Forgetting all about where they were, Marina pushed at his jacket, thinking only about how much she needed to feel his skin on hers, those hard muscles flexing against her, his power overwhelming her.
He let the jacket fall and she wrestled his vest off, but the buttons of his pants became too much for her to manage and she pretty much gave up trying because he moved one hand between her legs. His touch paralyzed her on the spot. He slid his fingers slowly—agonizingly slowly—along her slick flesh, then circled them gently over her clit.
“I’ve needed to be right here all night.” His voice was raw, so hot and intense that she moaned embarrassingly loud, then almost screamed when he pushed his fingers deep.
“Oh, God, yes,” she whimpered. “Please.”
If she wasn’t paralyzed, she’d rip his pants off with her teeth. That’s how desperate she was to get him inside her.
But Quinn apparently didn’t feel her sense of urgency as he withdrew his fingers and dropped down to bury his face between her thighs, his tongue unerringly finding and swirling over her clit.
Her legs promptly gave out, so without missing a beat, he flung them over his shoulders and stood up—stood up!—as if she weighed nothing. Marina gasped and flattened her hands on the ceiling for support.
Not that she needed support. Quinn had her pinned in place exactly where he wanted her.
And there, with her on his shoulders and his strong hands at her waist, using only his tongue, Quinn made her come so hard she was pretty sure she died for a second or two and saw the face of God, all while she writhed and gasped and screamed loud enough to let everyone in the hotel know Quinn’s name.
He set her on her feet and turned her toward the chair, but not before she caught a glimpse of his expression. It was unlike anything she’d ever seen directed at her—adoring and feral and full of sinful, sexual promise all at the same time.
“Bend over,” he practically growled.
She bent over, no hesitation, and grabbed the back of the chair for support. “Hurry.”
He rucked up her dress and ripped open his pants as he nudged her feet apart with his. “Spread your legs wider for me, love.”
She was sure he’d drive into her then, hard, fast and deep. But instead, he took a moment to curl his body over hers and kiss her neck, nipping her sensitive nape. “You are so fucking sexy,” he said, groaning as she lifted her hips and pushed her ass back against him.
“Please don’t make me wait anymore,” she begged.
And—thank God—he didn’t. He slid into her with a single, slow, hard thrust that made them both moan.
Oh, God, yes.
Best charity event ever, she thought.
And that was when all hell broke loose on the other side of the door.
Chapter Seventeen
Rat-a-tat-tat! Rat-a-tat-tat!
Gunfire, Quinn realized. At least two shooters with AK-47s, followed by screams, shouting, panicked footsteps and the answering gunfire of what he assumed was event security.
Quinn covered Marina’s body with his own, pants still down around his ankles.
So much for his lucky night, he thought as his fear for Marina’s safety squashed what remained of his libido.
And then, just as suddenly as it started, the shooting stopped.
Quinn cautiously straightened and helped Marina up, then righted his pants. He dug his phone out of his pocket and handed it to Marina. “Call 911. Tell them there’s an active shooter and they need to send SWAT. Then, call your sister, just to be safe.”
Marina stared up at him with wide, terrified eyes, her face completely drained of color. “What are you going to do?”
He wanted to rip the fucker who’d put that fear in her eyes apart with his bare hands. “I need to figure out what’s going on and see if I can help,” he said, doing his best to inject calm into his voice for her benefit. “I want you to lock the door behind me, then hide in the corner of the stall. Don’t come out until I come back for you.”
“OK. But, Quinn?”
“Yes, love?”
“Please be careful.”
He kissed her hard on the mouth, then pulled her in for a quick hug. “Promise.”
Wishing like hell he’d been able to sneak a weapon—a gun, a knife, hell, a sharp stick, for fuck’s sake—past security on the way in, he eased out into the hall and waited until he heard the door lock behind him before he moved.
Time to go to work.
***
Harper was already in the car on her way to the hotel when Marina called.
“How did you know what was going on?” Marina asked.
“Benny has a police scanner. A few other people managed to call 911. But as soon as one caller said the shooters were vampires, the cops backed off and called Hunter.”
Well, Marina thought, that was a good news/bad news situation. The good news was that help was on the way. The bad news? Vampire shooters at her work event a week after she’d been attacked by vampires and Haven had almost been kidnapped? That couldn’t be a coincidence.
What if people had gotten hurt—or worse—because of her? What if Quinn got hurt because of her?
“Where are you? Are you someplace safe?” Marina heard Riddick ask over the steady roar of Harper’s car. It sounded like Harper had the pedal on the floor. She hoped her sister had her on speakerphone. High speeds while on the phone were never a good idea.
Marina gave Riddick the run-down on her location and promised to stay put no matter what she heard outside the bathroom, even though she felt awful about it. Quinn had rushed out to help while she cowered in the bathroom. What kind of coward did that?
“Hey,” Harper said sharply, “I can hear you mentally flogging yourself over there, and I want you to cut that shit out right now. It’s not like you wore Kevlar and brought stakes and a sword with you to that party. There’s nothing you can do to help. And if you’re out there in the middle of all that, Quinn will be too worried about you to do what he has to do to those vampires. So for me—and for mom and Haven and Riddick and everyone else who loves you—please stay put, stay safe, and we’ll be there as soon as we can. Do you understand me?”
Harper was right. As usual. “I hear you.” God, she really felt like she should say something else. Something…just in case. Marina swallowed hard. “And…sis? I just want you to know—”
Harper let out a half snarl, half growl. “If you tell me you love me and try to give me a deathbed speech right now, I swear to God I will kick your ass. You are not going to die. We won’t let you.”
She had been about to give her sister a deathbed speech and tell her how much she loved her. She’d even had a message for Haven planned. But as usual, Harper had sucked all the emotion out of the moment. So, instead of her planned heartfelt speech, she said, “I was just going to tell you that I’m having sex with Quinn, so I’m going to need you to change your policy about employees dating coworkers and family of coworkers.”
There was a stifled sound on the other end of the line that sounded suspiciously like Riddick trying to choke back a laugh. But after a moment or two of loaded silence from her sister, Harper said, “Tell you what. If whatever he’s doing right now manages to keep you safe tonight, I’ll let you bang Quinn on my conference room table in the middle of the workday. Deal?”
“Deal.”
***
Quinn grabbed the unconscious vampire by the hair and dragged him into the janitor’s closet to pile with the others he’d taken down, keeping one hand pressed against his side to stanch the blood flow.
He’d been out of the field for too long. When he’d been with Sentry, he would’ve been able to take down seven vampires without even really trying. Now he was gasping for air like a landed trout and he’d been grazed when one of the lucky fuckers managed to squeeze off a shot before he broke their necks.
He took a certain grim satisfaction from knowing that it’d take young vampires like those weeks to fully recover from broken n
ecks.
At least the hallway between Marina and the ballroom—and the stairwell—was now clear. Best he could tell, there were at least four gunmen—gun vampires?—in the ballroom. He’d taken out four in the hall and three in the stairwell.
Sadly, the rest of the place wouldn’t be as easy to clear. But there were at least 40 vampires roaming outside the hotel, guarding the perimeter, and he couldn’t be sure because he’d only gotten a quick glimpse, but there seemed to be at least ten on the roof.
Whoever these fuckers were, they certainly hadn’t half-assed their assault on the hotel. All event security had been killed, and from what he could gather, the event employees and guests were being held as hostages until the gunmen got what they wanted. Whatever the hell that was.
Quinn supposed he should just be thankful the hotel wasn’t booked solid and that the rooms had been reserved for out-of-towners attending the gala. It was going to be hard enough to get the hostages out safely without having to worry about clearing each hotel room.
He had to get back to Marina. When he’d left her in the bathroom, he’d assumed—stupidly, it would seem—that they were dealing with humans. After all, what kind of self-respecting vampires carried guns? Vampires didn’t need weapons. Vampires were weapons, for God’s sake. If he’d known the gunmen were vampires, he never would have left her.
There was no way this fiasco wasn’t related to Marina’s attack last week. These arseholes were here for Marina and he’d left her alone.
Quinn shoved his guilt down into a deep dark hole. His fear and guilt wouldn’t do anything to help her. He wouldn’t be of any use to her if he didn’t focus.
He took a moment to mull over his options. He could arm himself. It wasn’t like the vampires with the broken necks would need their guns anytime soon. But even if he managed to sneak into the ballroom, he doubted he’d be able to take out the four vampires there without putting any of the hostages in danger. Stray bullets had a way of ending up where you least wanted them. It was why he usually never touched guns. He generally didn’t need them.
He peeked around the corner. One vampire guard outside the main ballroom door. Dead human security guards all over the hall.
Jesus. What a mess.
Quinn jerked back when the ballroom door was kicked open and three—no, four—vampires, all wearing camo, looking like they’d just stepped out of Guns and Ammo magazine, marched out, dragging some hapless hostage with them. The poor sod was crying and begging for his life.
The unmistakable sound of flesh smacking flesh told Quinn the sod had just taken a punch.
“Shut up!” one of the vampires hissed. “You show me where she went, and you’ll live.”
“T-There,” the man whimpered. “She went to the bathroom right before you got here.”
Goddamn it! The weeping sod was Dex, and he’d just given up Marina’s hiding spot.
That stupid fucker better hope these vampires killed him. Because if they didn’t, Quinn was going to make him wish they had.
His every instinct told him to rush the bastards. But if he ended up shot—which, odds were that he would indeed end up shot—there wouldn’t be anyone to watch out for Marina until her sister or the cops got there.
And if they’d gone to all this trouble, brought in all these vampires and all these guns and took hostages, logic told him they weren’t here to kill Marina. They needed her for something. All he had to do was keep her alive long enough for help to arrive.
At least that’s what logic was telling him. His heart, on the other hand, was telling him to rip these fuckers limb from limb for daring to think they could even touch her.
But as it was, all he could do was watch as they knocked down the bathroom door and grabbed Marina, then forced her and Dex back toward the ballroom.
He felt a pang in his chest when he glanced around the corner and saw her being herded into the ballroom. Her back was straight, her head high. Her face showed absolutely no emotion, and if he didn’t know her, he’d think she was right as rain. But Quinn did know her. And she was scared. The fear was right there in those fathomless eyes of hers.
Just do as they say, love. Stay safe. I’m coming for you.
Digging the phone he’d pilfered from one of the fallen vampires out of his pocket, he banged out a quick text.
Time to call in the cavalry.
Chapter Eighteen
Marina fought to keep her expression neutral as she was marched into the ballroom behind a sniveling, wailing Dex. She’d love nothing more than to nut-punch the bastard for ratting her out, but frankly, he wasn’t worth the effort. Or the risk of getting shot in the process.
The goons brought her to an armed vampire seemingly doing his best impression of GI Joe, who had the audacity to smile at her.
“Ms. Petrocelli, I presume?” he asked, a touch of the South accenting his words.
She frowned at him. He was average-looking. About 20—or at least he had been before he was turned—with close-cropped black hair, a dark olive complexion, and eyes the color of the thick sludge that Quinn called coffee. Psycho killers who attacked charity galas should look like psycho killers, not like Zac Efron’s kid brother, for God’s sake.
“You might as well call me Marina,” she told him. “No sense in formality since you’ve gone to all the trouble to hold me at gunpoint and all.”
He chuckled. “I’m Davis. Nice to meet you.” He gave an exaggerated bow. “Feisty seems to run in your family, Marina. Your little niece gave my boys six shades of hell when they tried to grab her.”
Marina knew it would be wise to keep her mouth shut. But her temper was outweighing her wisdom at this point. “Anyone who manhandles a child deserves to get a good taste of his own balls.”
Another chuckle. “You’re probably right,” he conceded. “It certainly wasn’t my finest moment as a leader. But we needed to get your sister’s attention and thought the kid would be the easiest target, since you managed to slip through our fingers and your sister is pretty much always surrounded by half-feral dhampyres.” He shrugged. “We were wrong. Turns out you were our best bet after all.”
Now it was all starting to make sense. They were using her as bait to get to Harper. She narrowed her eyes on him. “I’m not going to let you hurt my sister.”
She wanted to smack the smirk right off his smug face. “I don’t want to hurt her. I need her to do me—well, my employer, really—a little favor.”
“What employer? What favor?”
His smirk flatlined a bit in irritation, but his voice was calm and steady as he answered, “Normally I’d tell you it’s none of your business, but I like you, Marina.”
“Imagine how flattered I am,” she murmured.
He went on without acknowledging her sarcasm, “See, my employer is a very important man who paid me a lot of money and all he’s asking for in return is the release of one Midvale prisoner.”
Marina bit back the stream of cuss words that threatened to spill from her lips. The dumb bastards had gone to all this trouble and what they were asking for wasn’t even in Harper’s control. “If you want someone released from the vampire prison, you need to talk to the Vampire Council,” she said with exaggerated patience. “My sister has nothing to do with that kind of decision.”
“The council will never let this particular prisoner go without some…persuasion. And Harper’s best friend is the council’s enforcer, who is married to the head of the council. I’d say she has some influence with them. I’m betting my life—the lives of everyone in this room, actually—on Harper being able to convince the council to do me this one little favor.”
While Marina processed that information, he pressed a phone into her hand. “Call her,” he ordered.
Marina straightened her spine and put every ounce of fuck you she had into her voice as she said, “No.”
He aimed his gun at her. “Don’t make me hurt you, Marina. A gut shot won’t kill you. Not for a long, painful while, anyway.”
“Go to hell.”
He cocked his head to one side, his gaze never leaving hers, and snapped his fingers. At that silent command, one of the other vampires snagged a woman by the hair and forced her to her knees at Marina’s feet.
It was Gladys.
Son of a bitch! One look down into Gladys’s tear-filled eyes and the gun at the back of her head and Marina knew she had no choice. Davis had effectively called her bluff.
“Fine,” she said through gritted teeth. “I’ll call her. But when she gets here? Just remember that calling her in was your idea. I guarantee you’ll regret it.”
***
“Is the roof clear?”
“It is now,” Quinn answered Harper, holding the phone in one hand while keeping pressure on his wounded side with the other.
Clearing it hadn’t been easy, either. There had been ten vampires guarding the roof, and the way they’d been spread out forced him to take them down one vamp at a time, as quietly as possible. When he had them whittled down to one and didn’t have to be quiet anymore, he’d shot the bastard in the knee, just out of spite.
“Good,” Harper said. “Backup will be landing shortly.”
Landing? What the…
And before he could ask any more questions, Harper disconnected the call and a helicopter appeared out of nowhere, landing damn near silently on the other side of the roof.
Quinn had to blink a few times to make sure he was seeing clearly, because if he wasn’t hallucinating, this was no ordinary helicopter. This was a Sikorsky UH-60 Black Hawk, heavily modified for stealth operations, nearly invisible to radar.
He was still trying to make sure he was really seeing what he thought he was seeing when people—his backup, he presumed—started piling out of the helo like it was a clown car.
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