Eternal Pleasure

by Nina Bangs

  This would be the last club. Q had already gotten out of the car and was waiting for him as Ty turned to Kelly. “You know the routine. Windows up, doors locked, anyone bothers you, lay on the horn and get me on my cell.” He’d sense if anything were wrong, so she’d be pretty safe in the parking lot.

  “Got it.” She’d set her cell phone, pepper spray, and flashlight out on the dashboard. Pulling a book from her purse, she prepared to spend her waiting time reading.

  No novel for her. The Hidden Life of Wolves said a lot about her interests. She’d be surprised at exactly what some wolves were hiding.

  Ty frowned. Each time they’d stopped, he’d expected her to ask if she could go into the club with them. He’d had all his reasons lined up why she couldn’t. Wasted effort, because she seemed happy sitting in the car.

  He trailed Q into the club. Music and voices washed over them in the semidarkness. Meeting Q’s gaze, he nodded. They separated and began to hunt. Ty tried not to let the scents overwhelm him as he searched for any that weren’t human.

  A path opened up wherever he went. He accepted it. In his world, the biggest and baddest survived. He was bigger than most of the men, and even in this time of diminished instincts, they sensed he was dangerous. Smart. Ty wasn’t in the mood to put up with crap from anyone.

  The women were a different matter. He felt their gazes trailing him, touching him with hot and greedy looks. His hunger fed on their desire. But when he thought of pulling one of them beneath him and driving into her, she always had Kelly’s face. Not good.

  Just when he was about to find Q and call it a night, he caught the scent. Not human. He growled low in his throat as he sought the source. There. Pushing through the packed masses on the dance floor, he headed for a door at the back of the club. Closed. He turned the knob. Locked. He shoved it hard, and it popped open. Unlocked. Looked like an invite to him. Pushing it open, he stepped into a small dark room.

  Death lived in this place. It was there in the coppery scent of blood that only a predator would recognize. He scanned the area.

  The nonhuman crouched in the blackness, thinking Ty wouldn’t be able to see him. Ty smiled. Nothing hid from him in the dark. Beside the creature lay a woman. She had the loose sprawl peculiar to death.

  “You’re a hunter, so right now you’re weighing your chances and feeling pretty good about them. You figure you can take me out before I make any noise. And even if I do scream, the music’s too loud for anyone to hear me.” Ty’s personal dance of death began in his mind, a dance the humans in the other room wouldn’t recognize. He didn’t need music to keep the beat, just the memory of a thousand other hunts that ended with him alive and something else dead. “But sometimes the hunter becomes the hunted. Welcome to my jungle.”

  The man hissed at Ty, baring long fangs stained with the woman’s blood. Vampire. Good thing Kelly had supplied info on them because Fin hadn’t. Ty smiled. Knowing Mr. Infallible could make a mistake now and then kept things interesting.

  Finally, something to fight. Excitement made his heart hammer and his breathing speed up. He couldn’t kill the vampire right away, though. First Ty had to find out what he knew about the gambling ring. But afterward he’d pay for killing the woman…

  Wait, there was a familiar scent here. Ty tested the air again. Yes. He’d also pay for killing the man last night.

  Just as Ty was about to take that last step before leaping at the vampire, Fin spoke to him. Ty didn’t let the voice in his mind distract him. He’d gotten used to Fin interrupting him at bad times. His gaze never left the vampire.

  “Good. You’ve found someone. Al is in your territory. I’m sending him to help you and Q.”

  “No.” His rejection of Fin’s offer was an angry snarl. This one was his.

  Fin didn’t bother answering.

  Ty would have to get the job done before help arrived. And then he’d find out why Al was in his territory. He took a calming breath. He thought about Q. Okay, their territory. Ty hated sharing.

  For a moment, the vampire looked puzzled. Probably used to everyone being scared shitless of him. Then he got a good look at Ty’s eyes. With a curse, he made for a door Ty hadn’t seen because he was so focused on his prey. With a speed that surprised Ty, the vampire disappeared through the door. He slammed it shut, and Ty heard the sound of a bar dropping. Who the hell tried to lock people in?

  Ty reached the door and hit it with his shoulder. It held. This one was stronger than the first. Metal. He backed up, then leaped into the air and kicked the door full force with both feet. It crashed open. He was in the parking lot. Scanning the darkness, he hunted for the vampire. Nothing.

  Kelly. For a moment he forgot about his prey as he searched the lot for their car. Ty had to make sure she was safe from the bloodsucking predator hiding among the shadows.

  He felt the wrongness at the same time the sound of breaking glass jerked his attention to the back of the lot. He found the vampire just as he saw Kelly.

  No! The thin veneer of civilization Fin had tried to paint over Ty’s primitive soul didn’t do the job this time. With a roar of fury, Ty’s soul bled through.

  The last thing he heard was Q’s shout behind him.

  Kelly was deep into her book when she sensed movement outside her window. She glanced up, expecting to see someone getting into the car next to her…and saw death staring back at her.

  Terror was a boulder clogging her throat. She opened her mouth to scream, but all she got out was a strangled squeak.

  Her brain barked orders at her. Grab the pepper spray. Call Ty. Start the car and get your butt out of here. Or none of the above, because her butt along with every other body part was frozen in place. She couldn’t even look away from him.

  Eyes. All black. Where was the white? Everyone’s eyes had white. She’d bet lots of white was showing in her eyes. His lips were drawn back to expose bloody fangs. Fangs!

  “Get outta the car, bitch.” Even with the closed window between them, he got his message of hate and violence through. He grabbed the handle and yanked. It came off in his hand.

  Never. Her power to move returned with a rush. She leaned on the horn with one hand while she fumbled around for her car keys with the other. From the corner of her eye, she saw his fist coming. Omigod! This can’t be happening. She flung herself to the other side of the car.

  Kelly stared in disbelief as he punched in the driver’s-side window, shattering the tempered glass. Then he reached in and unlocked the doors.

  Not daring to take her eyes off him, she felt around for the door handle. Suddenly, someone jerked the door open, grabbed her arm, and yanked her out.

  Kelly turned on this new source of danger.

  “Name’s Al. Work for Fin. Don’t fight me. I’m trying to help you.” He fed her the info between hard gasps, as if he’d run long and hard.

  The man holding her was as tall as Ty, with a face just as hard. He wore a leather duster and his hair was pulled back in a long braid.

  “Tell me that’s not a vampire. Fake fangs, right?” She’d found her voice. Good. Now for a scream that would wake the dead. She glanced at fang-guy, who looked ticked off that he hadn’t gotten the girl and the car. And if the dead were already awake? All the noise would bring help. Kelly had just sucked in her breath for the mother of all screams when she felt Al freeze.

  “Shit. I don’t believe him.”

  She turned to follow Al’s gaze.

  Kelly slapped her hand over her mouth. Cancel the scream. It was way past the time when a scream would do any good. In fact, it might call the wrong sort of attention to her.

  Al backed away, dragging her with him. Backing away was fine with her. In fact, running like hell made even more sense.

  Because pounding toward them was everyone’s nightmare from Jurassic Park. She’d had fun studying stuff like that in elementary school. Even remembered a few facts from a science report—forty feet long, six-inch-long teeth. But seeing a pictu
re in a book or even on a movie screen wasn’t anywhere close to having a Tyrannosaurus rex bearing down on you in a Houston parking lot, every thud of its feet shaking the ground.

  “Stay calm. You’ll be okay.” The man holding her didn’t sound scared, just mad.

  Easy for him to say. The only good thing was that the vampire—no, she hadn’t really said that—wasn’t focusing on her anymore. Now he seemed to be the one frozen in place as an animal extinct for sixty-five million years came charging toward him. How could something that big move so fast?

  In the few seconds before the unbelievable met the unspeakable, Kelly noticed something. The T. rex had shape and color, but it seemed a little lacking in mass. She could faintly see the back of the club and parked cars through its body.

  She gasped as she saw something else. At the heart of the creature was the shape of a man.

  After that, images spun in her head. People pouring out of the club to see what was happening, Q jumping in front of the T. rex in a doomed attempt to stop it, and three figures gliding out of the darkness that hadn’t been there a moment before. They moved toward the vampire.

  They wouldn’t reach him in time.

  This was bad, really bad. Kelly didn’t want to see what would happen next, didn’t want to be here when it happened. But she didn’t have a choice. Al still had a firm grip on her.

  And then the T. rex was there. It towered over the vampire cringing on the other side of the car. All teeth, it was a killing machine, and the vampire had run out of options.

  At the last moment, Kelly jerked her head away from the imminent carnage. But she couldn’t block out the sounds of death. The screams abruptly cut off. The sounds of bones snapping and flesh tearing.

  She clapped her hands over her ears and chanted a litany of, “No, no, no, no,” while the scent of blood gagged her.

  At last, Kelly sensed the silence. The vampire was dead. She knew it. She forced her hands from her ears and turned her head to look.

  Kelly couldn’t see what lay on the other side of the car. Thank God. But she forgot the vampire as she looked up and up and up. The twenty-foot-tall T. rex roared its triumph, mouth open to expose huge, bloody teeth and eyes still filled with a killing frenzy.

  Once again, Q put himself in front of the monster. Kelly caught pieces of what he was yelling.

  “Control it. Everything’s over, Ty. You’ll hate yourself in the morning if you don’t. Fin’s in your head. Listen to what he’s telling you.”

  The dinosaur paused, almost as though someone was talking in its mind. Then it swung its massive head to stare at Kelly and the man holding her.

  “Crap.” Al’s comment expressed her feelings exactly.

  Eternity passed while the predator made its decision.

  Then the T. rex simply faded away, leaving only Ty. That was what Kelly had seen in the woods, the last of the huge shape disappearing.

  She didn’t have even a moment to digest the fact before a wave of dread, followed closely by panic, hit her. Familiar. Uncontrollable. This time, though, she was sure of its source. Because Ty’s fury—jagged and sharp—was so solid she could just about reach out and cut her finger on it. Terror was a logical reaction to that kind of aggression. And all that anger was aimed at the man still holding her.

  Al must have recognized it too. Quickly he released her and stepped away. Ty ratcheted down his anger.

  The three who’d failed to reach the vampire before death found him moved, redirecting Ty’s attention. Al exhaled deeply. She understood his relief.

  Kelly was emotionally maxed out. She didn’t try to think. She just watched the bizarre drama unfurl.

  Two of the figures—Men? She wasn’t sure—leaned over the vampire’s remains. One took off a coat he was wearing and laid it over the body. Then they rose, the dead vampire between them, and just seemed to fade into the darkness.

  The third man walked slowly toward Ty. Dressed in a tux, with long dark hair flowing down his back, he should have looked out of place. He didn’t. This was a dangerous meeting, and he was a dangerous man. Her instinct was right on this one.

  Carefully, as though any sudden movement might release the beast again, he approached and then stopped. “Very impressive. But because of you, I have a bunch of memories to erase. Besides that, you dragged me away from a party with lots of entertainment potential.” With no further explanation, he walked past Ty to the people milling around the back door of the club.

  Once there, he simply looked at them while they stared back. “You heard a noise back here. When you came out, you saw two men scuffling over a woman. No one was hurt. You’ll go back inside now and continue what you were doing.”

  Obediently, everyone trailed back into the club. The man turned around and returned to Ty. “The police will be here in a few minutes. We all should be gone by then.”

  “You’re in our territory.” Q’s voice was tight.

  “I’m Jude, and you’re in my territory. It’s been my territory for a long time.”

  His smile was beautiful and the scariest thing Kelly had seen in, oh, say, five minutes.

  “Your guys just took a kill away from me. I want him back.” Ty’s voice was a softly rumbled warning that might was right in his world, and if Jude wanted another demonstration of T. rex might, he could oblige.

  Jude narrowed his eyes. “I don’t know what you are, but don’t threaten me.”

  Q held up his hand to stop Ty’s response. “Fin says he wants a meeting with Jude tomorrow night.”

  Jude scanned the parking lot. “Where’s this Fin?”

  “In my head. He said he’ll be in touch.” Q moved to stand beside Kelly and Al.

  As if this kind of communication were normal, Jude nodded and glided back into the shadows. No matter how hard Kelly stared, she couldn’t see where he’d gone.

  Ty’s glance took in everyone. “Get into the car. All of you.” He brushed the broken glass off the seat before stepping aside. “Nothing I can do about the window tonight. It’s going to be a cold drive home.”

  Kelly slid into the driver’s seat just as sirens sounded in the distance. Ty took his place beside her, and the other two men climbed into the backseat.

  “Are you okay to drive?” Ty’s eyes were still flat, dangerous, but the deadly anger was gone.

  She nodded. No way would she say anything right now. If she started, she wouldn’t stop. And she needed the steering wheel to hang on to. Without it, she couldn’t control her shaking. For whatever reason, she didn’t want Ty to know how upset she was. Something her mother had told her over and over as a kid popped into her mind. Don’t let an animal sense your fear. Would that work with dinosaurs?

  “I can smell your fear, Kelly.” Ty’s voice had lost its harshness. “I’m sorry you had to see that.”

  Yeah, right. Something else occurred to her for the first time. What were the two in the backseat?

  “You’re in our territory, Al. Why?” Q didn’t sound friendly.

  Their territory? What was all this territory stuff about? She concentrated on driving and kept quiet.

  “The vampire was in my territory first. When he crossed over into yours, I followed him. He’s my prey.” Al’s voice had a warning edge to it.

  Carnivore. Definitely. Kelly gripped the wheel tighter.

  The silence in the car thrummed with unspoken challenges.

  Ty exhaled deeply. “Okay, everyone relax. I’ve done enough damage for one night.” He glanced over his shoulder at Al. “Where’d you leave your driver?”

  “An accident tied up traffic, so when Fin told me what was going down, I got out of the car and ran the rest of the way to the club. I told my driver to go back to the apartment.”

  Ty nodded. “Tell Kelly the address, and we’ll drop you off there.”

  Once Al gave her the street number, everyone got quiet for a while.

  Finally Q asked Ty the question she figured everyone wanted to know. “What was that all about, man
? If the vampire hadn’t been there to erase minds, we’d be in a world of shit right now.”

  Vampire? Jude was a vampire too? Of course he was a vampire. Stupid of her to be surprised.

  Kelly noticed that Q made sure his voice didn’t sound confrontational.

  The silence dragged on for so long, she thought Ty wouldn’t answer.

  “He was going to hurt Kelly.”

  Silence again.

  Through the horror and disbelief making mush of her brain, Ty’s explanation touched something fiercely primitive in her. He’d been protecting her. That shouldn’t matter, but it did.

  She could see Al staring at her when she glanced in the rear view mirror. He looked worried. Why not? She was the eight-hundred-pound gorilla in the car. Jude hadn’t wiped her memory. And so far they didn’t have a clue what she was thinking. They’d be gratified to know that no rational thinking was going on inside her head at all.

  When she pulled up in front of Al’s apartment, he offered her a grin before getting out. “Great meeting you, Kelly.”

  “Same here, Al. Thanks for saving my behind from…” From what? The whole scene back at the club seemed surreal, something she could’ve dreamed. Except the air blowing in the broken window was real, her clenching stomach was real, and there wouldn’t be any waking up from this.

  Kelly watched until he went inside and then pulled away. Q and Ty didn’t say anything on the drive back to their apartment building. Good. She wasn’t in the mood for small talk. A million questions jockeyed for position in her mind, but she needed to get her head straight before asking them.

  The silence lasted all the way to her door. Q murmured a good night, then went into his apartment. No explanations, no apologies, no “this was all an elaborate hoax—ha ha.”

  Ty waited while she unlocked her door. Then he put his hand over hers. “We need to talk.”

  Shimmers of that first erotic burst she’d felt from him shivered over her. She tried to push them away. “So talk.”