by Nina Bangs
Ty simply nodded and climbed in beside Kelly.
As they left the parking lot, Kelly cast a glance in the rearview mirror. “He’s just standing there. How’ll he get back to his condo? He can’t drive Q’s car.”
Ty didn’t have a clue whether Fin could drive or not. Picturing Fin walking back to his condo gave Ty lots of satisfaction, but he knew that wasn’t likely. “Fin gets where he’s going in his own way. And he wants you to drive us to the condo in an hour. He’s got a meeting set up with Jude.”
She didn’t bother looking at him. “The fun just keeps on coming.”
Chapter Seven
Kelly had gone to the zoo with her parents a lot when she was a kid. She’d had these great fantasies about swinging through a jungle as Super-Tarzana and dropping onto the back of a tiger. Riding a tiger sounded like the coolest thing a kid could do. Getting on the tiger was easy. Too bad no one had mentioned that it was the getting-off part that could kill you.
She was having that same getting-off-the-tiger feeling now. So hanging on a little longer, until she could think things through, made sense. “What’s on our to-do list for the rest of the night? Bust a coven of witches? Herd a bunch of ghosts into the light? Kick a few demons back into hell? One thing, if there’re any animals on that list, cross them off.”
Q chuckled. “Yeah, I hear you.”
“And I need a shower. Bad.” She couldn’t do much about the blood on her clothes, but she wanted to scrub it from her skin along with the memory of how it got there. Unfortunately, the memory wouldn’t go away. It was like a bad tattoo. All you could do was cover it up and hope no one ever saw you naked.
Ty leaned toward her. “Pull over, Kelly.”
Groaning, she stopped the car and rested her forehead against the steering wheel. “Been here, done this.” This time she absolutely would not follow him. She’d sit in the SUV with the gun Q had returned to her in one hand and her pepper spray in the other.
He laughed. “No, I’m not running off this time. I just have something I need to tell you.” Leaning his head back against the headrest, he closed his eyes. “Fin wants you there when he meets and greets the local vampire lord.”
“Why? Will all the other drivers be there?” She had a bad feeling about this. “I can’t be there. Someone has to stay with Neva. Remember Neva? Q’s driver? Kidnapped by werewolves? Has a good chance of waking up furry? While Fin’s having his meeting, I could—”
“No.”
Kelly didn’t like the sound of that no.
“No, the other drivers won’t be there. And, no, you can’t stay with Neva. Someone else will watch her.”
Ty raked his fingers through his hair. She had a fleeting thought that running her own fingers through his hair would be…would be inappropriate right now, and why the hell was she thinking of his hair when she’d fallen into some weird alternate universe where werewolves and dinosaurs battled each other in Memorial Park?
“I wanted to give you a heads-up on what Fin will say.”
“And we had to stop while you told me?”
“Yeah.”
That wasn’t good. Kelly straightened. “Shoot.”
Q spoke from the backseat. “I don’t know about this, Ty.”
Ty ignored him. “I’ll let Fin fill in the details, but the bottom line is our souls are dinosaurs because that’s what we were. Before.”
Before? Before what? She blinked at him. “Umm, the T. rex has been extinct for sixty-five million years.”
“I know.”
“Okay, just to clarify. You were the real deal sixty-five million years ago, and now you’re here?”
“Right.”
“What happened when ye old mortal shell went extinct?” She heard her own voice. It sounded flip, detached. Maybe her psyche had realized that to survive it would have to jettison her emotions like extra weight from a doomed jet.
“Fin put our souls in safe places until it was time for us to walk the earth again.”
“You’re saying that Fin is sort of a god?”
Ty shrugged. “Never thought of him that way. He’s just…Fin.”
A few nights ago, Kelly would’ve offered to point Ty toward the nearest mental-health facility. Now? She just felt numb.
When she didn’t fling open her door and gallop off into the night, Ty explained his need to drop this bombshell right here and right now. “You’re mine, so I had to be the one to tell you.”
She should’ve argued the “you’re mine” part of his statement, but she couldn’t seem to work up the energy. Without a word, she pulled back into traffic.
“He’s telling the truth, Kelly.” Q sounded as serious as she’d ever heard him sound.
What were the chances that in one vehicle there’d be two crazy people, an unconscious werewolf, and one sane ordinary human? Right now, she wasn’t even sure she could stick the tags of sane and ordinary next to her name. So she just drove. And if her fingers gripped the steering wheel a little too hard, it was the price she paid for forgetting that if a job seemed too good to be true, it probably was.
She took a few minutes to wash off as much blood as possible in the condo’s lounge bathroom before they took the elevator up to Fin’s suite. Kelly held on to her silence all the way to his door.
She recognized the man who answered Ty’s knock. Al-with-the-braid, rescuer of women about to be eaten by vampires and all-around good guy. This time she was calm enough to also notice his gorgeous hazel eyes. Were there any ugly men in this group?
“Kelly. Great to see you again.” He took in her bloodied clothes. “Run into more killer vampires?” He pulled her into a friendly hug, ignoring Q, who’d already strode past him with Neva in his arms, and Ty, who stood right behind her.
She wasn’t fooled for a moment. Al fixed his gaze on Ty as his lips turned up in a sly smile, daring Ty to do something about the embrace. From the angry vibes Ty was emitting, he was about to pick up that dare.
Stepping out of Al’s hug, she smiled up at him. “Hey, I know the code now. Ty is for Tyrannosaurus, Q is for Quetzal-something, and Al is for…” She held up her hand. “No, don’t tell me.” Kelly ran through her meager knowledge of dinosaur names. She doubted there were any plant-eaters in this bunch. So Al was probably for…“Allosaurus? I know the name, but I can’t get a mental picture.”
“Right the first time.” He was now involved in a stare down with Ty. “Allosaurus was as big as T. rex.”
“You wish.” Ty’s murmur sounded murderous.
Al’s smile disappeared, replaced by a savage baring of his teeth. “And just as mean.”
Kelly closed her eyes wearily for a moment. What was with these guys? Al wouldn’t turn his back on Ty to lead them into the condo, and Ty wouldn’t walk past Al because then he’d have to show the other man his back.
She wasn’t in the mood for this crap tonight. Scowling at both men, Kelly strode past Al into the condo, then paused to take in everything. “This is spectacular.” Across a huge room sparkling with crystal and light was a split marble staircase. “How big is this place?”
Fin seemed to materialize from nowhere. “Three floors with a private pool and sundeck on the roof.”
The godlike Fin was dressed for the part tonight. His black leather pants and black shirt were stark contrasts to his sparkly silver hair. Kelly wondered how he’d managed not only to arrive before them, but to change clothes as well.
“Looking good for your company, Fin.” How’d you put the souls of the Eleven into human bodies? And where’d you get the bodies? Did you just hold people up by their heels and shake them until their souls fell out? How’d you keep Ty safe for sixty-five million years? What are you, really?
“This is my first meeting with a child of the night. I want to make an impression.” His smile was friendly enough, but his attention was for the two men still at the door.
She turned to follow his gaze. “They look like they want to tear each other apart.”
> Ty scowled. “They can hear you. And yeah, a little tearing and rending right now would put me in a great mood.” He took the steps necessary to pass Al and joined her.
Al threw Ty an angry glare before walking away.
Fin exhaled deeply and for the first time looked a little human. “Don’t blame Ty. Being around me ramps up his aggression.”
“Being around jerks who want to play games ramps up my aggression.” Ty stared at Al’s back as the other man left the room.
When Fin turned to lead them to the meeting room, Ty moved close to Kelly. His warm breath skimmed her neck and for a moment she forgot the blood, the violence, and all the weirdness. She stiffened her body against the desire to lean back against all that heat and hard muscle, to sink into his sensual promise, and forget, forget, forget.
“It’s been sixty-five million years, Kelly. Ask me how much I want you.” Ty’s soft laughter suggested all the things he’d like to do to make up for eons of missed pleasure. “I stopped last time. I don’t think I could do that again.” She understood that if the circumstances were repeated, he’d be a little less noble.
Kelly didn’t get a chance to answer Ty because Fin picked up his pace. Probably a good thing; she needed some space right now—to think, to accept.
Fin led them to a media room with elegant furniture and a solid glass wall with sliding doors that opened to a marble-tiled balcony. But the room itself paled in comparison to the men seated around it. All of them were big and beautiful with hard faces and eyes.
“Are these members of the Endeka family? I sort of see a resemblance.” She allowed Ty to guide her to a group of three men who sat watching them with eager, hungry gazes. They had to be brothers, because they all had short spiky blond hair and bright blue eyes.
“None of us are related, except for these three.” He nodded toward the men as he eased onto the couch beside her. “And endeka means ‘eleven’ in Greek. Fin’s idea of a joke.”
“Going to introduce us to the pretty lady, Ty?” The spokesman grinned at her while the two others fixed their unblinking attention on her clothes. “Looks like she fought something big and mean. And won. My kind of woman.”
Remembering that she still wore her bloodied jacket, she stripped it off. Her top had a few blood spatters, but they weren’t as spectacular. Then Kelly moved a little closer to Ty. He wrapped his arm around her waist and pulled her against his side. Under other circumstances, she would have resented the possessive gesture, but just this once she appreciated it.
All three men practically crackled with suppressed violence. No way would she ever want to see them in action. Together. Because instinct told her they weren’t solitary hunters.
Ty offered them a warning snarl.
Nope, he wasn’t going to introduce her. Kelly jumped into the breach before tempers could explode. “I’m Kelly, Ty’s driver. Fin wanted me here at your meeting. I’m having a great time figuring out who you guys are.” She didn’t do perky well, especially when her nerves were in screaming overload. “So what’re your names? You have to be triplets.”
The speaker shifted his gaze to Ty for a moment. Must be trying to figure out which he wanted to do most—attack Ty or dazzle her with his predator’s charm.
The latter won, because he looked back at her and turned up a kill-on-contact smile. Women would strew his path with lacy panties and indecent proposals in honor of that smile.
“I’m Utah. That’s Tor, and that’s Rap.” He nodded toward the other two men, who sent their own versions of “the smile” her way. “And yeah, we’re triplets. We do everything together. Everything.” His emphasis on the last word suggested that making love with all three at once would be a life-altering experience.
She believed him.
Ty might not believe the “life-altering” part, but he definitely believed the “making love” part. “Even think about it and you’ll be dying together.”
Oops. Kelly rushed into speech. “Fin wasn’t too subtle about your names. You’re Utahraptors.” Raptors. The word made her shudder. Jurassic Park had painted a chilling picture of the swift and deadly hunters.
“We frighten you.” One of the others spoke for the first time.
She didn’t have a clue whether it was Rap or Tor. “Well, yeah. You have terrifying soul forms.” Was she being too honest? Did she care? No. Worrying about the hurt feelings of prehistoric hotties wasn’t high on her priority list right now.
His smile shifted from sensual to just friendly. “Thank you. Oh, and I’m Tor. I know you can’t tell us apart. I’m the kind and gentle one.”
Rap snorted. “He’s the lying one.”
Their banter eased the tension a little. Too bad another hot spot popped up right away.
“What’s she doing here?” The question was a low angry growl.
Kelly looked up and up and up. Holy colossus. The man looming over her while he glared at Ty had to be close to Fin’s height. With wide shoulders and muscular arms exposed by his sleeveless black T-shirt, he made her want to slide between the cracks in the cushions and not come out until he was gone.
Which was exactly what she would not do. If she was going to be around these men for even a short time, she couldn’t always be in cowering mode. They’d enjoy it too much. “She’s sitting right here, so she’ll answer your question. I’m Ty’s driver, and Fin asked me to be here.”
The man turned his gaze on her. She took a deep breath and ramped up her courage. All the men in the room had a hard edge, but this guy was different. There was a wildness about him that said he just didn’t give a damn about anything. She’d seen animals like that. They didn’t do well in captivity.
“Why you? Why aren’t all the drivers here?” He studied her, his eerily pale eyes a startling contrast with his tanned skin and wild mane of dark hair.
She didn’t hear Ty move, but suddenly he was standing, crowding the stranger’s space. “Get away from her, Gig.”
Gig smiled, a predatory lifting of surprisingly sensual lips. “Why? Jealous? Looks like you’re a little possessive, the way you had her squeezed up tight against you.” He shifted his suddenly hungry gaze back to her. “I wouldn’t mind having a driver like her. How’d you get so lucky?”
“Back. Off.” Ty’s words were a guttural warning.
The room fell silent. Kelly dropped her gaze from Gig’s face to slide the long scary length of him past his jeans and scuffed biker boots. His jeans were torn in several places, but she didn’t think he was trying to make a fashion statement. God, she couldn’t let this come to violence.
Taking a deep breath, she stood. “Look, if my presence here is a problem, I’ll leave.”
“No.” Fin’s voice was soft, but it had a cutting edge.
All eyes turned to him. Kelly looked at Fin’s expression and understood how he controlled these men. She didn’t know what Fin had been before, but he must’ve been a hell of a predator.
“I asked Kelly to be here. She’s seen Ty’s and Q’s soul forms. I want her to know what we are and why we’re here. She can help us.” Fin narrowed his eyes as he focused on Gig. “Do you have a problem with that?”
For a moment, Kelly thought Gig would challenge Fin, but instead he stalked away.
“Anyone else?” Fin scanned his audience. Finally satisfied with the silence, he spoke directly to Kelly. “Cut Gig and the others some slack. They haven’t been around females for a long time. They’re hungry.”
Kelly nodded, but she hoped her expression let everyone know there wouldn’t be any snacking on her. She sat down and pulled at Ty to join her. He stood for a moment undecided, and she hoped he wouldn’t go after Gig. Finally, he sat down too.
She was relieved when Q joined them.
“How’s Neva?” Kelly kept her voice to a whisper. She wished she could help the other woman. Did Neva have a family? Would she want them contacted? Kelly thought about her parents. No, some things were better not shared.
Q shrugged. “Still
unconscious. Fin has her in a secure room with a guard. No one knows what to expect.”
Fin stopped any further conversation. “Jude is on his way up. He has three guards with him. They can stay. We want him to feel safe.” His smile said it would be a false sense of security. “We need allies. So no threats, no attacks. Mess this meeting up and I’ll show you violence like you never imagined.”
Kelly was duly impressed.
The tension built until the bell rang. Fin nodded at a man sitting near the back of the room. He was bigger than Ty, with a shaved head and the prerequisite hard face. The difference was that Kelly knew Ty smiled sometimes. This man looked like he’d never smiled in his life. He got up and left the room.
By the time the vampires trailed in behind the big man, Kelly felt as if she were drowning in a sea of testosterone gone wild. She expected to see fights breaking out all over the room. Fin was right about his effect on the others. Even she felt a little snarky.
Jude’s three protectors entered the room first: two men and a woman. The two men didn’t disappoint. They were massive, muscle-bound giants with scary faces, glowing eyes, and fangs on full display. As intimidators, they were awesome.
The woman was a shock: cute in a sweet, innocent kind of way, with big green eyes and curly red hair. You just wanted to take her home and plunk her on your bed next to your fave teddy bear.
Jude entered last.
The two hulking male vampires didn’t seem to inspire any interest from Fin and his men. The woman was getting plenty of interest, all sexual.
But when Jude appeared in the doorway, every predator in the room went on instant alert. Kelly didn’t have to read minds to understand the reaction of a bunch of alpha males to the vampire leader.
He was one of them—powerful, deadly, and an equal. With his red shirt open at the throat, black pants, riding boots, and that black hair loose and flowing, he gave Fin a run for his money in the notice-me department.