by Anna Lowe
“Such a pity,” Igor tsked, fingering Karen’s hair. “But I’m sure your sister will be happy to earn back what she owes me in a different way.”
Karen yanked out of his grip and snarled. “Over my dead body.”
Igor gave her an icy smile. “That would be the hard way, my dear. But that, too, can be arranged.”
The vampires behind him licked their lips.
Karen just smirked. “Think you boys can drink pure dragon blood? All that mercury in my veins…” She let the words hang in the air like a threat. “I doubt it.”
Trey glanced at Kaya. Hadn’t she said Karen was a half sister who couldn’t fly? Which meant Karen was only half dragon and probably didn’t have the high mercury content that protected purebred dragons from vampires.
Karen stood proud and unwavering, playing the world’s most dangerous bluff with a perfect poker face. Trey wondered how she’d ever lost whatever bets she’d made to get into trouble in the first place.
The corner of Igor’s eye twitched as he struggled to keep his cool. Clearly, Karen hadn’t been as cooperative a captive as he had imagined. More like the Ransom of Red Chief-type — the little boy who drove his captors so crazy, they ended up paying his family to take him back.
“The most noble of vampires can drink dragon blood.” Igor leaned in menacingly. “And it can be distilled. Remember, my dear: the easy way, and the hard way…”
“I’ll show you the hard way,” Karen muttered, clenching a fist.
Trey stepped forward before she swung it. “Forget it.”
Igor laughed. Just laughed. “And what exactly do you have to bargain with?”
He stopped just short of shaking a clenched fist in the vampire’s face. Crap, what did he have?
“The car. You can have the car.”
“Granddad’s car?” Karen squeaked. “No way.”
Kaya shook her head in a vehement No, and Trey stared at the two of them.
Igor let out another annoying tut-tut sound. “I have all the cars I need.”
Kaya cast a wild glance around the room, desperate for some bargaining chip. Trey socked Roric with a beseeching look. Surely, the old wolf…
Roric snorted and motioned his guards forward. Clear my hall of this rabble, he might have commanded, if Igor hadn’t spoken first.
“Of course, there might be one thing…” Cool, appraising eyes traced every inch of Trey’s bulk.
He felt the cold hand of death creep up and down his spine as he wondered what Igor had in mind.
“Two of my scouts reported spotting a new candidate for the pits,” Igor murmured. “I wonder if that could be you.”
Kaya froze at his side. “No. No way.”
Trey tilted his head at the vampire. The pits?
“No!” Kaya grabbed his arm. “Not the pits.”
She looked so long, so deep into his eyes, he nearly obeyed the unspoken command. Don’t do it. Don’t risk it.
Igor coughed in a not-too-subtle hint, and Trey dragged his eyes away from Kaya to her sister. Somehow, he had to get the two of them free. He could fight as well as any wolf. Better, even. And since he didn’t have any better ideas…
“Don’t,” Karen warned.
But what else could he do?
“I fight,” Trey proposed, turning to the vampire. “I win. We go free. All three of us.”
Igor’s eyes were a dull, flickering red that hurt to look at. Trey hung on, though, straining every muscle to do so. He could stare this ass down. He could fight and win.
He had to.
Igor’s pale lips parted in a mockery of a smile. “Agreed.” He said it so quickly, Trey wondered what he’d just gotten himself into.
“And the car,” Kaya shot out. “We get the car, too.”
Trey blinked at her. She sure had a thing for that Jag.
And a thing for him, apparently, because the squeeze she gave his hand a moment later came with a husky whisper. “I owe you, my wolf.”
His heart soared a little like Kaya had, that night off the balcony. That crazy night that started this whole wild day. A day he wouldn’t go back and change any part of if it meant losing her.
He swallowed the lump in his throat and told himself to concentrate. Fight first. Mate later.
Mate, his wolf hummed. My mate.
For the first time, his human side didn’t bother protesting. Just hummed right along. Mate. My mate. It had a certain ring to it, now that he’d had time to get used to the idea.
Igor snapped his fingers at one of his men, who pulled out a phone. “Rearrange tonight’s schedule.” He turned to Trey with a grin. “Come along, then, no time to waste.”
One of the vampires grabbed Karen, who elbowed him in the ribs but gave in when a second vampire clamped a hand over the back of her neck. She threw up her hands. “All right, already…”
Roric chuckled. “Funny how I just happen to have some cash on hand for a bet.” He thumbed through the wad of cash he’d pulled from the canvas bag. “Who’s fighting tonight?”
“Kyrill,” the second vampire said.
Roric whistled. “Sure money.”
Kaya gaped at him with wild eyes. Sure money for whom?
Trey shook off the sinking feeling in his gut. Everything was coming together in perfect symmetry, but it was a fucked-up kind of symmetry. The cash he’d won that had brought him together with Kaya was the same cash now being bet against his life. Make that all three of their lives, because Kaya’s and Karen’s fortunes were riding on his shoulders, too.
Was fate screwing with his head today or what?
Chapter Twelve
Kaya half stepped, half stumbled out of the vampires’ chrome and leather SUV. A neon light flashed in her eyes, setting every alarm in her dragon clanging. She’d never been so tempted to shake out her wings and fly the hell home.
Scarlet Palace, the casino sign announced.
“Home sweet home,” one of the vampires murmured.
Kaya held her chin high, and that bolstered her a bit. God, she wished she had Trey at her side, but he’d been thrown into another vehicle and taken a different route. Seeing him go…
Seeing him go was like waving good-bye to home, family, and every fond memory, all at the same time. Maybe wolves weren’t all that crazy to believe in mates, after all.
She forced herself to take a deep breath. She had to keep her cool and figure out what she could do to get Trey out of this mess.
“Get moving.” The vampire shoved her forward.
She took a last gulp of fresh desert air like a prisoner sentenced to life and stumbled through the double glass doors.
Jazz music hit her ears, and the scent of fresh greenbacks and cognac invaded her nose. Her eyes hurt from all the flashing lights, hysterically begging for attention.
“Like Christmas on steroids,” Karen muttered. “Can you believe I survived here for a week?”
“I can’t believe you got into this mess in the first place,” Kaya shot back. She loved her sister, but damn, this time, she’d really bitten off more than she could chew.
“I’ll explain later,” Karen whispered in a strangely determined voice that made Kaya look twice. What was there to explain?
Igor waved a pair of bouncers aside, led the way to a bank of VIP elevators, and tilted his head toward the open doors. “Ladies.”
“Blood-sucking vampires,” Karen muttered, digging in her heels.
Kaya dragged her sister in. “Do you have to provoke them?” she hissed while Igor barked orders outside the door.
Karen wiggled free. “Show these assholes an inch, they’ll take a yard.”
Kaya was thinking more along the lines of They’ll take a few gallons of your blood, but she kept her lips sealed.
Igor strode in with two of his henchmen, one of whom slotted a key into an unmarked space on the control panel below all the other buttons. The elevator started its descent.
Kaya counted fifteen floors, judging by the periodic rum
ble outside the doors as they dropped and dropped and dropped. Fifteen floors below street level?
The doors pinged, and Karen sighed, “Welcome to the lowest circle of hell.”
Kaya stepped forward and immediately ground to a halt at the sound of a cheering crowd coming from down a dark hallway. Haltingly, she followed Karen and the vampire to an usher’s station, high above an open arena. A rabid crowd of several thousand pointed at the circle of sand where two figures crouched. At first, she thought it was a boxing ring. Then she realized it was a gladiator’s pit, delineated by a stone wall topped with faux-Roman statues of gods and emperors.
“Jesus. Are we in Vegas or ancient Rome?” Kaya wondered out loud.
“The basic principles of entertainment haven’t changed in two thousand years,” Igor commented with a bored wave of the hand. His breath tickled Kaya’s ear, and she scurried forward. He’d been crowding her ever since they’d left the Westend wolf den. His eyes traced the long line of her legs, studied the rise and fall of her chest. The vampire might not be able to suck her mercury-rich dragon blood, but there were other ways he could hurt her.
Christ, they had to find a way out of this mess, and soon.
A commentator’s voice blared through speakers, but she didn’t catch a word.
“The Annihilator is on.” One eager spectator read to another from a printed program as Kaya brushed past.
The crowd broke the name into syllables and cheered in a bone-chilling cry for blood.
“Right this way, ladies.” Igor pointed to a red carpet that led to a sectioned-off booth, open to the crowd yet set apart.
“I’ll lady him right in the balls, first chance I get,” Karen muttered under her breath.
Karen, the tomboy. Karen, the wisecracker. Karen, who was likely to get them all killed.
“Stop that,” Kaya hissed.
Igor motioned them into the plush seats beside his. Each was big enough to lose herself in on a lazy weekday night with a bowl of popcorn, a good movie, and a good man.
Like Trey. A vision of being snuggled up with him on a quiet Wednesday night set off little sparks until Karen popped her bubblegum and dragged Kaya back to grim reality. No snuggling. No peace. No Trey.
She perched on the very edge of her seat and studied the scene. Damn it, where was he?
The popcorn gobbled by greedy spectators was about as far as the similarity to her fantasy went. There was no peace in this hellhole, just a greedy thirst for blood, pulsing under the surface of the wild scene.
“Ice cream! Beer! Lemonade!” a broad-shouldered salesgirl called, hefting giant beer glasses and flashing her cleavage, Oktoberfest-style.
“Place your bets! Get ’em in now, ladies and gents, get ’em in now!” a thin man in a pinstriped suit cackled, smoothing back a lock of his slicked-back hair. Kaya sniffed and found a clear hint of something canine in his scent.
Another wolf? She looked at her sister.
“Hyena,” Karen answered without a second glance. “They handle all the bets. The bears do security…”
Kaya looked up at the burly men guarding each aisle, clad in orange safety vests. Yeah, they were bear shifters, all right. One of them hustled an overeager woman back to her seat, while another bared his teeth at a man trying to sneak down toward a ringside seat.
“But how…” Kaya started.
Karen nodded upward, past the stage lights. “The witches cast just enough magick over the pits to make sure the human part of the audience only sees what they want them to see — either humans or animals, but nothing in between.”
Kaya squinted past the glare of lights to a glass booth high in the eaves of the arena, where she spotted three old women with blue-tinted hair. Witches, for sure. One filed and buffed her nails. Another leafed through the pages of People magazine. The third yawned and briefly put aside her knitting to peer over the crowd.
“Watch,” Karen said.
The witch sat straighter, and Kaya followed her gaze to a section of the crowd thick with humans. There was one elk shifter among them, apparently a little too caught up in watching the fight to remember to hide his animal side. His antlers were starting to show, and a woman in the row above his — a human in a sequined top — opened her mouth to scream. The witch fluttered her fingers in a quiet spell, and a moment later, the human shook her head, dismissing the crazy vision, and turned her attention back to the action in the ring.
The witch gave a satisfied nod and went back to knitting.
“See what I mean?” Karen said.
Meanwhile, in the fight pit, two figures closed in on each other: a lion and a grizzly, growling up a storm.
“Here, pussy, pussy,” the bear goaded his foe. Kaya heard the words coded into his roar.
The crowd cheered and Karen bent close to her ear. “The humans only see the animal side of the fighting shifters. They’re supposed to stay in one form or another, but they sometimes slip.”
The lion snarled. “Son of a bi—” he started with words and ended in a roar.
No one blinked an eye, and a glance up at the witches in the control booth showed one winking at another.
“I thought animal fights were illegal,” Kaya said.
Karen just rolled her eyes. “This is the side of Vegas the law doesn’t touch. Anything goes.”
That, Kaya had to agree with. The last few days in Vegas had proven that again and again.
“What other spells can the witches cast?” she asked.
Karen pooh-poohed the notion aside. “Not much, believe me. Third-rate witches.”
Igor leaned in to agree. “Good witches are so hard to find.”
“My heart bleeds for you,” Karen shot back.
He grinned. “That, too, can be arranged.”
Kaya elbowed her sister in the ribs and pulled her away. Far away.
A mighty roar cut off whatever smart-aleck response Karen had ready, and the crowd jumped to its feet. Kaya, too, in spite of herself, watching the lion and grizzly fly at each other in a blur of fur and fangs.
The grizzly howled in pain as the lion scraped four parallel lines into his back and jumped clear.
“God, do they fight to the death?”
“Nah,” Karen replied all too casually. “Not in this round.”
Kaya dug her fingers into the seam of her seat cushion. Jesus. What round was Trey in?
She looked away as the lion closed in on the staggering grizzly.
The crowd cheered. The grizzly moaned. The lion screamed in triumph. Kaya figured death would be swift, but a shrill whistle blew and a gang of handlers moved in to separate the fighters. Part of the crowd jeered while the rest clapped and consulted their programs.
“Who’s next?” A woman in a sparkly dress asked the bald man at her side.
Kaya’s heart thumped, but as much as she strained her ears, she couldn’t catch the response.
A pair of heavy wooden doors banged open on one side of the arena, and a team of animal handlers hustled the lion out as the crowd booed, wanting more action. Another crew tended to the injured grizzly, and as they trundled him out, she caught sight of a dozen grim faces peering out from the catacombs. The next fighters, ready for their round?
“God, where do they get them all?”
Igor chuckled. “Some volunteer. Others…let’s just say, they are convinced.”
She pictured the two thugs slipping Trey a drugged drink, and her blood boiled. To think she’d rescued him from the pits only to have him end up there anyway. Voluntarily, to save her sister and herself.
God, the irony.
A spark escaped her lips, and she nearly jumped back in surprise. Igor had turned away, so she tried it again. Collecting all the threads of her anger on a single breath, she puffed.
A six-inch flame burst out of her mouth. One she barely smothered before Igor turned back, wrinkling his nose. “Is someone smoking in here?”
“Are you nuts?” Karen whispered, grabbing her elbow.
Kaya considered the possibility through the next three fights, right up to the point when the announcer called out, “Ladies and gentlemen, Scarlet Palace is proud to present the greatest fighter of them all.”
Eager faces peered into the arena as a spotlight darted from archway to archway, teasing them in a guessing game. Which gate might the next fighter emerge from?
“Undefeated in a hundred and thirty fights…”
Kaya stared. Undefeated in how many fights?
“Unintimidated, unbeaten, unassailable!”
The crowd hooted in glee.
“The one, the only…”
The whole place hushed for an instant, then went wild when the announcer finally boomed out the name. “Kyrill!”
Kaya watched as a bare-chested giant strode into the arena and raised his sword.
A sword? She stared at Karen. What the…?
Kyrill made a slow lap of the arena, acknowledging the crowd as they broke into a frenzy of foot-stomping cheers.
“Ky-rill! Ky-rill! Ky-rill!”
Even from twenty rows up, Kaya could feel the ground shake.
A time machine couldn’t have spit out a truer image of a mighty gladiator. Built like an ox and oiled like an oversize engine block, the man strode forward on thick-muscled legs. His face was hidden behind a steel mask, and a blue belt flashed at his waist. One hand gripped the pommel of his sword, while the other brandished a shield so thick, it could serve as a battering ram. With the ornate helmet rising on his head, he had to duck to clear the eight-foot doors of the arena.
“A gladiator?” she asked.
“The Thracian!” a spectator called, pointing to a page in the program that illustrated various gladiator types.
Women squealed; men murmured statistics, and an aging shifter sitting not too far from Kaya’s seat — a hedgehog shifter, judging by his stature and scent — shook his head. “I’d hate to be the poor slob who has to fight him tonight.”
Right on cue, the announcer started a second introduction. “And now, Scarlet Palace introduces Kyrill’s opponent.”
