Thump, thump. Thump, thump.
She threw open the door and spotted John on the pavement. His arms braced as if he’d just finished doing push-ups, except he was covered in smears of dirt and blood. He swiped his forearm across his mouth, blood streaking across his cheek.
His head turned, and he locked eyes with her, relief clear in his expression.
The Hans quintuplets turned as well, scowling at the interruption. Three remained with John and two headed toward her.
John’s eyes expanded. He tried to leap to his feet, but a foot stomped onto his back.
“Wait!” she yelled.
The Germans paused.
Pleading with each eastern European staring back, she said, “Please don’t kill him yet.”
John’s eyebrows rose. “Yet?”
The beefy Germans raised their eyebrows too, but in amused curiosity. The one with his foot on John’s back smirked as if to say, Go ahead, humor me.
“Uh, yeah…please don’t kill him just yet.” She coughed and cleared her throat. “Please?” She batted her eyelashes, desperately trying to recall the year of German she’d taken in the tenth grade. “I mean, bitte?”
A few of the Germans offered appreciative smiles.
“Ja, deutsche talk.” She nodded after noticing their pleased reaction. “Me and meine man-freund…” She spoke slowly, deliberately, winking at the Germans as her hand gestured to herself and then her neighbor.
She was pretty sure John rolled his eyes and groaned, but she didn’t care. At the moment, he was alive and not being beat to a pulp.
Smirking, the Germans looked at her and then to John, seeming to forget that moments ago she’d made their brothers suffer in agony. “Ahh,” they said. “Liebespyrchen.” They nodded to one another. “Dein Mann!”
“Ja! Ja!” she said, boisterously happy her plan to delay their torture was working. “My man. Ich like to, uh…say guten-bye…” She waved her hand in the universal gesture of farewell. “…before you…killen him.” The last part was spoken in question since she had never learned the German word for “kill.” Not much use for it in the tenth grade.
It seemed to get her point across. Their smiles grew wider, so she took a step toward her neighbor. They grabbed him by the shoulders and yanked him up.
Frau Weber would be so proud! Sam squared her shoulders and took another step and then another, silently scolding her racing heart.
She stood within inches of John by the time his feet hit the ground. She was so close the heat from his body mixed with hers, and his musky male scent enveloped her. She took in two deep breaths, calming herself.
“What the hell are you doing?” he muttered, looking into her eyes with a mixture of both disapproval and awe.
“Just go with it,” she murmured without moving her lips. “My man,” she said, turning to smile at her new German friends. “Liebe man.” Sam caressed a hand across his cheek, slight stubble tickling her fingertips. “Oh, meine liebe man.”
“Is that your extent of the language?” he whispered. “Because if so—”
Sam pinched his cheek and twisted.
“YOW!” he shouted.
“Liebe, liebe man!”
Grunts and groans echoed from the Germans. Apparently they liked her dominance.
So she did it again.
“ARGH!” His face contorted into a scowl, and his eyes darkened. “Stop that, damn it!”
The Germans now moved in syndication, closing in on the pair, circling in attentive voyeurism. They nodded in encouragement and nudged one another in the ribs.
“Oh, meine liebe.” Sam tried to mimic the raspy voices she’d heard on TV for those 900-numbers. “Ich going to, uh…essen du.”
“Eat me?” John blanched, and Sam pulled his head toward hers with a swift and effective tug on his ear.
The Germans continued to smile and grow red in the face, their sharp white teeth shimmering in the dim night.
On her tiptoes, she placed a soft kiss on his neck. Though meaning to, she didn’t stop there. Her mouth worked its way across his cheek, slowly depositing soft kisses. His face dipped in response, and her mouth searched for his. Body heat rising, she forgot herself as their lips touched.
Both exhaling loudly through their noses, it was as if they had been holding their breaths until that moment. The Germans must have let go of him, because a pair of strong arms wrapped around her, steeling her in place against him.
He tangled his fingers in her shoulder-length hair and tugged back for better access. When his mouth took hers, she forgot about their audience and location. It was simply the two of them.
He kissed her good and thoroughly, his tongue demanding an improper introduction with hers. He wasn’t gentle, and he wasn’t slow as he parted her lips with haste.
She gave in and opened for him, enjoying the pleasure of his warm, wet tongue dueling with hers. Never one to be dominated, Sam met him stroke for stroke, grasping his head tight as she sliced her tongue along his.
His hands dropped to her backside. They lingered, as if deciding, then his fingers dug into the fabric of her skirt and rammed her forward, cradling her against his erection.
How can he be turned on at a time like this?
As if hearing her thought, he pulled back and looked into her eyes with a clouded expression. He looked to be in pain.
Before he blew the con, and the Germans realized what she was doing, she dipped into her purse and grabbed the remaining pair of earplugs.
She reached her arms around his neck and grazed her lips along his jaw line. Her fingers climbed toward his ears, and she pressed the buds into his canals.
When his eyebrows dropped and his forehead creased, she whispered, “Trust me.”
The Germans closed in. They now wore expressions of wary concern rather than horny curiosity.
John must have thought she lost her mind. “What are you—?”
Sam yanked his face to hers and planted a sloppy resemblance of a kiss that would have been fitting if she’d been about twenty years younger and eating an ice cream cone instead of kissing her hot neighbor.
Lips still locked, she lowered her purse between their touching bodies, blocking it from view as she searched inside.
The bartenders, now snarling, stood shoulder to shoulder, trapping Sam and her neighbor in the center with their massive bodies.
John’s body went rigid, every muscle locking into place. He was going to try to take on these thugs.
Before he could, Sam raised her arm to the heavens and pulled the trigger of the second air horn. With her other arm, she bear-hugged John as if they were on a ship in the middle of a monsoon. He tightened his arms around her waist.
Like in the club, the Germans dropped to the ground and began to bleed from their ears.
John’s head whipped around, watching the massive bodies fall.
Darkness invaded her vision as she looked up at him, smiling proudly. She’d saved him! She’d actually done something right, and she’d saved him! Without a badge. Without backup. Without anything but her brain and some homemade weapons.
And now it was time to get the hell out of Dodge.
Throwing his arm around her shoulder, she held him close as they hobbled toward the street.
He paused, bending to retrieve a gun from the ground, and tucked it into his waistband, before leaning on her again. His taut muscles pressed against her, and she realized it must be difficult for him to rely on anyone for help. He didn’t seem to have friends or comrades. No one ever visited. And aside from the Tyke guy he talked to, John seemed to be a loner. The thought pulled at her heart. Everyone deserved someone they could rely on for comfort and love.
Once they approached her car, he spoke. “What in the hell did you think you were doing?”
“Saving your ass, obviously.” She dug in her purse for her keys. She staggered a step as they approached the curb where her car was parked. “You’re welcome, by the way.”
“Savi
ng me?” He laughed without humor. “I had it under control.”
“Looked like it.”
“I told you to run.”
She leaned him against the passenger-side door. Taking in his battered appearance, she ignored the urge to shake her head at his ridiculous statement.
Black spots invaded her vision as she ran to the driver’s side and struggled to get the key into the lock. Success after three tries, she sat behind the wheel. “Can you get in okay?” Noticing his drooping frame, still covered in mud and dried blood, she opened the passenger door from the inside.
He fell into the seat, expelling a few sharp breaths. He buckled himself as she started the car and raced down 26th Street.
“Again,” he said, wincing as he turned to her. “What did you think you were doing?”
“Can we worry about that later? Right now I’m concentrating on getting us out of here.” She stole a few glances in the rearview mirror. The view tilted, so she narrowed her eyes, concentrating.
He looked in the side mirror and then craned his neck to look behind. “You can slow down. No one’s following us.”
She breathed a sigh of relief and slowed the car’s pace to the speed limit.
“What was that?” he asked.
“Are you okay? You look pretty banged up.”
No verbal response, but she sensed his eyebrow raise.
She sighed. “An air horn.”
“That wasn’t a regular air horn. Where’d you get something like that?”
She shrugged like it was no big deal she had a contraption that made people’s ears bleed. Thanks to the CIA for their research in the sixties on unorthodox methods of warfare.
He pulled the earplugs from his ears and held one up to examine it as if it was a rare gemstone found only in the most remote and dangerous cave.
“Where’s your gun?”
“My gun?” She removed her earplugs and placed them in the cup holder. “What makes you think I have a gun?”
“You’re a cop.”
She snapped her head to look at him. “No, I’m not.”
“You work for Baltimore City Police.”
Her jaw clenched and pain sliced down her neck. “There are other jobs in the department besides being a cop.”
She turned off 23rd Street, heading toward 22nd. They’d be home in a matter of minutes. If only her eyes would focus on the road. The glow from the streetlamps was doing funny things to her vision, creating large yellow orbs in front of her windshield. She blinked to clear her sight.
“What were you doing at Club Hell?” he asked again. More like demanded.
Why was her heart still racing? They’d escaped trouble, her body should have slowed by now. But it hadn’t. The blood in her ears drummed against her skull and she felt—actually felt—her veins stretching from the excess liquid pumping at accelerated rates through the canals. She was sure her stomach had just dropped out of her midsection. And her head. Good Lord, her head was like a balloon, growing lighter by the second. Any time now, it was going to detach and float away.
“Uh, I think I’m…” she said in a breathy voice.
She must have swerved because the steering wheel jerked and John shouted, “Hey. You okay?”
Glancing in his direction, she tried to focus on his features. But her eyelids grew heavy and her body went limp.
Then everything went black.
…
Shit! Ash grabbed the wheel, steering the car away from the light post they headed straight for. Blondie’s head had dropped back, and her eyes were closed.
“Damn it,” he muttered, turning his attention to the road ahead. They were still one block from their street.
He threw the car into neutral and guided it to the curb. Without stability or traction control, it was difficult to force the car anywhere. He used his remaining strength to yank the wheel, cussing and wincing as he pulled. The car hit the raised cement curb with more force than he’d wanted. There was a loud scrape and then white smoke drifted to the sky, and an acrid stench of burnt metal filled his nostrils.
Oh well. He’d worry about that later. It’s not like the POS couldn’t benefit from a visit to the auto shop.
First priority was to get Blondie to his house and assess her condition.
He pulled her from the car and hoisted her onto his shoulder, ignoring the gut-searing pain. Die Hard and his buddies had done a bang-up job on his ribs and stomach. He’d be more than black and blue tomorrow. But for now, just like he’d been trained, he pushed forward. He’d get first aid once he was back at camp.
Sprinting up the block, he reached his front steps within minutes.
He laid her on the worn sofa in his front room, taking care not to bump her head on the arm. He pried her eyes open, bracing himself for the telltale sign of Vamp use. He hadn’t seen her enter the club, so he had no way of knowing if she’d ingested any of the free drinks being shoved down everyone’s throats. The drinks were obviously laced if River and her girlfriends had been affected.
Blondie’s blue eyes stared back, and he said a silent prayer of thanks. There was no red. Or black. Just light blue. Like the color of the sky on a crisp fall day.
His finger brushed a damp strand of hair from her forehead, before checking her pulse, which was racing. Her skin was clammy and on fire.
She must have gotten a residual high from direct contact with a vamp. Much like a cold or flu, the effects of the drug could be passed from person to person by bodily fluids. Not as potent or deadly as ingesting the actual substance, but she’d be horny as hell tonight and might have a blinding hangover tomorrow. He wasn’t sure if she’d have a mild addiction afterward or not. All residuals were different. She was already reacting differently than other residuals—he’d never seen anyone pass out from contact as she had.
He’d need to keep watch over her tonight and make sure her temperature didn’t spike to dangerous levels. Also, he’d need to keep her close so she didn’t go out looking for someone on the street to ease her raging hormones.
There was no doubt about it. She was staying with him tonight—whether she hated him in the morning for it or not.
First step was to bring her temperature down.
Ash checked her pulse and breathing once more. No change. So he picked her up and hurried up the stairs to the bathroom.
He turned the knob and practically dropped her into the porcelain tub, clothes and all.
She sucked in a sharp breath as ice-cold water hit her bare skin.
“I’m sorry,” he said, pushing away a strand of errant hair. He stroked his hand along her shoulder and down her arms. She shivered.
Movement. That was a good sign.
“Can you open your eyes?”
No reaction.
“I wish I knew your name, Blondie.” Ash continued to caress her skin. Smooth, he noted. His neighbor was really something up close. Not that she wasn’t when she hung out her bedroom window or bounced down her front steps smiling, but it was her simplicity—natural makeup, arched eyebrows, daintily sloped nose, and high cheekbones. She was breathtaking. Why was he suddenly stunned to realize it?
He went to the closet and grabbed a towel. Dipping it into the water, he placed it over her forehead.
This woman was the first one he noticed as just that—a woman. Not a pain in the ass—though in the short time he’d known her, she was definitely that. No, this one wanted to walk alongside him in danger. Not get him into it.
She’d never let herself be the victim. She had proven herself less cowardly than most of the troops he’d served with in the Middle East. Blondie had a confidence that was ninety parts arrogant and ten parts naive. A disastrous formula concocted to blow up in his face any moment.
It only made him like her more.
She’d ventured out tonight in search of something so important she’d risked her own safety to obtain it. He was going to find out what that something was.
Just as soon as he made sure she lived
through the night.
He placed his hand on her forehead again. The cold towel had helped. Perspiration was less evident. Her temperature seemed to be lowering.
Her eyes fluttered once. “Grandma?” she asked in a strangled voice.
His hand stilled. “No.”
She turned to him, the blue in her eyes empty and dull. “I’m so cold.”
“I know. I’m sorry. I have to bring your body temperature down.” Hopefully the cold water would help minimize the next symptom as well, he thought grimly.
He took the towel from her forehead, soaked it in the cold water, and squeezed it over her shoulders.
She shivered again, and her teeth chattered. Her lips turned the same color as her eyes.
He went to the closet to get more dry towels. “Just a few more minutes. I promise.”
She nodded once, the movement choppy in conjunction with her shudders.
Jesus, it killed him to see her in this condition. She’d been so strong. So capable. And now she was so damn vulnerable.
Once he thought she’d had enough, he yanked her from the tub and wrapped her in a towel. When she curled into his chest, he softened even more as he carried her into his bedroom.
“You’ll warm up soon,” he said, rubbing her back. Sooner than she realized since his AC was broken.
He pulled back the sheets and laid her on his bed. Taking a deep breath, he laughed. “You’re definitely not going to like this when you wake up.”
His hands worked her skirt down over her narrow hips, doing his best not to look at the small bit of fabric remaining. Then he sat her up to remove the flimsy top, not daring to look at her bra.
He covered her up to her neck with the sheet and then reached under to slide her drenched panties down, shaking his head in disbelief as the thin material slid over her ankles. “This is definitely a first.”
Making sure the sheet stayed in place over her, he unhooked her bra. His breath hitched at the feel of her soft skin against his callused hands. It was impossible not to wonder what she looked like under that sheet.
Needing distance, he hung her clothes on a nearby chair by the open window.
On Her Six (Under Covers) Page 9