Loren nodded. “Vail. His name is Vail, and it would be wise you contact me should you see him. He is extremely dangerous. He may have a female with him, a dark witch known as Kordula.”
“We get a few witches in here and it can be hard to get a bead on them because of their spells, but I’ll keep an eye out. You got a number we can contact you on if your guy comes walking into the joint?” Kyter poured the mixes into a tall metal container, plugged the end with one of the glasses and shook it.
“Olivia will have a number for you.” Loren hoped Olivia didn’t return while he was mixing the drink. The action of shaking the contraption in his hands showed his muscles off and was drawing attention from several females lining the bar.
Kyter didn’t seem to notice them. He set the metal container down, cracked the glass off the end, and poured the mixed liquid out into two clean elegant glasses with long stems and a wide curved bowl.
The female bartender came over and handed a fresh shirt to the jaguar and he teasingly flexed his muscles, earning a roll of her eyes but gaining an eruption of giggles from the females waiting at the bar.
Kyter put the shirt on and buttoned it. Loren’s gaze followed the female bartender and then settled on the women at the bar. Did the jaguar male like the attention from all the women?
His earlier words about bonds left Loren feeling that he was a devoted bachelor like Bleu, determined to avoid finding his mate.
A prickle of awareness ran down Loren’s spine and a blast of anger followed it. He shifted his gaze away from the females at the bar, to the point behind them where Olivia stood staring at him.
“Busted,” Kyter muttered and Loren glared at him.
He held his hand out to Olivia. She came to him, leading the way with Sable ambling along behind her, but didn’t take his hand. She sat on the stool beside him and settled against the bar, her profile to him. Kyter pushed the glass of coloured liquid to her and then slid one over to Sable when she finally reached the bar.
Loren barely leashed the growl that rumbled through his chest.
Bleu moved, grabbed one of the bottles of alcohol in front of them, and took a swig from it, and then another. Was Bleu irritated by the attention Kyter showed Sable?
Loren was more than irritated by the attention the male jaguar showed to Olivia.
But Olivia was annoyed with Loren too. He had been looking at those females and she had seen him, and she thought he was attracted to them. He could feel it in her.
What could he do to show Olivia that she was the only female he desired?
Being in the club with her, where she had been with that other male, a male who had hurt her and made it hard for her to trust another, and seeing so many other men looking at her was driving him crazy. He wanted to erase the demon from her heart and wanted to stamp his mark on her in front of all these males.
It was becoming impossible to resist touching her, even though he knew that she was still fragile and was still intent on fighting him, and that things were still precarious between them.
He hadn’t won her yet and this evening had made him feel he wasn’t even close to achieving the victory he fiercely desired.
Perhaps Kyter was right, and Bleu had chosen the best recourse.
He needed to dull the edge of his temper. If he were lucky, it would dampen his need for Olivia at the same time.
Loren picked up the bottle of beer, brought it to his lips and drank it down in one go.
CHAPTER 16
Olivia wasn’t sure what happened. One moment Loren was standing beside her and the next he was on his knees, growling dark things in his language. She looked past him to Bleu, who stood frozen with his beer in one hand and his eyes locked on Loren.
“Holy fuck.” Bleu awkwardly slammed his bottle down on the bar. It rocked and then fell, spilling the contents.
The nice man behind the bar swore too.
Loren’s ears went very pointy and just as Bleu stooped to help him up, he shot to his feet and shoved his hand into Bleu’s face, sending him flying backwards into an unsuspecting group of people. The two males pushed their females behind them, their eyes flashing red at the same time. Vampires.
The blond male in the group shoved Bleu aside and bared his fangs at her. A corona of gold fire and blue ice edged his crimson irises and elliptical pupils.
Olivia stared into his eyes, lost in the strange sensation of falling and the growing haziness that swept through her, heating her from head to toe.
A feral growl shattered the hold the male had on her and she shook her head, trying to recall where she was and what was happening.
Loren stood before her, his gaze locked on the blond male. A vampire or something else?
The two females had moved out from behind the males, their dark gazes narrowed on Loren and her. The one closest to the brunet male muttered something about taking Loren down with a kiss.