by Nancy Gideon
She gazed up, then smiled. She looked wonderfully relaxed. She looked wonderful.
Her hand stirred within his and her thumb began a sensuous rub at the base of his, moving down to feel the slowing pulse at his wrist, pausing over the raised scars branded there.
And his mood started to cool as reality began to poke holes in their blissful bubble.
“I’m sorry, but I’ve got go,” he said.
Closing her eyes, she brushed off his awkward words. “That’s all right. I never let my lovers stay over.”
He tried to shrug. “Oww.” Surprised he looked down at the mark on his shoulder where she’d pulled his shirt aside. Her impassioned bite had left puncture wounds.
“No offense meant. I’m funny about my privacy,” she offered in explanation, not as an apology, still not looking at him.
She hadn’t been laughing as he invaded every aspect of it only minutes ago.
Still lying beside her, he pulled up his pants, oddly reluctant to go. The way she gazed up through the skylight hinted that she’d prefer he leave, and ordinarily that would be fine with him.
He rolled above her, supporting himself with palms placed in the spill of her hair to hold her captive. He slowly touched his lips to hers, and lingered as hers sweetly parted.
But not tonight. Not with her.
“No offense taken,” he whispered.
As he started to sit back he felt her hand in his jacket pocket, and watched in puzzlement as she drew out his phone. She programmed her number into his cell, then replaced it.
“In case you need me,” she told him simply. “For anything.”
His smile was a quick, white flash as he got to his feet. He put down his hand, but she shook her head.
“I’m just going to relax here for a minute.” Nica returned his smile as she looked up at him. What craziness had possessed her, making love to a potential enemy? Enjoying it so much she was tempted to have him stay, not just for sex, but for his company? For someone to relax with? Insanity.
He cautioned, “Don’t forget to lock your door.”
“I won’t. Good night, MacCreedy.” Nica closed her eyes, curious when he remained a moment longer, wondering what he was doing until she heard his sigh of appreciation and the clink on his wineglass being put back on the coffee table.
“That is good. Crisp and sharp-edged, with just a hint of sweetness. Like you. Good night, and thank you. For everything.”
She listened to his footsteps going down the hall, followed by the click of her front door. Lock your door. Smiling at his unneeded concern, she inhaled deeply, enjoying his scent upon her. Her hand ruffled over the carpet nap as if it still retained his heat. Sex usually left her anxious to shower and put the encounter behind her as inconsequential. Now she languished in the moment, unwilling to leave it, letting the sights and sounds and sensations return so she could revel in him all over again.
Silas MacCreedy had neatly slipped through her guard. He’d turned her fight into sexual excitement at the first hot taste of his mouth. And she’d loved every angry, sweaty, sensational minute of it. He’d had her so mindlessly panting for him that she’d actually bitten him in the throes of pleasure. Leaving two distinct punctures.
Nica sat up, the lethargy of fantastic sex falling away in the face of her dismay. MacCreedy was a cop with a Shifter’s intuitive senses, used to latching onto even the most insignificant clue. And she’d left one impossible for him to miss.
The mark of her fangs.
A sudden sharp pain pierced through her head, replacing worry with blinding agony. She fell to the floor, clasping her temples, writhing helplessly as a stern voice stabbed her with each empathic syllable.
“What do you think you’re doing, rolling around like a careless bitch in heat, jeopardizing everything just to scratch an itch?”
Moaning, she rolled to her knees, balling up as if she could protect herself against the splintering pain that punished her. She struggled to fight it, even though she knew it was impossible. There was only surrender.
“Please,” she cried out. “He’ll be useful. Stop!”
And just like that, the pain was gone.
She huddled, shivering weakly, thoughts of Silas replaced by razoring memories of the consequences of past infractions. Consequences she didn’t dare incur lest she not survive.
After a time, her strength returned enough for her to crawl to her hands and knees, and finally get to her feet. Sick and dizzy, she made her way to the bathroom where a hot shower rinsed away all traces of her lover. The cold, lashing spray that followed reminded her of where her focus needed to be.
On the lives she needed to save. Her own included.
Four
Silas and his temporary partner sat in their small, economical import with the wrappings of their fast food meal on the seat between them, the windows down to let the damp early evening breeze drift through. Alain Babineau was studying the photos from the gambling floor that Silas could afford to show him now that the originals were safely tucked away while he watched the front of the club through a telephoto camera lens.
“Holy crap,” Babineau gasped. “That’s Titus King. He heads up the Committee for Urban Advancement. I wonder if his wife knows he goes for transvestites?”
MacCreedy glanced at the photo. His eyebrow arched high. “Are you sure?”
Babineau chuckled. “I busted Gino before he became Gina. He was working the streets to pay for his hormone therapy. Nice kid. Very polite.”
“Nice legs. I can understand the confusion.”
“Since Gina hasn’t had the operation yet, I don’t think Mr. King is confused.” He nodded toward the image of the prominent community leader’s hand beneath a very, very short skirt.
“Huh. I wonder if Manny’s put the squeeze on him yet. I’m sure he’s got a file full of shots just like this one to pad his retirement.”
“Probably. Manny’s like a slug. He’s in no hurry, and he leaves a slimy trail.” Babineau looked at the last photo. “Is this it?”
MacCreedy thought he heard relief in that question. He didn’t want to believe Babineau was a dirty cop; he wanted to think there was a good explanation for his partner’s tête-à-tête with Cummings. But maybe he was padding his retirement by supplying Cummings with insider information.
Either way, Silas wouldn’t be here long enough for it to matter. His job with the NOPD was almost concluded.
“That’s all I got before I had to smuggle the camera out. I didn’t want to risk getting caught with it.”
Babineau nodded and tucked the pictures back into the envelope. “Got some good stuff here.” He shook his head. “How could Brady get tied in with someone like Blutafino? He’s got to know that if a whiff of that got out, it would be a career killer.”
Two furtive males crossed the street a block down and approached the club. One of them clutched his shoulder, and Silas was instantly alert. Babineau glanced over as he opened the car door.
“Spotted somebody I need to have a word with,” Silas said before slipping out into the foggy drizzle. He hunched his shoulders and jogged across the street, slipping inside the neon glare of the Sweat Shop.
The two men were approaching the bar. Silas recognized their scent the minute he entered the building, and now he could see their faces. He didn’t think they’d recognize him from the alley since he was backlit in the shadows, but the next few seconds would tell.
Silas went up to them quickly. “Help you fellas?”
They turned to him with a mixture of annoyance and wariness. He’d been keeping unofficial tabs on them for the past couple of weeks, ever since their names surfaced in loose talk from his former partner, Stan Schoenbaum, concerning missing girls and an alleged confrontation with a policewoman. The guy with the bad shoulder—whom Detective Charlotte Caissie had shot when they attacked her—looked pasty and ill. The other looked just plain scared.
“We need to see Mr. Blutafino. Tell him Nash and Willis are here
to talk some business.”
“Sorry, but Mr. Blu is out of town. My name’s Creed. Maybe I can help you. I handle things for Mr. Blu when he’s away.”
The two exchanged anxious looks, but when Silas’s friendly nod to the mammoth bouncer, Todd, was returned, they started to relax.
“Why don’t I get us a couple of drinks and you can tell me what I can do for you.” MacCreedy steered them to one of the corner booths where they wouldn’t be overheard, and ordered double shots for his nervous companions. He slid in next to the injured one, Willis, and casually pressed his hand down on his shoulder. Willis went gray and broke a cold sweat. “What’s the trouble, boys?” At their hesitation, he smiled reassuringly. “Don’t worry, you can tell me anything. I know all Manny’s secrets.” Or soon would.
“We need money to get outta town. Tonight,” Nash urged, his gaze flicking about the room fearfully.
“What’s the hurry?”
“Some she-devil is out to kill us,” Willis cried, “just like she done our two pals.”
“Shut your face, Willis,” Nash commanded. “Don’t forget who you’re talking to.”
A human, was the inference, Silas guessed. He took the drinks from the waitress and set them in front of the men, who sucked them down as he paid her. When he looked back at them, he let his eyes flash red and gold, then murmured, “I’m not an Upright, so those secrets will be safe, too.”
Nash heaved a shaky breath. “I never seen one of our females change, but she was on us with fangs out and dripping.”
“What? Are you telling me this female shape-changed?” He leaned in close. What they were saying was impossible.
“Not all the way, but enough to near rip off poor Mickey’s head,” Nash said.
Silas leaned back in the cushioned booth, thinking of the two puncture marks on his shoulder. The wounds had healed but the memory of them remained.
Nica could shape-shift.
He needed time to consider what this might mean. “Is there someplace outside the city where you’d be safe while I get some funds together?”
Relief made them grab his hands gratefully, gushing their thanks. He shushed them.
“Tell me where I can find you. Someplace no one will think to look.”
Nash gave Willis a glance. “Cousin Troy’s?” Willis nodded.
Silas took out his phone and cued the GPS app. “Show me.”
“Out Bayou Barataria in Crown Point. He gots a shanty tucked back in the swamp. We used to go there when we was younger to fish.” Poach, more likely, thought Silas. “Ain’t no roads. You ax one of them tour captains to take you out to Troy DuPree’s. They bring you in if you show them this.” Nash reached under his shirt to pull off a leather cord that held a huge alligator tooth. “Tell them that were left in Troy’s hip when the gator helped hisself to a steak.”
MacCreedy pocketed the necklace and pushed four twenty-dollar bills at them. “Leave the city right now. Don’t talk to anyone. Don’t stop for anything. I’ll be there in the next day or two, so sit tight. I’ll take care of everything.”
Starting with the answers to his questions.
Nica’s feet and shoulders ached from the busy night at Cheveux du Chien, and she was looking forward to a long, steamy shower. Then she saw Silas MacCreedy waiting at her door and her priorities changed.
He sat on the cold-air register against the wall of windows that overlooked the central courtyard. He was wearing jeans, tennis shoes, and an olive green T-shirt that temptingly accentuated his powerful chest and arms. The need to run her palms over that masculine terrain made her greeting a bit breathless.
“MacCreedy. This is a surprise.”
He rose smoothly to his feet as her hungry gaze followed. She was wondering how long it would take to get him undressed and horizontal, until she focused on his expression. He was unsmiling, his mouth and eyes narrowed. No trace of her fiery lover from the night before warmed his posture or his tone when he said, “Let’s talk inside.”
She ran her key card across the lock, a wary caution building. She was very aware of him, big and powerful and potentially trouble at her back. He clearly wasn’t here for let’s-get-better-acquainted sex. Too bad for them both.
“I had to close out for Amber. Her little girl was sick,” she chatted as she moved down the hall in front of him, all of her muscles tight and her senses alert. “I hope you haven’t been waiting long.”
“No. Not long.”
Something in his voice had her nerves taut and tingling.
Don’t start something I’ll have to finish, MacCreedy. I really like you.
She placed her backpack on the coffee table and pulled off the white shirt she wore over a snug black tank top. “Can I get you something? I have—”
“No. This isn’t a social visit.”
Damn.
“So why are you here?” She gestured toward the couch, hoping to maneuver him from his squared and readied stance.
“I think I’ll stand.”
So that’s how it’s going to be. What a waste. She sighed. “What’s on your mind, MacCreedy?”
“I found those two men.”
Her attention targeted like a gun sight. “Where?”
“I have them on ice. They’re part of my ongoing investigation.”
Investigation? It all came together with an unpleasant click, like a well-hidden trap.
MacCreedy hadn’t been in that alley by chance. He hadn’t stepped in just to save her life. His plan all along was to save the two who could destroy her.
“I don’t care about your investigation,” she told him. His cop business wasn’t a blip on her radar—unlike their personal business. Few moments had passed throughout the day where intimate thoughts of him hadn’t hovered.
And he’d been using her. How . . . disappointing.
“I don’t expect you do,” he replied. “But I have to keep those two alive long enough to give statements.”
How much did he know about her? How much had he guessed? Why was he here, alone, to confront her?
Nica stepped closer, her movements deceivingly relaxed, until they were toe-to-toe. She placed her palm on his chest. His heartbeat was strong and steady. If he knew anything, he had nerves of iron to stand there so cool and composed.
“What have they told you?” Her gaze held his while her hand eased upward to distractedly stroke his neck and the side of his face. Not a muscle moved beneath her light touch.
“All sorts of interesting things.” His tongue grazed her fingertips as they glided over his mouth, but his stare remained unblinking.
She stretched up to nuzzle his warm throat, to breathe in his scent and taste the heat of his skin with her lips. As she rubbed her cheek against his, she whispered, “What sort of things?” She glanced up to find his steel gaze upon her.
“Impossible things,” he replied. “Things I never would have believed if you hadn’t left your fang prints behind.”
“You know Shifter females can’t change shape,” she reasoned quietly. Her pulse pounded wildly. He knew. She couldn’t let him leave this room with that knowledge, couldn’t let him tell anyone what he’d discovered. Everything she’d worked for, every sacrifice she’d made would be for nothing.
Primal self-preservation kicked in, and she backed away.
“So,” Silas asked, watching her closely, “if you’re not one of our females, what does that make you?”
“More dangerous than you could ever imagine. Tell me where they are, MacCreedy. I’d rather take you back into the bedroom for a nice long tumble than scoop your remains into a plastic bag.”
Silas laughed. “Having sex with you is about the last thing on my mind.” Not exactly true. “Don’t get out the plastic yet. You need me alive to find them.”
Nica laughed, too, a low, throaty sound completely without amusement. “You’re wrong, hero. I can scent out those cowards without your help. So I guess that makes you . . . unnecessary.”
She sprang.
Even ready for her, Silas hadn’t anticipated her speed. She was on him before he could blink, and he was barely able to keep her snapping teeth from his neck.
She was everything he feared . . . and more.
Nica’s strength was unimaginable as she began to shape-shift. He struggled to contain her while dodging the vicious swipes of her claws. Pain streaked across his face, his chest, his neck, but it was her bite he needed to avoid, those massive fangs that sought to rip out his throat.
Her eyes were bloodred and merciless as the beast within her took control. If she could get him on the floor, she’d tear him to pieces in seconds. He didn’t want to kill her, but he wasn’t sure he could stop her from killing him without doing her serious harm.
As Silas fended off her aggressive moves with lessening success, the cold reality of his possible death shocked through him. If he died, what would happen to those he loved?
His legs bumped the arm of the couch and Silas tumbled back onto the cushions under the juggernaut of her determined fury. He allowed his arms to buckle, letting her fall upon him with a victorious roar. As her jaws opened wide and began to descend, he used his last breath to cry, “Nica, wait!”
She hesitated; for an instant, she didn’t move.
That was all the time Silas needed. As a surge of strength rushed through him, he tucked his knees, planted his feet squarely against her, then kicked out with all his might. She gave a furious screech as he sent her flying into the brick wall. In the second it took for her to shake off her daze, he’d reached the door.
He burst out of her apartment, threw his arms up in front of his face, and hurled himself through the window on the other side of the hall.
Hearing the crash, Nica stumbled out into the corridor. She stared incomprehensibly at the shattered glass, then moved to gaze down at the figure sprawled four floors below. He’d landed on his back in the courtyard’s decorative pool. The impact had broken the brick ledge and cracked its tiled interior. As the water turned red, startled tenants began to gather. Nica ducked back to avoid their uplifted gazes. When she dared risk another look, the pool below was empty.