Phillipa stood in the middle of the roofed-over street and looked up at the pretty lights that arched overhead. The light show shifted in psychedelic patterns as a Jimi Hendrix song played on the sound system. Fremont Street was lined on either side with some of the city’s older casinos. Closed to traffic, it was crowded with people, most of whom had stopped to gawk at the multimedia show that was the area’s main tourist draw. Phillipa liked this part of town a lot, although she’d never entered any of the casinos that used the light show to lure customers away from the swankier establishments lining the Las Vegas Strip.
While she enjoyed the show, she was very aware of the time. She checked her watch once more and began walking up the street. She’d done some undercover work hunting for a killer who preyed on prostitutes, and now she automatically moved in the hooker’s stroll she’d learned on that assignment. Though she appeared casual, she was alert for any signs that she was being followed.
She walked all the way up the several blocks under the glittering lights and was nearly back to her starting point when she spotted her prey. Once she knew she was being followed, she headed toward the shadows of the streets beyond the casinos. He caught up to her when she reached a parking lot where no one was around.
“It is you!” the Purist declared when she turned to face him.
“It sure is,” she answered, bringing up the small gun she’d taken from her waistband. “On your knees,” she directed. “And put your hands behind your head.”
Matt hated standing by and watching this takedown, but he had to admire his woman’s professionalism as she turned and raised her weapon. He’d been closely following the man who followed her, prepared for danger yet worried about having her play decoy. Watching her hip-swaying walk as she lured the Purist into the trap had certainly been arousing, though.
Even more arousing was her sheer, dangerous competence. He was Prime, and his impulse was to protect his mate, but he knew that his mate needed this. Besides, it was her right as Brandon’s guardian. It was what his supernatural enemies could do to the woman he loved that he feared. The man kneeling before her now was a mere mortal.
Matt came up behind the Purist. “Good work, sweet.”
The man’s head jerked around. “You!”
He started to rise, but Matt put his hand on the top of the Purist’s head and held him down. “I’ll take it from here,” he told Phillipa.
“What now?” she asked. She reached for her mobile phone. “Should I call LVPD?”
“No,” Matt and the Purist said at the same time.
“That isn’t how this game is played,” Matt went on.
“You’ve corrupted her,” the Purist claimed. “You creatures destroy all that’s pure. I have to kill her. My orders are to kill her.” He looked at Phillipa and started crying. “I hate that I have to kill her.”
Phillipa looked worriedly at Matt. “He’s pretty pathetic. You aren’t going to hurt him, are you?”
Matt didn’t point out that she was the one holding the gun on the man at her feet. “Don’t you want revenge?”
She sighed. “Maybe if someone had actually been hurt. They attacked a baby, after all. Brandon and Jo deserve justice, but justice isn’t the same as revenge.”
He smiled. “I knew you were going to say that.”
“What I want is for him to leave my family alone. Him and all his friends.”
“I totally agree,” Matt answered.
“If we can’t turn him in to the police, couldn’t he just forget about us?”
Matt nodded. “That is how the game is played. Give me a moment.”
Had Phillipa not been standing there, Matt might have punished the Purist a bit, but since beating the shit out of the mortal wasn’t the sort of civilized behavior befitting being in the presence of his love, Matt forsook the pleasure.
Once inside the Purist’s head, he quickly decided that the man was far too pathetic to warrant anything but a quick mind-wipe. Yet there was something very disturbing about the man’s mind. There was a touch of more than one personality there, and one of them wasn’t mortal. Matt probed deeper, looking for answers, information, identities. He found very little, but what he did find he didn’t like.
When he was done, the Purist got up and ran. Matt looked around to tell Phillipa that she was safe from this one now, but she was nowhere to be seen.
For a moment he was terrified that something had happened to her, but the fear quickly passed. She was his mate: he could find her in heaven, hell, and anywhere on earth. Besides, he was already certain where she had gone. All he had to do was follow.
Chapter Thirty-four
P hillipa sat in her parked car and held up her hands. With stunned numbness, she studied her fingers in the light of a streetlamp. Each dot of blood, and the scar tissue forming beneath it, represented a pinprick. They represented all the times she had tested her blood glucose level in the last several months.
The most recent pinprick still stung a little, since she’d tested her blood glucose as soon as the cab dropped her off by her car. She couldn’t believe what the meter reading told her. And it couldn’t be true that there weren’t as many marks on her fingers as she remembered. There had to be something wrong with the equipment, and with her perceptions. This was too good to be true.
She shook her head. “I’m going crazy.”
She wasn’t surprised when Matt opened her door and pulled her out to stand next to the car. He put his hands on her waist. “No, you’re not,” he replied.
“What would you know about it?” She put her arms around him and leaned her head wearily on his shoulder. “You’re a vampire.”
He drew her close. “Being a vampire makes it easier for me to spot crazy people. It’s a gift—along with my amazing sexual prowess.”
She laughed softly, but couldn’t deny his claim about being good in bed. “You know what I’ve always been good at?”
“What?”
“I’ve always been able to spot the bad guys. That’s why I haven’t had screaming hysterics about falling for a blood-sucking monster.”
“I’ll thank you not to refer to us as monsters. Such language would upset my mother if she were here. You are on the verge of hysterics, though,” he added. “Why, I can’t fathom.”
“You’ve never been sick, have you?”
“I’ve been wounded badly enough that it took a while to recover, but no, I have no concept of what illness must be like. And you don’t have to worry about it anymore, sweetheart, please believe that.”
The world had shifted a lot beneath her feet in the last few days, but this last change jolted her the hardest. That the supernatural world existed—she could deal with that. That she was finally together with the man who was meant for her—she rejoiced in that. That her sister and nephew were no longer being threatened—that proved she could still do her job.
All these things had shaken her, but everything was turning out okay. But this…this…
“I don’t deserve a miracle.”
Matt silently held her for a while, and she took comfort from being folded in his embrace. “I think the point about miracles is that no one deserves them,” he said finally. “Miracles are gifts; they simply occur. But I’m not offering you a miracle,” he added. “I’m simply offering you me—just my bad-tempered, stubborn, high-handed, difficult-to-live-with, don’t-ask-me-to-help-with-the-laundry self.”
She looked into his face. “You are my miracle.” Anguish almost choked her, but it was laced with joy, even if it was a guilty joy. “Over twenty-one million people in America have diabetes. And those are just the ones who know they have it. It’s a cause of heart disease and kidney failure and blindness, and most limb amputations are diabetes-related. Why am I the one who gets to walk away from this killer? It’s not fair or right that I’m the one person in the world who gets to be cured.”
“No,” Matt agreed. “It is not fair. Are you under any illusion that life is fair?”
She shook her head. “But don’t you see how confusing this is? How hard this is? Can you fix anyone else?”
“No.”
“Do I love you because you can make it better? It terrifies me that maybe it isn’t you I love—that maybe I sensed somehow that you could cure me, and that’s what drew me to you. You deserve more than a woman who wants to use you.”
“Yes, I certainly do.” He put a finger over her lips. “Or maybe I love you because you’re diabetic. I have a terrible sweet tooth, after all.”
That made her smile.
“Neither of us knew you were ill when we met, did we?” he asked. She shook her head. “It was lust at first sight, wasn’t it?”
Phillipa nodded, and her smile turned into a wicked grin.
“What we share, the blending of our blood and psychic energy, will extend your life.” He gave a crooked smile. “And it will complete mine.”
She touched his cheek. “Mine, too.”
“I concede that you were right in suggesting I was punishing myself with loneliness,” he went on. “I can’t apologize for not consulting you about fighting the bonding, but I do see your point about wanting choices.”
“Lack of apology accepted,” she told him. “Just don’t not consult me about something that concerns both of us again.”
“Very well, my love. From now on, I’ll ask your opinion before we do it my way.”
She chose to laugh rather than argue—for now. She was under no illusions that what they had would be a partnership, but she also doubted that there would be many things that they disagreed on. They were, after all, bondmates.
“I’m still terrified of something happening to you,” Matt said. “But not enough to try to run away from what we have. Please don’t punish yourself by believing you don’t deserve this gift of health I can give you.” He patted her rump. “And don’t consider it a gift, because I’m going to work your fanny off for it.”
“Really?” she asked, and pressed her pelvis against his. She felt him harden against her.
He closed his eyes. “Woman, do you want me to take you here against the car?”
“Hell, no,” she answered. “Not when there’s a perfectly good bed back at the house.”
He put a finger under her chin. “Are you going to be all right?”
She thought about it. It wasn’t right, or fair, but he was correct about life not being fair. It was wonderful.
“I’ll adapt,” she told him. “I have to, because I am not losing you.”
Chapter Thirty-five
H ow did you find out about this place?” Britney asked.
Michele was really getting tired of the younger woman’s questions.
“Are you sure this thing will work?” Britney went on.
“Yes. And it’s called a zapper.” Michele knelt in front of the small device she’d set in the middle of the living room, and checked the output readings once more. “It’s been used quite effectively in San Diego. One of my nephews designed it,” she added proudly. “He’s made quite a lot of improvements lately. This version draws power from a small lithium battery; the original versions weren’t as compact and portable.”
Britney, of course, was not impressed. “But do they actually work? Our lives might depend on that thing working.”
“You are such a Luddite,” Kevin said to Britney.
“What’s that?” Britney asked.
Kevin just shook his head, and went back to staring out the living room window.
Michele was glad he was sufficiently recovered from being stabbed with a knitting needle to join them. She was equally glad that he’d brought along his brother Doug, since Andrew was absent, and the other local Purist had quit the group when the operation to kill the brat went sour.
They’d broken into the vampire’s hidden lair an hour before and set up shop in the dark house. When you hunted vampires, you got used to working in ambient light. Doug was outside watching the road; Kevin had his post by the window. The waiting was making them all nervous. Michele so wanted to get this over with. She was weary of the hunt, and very nervous about why she was involved. The younger hunters were driving her crazy. And the vampire—no, she mustn’t think about the vampire.
“He means that you’re afraid of innovation,” Michele explained to Britney.
Britney held up a small canister of garlic spray. “I know this works. And I know silver works against the bastards, and wood.”
She carried a slender wooden dagger; Kevin was armed with a specially modified gun that shot silver bullets.
Britney nudged the zapper with her foot. “This—I don’t know what this does.”
“I’ve already explained. It creates an energy field that dampens the vampire’s psychic abilities. This will keep them from detecting our presence.”
“Until it’s too late,” Kevin added. “Now, if they’d only get here. I’d like to get the job over with and go home.”
“Yes. Let’s get it over with once and for all and strike a blow for humanity,” Britney said with fierce pleasure. “I’ve been waiting to destroy the vampire race my entire life.”
“One at a time.” Kevin suddenly tensed. “I think I see lights approaching.”
Michele shot to her feet and motioned to Britney. “By the door,” she ordered. She drew out a silver dagger, and crouched tensely behind the couch.
“Slow down. Something’s wrong,” Mike said.
He leaned forward in his seat and took deep breaths. The wolves in the backseat did the same. Cage was driving a convertible, and Mike had been enjoying drinking in the night air.
Jason braked to a crawl on the rutted dirt road. “I never argue with a werewolf’s nose. What is it, boy?”
“Don’t call me—”
“I was talking to George,” the vampire hastily informed him.
Mike didn’t buy that, but he let it go. Why argue with a guy who played with lions and tigers?
“It’s not so much what I scent, but…Mortals came this way recently. Matt’s also been here.”
With a woman, Mike could tell, detecting the musk and psychic residue of sex even a quarter mile away from the house. He recognized the scent of the woman Matt had been with back at the hotel. At least now he knew why his friend had kept his phone off. The perfect woman, Matt had called her. Mike guessed Matt Bridger had gotten over his fear of settling down.
“But Bridger isn’t here now,” Jason said. “I don’t detect his presence, either.”
So they wouldn’t be interrupting the honeymoon. It was certainly better to wait for his return than to interrupt a vampire in heat. Even so, Mike didn’t like the feel of the area. There was an absence up ahead, a hole in the fabric of the universe that tickled his senses. He couldn’t quite put his finger on it, but there was something familiar about what he wasn’t feeling.
“What do you detect?” he asked the vampire.
“Not a damn thing,” Jason replied. He stopped the car. “That’s not good, is it?”
Mike finally recognized the psychic absence up ahead. Besides, he could now detect the faintest humming sound. Glancing into the backseat, he saw that the wolves’ ears were pricked at the sound.
“Zapper. It’s an antivampire device,” he explained. “It was invented by the brother of an ex-vampire hunter who works in my family’s detective agency.”
“An ex-vampire hunter?”
“Yeah. She hooked up with a Tribe Prime, but he reformed, and they had a baby and now they both work with us. What can I say? Good help is hard to find.”
“I still don’t get it, but we don’t have the time to gossip right now.”
“Not when there’s an ambush waiting for us up ahead.”
The vampire grinned, showing very sharp teeth. “It looks like this evening is going to be entertaining, after all. How do you want to handle it?”
Mike began to take off his borrowed clothes. “I think you should drive up to the house and spring the trap.” He jumped out of the c
ar. “Okay if I take Burns and Allen with me?”
Chapter Thirty-six
T hat was a gunshot!” Phillipa said.
“It most certainly was,” Matt answered.
“What was that?” she asked about the eerie sound that followed the gunfire.
“Werewolf.” Matt flipped off the car lights and floored the gas pedal.
They’d had the windows down to enjoy the night air, and he’d just made the last turn to the safe house when the crack of sound came out of the night.
Phillipa gave him a sharp look. “Werewolf?” She surprised him by saying, “So there really is a werewolf responsible for the killings Pete’s investigating.”
He frowned at the mention of her police detective friend. “Yes.”
“You know about that?” She sounded outraged.
“Don’t take that tone, woman. I am a vampire cop. My partner, Mike Bleythin, is in town looking into the lycanthrope matter.”
“Your partner? You said you worked alone.”
“No, I said that only a single vampire does my job at a time. Mike’s the werewolf copper.”
Another howl sounded as they drew closer to the house.
“And that sounds like him now.”
Another pair of howls sounded from different directions.
“Those sound like real wolves,” Phillipa said. “George and Gracie?”
Matt was confused for a moment, then he remembered. “Jason Cage’s wolves. What’s Mike doing with Cage?”
“More importantly, why are shots coming from your safe house?”
“That is the most important point,” he agreed.
He stopped the car behind the cover of a bush, and fought the urge to order her to stay put. Anyway, she was out of the car almost before he shifted to park. Since he could move much faster than Phillipa, he grabbed her before she’d gone more than a step.
“I’m the one who gets to rush headlong into danger. You bring the gun and follow as backup.”
“Okay,” she conceded. “But—there’s a werewolf, and real wolves and unknown suspects. How do I know who to shoot?”
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