A Cat's Chance in Hell (11 page)

As he stepped into the light cast from a taller building she could see more of the newcomer. He was very tall, well over the 6 ft mark, his broad shoulders were emphasized by a full length leather coat, that she could
n’t help thinking must have been tailor-made to fit him. His hair was slightly longer than fashionable, in varying shades of dark blonde and brown and curling softly into his collar. His face could easily have been on the cover of any one of a dozen fashion magazines. He was the epitome of maleness in the hard angles of his cheek bones and jaw, and his dark eyebrows; offset by a sensual pair of lips and eyes framed by thick dark eyelashes that most women would give their first born child for. He was, quite simply, the most strikingly attractive man Gabi had ever seen in her life. Her heart felt like it stuttered a few beats while she took him in, before she forced her usual mask of haughty, nonchalance back into place.

“
You have me at a disadvantage Mr….” She left it hanging. She purposefully stared straight into his eyes, though she was by no means sure she would be immune to such an immensely powerful Vampire.

He flashed a brilliant smile, clearly displaying his pearl-white fangs, his expression taking on a sardonic edge.
“Of course, I am being rude. Forgive me, as I am not often in the company of one with such an esteemed reputation.”

Gaby raised her eyebrows but decided to keep her mouth shut for once.

He continued, “My name is Julius, and I would very much like to make your acquaintance.” He was still smiling mildly at her, keeping very still, and watching her reactions closely.

“
I take it then that you are the uh, Master, that Liam was referring to,” Gaby asked, trying to keep her voice steady. “The one who wanted to meet with me?” She tried to keep her voice even, and not show any sign of her injuries. She resisted the urge to cradle her injured arm to her body. Openly displaying weakness in front of an aggressive Vampire was courting a short trip to hell.

“
Yes, indeed,
” he replied. “I hope my envoys were clear and polite in their extension of my invitation.” He spoke slowly, with measured words, his voice low and husky.

She wondered if he knew how utterly mesmerising his voice was. She mentally shook herself,
scanning again and realising that the Vampire numbers had now grown to over a dozen, her heart jolted with a new surge of adrenaline, and she suddenly became highly aware of the blood seeping down from her shoulder. The Vampire in front of her suddenly stiffened and her left hand flashed to Nex’s hilt.

“
No.” He said in a flat, dead voice. “It would seem they were anything but friendly.” He was now radiating fury, but oddly
it didn’t seem directed at Gabi. He didn’t even seem to notice when she slipped Nex free of her sheath. He looked over her head and bit out the words, “Why is she bleeding?”

Gabi knew instantly why this Vampire was deemed Master of the City. The power rolled off of him in waves. It was like standing too close to a bonfire. A male Vampire stepped out of the shadows to her right, he had his head bowed deeply, but Gabi recognised Liam’s voice as he spoke.

“
Sire,” he began in a rough voice. “My deepest apologies. Genevieve’s temper got the better of her, and the rest of us were not quick enough to intervene in time.”

The cold fury on The Master’s face did not change as he demanded.
“Where is Genevieve?” His eyes scanned the roof quickly.

Liam’s head did not lift as he answered. “
Miss Bradford defended herself against Genevieve’s attack Sire.”

“
So she is gone?” Julius demanded.

Liam gave a quick nod of his head.

Gabi tightened her grip on Nex, no way was she getting out of this one alive if the Master considered Genevieve’s death malicious, but she would take a couple more with her, she thought fiercely.

“
And Stephan?” Julius demanded again, coldly but seeming completely under control.

“
Stephan tried to avenge Genevieve’s death. Nathan and I tried to talk sense into him, but he was incensed, out of his mind.”
Liam shook his head sadly.

“
You and Nathan took him down?” Julius asked, sounding completely matter of fact, as though it was a normal occurrence

“
No Sire.” Liam seemed to hang his head a little more. “He managed to get past us. Miss Bradford took him down too.”

Julius’s
eyes flashed with something that seemed a little like surprise as his concentration flicked back to Gaby. A muscle twitched in his jaw as he spoke through slightly clenched teeth. “I should never have given in to Stephan’s suggestion that Genevieve join the operation. I will speak to you and Nathan later. I expect a full debriefing.” The threat in his voice was implicit, and Gaby could almost feel sorry for Liam, if she wasn’t feeling so utterly exposed herself.

Gaby felt her body beginning to shake and knew that the adrenaline high was about to wear off. She closed her eyes for a brief second while she tried to collect herself, and when she opened them again he was standing mere inches from her. She flinched back automatically, but held her ground, tipping her head back to see his face. He looked to be assessing her, probably noting her hammering heart and quivering body. He seemed oblivious to Nex held tight in her left hand. He reached for her right arm, he could obviously smell the blood seeping down from the bite Genevieve had inflicted on her shoulder. As he brought her arm up, as if to inspect it, pain slammed into her. She pulled back from him, letting out a gasp and collapsing to her knees, her head reeling and nausea threatening to overwhelm her. She dropped Nex and wrapped her left arm protectively over the right; cradling it. She closed her eyes and fought the nausea down, trying to breathe evenly, feeling a cold sweat pop out on her forehead. Too late to hide the extent of her weakness now. If she had been in any less pain she would’ve been very surprised to hear his voice sounding apologetic as he crouched down in front of her.

“
I am sorry,” he said, sounding almost contrite. “I was not aware you were that badly injured. You hide pain well, too well for your own good it seems.” He sounded like he was musing to himself now. Then he suddenly became businesslike. “It seems my original plan for our meeting has gone completely awry, we must see to your injuries first, most pressingly the dislocation of your shoulder.”

Shit, how did he know it was dislocated? Gaby wondered disjointedly, he had hardly touched her. She brushed the thought away, trying instead to concentrate on getting to her feet and finding a way out of this mess. She briefly considered trying to bring in some bats to create enough confusion for her to escape, but quickly banished the thought, realising that these Vamps weren’t going to be put off by a handful of flapping mammals.

As she started to try and rise, Julius put a cool, strong hand under her left elbow. She felt herself flinch and had to work hard not to rip her arm out of his grip. She steadied herself and allowed him to help her upright, Nex once again in her left hand. Then she moved purposefully a few feet back from him. He watched her move back, with a brooding, pensive look on his face.

“
I’m guessing you
’re not going to want to come back to our headquarters with me, so that we can get your injuries attended to and then continue with our meeting.” He made it a statement of fact, rather than an actual question.

Gabi
quirked one eyebrow upward. “That would be a safe assumption to make.” She was trying for polite, shooting her mouth off earlier had got her hurt, but it was her natural defence when she felt cornered. “How about we all go home, and think about things, and we can try this again another night?” She tried to smile winningly. A girl could always live in hope. If she got out of this one alive, she vowed she would never, never, never run off alone after a Vampire again. Well, at least not for the next few weeks anyway.

“
Hmm.” Julius mused. “I thought you might feel that way. Fortunately I brought this with me. It will make the whole thing much more painless. For all of us.” And when he brought his hand up in front of him, there was a small black device in it.

Gabi heard a sharp whistling noise and as she tried to spin herself out of the way she felt a sharp sting in her uninjured shoulder. She looked down in surprise at the small dart and realisation hit home too late for her to do anything about it.

Her limbs began turning to jelly as she ground out the words “You BASTARD!” through clenched teeth. She felt him take the curved sword from her numb fingers. The adrenaline and the fury coursing through her couldn’t hold back the darkness crashing down on her. She expected to feel the impact with the ground as she collapsed, but instead she felt cool, hard arms catch her and lift her up. The last thing she heard as she slipped from consciousness was his deep, sexy voice saying, “It is the easiest way, trust me.”

Chapter 6

Julius sighed and threw down the pen onto his paper strewn desk. It was pointless trying to even pretend to get any work done while she was lying unconscious on the chaise lounge across the room from him. He was confident she would start to come around in the next few minutes anyway, so he needed to be ready when she did. They’d needed to give her another dose of tranquilizer on the trip, as she had started to come around too quickly. She was going to be like a cornered lioness when she woke up, cagey, mistrustful and more likely to attack him than listen to him. He had deliberately put her in his office rather than one of his many spare bedrooms, hoping she would feel less threatened in the businesslike surroundings.

He was relieved that Jonathon, his resident doctor, had been at the estate when they came in with her. Jonathon had been able to put her shoulder back into place with relative ease while she was still unconscious. They had bound her ribs, which Jonathon suspected were broken, and stitched up the bite wound. The doctor was reasonably certain that she had a fractured collarbone too, but it didn’t need resetting, so they had strapped her arm into place against her chest to prevent further injury. It was up to Julius to keep her calm and still when she came around, but he wasn’t sure how successful he was going to be. It was obvious that she didn’t heal as fast as a Vampire, but rumour was that she healed faster than the average human; she had never been off street patrol for longer than two weeks as far as his informants knew.

He frowned. She looked so small and helpless lying asleep on his couch, and she’d felt so fragile as he helped Jonathon take care of her injuries. He had only seen her in surveillance photos before tonight. In those she always looked proud, self-assured and utterly capable of ripping someone’s heart out without a second thought. She always had her russet hair tied back and a purposeful, almost arrogant mask on her face, and the ready tension in her body was visible even in those grainy images. And she had taken out Genevieve and Stephan, both Vampires over a hundred years old, without apparent difficulty.

Yet now, lying with her features calm and relaxed, she appeared very young and vulnerable, almost childlike. Her hair had come loose and was framing her face and neck in gentle, mussy waves. In the clear light of his office he could see a sprinkling of freckles across her cheekbones and the dark mark of a bruise slowly spreading across her right jawbone. There was also what appeared to be a burn mark streaked across her left cheek, though this must have happened prior to tonight, as it was still partly covered with make-up. He could sense the pulse of blood through the main artery just below her ear, and he felt his incisors lengthen instinctively. She smelled utterly delicious. Proof, he thought, that she was far more human than supernatural.

He found himself fascinated by her; something he hadn’t expected, it had been many years since he last found something so captivating, and it startled him. He wanted to know more about her abilities and capabilities, and how exactly she had come by her supernatural talents. The speculation was that she was part-Vampire, but he knew that was impossible unless she was ingesting Vampire blood, and that seemed unlikely. He’d heard many rumours and second-hand accounts of her feats, not too many first-hand accounts of course, though he had spoken some with Liam earlier. He knew she worked with animals as her daytime career, and he wondered how far her control of animals extended, and if she realised that this was a Vampire ability. Not many had it, but those that did were a sought after commodity in the Vampire realm, as they could also control Weres. He wondered if she had tried the talent on a Were, or if the idea had not occurred to her yet. Utterly intriguing.

On the whole, he’d never found women particularly interesting. Simone had been one of the exceptions, of course, intriguing him to the point of utter stupidity, and look what that had got him. Why was he only attracted to the dangerous ones? Death wish? He wasn’t sure. He took a deep breath and mentally shook himself out of the old memories.

He fervently hoped he’d made the right decision by approaching her. He’d been unable to dig up the names of any of the so called High Council of the Malus Venatori; it was much easier for them to hide themselves than it was for the Hunters themselves. Thank all that was holy for technology like facial recognition software and a loyal Clan member who knew more about computers than Einstein knew about physics. They’d waited weeks to get the chance at her alone, knowing that two Hunters together on patrol would probably fight to the death. They’d been ready to act the moment they could get her on her own. It was pure chance that she and her Werewolf friend had turned up tonight in one of his pool clubs and his barman had recognised her. His informants had confirmed that she was truly off duty, not just on an undercover job, and they’d put the operation into effect. It had seemed like it would work out so beautifully when they’d been able to separate her from the Wolf. And it had, right up to the point where Genevieve had attacked her.