“No karaoke bars,” Colleen said at once. “Suzette and ‘My Heart Will Go On’ need to be kept on separate continents.”
“Agreed. We can work out details later.” She took the armload of construction paper from Colleen. “Arts and crafts ain’t gonna do themselves.”
A night out. Colleen’s tension melted at the thought. She wasn’t a full-on party girl like Suzette or even the pre-Nathan Norelle, but she enjoyed a good bar crawl every now and then. Nothing lifted the spirits like piling on the war paint, squeezing into a too-tight dress and stilettos, and wedging herself onto a crowded dance floor. For a few hours, she could put sensible, tennis-shoe-wearing Miss Colly aside and pretend to be sexy and dangerous.
Now would be perfect. In the wake of the stalker incident, she’d spent the last week’s worth of evenings holed up in her apartment. Screw that. It was time to get out and start living again. Maybe a couple of drinks and some smolderingly sexy stranger would drive Jeremy out of her mind.
Emboldened by the idea, she decided to go for a test run. Instead of heading straight home after work, Colleen drove to her favorite Chinese restaurant, then out to Hermosa Beach’s biggest mall. For the next three glorious hours, she indulged in some serious shopping. She came away with a smokin’ blue dress, black spike heels, and a lipstick labeled Midnight Seduction. By the time she finally trundled the Ford into her parking space, night had taken full hold on the world.
For the first time in a week, she got out of her car without first looking around. Norelle was right. She’d needed to get out. She pulled out the bags with the dress and the shoes in them. That blue was going to make her stand out like a neon come-get-me. She wondered, just for a second, what Jeremy would think of it, what his favorite color was.
Forget him. He didn’t figure into her life anymore. Her first priority now was to get upstairs and take a photo of herself in her new outfit and send it to Norelle. She’d brew some coffee to sip while she waited for Norelle’s return squee.
Only after she locked the car did Colleen become aware of her psychic prickle’s frantic alarm and the cold sensation of a predator’s eyes watching her every move.
She bolted for the door to the stairwell. Her hand landed on the knob. A body as hard as stone slammed against her and crushed her to the door while a frigid male hand clamped over her mouth.
“Don’t,” an icy voice hissed in her ear. “Don’t scream, don’t struggle. Don’t give me grief. I’ve been told to take you alive with a minimum of damage. Cooperate and we’ll both be much happier, eh?”
Shock held her rigid and silent. All the preschool’s workers had taken a self-defense course. Vengeful exes sometimes tried to snatch their kids. Those lessons now deserted her, driven out by the man’s iron grip and the absolute deadness in his voice. Her overwhelming thought was, I don’t want to die.
Her lack of reaction brought a satisfied growl from the man. He nodded against her cheek. His touch was as cold as ice and made her skin crawl. “Good girl. Don’t try to fight me, and we’ll get along fine.” He paused with his nose pressed to her throat. She heard no rapid panting breaths other than her own. “You smell so tasty,” he murmured. His tongue washed across the pulse in her throat in a leisurely, lingering swath.
Revulsion broke her paralysis. Colleen rammed her elbow into his chest and her heel onto his toes. His grip loosened just enough for her to thrust herself free. Without even thinking, she whirled and swung her fist at his face. The punch rocked him backward. She grabbed the bag with the shoebox in it and began to pummel him with it.
Any second now common sense would rear up and she’d run from the parking lot screaming for help. Until then, however, she intended to take out a week’s worth of fear and frustration on this sick son of a bastard.
Her attacker wrecked her plans with a single backhand blow. She lost her grip on the bag, but not her footing. The man thrust his face at hers and smiled.
“You’re everything Lebec promised,” he said. “Or you will be, once we’re done with you.”
His teeth. Oh God. He had a set of fangs that would look right at home on a Rottweiler. She lost track of the fangs when his fist crashed into her jaw. Colleen was hurled into the brick side of the apartment building. Her vision filled up with a burst of light, and pain exploded at the back of her head.
She slid to the blacktop, fighting to stay conscious. She had to get up, run, fight back, do something. With a tremendous effort, she managed to lift her head.
The creep with the big teeth had his hands full with a second man. They grappled, broke, circled. Her defender had a blunt, bronze crew cut and wore a bomber jacket and jeans over a muscular body. They snarled wordlessly at each other like a couple of wolves.
Get up, Colleen ordered herself. She couldn’t just lie there like some helpless bimbo in a bad action movie. Her body flashed the finger at her brain’s exhortations and refused to rise no matter how much Colleen yelled at it. It kept her on the ground with a ringside seat to the vicious fight being waged over her fate.
The two men swung at each other so fast their limbs seemed to move in a blur. They threw each other against parked vehicles with a force that left dents in the metal but didn’t slow either a jot. The sounds that came out of Big Teeth’s mouth were nowhere close to human. The man in the bomber jacket made no noise at all. He circled and feinted and seemed to be waiting for something.
It came in a rush. Big Teeth dove at him with those Rottweiler fangs aimed for his throat. Her would-be savior whipped out a wooden stake from beneath his jacket and plunged it into her assailant’s chest.
Big Teeth went rigid. His jaws champed soundlessly. Then his body dried up and crumbled like a rotten tree trunk. The remains fluttered down to the blacktop in a man-sized pile of rancid ash.
Colleen squeezed her eyes shut. No. She hadn’t seen any of that. She’d cracked her head on the wall. Her mind was playing tricks. He hadn’t—she hadn’t—no.
This time, with the wall to back her, she managed to sit up. When she gingerly opened her eyes, the man in the bomber jacket was hunkered down right in front of her.
Whoa.
Eyes as green as a jungle cat’s caught and held her stare. Up close he looked younger than when he’d been snarling at Big Teeth, in his early thirties or so. He must have started out with a beautiful face before life got hold of it. She noted distantly that face hadn’t a bead of sweat on it. He wasn’t even breathing hard. He didn’t appear to be breathing at all.
“Colleen, right?” he said in a husky voice. “Sorry I was late to the party. Did he bite you?”
She blinked stupidly. His words made no sense. She fought to clear her head. Between the dizziness, shock, and those jungle-cat eyes, all she could think of was whoa.
He took her chin in his hand in a gentle but insistent grip. “C’mon, stay with me, sweetheart. Did he bite you?”
Still numb, she shook her head. Bad move. This time the dizziness brought its pal nausea along. So not helping.
Jungle Eyes sniffed her. Actually sniffed her, like a drug dog or something. His fingers probed the tender spot at the back of her head that had said hi to the wall. She winced and caught her breath in a hiss. He looked at his fingers and frowned.
“No blood,” he muttered. “Huh. The way you hit that wall, you shouldn’t even be conscious.”
Suddenly his voice registered. She’d heard it before. She’d been thinking about it all week. “Wallace? Are you Wallace?”
His intensity relented, and he smiled. The whoa factor soared upward several notches. He had the most amazing lips. They invited kisses. “Yeah, I’m Wallace. Scarecrow told you all about me, right? Of course he did. Damn. He sure does go for the pretty ones.” He swept a quick glance around the parking lot before he focused those incredible eyes on her again. “It isn’t safe for you here anymore. You’re coming home with me.”
She nodded. It never occurred to her to say no.
He slid his arm around her and lift
ed her without a hint of strain. Her feet barely touched the ground when he hustled her to her car.
“I’ll drive,” he said.
She handed over the keys without protest. Shock, she thought dimly. Must be shock. She didn’t react when he peeled out of the parking lot or when he patted her shoulder and assured her it would be okay, just relax and leave all this shit to the experts.
She couldn’t have seen what she’d seen. Wallace killing a man, okay. Last week had prepared her for that. But the man’s body turning to ash? No way.
At a red light he fished a cell phone out of his jacket pocket. “Scarecrow? It’s me. I swung by the chick’s place.” Those kissable lips formed a grimace. “All right. Colleen. Well, Colleen got attacked again. Yeah. Another one of our buddies. No, she’s fine. I’m bringing her home.” He returned the phone to his pocket. “That man is such a bitch,” he said, and grinned at her. “Hang in there, sweetheart. You’re with the good guys now.”
Colleen couldn’t summon a grin to give back to him. She slumped against the passenger door and stared blankly out the window. Hermosa Beach’s streets gave way to suburban housing. They passed a strip mall, a football field, and a college campus before Wallace turned her car up a street lined with vintage 1940s row homes, many with various sports team banners dangling from their windows. He pulled up to the curb.
She didn’t even see the house he parked in front of. All she saw was Jeremy standing in the doorway. She flung open the car door and ran into his welcoming arms. She voiced one panicked sob before she buried her face against his chest. The last hour’s terror receded before his urgent assurances.
“You’re all right now,” he murmured into her hair. “You’ll be safe with us. We won’t let anything happen to you.”
Wallace locked the car and ambled over to join them. Colleen jumped. She’d almost forgotten about him. He didn’t appear at all upset that she was clutching his lover in a death grip. If anything, he looked amused.
“You’ve been holding out on me,” he accused Jeremy.
“Knock it off, Wallace. She’s scared.”
“With good reason. Let’s get inside. I didn’t spot any tails, but who knows?”
Colleen allowed Jeremy to guide her inside, with Wallace at their backs. She couldn’t let go of Jeremy. Scared? Hell yes, she was scared. She’d just been attacked right outside her own door by a guy with teeth like a T. Rex. She’d watched the man now at her heels ram a stake through his chest. Funny how she wasn’t scared of him. Funny, yeah. Laugh riot.
Their home was a two-story—spacious living room and kitchen here on the first floor, with a stairwell that presumably led to a bedroom or bedrooms and a bath. Jeremy took her into the living room. By the time he got her settled in an overstuffed recliner her body had started to shake.
“I’m okay,” she chattered with a quivery smile. “Really. I’m okay.”
“Sure you are.” Colleen jumped. Wallace had appeared beside her chair. He’d gone into the kitchen and now, wham, here he was. He took her hand and folded her trembling fingers around a glass of dark liquid. “Whiskey,” he told her. “Drink up.”
With Jeremy’s help, she got the glass to her lips. The liquor burned down her throat like lava. After the resulting coughing fit passed, she felt somewhat better.
Jeremy took the glass from her. “Can you tell us what happened?”
“I went to the mall after work and bought a dress, and then I went home and got out of the car and he jumped me.” Maybe if she said it all in one rapid burst she’d have less time to be terrified. “I tried to fight him, and he hit me. Then Wallace—”
Then Wallace killed him and he crumbled like a cookie. Not even speed talking would let her get that out. She grabbed at Jeremy’s arm for comfort and went silent.
Jeremy turned to Wallace. “I took a swing by her place,” Wallace said. “Good thing. I got there right after the party started.” He grinned. “You should have seen her waling on the guy. Sweetheart, you’re a regular Xena Warrior Chick.”
“Another one?” Jeremy asked.
“Had to be another one. The first ain’t coming back.” He watched Colleen with an unsettling, blinkless stare. “No way this is coincidence.
“It’s the cult, isn’t it?” Colleen said. “They’re still after me. Why? What do they want with me?”
The stare whipped over to Jeremy’s face. “Cult?”
“You know,” Jeremy said with deliberate emphasis. “The blood drinkers. The ones you hunt.”
“Oh. Right. That cult.” He gave Jeremy an odd look. “They must be sharing intel. Not their usual MO.”
“Maybe you should have questioned him.”
“There kind of wasn’t time. Damsel in semi-distress and all.” Wallace shrugged. “Another one bites the dust, so what? Plenty more where he came from.”
“Please,” Colleen said. “Isn’t it bad enough you killed that man in cold blood? With a stake? Do you have to joke about it?”
“Hey, you’re welcome.”
“She saw you?” Jeremy cupped her chin and tilted her head to face him. “You saw him?”
“No.” She jerked her head free. “I didn’t see anything. I was scared. I was in shock. I hit my head. I was hallucinating.”
“Don’t try to shit us, sweetheart. Or yourself. You’re tougher than that. That man who jumped you wasn’t a man, and you know it.”
“Wallace—”
“Stow it, Scarecrow. If she’s been targeted by a flock, she deserves to know what she’s up against.” He hunkered down beside the chair to bring them to eye level. Those jungle-cat eyes held admiration. “You’re one nervy chick. You don’t put up with bull, even the bull you dish out to yourself. You know what you saw.”
“I told you, I didn’t see anything. I couldn’t have seen what I saw. What I thought I saw. Vampires aren’t real. They don’t exist outside of bad books and TV shows.”
Wallace leaned forward. The chair left little room to cringe away. His sea-breeze scent and emerald eyes pinned her to the fabric. Yet, even now, she didn’t fear him.
Until he smiled. Animal fangs flashed in a tiger’s grin. She discovered she had just enough room to recoil after all.
“Sometimes,” Wallace said, still smiling, “TV gets it right.”
Chapter 5
“You’re an asshole,” Jeremy said. “You know that?”
“So I’ve been told,” Wallace said. “Usually by you. How you holding up there, sweetheart?”
“Leave me alone,” Colleen’s muffled voice snapped. She perched on the edge of the recliner’s seat, bent over with her head between her knees. She hadn’t passed out, thank God for small mercies, but the room had gone dangerously gray for a minute. Jeremy crouched beside the chair. His hand made soothing circles on her back.
Wallace said to Jeremy, “You told her we were a cult?”
“I had to tell her something. If I’d said vampires, she’d have thought I was nuts.”
“Yeah, you’re right. ‘Cult’ works so much better. So what am I, the high priest?”
“No, you’re…” His voice picked up a sheepish note. “Special Agent Hamilton.”
“Seriously? Oh, well, that solves everything. I’ll just give the Bureau a call, and we’ll dump it on Mulder and Scully. Jesus H. lap-dancing Christ.” His next words came from far too close to her ear. She felt no breath against her skin. “I am not a special agent.”
“I kind of figured that.”
“We are not a cult.”
“You’re not a vampire, either. You are crazy. Both of you.” She lifted her head to glare at Jeremy. She wasn’t quite ready to look Wallace in the fangs again just yet. “I don’t know what kind of nutty role-play fantasy thing you’ve got going here, but leave me out of it. I don’t play those games. Take your fake teeth, and go away.”
“Feisty,” Wallace pronounced. “I like this one, Scarecrow.”
“Stop making fun of me. Vampires aren’t real. They can’t
be.”
“Then riddle me this—What happened to the guy I staked? Don’t tell me you didn’t see that.”
“I must have blacked out for a second.”
“And the voice in your head? The one telling you to come outside? To come home? How’d they pull that off?”
That jab won him her stare. “How do you know what he said?”
“I heard him same as you did. We’re all pretty much on the same frequency.” Wallace stood and leaned against the recliner’s armrest. “Look, sweetheart, here’s the deal. Vampires are real. We come out at night, we drink blood, we sunburn like a son of a bitch, the whole nine yards. You need to accept that because that’s what’s after you. It would help if we knew why they’re so undead set on nabbing you. Any insights?”
“How would I know? I didn’t do anything. I don’t go to Goth bars or bite clubs or whatever they call them. I babysit preschoolers, for God’s sake.”
Jeremy rubbed her shoulder. “It’s okay. We believe you. Don’t we, Wallace?”
“Sure, Scarecrow. Whatever you say. Even when you say we’re a cult. Don’t make that face at me.”
“Start being helpful, and I’ll stop.”
“Stop being a bitch, and I’ll start being helpful.”
“Stop it!” Colleen yelled. Both of them backed off. She spotted the glass of whiskey where Jeremy had placed it on the end table. She snatched it up and drained the remains of the liquor in one quick gulp. Wallace grunted. She set the empty glass aside and glared up at Wallace. “You’re a vampire.”
He showed off his fangs. “At your service. Just don’t ask me to sparkle. I don’t do that shit.”
She swung her glare over to Jeremy. “So what are you, his human slave?”
Jeremy shrugged with a little half-smile. “Pretty much, yeah.”
Wallace snorted. “The hell. He doesn’t do half of what I tell him. Watch this. Slave, get your perky ass over here, get down on your knees, and suck my cock.”
Cunningham, Pat - Legacy [Sequel to Belonging] (Siren Publishing Ménage Amour) Page 6