She spun to face Jake over the roof of the Malibu. He stood in a shooter’s stance, three bodies rotting on the ground on his side of the car. He lowered the gun, holstering it with a smug “looks-like-I-just-saved-your-life-there-little-damsel” grin forming across his mouth.
Nyla placed her sword back in the spine sheath, ignoring the dimples Jake’s grin formed and the magnetic pull his grin had on her. It wasn’t as easy to ignore the call of blood behind her in the security guard station.
“You almost shot me.” Even to her own ears, the softly spoken words sounded like a death threat.
“I knew what I was doing,” Jake said, the cocky grin no longer there as he watched her round the car and stalk toward him, his eyes wary. “Besides, I have UV-bullets. They wouldn’t kill you from just a graze.”
Wanna bet? she wanted to ask, but instead smiled sweetly as she closed the remaining space between them. She rested a hand on his chest, gritting her teeth to fight down the passion that touching his body stirred inside her. “I guess I should thank you for your help.”
Jake smiled, but it wasn’t cocky this time. He was still unsure of her, and he was right to feel that way.
Nyla’s smile changed from sweet to predatory as she performed a quick and well-practiced flex of her wrist, which put the small knife in her wrist sheath directly into her hand.
Still giving him a smile that promised pain, she kept her weapon-free hand on his chest in a mockery of affection and slipped her knife hand between his legs.
Jake sucked in a breath, holding it as if afraid letting go would put his testicles even closer to the blade. His eyes were wide, focused only on her face.
“If you ever shoot a bullet that close to me again,” she warned in a low and lethal voice, “I’ll be using your balls for ping-pong. Is that understood?”
Jake nodded, apparently still not taking a chance on breathing.
“I’ll take that as a yes.” She backed away, surveying the carnage around them, ignoring Jake’s loud gush of air as he started breathing again.
“What the hell is wrong with you?” he bellowed.
Nyla turned back toward him and raised one of her perfectly arched eyebrows. She noticed that he had yet to gain back the color he’d lost during their little “moment of understanding.”
“Seriously, are you insane? I save your life and you thank me by nearly Bobbittizing my balls. What the hell is wrong with you?”
“Ever shoot anyone other than a vampire with those UV bullets?”
“No,” he quickly snapped, his tone still angry.
“So you don’t know what would happen if you shot a person with one.”
“They disintegrate into the bloodstream. That’s why they kill vampires so effectively. They’re just UV.”
“And you think having pure UV coursing through your bloodstream wouldn’t hurt you? At the very least, you’d probably walk away with some seriously amped up melanoma.”
“Nyla, I knew what I was doing. I wasn’t going to—”
“You may have known what you were doing, but you didn’t know what I was doing. What if I’d moved just as you pulled the trigger?”
He heaved out a breath, flexing his hands in irritation. “I wouldn’t put your life in danger, all right? I wouldn’t hurt you after what I just saw.”
She blinked, confused. “What are you talking about?”
“The way you beheaded that vamp in midair. Whatever doubts I had before . . . well, I now know for certain you’re a hunter. You have some serious skill.”
“Am I supposed to feel honored for receiving your seal of approval?”
He closed his eyes and inhaled deeply, visibly trying to rein in his temper. “Let’s not fight, let’s just get what we came for.”
“This was an ambush, Jake. We need to get out of here.”
Jake shook his head. “An ambush would have been larger, with better quality opponents.”
“You don’t think flying vampires are worthy opponents?”
“They weren’t old.”
“Do you know how rare it is to cross a flying vamp?” She knew that not every vampire could fly. It was either a talent a particular vamp had, or it was a skill acquired after a very long existence. Centuries long.
“Yes.”
“Well, we just faced off with six, no, make that seven of them, and you don’t think any of them were old?”
Jake shook his head.
“Were they related or something?”
“How would I know that?”
“You felt the damn things before they could be seen. It stands to reason you’d know other things about them.”
Jake shrugged. “Well, I don’t. I just know when they’re coming and what they’re up to.”
“How do you know all that?
He shrugged again. “Practice. Apparently you haven’t been on a lot of hunts or you’d get that gut feeling too. It comes with the job.”
Nyla just looked at him. She’d always been in cat form when she’d gone on hunts with him before, and she’d always thought it was a gut feeling combined with his hunter skill which helped him perform his job. Now, after witnessing him in action while she was in human form, she suspected there was something more involved. She wasn’t about to voice her suspicions, though. If Jacob Porter was what she was starting to think he was, she didn’t have a prayer.
“Let’s get out of here, Jake. This isn’t exactly the boonies, and most likely someone heard the gunshots.” She raised both arms, gesturing with a circular motion. “Cops will be swarming this place soon, and I’m sure if they find us standing in the middle of all this blood and death, I doubt they’re going to give us the benefit of the doubt.”
“The bloodsuckers will be nothing but mush in a few more minutes. The first one already is.”
She peered ahead of the car and saw that he was right. The former vampiress was just a puddle of muck. “They might be mush, but the guards won’t be.”
“We haven’t even checked to see whether they’re dead or just injured.”
“And we’re not going to,” she said as sirens blared in the not-far-enough distance. “We’re getting out of here now.”
She rounded the car, quickly making it to the passenger side door, but Jake hadn’t moved an inch. He was staring toward the cemetery, determination in his eyes.
“Hey! Do I have to drag your ass into the car?”
He looked at her, glared long enough to make her just a smidge uncomfortable, then finally moved toward the car.
Neither of them even flinched as Jake drove the car over the puddle that was once a living person, but Nyla did count her blessings. She could have easily become one of those puddles.
“YOU REALLY DON’T think it was an ambush?” Nyla asked nearly an hour later, as she sat at the table in Jake’s motel room wiping down her freshly washed sword.
“No, I don’t. I think it was a test.” Jake lowered himself onto the bed, stretching back to rest on his elbows.
They’d both showered and changed, unfortunately Jake had changed into a pair of jeans—just a pair of jeans. Whether it was his attire, or the energy she’d spent during the fight at the cemetery, she didn’t know, but the Heat had flared back to life.
She sat at the table, busying her hands with the sword in order to keep from tracing that thin line of hair running from Jake’s navel down into his jeans, knowing the jeans wouldn’t be much of a deterrent in her search to discover just where that line of hair went. She tried to keep her mind focused on the hunter job while keeping her eyes focused on the sword she was drying, but the Heat kept making her itch for Jake.
And no wonder, she thought, realizing she’d spent the past several minutes stroking a phallic symbol.
She set the sword aside in disgust, w
ondering how she could possibly manage going through two weeks of Heat without pouncing on Jake. The only way she could think of managing that particular task was to have sex with someone else, but every time she did that she lost another piece of her self-respect.
She supposed she could shift into cat form for a while, but the drawback to that was she came back into human form hungrier than when she shifted, and then she’d have to feed.
“You all right, Nyla? You’re looking kind of funky again.”
She glanced at him, and her stomach did a little flip-flop. Must he lie on the bed all stretched out and barely clothed?
She gave an internal shake of her head to bring her mind away from his body and said, “I’m fine. You were saying about the vampires . . . ?”
“Yeah, if that had been an ambush at the cemetery, somebody older would have been sent for us.”
“They were lying in wait for us. Hel-lo. That’s the definition of ambush. It might have been a crappy ambush from their end, but it was still an ambush.”
“No,” he stated quietly but firmly. “It was a test.”
“Did the voices in your head tell you that?”
He frowned at her. “What?”
“Nothing.” She scratched her arms and squirmed in the chair. Her skin was crawling with the need to touch him. Dammit!
Jake shook his head, rose from the bed and crossed over to the window, making sure—for the umpteenth time—that the window was raised.
“You really miss that cat, don’t you?” She fought back the grin tugging at the corners of her mouth.
“Yeah, well, animals are cooler than people sometimes.” He shrugged, an embarrassed smile adorning his face.
Sometimes it was easier being an animal, Nyla wanted to say, but didn’t. She chose to stick to the original topic. “So what were the vamps testing us for?”
“I don’t know. I’m not even sure they knew.”
“Thanks for clearing that up,” she scoffed.
Jake laughed. “What I’m trying to say is that I think someone more powerful than them sent them to test us. To see if any of them came back alive.”
“But who would do that? There aren’t many master-led vampire gangs around anymore.”
“Yeah, but there are some,” he said. His eyes took on the haunted look they always got when he thought of his friend Bobby and the night they’d been attacked by vampires.
The night they’d both had the misfortune of meeting Demarcus.
“You all right, Nyla?”
She glanced up as he started walking toward her. She could only stare in awe as his spectacular body crossed the floor to stand before her. His toned abs were right in front of her face. Unable to stop herself, she reached out and traced the taut, muscled lines with her fingertips.
Jake sucked in his breath, obviously surprised by her touch, and if the sudden tightening of his jeans was any indication, he was aroused. The knowledge she’d put him in that state sent a thrill spiraling through her body.
Suddenly, he reached down, grasped her by her nape, and pulled her out of the chair. She stood before him, only a breath away from a kiss, both their heads tilted at the right angles—just her, in her human form, and Jake . . . and the Heat.
Dammit!
“I need some air,” she said, fighting with herself not to pull him toward her and pushing him away instead.
“Nyla—” he began.
“Stay here, I’ll be back soon,” she called over her shoulder before closing the motel room door behind her.
She ran down the hall, dissolving into mist before she’d even hit the parking lot.
Chapter Ten
“DAMMIT,” JAKE MUTTERED, watching the door slam shut.
Groaning, he threw himself back onto the bed and wondered whether he’d misread her signals.
It had been a real crapper of a night. They’d faced off with flying vampires, he hadn’t gotten to dig up Janie Paxton’s body, and just when he’d been sure he was going to get some action with Nyla, she’d practically run out of the room.
It was just as well, he decided with a resigned sigh. He needed to focus on the job and not on Nyla’s deliciously rounded curves. She’d proven herself a true hunter, wielding that sword like some sort of barbarian princess. She was a good partner to have, just as long as he didn’t piss her off and send her on a quest to castrate him, which she seemed to have a fondness for when angry. Mixing business and pleasure with her, a woman who ran hot and cold faster than he could blink, was not one of his better ideas.
He felt something land on the bed next to him, and he jerked into a sitting position.
“Alley!” He grabbed the cat off the bed, cradling her against his chest. “Where have you been, girl?”
Alley purred softly, cuddling in closer to his chest, and Jake felt a gentle calm wash over him. Some kids had security blankets, some had teddy bears. He’d always had Alley.
“We got company with us on this job, Alley, so if you’re sticking around I’m going to have to ask you to behave,” he told his cat while stroking the fur along her back. “To tell you the truth, this particular woman kind of scares me. Behave so I don’t have to save you. The crazy woman might try to impale you on her sword.”
Jake’s cell phone rang from where it sat on the nightstand, demanding his attention. He lay back against a mound of pillows, with Alley sprawled across his bare chest, and reached over to grab the phone with his free hand.
“Porter,” he announced, continuing to stroke Alley’s soft black fur.
“It’s Jonah. I have a body.”
“Good for you, Ego-boy. Anything else?”
“What? Ugh, I don’t mean I have a body, I mean I have info on another body.”
“Yeah, I figured that, Sparky, I was just twisting your shorts. What’d ya get?”
“You’re a pain in the ass, you know that?”
“It’s in the genes. You going to give me the information or not?”
“What’s got you so irritable?”
“Let’s see,” Jake began, thinking over the list of things currently ticking him off. “Bodies are piling up, I haven’t found Curtis Dunn, I got jumped by flying vampires, and if I don’t have sex soon I’m going to bust.”
“Those things fly?”
“Some of ‘em.”
“You all right?”
“I’m talking to you, aren’t I?”
“You know, you’re pretty snippy when you aren’t getting any. You should go take care of that.”
“Believe me, I have every intention of going to the closest bar and finding someone warm and will—Ahh, dammit!” Jake jumped off the bed, letting Alley fall to the mattress.
“You all right, Jake?” Genuine concern laced Jonah’s voice.
“Yeah,” he said into the phone while checking his chest for blood. “My frigging cat bit me!”
Jake swatted at Alley, chasing her off the bed, while the sound of his brother’s laughter poured through the phone.
“I’m glad you enjoyed that,” he said, lying on the bed again after determining there was no need for a bandage. Alley had just nicked him.
“Dude, I swear that crazy cat thinks you’re her boyfriend.”
“That’s just perverted. Now tell me about this new victim before I have to drive up there and beat it out of you.”
“All right, all right. The body was found just outside Hicksville, a tiny little town not even on the map. Two apparent fang holes, body drained. It’s definitely Dunn’s work.”
“Yeah, and he’s moving. I need to move with him.”
“I’ll email you directions. It’s not the easiest place to find.”
“Hmm. Sounds like just the type of place a killer would want to go. I’ll sniff him out though.�
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“Yeah, well, if you’re going to Hicksville, there’s something you should know.”
“What’s that?”
“Peewee is the sheriff.”
He frowned. “Peewee who?”
“Our cousin.”
Jake thought back to his childhood, remembering the nerdy little guy. The boy could trip over air and couldn’t fight his way out of a paper sack.
“Our cousin Peewee is walking around some town with the right to carry a loaded weapon? That’s comforting.”
“Jake . . .”
“What?”
“Don’t get so caught up in your memories that you give the guy a wedgie or Super glue his butt to the toilet seat.”
“Hey, that was a long time ago, but he deserved it. And as I recall, you laughed too,” he reminded his brother.
“Jacob—”
“Fine. I’ll leave the little twerp alone. What else you got for me?”
“The body was found in a wooded area outside of the town, but it wasn’t hidden. It was seen from the road.”
“Any markings?”
“I told you, the fang marks were there.”
“Other markings, I mean. We were looking at the pictures you sent of Janie Paxton, and Nyla found some strange markings on the fold of her elbow, but we couldn’t make them out. We went to the cemetery to dig her up—”
“Whoa, little brother! You’re letting this Nyla woman look at the evidence?”
Jake chuckled, amused that of all the things his brother could have focused on, he chose that. “You know, it used to be stuff like digging up bodies that shocked you.”
“Yeah, well, I’ve accepted that you do that kinda stuff. However, I’ve never known you to partner up with anyone. Can you really trust this woman? What if she’s a cop trying to bust you? You know you do some highly illegal crap.”
“Believe me, she’s no cop. By the way, what did you find out about her?”
Alley jumped back on the bed but kept her distance. Jake eyed her while she curled up next to his feet, gazing at him intently, and gave an amused shake of his head. All he had to do was mention a woman’s name, and she was on high alert. Jonah was right. She was a damned crazy, jealous cat.
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