Byzantine Heartbreak Read Online Free Page A

reaction.
    “Thank you for helping me,” she said softly.
    She wasn’t going to tell him what her decision was, he realized.
    Who was this jerk that was screwing with her peace of mind? He’d rip him a new throat. His incisors descended at the thought and Ryan had to calm himself to make them retract. He nodded at Nayara. “No problems,” he lied.
    She floated across the floor toward her office door, the one that interconnected with his own. At least, she seemed to float. The elegant floor-length tunic hid the motion of her feet and she was naturally graceful, so she seemed to glide right across the floor.
    Ryan sighed and this time he let himself breathe it out, along with all his frustration and anger, trying to let it all go.
      Who was the bastard?
    He watched Nayara’s door shut behind her as he had so many times before, then turned on his heel and strode toward his private quarters to change. New Orleans and the bottle of 100-proof whiskey with his name on it was suddenly the place he longed to be. No one would miss him for the five minutes he would be gone from here. And he could spend three weeks there, if he needed to, drinking the nameless asshole out of his system and from his imagination.
    Irish malt had never let him down before, when he desperately needed to forget.
    Then he could get on with his day.
    Finally.

Chapter Three
     
    The day had started bad and it swiftly got worse.
    Nayara’s days generally extended for fifteen or twenty hours, or sometimes she simply kept working as the days blended one into the other. She had a genuine advantage over humans with their need for food, sleep and relaxation every few hours or so. The only real clock she had to take notice of was the need to feed and these days, that demand raised itself with diminishing regularity because she had learned how to make her feedings more efficient and her body had adapted to the fuel source, too.
    If her symbiot did not call for blood, she could theoretically keep working forever and not feel fatigue or lose concentration. So while her human counterparts slept, she could catch up or by-pass them altogether. When the humans awoke and returned to their offices, she could present completed work while they were just getting started.
    It took all that time and all those advantages to keep the station running. In the last fifty years or so, the demands upon the Agency had increased astronomically, as vampires and the work they did were accepted into society and the old prejudices died away.
    Nayara had always worked alone, without need for assistants and flunkies, but lately she had begun to wonder if an executive assistant might not be a useful thing to have.
    The only problem with that was finding a vampire who didn’t want to travel. Vampires were drawn to the Agency by the one overwhelming perk: time travel. To become a member of the agency and not travel... Such a vampire might be impossible to find.
    After changing out of her Roman patrician clothing and returning it to the wardrobe department, Nayara had headed back to her office, already dealing with a dozen different messages and communications via her personal implant. On the way through the station she was stopped half-a-dozen times by people asking questions that only she could answer and dealt with them on the spot. By the time she walked in the door to her office, her to-do list had extended by another four items.
    She walked straight over to the window, to look out at Earth’s darkside. The Atlantic was on display. A black blanket of nothing.
    With an impatient mental shove, she turned off her personal communications. The incessant buzz was too much for right now. Just for a moment, she wanted to think.
    Her public door chimed.
    Nayara ignored it.
    Today, more than usual, she was feeling the weight of all the years behind her. Not even Ryan knew just how many she bore. She had always hidden her real age from Ryan because she knew him too well. He would be shocked and