The Vampire Diaries: Stefan’s Diaries #3: The Craving Read Online Free

scattering every stray beam like iridescent dragonflies.
    I nodded at my host and took a small sip, sitting down when he motioned to a leather chair. The warm, sweet spirits poured over my tongue, both comforting me and making me feel strangely uneasy at the same time. I had gone from living in a park to sipping fine liqueur in a mansion with a very wealthy man in the course of one short night. And at the same time that I longed to sprint back into the darkness—the loneliness that pervaded my very being begged me to linger. I had not spoken to anyone in two weeks, but here I was, invited into a veritable palace of human activity. I could sense at least a dozen servants and family members in the few rooms nearby, their heady scent indistinguishable to all but myself, and the two dogs I knew were in the kitchen.
    My benefactor regarded me strangely, and I made myself pay attention.
    “Yes, sir. I found her in a clearing by the remains of the old Seneca Village.”
    “What were you doing in the park so late at night?” he asked, fixing me with his eyes.
    “Walking,” I said evenly.
    I braced myself for what would come next, the uncomfortable series of questions that would assess my station in life, though my ripped clothes surely gave some indication. If I were him, I would have pressed a few dollars into my hand and sped me out the door. After all, New York was not short on predators, and though he couldn’t know it, probably could not even imagine it, I was the worst sort.
    But his next words surprised me. “Down on your luck, son?” he asked, his expression softening. “What was it—tossed out of your father’s house? A scandal? Duel? Caught on the wrong side of the war?”
    My mouth gaped open. How did he know I wasn’t just some vagrant?
    He seemed to guess my thought.
    “Your shoes, son, show that you are obviously a gentleman, regardless of your current, eh, circumstances,” he said, eyeing them. I looked at them myself—scuffed and dirty, I hadn’t shined them since Louisiana. “The cut is Italian and the leather is fine. I know my leather.” He tapped his own shoe, which looked to be made from crocodile. “It’s how I got my start. I’m Winfield T. Sutherland, owner of Sutherland’s Mercantile. Some of my neighbors made their money from oil or railroads, but I made my fortune honestly—by selling people what they needed.”
    The door to the study opened and a young woman I’d seen downstairs came in. She was composed and graceful, with a step that was both regal and efficient. Her cap was simple—almost like a servant’s—but it accentuated her refined features. She was a rarefied version of the girl I had found in the park. Her hair was a more subtle golden shade, and her curls fell naturally in soft ringlets. Her eyelashes were as thick but longer, framing blue eyes with just a touch of gray in them. Her cheekbones were a trifle higher and her expressions more subdued.
    My human appreciation of her beauty fought with my vampire’s cold appraisal of her body: healthy and young.
    “The doctor has just arrived, but Mama thinks she will be fine,” the girl said calmly. “The wound is not as deep as it first seemed, and appears to be mending itself already. It is by all accounts a miracle.”
    I shifted in my chair, knowing that I had been the reluctant source of that “miracle.”
    “My daughter Lydia,” Winfield introduced. “The most queenly of my three graces. That was Bridget whom you found. She’s a bit . . . ah . . . tempestuous.”
    “She ran off by herself from a ball,” Lydia said through a forced smile. “I think you might be looking for a slightly stronger word than ‘tempestuous,’ Papa.”
    I liked Lydia immediately. She had none of the joie de vivre that Callie had, but she possessed an intelligence and sense of humor that became her. I even liked her father, despite his huff and bluster. In a way, this reminded me of my own home, of my own family, back when I had