January 15, 2004
He crouched in a red haze. Hunger. Everywhere. Pain burning his gut, gnawing, biting, coiled like a dragon, snarling and twisting and devouring itself. He no longer knew how long he’d been locked away. Why he’d been locked away.
Enemies. Hate. Death watching him with red dragon eyes, eating him alive from the inside.
A sound.
He lifted his head like a wolf. Stared at the reinforced steel door pockmarked with dents. Someone at the door. He inhaled. BLOOD! Enemy! He knew that smell. His mouth flooded with saliva. Strength flooded his weakened body.
Animal cunning stirred. No! Play dead. He ducked his head and curled tighter on his side on the cold cement floor. Smelled blood on his own hands from battering the door. Managed not to bite.
Creak of the warped door being forced open. “Jesus, Cade, it stinks in here!” German accent. Enemy. “And what the fuck have you done to the door?”
Scrape of shoes on concrete. He coiled tighter, the Dragon’s flame searing his belly.
“Not so pretty now, are you, you bastard?” The voice sounded smug. “Guess that’ll teach you to piss off Ridgemont, you stupid --”
He exploded off the floor, slammed into the prey, took him down, forced up his head. Dove for the throat. Bit.
BLOOD! BLOOD! BLOODbloodbloodbloodblood
Didn’t feel the massive fists battering his ribs, hear the screams, too lost in the delicious sensation of hot red life in his mouth, the Dragon humming in pleasure as it gorged.
ENEMY! He knew the scent, the footsteps. He bit deeper, drank harder, ignored the rib that cracked under a desperately vicious blow from the prey’s fist.
“Get him off me!” Shriek of terror.
“Let him go, gunslinger.” Vicious power wrapped around his mind, but the Dragon was stronger. He snarled against his prey’s throat and refused to obey.
Something massive struck him a stunning blow in the side of the head. His jaws unlocked. Felt himself rising, jerked away from the life-giving flow of red. No! He twisted like a cat in the Enemy’s grip, drove for the bull neck. Glimpsed startled fury on Ridgemont’s face.
A fist knocked him into darkness.
* * *
Something soft, vibrating, under his head. He tried to move. He was bound. He snarled and began to struggle.
“Stop it, gunslinger.” The black, familiar power coiled around him tighter than the thick chains on his wrists. Locked his muscles, froze him.
“He’s gone mad.” The German’s voice. Hoarse. Hurt him. Good.
“Two weeks of starvation will do that. You’re lucky he didn’t rip out your throat, you idiot. I warned you.”
Car. They were in a car. He was bound in the back seat of a car.
The Dragon stirred and coiled and began to bite at his guts. He shuddered. Locked a whimper behind his teeth.
The car stopped. Ridgemont and Hirsch got out. He heard their voices retreat. Leaving him alone with the Dragon. It coiled and snapped. Red pain rolled over his head, submerged him in the cold, burning madness.
He’d lost track of how long he floated in insanity when the car door finally opened. A big hand grabbed his shoulder. Flipped him over. He wanted to struggle, but the Enemy’s power kept him still.
Chains clicked and fell away. The Enemy seized his collar, hauled him out of the car. “Come on, gunslinger. You don’t want to miss this. If you’re good, I’ll even give you someone.”
Some tiny, sane fragment of his mind knew he’d kill any victim he was handed. It moaned a protest, but the rest of him was too wrapped in the Dragon’s coils to care. Famished, mad, he staggered up a cement walkway, half-carried by his Enemy’s grip on his elbow.
Through the dragon’s fogging breath, he heard screams coming from a big brick colonial just ahead. His own howl built in his throat, emerged as a strangled whimper.
Bad. This was bad.
The Enemy pushed him through a set of tall wooden doors. Just across the threshold, Cade almost stumbled across a male body lying unconscious on the floor. BLOOD! Instinctively, he started to dive for the new prey.
“Stop!”
The Enemy’s will jerked him short like a wolf on a chain. He snarled and fought, but Ridgemont held him still long enough for something sane to realize that if he touched the mortal, he’d kill him. He fought for control… only to almost lose it again when he realized the shrieks he heard were coming from a woman Hirsch was raping on the couch. Her panic rolled over him, made the Dragon roar. He tried to lunge again, but the Enemy wrapped him in power. Frozen, tormented, he lost himself in the red fog, barely aware of the screams and pleas of his enemies’ victims.
Gray eyes. Terror. “Mommy! Daddy!”
He jolted out of the dragon’s grip to see a little girl staring at them from the doorway.
Where was he? What the hellfire was going on?
Disoriented, Cade gazed around at the elegantly appointed living room. Hirsch had a naked woman down on the couch, feeding as he fucked her. Ridgemont held a struggling, screaming man who battered at him even with the ancient’s fangs buried in his throat. He dimly recognized the guy on the floor. Poor devil must have come to.
The smell of blood almost cut Cade’s legs from under him. The Hunger had never been so vicious in all his years as a vampire. He fumbled for an explanation. Ridgemont had been starving him. He didn’t know how long. Days, weeks. He tried to remember why. Couldn’t.
The child was watching, her face stricken and pale. She shouldn’t see this. Instinctively, Cade fought Ridgemont’s psychic hold, wanting to go to her, take her away from this.
His moment of sanity attracted his sire’s attention.
“Well,” the ancient purred, thrusting his prey away with a backhanded slap that knocked the man out cold again. “If it isn’t little Valerie Chase.”
Gray eyes widened as the girl stepped back, but Ridgemont crossed the living room so fast, she had no time to run. She screamed as he snatched her thin forearm and dug the thumbnail of one hand into it. Blood welled. The child grabbed the cut and stared up at him in hurt bewilderment. He grinned down into her shocked eyes and let her go. “Run.”
With a wail of terror, she obeyed.
Ridgemont turned to Cade, freed his locked muscles, and drove a new compulsion into his brain: “Kill her.”
And the Dragon roared an explosion of flame that seared his sanity away.
Blood blood bloodbloodbloodblood
Running. Chasing the prey. Stink of terror, delicious terror. Blood filling the air, hot, sweet copper musk…
neednowfeedbitekillfeedfeedbloodscreambabyscreaming
Baby screaming… Baby?
Cade jolted back to sanity to find himself standing in a nursery facing a twelve-year-old girl who clutched a howling toddler. “Stay away!” the girl spat, her gray eyes huge as she pulled the baby protectively close.
He opened his mouth to tell her he’d never hurt a child… and scented the blood trickling down her arm. The Dragon lashed in his brain, backed by the ferocious weight of Ridgemont’s command. He could almost taste her life, hot and sweet. Just what his aching, cramping body so desperately needed.
Staring at the red runnel snaking down her thin arm, Cade felt his empty stomach wrench with sickening horror. Normally he could control the amount he drank, but his sire had starved him too long and planted the compulsion to kill too deep. He was about to become a murderer.
No!
Determination, sick and desperate, stiffened his spine. He’d done things he wasn’t proud of in three years of war, a decade as a Texas Ranger, one hundred and thirty-eight years as a vampire. But he’d never harmed a child, and Cade was damned if he’d start today. He’d rather die himself.
If he could just reduce her fear somehow. Terror, like any strong emotion, made the Hunger worse.
He flung out his will to touch hers. “Sleep,” Cade said, and was distantly surprised at the broken rasp of his own voice. “You’re safe. Just go to sleep.”
The child should have collapsed like a marionette with cut strings. Instead, she met his gaze and sneered. “Do you think I’m stupid, mister? I heard him tell you to kill us.” She backed up another step, hugging her sister, who had blessedly stopped screaming to cling like a frightened monkey. “But you’d better not do it, ‘cause they’ll put you in jail!”
Oh, God, she’s Kith, Cade realized numbly. On top of everything else, she’s one of us. If she hadn’t been, she could never have resisted his command.
He drew in a breath, and her blood scent rolled over him again, maddening the Dragon. He felt his muscles coil to leap. Somehow, he managed to drop to his knees. “Get out, dammit!” Cade gasped. “Get out before he makes me kill you! Now!” He could feel his strength failing as the Dragon coiled in his guts.
He lifted his head to meet her gaze, hot with fear and revulsion and the need to live.
Gray eyes. So wide. Burning with astonishing power. Reaching out to him. Pulling him in. Touching him. Knowing him. As he touched her, knew her, felt her purity, her strength. Her power. Power that for an instant chained the Dragon until he could find his own strength.
“You’re not going to kill us.” His mind reverberated like a bell with the strength of her will.
“No,” he said. It was a holy oath, sworn mind to mind, a vow that would bind him from then on. “I’ll protect you.” From Ridgemont. From himself.
The child’s eyes flicked past him toward the door. Ridgemont was in the living room, blocking her escape. Both of them knew she’d never get past him.
“That way.” Cade pointed toward the nursery window behind her. “Climb out and run to your neighbor’s. They’ll protect you. I’ll keep Ridgemont from following.” Somehow.
She stared at him, those eyes so much wiser than a child’s had any business being. “What about Mom and Dad?”
“I’ll save them.” He’d try. He’d probably fail, but he’d try.
She turned toward the window and reached for it with one hand, the baby still in her arms. He realized she’d never be able to raise it.
Grinding his teeth with the effort, Cade reached past her to grab the sash, though it brought him too close to her tempting throat. He jerked upward, and it lifted with a thunderous shriek of wood and reverberating glass.
He turned and caught the child by the shoulders -- and damn near lost control as the scent of her blood flooded his head. The Dragon clawed at him, but he fought it off and jerked her into the air. Still clutching her baby sister, Valerie shrieked as he thrust them both out through the window. The instant her feet hit the ground, Cade snatched back his hands as though her skin burned his. “Run, dammit!”
And she did, never looking back. He watched her go, fighting the horrible instinct to chase her.
Instead, he turned and ran toward the living room.
And let the Dragon have him.
* * *
Cade’s eyes snapped open as he jerked upright, swallowing a bellow of rage. Rubbing his hands over his sweating face, he thanked God Valerie hadn’t shared this particular dream.
He shuddered, still tasting the ghost memory of Ridgemont’s blood. He’d been too late to save Valerie’s parents, but he’d kept Hirsch and the ancient so busy trying to fight him off that the police had almost caught them all. For the first time, his sire had been utterly unable to control him. It took another twelve years to break Ridgemont’s mental grip entirely, but that night the ancient had been forced to beat him unconscious before they could make their escape.
Shaking off the remnants of the nightmare, Cade glanced down at himself. Despite the stink of dried blood, he could tell his injuries had healed. Unfortunately, the repairs had come at a cost, as they always did -- they’d brought back the Hunger. Luckily it wasn’t the roaring crimson dragon of his nightmare, just the usual pale rose need that could be satisfied by an hour in a woman’s arms and a cupful of her blood.
As he rolled out of bed, he spotted his own reflection. His uniform hung on his bloody body in gray shreds. Damn good thing I’ve got a spare in the closet. Shower first, he decided, then dress.
Then hunt.
* * *
Jump Shots was a classic Brooklyn blue-collar bar with a TV set tuned to ESPN and autographed basketball jerseys tacked to the paneled walls. It wasn’t the sort of place where the young and trendy went, but then, Cade wasn’t interested in young and trendy.
Moving easily after the day’s healing sleep, he slid a hip onto a stool where he could watch the room in the long mirror behind the bar. Opening his consciousness to the crowd, he allowed their thoughts to flood his mind, borne on a tide of alcohol, anger, or sex. But they weren’t what he needed, so he brushed past them like a man walking through tall grass.
Then he sensed her.
Cade turned to focus on the woman with a predator’s intensity. She sat alone in a shadowed corner, defeat weighing her shoulders into a leaden slump. Reaching into her mind, he learned she was Jean Riggs, a middle-aged schoolteacher whose husband had recently found someone two decades younger. Her need for companionship was almost as acute as his for blood. He rose from his stool with a confidence born of decades of seduction.
When Cade slid into the booth across from her, Jean flinched, startled. Taking in his face, her eyes widened in automatic alarm. A glance into her mind told him she thought he was too young and too good-looking to be interested in her for any good reason.
Before she could obey her instinct to jump up and leave, he leaned forward. “You don’t have to be afraid of me.” He touched her mind and took away the fear.
And she smiled.
* * *
Val sat hunched in the uncomfortable airline seat, staring out the window at the lights jeweling the night-shrouded landscape below the 747’s wing. Wispy clouds stole past like fleeing ghosts, glowing faintly in the milk-pale light of the full moon that rode the horizon.
Her eyes felt so scratchy with exhaustion, she let them close. After last night’s restless dreams followed by a day spent packing for this trip, she felt drained. With a sigh, she slid into sleep.
And began to dream.
* * *
Cowboy was cheating on her.
He loomed over the strange woman, one of her plump thighs draped over his arm, a big hand gripping the bend of her other knee, holding her legs spread wide. The tight, hard muscles of his abdomen laced as he slowly pumped his thick shaft deep.
Bastard!
Valerie seethed in jealous rage as the woman tossed her head on the pillow, graying hair tangled around her face as she gasped in time to his rolling hips. He watched her, his expression absorbed and sensual, his eyes blazing crimson. His partner either didn’t notice the demonic glow or was too lost in pleasure to care.
He rumbled something and shifted positions, moving over her, mantling her with his much bigger body. Muscle rippled up and down his broad back, flexing in the tight hemispheres of his butt with every thrust. She surged up against him until his curling chest hair teased the tips of her nipples. Her small, soft hands clawed at the tangled sheets. Eyes clenched shut, she keened softly, coming, pushing her head into the pillow, arching her throat.
His eyes glowed brighter and his sensuous lips parted to reveal canines that were an inch long. He bent his head toward the tight, thin skin over her pulse. Just above it, he paused. A slow, hot smile of anticipation spread over his handsome face.
Then he took her, sinking his fangs into her throat. She jerked against him with a gasp of shocked delight.
Horror stirred in Val’s mind. He’d kill the poor woman! She struggled to wake, but the dream held her fast.
He circled his hips, screwing deep while he drank. The woman convulsed, screaming hoarsely, but not in pain.
In pleasure.
With a muffled growl, he rolled over with her, spreading her over his body. One strong hand locked in the soft, generous flesh of her bottom while the other fisted in her hair as if to prevent her escape. His jaw worked as he simultaneously surged upward, giving her such long, deep plunges that his big shaft almost slipped free with every driving thrust.
Suddenly the woman he held changed -- grew younger, slimmer, the hair fisted in his hand taking on a rich, autumnal copper.
Val recognized herself wrapped in Cowboy’s vampire grip. Opening her eyes, she shuddered with helpless ecstasy as he fucked and fed on her.
* * *
She snapped awake with a gasp.
Wildly, she stared around the 747 at the passengers around her, some sleeping, some gazing, bored, out the plane’s windows at the shimmering night.
A dream, Vale thought, blinking hard as she scrubbed a shaking hand over her face. It was only a dream. She slumped back into her seat, then stiffened convulsively as the movement rasped hardened nipples against the lace of her bra. A flush burned her cheeks as she realized she was very wet.
* * *
“Oh, God, oh God, oh GOD!” Jean chanted as Cade drove his cock upward into her plump, soft body. He could feel himself growing stronger as her orgasm fed him, the intensity of her emotion so sweet and hot it was maddening. Her pleasure kicked him into his own, and he growled out his climax against her throat.
As it crested and began to recede, he was tempted to force her even higher. But he’d brought her to peak four times already, and to take any more would leave her dangerously weak. He withdrew his fangs from her throat and rolled onto his side, cradling her close.
For a moment Cade allowed himself to savor the sweet, rare peace, the pure animal satiety of his own body. Jean felt so deliciously warm, so deliciously female. He closed his eyes and wrapped himself in her scent, the softness of her skin, the taste of her musk lingering on his tongue.
Yet inside him, something felt… empty, as it always did after he fed. He knew why, of course.
His partner wasn’t Val. They never were.
But maybe soon…
No. He pushed the temptation away. Even if he succeeded in rescuing his dream lover, he’d never allow himself to touch her. He didn’t dare. He wasn’t sure he could resist the urge to Change her, make her completely his.
Betray her trust.
Shaking off that depressing thought, Cade reached for Jean’s mind and removed the memory of his bite. Glimpsing other mental wounds he hadn’t inflicted, he prepared to repair those as well. He owed her for what she’d given him, and he paid his debts.
He could feel her bewilderment. Why had he chosen her, of all people? In her mind, she ticked off her own flaws -- the twenty-five extra pounds she’d never managed to lose, the strands of gray in her hair, the mouth that was too wide. He could have had a younger, more beautiful woman.
He could have told her that a younger, more beautiful woman wouldn’t have responded with the starved intensity she’d given him. Instead, he kissed the top of her graying head and said softly, “You were amazing.”
Jean laughed, the sound too close to a sob. “My ex-husband doesn’t think so.”
In her mind, he could see the hundred little cruelties Gary had inflicted as he’d worked himself up into leaving her. Cade’s grip tightened as he entertained the pleasant fantasy of hunting the man down and beating him bloody. “Why do you care what that bastard thinks? He didn’t even have the sense to recognize the treasure he had in you.”
She lifted skeptical hazel eyes to his, thinking he was being kind.
Cade met her gaze and used his power. “Don’t let it eat at you anymore, Jean. Life’s too short. There’ll be another man, another love.”
She lowered her lids. “But not you.”
“No,” he said. He liked her, liked her kindness and hidden sensuality. But she wasn’t Val.
Since he couldn’t say that, he gave her another simple truth instead. “I take too much.” Though he never drank more than a pint of blood over the course of a night, he could kill or dangerously weaken his partners if he took them too often. He never slept with anyone more than once. “You need a man who’ll give. And you’ll find him.”
“Oh,” she said in a small voice.
He caught her chin and brought her eyes to meet his. “You’re a wonderful woman. Believe in yourself.”
Jean’s mind seized Cade’s telepathic suggestion and released her doubts. A brilliant smile spread across her face. She wrapped her arms around him, cuddling close. Slowly, gently, he stroked a hand through her hair, allowing himself to savor the moment’s warmth. If he fought Ridgemont and lost, it might be the last he’d ever know.
Finally, with a regretful sigh, he urged her into sleep. He was due at the airport -- and his duel for Valerie’s life.
* * *
Val watched the lights of the runway speed upward to meet the plane, fighting the nervous jitter in her stomach. She was not, dammit, rushing toward her doom. And no matter what her overactive imagination insisted, Cowboy was not waiting down there to claim and betray her.
There is no such thing as vampires. And Cowboy’s just a dream, she told herself firmly, forcing away the image of herself writhing astride his grinding hips with his fangs sunk deep in her throat.
* * *
Ridgemont had not come to meet Val’s plane.
Grim, Cade scanned airport lobby, but the ancient’s dark mental signature was nowhere in evidence. It didn’t make sense.
Frowning, he turned and studied Bobby Mason, who leaned against the information center flirting with the pretty girl who manned it. Mason was Ridgemont’s backup driver, but according to Cade’s mental scan, he didn’t remember bringing either of the vampires with him. Of course, his memories could have been altered. Probably had been.
Ridgemont was no fool; he had to know kidnaping Val would be Cade’s next move. And Mason damn well couldn’t stop him from doing it. Which meant this was a trap.
Unfortunately, it seemed Cade had no choice except to walk into it.
He stepped up behind the chauffeur and murmured in his ear, “Hey, Bobby.”
Mason straightened and jerked around. “What the fuck are you doing here?” he demanded, eyes widening in his square, pleasantly beefy face. He glanced back at the suddenly alert airport rep, then grabbed Cade’s elbow and dragged him off to one side. Lowering his voice, he hissed, “You know how long it took the bomb squad to disarm that thing you left in the limo?”
Cade winced. He hadn’t thought of that. “Anybody get hurt?”
“No, but where the hell did you get all that C-4?” His eyes flickered toward a Transit cop who was frowning at them suspiciously. Cade caught the man’s gaze and compelled him to lose interest in the conversation. The cop glanced away, and Mason relaxed, though he dropped his voice even more. “That’s military ordnance. They control that shit like nuclear material.” He used to be in the Army.
Cade shrugged. “Took it off a nutjob white supremacist. Figured it would be put to better use killing Ridgemont than blowing up a synagogue.”
“Do I want to know what happened to the asshole?”
“He gave a full confession to the Feds. I think he’s awaiting trial.” Cade met the mortal’s hazel eyes. “Bobby, you need to take a walk. I’ll give Ridgemont’s guest a ride back to the house.”
“Are you nuts?” Mason rocked back on his heels. “You left a half-pound resignation letter wired to the ignition!”
“No, I didn’t.” He reached into the other man’s mind and gently laid the force of his will across it.
“Oh.” The chauffeur’s face went blank as he instantly forgot about the assassination attempt. “Sure, Cade. Whatever you say.” Turning, he wandered off.
With a sigh, Cade folded his arms and settled back against the wall to scan for Ridgemont and Hirsch. And wait, one eye on a nearby departures board.
When he saw that Val’s flight had arrived, he straightened and moved toward the escalator she’d descend once she arrived.
His gut knotted. This could get nasty.
Chances were good she’d recognize him, either as Cowboy or the vampire who’d almost killed her seventeen years before. Of course, he’d been thin and half-starved back then, and she didn’t believe Cowboy existed, so that might buy him a little time. But eventually it would hit her who he was.
And she wasn’t going to be happy about it.
If she became hysterical in the airport, things would get dicey in a hurry. The latent psychic powers that made her a candidate for vampirism meant he’d be unable to influence her mind. If she started screaming, he’d have a hell of a time shutting her up before she attracted dangerous attention. Even he couldn’t control a pack of pissed-off airport cops. That many minds would be impossible to manage.
He really needed to get lucky for once, Cade thought grimly, pulling his cap down over his eyes. Fortunately, his black chauffeur’s uniform was as far from his Texas Ranger’s jeans and Stetson as it was possible to get. Maybe that would buy him just enough time.
Watching the down escalator, he saw a group of deplaning passengers headed his way -- families towing weary children, businesspeople draped like pack mules with laptop cases and carry-ons. As they poured past him, New York relatives met visiting family members with squeals and hugs.
Then he spotted a familiar, long-legged figure riding the escalator, the strap of a laptop hooked over one shoulder. His throat tightened at the sweet symmetry of her face and the lush, tight curve of her breasts and hips.
Valerie.
She looked just as she always had in his dreams. Her face was a delicate oval set off by a pointed little chin and narrow nose, but her mouth was lush, with a hint of a wicked smile playing around its corners. She wore a summer weight cream suit that managed cool professionalism even as it hugged her long legs. A silk blouse provided discreet coverage for round, pert breasts he knew from personal experience made a delightful handful. The blouse’s mint green fabric contrasted against the dramatic tumble of auburn hair that frothed around her slim shoulders.
Valerie. There, in the flesh. Close enough to touch.
Cade’s knees actually went weak.
* * *
“Okay,” Val muttered, stepping off the escalator as she scanned the crowd for anyone who appeared to be searching for her. Mr. Ridgemont’s secretary had said she’d send a driver, though how Val was supposed to recognize him in this mob was anybody’s guess. Maybe he’d have a sign with her name on it, like they did in the movies. “So where are you?” She lifted onto her toes, wondering if he’d be wearing one of those gray chauffeur outfits. The only man she’d seen in a uniform was that handsome cop she’s spotted on the way down…
“Valerie Chase?”
Val turned to see a broad chest covered in black linen, met the man’s eyes, and blinked. At five-foot-nine, she didn’t have to look up at many men, especially when she was wearing heels. It’s the cop, she thought, taking in the billed black uniform hat he wore. Then she looked again and realized her mistake. It was a chauffeur’s cap, tilted down over short black hair that looked as if it would have liked to curl if not for its ruthless cut.
“Ms. Chase, I’m Cade McKinnon,” the man said, extending a big, gloved hand in greeting. “I’m Mr. Ridgemont’s driver. He sent me to pick you up.”
His face was long and angular, with broad, jutting cheekbones, a deeply cleft chin, and a narrow nose. Despite those aggressively stern features, his mouth was intensely sensuous, with the kind of generous, mobile lips that could kiss and charm with equal skill.
Val shook off her reaction to his sculpted male beauty and opened her mouth to attempt a professional greeting. Just as she met his eyes.
Framed by thick lashes under black brows, his irises were a rich, dark chocolate. God, she thought, forgetting what she was about to say, he’s got the most beautiful eyes I’ve ever seen… Entranced, she looked deeper.
Suffering. Ruthless determination. And hunger -- devouring, threatening, somehow erotic.
She froze. It was Cowboy.