“Men,” Kara said with some disgust, pushing herself out of her chair. “I’m going to the bar. You want another one of those things?” She gestured to Ellie’s empty glass.
“Yeah. Hit me.”
As Kara left, Hunter’s reply came through.
Not at 1am you’re not.
“Oh for Christ’s sake.” The pair of them always treated her like she was ten years old, not twenty-five. Especially Hunter. He persisted in seeing her only as Vin’s little sister, not as a woman fully capable of looking after herself. God, she’d be ecstatic if he even thought of her as a woman, period. Irritated, Ellie sent him a snarky response.
The taxi rank is right outside the conference centre. I think I’ll be safe from attack in the two seconds it takes me to get there.
She rested her phone on her knee, looking toward the bar. Kara was standing next to Tall Spock and engaging in some animated conversation. Maybe Kara would get lucky. God knew her friend could use lucky.
The handset chimed another message.
I’m in town anyway. Indulge me, sweetness.
Ellie cursed. Hunter didn’t tend to order her around, unlike Vin, who was autocratic as hell. He did have a line, of course, though before he got to that line he used a combination of laidback charm, gentle insistence and blatant emotional manipulation to get her to do what he wanted. The prick.
Chewing on her lip, Ellie flicked him off a sulky fine text. Protesting was futile since he never took no for an answer. Especially when it came to “looking out for her” as he termed it.
Man, she couldn’t wait to get out of the country and away from Hunter’s protective tendencies.
“Here’s your drink.” Returning from the bar, Kara put another cocktail down on the table.
“Thanks.” Ellie grabbed the glass and downed a good portion of it, hoping the liquid would cool the anger suddenly festering in her gut. Hunter would pick up on it and ask her what was wrong, and then she’d have to make up some shit about why she was angry.
It’s you, you bastard. I’m angry at you. Because I want you. I’ve wanted you for years. My last relationship died because I can’t get you out of my head. And now leaving the country is the only option I have for getting away from you because you’re always a-freaking-round!
Oh yeah, she should so tell him that word for word. That would go down like a cup of cold sick.
“So…” Kara lowered herself down into the chair, an unexpectedly pensive look on her face. “Uh…how long are you planning on being here?”
“Why? Hunter texted that he’s coming to give me a lift home, but I’m considering telling him to piss off.”
“Oh. Well.” Her friend began to toy with the strap of her vast messenger bag. “Just thinking it may be a good idea to go with him.”
Ellie sat forward, putting her glass on the table. “What? Why? I thought we were going to have a big night?”
Kara’s smile was half apologetic, half nervous. “Yeah, I know but…I have to go, Ell. I’ve got a…a thing.”
“A thing?”
But Kara was already rising to her feet, gripping her bag tightly. “Yeah, a thing. Sorry. You’ll be okay going home with Hunter then? I don’t want to leave you alone.”
“You’re going? Now?”
“I kind of have to. Hunter will be coming soon?”
“Uh, yeah, I guess so. But—”
“Great. Awesome.” The worried look disappeared off Kara’s face. “Good con, babe. Come see me tomorrow—uh, on second thoughts not tomorrow. Day after. Okay? Good?”
“Kara,” Ellie said with some exasperation. “What the hell?”
Her friend sighed. “I can’t talk about it now. Sorry. But I do have to go. You’ll be okay?”
“You’ve asked me that three times and yes, I’ll be okay.” She gave Kara a narrow look. “Nothing’s wrong, is it?”
“Oh no.” A strange expression appeared on the other woman’s face. “Not wrong.” Then Kara blinked and went on, “But I do have to go. Like now.”
Ellie let out a sigh, waving her gun in a dismissive motion. “Fine. Go then. I’ll see you when I see you.”
“Cool. See ya, babe.” Kara turned away, dodging through the crowded bar, her gaze on her phone that she’d now taken out of her bag. As if Ellie had ceased to exist.
Ellie pulled a face and sat back in her chair, trying not to feel ignored and failing. The festering anger burned a little brighter, aided by cocktail number five. Tonight she’d planned on a big blowout, a prelude to leaving for Tokyo: NZCon, the perfect excuse for a party. But what did she get? First, she had to put up with her brother and Hunter interfering, then her friend had walked out on her for seemingly no reason at all. And now here she was waiting to be taken home like a kid after a school dance.
She’d bypassed irritation and gone straight to pissed. Mightily pissed.
Ellie raised her gun and pointed it at the bar door.
Stupid, bloody Hunter Chase was so going to get it.
Hunter stopped inside the entrance to the bar and looked around. Jesus. The place looked like a fucking freak show, full of escapees from every comic book, sci-fi movie and computer game known to man. Not that he had a problem with that per se. It was only that all the weird costumes around were going to make tracking Ellie down damn near impossible.
As he moved farther into the bizarrely costumed crowd, a woman wearing nothing but a fur bikini stopped near him and smiled, catching his eye. “Hey,” she said in a sultry voice, giving him the once-over. “I like it. What are you supposed to be?”
Hunter smiled. “A lawyer, honey.”
She laughed, taking in his worn jeans, black T-shirt and leather jacket. “And here was I thinking Ghost Rider.” She put a hand on his arm. “Well, whatever you are, wanna buy me a drink?”
Hunter shifted discreetly, letting her hand slip off his arm. He didn’t like to be touched, especially by strangers. “Sorry, sweetheart. I’m only here to pick up a friend. Maybe another time.”
The woman pouted, but by that time he’d moved on, casting around for any sign of Ellie.
Vin had been very specific about where she was, not to mention most insistent about her being picked up. He’d had something “come up” urgently and couldn’t do it himself, but Hunter didn’t mind doing the job. He’d been helping Vin look out for Ellie since she was eight years old, and doing so was instinctive. Besides, he’d been in town having a couple of drinks with some of the boys from the construction firm he and Vin owned. Giving Ellie a lift was no skin off his nose and far better than her wandering around town in the middle of the night, looking for a cab by herself.
He did another sweep of the crowd, trying to spot Ellie’s tall figure and copper-red hair and coming up with nothing. Shit, where the hell was she?
Abruptly he caught sight of a woman in an armchair in one corner of the bar. She wore some kind of tight-fitting black jumpsuit that looked like it had come from one of the fetish clubs around the corner, a silver belt circling her narrow waist and a couple of gun holsters strapped to her thighs. The neckline of the jumpsuit nearly went to her belly button, leaving bare a quantity of very white skin. She was holding a fake gun, the muzzle pointed very definitely at him.
Hunter narrowed his gaze at the woman. Her small, precise features were lost under a metric ton of mascara and heavy black eyeliner, but they looked sort of familiar. Her eyes were the most startling shade of green rather than misty gray and her hair was black rather than red but…
Jesus Christ. It was Ellie.
She’d always been a bit way out there with her dress sense, going for a Goth girl look, but even with the tartan minis and tight black jeans she favoured, she never showed much in the way of skin. Unlike now.
Fuck. What the hell was she doing wearing that? He didn’t like it. Not one bit. He wasn’t one to get judgmental about women’s clothing, but Ellie Fox wasn’t really a woman. She was Vin’s sister. Vin’s little sister. And Vin’s little sister shouldn’t be wearing an outfit more appropriate to a bondage club than a city bar.
He started toward her, making his way through the crowd to the corner where she sat watching him, a decidedly pissed-off look on her face. Probably because she resented him coming to get her. Too bad. He’d never left her alone to fend for herself, not once. He wasn’t about to start now.
“There you are.” Hunter came to a stop behind the empty chair facing her. “I didn’t recognise you in your bondage outfit.”
She scowled at him. With her heavy-looking platform boots resting on the table and one hand outstretched with the gun pointed directly at his forehead, she looked almost…dangerous. An odd thought considering Ellie Fox had always been an open, sweet girl.
“It’s not a bondage outfit, idiot,” she said. “I’m Dark Shadow. From my game.”
Hunter leaned his elbows along the back of the chair in front of him. “You’re dressed as your own heroine?”
“Promo.” The muzzle of the gun wobbled a bit. “And you’re sounding a touch judgmental, Chase.”
A small bolt of surprise went through him at the snarky tone in her voice. Ellie never got angry with him. Never showed her anger, period. She wasn’t one for confrontation, tending to retreat in on herself when she got mad or when other people got mad at her. And yet now she stared at him with a decidedly belligerent look in her startling green eyes.