by Amie Gibbons
“Ariana Finn,” I said. “Didn’t Len tell you that?”
He frowned.
Fear spiked my blood and my stomach lurched.
It’s okay, the guys have my back.
Though, they were outside and would have to fight past a beefy guy who was probably a vamp to get in and save me.
Uh-oh.
“Are you a singer, Ariana?” he asked, forehead creasing.
“Yessss.”
My head ached from the inside out, like someone was pushin’ too much inside my brain and it was trying to expand outta my ears.
I rubbed my temples. “What’s going on?”
His eyes flashed and his frown deepened.
That’s not a good look to get from a vamp holding you in a back room. I smiled. Apparently he wasn’t getting whatever he wanted here.
He stared me in the eyes again and my breathing picked up.
With that same confused look, he grabbed my right wrist.
Flash.
I marched through the forest.
It was cold and my feet were starting to tingle even through the boots. The eyes (my eyes?) swept the sun tickled forest until I saw the boar.
My heart thundered and my vision sharpened. My arms pulled back a giant bow and let go, straight and silent, getting the animal between his eyes before he knew I was there.
I loaded him onto my sled with the rabbits, and started trekking home.
It was my first big kill. My father’s spirit would be proud. My sisters would have food. I was no longer just the son of a dead carpenter.
I was a hunter.
I gasped, heart pounding.
I’d never had a vision where I saw through their eyes.
I couldn’t breathe!
My brain sweated inside my skull, threatenin’ to boil right over. I could still smell the boar’s blood, practically taste its meat in my mouth.
I knew his oldest sister was named Helen; she took over the household when his mom and dad died and was a highly skilled seamstress and cook. She would make a stew with the rabbits and he’d sell the boar at market.
“What are you?” Quil asked, resting a cool hand on my forehead. “You’re burning up.”
He took a deep whiff and cupped my cheek with his other hand.
We stared at each other for nearly a minute, him breathing me in, and me cooling down.
Finally he asked again, “What are you?”
Have you ever had one of those moments where you ask yourself just a split-second later, “Why in the blazes did I do that?”
I opened my mouth, perfectly ready to lie and say I had an infection, when instead I said, “I’m a psychic.”
He drew air through his teeth in some strange parody of a hiss. “You know what we are?”
I nodded.
“Why are you here?” he asked.
“I’m trying to find out who killed Jo,” I said.
Why am I answering him!
I took a deep breath. What was it Grant always said? The best lies are mostly truth.
“I’m a fr... was a friend of hers. I figured out she worked here and I was hopin’ to get in and... I don’t know... look around. Find out what killed her.”
“You mean a vampire?” he asked.
I gulped and nodded. “I saw her body. She had two holes in her neck.”
He blinked quickly.
“You didn’t know that?” I asked.
“Two holes in the neck?” he said.
I nodded again.
“What did you see when I touched you?” he asked.
Change of subject. Interesting.
“I saw you hunting,” I said. “You took down this huge boar and you were really proud of yourself.”
His eyes met mine again. “That explains it.”
“Explains what?”
“Why I can’t hypnotize you.”
“Hypnotize?” I asked. “You guys can actually do that?”
He didn’t answer.
“Hello! You’re a vamp; unless that whole thing about your hearing being fantastic is a myth, you can hear me. Don’t ignore me.”
Okay, hollerin’ at something that’s about twice as strong as the average human is stupid.
He sneered and before I could blink, he was leanin’ in front of me, face inches away.
My heart skyrocketed, hitting the moon, actually, it probably made it to Mars and planted potatoes.
“You would do well to mind your manners, little one.”
“I will if you will.”
Yes, I’m that stupid.
But he actually smiled. It was cold and made his eyes sparkle like snow.
His lips parted and slender fangs slid out, framing his two front teeth like pillars.
I gasped, breathin’ so fast I’d need a paper bag if this kept up. His eyes looked almost red for a moment as he stared me down.
Then the color and the fangs were gone and I wasn’t sure if I’d imagined them or not.
“Fair enough.” He was across the room in a flash, reclining against the wall like he’d been there an hour. “I’m investigating her death as well.”
I didn’t say anything.
“You’re not surprised?” he asked.
My eyes danced and his face turned cloudy. He was behind me in two seconds and I jumped in my seat.
How did they move that fast!
“I could make you tell me,” he whispered in my ear, ticklin’ the small hairs with his breath.
He took a deliberate sniff again. I tried to stand, but he put a hand on my shoulder soon as I twitched.
Where were the guys?
His cold fingers twiddled my ear and I froze solid as he took out the earbud and hung it in front of my face.
“Now tell me,” he said, “where does a college girl get something like this?”
I gulped.
“I don’t like being lied to, Ariana.”
He closed his fist over the small electronic right in front of my face and it snapped, crackled, and finally popped.
“The back rooms are protected from bugs, but I hope that made my point.”
So maybe the block made it fuzz out in the hall too and that’s why Grant didn’t say anything when the vamp took me back here?
He dropped the broken bug to the floor and walked around, sittin’ in front of me again.
“The point being, we don’t like spies in our midst.” His voice was still so quiet.
Oh yeah, I got the point.
I wasn’t leavin’ this room alive.
Chapter five
“You’re going to tell me who you really are and pray to God your answer makes me happy.”
I didn’t have time to wonder about the strangeness of the vampire sayin’ pray to God.
“My name really is Ariana. I’m an FBI special agent. We’re part of a semi-secret unit called the Special Division Force. We investigate the supernatural.”
I honestly didn’t know what I was supposed to say. I mean, when you’re undercover you don’t just spill your guts the second someone has you in a back room and is threatenin’ to kill you.
At least the undercover agents who know what they’re doing don’t.
Quil looked at me a moment.
Then burst out laughing.
“I actually believe you,” he finally said.
“So why are you laughin’?”
Did that mean he was gonna let me go or eat me?
I couldn’t even try to stop him since he was so fast, and my gun wouldn’t do much good.
“The audacity of the human race,” he said. “This is not your world. I will let you go on your solemn oath to leave this to those of us who know what we’re doing.”
“That’s not my call.”
Oh stupid, stupid, stupid!
His green-blue eyes found mine again. “Oh?”
“I’m not the boss, in fact, I’m the probie. The most junior agent on the team. What to investigate or not isn’t my call. And I can already tell yo
u my boss won’t back off, and the others were listenin’ in, and will be in here any second since the bug’s cut off. It’s the same with you, Quil, you were ord...”
I froze.
Oops.
“How did you know that?” he asked, eyes fixed on mine. “And how did you know my name?”
“I had a vision. Len was on the phone with you and he said your name, and you said the queen ordered you to investigate.”
Uh-oh. Wrong answer.
His eyes went stone cold and his nostrils flared.
Then his expression went thoughtful.
It wasn’t much better than the pissed look.
“Ah.” He grabbed my arm and pulled me up. “Come along.”
“Ow! Where are we going?”
I dug my heels in, slidin’ and stumblin’ across the carpet.
He looked at me like no one had ever asked him such a question as he opened the office door. “I keep forgetting how brazen humans are getting.”
“What, normally you just snap your fingers and they say, ‘Yes master?’”
“Actually, yes.” He made a face. “Well, normally when I need something, I hypnotize to get it and they say yes. I don’t make them say master. Honestly, I respect humans. The leaps you’ve made in the last century have been very impressive. But I really do need you to be the human who jumps and says yes, because I need your help with something.”
“I’m not one of those.”
Unless it’s Grant snapping the fingers.
“Apparently.” Quil pulled me out the door and I had to go with him. If I hadn’t, he would’ve just gone with the arm.
And I’m kinda attached to it.
“You want to investigate? Then investigate you shall.”
He yanked me down the hall to the door in the very back and opened it, revealing a staircase down. Really far down.
“My team will come,” I said, pullin’ against his grip for God knows what reason. Not like I could make him let go.
I just prayed the necklace was working now that we were out of the blocked area.
Unless this area was blocked too.
He looked like he wanted to say, “Let them,” but bit his tongue.
No, literally. He bit down, muttered something that most certainly wasn’t English under his breath, and sighed.
“You will call them and tell them you’re being borrowed, and if they want you to live, they will wait patiently for your return and agree to drop this case and any others pertaining to vampire affairs. At least for a little while.”
“What’s with you!” I said as he fished a cell out of his pocket. “Another girl was murdered last night, and she had some connection to you guys. Y’all said so yourselves. Someone wants to send a message, and they’re not killin’ vamps, they’re killin’ humans. This is our jurisdiction.”
His grip tightened.
My breath burned its way down my lungs and I swayed, vision darkening.
What the quack?
Flash.
She was the most gorgeous creature I’d ever seen. Long hair as black as ebony, and tinted skin. Her eyes were slanted like the people in the stories of Marco Polo.
Her name was Jade and she was a vampire. She lay on top of my naked body, bare as well save for her open robe, and bit into my neck.
It was barely a prick before pleasure swamped me. It wasn’t merely pleasure of the flesh. It sang in my blood. I rose under her, letting her suckle me like a newborn babe as I rubbed against her stomach.
I was near fainting when she pulled me up so she was sitting in my lap and pressed my mouth to her bare chest, just above the breast. She pulled a tiny, delicate blade out of some secret fold in her robe and sliced above her heart.
I sucked and it was magic, pure and delicious moonlight. She leaned into me and, using my pathetic human teeth, I bit into her around the wound, sucking harder, the arousal rising higher. I knew I would come soon, even as blood flowed out of me.
I lunged out of the vision, goin’ straight for Quil like a fat guy after a hotdog.
My teeth grazed his shirt and he pushed me back. I stumbled into the wall and put my hand on it to stay upright.
He leaned against the door, growlin’.
Blood thrummed through my body and I wanted to pull him back into the secret room with the sturdy lock.
I’d never felt such a ravenous need to jump someone I barely met.
“Don’t,” he growled, “do that again.”
“I didn’t want to,” I said, some spicy smell I was pretty sure was him swampin’ me with each gasp. “Stay outta my head.”
He glared. “What did you see?”
“You getting bit.”
“Why did you try to bite me?”
The words took a moment to register and I didn’t answer. That was two visions in maybe ten minutes, both where I was him.
My eyes felt like they were sweatin’ and my face burned.
I turned and ran.
Quil didn’t stop me.
I hit the back room and slammed on the boot brakes.
Grant and Jet held guns on the vamp bouncer and Dan was on the phone; dollars to donuts, he was callin’ for backup.
“Oh thank God,” Grant said, relief obvious even as he kept his gun on the bouncer.
My libido plummeted, and crash landed straight into guilt lake.
The guys were trying to save me while I was playin’ with the vamp in the hallway.
Oh God, the hallway!
My hand flew to the camera necklace.
What were the odds they were too busy trying to save me to see our little moment in the hall?
“You’re her people?” Quil appeared next to me and I jumped, dodging to the side.
“Who the hell are you?” Grant turned his gun on Quil.
“Guys?” I said. “Can you, um…”
“No,” Grant said, staring Quil down.
The pressure skyrocketed, threatenin’ to pop the room like a hot air balloon.
Two alpha males sharing air space! Mayday! Mayday!
“Fellas,” Len said.
I jumped again. Where the blazes did he come from?
“Quil, if they could help?”
Len was asking something more than that.
The guys kept their guns trained and something told me the vamps could still take us all out before anyone could get a shot off.
“We should talk,” Quil finally said. “We won’t attack you, and you will get to hold onto the mistaken belief that you could actually shoot us before we could snap your necks… or that you shooting us would do any harm.”
So that would be a no on the bullet thing.
Good to know… ish.
Grant lowered his weapon. “Talk.”
Quil looked at the Hell’s Angel bouncer. “Back to your post, John.”
“Yes, sir.” He closed the door and sat next to it again.
“Why don’t we go chat in my office?” Len said, walkin’ down the hall.
Quil followed him, and Jet and Dan looked at Grant.
Turning their backs on us. Was there any better way to say they thought we weren’t a threat?
Grant nodded and the guys followed down the hall, Dan still on the phone, muttering, like that’d keep the vamps from hearing.
Grant jerked his chin at me and I went, him close behind.
“Maybe we should take them into the club,” Quil said when we hit Len’s office.
Him and Len locked eyes, little jerks and half syllables passing as an argument.
“Fine,” Len said.
Quil turned to us. “If the others see us cooperating with you, they will be more likely to cooperate with you as well. If your science can help us see things we would normally miss, I think it would be worth having a few humans knowing some things about us.”
“How do we know you won’t kill us once we’re surrounded by your friends?” Jet asked.
“Because I could kill all of you now, without you being surrounded by o
ur friends.”
“He has a point, sir,” I said. “They move really fast. I mean, not Flash fast, but could definitely-”
“Please shut up!” Dan said, making me freeze.
What the quack was that?
“Watch it,” Quil and Grant said as one.
I grinned.
Grant and Quil looked back at each other.
“I’m trusting you here,” Grant said, tuckin’ his gun away.
“And I’m trusting you,” Quil said.
“Bridges, prop the door open and stay at it.”
“Watch your backs. Got it, sir,” Dan said.
Quil opened the door, spilling sound over us, and gestured gracefully towards the door. “Ladies first.”
I looked around. “Huh, I just realized I’m the only girl here.”
“Ryder, focus,” Grant said.
“Right.”
We marched into the club and more than a few eyes checked out the guys.
What made me think this didn’t happen… like ever?
We walked around the club against the walls and Len took the lead, takin’ the rope off a booth in the back with a reserved sign on it.
I turned and every pair of eyes I could see were on us.
I grinned at the closest pair.
The tension in the air coulda been scooped out with a spoon and served with hot fudge and a maraschino cherry.
I did the only thing I could think of, jumped back on stage and picked up the mike again.
Like it was planned, the overhead music died off.
“I’m sorry my break ran over, everyone.” I smiled so big a bird could’ve flow in. “Let’s get this place goin’ again.”
Len waved and yelled, “Yeah, get the party started. Y’all are acting dead.”
That got a few chuckles. Quil nodded at the crowd and that seemed to clinch it. They went back to their conversations, but the dancin’ was gone.
I’d have to fix that.
The guys piled into the booth.
Damn, wish I could hear the conversation.
My second set was over after about half an hour.
I hopped off the stage and headed for the booth.
My phone buzzed with a text.
It was from Grant. “Office. We’ll meet you there.”
Huh, so we were still tryin’ to hold up my cover?
I rushed back and was the first one there. I grabbed my purse from Len’s desk and pulled out my water bottle.
The door opened and I turned mid-swig.
