Beautiful Danger

“You’re pretty,” he said, again giving her that curious look, much like a boy looking over an insect he’d crushed in the backyard. “And deadly.”

“You win tonight,” she said, hoping to appeal to the sane part of him that would have compassion and let a woman go. There was always tomorrow night.

“So what’s my prize?” he asked.

He pressed his body against hers and she could feel his hard muscles pulse with movement. Not bulky like the wolves, but sleek and dangerously strong. A predator to the core.

His prize? If he expected what she had just denied the wolves, she would slay him right here and now, and be damned if she fell to her death.

“I can’t bite you,” he said, dashing his tongue along one fang, “because you’ve that damned collar. Too sharp. Though pain gives me a thrill. But I can do this.”

And he kissed her. Hard and urgent, forcing his sweet breath into her mouth. She didn’t like it, and twisted to get away—he slapped a hand to her head and held her still. Lark struggled, and shoved up her knee into his groin. The move hadn’t the punishing force she’d hoped for. The vampire persisted, pressing his body against her knee, challenging her to hurt him, to deny him this stolen prize.

With her heartbeat thundering, Lark’s rationale scrambled for a solid hold. Training had not covered this sort of attack. What to do? How to…She could feel his fangs pressing into her lip but not cutting. Insanity! Never would she—

Too long since you’ve been kissed. If you’re going to fall, shouldn’t it be like this? Less painful than splattering on the street below.

Suddenly the hard crush of their mouths softened. Lark dropped her knee. And like a moth with tattered wings surrendering to the flame, she granted the vampire his prize.

Because nothing in her life made sense anymore. And everything was opposite what it should be. Now she dealt with strange paranormal creatures on a daily basis, when once she’d never even believed in them.

And because it hurt her heart to remember the last time her husband had kissed her.

A regretful protest rumbled in her throat, and the vampire pulled away from her. The city was bright with the glow of neon and streetlights, and the eerie illumination fell upon his handsome yet deceptively brutal features. Too much facial hair to decide if he possessed true beauty.

The vampire studied her face and touched her cheek, drawing away to inspect the droplet wobbling on his fingertip.

A teardrop? She had become a mental case herself!

“What’s this from?” he asked, pointing the tear-soaked finger at her. “I am so awful to you?”

She nodded. That was as good a reply as any. Not the truth, but she needed that lie right now.

He licked her pain from his finger and nodded. “Of course. I can be nothing more to one so beautiful as you.”

And then he turned and ran across the rooftops, leaving her clinging to the chimney like a bird without wings. And Lark wondered how in hell she was going to get down from this aerial perch.

Chapter 3

He felt freest and safest walking above the city, but Domingos sensed the sun was not far off, and exposed on the roofs was the last place he wanted to be for that terrible event.

He leaped, landing on the tarmac, and moved sinuously up into a walk, but he turned as he did to spy the hunter. She was rappelling down the side of the building. Must have pulled some rope from her utility belt. Heh. Wasn’t that what vampire hunters wore? Some kind of superhero belt to hold all their crazy weapons?

“Smart chick. Pretty, too.”

And vicious. He sucked at his palm where the blade had cut deep. Almost healed, it wouldn’t scar, but there was humiliation in actually taking the cut. From a woman. Yet it hadn’t been her deft punches and kicks that had hurt him most. Her rejection following his kiss had hit him in the one tender spot remaining within him after all he’d been through.

“No, it didn’t,” he argued with what little clear conscience he could find. The whispers slithered accusingly. “Stupid hunter. Not pretty.”

A chuckle burst from his mouth. He hated the part of him that did that, but it wasn’t a reaction he could control.

Yet he remained, watching, to ensure that she landed on the ground safely. The werewolves would not give up. They had her scent and would retaliate like dogs to her bones. But if distracted they’d forget the bone in favor of another more meaty treat.

The hunter wasn’t meaty, by any means. But she’d done the one thing that would ensure that the wolves didn’t lose her scent—she’d stood up to them.

And for that Domingos could overlook her nasty rejection and applaud her moxie. “Too bad it’s going to get her killed.”

But better the hunter than him, eh? Heh.

She headed west. Drawing up the goggles over his eyes and tugging his sleeves down over his hands, Domingos decided to parallel her, for the heck of it.

Lark slammed the apartment door shut behind her, dropping her weapons on the gray leather sofa and stripping off her coat and shirt as she made way toward the back of her home. Dawn was not far off, yet the apartment was dark. She navigated the murk with ease. In the bedroom, she unlaced and pulled off her boots and pants and beelined into the black-and-white-tiled bathroom to turn on the shower.

Tonight had been a complete failure.

Standing before the vanity mirror in a black lace bra and panties, she stared at her reflection, assessing the damage. The months-old brand of the Order marred her left shoulder, the design of four stakes within a circle pink and rough. Part of the knighting ceremony, the branding had hurt like a mother. She was proud of it, though; she’d endured a lot to earn it.

She’d taken a nasty bruise from a werewolf’s fist on her right arm, and it had already blossomed deep purple and red. Studying a thin slice dashed under her jaw, she realized one of the wolves’ talons must have done that. With the adrenaline pumping at the time, she hadn’t noticed the cut.

Pulling out the band from her ponytail, she shook out her long, stick-straight hair. Her eyeliner was smeared up on one corner, giving her a half-cat’s-eye look.

Staring at her pitiful reflection, she wondered when she had last cared. Had she ever cared?

Yes. The world had been different two years ago. Dreams had felt fluttery and fun, ambitions solid and achievable. Fashion and beauty had been important to her, because she’d known she was pretty and liked to look her best. Music—oh, music—it had been more than a hobby. Despite working nine-to-five for a local attorney’s office as a file clerk, her real passion had been her music, and she’d been practicing to audition for a seat in a small community orchestra. But she’d abandoned the fine arts after falling in love.

During a trip to Paris, she had fallen in love and married Todd Cooper, knowing what he was. And, okay, so the falling-in-love part had come after the marriage. After four months of dating, she’d discovered she was pregnant and Todd had gotten down on his knee and promised to take care of her and their family. She’d been ready to plunge into the unknown of family and the new known regarding his profession, but only because fear had motivated that readiness.

And that fear should have forewarned her of this dangerous future in which she now existed.

Fool, she thought now. To have thought she could change a person? That had been her mind process as she’d said “I do.” She hadn’t liked Todd’s profession and had hoped a new family would lure him out of it. Yet she’d quickly learned people didn’t change; they only grew more deeply into themselves, altering imperceptibly, minutely, but at their core, ever remained the same.

While she waited for the water to warm up (she could brew a cup of tea faster than it took to summon hot water from the pipes in this old building), she wandered out to the living room to get her coat. Best to keep it hung when not wearing it. The Kevlar vest and pants she let lie on the floor. She was too tired to do housecleaning right now.

No, not tired. More like annoyed. Yes, by that irritating vampire!

She selected a hanger from the movable rack she’d pushed against the back door, because the iron staircase that climbed the rear of her building was unsafe and coming loose from the outer wall so she never used it.

She heard a knock outside. On the back door that sat atop a dangerous staircase that only someone very stealth might navigate.

“Shit.” Lunging toward the end of the bed, she grabbed her pants and shuffled them on. Then she ran into the bathroom, shut off the water and grabbed a stake from the linen closet. She kept weapons hidden throughout the apartment.

Returning to the door, she slowly pushed aside the hanger rack but didn’t get it moved all the way when the door burst open, shoving the rack of clothes toward her. She stepped aside, stake raised—and recognized Domingos LaRoque behind the funky brass goggles.

The vampire remained on the threshold, his palms flat before him, pressed against…nothing. A vampire could not enter a private residence without permission. That he’d been able to push the door inside surprised.

Lark exhaled but didn’t let down her guard. She wasn’t safe by a long shot.

“Save it for later,” he said, eyeing the stake held aloft by her shoulder. “The wolves are at your front door.”