Right. That could work.
Peering around the beam, Johnny focused on the singer below calling the masses to worship with arms spread wide and head tilted back as she sustained a long and gorgeous note. The sexual energy in the club was thick as blood. Dancers gyrated against one another, their bodies speaking without words. Hands sought curves and skin and moist, dark places. Lips brushed and crushed and bruised.
He and Kam’s kiss in the garden had been nothing compared to what Johnny dreamed of doing with her in the privacy of a bedroom. And he needn’t words, either. Sinking his fangs deep into her body, he would drink her essence. Learn her. Damn the worshippers, the hangers-on. The fang junkies. The mysterious boyfriend. He would win her, body and blood.
Pushing past a group of black-leather-clad dancers, he shuffled down the stairs and shoved to the edge of the dance floor. He wasn’t much for dancing. Music was for banging his head, racing his heartbeats. Thumping the universe.
Johnny smirked. Had he charmed Kam the other night? She’d started off as closed, sitting on the park bench, her arms wrapped about her legs. As they’d talked, she had turned toward him, opening to allow their conversation. She had asked him for the kiss. And what a kiss.
The band tore into the final, encore song.
Kam screamed out the anthem he’d sung along to last night. Pumping the air with a fist, Johnny sang along as he headed toward the backstage area. In order to pass into the dark hallway that led to Kam’s dressing room, he had to swerve around the big bruiser who was arguing with an even bigger bruiser, the club’s bouncer. Apparently the guy wanted backstage access to see Kambriel, and to prove his urgency, he growled, revealing thick canines.
“Werewolf,” Johnny muttered under his breath. He had nothing against the dogs; he just tried to walk a wide circle around them. They touched volatile at the drop of a bone.
He clamped a hand on the back of the werewolf’s shoulder. “Hey, don’t give the guy a hard time. He’s doing his job.”
The wolf growled at him. “Back off!”
"Yeah? I don’t think she wants to see you. Wolves aren’t exactly her type.”
“And how do you know her?” The wolf turned and eyed him cruelly. He was a big one. Thick curly black hair dusted about pale eyes and a tense jaw. A gray tee shirt stretched over his biceps; muscles Johnny suspected could deliver a murderous punch.
“She’s with me,” he offered, not backing down from the obvious threat.
If the wolf so much as flinched into a fist, Johnny would slice open the vein bulging on his neck so fast he’d wish he’d stayed at the kennel with the other dogs tonight.
The wolf clutched Johnny’s leather jacket lapels and slammed him against the wall. “Who the hell are you?”
“Take it outside,” the bouncer ordered. “The wolf leaves one way or another. We don’t cater to your breed here. You can go back, Johnny.”
Heh. So she must have given his name to the bouncer. Nice.
“I’m not going anywhere until I talk to Kambriel.”
Johnny winced at the squeeze the wolf held on his shoulder. He was this close to whipping out the fangs. Last thing a wolf wanted was a vampire bite that would then develop into a nasty thirst for blood. Wolves didn’t do the bite.
Idiots didn’t know what they were missing.
Johnny calmly met the big guy’s gaze. Best way to befriend a dog? Look at them on their level and don’t show any fear. “She’s taken. By me, Johnny Santiago. Now back off.”
“Santiago?” The werewolf considered his name. Probably heard about him singing. Or not. Bitter/Sweet hadn’t headlined any large clubs. Yet. “How long have you known her? Does she love you?”
Johnny quirked a brow. The rival got right to the point. “None of your business.”
The wolf slammed him hard against the steel wall. Just as Johnny’s fangs descended, the man said, “She’s my sister!”
“Seriously?” He retracted his fangs. The threat felt wrong with this stunning new information.
Johnny noted the bouncer talked into a headset, eyeing the wolf cautiously. Her brother was a werewolf? “I happen to know the lady is a vamp,” he offered. “I doubt very much—“
“Our mother is a werewolf and our father a vampire,” the wolf quickly explained. “Now if you know her, then you get me back to see her. She’s been missing for half a year.”
“Missing?”
The wolf took his hands off Johnny and nodded. His jaw tightened as he looked aside. Those impossible muscles flexed with nervous apprehension.
He was telling the truth. And he was hurting. Johnny could feel his anxiety waver off him like steam from a shower.
“She took off for Paris last year to find herself,” the werewolf explained. “Haven’t heard from her since. Until I happened to walk into this club and saw her on-stage singing. Kam has never sung before.”
“Just started,” Johnny said. “Amazes the hell out of me, too.” He offered his hand to shake. “Honestly, I’ve only known her a short while, but I can probably get you backstage. Her brother,” he said to the bouncer. “I’m sure she’ll want to see him.”
The bouncer nodded and stepped back against the wall.
"Thanks, man.” The wolf shoved a firm clasp into Johnny’s hand. “I’m Malakai Saint-Pierre. Older brother by a minute.”
“Twins, eh? I don’t see the resemblance.”
“Yeah, Kambriel got the beauty, that’s for sure. Enough small talk. Take me to her.”
Halfway down the dark hallway, which seemed much longer than it had been last time he’d been here, Johnny broke the strange silence. “So if you haven’t heard from your sister since she left there could be a reason for that. Maybe I shouldn’t bring you in to see her. I should go ahead. Ask her if it’s kosher.”
“Listen, man, her whole family is worried about her. I need to know she’s all right. I’ll step back if that’s what she wants. Has she been singing long?”
“I’ve been coming to the club a few months and she’s been a headliner. The Dark’s Mistress. What a kicker. She’s…sweet, your sister. But I think she’s trying to be something she’s not.”
“A rock star? That is the weirdest thing. Kam has never expressed interest in singing. She was always interested in fashion and wanted to marry a rich guy and let him spoil her. Just like my mom did.”
Johnny smiled at the wolf’s easy confidence with him. The peek into Kam’s life warmed him to her even more. But worried him as well. She’d left her family for this?
“There’s something else about her…”
The wolf cast him a sidelong glance.
“She’s not in the right place,” Johnny said. “Like, she’s in trouble, or something. I don’t know. She didn’t say that to me.”
But she had said ‘save me’ that night in the park. Save her from what?
“It’s a feeling I get when I’m near her.”
“You shouldn’t have told me that, man. Now I’m really worried. This is a long hallway, and…” The wolf stopped and looked about.
Behind them darkness loomed. Before them it was also dark. Johnny couldn’t see the red outlined door he’d walked through previously. The apparition bodyguard was nowhere in site. And it was suddenly tit-freezing cold. He ran his fingers over his shaved scalp. What the hell?
The werewolf tilted his head at him. His lip sneered and he sniffed the air. “Who are you again?”
“Dude, I’m Johnny Santiago. A friend of your sister.”
“Sister?” Malakai rubbed his chin. “I…don’t think I have a sister.”
“But you just— Your twin?”
“Twin?” The wolf shook his head and grimaced.
And Johnny sensed something strange had occurred. The wolf had forgotten about his sister? And this never-ending hallway that led to a frozen Hell. What was up with that?
“I’m not sure what I’m doing here, but this place gives me the creeps.” The wolf backed away from Johnny, his palms
up in defense. “Later.” He turned and loped down the hallway.
Johnny stood, mouth agape, thinking he should call out, but too stymied to do so. What was the guy’s name? Had he just been chummy with a werewolf?
When he swung around in the darkness he stood immediately before the metal-studded dressing room door. Red light seeped around the edges. The ghost appeared, smiled at him, and pushed the door inward.
“Something is fishy in Denmark,” he whispered as he entered the cool room walled in black marble. “Kam?”
“Johnny.” She appeared at his side and, still wearing the ribbon-laced demon horns, smiled up brightly at him. She looked a pixy gone over to the dark side. “I didn’t think I’d see you again.”
“Really? Oh, uh, last night I had this thing.”
“You don’t need to explain.”
Right. But he knew when a woman spoke in that tight tone she’d just used he really did need to explain. “It was a family thing.”
Something softened in her irises.
“Family means a lot to me,” he said. “I put them above all else.”
“That’s refreshing. I have family.” She tilted her head, as if wondering if that statement was true. “Yes, I do.”
Yes, she did. Maybe? Why did he feel as though he’d met her family, and yet—he lost the thought. He wasn’t sure what he was thinking. Must be the smoke from the club fucking with his senses.
“So you’re here now,” she said. “What took you so long?”
“Well, the walk down the hallway was a mile long, and there was the…”
The…? He’d been talking to someone not moments ago, but couldn’t place his memory to the face or even a name. But that someone had been important. Maybe? Hell, he needed blood.
“And now there’s you,” she cooed sweetly.
He tapped one of the horns jutting from her temple. “Will you let me take you away from here tonight?”
“Like on another date in the park?”
“We’ll go someplace different. Somewhere you want to go. Have any ideas?”
“I do. You wait out in the hall while I get changed.”
She left him standing before the water fountain that dribbled black water over silver fish. Johnny reached to stroke the back of one of the koi and the fish snapped at him, revealing fangs. He recoiled.
The foreboding promise of heart-wrenchingly emotional pain should he continue to see Kambriel seeped through his pores. Indeed, perhaps even physical torture waited for him.
"Bring it," he muttered. "Always in for the adventure."
* * *
It was two o’clock in the morning. Exhausted tourists had trudged to their hotels and rental apartments. Traffic had settled by half, but still the streets glowed with headlights. Barges floated the Seine and a bonfire across the river at the Trocadero welcomed late night protestors. Kam couldn’t hear what they were singing about from this distance, but she had to laugh at the Parisian’s insistent need for a new protest each week.
The Iron Lady loomed before her and Johnny. She stepped toward the daunting structure, spreading her arms out as if she could catch it should it topple.
“I’ve always wanted to go to the top,” she said, “but the lines and the tourists have kept me away. And now it’s closed.”
Johnny leaned in beside her cheek. His nearness traced an expectant shiver up her arms. “There are no lines now,” he said. And he took off toward the east leg of the Eiffel Tower. “Race you to the top!”
Kam opened her mouth to protest then shut it. Really? She squeezed her fists together in glee. “Yes!”
They met at the base of the tower. Johnny chuckled as he climbed the crisscross of iron, encouraging her to do the same. He moved as if an animal comfortable with climbing.
Kam knew it was the vampire in him—and her—that allowed them to move without fear, and with a surety of step that saw them both around the daunting two-metre overhang and up and over the suicide cages to the first level in no time. Good thing she’d worn tight black leggings and a steel mesh top. A dress wouldn’t have cut it. Though her heeled boots gave her little trouble, and in fact, she hooked the heels in the iron crevices for good hold.
Gasping with elation, she met Johnny’s high-five with a loud smack.
“Think you can make it to the top?” His eyes twinkled with a challenge no female could resist. Because it was so much more than a dare to race to the top—he’d invited her into his heart.
Leaning out into the sky, Kam grabbed the outer side of the tower, swung her body around, and started upward. The iron was rough and in some places sharp in her grasp but she didn’t care or take notice as she soared higher and higher.
Johnny moved beyond her, and then he slowed, and she was able to bypass him. He was letting her win. Not fair! And oh, what a sweetie. She caught his switchblade smile as she glided past him, and thought she’d not seen a more appealing expression on a man ever. Happy to let her win.
They reached the second level and didn’t stop, heading straight up the last and longest stretch toward the top of the tower. The upper portion served as a communications platform and was riddled with satellite dishes and radio antennas. Kam navigated around them to climb to the topmost platform. Once there, she held out her hand and Johnny took it, but didn’t use her strength to lever himself up because he could do it himself. He was allowing her the illusion of her assistance.
He settled next to her on a small steel platform. Thrusting up his fist, he shouted, “Yeah!”
Kam wrapped her arms across her chest and closed her eyes. The breeze swayed her body and swirled in her hair. Felt ominous and so far away from her reality down below. “It feels…” Safe, was the first word that came to mind.
Johnny hugged an arm across her shoulders. “It’s beautiful up here. Wow! Look at the river. It’s lined with faery lights.”
The buildings that edged the river flashed light across the Seine and it did look like something magical, even faery-like. Seeing it through Johnny’s eyes gave her a new perspective on the city. It wasn’t so dark and mean as she’d come to know it.
“Wouldn’t it be cool to record a music video while singing from up here?” His enthusiasm rippled into her pores as if a warm summer breeze. “Here’s to rock n’ roll!”
“Long live rock n’ roll!”
“You know, if you hang around me long enough, you’ll learn all my musical tastes.”
“Not all heavy metal and goth?”
“I have to admit, it’s not. I grew up listening to Johnny Cash and Lynyrd Skynyrd. Weird, eh?”
“Not at all. Music, no matter the style, is life. But let me guess. Is Johnny Cash your namesake?”
He chuckled. “Yeah, my dad has a thing for him. Good ole dad. Always walking around, singing about ghostriders in the sky and a boy named Sue. Surprised I became a musician?”
“I suppose not. I’ll confess to a few boy bands and an abiding love for Adam Ant.”
“Hey, ant music for sex people, sex music for ant people!”
That he knew the slogan for the 80s pop star was incredible and silly, and too cool. The guy had some geeky musical passions, as did she. That made him more appealing by the second. Not that he needed the added appeal.
The tickle of skin against skin pulled Kam’s attention toward him. Johnny traced a finger along the butterfly tattooed on her shoulder.
“I used to envy the mortals,” he said.
“Why?”
“Mortals always want to be like us. And now here’s where you picture me with fake plastic fangs and a lisp: I vant to suck blood and have fangs. That would be so vitchin’.”
She laughed at his impersonation of a mortal with aspirations to become vampire.
He made show of tugging out the invisible fangs from his mouth and flicking them away into the sky. “But I’m always like ‘You mortals are so lucky. You get to eat food and sit in the sun, and have tattoos’. I want my whole body covered with tattoos. I think
it’s an awesome expression of inner self. Yours are cool, but I don’t understand how you have them if you’re bloodborn.”
“They’re special. Gifted me by…” She sighed and looked down over the buildings that resembled toys set on a stage. No sense in spoiling the mood by mentioning the boyfriend. Quickly, she grasped a fleeting memory. “I used to want to be a werewolf when I was growing up.”
“No way.”
“Oh yeah. My mother…uh…” The memory was blurry, but she managed to touch it. “Yes, she’s a werewolf. I wanted the fur and the shapeshifting abilities, big time.”
“I can’t imagine you with a furry nose.” He tapped her nose.
“Werewolves do not have furry noses. They feel like soft suede and are really warm.”
“If you say so. I haven’t gotten close enough to one of the dogs to study their nose. But I’m sure you’d be a cute werewolf. Your mom, eh? Your dad must be vamp?”
“Yes. And then there’s…” Another close family member she couldn’t place a name to right now. “Anyway.” She scanned below, locating the right bank and the Champs Elysees lit up as if for a parade. “My house…” She followed the trail of streetlights beyond the circular street sweeping around the Arc de Triomphe. “...is somewhere over there.”
“You live in the rich bitch neighborhood.”
“I am rich.”
“But you’re not a bitch. You’re the Dark’s mistress.”
Kam sighed and softened her gaze on the river below. She didn’t want Himself to intrude on this amazing evening. “I don’t belong to anyone, Johnny. Not in my heart anyway.”
“I’d like to win your heart.”
The elated confession startled her, and she met Johnny’s gaze high above the city of lights. The wind whipped his hair across his forehead, as it did hers. His eyes teased her to leave everything behind and jump into his world, his exotic, sexy, whirlwind of a life everyone dreamed of having, yet no one ever needed. Because freedom was all that mattered.
The Dark's Mistress (The Saint-Pierres) Page 5