by Kat Cotton
We got on the floor. It’d been so long since I’d been out dancing. That was the part of clubbing I’d always liked. I figured Kisho would be a crap dancer on account of coming from a time when people waltzed, but when he got started, he was amazing. His hips mesmerized me. I wanted to be much, much closer to those hips.
I moved so that our bodies touched. He didn’t move away, but then he didn’t move closer either. I ground against him. As close to sex as we could get without taking our clothes off. He totally responded, and a smile flickered over my lips.
We made a hot couple, that much was obvious from the eyes on us around the room.
Hells, that was way too much attention. We should be blending in, but being able to touch him was way too tempting for me. It was just dancing after all.
He wrapped his arm around my waist, pressing me closer. He was interested. I could feel it, sticking into my leg. He was most definitely interested.
The first scream could barely be heard above the music, then the DJ cut the sound. I jumped away from Kisho. This was not the time to be sexing it up. I had work to do. I needed my mind out of my pants.
The room fell silent and the screams stopped.
People ran, knocking into us. The tension in the room became palpable. A blond chick spun around, trying to figure out what was going on, but most people knew. They wanted out of here.
“Run,” I said to her.
As the crowd cleared, I saw him standing at the other end of the dance floor. The Demon Child. With a victim at his feet.
I stared at him across the empty floor. Oh my God.
He was so freakin’ cute.
How could someone who looked like that be evil? If you mixed up puppies and rainbows and cupcakes into a vaguely human form, that’s what it’d look like. He was supposed to have turned at fourteen years old, but he looked more like nine. He was much shorter than most fourteen-year-olds. A tiny little kid.
Didn’t they ID anyone at this club? How the hell had he even gotten in?
In this world, you’d be hard-pressed to find someone with less maternal instinct than me. I don’t do cute, cuddly things. But that damn Demon Child, I couldn’t stake him. I wanted to squeeze his chubby little cheeks or pat his hair. Staking him would be like staking a fucking Care Bear.
“He kills people?” I said to Kisho.
“He feeds. You’ve seen the damage.”
“No fucking way.”
He wore a white t-shirt, a little stained with blood splatters, and loose jeans. His black hair was slightly awry. The main thing about him, though, was his eyes. They sparkled and shone. Then he smiled. His front teeth, slightly crooked and chipmunky, just added to the intensity of his cute.
That was totally disarming. If Nic had an aura of moonlight, this one’s aura was rainbows and sparkles.
He walked toward me, that cutesy grin still on his face. The stampede of people leaving echoed through the club. That made the fight easier. At least he wouldn’t be feeding on them tonight.
The bloodstained body on the ground behind him and the blood on his t-shirt proved he wasn’t as innocent as he looked. Still, it was hard to believe that cute little chipmunk had done that. I’d met way too many demons and vampires in my time. I wasn’t blind to their faults, that’s for sure. But this one… I didn’t want to kill him, I wanted to adopt him.
I dug deep inside to reach the steely center of my heart. In that part of me, I had the image of Cassie Manchelli’s tortured body. That cute little chipmunk had done that. Then I thought of the cash.
A fluffy vampire kitten couldn’t keep you warm at night, not like money could. Money meant cakes and new boots and a roof over my head. Cute or not, I didn’t get the rest of that money until the Demon Child died.
He might be cute, he might be the freakin’ fluffy kitten of vampires, but I had a helluva lot of money riding on staking him. It might be the hardest kill of my career, but screw it, a girl has to eat.
I walked to meet him. The two of us in a face-off.
“Demon Child, you’re going down,” I whispered under my breath.
We circled each other. He wasn’t the innocent little kitten I’d first thought. For starters, the hunger in his eyes wasn’t a child’s. And, as we got closer, I could smell the blood on his breath.
One thing was for sure, this would take brute strength, because I wasn’t prepared to transfix him with my sexual power. Not this kid. That was a line I couldn’t cross. I’d macked on with hell demons. I’d let primal beasts feel me up. I’d left all morals and good taste behind in my quest to obliterate the supernaturals, but all those creatures had looked of legal age.
The Demon Child had no qualms, though. He rushed me. I dodged, stake at the ready. Still, he barreled into me, wrapping his arms around my neck. Then he patted my face. No fangs, no biting, just a gentle pat.
“Pretty lady,” he said, his accent proving English wasn’t his first language. Maybe any language wasn’t natural to him after the last hundred years.
What the actual fuck? I had not used my sexual aura on him. I hadn’t even tried it. Because, urgh, gross. I looked for Kisho to get him off me, but Kisho wasn’t in sight. The Demon Child pressed against me, his head resting on my boobs.
I need access to his heart to stake him. I couldn’t do that while he snuggled with me.
“Hey, kiddo, stop that.”
I grabbed one hand and tried to pry it off. That proved impossible. When people said he had super strength, they weren’t joking. He might look like a cute kid, but his power was no joke.
“Pretty lady,” he said again, his high-pitched voice proving he hadn’t finished puberty before he’d been turned.
Was that something he did before he ripped people’s throats out? He could compliment me all he liked, I still had to stake the kid.
I twisted, trying to break his hold. That just resulted in jerky movements around the dance floor, like we were awkwardly paired wedding guests. I needed to break his iron hold on me. Did he think I was his mother or something? Even so, he was too old to be acting like this.
He still clung to me, like a damn weed. A choking weed.
“Kisho?” I called out.
For fuck sake, he should be here, helping. Where was the garlic? Where were the goddamn sea witches’ toenails? Anything that would weaken this kid’s hold would be a huge help.
You can’t rely on anyone else in this damn world.
A heavy thudding noise broke my concentration. Someone coming into the club? Lots of someones. It sure as hell wasn’t the clubbers coming back in.
Maybe they were cops.
Come to stop the Demon Child. Come to stop me from killing him, more like, if the mayor had anything to do with it.
I’d crashed his massacre party and screwed up his plans. The mayor wanted the Demon Child alive, and I wanted him dead.
I stood in the middle of the dance floor with all the lights shining on me. Out there, in the darkness, they surrounded me. Even without seeing anything, I heard them moving amongst the tables. I had no idea how many or who they were.
I had to get off the dance floor and into the darkness.
Before I could do anything, though, I had to deal with this kid. I hoisted him onto my hip, like a freakin’ baby. He giggled, thinking we played a fun game, as I ran for the edge of the dance floor.
Kisho stood, staring at something in the darkness. What the hell was he doing? This was not the time or place for going into some kind of daze. He’d come with me to help, not add to my problems.
“Kisho!”
That broke him out of his daze. He ran to me and grabbed the kid out of my arms. The two of us exchanged glances and then scanned the club. Lights flashed in the darkness. The cops surrounded us.
Fuck. I should’ve been checking out escape plans before the attack instead of dirty dancing with Kisho. Those cops would have no qualms about killing us to get the kid. We had to get out of here.
While we hesitated, a co
uple of them rushed us.
They were no cops, though.
Vamps.
First a demon, now vamps. And the mayor had said he hated them.
The first one flashed his fangs at me. I had the stake in my hand, so I swung for him. Perfect aim, straight into the heart. I wiped the stake on the side of my skirt and got ready for the next bastard.
“Come at me,” I yelled.
Kisho fought the second one, but that damn Demon Child held him back. The vamp had him around the throat. No point biting Kisho, but we sure didn’t want to lose that kid. The easiest thing would’ve been to stake the kid first, but that would have to wait now.
The third vamp came at me. He wasn’t stupid enough to come within staking distance. Instead, he hovered around, trying to separate me from Kisho and the kid. I danced around him.
He wanted to play. Well, I’d play him. I stopped and slowly smiled at him. The bloodlust in his eyes turned to regular lust. I ran my tongue over my top lip. That got the dude fired up. Good thing, too. I didn’t have time to mess with subtle seduction, not with who knew how many others waiting in the wings.
I moved closer, not breaking eye contact with him. A sheen of sweat broke out on his upper lip. Poor bastard probably thought he’d have the best night of his life. He kept thinking that right up to the time that I shoved that stake into his chest.
Done.
Kisho still struggled with his vamp, though. He had both hands around the Demon Child, trying to keep him away from the vamp. He needed help. I rushed in and got the vamp in a choke hold. No sexing this one, not when I couldn’t make eye contact. Grabbing him from behind made it hard to stake him. Instead, I stuck him with my blade. He screamed out in pain and sunk to the floor.
“Weak as piss,” I muttered as I staked him.
That was three down, but there were more. We wouldn’t get out easily.
“Back door,” I mouthed to Kisho.
He nodded and we ran for it. Out of nowhere, another vamp swooped down. He wrenched the Demon Child out of Kisho’s arms. Kisho struggled. I tried to grab the vamp, but he was much stronger than the first three, and I’d tired myself out carrying that damn kid around.
The vamp had the kid, and he ran.
We both took off in pursuit, racing up from the dance floor to the tables. The lights flicked on. A mob surrounded us. There had to be twenty or more of them. Fuck. That bastard had taken the kid and led us into a trap.
Again, Kisho froze.
“Not now,” I whispered to him. Definitely not reliable in a crisis. The vampires moved closer. I edged back to the dance floor, but they’d moved to fill in that gap too. I couldn’t fight all of them, and my sexual aura wouldn’t work, not on an entire mob. Especially with them all around us.
Jeez, a cigarette would be great around now.
Chapter 15: Kisho
I moved so I was back to back with Kisho. Even if he wasn’t any good for fighting, he could be a human shield. Well, a not-so-human shield.
Something hard rubbed against my back. What the hell was going on? Shit, the garlic spray in Kisho’s pocket.
I reached behind me and rummaged in his back pocket. God, he had a great butt. I got something out, ready to spray the bejesus out of these vamps.
Wrong bottle. Sea witches’ nails. Not sure if they’d work, but there was no way I could beat all these beasts in a fight. They moved closer. They didn’t seem real smart, to be honest. If a couple of them rushed us, we’d be screwed, but they kept their ranks.
I had no idea what to do with the nails. The garlic spray would’ve been much handier. I grabbed one of the nails and threw it like a ninja star. It embedded in a vamps’ forehead. He clutched at it, screaming like a banshee.
Well, that worked.
“Garlic,” I gasped at Kisho, hoping he’d get some sense into his head.
I threw another of the nails. They slowed these bastards down, but it seemed the other vamps got a bit upset about it.
Kisho moved. Hopefully, he was coming to his senses.
Hell yes, he had the spray.
I threw the rest of the nails, taking down a few more vamps. Kisho sprayed them until we broke their ranks. I grabbed Kisho’s hand and ran back to the car.
Shit, what a cock up.
“Nic is going to kill us,” Kisho said.
He wasn’t wrong. We’d failed.
“You failed.” Nic was way beyond angry. Waves of chilling hardness came from him.
“Yeah, well, it wasn’t that easy. We walked into a trap. Someone set things up.”
He could be as angry as he liked, it was nothing compared to how angry I was with myself.
I slumped down on the sofa. It wasn’t like we hadn’t tried. Whoever had come for the Demon Child had expected us to be there. It’d been a trap, for sure. All the fight had gone out of me. I didn’t want to have this discussion. I hadn’t even wanted to go back to the vampire lair, but Kisho had begged me to go in with him.
I’d failed. I knew that. I didn’t need Nic to rub it in. I’d failed, and I never fail. I’d completely underestimated the situation.
“Who wants the Demon Child except the mayor?” I asked.
“Us.” Nic scowled.
“Besides the mayor and us? There have to be others, right? He’s a weapon. Who broke the sleep spell in the first place?”
Nic didn’t smile. “It doesn’t matter. What matters is that the Demon Child is still on the loose.”
He could say it didn’t matter, but it did. Timon had said so.
“We’ll get him next time.”
“If there is a next time.”
Whoa, shots fired. There would be a next time. The fact that the bad guys, whoever they were, had captured the Demon Child just made finding him even more imperative.
“Are you sure the Demon Child is even evil? He’s so cute, and we’ve never seen him actually fed. It could be a mistake.”
That dead body at his feet sure made it look like he’d fed, but I hadn’t actually witnessed him do that.
“Are you fucking stupid? Firstly, he’s not evil. This isn’t about evil. He’s out of control, pure chaos. Good and evil have nothing to do with this. A tiger isn’t evil because it kills. A shark isn’t evil. Are you evil when you eat a steak? Same thing. He’s hungry and he has to eat. And secondly, you think he’s not evil just because he’s cute? What fucked-up logic is that? I’m as cute as fuck and you don’t get more evil than me.”
“Well, to be honest, you’re more angry than evil.”
The look he gave me almost burned. Nic was obviously in no mood for jokes. And he was angry. His nostrils flared and his eyes hardened.
“So, this famed sexual aura didn’t work on him?”
“Holy shit, he’s a kid. He’s fourteen years old. Jailbait.”
He could get as angry as he liked. The kid was a kid. It’d be like sexing up your little brother.
“If you were a professional, you wouldn’t let that stop you.” He moved closer, his voice raised a little.
“He looks even younger.” I moved closer, definitely raising my voice. “He looks and acts like a little kid.”
“I don’t care. He’s not younger. He’s old enough to kill and he’s old enough to be killed, so he’s definitely old enough to get a bit of a boner for you.”
Nic was right in my face now. I was beginning to reach that level of anger where words don’t come out. I’d just be screaming big gulps of air if I didn’t settle down.
“It’s wrong.”
“Everything about this is wrong. You have one power. Use it.”
I folded my arms. “Fine, then. I’ll dust him. The mayor is after him, this new guy has him, but we’re the best.”
Nic rolled his eyes. “Yeah, you proved that.”
I needed to lighten up this situation. Otherwise I’d get too angry, and that would lead to nothing good. I had to remember that, as annoying as he was, Nic was the one paying me, and I still had to get the rest
of that money.
“Hey, you’re supposed to be the motivational speaker. Where’s all the ‘rah-rah, if you believe it, you can do it’ shit now?”
“I’m not getting paid to motivate you, and if you need that bullshit, I want my money back.”
“You can’t do that.” He so couldn’t. I folded my arms and sulked.
I’d spent that money. I had my car and had paid bills and bought shiny things.
“Hell yeah, I can. And you can give me that car.”
He had his hands on his hips, glaring at me.
“I can do it. We just weren’t expecting the surprise attack tonight.”
He walked off as though saying I was dismissed. Bastard. This was only a temporary setback. I’d never lost out yet, and I wouldn’t with this case. I just needed to regroup, make new plans and get my mojo back. One of the things I hadn’t accounted for was that using any kind of sexual lure was out of the question. Like, I’d known the kid was only fourteen years old, but I hadn’t expected him to be so childlike.
“He was awfully cute,” Kisho said.
Up until now, he’d stood to the side as though not wanting Nic’s attention on him. I hadn’t mentioned that Kisho had frozen. I hadn’t even asked him yet why he’d done that.
“You, get in there,” Nic ordered.
Kisho seemed startled but walked into the other room.
“You come too.”
I shook my head. “I’ll just leave.”
“You’ll stay. You’re part of this.”
I could’ve walked out. There was no way he could make me stay, but I couldn’t. My legs weakened and my heart fluttered. It scared me that I reacted so quickly.
I followed Nic into the other room, quivering with anticipation. When we got in the room, Kisho had already put the leather cuffs on his wrists and stood, arms in front, waiting.
“Did you put that hook in the ceiling yourself? Because if you did, how do you maintain your five-star Airbnb rating?”
He snorted.
I was nervous and blabbering. I should just shut up.
“Take your shirt off,” Nic said.
“And your pants.” Oops, that just slipped out. I really wanted his pants off, though.
