by Trina M. Lee
Minutes before midnight, Kale swept through the front entry. With the grace and presence that five centuries had gifted him, he sauntered toward us. Dressed head to toe in black, complete with his trademark leather duster, he was painfully alluring. More than one human female sought his company as he made his way through the club.
I struggled not to choke on my whiskey when his sugary sweet energy reached me. “See, Jez. I told you he wouldn’t be late.”
Kale reached our booth and immediately slid onto my side, across from Jez. I pressed myself farther into the corner than was necessary, feeling awkward and nervous.
“Hello, ladies.” Kale’s gaze slid over me, lingering for just a moment before turning to Jez. No matter how many times I looked into his mismatched eyes, I was always enamored. The right one brown and the left a startling blue, heterochromia had endowed him with an eerily beautiful feature.
“You’re anxious tonight, Alexa.” Kale observed. “It’s enticing.”
Enticing was the last thing I wanted to be to a vampire whose control was precarious at best. “I just found out there’s a price on my head and my dead sister is actually alive.”
A frown creased Kale’s brow. “Seriously? That’s intense. Who would be stupid enough to think they can take you out?”
“Ahem,” Jez loudly cleared her throat, drawing our attention. “Can we play ‘Who wants to kill Lex’ later? This little shindig is supposed to be about me.”
Kale turned his attention to her, and I released the breath I’d been holding. They stared at one another, Jez with fire in her eyes. She was going to be stubborn about this.
“Jez,” Kale began, speaking loud enough to be heard over the music but keeping his tone gentle. “Thank you for agreeing to see me. I wanted to apologize to you, face to face. I have no excuses. I’m sorry. I wish I had never hurt you.”
There was a dramatic pause as Jez considered his apology. She tossed her curls and twirled the little umbrella in her drink, all the while staring him down with that haughty cat gaze. I struggled to keep from rolling my eyes, but it wouldn’t be Jez without a little drama.
“That’s the best you can do? You almost killed me, Kale. You know, like dead. I trusted you.” Leaning back in her seat, she dropped the umbrella and crossed her arms. “And, you should know I don’t trust very many people.”
Unaffected by her attitude, Kale nodded. “I know. I’m honored to have had your trust, and I fully understand that I’ve destroyed it. But, I am sorry. You know you mean a lot to me.”
“Prove it.”
I sat in amused silence, a half-empty glass in my hand. Poor Kale. She was really intent on putting him through the ringer.
In part, he was humoring her, giving her what she wanted so this whole thing would blow over. But, I knew Kale, and if he didn’t genuinely care about their friendship, he wouldn’t be here. Being the amazing guy that he was, he was willing to do anything it took.
“What do you want from me, Jez?” His expression was playful, but his manner was serious. “Want me to get on my knees and beg your forgiveness?”
A slow grin spread across her lips. “Knock it off, Kale.”
However, he was already standing up. I was shocked. “Jez. Isn’t that a little much? You’re not going to make him do that, are you?”
“No, that’s fine.” Kale rose and went to her side of the table. “If Jez wants me to beg, then begging she’ll get.”
“Hey now,” she protested with a giggle. “I did not ask you to beg. Don’t be ridiculous.”
He gestured for her to stand, and I cringed. I couldn’t believe he was doing this. Despite Jez’s protests, I could see the flash of pleasure in her eyes.
It was hard to sit there and bite my tongue when he knelt before her. He grabbed her hand, holding tight when she tried to pull away. A few people at the nearby tables turned to stare, but Kale paid them no attention.
“Jez St. Claire, you are the little sister I never had. You’re one of the only people on the planet I would do this for. You have no idea how filled with regret and guilt I am over what I did to you. I hate myself for hurting you. And, I am truly sorry.” With true repentance in his eyes, he gazed up at her.
The depths of Kale’s love for Jez captivated me. Not only was he willing to humiliate himself in public, he acted as if it were the least he deserved. I groaned inwardly, hating myself for swooning over this. I flashed back in my mind to a night of warm summer rain and Kale. It had been less than a month ago that we’d made love outside The Wicked Kiss, but it felt like forever.
Jez dragged out her response, staring at him until the tension hummed. After making him wait for what she felt was a reasonable amount of time, she nodded. “Thank you, Kale. I forgive you. If you ever try to kill me again, I’ll have your balls for breakfast.”
And just like that, Jez abolished the grudge she’d been holding for weeks. She pulled Kale to his feet for a hug, and the tension between them slipped away. He resumed his seat next to me, winking a puppy dog brown eye at me.
“I can’t believe you did that.” I laughed, shaking my head.
“Honestly, I expected her to really torture me, so it wasn’t too bad.” Kale shrugged it off as if he hadn’t just made himself her bitch.
“So, it’s been a while since the three of us did something. I mean really did something.” Jez leaped in like the last few minutes had never happened, let alone the last few weeks. It was mind-boggling. “We need to hang out. But, not in this place. It’s disgusting. We should go to a concert or a movie.”
I’d given up on figuring Jez out long ago. She was a firecracker alright. From being pissed at Kale to excitedly planning an outing, she was lively in a way that made her infectious. No wonder the vampires here were so drawn to her.
With my back to the corner of the booth, I nodded as necessary while she prattled on. There was a pleasant tingle in my limbs as the alcohol coursed through my bloodstream. My anxiety eased and I relaxed.
Kale was alluring at such close proximity. Just a year ago, he hadn’t set me off like this, but as my power had grown, so had my hunger for him. Some might say that the two weren’t related, that plain old, physical lust afflicted us, but I knew the source of my desire was something bigger.
“You know what we should really do?” Jez continued, pausing only to sip from her drink before going on again. “Road trip. Seriously. We have never done anything like that. Let’s go somewhere. Oh! Let’s go to Vegas! You have some ass to kick there, Lex. It would be a blast.”
“Vegas? Oh hell no.” I shook my head despite my mild intrigue. “I can’t begin to imagine the kind of trouble we’d find there.”
“Then let’s not imagine. Let’s go. Pick a date.”
Kale laughed and relaxed in the booth beside me. Just inches kept us from touching. “Knock yourselves out. Most road trips aren’t exactly vampire friendly.”
“They can be.” Jez shrugged off his protest. “We can hit hotels during the day. Really damn expensive ones. It would kick ass.”
What was she doing? Kale and I on a road trip together would be all kinds of bad news regardless of whether or not she was there too. Not to mention the fight with Arys that would ensue. I hadn’t considered leaving town at all recently, although a chance to get away didn’t sound like a totally bad idea.
Las Vegas had made me curious in recent months. Arys had ties to the city through his sire, Harley, the most powerful vampire in Sin City, or at least, he was.
“Besides,” the feisty leopard went on. “You guys need to spend more time away from this place. Both of you. It’s a menace to your mental health.”
“Can’t argue there.” I tossed back another mouthful of whiskey. A vacation from this place sounded like heaven.
Right on cue, the rear door separating the back rooms from the rest of the club opened, and Shaz strode through. My stomach plummeted in a nauseating free fall when she appeared at his side. They didn’t touch, yet there was an unspoken i
ntimacy between them. I was going to be sick.
I knew very little about her, the vampire Shaz had become acquainted with. She was a tall, leggy thing with long black hair. I got the sense that she wasn’t an old vampire but not brand-new either. I didn’t even know her name, but I hated her more than I’d ever hated anyone or anything. Even Raoul.
It wasn’t just her. It was everything she represented. This world…my world. And now, because of me, it was Shaz’s world, too. He’d promised me that he wasn’t sleeping with her, but that had been weeks ago. Things change, and I didn’t have the guts to ask.
Besides, a sexual element always tinged such encounters; the absence of intercourse didn’t mean it wasn’t sexual. Of course it was. My own personal proof of that sat beside me, a dark dream in leather. The carnal tension had been running high between Kale and I long before our night in the rain. It was only a matter of time until Shaz made all of my mistakes.
Worse than sexual tension was the chance of emotional entanglement. That was the fear that gripped me as I watched them from across the room. I held my glass in a white-knuckled grip, willing myself to react. I was frozen.
Feeling the weight of my stunned stare, Shaz met my gaze across the distance. We shared a moment of horror, and then he looked away. So, he hadn’t expected to see me. Should that make me feel better?
The chatter at my table fell quiet as my companions followed my gaze. I watched Shaz whisper something to the vampiress who immediately turned my way. He was trying to get away from her without making a scene. I could tell by the tension in his shoulders as he pulled away. She stopped him with a hand, ensuring I was watching before she slid a hand into his platinum hair and laid one hell of a kiss on him.
The glass in my hand shattered into several little shards. Whiskey splashed the table and covered my hand. Blood welled up from the cuts I’d sustained, but I barely noticed. I was already fighting my way out of the booth.
I snapped. Rather than throw Kale out of my way, I leaped across the table, hitting the floor at a run. Jez’s voice was quickly lost in the crowd as she called my name. The wolf inside me exploded in a territorial rage. I was suddenly all fangs and claws, ready to kill.
The crowd was thick, and I shoved people out of my way with more force than necessary. Both Shaz and the vampiress looked up at my sudden approach. Fear flickered in Shaz’s jade green eyes. He reached as if to stop me, but I threw him back with little more than a thought.
The power exploded inside me, overflowing to wash throughout the building. It was magnificent. The vampiress had no chance to brace against it. Using my bloody hand to guide the force surging through me, I drove her to her knees. I was lost in the hypnotic rush of life and death, as the vampire and werewolf power I possessed became one writhing, demanding entity.
I saw nothing but her. The rest of the club ceased to exist as I stared down into her frightened brown eyes. I wanted her to hurt. In response to that thought, she screamed. I envisioned her insides on fire, and her shrieks became deafening.
A wicked smile pulled at my lips; it didn’t feel like mine. “Don’t you realize who you’re messing with? I will break you.” My voice was exceptionally calm, almost detached.
She cowered before me, grasping her head in agony. I could feel it, her true death. I could have it. The power went out from me with surprising ease. It was almost disappointing that I could kill her so easily.
“Alexa, please.” Shaz lingered nearby, his voice an annoying reminder that if I loved him, I couldn’t destroy her. He’d put up with too much from me in the name of love.
I growled, shooting him a dark look. I didn’t release my hold on her though. No, I wanted her to know she’d gone too far. Her heart was there, in my mind. I could feel it, ready to burst at my command. I had killed more than one vampire this way, and every time it got easier.
“I don’t know what you were thinking, putting on a display like that, but I am not the one you want to fuck with.” I put pressure on her heart, squeezing until she coughed blood. In my mind, I was inside her as surely as if I’d held her cold, dead heart in my hand. With a hand beneath her chin, I forced her to meet my eyes. “You won’t get another warning. Next time, we finish this.”
I dropped the livewire running from me into her, releasing her from my deadly hold. She collapsed completely, spitting blood and whimpering. Only then did I notice the entire place had fallen silent. Even the band had stopped.
Several vampires were on their knees, blinded by pain as a wave of heavy energy swept over the crowd. Shya’s words echoed in my head. “You have immense power over vampires and werewolves. You are both and yet somehow neither, all at the same time.”
I hadn’t believed that then. I was starting to now. As I looked down at the suffering vampiress, it was startlingly undeniable. Shaking from the pressure of conducting so much energy, I needed some air, so I turned and headed for the front door. However, I carefully avoided eye contact with those I passed.
Shaz said my name, but I didn’t stop, and he didn’t pursue me. Jez ultimately caught hold of my arm and stopped me in the lobby. She held firm, refusing to be shaken off.
“Hey, are you alright?” She produced a tissue from her purse and gestured to the blood dripping from my nose. “That was pretty fucking intense. You dropped Kale like a sack of bricks.”
I accepted the tissue and wiped my nose. It wasn’t bleeding much, and I felt fine. “Is he ok? I didn’t mean to.”
“Yeah, he’s ok. Or, he will be, anyway.” When she couldn’t keep me inside the building, she followed me outside. “I felt something, too. It kind of scared me.”
I turned to her sharply. Jez didn’t readily admit fear to anyone about anything without a damn good reason. “Why? What happened?”
She shrugged and walked farther away from the entrance and the people that mingled there. With a longing look at some of the smokers enjoying their cigarettes, she feigned casual. “When you dropped Kale and the others, I could feel this pull inside me. Like you were pulling the cat out of me. Forcing the shift.”
“Sounds like what I did with Zoey, when she was stuck in wolf form.”
“Well, it didn’t feel so great. It didn’t hurt, but it freaked me out. How about we don’t have a repeat of that, hmm?”
I turned toward the parking lot, focusing on the earth at my feet to ground my unbalanced core. I was riding a high so intense I walked on clouds. “Sorry, Jez.”
Her presence was comforting. Jez was special to me. The circle of people I could trust was small, but I was madly grateful for every one of them.
“It’ll be ok, Lex. I know you’re hurting more over this Shaz stuff than you would ever let yourself admit. There are no easy rides in love. It’s complicated agony. But, it’s worth it.”
I couldn’t help but stare intently at her. That didn’t sound like something she’d usually say. “Is it really though? Or, is it just not knowing when to let someone go?”
“Don’t talk like that. We both know that’s not what either of you want.”
No, it wasn’t what I wanted. What I wanted was to go back to a time before Shaz had gotten involved in any of this. It was too late for that.
The night air was muggy; it did nothing to provide the cooling relief I longed for. If only it would rain.
My breath caught when Shaz’s car sped past us as he peeled out of the lot. He and I needed to talk. We’d been dodging this issue for weeks, and that mistake had caught up to us. I didn’t want to delve deeper into it, but I knew if we didn’t, we wouldn’t grow past this. And, it would destroy us.
Chapter Five
The urge to go after Shaz was strong, but he was long gone. It was anyone’s guess where he was going. I wanted to punch something, but the claws protruding from my fingertips prevented me from even making a fist.
My wolf wanted to take over, to shield me from the pain by escaping my human body. If I could just lose myself in the forest, it would all cease to exist. If only
that were true…
I paced in the parking lot, unwilling to go back inside the club. It was probably best if I vacated for the rest of the night. I had a lot to deal with. Jez leaned against a nearby car, watching me silently. Restless and distressed, I didn’t know what to do with myself.
“Just what were you trying to do in there?” Kale’s voice rang out behind me seconds before his honey-dipped energy slid over my skin like a forbidden caress. “Blow the roof off the building?”
“I don’t know,” I said with a shrug. “I snapped. I couldn’t let her challenge me that way. Not in my city and most definitely not in my club with my wolf. It just happened.”
“Well next time you lose it like that, direct your focus. Save the rest of us from having to take an undeserved hit.” He joined Jez where she stood against the car. With a look that was supposed to be serious, Kale studied me. “You’re an accident waiting to happen, Alexa. Too wild and unruly. It’s dangerous.”
I didn’t buy his serious expression because of the playful lilt to his tone. Whatever I’d done to Kale inside, some part of him had liked it.
“Maybe that’s why someone wants me dead.” I felt pinned under the weight of their matching stares. “Sorry. It shouldn’t have happened.”
“Nobody is going to hurt you. You just proved why that wouldn’t be easy.” Jez shrugged casually, but her shoulders tightened, and her body language became defensive. Wary.
Kale’s gaze dropped to my bloody hand. His pupils dilated and a memory blazed between us. “I’d like to meet the person willing to take you on after what you just did in there.”
“I don’t know.” With a shake of my head, I scanned the area. I couldn’t be too careful, not until I knew who was gunning for me. “This is just more trouble I don’t need. It seems to find me no matter what I do.”
A sudden, unnatural wind picked up, tossing my long blonde hair around in total disarray. The air rippled, and Falon appeared out of nowhere. It spooked me and I jumped. He eyed me with grim amusement dancing in his silver eyes.
