Feisty Heroines Romance Collection of Shorts

by D. F. Jones

  “You’re dismissed, Donovan,” Bain said impatiently, standing. His towering muscular frame was as imposing as a bull’s, accented by long black hair that hung at least three feet past his shoulders. “I can handle Cordray without a chaperone.”

  Bain knew of the simmering feud between her and Donovan and had grown increasingly frustrated with it.

  As Donovan’s face shaded pink, he tossed a contentious glance toward Cordray, then turned and quietly stormed out, barely refraining from slamming the door.

  Cordray dropped onto the plush leather chair in front of Bain’s desk and kicked her feet up on the polished surface, crossing them at the ankles.

  “Why do you insist on antagonizing him?” Bain asked, sitting back down. The leather of his thronelike chair crackled as it accepted his weight.

  “Because he’s completely inadequate for the job you’ve given him.”

  “You think everyone is inadequate for that job.” His piercing blue eyes met hers. “Maybe I should just give it to you.”

  “Not interested.”

  “Then stop busting Donovan’s balls.”

  She sprawled back in the chair and glanced up at the ceiling as she nonchalantly crossed her hands over her stomach. “I’ll think about it.”

  It was the same conversation they’d had so many times it had become a standing joke.

  Right on cue, Bain grinned, then chuckled as he leaned forward and laced his fingers together on the desk. “What am I going to do with you?”

  “What you always do. Give me the hardest, most dangerous, and most sensitive jobs on your docket, because you know you can trust me to get them done as quietly and quickly as possible.”

  Bain studied her in the brief silence that followed. “You could be doing so much more, Cordray.”

  “I like the work I do. I’m good at it.”

  “You are, but your talents could make you a valuable negotiator in my court.”

  Her talents. He was referring to her ability to worm her way into other vampires’ thoughts without them being able to detect her mental presence.

  She examined her long black-lacquered fingernails. “My talents are more valuable to you in the streets.”

  Bain had tried to talk her into joining his council before, but the work was too boring and required too much political glad-handing for her tastes. She knew why he wanted her there. Rumors had surfaced that someone was mounting a coup against him. If she were to bring her mind-cracking talents to his council, she could easily pinpoint anyone in his circle who might be involved.

  But that was no way to run a kingdom. Placing her on the council could backfire and enable those who were already disloyal to infect even more with their treason.

  This was one time her brother would have to rely on his own cunning and superior political prowess to weed out conspirators.

  “So, what’s this priority job you’ve got for me?” she asked, pointedly changing the subject.

  Bain straightened, his demeanor morphing from casual family chatter to all business in an instant. “Micah Black.”

  Cordray blinked. “Micah Black?” What kind of priority assignment was this?

  “He’s an enfor—”

  “I know who he is.”

  Who didn’t?

  Cordray’s path had never crossed Micah’s, but his reputation was legendary. Not only was he the most lethal enforcer in Bain’s employ, but he had a past that sent shockwaves through the hearts of every male of the vampire race.

  After losing his mate eons ago, Micah had fallen heavily into the suffering, as males usually did after their mates died. Many males didn’t survive the suffering, and those who did often became shells of their former selves until they were killed, offed themselves, or took another mate.

  Micah was one of the unlucky ones who had survived the suffering’s soul-crushing torment, but at a price. He had become a loose cannon, impossible to control, with little regard for his own life. As an enforcer, he was all but rogue, going out night after night, searching for someone to hurt… or someone who would hurt him. It was like the guy had a death wish but didn’t have the balls to pull the trigger himself. Cordray was shocked he hadn’t gotten himself killed by now, but somehow, his heart kept on beating.

  Honestly, Cordray had always thought of Micah as kind of an asshole. There was a little bit too much drama queen in that one for her taste.

  “What about him?” she asked, curious as to how Micah had become a “priority” and exactly what Bain expected her to do about it.

  “He’s taken a turn for the worst.”

  “So?” Plenty of males had succumbed to the suffering. What made Micah so special that he’d landed on Bain’s radar?

  “I want you to watch him. Make sure he doesn’t hurt himself, or worse.”

  She groaned and laid her head back. “Ah, Jesus, Bain. Seriously?”

  “This is important, Cordray.”

  “I’m not a babysitter.” She lifted her head and looked at Bain, slightly taken aback at the gravity in his expression.

  Bain shook his head. “This is one time I won’t broach any argument from you, C. You will do this job, and you will ensure Micah stays alive, whatever it takes. This is your top priority. I don’t want you working on anything else.”

  She reared back. “Why the urgency? Why now?”

  “From what I’ve been told, Micah took another mate.”

  “Shouldn’t that be a good thing?”

  If Micah had taken another mate, what the hell was the problem? The guy should have been balls deep inside the warm confines of the lucky bitch, enjoying the good life, no suffering in sight.

  “It would be if the other male had mated him back.”

  She arched one eyebrow and held up her hand. “Wait a sec. Male? Are you telling me that Micah mated another male?”

  She’d heard that Micah had become more gender fluid, but she never would have imagined him taking a male mate, especially since his first mate had been female.

  Bain released an irritated sigh. “He might have mated another male. That part’s unclear. Apparently the other guy—I guess his name is Jackson—didn’t form a mating bond back.” Bain scrubbed his large palm distractedly over the scruff on his cheeks. “Which makes me question whether it was a real mating or a hormonal misfire.”

  None of this made sense.

  “Hold up.” She dropped her feet to the floor and scooted to the edge of her chair. “Whether Micah really has taken another mate or only thinks he has, shouldn’t he be happy?” Wasn’t that how mating worked for a male? That’s certainly how it had worked for Gideon, the male who’d left her at the proverbial altar. She’d become nothing more than a faded memory the moment his biology fired up for that other wench instead of her.

  A grim expression fell over Bain’s face. “Jackson split on him.”

  Cordray’s whole body sank. “Oh, shit.”

  “Exactly,” Bain said. “Now you know why I’m concerned.”

  Micah was a male who’d already lost one mate and had now lost another, whether the mating was real or only imagined. But if it had been real, Jackson should have mated him back. That’s how same-sex matings usually worked. Sure, there were exceptions, but they were rare. Which meant the odds were that Micah’s biology had blown it on this one, or the suffering had given him false hope with Jackson. Either way, this wasn’t good.

  “I need you to keep his ass alive until I can figure this shit out,” Bain said, pinching the bridge of his nose before dropping his hand to the desk. “And you have to do it without him knowing you’re following him.”

  She rocked back and threw her arms up in the air. “Well, gee, Bain, why don’t you just hog-tie me and throw me into a den of starving wolves?”

  “Cordray—”

  She ratcheted forward again. “I can keep him from knowing I’m following him if I have to, but how the hell do you expect me to pull this off without either of us killing the other?” She was less than thrilled
with this bullshit assignment. “How do you expect me to keep him alive if dying is all he wants? Or if he turns mutant?”

  Her brother knew that a male locked in the shackles of suffering was more powerful than a T. rex on steroids. His agony alone could turn him mutant. Cordray could stop a tank, but tanks were easy compared to a mutant vampire. She would have to empty her Glock’s clip into him just to subdue him, because her fists wouldn’t be enough. Hell, a dozen bullets might not even be enough if he went mutant.

  Bain glanced at the tome locked within a Plexiglas case beside the Victorian couch in the middle of the room. The mammoth book contained the historical records of their family.

  His gaze returned to hers a moment later. “I don’t care how you do it, C, but losing Micah isn’t an option.”

  Not an option, huh? Great.

  Of all the assignments Bain had given her, Cordray had never thought failure was a real possibility.

  Until now.

  Chapter 3

  With the impossible assignment from hell mounted on her shoulders, and an endless, frustrated grumble growling from her throat, Cordray left Bain’s mansion and set out to find her quarry.

  Upon scouting Micah’s home in the suburbs, it was clear he hadn’t been there in weeks.

  After picking up the barest hint of a trail, she tracked him to the Sentinel in downtown Chicago. The Sentinel was a high-rise apartment building in the heart of the city. Micah’s scent was stronger there, and even more powerful around the eighteenth floor, where he clearly owned a penthouse apartment. A secret penthouse apartment. Because the address wasn’t listed in his personnel file.

  Micah wasn’t there, either, but given the intensity of his misery-laden, suicidal odor, he had been there within the last few hours.

  Perhaps Bain had reason to worry about Micah. He certainly carried the smell of someone looking to vacate his soul from his body. Tonight, if he could manage it.

  Following this more robust trail, she caught up to Micah in a parking garage outside the Black Garter.

  The Garter was a local spank-bait establishment for a higher-end clientele who preferred fashionable digs and classier strippers to the strung-out trailer trash who performed in Chicago’s seedier titty bars.

  These were “gentlemen” with deep pockets, who wanted to keep their patronage as quiet as possible and tipped well to keep it that way. And since the Garter’s security was top-notch, plenty of famous figures spent their time and money there. Senators, congressmen—and women—and celebrities of all flavors could be found haunting the shadows inside the Garter any day of the week.

  But it wasn’t just humans who frequented the Garter. Vampires spent plenty of time there too. It was a good place to find blood donors. In fact, it wasn’t uncommon to find vampires trolling all the strip clubs in the city. They were good places to scent out tasty blood, given the heightened state of arousal of the clientele. It was like being served a sampler platter. Try before you buy.

  Cordray had seen Micah at the Garter a few times, but he’d never noticed her. He’d been too enthralled with the stage show to detect her slinking around in search of a meal.

  But the Garter’s riveting strip shows weren’t on Micah’s mind right now. His being here appeared to be purely coincidence because he was currently taking the beating of his life—or the end of it—at the hands of five drecks.

  Drecks. Mortal enemies to the vampire race. Drecks were shifters who loved nothing more than killing vampires, and from the way Micah wasn’t even trying to defend himself, he had used that knowledge to bring about his own demise.

  Merry belated Christmas to her, because as much as drecks enjoyed slicing open vampires, she enjoyed ripping them apart. This was one gift—or five—she would enjoy unwrapping… by tearing off their skin.

  She was just about to hop into the fray and mop up Micah’s assailants with their own blue blood when a blond spitfire who resembled the Garter’s star dancer leaped from behind the far wall, gun raised.

  “Hey!” the blonde yelled. “Get away from him!”

  The drecks stopped pummeling Micah’s face and snapped around to take in their feisty intrusion. Even Cordray froze at the woman’s commanding tone. This bitch had massive balls to face down five drecks who were partially shifted into their blue state. They had to look like a five-man posse of aliens to little Blondie with her teensy-weensy gun.

  Movement in the distance, upwind from her, caught her eye. There, in the shadows behind the blonde, was another vampire. A male. He was wearing a skullcap. Cordray could feel his power all the way from where she was perched on a rooftop across the street from the garage.

  But shadow boy wasn’t the only extra onlooker at this party. Crouching on the rooftop of the hardware store below her was another male.

  Looked like The Micah Show had an audience.

  She sniffed the air, then grimaced and wrinkled her nose.

  No way. She had to be mistaken.

  She inhaled again, more carefully this time, hauling in a sickening whiff of… lycan? The male on top of the hardware store was a lycan?

  What the hell was a lycan doing in Chicago? This was vampire territory. Just by being there, this asshole was violating the treaty Bain had set up ages ago with Memnon and Rameses, the ancient brothers who led the lycan race.

  The treaty designated the eastern half of the country as vampire territory and the western half for the lycans. To enter the other race’s territory, you had to petition the leadership first. Since Bain hadn’t mentioned anything about lycans prowling around Chicago, this wild dog was in violation of the treaty.

  That gave Cordray permission to kick his ass first and ask questions later.

  With Micah temporarily out of danger as the blonde spitfire held the drecks at bay, Cordray made a judgment call to pay their lycan intruder a visit.

  Focusing on her new prey, she stepped off the ledge of the roof just as Blondie got trigger happy.

  BANG!

  Cordray saw the bullet slicing through the air toward her a split second before it blew a hole in her chest. The impact pitched her backward in midair, somersaulting her ass-over-head, until she slammed into the brick wall behind her.

  “Oof!”

  She didn’t have to feel the pain to absorb the shock of the collision, or to know she was in serious trouble.

  Dropping ingloriously to the roof of the hardware store, she crumpled in on herself as her vision blurred, then faded out and back in. A moment later, she fell to the side and blinked drowsily up at the few stars that broke through the bright lights of the city. It was hard to breathe, like her lung had a big-ass hole in it.

  Well, great, this was inconvenient.

  Footsteps raced toward her, then a shadowy silhouette knelt beside her as the scent of male lycan invaded her nostrils, along with the scent of blood. Her blood. A lot of her blood.

  She couldn’t see the lycan’s face, backlit as it was, but she sensed the pressure of his hands palpating her body. A moment later, he threw her coat open.

  “Shit.” He rocked back on his haunches.

  And how about that, he had a nice voice. Deep. Dark. Smooth. The kind of voice that made her sense of hearing perk up.

  The bullet’s handiwork must have been a thing of beauty for him to react that way, though. Maybe Blondie had blown open her aorta along with her lung.

  And based on the scrambled eggs inside her head, along with her pirouetting vision, she had a nasty concussion.

  Cordray managed to find her voice, even though it whispered out of her on a drunken slur. “You’re violating—”

  The lycan’s hand clamped over her mouth. “Ssshh!”

  She willed her arms to throw him off, but they remained planted on the rooftop, refusing to budge. Unlike her fiery ego that was demanding her to kick this lycan’s ass, her arms seemed to understand that she’d been severely injured and needed to recover before trying to move.

  The lycan cursed quietly again, then paused a
nd looked over his shoulder as another shot rang out and one of the drecks released a shriek that would scare a banshee. Looked like the bastard had gotten a taste of Blondie’s firepower too. Good for her.

  The lycan paused, glanced back down at her, then looked back toward the action, appearing to debate whether to leave her there or help her.

  Meanwhile, the scent of her blood grew stronger. She was losing all the delicious life force Biff had given her earlier. Damn. And she’d so been looking forward to a few days without needing to hunt down another meal.

  “Goddamn it,” the lycan quietly bit out, turning back to her with a frustrated sigh that indicated he’d decided to choose door number two and help her, as if she were a damsel in distress.

  Like hell. She was no damsel and didn’t need help, especially from a lycan. She tried to tell him so, but all that came out of her mouth was a gurgling, unintelligible string of syllables as she tasted her own blood.

  “Save your strength, sweetheart.” He hefted her into his arms as if she weighed no more than a Q-tip.

  With her vision winking in and out, and her independent, I-can-take-care-of-myself ego taking a major blow, she sensed herself being cradled against his very solid, surprisingly sturdy body.

  And whaddya know, up close, he didn’t smell half bad. In fact, he smelled pretty damn appetizing.

  Blackness encroached from all sides as she inhaled weakly, her head rolling on the steely mound of his biceps until her nose was tucked against his shoulder.

  Her mouth watered from his scent. She wasn’t so out of it that she couldn’t recognize good blood when she smelled it, and this lycan’s blood would taste heavenly flowing down her throat, even without the added spice of arousal.

  Which was insane, because mixing lycans with vampires was like mixing milk with grapefruit juice. Just… ew. And yet… all she wanted was to sink her fangs into the side of his neck and suck on him for the next twelve hours.

  And with that thought hanging inside her head like a lit match over spilled gasoline, she passed out.