by Cara Villar
“I could have been a vegetarian, y’know?” I murmured.
“Highly unlikely,” he said. “You’re a hybrid of two of the most ravenous species on this planet. Common sense dictated that you would be a very avid meat-eater, darlin’.” His voice was a provocative rumble and I decided right there and then that I would more than likely be flushed with embarrassment for our entire conversation.
Meat-eater? Good God, by the end of this I’ll know exactly what he tastes like!
I decided to play along. “It has been a while since I had something meaty.” Vince stilled as I tapped my lips, his eyes trained on my mouth. “Nothing quite fills you up like a big, juicy, bit of meat.” I arched a brow.
His eyes sparkled. “Touché,” he murmured, just as a faint knock came from the door.
Vincent rose and moved for the door, and I just then noticed he was barefoot. I tilted my head as my eyes travelled up his long, muscular legs to his nicely packed backside. He was built very much like Vampires when they turned, becoming the perfect hunter in every sense of the word. But where the vampiric virus alters its hosts appearance to maximum effect, Weres—whatever their alternate species—were honed from the turn to be at their peak. Weres did not live forever, but they lived an elongated lifetime, and were a bitch and a half to kill. I knew from experience.
A man in a crisp white shirt with two strips of gold piping around his cuffs wheeled in a trolley laden with food. He smiled openly at me as I took in his clean uniform, smooth young face, the shine in his shoes and the smart crease down his black pants. He set all the covered dishes on the table with a swift, friendly efficiency, and Vincent tipped him handsomely. The man beamed, dark eyes sparkling, bowed to both of us and left silently.
It happened so quickly and competently that I just sat there blinking at the door.
Vincent reclaimed his seat as I murmured, “I should start staying in more expensive hotels.”
“Why?” he asked, removing the covers and setting them on the trolley. “You’re a bounty hunter. All you do is sleep in the bed. What more do you need?”
Exactly! My inner hunter proclaimed. However, the inner girl in me was like, nothing wrong with a bit of pamper after a hard days’ work.
I arched a brow at Vincent, thinking how unlike Felix he was. “An unlimited supply of food would be nice,” I said, turning to the table. “How do you want do this? Before I eat or during?”
“I’m starved, so how about during?” he replied, turning his plate of steak, fries and fresh salad this way and that.
I reached for my plate cover, eyeing the buttered new potatoes, garlic asparagus and all the dips that I was so-o-o dipping my fries in. “If you don’t mind sitting across from a washing machine then…” My breath caught as I lifted the cover and my eyes zeroed in on the plump, juicy grilled fillet of steak just oozing deliciousness. It was massive, taking up more plate than the fries and salad combined. Stretching without taking my eyes off the meat, I plopped my cover on the trolley and took up my cutlery.
“Ask away,” I said, not caring that I’d be talking with my mouth full and that he’d be seeing. I wasn’t going to wait to eat this. I was going to savor.
With a soft smile, Vincent dug into his own steak. After a couple mouthfuls of food, he sipped from a glass of water and said, “I want you to tell me about the night you were bitten.”
The food instantly went stale in my mouth.
“Why?” I asked, my voice raw as I sat stiff in my seat, my stomach in my DC’s.
“Because of your reputation as a wolf-killer,” he replied with a shrug.
I methodically chewed a fry, refusing to show how much the very idea of re-living that night was making me want to blow chunks right in his nosy damn face. “I kill Wolves, I kill Vampires, and I kill Fairies, Pixies, Witches and Warlocks.” I shrugged. “It’s part of my job.”
Vince was shaking his head at ‘I kill fairies’. “I want to hear the story from you and see your face as you tell it. I want to know if you are a danger in my territory.”
“And what if I turn out to be a danger?” I asked, a hollow feeling starting to well up in my chest. I didn’t need this. I was perfectly happy in my anonymity. Why did I have to go and give it all up for a damn handshake? I want to go home. I want to go home and sleep in my bed and eat my food and watch my TV.
“Then you die.”
All my breath left me in a pained gasp, and my eyes started to burn. My cutlery lay forgotten with my steak as I slumped back in my chair. “But I never did anything to you,” I protested softly. “I never did anything to anyone. It’s just a job.”
God, it was just a job.
“Red.”
My eyes lifted to his at the sound of his voice. His face was blurred.
“Just tell me how you were bitten.”
“But I’ve never told anyone,” I said, my arms going around my middle as if that would stop me throwing up barely digested steak and fries.
“And I‘m the only one you’ll have to tell it to.” His voice was soft, but his eyes were intent.
Vincent was leaning back in his chair, watching me with a stillness that made me feel like a doe in a clearing, ears twitching for the beast I couldn’t see. I swallowed the lump in my throat several times before I was able to voice my thoughts.
“I’d only been home an hour or so when Glenn came through the door covered in blood,” I whispered, staring into Vince’s eyes but not seeing. I could still see Glenn’s face, as if it were yesterday. How pale his skin was against the rich red of his blood.
“Who is Glenn?” Vincent asked softly.
I swallowed the lump in my throat. “My husband.”
“You were married?”
“Yes. For three years.” I looked away from his face and down at my hands, clenched in my lap. “I was making dinner. Rabbit pie. It was Glenn’s favorite. And I thought a warm, hearty meal would please him after his day in the snow. I was…”
I can’t say it. I’ll never tell him that.
“I heard a noise outside, and was just going to the door when Glenn came in. His hand was on his neck, and for a moment, I couldn’t understand what all the red stuff was.” I gave a bitter laugh, a part of me mourning the innocent, foolish girl I’d been. “His throat had been ripped out.”
So much blood…
“But the wolf wasn’t done playing with him. Right in front of my eyes it grabbed my husband by the back of the shirt—a shirt I’d made and flung him outside into the snow.” There had been a ten foot streak of blood that I still see to this day with a clarity born of horror, whether my eyes are open or closed.
“Why was the wolf there?” Vincent asked, breaking me out of my memory.
I looked at him. “I don’t know.” I shook my head. “We’d always had problems with wolves in the winter, scavenging through the village for food, but they’d never harmed people.”
“What did you do?” He shifted slightly, resting one ankle on the opposite knee, rubbing his stubbly chin with one hand.
“I did the foolish thing.” I snorted derisively at myself. What could a mortal girl do against a wolf twice her weight? But I loved Glenn, and the beast was hurting him. Rational thought didn’t stand a chance against heart-stopping fear and fury. “I grabbed Glenn’s axe and ran out after it.”
Vince twitched. “Axe?”
“Glenn was a woodcutter, and he was named so. Glenn Cutter. He and a group of the village men used to go out and fell trees for firewood and furniture.” I felt my lips shift into a soft smile. “He used to carve me forest creatures when I was little.”
His hands had been rough, but the way he would carve and mold the wood with his whittling knife used to captivate me. His brow would furrow in concentration, and he’d sit there staring into space while his hands worked and a pile of wood curls formed between his feet. I’d sit by the fire, wrapped in a blanket, my eyes caressing his strong, bearded jaw and wind-wild hair curling around his cheeks.
“Did you kill the wolf?” Vincent asked, and my small smile faded, my memories once again awash with blood and my chest tight.
I blinked back the burning in my eyes. “No,” I breathed. “I never had a chance.” I pulled my knees up and wrapped my arms tightly around them. “The axe was too heavy for me. All I could do was swing it with no particular target. The wolf ran off before I got to it, and while I ran for Glenn, he hit me from the side.” The impact had knocked every last bit of air from my lungs, and the pain of landing had ricocheted up my spine with enough force to make me scream. “He knocked me to the ground with his teeth in my shoulder. He bit down hard, sinking every last tooth he had into me, pinning me to the snow.”
“He was trying to tell you to stay down.”
“If he was trying to tell me to stay down, he could have done it without embedding every goddamned one of his teeth in me. I mean, really?” I snorted, my sneer as twisted as my rage. “He just ripped out my husband’s throat, and he expected me to be submissive?” I shook my head. “No. When he released me, I could feel my life flowing out of me along with my blood. I lay there shivering in the snow, staring up at a full moon, slowly bleeding to death.” My eyes blurred again, and I swiped angrily at a tear that had the audacity to burn down my cheek.
“Something else was there, wasn’t it?” Vincent asked. I stared at him, raising my chin. His features hardened. “Wasn’t it?”
I flinched at the brutal command in his voice.
“Yes.” I whispered. “Black hair, pale skin, a voice as rich as wine and as smooth as honey.” I gritted my teeth. “He bit me too, feeding on the blood weeping from the wolf’s bite. He fed me his blood when I was too weak to act on my disgust to refuse him. All the strength I had left went into lifting the axe and ramming it into his face. He’d staggered back, cursing words I didn’t understand. My husband was dead, and I was soon to follow. I didn’t want to live without him.”
“He turned you?” Vincent asked softly, and I exhaled a harsh breath, trying to dislodge the weight in my heart and the lump in my throat all at once. It was a wasted effort.
“I blacked out. When I came to, I was still lying in the snow, blood all around me, and the sun was shining. Glenn and the wolf were gone. I assumed the wolf had dragged Glenn off, but when I followed the bloody trail, it abruptly stopped.” I glanced at Vincent and shrugged. “I never found his body; I never got to bury him.”
The Alpha was quiet for a time, for which I was grateful. He sat, taking in my retelling of the worst night of my life with stoic calm, while I swallowed back tears and tried to push the memories back into the box they’d been locked in for three centuries.
“When did you know you’d changed?”
I flinched at the sound of Vince’s voice, and I had to clear my throat to speak. “Two nights later,” I replied, not elaborating.
He nodded. “When did you discover you were a hybrid?”
“The first and only time I killed a mortal by drinking his blood. Before that, all it was, was just teeth and claws.”
I don’t remember much about that night, not like the night when I was bitten. That crystal clarity escaped my first feeding. The only thing I remember is the rich, exotic taste of warm blood and the filling relief settling in my stomach. I hadn’t drunk blood since. Well…until Felix. But he wasn’t mortal.
“Have you ever fully shifted?” Vince enquired, and I shook my head. “We always believed Red Riding Hood was a Werewolf,” he continued questioningly.
Feeling the emotional rollercoaster was moving on, I settled more comfortably into my seat, relaxing. “I tend to suppress the more obvious Vampire traits when I work.”
“Such as?”
“The golden gaze, the bloodlust, the grace.”
Comprehension sharpened his gaze. “The way you moved in Ozzy’s foyer.”
I cleared my throat, blushing a little. “Comes in handy.”
“What about your wolf?”
“Good senses. Instinct.” I shrugged. “It’s why I’m a good hunter.”
He nodded, the curling ends of his blonde hair swinging with the motion. He sat quietly for the moment, then suddenly jerked forward, grabbed the bottom of my chair, and wrenched me closer. I squeaked, eyes wide, gripping the arms of the chair.
“What are you doing?” I squawked as he took my ankle and pulled off my shoe.
“Technical term.” He grinned, pulling my stripy two-toned green sock off and tossing it after my DC. “I’m gentling you.”
“No!” I jerked my foot away, but he easily recaptured it. Jeez, his hands look huge on my small feet.
“Yes.” He drew out the word as if admonishing a petulant child.
My nose wrinkled in another scowl. “Don’t touch me, Cujo.”
His head-tilted as his eyes narrowed. “Keep name-calling, darlin’.” He leaned forward, voice dropping, “I dare ya.”
I bristled. “Flee-ridden—“
“Jumped-up—“
“—Tick-infested—“
“—Little brat—“
“—Worm-filled—“
“—Spoilt madam—“
“—Over-grown—“
“—Who desperately needs to get laid—“
“—Dog!”
“—Just to loosen up!”
I tried to yank my foot back as my jaw dropped in indignation. “Excuse me? I don’t need—oohhnmmm…” I slumped in my chair as the big, bad Alpha dug his thumbs in and pushed them firmly up the arch of my foot. A satisfied grin spread across his face.
“Good?”
“No.” I gasped as he rubbed over a particular sensitive, sore spot. Dear God, he’s making me a puddle.
His grin returned, taking off ten years and turning him into a gorgeous, surfer hunk.
Yeah, definitely a puddle.
“This spot right here,” he rubbed right in the middle of my arch, just under the balls of my foot as my pulse jack-knifed, making me squirm, “stimulates the adrenal gland.”
“No shit,” I panted, my pulse-rate pounding.
His grin stretched. “Pair it with this one….”
“Holy Mother of Christ!” His fingers were working the heel of my foot, but by God, I swear they were inside me, pushing, pressing, stimulating. I wriggled in my seat, panting for breath, getting hot and wet and he wouldn’t let go of my damn foot. “Stop. Stop!”
He released my foot with a laugh, but as I breathed a shaky, embarrassed exhale, he took up my other foot and started de-shoeing and de-socking it. I scowled, knowing how wet my panties were. And if I could smell it, he could for damn sure smell it too. Damn wolf.
“Most females enjoy being gentled,” he said, as my head dropped back onto the curving back of the chair. From under my lashes, I saw him taking a deep breath, as if tasting my arousal.
“I’m not most females,” I growled—or moaned. His hands were quite deft, and watching him breathe me in made me feel…naughty. Oh dear. Oh dear, dear, dear. Puddle.
“I’d say you are more like most females than you think.”
That brought my head up. “Then consider me contrary and blame it on my vampiric nature.”
His brow arched, glancing at my wrists where my bracelets hung. “You have a peculiar way of talking, darlin’.”
“I’m British, mate.” I stated flatly, which made him smile to show teeth.
“I know.” He took a deep breath, tasting me again before licking his lower lip. My gaze followed the fast, pink swipe. “Did you know it’s part of the wolf’s nature to acclimate? As the times change, the wolf’s instinct dictates that we learn as much as we can.”
“Survival instinct,” I murmured, considering my own drive over the years to learn, from simple things such a reading and writing, to combining different forms of martial arts. New technology fascinated me, and I was a fool for my iPad. I wonder if my sexy techy can update my software…
“Do you camouflage?” Vincent asked, massaging my toes.
My
eyes all but rolled back in my head. “In a sense,” I breathed. “I can look older or younger, shift my coloring.” I looked at him with narrow eyes. “Are you gentling all my secrets out of me?”
He laughed again, the sound deep, rich and unfiltered. The kind of laugh that comes right from the belly and can’t be faked. Neither can sparkling blue eyes full of mischief. “Does that mean you’ll show me your bite scars?”
My smile froze on my face, my whole body going rigid as my hand eased up to my shoulder. My smile dropped as the sick feeling rose at the prospect of showing him my scars and having him react like Des had. Like past males had, with shock, pity and disgust. I swallowed and opened my mouth, hesitating.
God… can I handle another hit today?
Then Vincent spoke. “I’ll show you mine if you show me yours?” His tone was soft, playful, his eyes earnest and unflinching. I wondered if they’d stay that way.
“Girls like scars on their men.” I looked at my hands clenched in my lap. I’m looking at my hands a lot today. “Men don’t like scars on their girls.”
“Men aren’t Weres.” Vincent smiled knowingly.
Yeah, I really didn’t think he had any problem getting females to warm his bed, scars or no.
“We like our women tough.”
I arched a brow. “Like Des?” The female were didn’t strike me as the cuddly type.
“Des is a valued member of my pack.” He made a face. “Not essentially my type, but…”
“Why not?
“Des is a dominant.” He shrugged. “So am I.”
What the hell did that mean? Was he purposely being cryptic? Jeez, talking to this guy is an emotional roller coaster!
“What am I?” Why did I care?
Vincent only smiled, enigmatic and full of promise. “I have no idea.” I shivered, despite myself.
15
The drive over to Natasha’s house—or ‘lair’ as Felix kept calling it—was a quiet one. I sat, staring out the window of the black Mercedes, watching the Chicago scenery zip past in the brief illumination of our head lights, contemplating Felix’s sedate choice in car. Felix drove, giving me furtive sideways looks as he sped down the interstate to Norwood Park. I don’t know what he was looking for in my expression, but I was waiting for him to ask me what was said. Dinner with Vincent had ended up lasting a good couple hours, and the sun had well and truly set by time it finished.