by Arthur, Keri
I stopped and heard something else. A scream of air, as if something fast and deadly was tearing through the night toward us.
I threw myself sideways and knocked Quinn out of the way. He cursed, his arms going around me, instinctively cushioning my body with his as we fell to the ground. He grunted as we hit, and his eyes widened. Air hissed, and I twisted around to look. Something cut through the night just above us, something that was wood rather than metal, with a deadly pointed end.
An arrow.
The fact that it was all wood suggested it had been aimed at Quinn, but the reality was, an arrow in the heart wasn’t going to do either of us any good.
It hit the glass behind us and ricocheted harmlessly away. Footsteps whispered across the sounds of the night. Our attacker, on the run. I broke away from Quinn’s embrace, flung off my bag, coat, and sweater, then shifted shape. In wolf form, I bounded after the bastard.
“Riley, wait!”
It was a command, one I ignored. The would-be assassin was running toward South Bank, perhaps hoping to shake any pursuit in the crowd gathered near the casino. Meaning he either didn’t realize I was a wolf, or he had no idea just how keen a wolf’s hunting sense was.
He kept running, looking over his shoulder as he did so, barreling into people and thrusting them out of the way. I loped after him, lithely avoiding the idiot humans who screamed or stepped into my path rather than out of it. The man ahead was another Gautier, right down to the long, greasy ponytail. He was obviously aware that he was being pursued, but he was looking over the wrong shoulder and I was drawing closer and closer. His scent was cloying, the minty smell barely covering the growing odor of death and decay. I wrinkled my nose and resisted the temptation to sneeze.
He didn’t head over the bridge, as I’d expected, running instead into the Clocks poker machine venue. I shifted shape, retied the shirt, then strode in after him.
He weaved through the machines, not quite running. I kept back, out of sight. His scent lingered in the air, a trail I could follow anywhere, even in a venue layered with so many conflicting odors.
Another aroma joined the throng—sandalwood. I smiled and glanced over my shoulder. Quinn was three feet behind me, my bag slung casually over his shoulder.
His dark gaze was filled with anger as it met mine. “You could have gotten yourself into trouble running off like that.” He handed me my sweater, and I put it on as he added, “It might have been a trap.”
It still could be. Who knew where Gautier’s double might lead us? “That arrow was aimed at you, not me.”
“It would have got me, too.” He reached out, catching my hand and raising it to his mouth as we walked. The brief caress of his lips across my fingers was unlike anything I’d ever felt before. Sweet, and yet at the same time, erotic. “Thank you,” he added softly.
I took a deep breath, trying to control my suddenly erratic pulse.
Ahead, our would-be murderer ducked through a door and disappeared. I looked up at the sign above the door and smiled. He’d gone to the toilet. Perfect.
“You mind the door.” Quinn handed me back my bag and coat. “I’ll have a little talk with our friend.”
“Anyone else in there?”
His gaze narrowed slightly, and I knew he was using his infrared vision to check. “No.”
“Good.”
I followed him in, but stopped just inside, leaning back against the door as it closed. I have to say, the smell of men’s toilets was never pleasant, no matter how much air freshener they used. Not that I’d been in all that many, but hey, it was one way of avoiding the queues in the women’s during intermission at the theatre or concerts.
The urinals weren’t occupied, but one stall was. It had to be our man. Why he thought he’d be safe behind the closed door of a toilet was anyone’s guess. Maybe he didn’t get out amongst vamps or werewolves much.
Quinn raised a foot and kicked the door open, then blurred so fast one second he was there, and the next he wasn’t. There a brief flurry of sound, flesh smacking against flesh, then a squeak that was more a note of pain than fear. It wasn’t Quinn’s squeak.
Silence fell. No conversation, no nothing. But I knew what was happening. Quinn was raiding the other man’s mind.
The door behind me bumped slightly, then someone knocked. “Sorry,” I called. “Closed for cleaning. Someone vomited.”
The gent on the other side cursed and walked away. “You’d better hurry, Quinn. Security will have seen us come in here. We probably haven’t much longer before they investigate.”
He came out five seconds later and closed the stall door before walking over to the basin to wash his hands. I watched him for a moment, then my gaze drifted back to that closed door and I felt a sudden chill. “He’s dead, isn’t he?”
“Yes.” He didn’t look at me, just finished washing his hands, then tore off some paper towel to dry them.
“How?” I hadn’t heard the snap of bones, so he certainly hadn’t broken the other man’s neck.
“Heart attack.” His dark gaze met mine and the coldness there chilled me. “An easy thing to do when you can read their minds and know their worst fears—and have the empathic capabilities to enforce the belief those fears are currently happening.”
So he was empathic as well as telepathic. That certainly explained why he was catching my aura so strongly, despite my shields and his. “He died of fright?”
“I’m afraid so.”
He dumped the paper in the bin and walked toward me. I would have backed away had I had anywhere to go. And while I recognized it was a ridiculous reaction, I just couldn’t help it. As much as I was certain I could protect myself, I had the strangest feeling that, against this vampire, there was no defense.
“We’d better get out of here,” he continued, in that same soft, flat tone. “Security is coming.”
I opened the door and walked out. Sure enough, two men in black security outfits were walking toward us. They didn’t look at us, didn’t even appear to notice us, and I knew Quinn had touched their minds, diverting their attention away from us.
His fingers pressed into my back, but this time I stepped away from his warm touch, walking quickly through the room and out into the night. I stopped at the curb, crossing my arms and drawing the cool, flavorsome air deep.
He stopped behind me, a heat I could feel more than hear. “I scared you.”
“Yes.”
“Why? You work with guardians. They do far worse than what I did in there.”
“I know. But I expect it from them. I didn’t expect it from you.”
“I’m a vampire. That’s what we are.”
“Yeah, but for some reason I’d been hoping you were different.” That the exterior gloss was fact, not merely a show. But that was my problem, not his. Hell, it wasn’t as if he hadn’t warned me that he could kill as easily as he drank blood. And, truth be told, the demonstration hadn’t really killed my desire for him. “Did you uncover anything useful?”
He was silent for a moment, then said, “He was partially blocked. I caught images. Moneisha’s not where these things are coming from.”
I glanced over my shoulder. He wasn’t even looking at me, but staring up at the cloudy sky, his expression thoughtful.
“What images?”
“It’s underground. Lots of concrete, bright lights, white walls, that sort of stuff.”
“Nothing recognizable in the way of scenery?”
He shook his head and finally looked at me. His eyes were shuttered. “It could have been anywhere. Any country.”
Great. “Then let’s go get Rhoan out.”
“Disguises first.”
“Where? It’s midnight and there’s not a lot open.” Not a lot beyond restaurants, clubs, and the Casino, that is.
“As I said before, that doesn’t mean a lot when you have money.”
A point he proceeded to prove by having the largest retailer in the city open its doors so we could sho
p. “Can you do tarty?” he said, as we headed up in the elevator to the women’s floor.
I grinned. “I’m a wolf. We do tart better than the tarts.”
A smile warmed his dark eyes. “I’ve noticed that about wolves. I shall leave you to your own devices, then, and go get the supplies I need.” He glanced at the assistant. “Anything she wants. Charge it to my account.” His gaze came back to me. “I’ll meet you downstairs in half an hour.”
Half an hour wasn’t long when you’d just been given full use of unlimited credit, but hey, I wasn’t about to bitch. I wasted ten minutes simply walking around looking, and eventually went for the thigh-length silver snakeskin boots, simply because I’d always wanted a pair. But I settled for the four-inch heels rather than the six-inch, just in case I had to run. I combined those with a barely decent blue net skirt that was way too short to be described as micro, and a silver crop top that had peekaboo holes for my nipples. To complete the effect, I went for a bright blue wig and blue-toned skin makeup. Then I headed into the change room to make the transformation.
As I studied my reflection in the mirror, I decided I did slut superbly well. The blue wig and skin toning made my smoke-colored eyes glow a bright blue, and the skirt and shirt flirted with indecency but left enough covered to stop the cops hauling me off to charge me. I shoved my jacket on, put my other clothes in my bag, and walked downstairs to meet Quinn.
He was waiting, several bags at his feet. His gaze went to my hair, then slid down to my face, and a mix of surprise and hunger flitted through his eyes. The surge of his desire nearly scorched my skin.
“Rather keen on the blue, are we?” I teased.
He didn’t deny it. Couldn’t, when I could so easily smell it. “I don’t get a preview of the rest of it?”
I grinned. “And spoil the surprise?”
His gaze slid down, lingering on my leather-clad ankles. “I’ve got a feeling the surprise could be heart attack material.”
“Isn’t that the effect you want?”
“Yes.” He bent to pick up the two bags, affording me a glimpse of laser guns and some sort of electronic sensor. I didn’t even know they sold that sort of stuff here, and I shopped here frequently. But maybe they had a special section set aside for billionaires.
He gave the manager a huge tip, then escorted me outside. “Did you come in a car?”
I nodded. “It’s in the Casino parking lot.”
“Then we’ll leave it there and go in mine. They might have taken note of your car earlier.”
We walked down the street, heading back to his building. My heels clicked against the pavement, a tattoo of sound as rhythmic as the beat of desire burning through my blood. I felt good in the blue clothes, sexy rather than slutty. Not that I minded slutty if the occasion was right. And if it hadn’t been for the fact that I needed to get my brother free that night, I would have offered to take Quinn’s neat packaging for a quick test drive.
His car turned out to be a black Ferrari—sleek, sporty, and hot. Much like the man himself. He opened the door for me and I climbed in.
“So, what’s the plan?” I said, once we were under way.
“If you look as good beneath as I think you do, all you’ll have to do is walk up the street and every camera in the vicinity will be on you.”
I grinned. “And then?”
“You find a way to keep those cameras on you while I either get over the wall or get through that second entrance and try to find a way to get Rhoan out.”
I raised an eyebrow. “It’ll take two of us to get Rhoan out, won’t it?”
He shrugged. “It might. But first off, we’ll have to find out if he’s in there, then we have to discover just how well guarded he is. It may not happen tonight.”
So he thought. I, on the other hand, was damn sure that, one way or another, Rhoan was coming out of the place that night. “If you do a drive past first, I might be able to tell you if he’s still in there.”
Quinn nodded. We cruised through the streets, the streetlights blurring past at a speed that suggested he wasn’t keeping to the legal limit. I suppose when you were a multibillionaire, a ticket or two didn’t really make that much of a dent in the bank balance.
We reached Moneisha in record time, and he slowed to cruising speed. I studied the white walls but didn’t feel anything. I said as much to Quinn.
“It might be because you’re in the car. Maybe you have to be closer to feel him.”
Maybe. And maybe he was simply gone. I tried to ignore the unease sitting like a weight in my stomach, and said, “I’ll have to do a walk past.”
Quinn turned into a side street and stopped well out of camera range. “I’ll drive past in five minutes and stop. You can pretend I’m a potential client and come talk to me. That way, if he’s not there, we can simply drive away.”
I raised an eyebrow. “Why don’t we simply lower our shields a little and use telepathy?”
He gave me a glance that could have meant anything. “I don’t think so.”
“Why not?”
“Because you’re a wolf in moon heat, and your aura is so strong that I can feel it even with my shields up.”
“And this is a bad thing because . . . ?”
“Because when I make love to someone, I prefer it to be in comfort, not in the confines of a cramped sports car.”
I grinned. “I’ve never done it in the front seat of a Ferrari. It could be fun.”
“It could be dangerous.”
I laughed. I couldn’t help it. “You know, for a man who’s seen a thousand years pass by, you have some pretty staid ideas.”
“And you’re a pup who hasn’t yet had the time to appreciate the finer things in life—like making love in luxurious surroundings.”
“Hey, I fuck millionaires, so I already know all about luxury. Danger and discomfort can be just as thrilling, believe me.”
He shook his head. “I’m going to have to teach you better.”
I grinned. “Or maybe you just need some of that stuffiness shaken out of you.”
“In the twelve hundred years I’ve been around, I’ve tried it all. Believe me, I know which is better.”
“But in all that time, I bet you ain’t met someone like me.” I gave him a saucy grin. “I’m going to rock your world, vampire.”
His smile just about smoked my insides. “You’re welcome to try.”
My hormones were all for trying right there and then, but I had a brother to rescue first. I opened the door and started to climb out. Quinn reached across the car, his fingers wrapping around my knee, a heat that burned past the snakeskin leather and slithered deep into my bones.
“There is one thing I must make clear, though,” he said, his low tones holding a hint of warning.
I glanced at him. “What?”
“There can never be more than a casual dance between us. I have no intentions of getting seriously involved with another werewolf.”
I raised my eyebrows. “What makes you think I want anything more than casual? I’m a wolf—and like all wolves, I want the soul mate and kids ideal. You can never offer me that.”
“I’m just warning you.”
“So I consider myself warned.” I slipped out of the car and took off my coat, throwing it back inside. His sharp intake of breath made my grin widen. “Consider this outfit your warning, my dear vampire.”
I blew him a kiss and slammed the door before he could make any sensible reply. Grin still wide, I strolled down to Acacia Street, crossed the road, and began an exaggerated, saucy walk far enough away from the walls for the cameras to see me. A soft buzz filled the silence as they began tracking me.
I sensed Rhoan within minutes. He was still there, still in those same rooms I’d sensed him in earlier. I sighed in relief. All we had to do was try to get him out.
Lights cut across the darkness behind me. I kept walking, listening to the throaty purr of the engine, knowing it was Quinn simply because I could sense him
with the same ease I was currently sensing Rhoan.
He stopped beside me and the window slid down. I strolled over and leaned down, flashing the cameras an eyeful of butt.
“He’s there.”
“Right now, with you looking the way you’re looking, I’m not particularly worried if he’s there or not.”
“So the front seat of the Ferrari is suddenly looking good?” I teased.
My phone rang before he could answer. He reached into my bag, clicked the flashing vid button, then held it up so I could talk without blowing our cover.
Jack came online, and he didn’t look happy. “Riley, where are you?”
“Outside Moneisha,” I said. “Why?”
“Well, when you grab Rhoan, don’t bring him to the office. There’s been some trouble.”
“What kind of trouble?”
“Someone’s just tried to kill me.”
“A pretty stupid someone, I’d say.”
Jack gave me a crooked grin. “Well, yeah, seeing he missed his target and was caught. Unfortunately for us, he killed himself before we could question him too much.”
I frowned. “Where did this all happen?” I couldn’t imagine a shooter getting through the Directorate’s street-level doors, let alone down to the guardian levels.
“I was on my way home.”
“I thought the Directorate was your home?”
“Only most of the time.”
“So whoever sanctioned the shooting knew your movements pretty well.”
“Exactly. And combined with Rhoan’s disappearance and the attempt on your life, I think we’d better start playing extra safe. Once you snatch Rhoan, don’t go home or come here. They’ll expect those, so go somewhere else and ring me once everyone is safe.”
“Will do.”
He hung up. Quinn put the phone back in my bag, then said, “So where do you intend taking him?”
“I’ll worry about that once I get him out.”
He considered me for a moment, the heat that had been so evident in his eyes moments before totally gone. “I could fly him up to Sydney and have him checked there. They certainly wouldn’t expect that.”
