Seduced by the Night

by Robin T. Popp

  “Are you all right?”

  Miles’s question caught her off guard and it took a second to realize that he was referring to the break-in and murder, not Dirk’s behavior. She nodded slowly.

  Glancing around to make sure she and Miles were alone in the lab, she gave him a hard shove. “Do you think that maybe now you can tell me more about where you got the extract?”

  Though there was no obvious change in his expression, suddenly her warm fiancé was replaced by the cool, efficient businessman. “Not tonight, Bethany. It’s almost morning and neither of us has had any sleep. Let’s go back to my place. You can relax in a nice hot bath while I make arrangements for the bodyguard and then—”

  “—we’ll talk?”

  “We’ll go to bed.”

  His suggestion distracted her from the topic at hand. “Miles, I . . . um . . . I’m pretty tired. I don’t know if I feel like . . . you know.”

  Smiling down at her, he was the warm fiancé once more. “I only meant that we should sleep, my dear—but at my place. I don’t think it’s a good idea for you to return to your apartment tonight.”

  So much relief swept through her that she felt guilty. Miles had practically been her best friend—her only friend—for the last couple of years. In many respects, he was more her family than her parents and siblings. She didn’t think there was anything wrong with marrying her best friend, but wasn’t she supposed to want to “sleep” with the man she’d promised to marry? She shoved the thought aside, telling herself that with all that had happened tonight, it was only natural to feel uncomfortable with . . . everything.

  “I don’t have any clothes at your place,” she objected in a feeble attempt to justify going back to her apartment.

  Miles merely chuckled and guided them into her office so she could retrieve her purse. “Not a problem. I’ll simply call one of the stores and have an outfit delivered.”

  She rolled her eyes. “That’ll cost a fortune.”

  He smiled. “What’s the point of having all this money if I can’t spend it on the woman I love.”

  Two hours later, Bethany was soaking in the oversized tub in Miles’s penthouse suite, letting warm vanilla-scented bubbles soothe her nerves as the hot water worked to relax her muscles. Lit candles around the tub provided enough light to see without the harshness of the overhead lights, giving the room a quiet, peaceful atmosphere. She could almost forget the night’s traumatic events or that Miles was, this minute, on the phone in the living room making arrangements for a bodyguard.

  In her mind, she replayed the evening, from the moment she first saw Dirk on the street, to when she found Frank dead, to the memory of Dirk in the lab, standing before her. It was all like a strange, disturbed dream that made no sense and Bethany finally closed her eyes, willing everything to go back to normal. She wanted her structured, uneventful life restored.

  When the water grew tepid, she climbed out of the tub and dried off before slipping into the extra set of pajamas Miles had provided for her. When she walked into the bedroom, the sun was beginning to peek over the horizon. She went to the window and looked out, a sense of hopeful anticipation filling her at the thought of the day that awaited and the opportunities that lay ahead. It was the way she felt every time she witnessed a new dawn.

  Then her thoughts turned to the chaos that awaited her at the lab, and heaving a sigh, she pulled the drapes closed and plunged the room into darkness.

  Dirk sat in the admiral’s Humvee as their small group drove back to the mansion and felt the clawing weight of fatigue spread over him as the sun rose on the horizon. He hated the dawn and the sooner he went to bed, the better off he’d be. It had been a strange night. Not that killing vampires or finding dead bodies was unusual. That was becoming all too familiar.

  Six months ago, Mac and Lanie had gone to the research facility in South America expecting to identify the bodies of Lanie’s father, Dr. Weber, and that of Lance Burton, a former SEAL teammate of Mac’s and Dirk’s. Both men had been killed in a wild animal attack. However, when Mac and Lanie got there, they found everyone at the research facility was dead. The only marks on their bodies had been two puncture wounds in the neck through which the bodies had been drained of blood. To make matters worse, the bodies of Weber and Burton were nowhere to be found.

  A search resulted in Lanie finding her father’s journal and from it, they learned that the mysterious creature her father had been brought in to study was the legendary El Chupacabra. It didn’t take a detective to figure out the wild animal that had attacked Weber and Burton was none other than the chupacabra and that, in killing them, the creature had turned Weber and Burton into vampires. They, in turn, had killed the researchers at the lab.

  Then, to make matters worse, Burton escaped with the chupacabra to Washington, D.C., where he forced the creature to kill his friends in order to create his own special ops vampire team, which in turn targeted the President of the United States for assassination. Stopping him had almost cost Mac, Lanie, and Dirk their lives and in the end, two of his team got away—Patterson and Harris.

  For the last six months, Dirk and Mac had been searching for Patterson and Harris—without success, but they had hunted plenty of the creatures Harris and Patterson created when they fed off humans—so much so that Lanie had affectionately dubbed them “night slayers.”

  Kidnapping was something new, though, and Dirk had to wonder why, suddenly, Harris and Patterson had targeted a biochemist.

  Given their military background and their mercenary tendencies, the first answer that came to mind was that they had decided to continue with Lance Burton’s original plan.

  Not liking the direction of his thoughts, he turned in his seat so he could face Mac and Lanie in the back. “How hard would it be for a biochemist to make a biotoxin that could, say, take out the entire D.C. area?”

  “It couldn’t be just anyone,” Mac replied thoughtfully. “It would have to be someone who really knew what they were doing.”

  “Like someone who’d just won the Rod O’Connor Award for Biochemical Excellence?” the admiral put in from the driver’s seat.

  “Oh, no,” Lanie breathed out, expressing how they all felt.

  They fell silent and Dirk let his mind wander back to the lab; back to the image of a woman with shoulder-length ash-blond hair and features so delicate and fine, it was little wonder Miles Van Horne wanted her for a wife. He did his best to push that thought to the back of his mind, where it refused to stay.

  Almost a foot taller than Bethany, he’d lost himself staring down into her emerald-green gaze. He relived the memory of their hands touching when they first met and the spark of electricity that sizzled between them. His mental image shifted to include Miles Van Horne and he frowned. The man was clearly wrong for her.

  Glancing back at Lanie and Mac, it was hard to miss the look of affection Mac gave his wife. Not for the first time, Dirk felt there should be something more to his life.

  He silently scoffed at himself. The kind of peace and fulfillment he longed for came to others—it didn’t come to people like him. He slammed the door on emotions leaking past the mental barrier he’d erected long ago.

  When they reached the mansion, Dirk and Mac climbed from the vehicle with obvious effort.

  “You boys should go on to bed,” Lanie said as they went inside. “I can see you’re both dragging.”

  “What about you?” Mac asked.

  “I’ll be there shortly.” She smiled as she gave her husband a kiss. “I want to be here when the new assistant arrives—help her get settled.”

  “You’re kidding?” Dirk said, surprised. “He refuses to hire a maid or housekeeper for security reasons, but now he’s hired an assistant?” Confusion and concern overrode Dirk’s fatigue as the group automatically headed for the kitchen. “Why?”

  “Oops, what are you doing here?” Lanie walked over to the large gargoyle-shaped statue sitting on the kitchen counter and picked it up. Then she
turned to Dirk. “Our security work is starting to take up more of my time so Uncle Charles thought it would be a good idea to hire someone to help out.”

  “Where’d he get this person?” Mac asked. “It’s not like he can just hire anyone off the street.”

  “Don’t worry,” she assured them. “He went through a special agency. This woman has cleared all the background checks.”

  “If he’s already checked her out, then I guess there’s nothing for us to worry about,” Dirk mumbled around a yawn. “I’m going to bed.”

  “Yeah, me, too,” Mac added.

  The two walked in silence up the stairs to their respective rooms. Being half vampire came with a cost—one of which was they had a hard time functioning during the day. Although Dirk missed the sunshine, he didn’t mind sleeping during the day and being up all night. After all, he was a vampire slayer and night was when he hunted.

  Bethany left for the lab the next evening dressed in the outfit Miles purchased for her. She’d almost refused to wear it, afraid of what an errant drop of acid might do to the fine linen. He’d dismissed her concerns and sent her to work, accompanied by her new bodyguard, Mr. Yarbro, a huge, beastly-looking, bald man who was nearly as broad in the shoulders as she was tall. It didn’t take much time in his company, however, to realize that while he might be effective at protecting her from outside dangers, she was at risk of dying from boredom. Not used to having someone with her constantly, she’d tried engaging the man in conversation only to discover that he had the wit and personality of a rock.

  On a lighter note, however, Miles had ordered the lab to be cleaned and the broken equipment replaced, so everything was ready for her to begin work when she arrived. She went to the refrigerated safe and keyed in the combination to open it. Inside was the original vial of plant extract that Miles had given her. She used a dropper to siphon off a small amount that she then placed in another tube before setting to work.

  After studying her notes, she realized that there were only a few tests she needed to run to be caught up to where she was before the break-in. By eleven P.M., neck and back muscles aching from bending over the counter for hours and a nauseous hollow feeling eating away at her stomach, Bethany finally decided it was time to quit. “Mr. Yarbro, I think I’m ready to call it a night.”

  The bodyguard nodded and together they left the building. As she walked to the parking garage several blocks away, Bethany felt like she was being watched. A flash of something across the street caught her eye and she looked to see what it was.

  A couple of men, their backs to her, stumbled into the open alleyway, at least one of them too drunk to stand on his own. She thought the dark coat of the man supporting him looked familiar and felt her heart lurch in hopeful anticipation.

  A touch at her elbow dragged her attention away. “Ms. Stavinoski, we really should keep moving.”

  Bethany glanced at Mr. Yarbro’s profile as his eyes kept a constant surveillance of their surroundings. His caution reminded her of just how surreal her situation was. She glanced back down the alley and, seeing that the men were gone, allowed Mr. Yarbro to steer her toward the garage. She silently chided herself for silly daydreams that conjured up images of Dirk Adams everywhere she looked.

  Dirk held the dead vampire up against the building behind the trash Dumpster where they were well hidden from view. He counted to ten and then to twenty, resisting the temptation to lean out far enough to catch one more glimpse of Bethany Stavinoski.

  Letting her see him wouldn’t do any good and might even prove disastrous. She might wonder why he was following her and he didn’t want to tell her that her human bodyguard couldn’t keep her safe. Neither could he tell her that she was being stalked by vampires—she’d think he was a nutcase.

  She was observant, though, which was more than he could say for her bodyguard. At least, he assumed that’s who the joker in the monkey suit was. The man had been totally unaware of the vampire shadowing them for half a block. If Dirk hadn’t been there to eliminate the threat, there was no telling what might have happened.

  He let the body of the creature slide to the ground, the small wood stake barely visible in the vampire’s chest. Pushing the body out of sight behind the Dumpster, he left the alley and headed for his Expedition. With luck, he’d have the body loaded and be waiting to follow Bethany and her bodyguard when they pulled out of the garage. After tonight, there was no doubt in Dirk’s mind that he needed to keep an eye on her—even if he did it from afar.

  Bethany went into the lab late the next afternoon to run her experiments. Miles had offered to pull a couple of college students off another project to assist her, but she wasn’t sure she wanted to involve anyone new on the project, even if it meant having to spend a little more time in the lab herself. At least this way, she knew the experiments would be done correctly. Not that she was a control freak, as Miles liked to imply.

  As they had the night before, she and Mr. Yarbro parked in the garage and walked to the research building. Bethany again felt as if she was being watched and fought the urge to turn around for as long as she could. When she did finally glance behind her, she noticed one man in particular among the other pedestrians.

  He wore a familiar black duster over dark clothes and had shaggy blond hair. His dark sunglasses prevented her from seeing his face well enough to tell if it really was Dirk Adams, but she felt almost positive it was.

  “Is there a problem?”

  She glanced up at her bodyguard and considered pointing out the man she thought might be Dirk, but then changed her mind. “No, no problem.”

  She allowed him to lead her away, but after walking about ten yards, she glanced back again. The man was gone and for some reason she found that even more disturbing.

  Her thoughts remained on him all the way to the Van Horne building and as soon as she entered the lab, she crossed to the window looking down on the street below. The sun had completely set and a streetlight lit patches of the sidewalk while leaving the rest in shadow. It was enough, though, that she was able to make out the form of a man standing against the building across the street. Though she couldn’t see him clearly enough to make out his features, from his stance she knew he was the man she’d seen earlier. Logic told her that it could be anyone, but intuition told her it wasn’t.

  It was almost one in the morning when Bethany recorded the last test results. The next set of experiments she wanted to run would keep her at the lab until dawn if she started them now and she didn’t feel like being there that long. She cleaned up, and then, accompanied by the ever-present Mr. Yarbro, left the building. Though she looked around outside for the familiar figure, it appeared that she and the bodyguard were the only ones on the street.

  When they reached the garage, they rode the elevator to the third floor. The garage seemed unusually quiet and the sound of their footsteps echoed loudly as they started toward her car. They had gone about halfway when a scrape and muffled cry stopped them in their tracks.

  Mr. Yarbro stepped closer to her as he pulled a gun from inside his jacket. A flicker of movement to one side caught Bethany’s attention and before she could figure out what was happening, the bodyguard was off and running.

  Wondering exactly what she should do, she spun around several times, realizing just how alone she was in the darkened garage. A tremor of fear shot through her as she imagined bogeymen lurking behind every car and in every shadow.

  Her own vehicle was parked about twenty yards away and the overhead lights that should have kept the spot well lit were mysteriously dark. The safety of the elevator loomed a good thirty yards behind her, leaving her feeling trapped in the open. Only the stairwell, dark and ominous off to the side, lay close enough to provide an escape, yet it could just as easily be another source of danger.

  As she focused her attention on it, she became aware of a shuffling noise coming from out of the shadowy depths. Frozen in place, she strained to see beyond the blackness as the sound of metal scr
aping metal caused the hairs on the back of her neck to stand up.

  Heart racing, Bethany stared helplessly as the shadows swirled and took form. Then, a dark figure appeared, looming larger than life, exuding danger. It was the devil incarnate and he was coming for her. Somewhere inside her head, a voice screamed for her to run.

  Chapter 3

  I won’t hurt you.”

  “You!” Her voice came out sounding breathless as she found herself staring at a familiar face.

  “You shouldn’t be standing out here in the open,” Dirk chastised her.

  Less afraid now, she reacted to his tone. “Well, no, but on the other hand, you shouldn’t be jumping out of dark places and scaring me half to death either, should you?”

  He was closer now and held her gaze for a moment before looking around the empty garage. “You’d think as rich as your boyfriend is, he could afford to hire a real bodyguard for you.” The disgust in his voice was hard to miss.

  Bethany opened her mouth to defend both Miles and the errant bodyguard, but Dirk cut her off.

  “Save your breath. Any bodyguard worth his salt would have made sure you were safe before leaving you. I’ve got a good mind to . . .” He let the threat trail off as he scanned the area once more. “Where’s your car?”

  “Over there.” She pointed to it.

  “Come on.” He placed a hand at her back and though his touch was light, her skin tingled from the contact, even through the layer of clothing. She glanced up at him, wondering if he’d noticed the frisson of electricity that snapped between them, but he wasn’t looking at her. His eyes were in constant motion, looking everywhere except at her.

  “Do you have the key?” he asked as they drew near her vehicle.

  She nodded, glad she’d made a duplicate key for the bodyguard and kept her original. She pulled the key ring from her purse and handed it to Dirk. As they got close, he unlocked the driver’s side door. “Get in. I’m going to see what happened to your protector. If I don’t come back in five minutes, or you see anyone that you don’t know, start the car and get the hell out of here.” He reached into the pocket of his coat, pulled out a business card, and handed it to her, along with her keys. “If you do have to leave, don’t go home. Call this number and talk to either Admiral Winslow or Mac Knight. They’ll know what to do.”