As Vail took a step toward the door of the tavern, he was surprised to hear the loud and jarring grate of a barstool on the wooden floor behind him. He glanced back over his shoulder to see that the Lady Victoria had risen from her seat and was now glaring at him coldly. The venom in her expression caught him off guard. He had expected her to be thankful for his help, since he had gone out of his way to brush off the stranger who had been eyeing her so lustfully. Instead, she almost seemed offended by the gesture.

He groaned inwardly. [i]Why[/i] couldn’t he have just left the situation alone? It didn’t matter to him one way or another what the Lady did or what became of her. Looking back on it, he knew he should have walked away; made some excuse to lure the man he’d been targeting earlier into an alleyway and gone home without causing more trouble for himself. Instead, he had to go and play hero to a maiden in distress—or so it had appeared to him at the time—for only God knew what reason. To make matters even worse, it looked like Victoria was about to cause a scene.

In the next moment, she proved his theory correct by chiding him loudly in front of the other patrons. However, when she addressed him, he tensed. Apparently, sometime between their last encounter and the current moment, she had learned his real name. He cursed under his breath, his eyes flitting discreetly over the crowd. The Saints in the Order were everywhere, and she had just announced, quite loudly in fact, that there was a vampire in their midst. If any of the hunters were among them, he didn’t have long to get out.

As Victoria went on to reprimand him for telling her what to do—it seemed she had mistaken his earlier words of advice for an order—he slowly edged back from her, intent on leaving the Black Bull before the Saints could have a chance to catch him. He no longer paid attention to what she was saying. Now that his cover was blown, he didn’t have time to think about it. All he cared about was escaping from the crowded room without taking a knife to the back.

When the Lady stormed past him to get out of the tavern, herself, Vail rolled his eyes. Even though she had completely misunderstood his intentions, he didn’t care what she thought. The situation had been resolved, so he was going to move forward with his original plan and find a new target to feed on. With that thought in mind, he made his way quickly through the small sea of men, slipping out the door and heading for another tavern before anyone else could approach him.

As he walked, he frequently glanced over his shoulder to see if he was being followed, but as far as he could tell, no one had come after him. He relaxed slightly. It seemed he had gotten lucky and there hadn’t been any hunters in the Black Bull after all—at least, none who knew his family name. He turned back to the building he was walking toward now, a tavern called the Open Leaf where he had hunted in the past. Gazing through the windows, he was pleased to see that there were a few women interspersed amongst the men inside.

He traced his tongue hungrily across his lips as he stepped into the building, eager to finish what he had started before he drew any more attention to himself that night.