by Kat Cotton
Nic gave me a sweeping look, like I was stupid. “Of course he does. If he was serious about killing me, he’d have not asked you. He probably just wanted to test you.”
“He wants you dead. Don’t mistake his pleasant manner for anything approaching like. When the revolution comes, you’ll be first against the wall.”
“You’d like that, wouldn’t you?”
Then he gave me a wink that gave that comment a whole other meaning. I didn’t want Nic against the wall or any other way. I thought the begrudging disdain we had going on was as good as this relationship would ever get. I didn’t want him close to me. I didn’t want him making my heart pound.
“I’m not stupid. We need the mayor on board with this. Mayor equals Demon Child.”
“Maybe I should’ve taken the mayor’s money when he offered it.”
“Why didn’t you?” He turned to face me. “You’d never be able to stake me, Clem Starr. You aren’t fast enough, and your sex thing doesn’t work on me. Also, you’d miss me if I wasn’t around. You’d be all on your miserable own.”
We glared at each other, neither of us wanting to break away.
“Are you and Kisho a couple?”
That question had been burning at me for so long. I’d waited, wanting the right time to ask. Now I just blurted it out without thinking. Why had I even asked that now? My hands curled into fists and I didn’t want to breathe too loudly. I wanted to think that I didn’t care about the answer to that question, but I cared more than I’d ever wanted to care.
Nic snorted.
“A snort isn’t an answer. Jeez, yes or no?”
“What do you think?”
“I have no idea. That’s why I’m asking.”
“This is not the time,” he said. “And I’m not sure you’d understand.”
That was still no answer, but Nic turned to look out the window.
Him avoiding the question just made it more important that I knew the answer. With regular folk, all that bondage and whipping would be a prelude for fucking, surely. But then they weren’t like normal people. Even normal undead people. Regular vampires tended to be a lot less complicated. Nic might say that gender lines blurred after four hundred years, but they didn’t blur that much.
Kisho said nothing either. You’d think a simple yes or no wouldn’t be so damn difficult. I hated ambiguity. I might die today without ever finding out.
The venue wasn’t anything special, a typical conference center. Cheap carpet on the floor, salmon-pink vertical blinds.
It would hold a lot of people, though, and that was exactly what the mayor would love. He thought Nic was playing right into his plans. The mayor had no idea that Nic wanted the Demon Child for himself.
Nic told me to stay backstage for the sound check, but I got bored and wandered up to watch from the wings.
“And that’s when Clem will appear onstage,” Kisho said.
“Huh? What?”
Nic turned to me, his eyes flashing. I obviously was not supposed to hear that. Before I could react, the surprise on his face disappeared completely.
He walked over to me and put his hands on my shoulders, his head to the side, and gave me the sweetest smile. So sweet it sent my blood sugar soaring sky-high. I’d never seen Nic like that before. His regular smile could pierce your heart and make you forget what a complete and utter dick he was, but this one was like staring into the sun. His smile so bright, it hurt to look at him.
“Sorry, Clem, I wanted to explain the plan to you properly, to prepare you.”
The smile turned bittersweet.
“Prepare me for what?”
He moved a little closer, keeping his hands on my shoulders but narrowing the distance between us. My stupid, betraying heart beat like crazy. I wanted to run so that he couldn’t do this to me, but the way his gaze locked on mine made that impossible.
“We have to lure the Demon Child to the stage, you understand that. The venue will be filled with people. People who are coming here because they trust me, they trust us. I can’t risk the lives of those people. Even with the entire pack here, we’re only seven vampires. The Child could come from anywhere. He could do a lot of damage before we get to him. That’s why we need you. You aren’t dressed like that just to sit in the audience, you know.”
His eyes glistened with unshed tears. My stomach flipped.
“But…”
He pulled away for a moment. “Kisho, I left my hair straightener in the van, can you go get it for me?”
I blinked. He went from seduction mode to worrying about his hair that fast?
“Ah, I think the Demon Child hates me now. You know, on account of me trying to stake him and all that.”
I gulped. He turned his smile back to me. I wished this damn vampire would stop with the eye contact. The intensity of it made me sizzle inside. I knew how those demons felt when I punched them with my silver ring now, because that’s exactly how my insides felt.
“That’s fine, whatever the motivation, so long as he heads to the stage.”
When Kisho had left, Nic pulled me closer.
“There’s more. The Demon Child I can probably handle, but we have to prepare for another eventuality. The Vampire King. That’s where you’re needed.”
“And you didn’t want to say anything in front of Kisho?”
He smiled, that warm, embracing smile again.
“You understand. If we are confronted by the Vampire King, I can’t fight him. None of us can fight him. But you have the one thing that can distract him. The famous Clem Starr sex aura.”
I pulled back from him.
“You’re risking your life on something you don’t believe in?”
A grin came over my face. There might have been a touch of smugness in that grin.
Nic looked away. “I’m not saying it doesn’t exist, just that I’ve never seen it.”
“It’s your life, the lives of your pack. You must believe in it. Go on. Say it. Say ‘Clem Starr has an amazing sexual aura.’”
“You know, sometimes you aren’t very mature.” That was more like the Nic I knew.
Mature or not, I wanted to hear him say it. If I had my phone on me, I’d record him.
The snarkiness left his face and that special smile came back.
“You have an amazing sexual aura. We need you. These people need you. You are the key to the whole plan. Without you, we fail.”
He was playing me, totally playing me. I wasn’t a fool. No one changes that quickly. He practically beamed sincerity, though.
“It might never come to it, but you are our secret weapon. If we need to get out, you only need to distract the King. Work your mojo on him while we escape, and then we’ll get you away from him.”
As if that wasn’t enough, he tucked a strand of hair behind my ear. His breath caressed my skin as he leaned closer. God, I had to steel myself. My body melted, bending into something I didn’t want to recognize. It wasn’t even a thrall, it was much worse. It was totally his charisma. The thing that would get the crowd coming to this venue eating out of his hands.
I gulped but couldn’t answer.
“You have to know up front, if you do this, Kisho may end up hating you.”
“But he’d realize, if I have to sex up his dad, I’m only doing it as a job. I’m not really into the guy.”
Kisho knew what I did for a living. He’d seen me sex up demons. He’d even told me to do it to the Demon Child.
“His head might understand, but he has issues. Layers and layers of issues. It’s a very complicated relationship.”
Hell, it seemed with these guys, every relationship was complicated.
“You understand, don’t you?”
That smile again, this time with a hint of pleading. My stomach dropped.
Even if it was a con job, even if he wanted to use me, I knew I had to play along with his plan. All my demon-fighting career, I’d gone it alone. Just me against the demons. And that had worked for me.<
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“You will do it? You’ll be part of our team?”
And that was the worst part of it. I had to turn to the thing I feared most in the world. A team. I had to play nicely with others. While I’d gone along with them until now, this development pushed me over that line. It would require trust and depending on others.
The Demon Child wasn’t like any demon I’d fought. Even using the best of my ability, I hadn’t been able to defeat him, but the Vampire King scared me more. I hadn’t even gotten that close to him at the warehouse, but I felt the chill of him. I wasn’t even sure my aura would work on him. He had no humanity, that was certain.
I gulped again, but Nic smiled. Warmth spread through my body, his smile now wrapping around me like an embrace.
“Please.”
OMG, he’d actually said please? I was about to say yes. I’d agree. I’d be this new Clem Starr who’d work with them. I’d take orders and be self-sacrificing, because of the greater good. I’d be part of his team. Even if I wasn’t getting paid—
Wait. I might be a fool, but I wasn’t that big a fool.
“We reinstate the original payment terms?”
After all, he needed me. He wouldn’t be laying it on this thick otherwise.
The warmth and caring quivered for a moment. I could actually feel the change in temperature. His mind clicked over until, finally, he nodded.
I nodded back.
“But I’m not doing because you were nice to me. I’m doing it because it’s the only way to get the job done.”
“You made the right decision.” And again with the sweet smile.
I couldn’t believe I’d agreed to his stupid plan. His hand ran down my side. What was he up to now?
He slipped his hand into a pocket on the side seam of my dress. The dress was so skintight that it became a silken caress on my belly. Jeez, that touch shot straight between my legs. This was not the time for playing around, but I sucked my breath in.
“Slip the orb into this pocket before you go near the Vampire King. You don’t want to repel him.”
As Nic removed his hand, I became aware of noise outside the doors. The audience waited to enter the room. Soon, Nic would be onstage and this plan would go into motion. This stupid plan. Although, I wondered how much Nic held back. He’d obviously planned for me to wear this dress for the purpose of seducing the Vampire King, knowing I’d be wearing the orb. I mean, how many evening dresses have convenient pockets like that?
“Will the orb work on him?”
“It’ll injure him and do more damage than silver alone, but it won’t kill him. Use it as a last resort if you need to get away. I never expected Kisho to give it to you last night, but it might help.”
“And if I die?”
I wanted to be reassured that wasn’t a real possibility. It wasn’t something I wanted to consider.
Nic patted my arm. “Won’t it be great to know you didn’t die in vain? That you were part of a grander scheme?”
“Actually, no.”
“Don’t worry, Clem. We’ve put a lot of safeguards in place.” Kisho had returned. “Your straightener wasn’t in the van, Nic.”
Nic gave me a smile, one of his smug ones.
“We won’t let you die unless it’s absolutely necessary. And if you die, you die well dressed.”
I hated that vampire.
Chapter 32: Backstage
Chewing my nails seemed the best use of my time in the green room while waiting to go onstage. I’d never been a nail chewer, but I could see the comfort that it gave. Although it didn’t give me any protection against the fact that, at any moment, the police could burst through the door and arrest me. Or the Demon Child could time things badly and get to me before I got onstage. Or I could just spontaneously combust from all the stress brewing away inside of me.
I didn’t even want to think about the Vampire King or any of the other things that could go wrong.
The mayor talked onstage. I couldn’t hear his exact words, just the shape of his voice. He had a gentle authority to his words, the kind of voice that lulled his audience.
I had to trust that everyone was in position and they could do what they had to. The entire crowd would want me dead when I got out there. I wasn’t sure the vampires could protect me from that. I wasn’t even sure if they intended to. I was expendable. Nic had said that before.
Other issues buzzed in my head. If I survived this, I couldn’t keep living at the vampire lair. The thing I had with Kisho wasn’t something I could label, and it wasn’t something solid, but that small, fuzzy happiness kept me afloat. Losing that would be a horrible thing. I told myself it might never come to that. Nic had said they couldn’t go up against the Vampire King, but if it came to the crunch, I’m sure he could. It’s not like he’d just obey unquestioningly.
I got up and tried pacing to see if that worked better than nail biting. I rubbed the orb Kisho had given me between my thumb and finger. That reassured me a little. I knew that Kisho would do his best to protect me, even if the others didn’t care two hoots. Or would he? If it came to a choice between me and Nic, I had no illusions that I’d win.
All this needing to trust didn’t come naturally to me, that’s for sure. I wasn’t even sure that Nic could capture the Demon Child or if he was just totally demented. He hadn’t gone into any detail about his plans to tame the Demon Child. He said he knew what he was doing, but I couldn’t see how.
Nothing in the scant information we’d found said anything about taming. The unicorn side of him was too strong. Even with me, the Demon Child’s affection had been rough and crazed. A child’s unbridled affection with the strength of a monster behind it. The kind of affection that would kill you.
Applause thundered through the venue. The mayor had finished talking. By our reckoning, the mayor would hightail it out of the place, not wanting to be around when the real shit went down. Then he’d swoop in afterwards for the cleanup, with a tear-stained face and a bunch of promises. He’d drop all the hints he needed, and the video footage would say the rest.
Getting the kid from here to the place Nic had set up would be a whole other nightmare. In my opinion, he was being totally overconfident in his ability to control the kid. He’d never been up against him in a fight. Kisho and I had, but Nic totally disregarded our opinions.
When someone knocked at the door, I figured it was Kisho come to fetch me. I’d thought I had about five minutes left, but maybe he was being overly punctual.
“Well, hello there, Clementine.”
The mayor. My gaze darted around, trying to find a way out. There was only the door, though. Shit, we hadn’t planned for this. If I got arrested now, it’d ruin everything. The mayor stood in the doorway. I couldn’t get around him.
“Ah, hi.” I gave the mayor a little wave.
“What are you doing here?” the mayor asked. “You look real nice dressed up like that.”
“Umm…” I gazed around me. “I’m getting motivated. He’s a very inspirational speaker, isn’t he?”
“Don’t worry. I’m not about to have you apprehended. I know you weren’t trying to kill that ‘child.’ Well, you were, but we both know he’s not the innocent child he appears to be.”
That didn’t relax me one bit. The mayor wanted something, that was for sure. I twisted my ring around my finger. That worked no better than chewing my nails or pacing.
The mayor walked into the room and leaned against the table. He sure looked at home, unlike me. I’m pretty sure that the slinky green fabric of my dress had patches of sweat all over it.
“I’m sure you don’t want to be known as a child killer. That can’t be good for business. And what’s with this working for vampires? You know as well as I do that’s not allowed. Your friend Bob isn’t very impressed with it either.”
I backed away a little. Even delivering threats, the mayor kept that affable smile on his face.
“I want to make a deal,” he said.
�
�I’m not killing Nic.”
“No, not that. It’s too late for that anyway. Look, we need to handle this Demon Child issue. There’s only one way to clear your name, and that’s for the people out there to see him for the evil monster he is. Once that’s established, you stop being a public enemy and become a hero. Hell, I’ll even throw a little hero ceremony for you. People will love you, your business will boom, and I’m sure the Demon Fighter Council could be convinced that this connection with those undesirables was just a necessary step in your plan. That’s a pretty sweet deal for you. All you have to do is make sure that the Demon Child gets seen for what he is.”
“Does that mean a few innocent people have to get attacked?”
God, I wished I was recording this so that the people out there could see what an evil bastard this mayor was.
“Is anyone really innocent? Think about it. Those fools are willing to pay good money to have some flashy vampire tell them they can achieve their dreams. They aren’t exactly the cream of the crop, if you know what I mean.”
I knew exactly what he meant. Hell, I didn’t have the greatest opinion in the world of the kind of people who’d get motivation from Nic, but that didn’t mean they deserved to die.
“You’re evil.”
The mayor screwed up his face. “That’s not a nice thing to say. Just ask anyone, they’ll tell you I’m a swell guy. Do I need to spell out the advantages to you again? I think I’m being super generous. You’re a good girl, Clementine. You don’t want to get mixed up with these vampires. They’ll use you and warp you, and just when you think you’re getting close to them, they’ll have you for dinner.”
I wanted to tell the mayor he was wrong, but was he? Even now, I had second thoughts.
“It’s not like anyone has to die,” he added. “We could stop him before that. So long as people get the general idea.”
“So just some nasty injuries?” I injected all the sarcasm I could into that comment.
“You have me wrong, Clementine. I’m not evil. You don’t seem to get that. There might be some initial collateral damage, but in the end, this will save more people than it hurts. I have the stats. These blood feeders account for a lot of deaths in the city every year. Not just the ones that you and the other fighters cover up, but other deaths. Ones that get counted as drug overdoses or house fires or suicides. And the numbers are getting higher every year. If you want to talk about the deaths of innocents, look at what your newfound friends are doing. Don’t take anything they say at face value.”