realize just how far he’d come in the years since getting clean.

The vampire looked ready to pounce on the mayor, but then suddenly he stilled, as if he’d heard something. Or felt it.

Bastian felt it, too.

A hush, as if the air had suddenly withdrawn from the ballroom.

At the door, De Luca staggered sideways as three shapes slipped past him into the ballroom, gliding like wraiths.

The vampire council. They’d found him.

“Well, well, well,” Jared drawled, casting a surprised gaze around him. “This is quite unexpected, I must admit.”

“Quite,” Emmeline agreed, unspooling the silver chain from her sleeve.

“It was the mayor’s husband!” Whitby cried, remaining by De Luca’s side, her tail wound protectively around his shin. “He’s the killer!”

The council flicked a glance in the cat’s direction, then turned to consider the vampire in the chandelier.