“You have ten dead slayers, Miss Bartone. And I wouldn’t have killed any of them if given any other choice.”
She gulped, realizing what she held in her hand. Dog tags. She didn’t have to look to know that they belonged to Kevin Daniels, the slayer she’d most recently sent after Wolf Hunter. He’d been good at his job, and yet it would appear that he hadn’t managed to leave a mark on the vampire.
“Congratulations, Wolf Hunter,” she said around a lump in her throat. “Ten slayers. That must be some kind of record.”
He growled at her, and she sank into her chair before her knees could give out and betray her cool façade.
“It’s just Hunter, and I’m not here to brag,” he snapped. “I’m here to tell you to stop sending slayers after me.”
“I’m only doing my job.”
“And I’m only doing mine.”
She stared at him for a moment, then asked quietly, “Can I ask you a question?”
He pulled back a little, obviously thrown off guard. “I suppose so,” he said, his skepticism clear.
“Was it…did any of them even present a challenge to you?”
“You mean did any of them even come close to being able to kill me?”
She nodded.
“Miss Bartone, I’ve been around a very long time. I’ve fought in so many wars I probably can’t even remember all of them. I have more training and experience than all of your slayers put together.” He sounded unbelievably weary as he added, “So, to answer your question, no, none of them were even able to hurt me. And to answer what you really want to know, yes, I’ll keep killing the men you send after me, one by one. My existence isn’t ideal, but I intend to protect it nonetheless.”
She ignored the sadness in his voice. She’d be damned if she’d feel sorry for a vampire who’d killed ten of her men.
But still, he did make a powerful argument. After this many failures, she was already in danger of becoming Ahab, continuing to hunt her white whale to the detriment of herself and her crew.
She sighed. “All I can do is make a recommendation to my superiors to stop sending people after you. I can’t guarantee they’ll take it.”
Surprise flashed through his expression. “You’d do that?”
“Well, I certainly would rather have you killed, per my orders. But since it doesn’t look like that’s going to happen anytime soon…” she shrugged. “A truce certainly seems to be in my team’s best interest.”
He scowled. “Truce, huh? I’ve heard that before.”
She rolled her eyes. “Oh, please. If you bring up George Custer, the whole deal’s off. I’m not going to be held accountable for mistakes made hundreds of years ago.”
He let out a short bark of laughter and the sound startled her. “Fair enough.” His gaze turned speculative. “You know, Miss Bartone, under a different set of circumstances, you and I could have been…”
She straightened. “Don’t even think it.”
He cocked his head to one side. “You don’t look like any of the other watchers.”
Like she hadn’t heard that a hundred times. “You were expecting someone older? Taller, maybe?”
“I was expecting someone less beautiful.”
Heat rushed into her cheeks. “Flatter me all you want, I’m still not inviting you in.”
He chuckled. “You’re still so sure I need an invitation?”
“I think you would’ve killed me already if you didn’t.”
“I didn’t come here to kill you.”
Sure he didn’t. She fucking hated liars.
“I have no reason to lie to you. And what an unladylike turn of phrase.”
Her eyes widened and her jaw went slack. She’d heard tales of vampires old enough and powerful enough to read thoughts. She’d dismissed them as Sentry lore. Apparently she should have paid better attention in her vampire mythology courses.
She gave herself a good mental slap across the face and forced her features into a cool, aloof expression. “You’re not invited into my head either, Hunter, so stay out of it.”
He leaned against her doorjamb. “I enjoy hearing my name on your lips.”
Over the rush of blood in her ears, she heard security scrambling into action. About damn time, she thought. “Security knows you’re here. You’d better go or else our little deal’s off.”
He winked at her and her breath lodged in her throat. “They won’t even know I’m here.”
She was just about to ask him what kind of blind fuckwit could fail to notice a huge dead guy standing in her doorway when she heard Curtis, the night guard who worked her end of the building, hustle around the corner and yell, “Freeze.”
She barely resisted the urge to roll her eyes as she moved toward the door to catch a glimpse of the twenty-something guard. He sounded like Barney Fife. She wondered if he’d even remembered to load his gun. Sentry probably hadn’t had a break-in this century and the quality of their security guards clearly reflected that fact.
Hunter also didn’t look impressed. He didn’t even bother to raise his hands as he stared down the barrel of Curtis’ .22. “You missed the intruder,” he said in voice so mellow it made Mischa a little sleepy just hearing it. “He’s long gone. You’ll want to disable the alarm now.”
Mischa watched, stunned, as Curtis’ expression went completely blank. “Sorry to disturb your work, Miss Bartone,” he said, his voice flat as day-old Diet Coke. “The intruder is long gone. I’ll just go disable the alarm now.”
Jesus, Mischa thought, feeling a little sick to her stomach. The bastard could not only read minds, but control them.
No wonder her slayers hadn’t stood a chance against him. He’d probably convinced them to kill themselves!
Then a horrific thought dawned. “You son of a bitch,” she whispered. “Did you use mind control on me to—”
He held up a hand to cut off the rest of her sentence. “No. The truce truly was your idea. The extremely stubborn and strong-willed seem to be immune to mind control,” he added pointedly.
She carefully blanked her mind, not wanting him to read her thoughts and know how relieved she was that he had no control over her. “I think you need to go now before I decide the truce isn’t such a wise idea after all.”
His answering smile was blinding and her relief dissolved. She hadn’t had a date in some time, and with a smile like that, he just might be able to exert some control over her.
“Now that is truly good to know,” he murmured a moment before he grabbed her wrist, yanked her into the hall and pressed his lips to hers, quick and firm.
Before she could raise her hands to push him away, he dissolved into thin air like fog. She sucked in an outraged breath and shouted at the empty hall, “Truce is off, you asshole. If I ever see you again, I’ll kill you myself!”
Laughter—laughter at her expense—floated back to her on a breeze.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Mischa smoothed her hair into a ponytail, then leaned over her bathroom sink and took several deep breaths.
Whatever you do, don’t think about that stupid kiss. He was just trying to aggravate you, get a rise out of you. It wasn’t that great a kiss, anyway. She’d certainly had better.
Just because she couldn’t think of a time when she’d had better, didn’t mean she hadn’t.
“Pull yourself together,” she whispered to her reflection. “You’re smart, strong, and can handle anything.”
And until a few moments ago, she would have believed that statement. But now…she just wasn’t so sure.
She blew out an exasperated sigh. What she did know for sure was that she couldn’t spend the entire day in her bathroom. She was barely willing to admit to herself that Hunter made her nervous, let alone let him know he made her nervous.
With one more glance at herself in the mirror—not that she cared how she looked to a vampire, no siree—she stalked back to her living room, head high like a general leading her troops into battle.
What she saw when she got there stopped her in her tracks.
Hunter sat exactly where she’d left him, elbows on his knees, hands steepled beneath his chin. Cane sat at his feet, motionless. Apparently, they were engaged in some sort of eye-contact combat.
“Your dog has some issues,” he said without glancing away from Cane.
“Maybe she doesn’t like you.”
One corner of his mouth quirked up. “Impossible.”
She frowned and took the seat furthest from Hunter. “In case you haven’t noticed, vampires haven’t been very good to her. She has every reason to dislike you.”
This time he did look at her. Cane sniffed and shuffled off to the bedroom to enjoy her victory.
With the full weight and intensity of Hunter’s gaze on her, Mischa felt like a bug pinned to a board in a science class.
“She has every reason to dislike the vampire who hurt her,” Hunter said quietly. “She has no reason to dislike me.”
And suddenly Mischa realized they were no longer talking about Cane, which for some reason had her shifting uncomfortably in her seat.
Harper often accused her of being too black-and-white oriented. Mischa had never given it much thought. Those attitudes had been drilled into her by Sentry. Vampires were evil: end of story.
But Sentry no longer existed. If she thought about it long and hard, she might be willing to admit that Hunter probably wasn’t totally evil. He probably fell somewhere between…oh, maybe not-quite-evil and not-quite-good.
He chuckled. “That’s very generous of you, love.”
Mischa narrowed her eyes and mentally moved him back into the totally evil category. “Stay out of my head, bloodsucker. I’m not one of your little alley trollops.”
“Sorry.” He slouched deeper into the chair and smiled at her. “You’re so lovely when you’re concentrating that I couldn’t help myself. I just had to know what you were thinking about so hard.”
Heat rose to her cheeks. “Stop that too.”
His brow furrowed. “Stop what?”
She waved a dismissive hand. “The compliments. I don’t need or want them.”
His smile slipped into a smirk. “That’s right. Because you’re smart, strong, and can handle anything.”
Her jaw dropped. “You unbelievable bastard. You were reading my mind when I was in the…”
His hands came up in mock surrender. “No, I didn’t. You’d do well to remember that vampires have excellent hearing, however.”
Mischa couldn’t bite back her growl of frustration. “You are the most infuriating, insufferable…”
“Handsome, sexy, exciting,” he added helpfully.
“…blood-sucking jackass I have ever had the misfortune of knowing.”
His smile widened. Against her will, her inner girly-girl couldn’t help but admire that smile. How did a guy who was born centuries before orthodontia get such straight white teeth?
And since her inner girly-girl was already traveling down a dark alley, she let her gaze fall to his chest, still half-exposed by the shirt he hadn’t bothered to button. How did a guy who was born centuries before the Bow Flex get such hard, well-defined pecs? If his chest looked like that, she’d just bet she could see a nice set of six-pack abs if that shirt just gaped a little more to the right…
“Why, Miss Bartone, you’re making me blush.”
Her mortified gaze shot back to his amused one. But there was something beneath the amusement that bothered her more than a little. Something that Mischa hadn’t seen directed at her in a long time. Not since the last time she’d been this close to Hunter.
Desire. Hunger. Need.
Her heartbeat spiked as if she’d just sprinted up a dozen flights of stairs. Mischa wasn’t used to men wanting her. Hell, most men were terrified of her. And the ones who weren’t, she thought, still hopelessly held captive by the heat in Hunter’s eyes, scared the bejesus out of her.
As did the answering desire she felt gnawing at her heart and body. Holy Hell, Harper had been right.
She wanted him too!
He stood and moved toward her. “So why would that frighten you, love?” Kneeling in front of her chair so that they were eye to eye, he whispered, “I’d never hurt you.”
“You’re a killer,” she said, though without a lot of the conviction she usually felt when speaking about him.
He shook his head slowly. “No, I have killed. There’s a difference.”
She scoffed. “What’s the difference?”
“Phoenix is a killer. He takes pleasure in the pain of others. I killed in times of war and in self-defense.”
Mischa swallowed hard. “No, I had records. Proof-”
“You had proof of nothing,” he interrupted harshly. “Whoever told you I was killing humans lied. I’ve never killed to feed.”
She searched his eyes using every assessment skill Sentry had taught her, and he met her gaze unflinchingly. And as much as she wanted to find them, she saw no signs of guilt or duplicity in the depths of his dark eyes.
By God, he was telling the truth. He’d tried to tell her hundreds of times over the years and she hadn’t bothered to listen. It was Sentry who’d lied to her, not Hunter.
The Director had given her file after file regarding Hunter’s so-called victims. Innocent slayers had died…no, even worse, she’d forced an innocent man to kill innocent slayers in self-defense all because of misinformation Sentry had fed her.
Oh God, if they’d been lying about Hunter, how many of the other hundreds of vampires her teams killed over the years had been innocent?
Her world spun on its axis. She’d devoted her entire adult life to Sentry. She’d thought she was helping people, fighting the good fight. Was it all a lie?
Hunter shook his head. “No, love. You did what you thought was right. It’s not your fault.”
Mischa felt her eyes glaze over with tears and she got up, turning away before Hunter could see her at her weakest. She’d embarrassed herself enough today.
Her job with Sentry had been everything to her. She had no friends other than Harper, she’d never married or even dated seriously. She had no life because she’d dedicated all her time to a job, a job where her superiors had lied to her and tricked her into killing innocents.
She jerked as Hunter laid his hands on her shoulders. “I’m a lot of things, love, but no one’s ever called me innocent.”
Chuckling despite herself, she swiped a hand over her eyes. “Innocent or not, if you don’t stay out of my head, I’ll kill you myself.”
He eased her back against his chest and rested his chin on the top of her head. “And I believe you just might be the only one strong enough to actually do it.”
Mischa closed her eyes, shocked at how perfectly her body fit against his, but she refused to let herself relax in his arms. Just because he wasn’t a killer didn’t mean that a relationship with him would be a good idea. He was, after all, a vampire who’d been roaming the earth since before her great, great, great, great grandmother was just a twinkle in her great, great, great, great, great grandfather’s eyes.
Not to mention that she was pushing forty and getting older every day, while he’d stay looking exactly like this—wrinkle-free and all-together edible—for all eternity.
Yikes.
“You needn’t worry about that,” he whispered, his voice sending a hot shiver down her spine. “You’re as lovely today as you were the first time I saw you.”
Yeah, right. Twenty years and ten pounds ago. “Hunter…”
Someone pounded on her door.
Oh, thank God, she thought, lunging for the door. Maybe Riddick had found Harper. And saved her from having a very uncomfortable conversation with Hunter in the process.
But when she opened the door, she wasn’t greeted by Riddick and Harper. Instead, a pig-tailed little girl and a woman about Mischa’s age stood on her stoop.
“Hi,” the woman said. “I picked up this flyer on Eighth. We th
ink this is our dog, Slinky.”
Mischa glanced at the flyer, which featured a sad-eyed Cane, as well as Mischa’s address. Harper must have put the flyers up before Phoenix had taken her. “Well, we’ve been calling her Cane, but…”
Just then, Cane came trotting out of the bedroom, stopping dead in her tracks at the sound of new voices.
“Slinky!” the little girl cried.
Cane/Slinky bounded toward the girl, tail wagging and ears flapping. The girl gathered the dog in her arms and hugged her close.
“Oh, thank God,” the woman said on a relieved sigh. “Slinky’s been missing for about two weeks and Lily hasn’t been able to sleep without her.”
Mischa glanced down at Lily as Slinky covered her face in sloppy kisses. “Well, I think everyone will sleep better tonight.”
Except me, she thought. She’d gotten used to having Cane around the past few days. She wasn’t sure she could sleep without that fat little dog curled up against her stomach.
But several heartfelt thank-you’s and hugs from Lily later, Cane/Slinky was gone, and Mischa no longer had a dog.
“If it makes you feel any better,” Hunter said quietly, “the dog liked you better than them.”
She laughed without humor. “It doesn’t, but thanks for reading the dog’s mind for me, anyway.”
In the course of one afternoon, she’d lost her faith in Sentry, her dog, and possibly the only friend she’d ever had.
All in all, it was starting to feel like rock bottom.
Alone had never before felt so…terrifying and overwhelming.
“You don’t have to be alone, love.”
She glanced back at him. The warmth in his eyes beckoned her, promising to fill the empty spaces she’d just discovered in her life, her heart.
Go with your instincts, she told herself, trying to channel Harper. For once, trust your heart.
With a deep, steadying breath, she took a step toward him.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Phoenix clucked his tongue against the roof of his mouth and swaggered down the first two steps. “Benny, Benny, Benny. I’d say I was disappointed in you, but actually, this is exactly what I expected you to do.”
Harper Hall Investigations Complete Series Page 17