Read Online Drawn to the Vampire (Blood and Absinthe, Book 4) by Chloe Hart - Free Book Online Page A

and when she straightened Luke grabbed her arm.
    “Hey! What are you—”
    “Look,” he said, pointing offshore. There was a group of rocks several yards away, surrounded by the ocean on all sides. On the largest was a small gray seal.
    The seal was looking straight at them with wide, deep, and disconcertingly human eyes.
    “How lovely,” Kit breathed.
    “Make a wish,” Luke ordered her.
    She looked at him in surprise. “Huh?”
    “That shell you picked up. It landed at your feet the same time the seal appeared. A gift from the sea, and a seal within sight. Don’t you know your fairy tales? There’s powerful magic within reach. Make a wish! Legend has it that whatever you ask for will be granted.”
    The shell fit perfectly into her palm. Kit closed her fingers around it and returned the seal’s solemn regard.
    “I don’t read fairy tales.”
    “Somehow, that doesn’t surprise me,” Luke murmured. “But it won’t hurt to make a wish. Go on, Kit.”
    Daughter of the sea, Kit thought to herself, and wondered where she’d heard that phrase. The sleek gray head was tilted to the side, the seal’s expression thoughtful and unafraid as she looked back at Kit. Her eyes were dark pools of quiet intelligence.
    Kit’s heart ached at the sight of such beauty and innocence.
    “I wish you joy, Daughter of the Sea,” she said impulsively, squeezing her hand around the shell. “I wish you a long life and many children.” Then she raised her arm and threw the shell as far as she could, out into the waters it had come from.
    It disappeared beneath the waves. In the same instant the seal raised her head, made a sound that Kit could almost understand, and dove into the ocean behind the rock.
    Kit took a deep breath and glanced at Luke. Now that the moment was over she felt a little silly.
    He just looked at her, his face shadowed.
    “What?” she asked defensively. “I know I could have wished for anything…” Like to get Peter back, she thought with a sudden flash of regret.
    No , she told herself firmly. Never regret a generous impulse, her mother had told her once. We humans have so few of them.
    Something about the vampire’s gaze was making her uncomfortable. “Stop looking at me like that,” she said crossly. “It’s too late to change the wish now. And I’ll bet that story is just an old wives’ tale.”
    “That’s possible, of course. Still, you passed up an opportunity to ask for magical help, and frankly, we might need it before we’re done. Do you have any idea what we’re getting ourselves into?”
    For some reason, the fact that he used the word we was strangely comforting.
    “Probably not,” she said cheerfully. Maybe she hadn’t made a very smart wish, but her heart was lighter, somehow, after her encounter with the seal. “But I’m still going.” She smiled at him. “I even have a plan.”
    Luke fell back a step and gestured back the way they’d come. “After you. Do I dare ask what your plan consists of?”
    Kit began to make her way up the rocky path. “It mostly consists of you,” she said over her shoulder.
    “Our deal was that I would conduct you safely to the land of the dead,” he reminded her. “What else did you have in mind? I might want to renegotiate my payment.”
    “That won’t be necessary,” Kit assured him, scrambling up the last few feet to the path along the cliff’s edge. “It’s such a little thing. I’m sure you’ll agree it ought to be included in the original price.”
    “I see,” said Luke, who’d finished the climb as well and was now standing beside her. “Why don’t you tell me more about this little thing?”
    “The Gem of Fanor,” Kit said, trying to sound casual and confident. “You stole it from the land of the dead. I thought it would be a nice gesture if you returned it. Specifically, if you told the king of the dead that I convinced you to return it.”
    Luke started to walk back towards his tower. Kit followed, taking two