Replica(16)

“It means I’d like to get to know her on a more personal basis. She has a nice ass.” He winked at me and Rachel threw her glass at him. He ducked and came up with a frown etched on his mouth. There it was—the look of an enforcer.

Rachel gave him a long hard look before she said, “Why do you think we need you?”

He shook his head, and I pulled one silver stake out of the top of my boot and pointed it at him.

“Let me be crystal-fucking-clear. Rachel comes first. We get in trouble, I’m getting her out before I do anything else. You come with us, you better understand that. If she asks a question, answer it, wolf.”

Rachel’s surprise was a palpable sensation in the air, but I ignored it and kept my focus on Ivan.

His green-yellow eyes locked on mine. “You think vampires are the only ones with blood that has power? Werewolves age slowly. We don’t get sick. We heal faster than you vamps because we aren’t dead.”

“Fucking fantastic.” Rachel slapped the wall beside her with the flat of her hand. I tucked the stake back into the top of my boot.

“You going to listen to me, Ivan?” I asked.

“I’m going to help,” he countered.

That would have to be good enough.

“I’m going to hunt me up a vampire. It’ll be best to get the information straight from the horse’s mouth,” I said.

Rachel didn’t seem convinced. “That didn’t go so well last time.”

I grimaced. “Caine was an old vampire. They’re always a pain. I’ll look for someone younger.”

Her eyes met mine and I forced myself to hold her gaze. I had convinced a young vamp, Louis, to follow me back to Rachel’s now-destroyed apartment a few days ago. I’d hoped to chat him up, get some useful info. He really hadn’t been a lot of help other than to spill the beans about a vampire council I’d had no knowledge of. Rachel had asked me not to kill him. I’d promised I wouldn’t.

And then Calvin, whose vendetta against vampires had never faded, took the choice from me, killing Louis before I could stop him.

“That won’t happen again,” I said. “Calvin isn’t here. Ivan isn’t going to rip heads off unless we let him off his leash, right?”

I swung my gaze to the werewolf. He’d moved closer without me realizing it. While that should have worried me, a very small part was rather turned on. How long had it been since a man could match me for stealth, agility...stamina?

I took three quick steps back as my mind wandered to places I dared not go. “Ivan. You follow Rachel. I don’t trust the scientist she’s meeting later, and she might need backup.” I headed to the window, paused, and looked over my shoulder. “Remember where we met Sean and his buddies?”

She nodded.

“Meet there right after the meeting.”

I slipped out the window, the silk curtains billowing around me. I climbed up to the roof and then sprinted across to jump the gap to the next building. Time to find a vampire.





CHAPTER 8





RACHEL



I groaned as I watched Lea jump out the window. “For the record,” I said, turning to Ivan, “I don’t need a babysitter.”

He sat on the leather sofa and leaned back, extending his arm along the back and crossing his ankle over his knee. “You’ve proved that.”

I poured myself more whiskey in a new glass, then walked to the dining room table and pulled my laptop out of my bag. “So why aren’t you chasing after Lea?”

He shrugged and grabbed a remote, flicking on a large-screen TV attached to the wall. “She thinks you need someone to watch your back.”

“Keep your eyes off my ass and this might work.” I studied him as he cast a side-glance out the window. Hmmm…it would seem he was only interested in one ass—and it wasn’t mine. More relief than I’d expected accompanied that realization. I had enough to do—the last thing I needed was some beefcake making advances on me.

But from the look in Lea’s eyes, she enjoyed his attention.

Good for her. She was welcome to him.

I cast a nervous glance toward the door, wondering if maybe we should go someplace where we’d be less likely to be arrested for breaking and entering.

“I’ll hear someone coming,” Ivan said good-naturedly, keeping his eyes on the television screen. “We’ll have plenty of time to get out the window.”

Since I didn’t really want to find someplace else, I decided to trust him. I opened my browser using my hotspot and plugged in the address Hades had texted. A twenty-four-hour diner in the heart of the Financial District. I opened Google Earth to check out the surrounding businesses. Mostly office buildings and Starbucks. A dry cleaners. A jewelry store. Nothing else that would be open around that time. It would be a wasteland, all right.