Femme Fatale (3 page)

Vampire.
Was everyone really thinking monsters were running loose in Chicago?

“She’s been in the club enough,” Will muttered, jerking his chin toward Savannah. “I’ve seen what she does, when she takes the men into the private room. I’ve seen the marks.”

Savannah started pacing. “I didn’t
kill
those men! You saw them all come back out, didn’t you? Alive?”

“You had Ben in that room with you two nights ago,” Will said. “Then he wound up dead. Same marks on him…and you’re the only vamp I know.”

“But I’m not the only vamp in town,” Savannah snapped back. “But I’m betting the real killer
was
in the club the night Ben Travers died.”

Mick’s hold tightened on Will. “Did you see Ben with anyone that night?”

“Heard him say he had a hot date…” Will edged away from the garbage container. “Figured it had to be with her.”

“It
wasn’t,”
Savannah fired at him.

“All I know is that Ben went out the back door, rushing to meet his date, and when I headed out back a few hours later, he was naked, with vamp marks on his neck, and stone cold dead.”

The guy sounded as if he were actually telling the truth. He was terrified. Will Mato was trigger-happy, but…truthful?
Maybe.
“You didn’t see anyone else in the alley? Didn’t hear anything?”

“Nothing. Ben was dead, sprawled on the ground. His clothes were tossed away, and the guy was just lying there.”

“I didn’t kill him,” Savannah said again. From the corner of his eye, Mick saw that she’d stopped pacing.

Mick kept his focus on Will. “You knew the other victim, too.”

Will nodded, a bit hesitantly. “Steve was a regular at the bar. He had an eye for blondes. Poor dead bastard.”

Savannah lunged toward Will, but before she could grab him again, Mick stepped in her path. He gave a short, hard negative shake of his head. Savannah threw up her hands, as if surrendering, and stepped back.
Got to remember…that lady has a temper.

Mick cleared his throat and glanced toward Will. “The night Steve vanished…did you see him talking to anyone special at the club?”

“Uh, yeah…Now that you mention it…Steve Douglas was with some guy. He came in with a buddy and left with him, too.”

Savannah leapt to Mick’s side. “What buddy?”

Mick put his hand on her shoulder. She needed to tone the hell down. If she’d hired him to do detective work, then she needed to let him do his job. “Describe the buddy.”

“A-about your height. Your build. Brown hair. I don’t know—it was a dude, okay? I don’t spend much time watching dudes. He and Steve were drinking beers together, well…actually…
he
wasn’t drinking. Just Steve. And when Steve seemed to get drunk, the guy said he’d take his friend home.”

Only Steve hadn’t wound up at home. He’d wound up dead.

“You think that guy was a vampire?” Will asked, his voice hushed.

He had no clue. Mick slipped the bartender his card. “You remember anything else about that…
buddy…
you call me, got it? You see anything suspicious at Intoxication, then you notify me right away. I’ll make it worth your while.” No, he wouldn’t. But it was fun to say he would.

Will’s fingers fisted around the card. “You aren’t going to kill me?”

“
What?”
Mick demanded. Then he realized Will had been staring at Savannah when he asked that question.

“Don’t tempt me,” she muttered back.

Uh, not the answer she should have given. No wonder the lady had come to him instead of the cops.

“Get the hell out of here,” Mick ordered Will. But when Will tried to brush past him, Mick caught his shoulder and yanked the guy close, “And for the record,” he whispered in Will’s ear. “If you ever pull a gun on me or on her again, it will be your last bad mistake.”

Will flinched.

When Mick let him go, the guy ran back toward Intoxication. Fast. The door slammed shut behind him.

“So…” Savannah’s voice seemed huskier than before. “Remember how I said I wouldn’t drink from anyone else while we were together?”

His head whipped toward her.

“I-I may have to break that promise.” She took a step, then stumbled. Before she could hit the ground, he grabbed her, holding her tight.

“Savannah?” She’d seemed fine moments before—so strong and fierce, but she was trembling in his arms.

“Didn’t…want him to see…how weak I was…”

His hands slid over her, and Mick realized that her shirt was wet.

She whimpered at his touch.

Not wet. That’s blood.
“That sonofabitch shot you.” Rage poured through his veins. She’d protected him, and that asshole had shot her!

“Blood loss…is bad for a vamp…” She shivered. “I need to find prey.”

“No, what you need is a doctor.” He lifted her into his arms, holding her easily. “I’ve got you, baby, I’ll take care of you.” The endearment rolled right off his tongue and he didn’t give it a thought. He was too busy being scared. Being pissed. And rushing her the hell back to his car.

He got her inside the vehicle and the interior light shone down on them. He hissed out a hard breath when he saw the damage. Her shirt was soaked in blood. She’d been hit not once, but twice.

And one of those hits…

Too close to her heart.

“How are you even alive right now?” He started to back away so he could run around to the driver’s side of the car.

But her hand flew out and wrapped around his wrist. “A doctor can’t…help me…” He saw her fangs peeking from behind her plump lips. “I need…blood…have to get…blood.”

She’s a vampire. I’ve seen the fangs. I’ve seen the super-speed. And she is still alive when she’s got a fatal wound.

She’d saved his ass.

So now, he’d save her.

He knelt near the open car door. He pulled her to the edge of the seat, turning her body to face him. Mick wrapped his arms around her and tilted his head. “Can’t believe this shit, but I’m actually asking…bite me. Do it, Savannah, just—”

She bit him. And white-hot pleasure rolled through his whole body.

“Are you…all right now?”

Savannah couldn’t help but smile at Mick’s halting question. “I’m wonderful, thanks.” His blood was just as powerful as she’d suspected it would be. Absolutely delicious and totally just what she needed. Her wounds had closed. Her body had healed in record time, and now, if she could just ditch the blood-stained top she wore, Savannah figured she’d be back in business.

Mick drove for a few miles, then said, “It didn’t hurt.” He took a right turn and appeared to stay focused on the road.

“Of course, it didn’t hurt.” Now that was just insulting. “I wasn’t trying to kill you. I just needed a little blood to survive.”

His hand lifted and pressed to his throat. She’d licked the tiny wounds there when she’d been done, and he’d let out a guttural groan. As close as their bodies had been, she hadn’t been able to miss his physical response to her.

Her detective had gotten very hard.

From her bite.

From…
her?

“If you need more,” he said, “let me know.”

I need everything.
They’d get to that part, later. Right then, she was rather impressed with the progress of her plan. Things were moving along just perfectly. Unless she missed her guess, Mick was even starting to trust her.

Only fair, really, since she’d taken a bullet—two—for the guy.

He took another turn and then a tall, looming, white-bricked building appeared. She leaned forward, peering out of the windshield. There were cops near that building. Men and women in uniform who were walking in and out of the place.

“I’m guessing you haven’t been to this station before,” Mick said.

“I generally try to avoid cops.”

He killed the engine. “We won’t be seeing the cops. The ME is on the bottom floor. You want to find out who killed those men? Then I say we take a peek at the bodies.”

Her breath caught. “You can get us access to them?”

“That’s why you’re paying me the big bucks.”

He shoved open his door.

Smiling, she hurried out of her side even as he started coming around the front of the car. She took a step forward, then stopped, wrinkling her nose. “I’ve got to ditch the bloody clothes.”

“I…have an extra t-shirt in my trunk. Keep it there, for when I work out.”

“Excellent.” It would probably swallow her, but she’d make do. Too big was way better than too bloody.

While he headed to the trunk, she stripped off her shirt, used some of the cleanish material to try and wipe the blood away from her skin, then she tossed the ruined top into his back seat. It was a good thing he’d parked in the shadows, or some of his cop buddies—

“You stripped.” His voice sounded strangled. “In front of a cop station.”

“They can’t see me…”

He was suddenly right in front of her, using his body as a shield and his eyes were seeming to drink her in.

She couldn’t help it. For fun, she arched a wee bit. Since she wasn’t wearing a bra, she figured it was a fairly good arch.

He swore.

Then his hands were jerking his t-shirt over her head. It smelled like him, that rich masculine scent that she’d already come to like, and his fingers lingered for just a moment as he pulled the soft cotton down over her breasts.

“You…you don’t have bullet holes in you.” His hands flew away from her. He even took a step back. “How is that possible?”

“I’m a crazy fast healer, especially when I have blood like yours.” She glanced down at the shirt. Oh, that just wasn’t going to do. The thing was so long that it fell far past her skirt. So she just grabbed a big section of the shirt and ripped it away. “There. So much better.” The torn material joined her bloody top in the backseat.

She looked at Mick. He was standing statue-still, just staring at her. “Is there a problem?”

“You’re a vampire.”

Savannah laughed. “You are one fine detective.” She looped her arm through his. “Now, let’s go inside, shall we? I think there are some dead bodies waiting for us.”

***

She had a perfect body. Firm, round breasts. Tight nipples. She’d just been standing there, naked from the waist up while a half dozen cops wandered close by.

And she hadn’t cared.

He’d cared. Mick had wanted to cover her up and get her away from everyone and everything else. He wanted her alone. He wanted her safe. He—wanted her.

But then, Mick had been lusting after her ever since she’d first placed her high-heeled foot in his office. And now that she’d bitten him, he wanted her even more. Desire was growing inside of him. A desperate need that he hadn’t felt for another woman. He’d never wanted to take and take and take but she—

“Mick?”

Do the job.
He cleared his throat and headed for the double doors up ahead. They were already inside the station. It had been easy enough to get a buddy to give them access. Now they were steps away from entering the medical examiner’s office. At this time of night, no one was on the bottom floor. The place really did feel like a tomb to him.

He typed in the security code for the ME’s office.

“So handy to have you here,” Savannah murmured.

“We’re just lucky they’re slow as hell at updating security codes down here.” But then, most people weren’t real interested in sneaking in to see dead bodies.

He guessed they weren’t most people.

A few moments later, they were inside. The temperature seemed to have dropped. Hell, it always felt cold to him in that place. He headed right for body storage. The lockers waited, just as they always did, and he read the labels on those lockers in order to find the men they needed to see.

When he opened the first locker, a waft of cold air hit him. He pulled out the slab and saw the black body bag that surrounded the victim. “This is Ben Travers.” Moving swiftly, Mick grabbed a pair of gloves and then unzipped that body bag.

Ben Travers was stark-white and still—that unnatural paleness that comes at death. The two marks on his neck stood out in sharp contrast to his pale skin. As he stared at those marks, Mick could have sworn his own neck ached in empathy.

What was it like for you, you poor SOB? Did you feel pleasure right until the end?

“What happened to his chest?” Savannah’s voice was soft. Worried.

His gaze slid down the body. “The ME had to do an autopsy.” There was no missing the giant, Y-shaped incision on the man. The two arms of the big Y ran from each of Ben’s shoulder joints until they met right in the middle of his chest. The bottom of the Y ran down his stomach, disappearing beneath the half-open body bag.

“An autopsy wasn’t necessary,” she said, words sharpening. “It’s obvious the man died from blood loss.”

“Yeah, well, since he only has two tiny puncture wounds on him, I’m guessing the doc wanted to figure out how the hell his blood had been drained.” He turned away from Ben and found the next victim.

He yanked the slab out of the locker, pulled down the body bag’s zipper with a hiss, and found himself looking at another chalk-white victim. A victim with two puncture wounds on his throat.

He checked out both bodies. Sure enough, there were zero signs of defensive wounds. The guys had willingly taken those bites, and hadn’t fought back even when death had been at hand.

Anger simmered within him. His gaze shot to Savannah, and he found her staring—with somewhat dazed eyes—over at Ben’s face. There was definite sadness in her expression. Longing? “Just how involved were you two?” Mick demanded.

Her hand lifted, as if she’d touch the body, but then her fingers fisted. “He was my friend.”

“Lover?”

Her gaze turned to him. Tears glistened in her eyes. “I need to find his killer.”

That hadn’t been an answer.

His head cocked as he studied her. “Is every vampire bite like the one you gave me? Does it always feel like a damn orgasm?”

Her brows shot up. “Um, no. The bite
is
pleasurable, but not…not quite that good.” Her eyes had widened. “Is that really what it felt like for you?”

He’d already screwed up and said too much. “Why didn’t they fight back? They had to feel themselves growing weaker. Why not try to get away? Why not do something?”

“I don’t know. Yes, they
should
have felt themselves getting weaker. The instinct to fight would have kicked in.” Savannah shook her head. “This isn’t right.”

Mick leaned over Ben’s body. The victim’s hair was long, blond, thick. He pushed it to the side as he leaned in and tried to get a closer look at those wounds. Mick lifted up the guy’s head and—

What do we have here?

“Vamps only use two teeth for biting, right?” Mick asked.

“Uh, yes, our canines lengthen and cut into the skin.”

His gloved finger pointed to a spot just a bit below the base of the guy’s head. If he hadn’t tried to lift the guy and shove the fellow’s hair out of his way, Mick would have missed that little puncture mark. “How come this vic is sporting three marks?”

Savannah gave a little gasp and hurried toward him. “That’s not a bite mark.”

“No,” he agreed with her on that one. “Looks like a needle mark to me.” A small mark surrounded by a dark, circular bruise. He lowered Ben back on the table and hurried to examine Steve Douglas. Mick didn’t lift Steve up. Instead, he rolled him to the side. The guy’s hair was way shorter and it was easy to spot that needle mark and tiny bruise right away. “Both of them. The killer shoved a needle into them. He drugged them, and that explains why they didn’t fight back.” The poor bastards might not have even been conscious while the vamp fed on them.

“The killer
drugged
them?”

“Yeah, and let’s see if the ME realized that yet.” He put the bodies back in the freezer and then started flipping through files on the ME’s desk. “Their blood work isn’t back yet, but he’s got an order out for it. The doc will realize soon enough what was given to the vics.”

There was a faint squeak of sound behind him. Mick glanced over his shoulder. Savannah was staring at the closed body lockers.

His stomach knotted as a sudden thought struck him. “Uh, they aren’t going to come back, are they?” He shut the folders and ditched his gloves.

Savannah tossed a glance over her shoulder. “Back?”

“Yeah, as in…rising from the dead. Being all
un
dead. That is the vamp term, right?”

She shook her head. “It doesn’t work like that.”

Then how does it work?

Savannah stiffened. “Someone’s coming,” she said suddenly. “A person just got off the elevator and is headed this way.”

Hell. He’d gotten access to the building from a buddy, but if another cop found him in a secure area like this…with Savannah…
can’t explain that easily.
Especially if she decided to vamp out on anyone.

He hit the lights, plunging them into darkness, and he grabbed her. Mick yanked her toward the storage closet on the right, and the door to that closet closed behind them just as he heard the click of the ME’s office door opening.

“Mick—” Savannah whispered.

He covered her mouth with his, stopping that sound. It had been an instinctive move. Crazy. Definitely not planned. He’d just needed her to be silent.

He’d just needed—

Her.

Because the instant his mouth touched hers, all other thought left. Her lips were soft and sweet, her tongue slid against his, her taste inflamed him and he wanted
more.
He pushed her back against the wall, caged her with his body and lust drummed through his veins. Her breasts pressed against his chest. Her nipples were tight. He wanted to taste them. Mick wanted to taste every single inch of her. He craved her, a need too frantic to be denied, a need too desperate to be ignored and—

Savannah pulled her mouth from his. “The cleaning lady is gone. She only stepped inside for a moment.”

His breath sawed out. “What?”

“The cleaning lady. I could tell it was her. The cleaners she’d used today clung to her, and—”

He kissed her again. Because he was still desperate for Savannah. They were in a closet in the ME’s office, for shit’s sake, and he wanted to jump her. He needed to get his control back.

Why isn’t that happening?

Was she doing something to him? Had the bite made him want her this way?

He caught her lower lip between his teeth. Nipped.
One bite deserves another.

Mick felt her shudder against him.

If I don’t step back, I will take her right here.

And that wasn’t him. Hell, this was hardly a romantic scene. More like a nightmare one. He sucked in a deep breath, tasted
her,
but still managed—finally—to back away. Then he cracked open the door.

“She’s gone,” Savannah said, sounding breathless. “I told you—”

His head turned toward her. He couldn’t see her well in the darkness, even though she was right next to him, but he got the feeling she could see him perfectly. “I’m guessing vamps have enhanced senses.”

“Yes.” A pause. “I would have explained who she was sooner, but…” Her words trailed away. “I was rather enjoying myself.”

He’d been enjoying himself, too. But now they needed to get the hell out of there. Mick laced his fingers with hers. “Come on, let’s go. Before someone else decides to stroll in on us.”

He’d learned something important at the ME’s office. Their supernatural killer…he was using a very
human
method to weaken his prey. A smart vamp who didn’t want his victims to fight back.

That made for one very deadly bastard on the streets of Chicago.

***

Will Mato had never been happier to see the end of his shift. Sure, Intoxication was still packed with patrons, but he was
done.
Someone else could clean up that night. He was getting the hell out of there.

He grabbed his tips, closed the register, and was running out the front door before anyone could even
think
of ordering another round from him. The bouncer waved him away as Will hurried outside, and a few moments later, he was on his motorcycle, ready to rev the hell out of there.

Maybe it was time for a new scene. Chicago…it was dead to him.