1 Dicey Grenor (3 page)

But he was
obviously more interested in murder than rape.
Too bad.
’Cause unless he knew I was a vampire, killing me wasn’t going to happen any
ol
’
kinda
way.

Just as I was
counting my chickens before they hatched, he slapped a heavy handcuff across my
wrist and attempted to lock the other around my other wrist. I couldn’t break
free of the shackle because it was silver, which was synonymous with poison for
a vampire. Like kryptonite for Superman. It immediately started burning my
skin. I screamed again. I was tired of being burned, but I wasn’t the type to
give up. We tussled until I
kneed
his groin with all
the strength I could muster, so hard he could taste the sole of my shoe.

He bellowed in
pain and loosened his grip.

Hope he didn’t
want kids.
That would teach him to fuck with me.

I was pissed!
Pissed that he’d interrupted my dinner plans.
Pissed that he’d tried to kill instead of fuck me.
Pissed that he’d sprayed my eyes with that god-awful substance and
almost completely handcuffed me with silver.

Damn
necrophiliacs
!

I’d get
retribution though.

My fangs extended
to full length, my eyes changed to glowing red, and I leaned down to take a
chunk out of his motherfucking neck when Cindy yelled, “
Wiiiillooow
!”
from down the hall.

Chapter 3

Oh, no.

I had no idea how
much Cindy had seen. She was my friend but certainly not close enough to know I
was a vampire. No one was, except
Saybree
the witch,
and I wanted to keep it that way. My survival depended on it.

If I could help
it,
Saybree
wouldn’t know either. But there was no
way around that and I trusted her. She was an outspoken human with supernatural
powers and therefore, with enemies of her own. As my psycho-spiritual counselor
for years, she had tried to cure my narcolepsy with magic potions and spells.
When that hadn’t worked, she introduced me to Max because she thought vampirism
would cure me. Vampires didn’t get human illnesses and diseases, after all.

She’d been wrong,
but I’d never regretted being a vampire, just being bonded to Max.

Growling like a
mad dog because I was, I decided to proceed with ripping my attacker to shreds
regardless of who was watching. The rational side of my brain had been
swallowed by the instinctual, base side. I no longer cared who witnessed my
ravenous desire, my incarnate evil. Cindy could go eat a dick if she had a
problem with it…

Suddenly, I
started feeling funny, like I was going to have another sleep attack. Oh, Fuck!
Bad timing! But if I could control when I fell asleep, it wouldn’t be a
disorder, now would it? Then it didn’t matter anymore because I passed out in
to a deep sleep.

When I awakened, I
realized I’d been moved, which meant I must have slept longer than a few
minutes. Uh oh…

I panicked.
Started feeling around. Decided I lay on a bed, no, a couch. Looking around, I
discovered my surroundings were
pitch
black. Had the
spray damaged my eyes or was I really in a pitch black room? I got still and
listened, smelled. There was sweet cinnamon and…and sulfur.

“She’s waking up,”
Franco said. “Willow, are you okay?”

Fuck. I could
usually see well in the dark and I hadn’t seen Franco. Sure hoped the damage to
my eyes wasn’t permanent.
     

Having the ability
to heal quickly from injuries was a wonderful vampire characteristic, but we
weren’t entirely invincible, not entirely immortal. Silver, holy water and
garlic were all harmful. Sunlight, fire and decapitation were fatal. Stakes
were bad, but not in the mythological sense. Wooden ones hurt like hell. Silver
ones were nearly paralyzing, which gave the wielder enough time to light a
match or open a curtain or swing a fucking machete at our necks.

So I ran through
the list: Able to move my head? Check. It was still attached. Not burning to a
crisp and turning to ash? Check. Sunlight and fire weren’t an issue. Not
paralyzed or bleeding from a gaping hole in my chest? Check. I hadn’t been
staked.

Nope. Just my eyes
were out of commission.
A temporary, fixable problem.
I hoped.

“I can’t see,
Franco.” I said.

“That’s ’cause
your eyes are closed.”

That seemed
reasonable so I tried opening my eyes. They were stuck, maybe glued shut.

Shit! That
studly
bastard had blinded me! “I can’t open my eyes!”

I felt more than
heard Cindy sigh. “I’ll go get a wet cloth. Maybe we can wash that stuff off,”
she said.

Good idea. Glad
she was being helpful, but she sounded disturbed, tense.

She had seen me
changing into my monstrous self. Not good. What would she do? Who would she
tell? Would she turn me in and pocket the reward money? Our friendship was
about to be tested.

The evening was
getting worse.

“
Cin
?”
I started though I wasn’t sure what I’d say.
Felt it was worth a try.

There was movement
then silence.

“She’s gone.”
Franco said. He was close enough for me to feel his warm breath on my face.
“Probably for the best.
She seems frightened. We have lots
of security but sometimes things happen. I do my best to keep you
girls
safe, but…”

“
It’s
okay, Franco. It’s not your fault. My death scene
brought out all the crazy in my fans.” I laughed.
Might as
well joke about it.

Laughing turned to
coughing, which was odd. I hadn’t coughed since I’d become a vampire. What the
hell had he sprayed?!

When I brought my
hand up to cover my mouth, I remembered how my wrist had burned and
instinctively rubbed it. My skin was normal, smooth like a baby’s butt.

“Your wrist has
already healed,” he said in a low voice.

I froze.

This was the first
injury I’d had around my colleagues that I couldn’t pretend wasn’t real. Franco
had seen how fast it healed. Humans didn’t heal from burns that quickly. And
they didn’t burn from silver handcuffs.

The Human
Preservation Act (HPA) had made vampirism illegal which meant harboring,
marrying, and employing us was illegal too. Would he fire me? I sure
hoped
not. I loved my job. It was the one place I could
combine my love of performing with my nocturnal wiring and newfound sexual
allure. Strangely, I also felt safe here amongst other non-conformists. I’d
always been peculiar and it didn’t stand out at Hades.

“Franco…” I began.

“We’ll talk later,”
he whispered.

I smelled cinnamon
a second later. Cindy was coming back.

Before she was in
the room good, Franco did something surprising. He wrapped and tied soft
material around my wrist to hide the fact I’d healed so quickly. But why would
he help me?

When a lukewarm
washcloth was applied to my eyes, he gently rubbed in long strokes from inside
out then in circular motions.
Cleansing me of impurities.
Nurturing me like a sick child. In fact, he had always handled me that way.

Never could put my
finger on what made Franco tick. He was entirely too comfortable around
perverts yet he appeared normal, asexual in fact.

Okay, maybe that
wasn’t normal.
     

To own and run a
successful fetish club, there had to be something dark deep inside him I just
hadn’t seen yet. The fact that he was the only human I hadn’t been able to
captivate made me think he wasn’t human at all. He didn’t smell wild and
beastly the way others did, so I’d ruled out were-animal. And I had disregarded
the rumors that he was a sex demon. Had always thought people were joking. Now
I considered its validity.

Oh, well. As long
as he let me keep my job, he could be the devil himself and I’d find a way to
deal with it.

Since
supernaturals
were wisely cautious these days, I’d probably
never find out anyway. They were too afraid humans would
band
against them and pass anti-were or anti-goblin or anti-whatever laws. Humans
had already proven themselves to be crafty and highly motivated and they
outnumbered the supernatural community by far. Just look what happened to us.
As powerful as we were, we’d been hunted to near-extinction because humans had
discovered and used our weaknesses against us. Public
supernaturals
were forced into hiding and closeted ones were forced to remain that way.

“What happened to
the guy who attacked me?” I asked.

It was club policy
to call HPD, but I really didn’t want any more trouble, no more attention.
Police reports and investigations were not welcomed to anyone who had secrets.

“After we beat the
shit out of him, we dumped him on his ass and told him never to come back. I
had to fire Don for taking a hundred bucks and letting him in without a
membership.”

Franco had
surprised me again, went against his own rules. It could come back to bite him,
especially if I wanted to press charges against my assailant. The assistant
district attorney would ask for the nonexistent police report and wonder why
Franco had let him go. But Franco knew I’d want things handled quietly more
than anything, didn’t he.

He rubbed the
cloth over my eyes a few more times then removed it.

I slowly opened my
hazels one at a time.

His serious dark
brown eyes were focused on mine. His dark hair was gelled back in a long
ponytail with one stray lock over his forehead. A strong dimpled chin and high
cheekbones gave his face a dashingly handsome look. And as usual, an
indescribable tattoo peeped through the top of his leather shirt, giving him a
mysterious, sexy vibe.

I blinked long,
thick lashes. Yeah, the warm water had worked.

“Thanks,” I said,
hoping he knew I meant for everything. Just in case, I tried once again to
capture his gaze, lock him in psychically. I’d love to remove the memory of
what he’d discovered about me, even if for just a little while. He just
blinked, totally unaffected.

Cindy cleared her
throat. My moment with Franco must have looked more intimate than it was. There
was no lust, no hunger toward him whatsoever.

Franco rose, said
I was to take the rest of the night off and that he’d send Punch to take me
home. Before I could protest, he exited. I was left in silence with Cindy’s
sweet scent. Not good since I still hadn’t fed.

“Are you a
vampire?” she asked boldly.
Keeping her distance.

“Why would you ask
me that? You know me,
Cin
.”

“I saw your eyes
change. You changed. You became something else.”

“I don’t suppose
angel
ever crossed your mind?” I smirked. Humor was all I had at this point.

“Don’t play with
me, Willow. Angels don’t have fangs,” she crossed her arms over her chest
indignantly.

So she’d seen the
whole shebang and wasn’t backing down. Now what? Arguing that she didn’t know
whether angels had fangs seemed petty.

“What do you want
me to say,
Cin
?”

“Tell me the
truth. What are you, for God’s sake! You’ve been to my house, watched my
daughter…”

I didn’t see how
any of that mattered, but apparently it was important to her. “I’m your friend,
have been since I started working here.”

“Like hell you
are. If you’re a vampire, then I don’t even know you.”

The angrier she
became, the more her voice raised. The more pronounced her jugular became. It
was jutting, begging to be tasted.

I accidentally bit
my lip, tasted my own blood. She had to get herself and her accusations away
from me sooner rather than later. Anger made her blood pump faster.
Egged me closer to losing control.

If she truly
believed I was a vampire, she wasn’t acting like it. Like the Incredible Hulk,
she wouldn’t want to make me angry. Surely she’d know being friendly would be
more to her advantage since I could easily snap her fucking neck. Turning my
head towards the chair cushion, I began counting.
Ten, nine, eight, seven
…

“You know, I could
really use the money.” Her voice lowered, sounded strained, a little shaky. “Did
you know they were paying ten thousand dollars now for each tip that leads to a
vampire arrest?” she asked.

“Is that
so.
” I didn’t turn to look at her. She was pushing it and I
didn’t trust myself to show restraint.

She was referring
to the Vampire Extermination Team, un-affectionately known as VET. HPA ordered
execution for all vampires, VET served as the enforcement agency. They hired
ex-military, ex-law enforcement, ex-felons, anyone who had the skills to hunt
down and kill us. Sometimes they contracted out to private vampire hunting
businesses too. It was a dangerous but lucrative industry.

Which
meant the bitch had just threatened me.

She sighed
noisily, some of the tension easing. “Yeah, this custody battle is getting
really messy, and really expensive. I could use that money. I’d hate to do it
to you, Willow, but I’m close to losing my daughter. My lawyer’s threatening to
withdraw from my case.” She bit her lip like she was holding back a sob. Her
desperation was palpable.

I knew she’d been
going through an ugly divorce and custody case. Her hubby played for the Texans
and was spending a nice chunk o’ change to make her look bad in court and in
the media. Even though he’d met Cindy at Hades, her job as a performer here was
now being slanted to make her look unfit. It was unfair. She was a great
mother.