by Dannika Dark
I lifted his sunglasses and tossed them into the sink. “Is that with a big O or a little one?”
I nestled my body against his and wrapped my arms around him in an embrace so that I could unlock the door for Christian, wherever he was.
“Your light’s so strong,” I moaned against his chest, silently turning the lock. “I like the way it feels on me. Do you have a car?”
“Uh…” He drew back.
“I don’t care about this dress anymore, but I was hoping that maybe… Well, you know. I’ve never done anything spontaneous like this, but I can’t do it when there’s a toilet three feet away.”
“What exactly do you want to do?” he asked, a bead of sweat rolling down his cheek.
Binding energy with another Mage was highly erotic, but I’d heard that doing it while having sex was otherworldly.
I rubbed up against him like a cat and whispered, “Everything.”
Owen trembled, cursing under his breath as he leaned back. There was a peculiar look in his eyes that I couldn’t discern. “Devon’s going to kill me, but fuck it. He gets all the fun. Come on.”
Before I knew it, we were moving out the back exit. He opened the rear door to a dark sedan, and I climbed in.
Owen slammed the door and got into the driver’s seat.
“Don’t you want to come back here?” I asked warily.
The plan was to get him out of the building so his friends wouldn’t be able to corner us in a bathroom if they came looking. Usually men didn’t go searching for one another, but since these guys worked together, it might be a habit, and we couldn’t take any chances. Viktor had suggested either inside a car or in an alley near the building, just so long as we could make a quick getaway if caught.
When he started the car and backed out, my throat went dry. I crawled into the front seat and searched the parking lot for Christian as we sped away.
“Where are we going? My car is still back at the bar. Just pull over here; the alley is fine.”
Ignoring me, he stepped on the gas even harder, and we sailed around the curve of the road. Buildings soon turned into trees.
Just a slight detour, I told myself.
What I didn’t understand was why we were going so far out. Viktor had given both Christian and me a stern warning about causing a scene and tipping off his men. No bloodshed. Well, given my current situation, at least his friends were out of the picture.
Without Christian to charm him, I was going to have to work out another plan to get information. I was used to thinking on the fly, so I kept my cool. “I saw the guys you were with. I don’t think you get half the respect you deserve.”
There are two things that all men like stroked: their cocks and their egos.
He veered off the road, and my heart finally slowed down.
Owen shut off the engine and turned to face me, his eyes dancing with mischief. “Ready to play?”
“If you have to drive all the way out here to have a little fun, maybe you need to find a new boss.”
“That wasn’t my boss,” he ground out. “Hike up your skirt and show me what you’ve got.”
“I’m not a prostitute.”
“Do you think I’m a moron?” He gripped a fistful of my hair. “You’re not the first person who’s tried getting information out of me. My boss told us to keep an eye out for a rogue who has her nose in his business. I’m supposed to bring in any suspects.”
“So why didn’t you call your friends when you had me in the bathroom?”
“Maybe I’m sick of someone else getting all the credit. I’ve got plenty of time to take you in, after I get some information and have a little fun of my own.”
“I didn’t know you were into the rough stuff, but that’s okay.” I traced my finger up my leg. “You want me to pull up my dress? You got it, daddy. I’ll show you everything.”
The automatic locks clicked on all four doors.
He knocked my hand out of the way and reached between my legs, searching for a weapon. I slapped his face repeatedly to get his hand away from my dagger.
Owen gripped my wrist, trying to subdue me. “Who do you work for?” he shouted.
I bit his arm and twisted out of his grasp. With my right hand free, I palmed the dagger and went for his throat, but he knocked the blade out of my hand before I made contact.
When I reached down to get it, he pulled a dagger from inside his jacket and plunged it into my thigh.
My scream filled the car like a nightmare.
Immortal or not, daggers hurt.
“What a shame to ruin those pretty legs,” he said, his voice jovial. “Now tell me who the fuck you work for!”
“Take me to Darius and I’ll deliver the message myself.” My fangs punched out as I thrashed my head.
Owen panicked when he realized he was in the car with a Vampire. He went for something beneath the seat, and I knew he must have impalement wood.
I quickly pulled the knife out of my thigh and drove it into his leg. “How do you like that!”
He screamed louder than I had. Before he could react, I gripped his hand in mine and juiced all the Mage light I could.
“What the fuck?” he shrieked in bewilderment.
“Owen, you’re not the brightest crayon in the box.” I twisted the knife with my free hand, and he let out a guttural scream. “Why doesn’t Darius issue you stunners? Just a plain old dagger?”
He tried to fight me with his free hand, but I’d drained his light to the point where all he could do was drape himself over the steering wheel.
“It’s my turn to ask questions. Where does your boss hide? Better tell me, because you’re not going to like some of my other talents.” I pulled more of his energy out, already feeling nauseated from his dark light churning through my body like poison. “We’re going to keep holding hands until you decide how loyal you want to be to that monster you work for. I can hold on for a long time, and you don’t want to know how much I can take from you.”
Owen struck me across the face in a surprise attack. “Can you take that?” He wasn’t as weak as he’d led me to believe. “That’s okay, bitch. I like it rough. Remember?”
When Christian’s motorcycle sputtered around the corner, I was reclined against an oak tree, replaying the events in my head to figure out where it all went wrong.
Had Owen’s friends discovered us in the parking lot, the situation could have escalated out of control. Three against one, and I couldn’t be sure if Christian would have intervened. Maybe I should have packed my stunner instead of the regular dagger.
The headlamp on Christian’s bike illuminated the fog, making it appear as if there was smoke rising from the earth. We were on a quiet stretch of road, surrounded by aging trees, moss, and croaking frogs.
His bike slid sideways, and the engine shut off. A cloud of fog and dirt eddied around the bike as Christian left it lying there and stalked toward me. All I could make out was a dark silhouette of a man, the tail of his coat floating behind him.
When he knelt down, I weakly swung my arm and slapped him. “You set me up.”
“Pardon?”
“You were supposed to be there and you weren’t.”
“For your information, this wasn’t an elaborate plan to sabotage you. If I wanted you gone, I’d drain you and bury you in the east cemetery. Now what happened?”
I lifted my eyelid and removed the contact lens from my blue eye. “This,” I said, balancing it on the tip of my finger. “It jinxed me.”
He scanned my body, which was covered with blood. “Is the dry shite dead?”
“I popped his cork.”
He furrowed his brow, not understanding. “How many drinks did you have this evening? You really know how to pick ’em. I would have gone for the little guy.”
I flicked the lens at him. “Then maybe you should have worn the dress.”
He winked. “Afraid it’s too short to accentuate all my curves.”
I closed my eyes, a
gentle breeze cooling my face. The air smelled of wet earth, pine, and my beer-stained dress. I’d never been in a predicament like this where I was so gravely wounded. Owen had put up a heck of a struggle, and I’d lost a lot of blood in the process. I had my legs stretched out in front of me—the holster still strapped to my right thigh but missing the dagger. My left leg was a mess since a lot of the blood had gushed down to my foot when I stumbled out of the car. I wasn’t sure where my heels had gone.
Christian marched over to the vehicle, yanked out the dead body, and flung him into the open. It was almost comical to watch.
“Jaysus wept. It looks like you played pin the fang on the jugular in there.”
“I ran into a snag.”
Christian straddled the Mage, staring down at him. He could give a shadow a run for its money.
“A dagger in the heart was a nice touch,” he offered.
I glanced at the handle poking out from the Mage’s chest. “That one’s his, so just leave it there.”
“Exactly how did you manage to kill a Mage without cutting off his head? I thought you were draining your victims and juicing them to the point of death, but his wounds are still oozing.”
“It’s a family secret,” I murmured, knowing he could still hear me.
After another moment, he stood up and kicked the body. “Viktor’s going to have a conniption.”
“Let him.”
Christian turned a sharp eye toward me. “If we’re not able to cover this up, we’ll lose more than just a shot at Darius. It could be the downfall of Keystone.”
“If I had to do it over again, I would have killed him in the bar and put him in your lap.”
His jaw set.
“Don’t look at me like that,” I said, my voice weakening. “I had no choice. My guard was nowhere in sight.”
“I thought you didn’t need a guard?” Christian walked over and crouched before me. “You’re an audacious creature.”
Although his hair was a dark brown, his eyebrows were much darker and sloped down a little in the center. I’d never really stared at a man’s eyebrows before, but I couldn’t help but wonder why I found it so attractive that some of the hairs in the center weren’t cooperating. It made him seem less like a Vampire and more like the Big Bad Wolf.
Something dark flickered in his eyes when he noticed my bleeding wound.
Probably hunger.
“Looks like he stabbed you in the leg. Where else?”
“My back. Did you go off with that woman? What kind of bodyguard are you?”
“Are you daft? The plan was to lure him into the parking lot, not take a sightseeing tour of the city. When I heard you two in the bathroom, I kept my distance so his men wouldn’t get suspicious. They were eyeing the hall, and I suspect they’re probably searching for him as we speak.”
Christian looked over his shoulder and scraped his teeth against his bottom lip. “There’s too much evidence. I’m either going to have to call in for help or put gasoline on the car and torch it, and I’m fresh out of matches. I knew I shouldn’t have brought the damn bike,” he muttered. “I’m going to have to rope you to my back.”
A wave of terror swept through me when I thought about riding on the back of his motorcycle. It wouldn’t be the first time I’d ridden a bike, but I was too weak to hold on and didn’t have any desire to end up as roadkill.
His fangs punched out and he used them to slice a hole in his shirt. After he tore off most of the bottom, he used the material as a tourniquet on my leg.
“So much for your lucky dress,” he said.
I flicked another glance at his bike. “Don’t even think about putting me on that piece of junk.”
“Junk?” he exclaimed. “This old Ducati is more reliable than anyone I’ve ever met. Maybe she’s not as flashy as your Harley-Davidsons, but I’ll have you know she’s gotten me out of many a jam.”
Personally I was a Harley girl. Christian’s Ducati Scrambler reminded me of a Bonneville Triumph, only less flashy.
The rain suddenly unleashed, as if punishing me for what I’d done. I began to laugh at the insanity of my life. What kind of monster had I become? All I’d ever wanted as a child was a normal life, and here I was, sitting in the pouring rain, bleeding profusely from stab wounds, and having an argument with a Vampire about his mode of transportation.
“You’ve gone mad,” he said with a shake of his head.
“We’re all mad here.”
Christian launched to his feet and stalked toward the Mage. In a swift movement, he pulled out the knife and then punched him in the face.
The laughter died in my throat, and I stared up into a canopy of darkness. “This wasn’t in the brochure.”
Chapter 10
After Christian admonished me about the mess I’d made in the Mage’s car, he tossed the body into the trunk and then hefted his motorcycle before busting it through the back windshield.
I passed out, and when I awoke, I was in the passenger seat of the Mage’s car with a black coat tucked around me.
I smirked when I noticed the Vampire behind the wheel.
“Something funny?” Christian asked.
“You’re naked.”
“Not entirely, but the night is still young.”
He’d removed the rest of his shirt and only had on a pair of black trousers. The next thing I knew, I was staring at the back of my eyelids again.
“Don’t ask inane questions. Just get Niko,” he said in clipped words.
Bewildered, I opened my eyes and realized how much time had passed. We were no longer in the car—Christian was carrying me through a hall in the mansion. A bone-deep chill made it difficult to move, and every muscle tightened as I shivered uncontrollably. My neck hurt, my back hurt, and my legs were numb. All I wanted was a warm pair of socks on my feet.
The lanterns were making me dizzy, so I rested my cheek against Christian’s bare chest. Who would have thought that a Vampire could feel so warm to the touch? Christian’s body felt like a blanket that had just come out of the dryer, and all I wanted to do was wrap him around me.
“I see someone’s awake,” he murmured against my hair.
“How did you know?”
“Your lashes are tickling my chest.”
Wyatt peered down at me as we passed by him. “You really screwed this one up. Where’s the Mage?”
Christian snapped his head around, his tone sharp. “In the trunk of the car. Why don’t you go outside and say hello?”
“Shepherd! I need you down here. Hurry up before the freshy gets in!” Wyatt’s voice grew distant.
“Set her down here,” Viktor said.
The next thing I knew, I was on a metal table with sterile instruments all around. I shivered uncontrollably when the cold surface touched my back.
Viktor pulled Christian’s coat away from my body. “This is unacceptable.”
Christian leaned against the table on my right, blood smeared across his chest. “I called in our cleaner to take care of the scene. There was blood and emotional imprints left behind, but nothing he can’t clean up.”
“And the body you decided to bring home with you as a souvenir? How did this happen? I thought we had an understanding.”
“Apparently the shitebag who put a dagger in her back and leg didn’t get the memo. He drove her over the county line and into the woods. Maybe we’ve underestimated how many times this has happened to them before. She put up a hell of a fight. I’m guessing he was the sort of man who got his jollies by roughing the girls up.”
Viktor pointed his finger in Christian’s face. “Why did you let her get into the car? All this for nothing. If Darius’s men saw Raven with the victim, they’ll be able to ID her.”
“I had on my brown contact,” I mumbled.
Christian’s lips twitched.
“Let me paint you a picture,” Viktor began. “Darius discovers who we are, and instead of taking matters into his own hands, he reports us to the higher
authority. They will strip away everything we have worked for because they will have no choice, even if they have backed our previous cases. Only a chosen few are delegated to use funds for such things; they don’t all know what we are doing for them.”
“They can’t ignore what you’ve done for them already,” Christian retorted. “And I don’t think we have to worry about this dolt going to the higher authority if he’s busy going after humans.”
“You cannot take such risks. We’re not bound by the laws, but I do not operate a casino,” Viktor argued, his voice reverberating off the walls. “You’re gambling with the life of this organization when you break my rules.”
“I know where he lives!” I cried and then rattled off the address.
The bickering ceased.
I swallowed, my throat parched. “Do you think I went through all that and didn’t get what you needed? Darius knows about me, and he warned his men to be on the lookout. He thinks I’m working for someone, and Owen tried to get me to talk.”
“You summoned me?” Niko called out from across the room. He paused at the foot of the table. “Who is that?”
Viktor turned away. “Raven is injured, and we cannot stop the bleeding. Normally there is some clotting. Can she last until dawn?”
“Move aside,” Niko said, entering my line of vision. He hovered over the left side of the table, looking at me but not really looking at me. “Three stab wounds.”
“Two,” Christian corrected.
“Did you miss the one behind her neck or on her back?”
“What time is it?” Viktor asked.
Niko shook his head. “It won’t matter. She doesn’t know how to use sunlight to heal; it’s not something we’ve tested yet. Aside from that, it’s raining.”
“She’s Vampire and Mage,” Christian stressed. “I don’t think she’s on the brink of making a trip to the pearly gates just yet.”
Niko’s expression tightened. “And if that were Blue lying there and she wasn’t able to shift to heal, would you just walk away? I can’t say if she’ll die—we have not yet learned enough about her. It’s inhumane to allow someone to suffer a slow healing that could take days or even weeks.”