Dear Reader,

I’m thrilled to present Bonded By Blood, the first book of my paranormal series with Mills & Boon® Nocturne™. The Sweetblood world is a deadly and seductive one, where the forces of good and evil battle secretly around us, and the power of love can change everything.

The kernel of this story and my love for the ultimate bad boy began years ago, when my sister and I saw Fright Night eight times in the movie theater. Chris Sarandon played a dangerously handsome vampire whose intense magnetism literally sucked me in. Although he was the villain, I dreamed of being Amy, the girl he’d loved for centuries. The scene at the club still gets my heart pounding …

Okay, where was I?

Far beneath the streets of the city, in an unknown part of Underground Seattle, a team of vampire Guardians fights to protect humans from Darkbloods—vicious members of their race who kill like their ancestors and sell the blood on the black market. The rarest, called Sweetblood, commands the highest price.

Tortured by his need for vengeance, Dominic Serrano will stop at nothing in order to kill his enemy … until one forbidden taste of Mackenzie’s sweet blood turns his world upside down. Seeing this fierce warrior struggle to restrain himself with a woman who brings him to his knees got my heart pounding. Just like it did in that theater.

Come with me and explore the Sweetblood world, one dangerously seductive romance at a time.

All my best,

Laurie London

Bonded

by Blood

Laurie London

www.millsandboon.co.uk

To my husband, Ted,

for a zillion reasons, starting with I love you

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS:

Because this is my debut novel, I have so many people to thank.

First and foremost, thank you to my sister, talented author Rebecca Clark, for her unwavering encouragement, even when I thought she and her “feelings” about this story’s potential were crazy.

Thank you to my agent Emmanuelle Morgen and my editor Margo Lipschultz for taking a chance on this new author and for their enthusiastic support of this series. To all the people at HQN, including the uber-talented art department, thank you.

To Alexis Morgan, thanks for your friendship and for telling me, early on, to write the story I want to write.

Thank you, Cherry Adair, for your encouragement, your wisdom, your generosity, and your belief in me. I’m truly humbled.

To my dear friends and beta readers, Shelley, Mandy, Kandis, Kathy, and Janna: your friendship and feedback mean the world to me. You made this reader think she wasn’t nuts when she nervously told you she’d been writing. Barb, muchas gracias for your help with Spanish words and cultural details. Thanks to my GIAM friends, my Lex buddies, the writing community of Greater Seattle RWA, and the Bookinville ladies for your hearty enthusiasm.

Hugs and kisses to my two awesome children for their love and support, and for picking up the slack around the house because Mom had to write “just one more page.”

Last, but not least, thank you to my real life hero, my husband Ted, for supporting my dreams and managing more than his share of the chaos so that I can write. Oh, and for agreeing with Emmanuelle that a guy wouldn’t use such expressive words in a particular scene. The final version is much better.

CHAPTER ONE

MACKENZIE FOSTER-SHAW spotted the cemetery sign at the last minute and squeezed the brakes, spinning out her white Triumph motorcycle in a spray of dirt and gravel. She meant to lean into a sharp, controlled turn, but the back tire lost traction and she almost had to lay the thing down.

Crap, the rocks hadn’t looked that loose. Irritation at her carelessness momentarily replaced the uncertainty riding in with her as she sprang from the bike. After examining the chrome for chips and seeing no damage, she felt the hard lump of anticipation return, but she swallowed and tried to ignore it.

She yanked off her helmet and squinted into the shadowed interior of the cemetery. Even in the late afternoon sun, little light penetrated the heavy canopy of fir trees.

“I’m liking this so far,” she said to herself as she tossed her sunglasses on the seat. But she knew better than to get her hopes up too soon. Hope didn’t pay the bills, nor did wishful thinking.

Situated on a forest access road, miles from the main highway, the cemetery was certainly ancient enough. The county register listed it as one of the oldest in the region. How long had it been since anyone visited this place? Ages ago, probably.

She started to unzip her leather jacket, then hesitated. Like most people in the Pacific Northwest after months of gray skies and the unending wetness of winter, she didn’t need much of an excuse to strip off the layers. But with one glance at the bushes she’d need to traipse through, she zipped it back up. Those vivid green leaves couldn’t camouflage the barb-covered vines eager to hook anything within reach. Especially bare skin. Besides, it was probably cooler and wetter inside the trees.

She grabbed her camera from the saddlebag and fiddled with the settings, not bothering with the flash attachment. The client was adamant the pictures needed to portray the ambient lighting and convey an oppressive, haunted feeling.

“Hopefully, this location will work for them.” It was the fourth or fifth graveyard she’d visited in the past two weeks. If it didn’t, she was screwed because she was totally out of ideas.

Bear Creek Pioneer Cemetery was etched in once-white paint on a crooked sign at the side of the road. After shooting a few pictures, she scanned the area for a pathway and noticed a slight indentation in the underbrush. She’d do her sketches and take measurements of the road later.

Her boots crunched on the gravel as she slung the camera strap over her shoulder and plunged into the blackberry bushes. Good thing she’d kept her riding leathers on. Both the jacket and the pants. Sharp thorns and stickers grabbed hungrily at her arms and legs, but they weren’t able to gain purchase on the thick hide.

As she stepped into the small clearing, the still, dank air clung to her face. Tufts of tangled grasses crowded around the crumbling headstones in the middle of the cemetery, but at the edge, the bushes covered them completely. Oppressive? Most definitely. Her stomach lurched with excitement, but again, she quickly tamped it down and got to work.

Opening the tripod, she balanced it on the uneven ground next to a stone cross. Something about it made her hesitate. The name was no longer legible and she paused to run a finger over the weathered, rough surface. Who was buried here, gone and forgotten? A man? A woman? A child?

She must have stared a little too long because her sinuses began to itch. She wrinkled her nose, tried to sniff away the sudden heavy weight pulling at her heart, but it didn’t quite work. Would someone wonder about her, too? What she looked like. What kind of a person she was. How long from now? Months? Years, maybe? If she were lucky. But the thing was, there’d be no body in her grave.

Stop. Just stop it. Quit being so damn morbid. Normally she was pretty good at not thinking much about the future. Why worry about something completely out of her control? It had to be all these depressing cemeteries she’d been visiting lately.

She took a deep breath to change the unproductive air in her lungs, screwed the camera in place and exhaled, wrenching her mind back to the present where it needed to stay.

With every satisfying click of the shutter, the outside world became only what she could see through the view-finder. The gravestones, the trees and the quiet loneliness.

When she finally stopped to examine the results, her pulse jumped like it always did when she captured something magical through the lens. They were good. Really good. Much better than the other locations. When she got to one particular image, she hesitated. The lengthening shadows stretched out over the headstones and mounds of grass like the distorted, tortured lines of Munch’s painting, The Scream, and her spine prickled.

Or maybe it was the wind.

A slight breeze found its way into the open collar of her jacket, tickling her neck and ears, and stirring the branches of the watchful trees. She shivered and brushed her hair away from the lens.

Zombies? Dead eyes and insatiable cravings? She could totally visualize rotting hands stretching out of their graves here. Would Hollywood think so? That was the fifteen hundred dollar bonus question.

She twisted her hair up, clipped it off her neck, and dropped to the forest floor. Although it hadn’t rained, moisture lingered everywhere and the ground smelled woodsy beneath her. She rolled over onto her back, again thankful she’d decided to keep the jacket on. A few wispy fronds of grass brushed her cheek and she batted them away. Twisting the lens to focus on the treetops, she—

A sound sliced through the silence of the graveyard and she froze.

A cry? A growl?

She patted her jacket pocket and felt the reassuring hard lump of her handgun.

Maybe it was just the squeak of tree limbs protesting against the wind. Of course it was. With shaking hands, she pushed herself to a sitting position just to make sure.

When she heard it again, she scrambled to her feet.

An animal. Definitely not a tree limb.

She held her breath and fixated on the spot at the edge of the cemetery where the noise originated.

A mound of leaves and branches moved. Twenty feet or so in front of her.

Her pulse thundered behind her eardrums. It was probably just a raccoon. But didn’t they hiss? She took a step backwards, her gaze unwavering.

A badger? They were mean sons of bitches. No, this definitely didn’t sound like the one that crawled into their tent on the last camping trip with her father all those years ago. This sounded bigger, different.

Her breath came out in shallow bursts as she glanced behind her. Okay. Her bike was about thirty steps away then up that slight embankment through the sticker bushes. If she ran, would the thing chase her? If she moved slowly, would it even follow? No, it was probably even more scared of her. She eased the camera strap around her neck and—

She heard it again.

This time it was unmistakable.

“Help me.”

The pile of leaves shuffled, falling away to reveal a man hidden underneath. With a hand outstretched to her, he writhed as if in pain.

A man? What the hell? Here in the middle of nowhere? Should she run for help? Should she walk closer?

Even from this distance, she could see his brow furrowed in agony, his eyes desperate and hollow. He didn’t appear to be in any shape to harm her. Besides, she had her gun.

Recalling her mother’s stern warnings over the years, she paused. This couldn’t have anything to do with her family, could it? Her cousin Stacy’s face flashed in her memory along with the faded one of her father. But this wasn’t the big city, nor was it summer. Two critical elements. Usually.

She placed a cool hand to her throat, the racing tempo of her heart slowed just a little, and she considered her options. Maybe this was his version of “here little girl, help me with my puppy.” Clear out here though? It wasn’t like this place got a lot of foot traffic.

He dropped his arm and his mouth moved silently. God, he really seemed hurt. She had to do something; she couldn’t just leave him.

She pulled out her cell phone, punched 911, and kept a finger above the Send button. Shaking off myriad notions of zombies and cemeteries, she strode forward to the edge of the trees.

The man lay on his back, half-hidden under the leaves and branches, his clothes covered in dirt. Given his disheveled appearance, he looked like a vagrant. But as she raked her eyes over him, she noted his expensive-looking boots and pale blue dress shirt, and he, too, was wearing leather pants. Most definitely not homeless.

Torn and muddy, his shirt was unbuttoned, ripped open actually, revealing a dirt-smeared but well-defined chest. Some of his shoulder-length dark hair, tangled with bits of leaves and debris, seemed to be partially captured in a ponytail, but she couldn’t be sure from this angle. His eyes, an electrifying shade of ice blue, pierced through her. She stopped a few feet away.

“What happened to you? Are you hurt?”

“I need … your help.” His voice, slightly accented, was clearly laced with pain.

At that moment, the wind picked up and swirled at her feet as if urging her to move. The leaves around him danced on the air and settled slowly back to the ground. Stepping closer, she heard his sharp intake of breath. His eyes widened at first then narrowed to slits, and he shrank backwards into the leaves.

He couldn’t be scared of her, could he? He was a tall man, athletic and powerfully built. Why would he be afraid of her?

“Stay away,” he ordered. Given his condition, his forceful tone surprised her.

She didn’t understand. Why the sudden turnabout? He clearly needed her help. He had to be hallucinating. How long had he been here anyway? Squatting down to appear less intimidating, she tucked her phone in her pocket and stretched out her hands like she would to a frightened dog. “It’s okay. I won’t hurt you. I can help.”

Then she saw it. A hole in his mud-encrusted shirt. She hadn’t noticed it right away because it was fairly small, the size of a quarter maybe, and he cradled his arm as if it were injured.

“Oh my God. Is that … blood? Have you been shot?”

As she sprang to his side, the last thing she remembered was the way his pupils suddenly dilated. Like a shark rolling back its eyes when it bites.

DIOS MIO. What have I done?

Even in his weakened condition, his senses dulled from the blood loss and the daylight, Dominic Serrano had caught the woman’s scent before he saw her or sensed her energy trail. A mesmerizing fragrance wafted in the air around him and woke him from his stupor. He should have known though. He’d been in and out of consciousness all day, but he still should’ve known. Should have recognized it. What an idiot.

He had kicked off some of the branches when he spotted her, not more than a few paces away, and watched as the tall, slender woman took pictures of the old headstones. Her movements were graceful, almost feline, as she swung her body around for different camera angles. When she recklessly flipped those loose curls behind her shoulders to reveal a long shapely neck and large hoop earrings, he almost stopped breathing.

His eyes were glued to her; he was powerless to peel them away. But his heart thundered against his ribs and he hardened instantly when she bent forward and wrestled with her hair. Closing his eyes for a moment, he imagined her standing over him, straddling his body with those long legs.

What the hell was he thinking? For God’s sake, he needed to ditch the fantasy shit and figure out how to—She fell to the ground and all he could do was stare.

With a knee bent and a boot heel wedged into the forest floor for traction, she shimmied and wriggled, aiming the lens at the distant treetops above. And, sweet Jesus, he imagined her body squirming like that beneath him.

His sudden erection surged like a battering ram against the seams of his pants and he hurried to adjust the tight-fitting leather. But the minute he moved, scorching jolts of pain shot from his injured shoulder and he cried out in agony.

The woman sat up and looked in his direction.

Shit. He held his breath, remained motionless, and hoped she’d leave without seeing him. What the hell was wrong with him? He certainly didn’t need another goddamn complication. But his arm lay awkwardly at his side, the throbbing intensity getting worse.

Sucking air through his teeth with a hiss, he inched his good arm over his stomach to reposition the bad one, but the instant shattered bones grated against torn muscles and infected tissue, he couldn’t help it.

He groaned again and she stared right at him.

Think. Think. It was getting late. Not much time before the Darkbloods would be back. They knew they’d shot him and they knew what he’d stolen.

With his barely functioning willpower, the woman was vulnerable to him. He would require more than the use of her cell phone as powerful urges simmered below the taut surface of his sensibilities. He tried not to feed from humans much, but at this point he was out of options. He had no other choice.

He called out to her and licked his dry lips. With that long hair cascading past her shoulder blades, it would encase his face as he drank from her, tickling his nose and giving his hands a luxurious anchor. He’d take just enough of her blood and energies, then send her away with memories of nothing. God, he was parched.

Although he sensed her fear, she came toward him with purpose in her stride. She moved with confidence, stepping over obstacles with a strong, even pace, unaccustomed to being afraid. Her curious green eyes locked onto his and he could think of little else except the mesmerizing sway of her hips. She stopped several feet away and appraised him.

He was about to ask her about her phone when his world caved in around him. The wind picked up and with it came her scent, swirling innocently in the leaves at first, then bashing him across the forehead like a lead pipe.

Dios mio. Sangre Dulce.

He wanted to pump his legs. To scramble away from her. But his muscles were like stone. He was virtually paralyzed.

She was more than just vulnerable, he realized. She was in terrible danger. Not just from him, but from the Darkbloods. She had to run. Get away. Now.

He clamped his eyes shut, tried to block out this nightmare. What were the odds a rare sweetblood would be the one to find him? Their blood was almost irresistible to his kind. Yes, how goddamn ironic was that? He wouldn’t drink from her. He couldn’t.

Once he tasted the blood of Sangre Dulce, especially in his present condition, there’d be little hope of a successful Stop and Release, a fact he knew only too well. Baser, primitive instincts would take over and the immunity training, required of all Guardians with the Agency, wouldn’t do him any good.

“Leave me alone.” He clenched his teeth to keep his fangs from elongating, but it was no use. As they stretched from his gums, his control ebbed away.

When she leaned close and he smelled her sweet breath on his face, all rational thought vanished. The animal lying dormant inside knew just what to do. A hidden store of energy coursed through his veins and he pounced with the practiced grace of a tiger, rolled her to her back and enveloped her body with his. Before she could scream, he pressed his palms to her temples, entrancing her in the age-old trick of his kind to subdue its prey.

She would remember nothing of the terror. Nothing of the pain. Nothing of him. That is, if she survived.

Her eyes closed and her head lolled backward, exposing the smooth delicate skin of her neck to him. In one swift movement, he tossed aside her camera, yanked the jacket off one shoulder and tore the neck of her T-shirt.

With a growl, he plunged his teeth into her flesh.

Pulling hard at her vein, he consumed mouthful after mouthful of her warm, beautiful nectar. He’d never tasted anything so glorious. So sweet. So utterly perfect. Good God, it was as if she were created solely to nourish him. Her fresh scent overpowered his nostrils as her blood filled his mouth and danced on his tongue. Suckling like a baby at the breast, his whole body shuddered in ecstasy and euphoria embraced him as a lover.

Without breaking their contact, he slipped a practiced hand to her cheek and temple, and her concentrated warm energies sluiced into his body, rejuvenating him with shocking speed. The cocoon of her fragrant hair captured his breath against her neck, making a heated and welcoming hollow for his face, and he pushed her deeper into the pile of forest debris with the weight of his body.

A small voice at the back of his head told him to stop, but he shoved it aside.

He’d fed directly from humans before, probably more than he cared to admit, and he’d absorbed the energies of thousands, but never were any of them like this. He heard about the taste of sweetblood, all of them had, but no verbal description even came close to this delicious reality. And her energies? He’d never experienced anything like them before. There was nothing he couldn’t do with her in his body, he realized. Impossible no longer existed.

Darkness licked at his soul as the fragile barrier between strongly held beliefs and suppressed instincts threatened to shatter around him. That voice again, deep inside, roared out like a freight train, calling him back.

Stop. You’re killing her. You’re not an animal.

Oh God, he did have to stop. Her pulse weakened under his lips and he sensed her life energy slipping away. This was wrong. He knew it was.

Releasing her vein, he crouched over her and rubbed his mouth with the back of an unsteady hand. Her scent, her sweet scent, clung to every fiber of his being, seducing him back like an addiction.

A junkie desperate for another fix, he needed more of her. The blood, the warm energies. All of it. No one would know. It’d be easy to keep this secret from everyone. He’d dispose of the body so it wouldn’t be found and she’d be just another missing person. Yes, that could work.

Move away from her. Remember Alfonso.

He pinched his eyes shut, scrambled backward and collapsed next to a tree. With his head cradled between his knees, he pulled at his hair and wished she had never found him.

He raised his head and forced himself to look at what he had done. There she was, nestled innocently in the leaves, unaware of the monster at her feet, her mouth ajar, hair billowing out behind her, and long dark lashes contrasting against the pale softness of her cheeks. He noticed a small mole on her upper lip, or maybe it was a dark freckle. It looked just like the one his mother used to draw on for vanity purposes.

Dios mio. What have I become?

His parents had fought so hard to elevate their kind to more than the thoughtless killers their ancestors had been. And now look at him. If his mother were alive, she’d be horrified at what he had done and everything it represented.

Another gust of wind blew through the forest, stirring the fir boughs into a rhythmic, fanning motion around him. Cool, fresh air brushed against his face, aerating him slightly and clearing out a tiny corner of his mind.

He forced himself to stand and staggered to the edge of the creek rollicking a few feet away. She was a magnet and it took every ounce of willpower to pry himself from her presence. His body cried out, wanting more, but his mind pulled him away.

He peeled off his shirt, thrust his head into the icy cold water, and pulled the tie from his ponytail. The rushing sound filled his ears and refreshed his head. Over and over he rinsed his mouth, trying to rid himself of her taste. He scrubbed his hair, his face, his neck, washing away her smell.

He rocked back on his heels, water dripping onto his bare shoulders, and he took a deep cleansing breath. He knew what he had to do. He was not going to end up like Alfonso. No way. He’d kill himself before he let what happened to his brother happen to him. His parents’ memory deserved more than that.

He doused his shirt in the creek, rubbed the fibers of the fabric together as if he had soap. Then he wrung it out and wrapped it around his nose and mouth like a makeshift bandanna.

When he scooped the woman up, his sudden strength stunned him. She was hardly a wisp of air in his arms. Her lips had a bluish cast to them and her pulse was weak, but she was alive. Thank God. He barely noticed that the agonizing pain from the silver bullet was gone.

There was no time to think about what a monster he was. That he was actually capable of such a despicable atrocity. He would deal with that later. Right now, he had to get her away.

With her scent all over this place, he had no doubt the Darkbloods would instantly abandon their search for him and focus on finding her instead. They’d go ape-shit when they smelled Sangre Dulce. And they had no qualms about killing. None.

He fished her keys from her tight leather pocket and stifled a bitter smile when he saw her juvenile key ring. Then, pausing to retrieve her camera, he cradled her body as gently as he could.

When her head rolled back, he saw two puncture holes on her graceful neck. He had backed away from her so quickly, he hadn’t sealed the wound. Without much thought, he lifted the shirt from his mouth and touched his lips to her skin.

When they drank from a human, they were never to leave an unhealed mark, no trace, no memory. He might be a rebel in the Agency, but he was no fool. Shock registered a moment later, when he realized he’d somehow controlled the urge to feed from her again. Good, maybe he could do this thing.

As he emerged from the forest into the sun of the dead, his pupils tightened and he dipped his head to shield his eyes. He started to step back into the shadows before he realized he felt none of the expected burn and no measurable energy drain. When had he last been outside willingly during this restless time of day when the sun died and his people awaited its disappearance beyond the horizon? Except as a vampire youthling prior to the Time of Change, maybe never. After that point, the cravings began and they lived out their lives away from the weakening effects of sunlight.

Just through the trees, the cemetery signpost leaned into the bushes, its wooden placard dangling in the wind, jeering, mocking him. He bit down on his defiance and strode past. There was a time when he would’ve made the sign of the cross and offered up a prayer, but not any longer. And certainly not today.

He glanced up the dirt road, expecting to see a sassy little sports car or even a truck. Not a freaking white motorcycle. Who was this woman with a Hello Kitty keychain?

Hell, this was going to be interesting.

CHAPTER TWO

MACKENZIE COULDN’T REMEMBER ever having a migraine this bad. Her temples pounded like mallets as blazing sunlight penetrated her eyelids. She rolled over, covered her head with her pillow, but the throbbing pulse continued over and over in her skull.

Oh God, she felt like puking.

She dragged herself from the bed toward the bathroom, sheets tangled around her, but she took only a few steps before her head began spinning even faster and her knees buckled. She expected to hit the floor, and weakly stretched out her hands, but somehow she fell onto the bed instead.

She must’ve slept again, drifting in and out of consciousness in an endless stream of time. Damp coldness touched her forehead and neck. It felt so good. Drops of liquid touched the back of her tongue and slid down her throat. The deafening pounding in her head receded beat by beat as the pain fibers loosened their grip from behind her eyes.

When she opened her lids, probably much later, the room was darker than before. But given the small amount of light filtering in through the margins of the closed blinds, she knew it was still daytime.

Hadn’t the blinds been open earlier? Stretching her arms up, she yawned and heard her shoulders crack. Was that migraine only a bad dream? She felt wonderfully refreshed now.

Several washcloths lay neatly folded on her nightstand and a glass of ice water sat on a coaster. That was strange. It wasn’t like Samantha to look after her like this. Her housemate kept strange hours and was rarely home lately.

She looked around but couldn’t quite put her finger on it. Everything looked the same and yet things felt … different. As though something had happened and she’d become aware of it after the fact. The little hairs on the nape of her neck prickled. Change hung invisibly in the air, like perfume lingering in an empty elevator.

How long had she slept? Glancing at her alarm clock, her jaw dropped.

What the … that couldn’t be right. Three o’clock?

She grabbed her cell phone and flipped it open.

A full day gone? She racked her brain for any detail, something that would remind her of how she’d spent the last twenty-four hours.

She remembered riding out to the lonely cemetery, but that’s where everything fogged. Crumbling headstones? Towering trees? Piles of leaves? Yes, she could almost feel them swirling around her legs, hear the wind rustling through branches.

She dug deep and massaged her scalp with her fingers, determined to loosen the memory. There had to be more. An almost faded feeling of dread and sadness wavered somewhere inside. And oddly enough, so did pleasure. She recalled taking a few pictures then … nothing. Could it all have been a dream?

She leaped from the bed, grabbed her camera and snapped the memory stick into the card reader of her computer. She sank into the chair and waited a few impatient moments for all the pictures to transfer. With a click, she opened her photo-editing software and sucked in a tentative breath. The first ones to pop up were of the old cemetery sign. Thank God, she hadn’t imagined riding out there. She blew the air from her lungs in a quick burst of relief.

One by one, she scrolled through the images then emailed them to her boss. Wow, they were pretty damn good. So why couldn’t she remember taking them?

She pinched her upper lip, massaged it between her thumb and forefinger, and rested her elbows on the top of the desk. There had to be a completely rational explanation. She paced around the room, then picked up her cell phone.

“Steve, yeah, it’s me. I just emailed you the pics I took of that location yesterday.”

She heard his fingers flying over the keyboard. “Got ‘em.” He paused and she held her breath. Would he like them or would he hate them?

“Hey, nice work. Are the specs here somewhere, too?” He spoke slowly, as if he were concentrating on the pictures.

The specs? Did she even take any measurements or assess the surroundings? “Uh, not yet. I had the mother of all migraines and just now got the chance to send the pictures. I’ll get the specs to you as soon as I can.”

“You’re not sick, are you?” He was probably thankful they were talking on the phone. He had a major germ phobia.

“I don’t think so, but … I sort of blacked out yesterday. I don’t remember taking any of the photos I just sent you.”

“Well, let’s hope the pictures are good enough, then.” He clearly wasn’t concerned about her missing time. “Talked to Patsy at the production company. Turns out they’re considering shooting the film up in Vancouver instead. Something about an actual haunted cemetery.”

Crap. There went her bonus if they went to Canada. Steve talked about several other potential projects, but Mackenzie didn’t really listen. The zombie picture, backed by a major studio, was the only one that promised decent money up front.

Maybe she shouldn’t worry about her long-gone migraine and instead should think about how she was going to make her brother’s tuition payment and get the damn car fixed. Why did big expenses always seem to happen at the same time?

She examined her face in the bathroom mirror, lifted her chin and moved her head from side to side. No dark circles under her eyes, no tired lids. Just refreshed, as if she’d had a great night’s sleep. She reached into the top drawer and grabbed a handful of peanut M&M’s. A large unopened package of candy lay next to the opened one. When had she bought that?

She padded out to the bedroom door and cracked it an inch.

“Sam? You there?”

No answer. She waited a moment then called again. Nothing. The house was silent. What would her roommate be doing digging through her bathroom drawers? Had she eaten the candy, then felt guilty and bought more?

In one bite, she crammed the chocolate pieces into her mouth, turned back to the bathroom and stepped into the shower. Maybe she’d gotten sick and blacked out. Food poisoning? What had she eaten yesterday? Cold pizza?

As she shampooed her hair, her mind ran through the gamut of possibilities. At twenty-six, Mackenzie doubted she had Alzheimer’s like her mother, but losing an entire day with no recollection plucked at the tight order of her life.

She stretched her arms overhead and flexed her muscles. Her temples tingled, probably just remnants of the migraine, but the sensation wasn’t painful. It made her feel … happy? Content? How weird.

She rinsed off and debated hitting the gym, something she rarely felt like doing. With the photos emailed and no classes to teach at the art school, she had the rest of the day free. She should probably go visit her mother, but maybe she’d organize her bedroom closet instead.

Then it struck her. How the hell had she gotten home?

She turned the water off with a jarring crank of old pipes, grabbed a bath towel and ran down the stairs, dripping wet, almost slipping on the bottom step. She skidded through the kitchen and wrenched open the garage door.

Thank God. It was there. But a niggling feeling tugged at the back of her neck as she stared. Her bike was parked on Sam’s side of the garage.

What was going on? Had she lost her mind?

Organized to the point that her brother called her anal, she wasn’t used to feeling so out of control. Maybe she really was going a little crazy. Maybe she did need to see a doctor.

Water from her hair dripped down her back. She wrapped her head with the towel, genie-style, and imagined what Samantha would think if she walked in right now. She’d certainly think Mackenzie was nuts. Although Sam worked at a spa and wasn’t a stranger to seeing naked women’s bodies, she just hadn’t seen this particular one before.

Mackenzie had started back inside when she had a thought.

She approached the bike, opened one of the saddlebags, and sifted through the contents. Where was her tripod? Normally she kept it stored there. Less of a chance she’d forget to bring it on a shoot if she happened to need one. And she hadn’t seen the thing in her room, either.

She noticed her field notebook tucked on its side and flipped through the pages. There were no notes pertaining to the Bear Creek Pioneer Cemetery. No measurements, no sketches, nothing. What the hell happened? Had she forgotten to do them?

She wandered back inside and pressed a few buttons on the espresso maker next to the kitchen window. The high-pitched sound of the grinder echoed in the room and the air filled with the aroma of coffee beans. With a hand on her toweled head, she leaned over the sink to get a better view of her mother’s bird feeder hanging just outside the window overlooking the backyard. The thing was almost empty again. Stupid squirrels.

Her temples began to vibrate, the tingling suddenly replaced by a low buzzing hum. The migraine wasn’t coming back, was it? She put the heel of her hand to her forehead, pressing up on her eyebrows. No. Her head didn’t hurt. Just felt a little strange. She stretched on her tiptoes, reached into the cupboard on the other side of the window and grabbed a coffee cup.

Sweet Jesus.

The oath rang through her head, deep and hoarse. A man’s voice.

She spun around in confusion, the mug slipping from her fingers and clattering to the counter. Where did that come from?

I could just … damn … she’s so …

Words and sentence fragments tumbled into her head from elsewhere but it made no sense. God, what was happening to her? Was she really losing her mind?

“Hello? Sam?” Barely able to eke the words out, she knew her roommate was gone, but she called to her anyway, hoping Sam would answer, though the voice was clearly male. “Who’s there?”

She yanked the towel from her hair and wrapped it around herself in an attempt to cover up. Her heart hammered out a deafening staccato in her chest, while the atmosphere seemed to shift around her as if someone was near. She pulled a large knife from the cutting block, held her other palm to the hilt as she’d been taught and backed up until the edge of the countertop stopped her from going farther.

The words felt as if they had been projected into her head rather than spoken aloud. With the noise from the espresso machine, someone would need to shout for her to even hear them. And what she heard was crystal clear. It just didn’t make sense. She must be going crazy or—

Exquisite … so frightened … I wish … can she hear …

She ran into the dining room, pointing the blade out wildly in front of her. Her temples continued to vibrate and she rubbed her forehead with the back of her knife hand.

Oh God, was this it? Was this what had happened to her father when he disappeared all those years ago? And Stacy?

A surge of strangling heat started at her toes and rose upward, clutching at her chest and pythoning her airways. She could hardly breathe.

It couldn’t be. It couldn’t be happening. Good Lord, no.

Then, like the snap of an off-switch, the vibration in her head stopped. Gone.

Relief flooded over her and she dropped the knife on the dining room table. She drew in a few raspy breaths and the constricting panic disappeared, fading into a calm assurance that she was safe.

What happened to her father had nothing to do with this. She didn’t know why. She just knew.

Seconds ticked into minutes and her breath eventually evened out.

Although she didn’t hear the voice again, something tangible still called to her. A silent longing tugged at her heart as an ache settled into her bones.

Her lips throbbed, felt swollen, and she detected a slow rhythmic sensation in her head. Not painful, just strange. It didn’t seem to match that of her own heart doing cartwheels and clanging around her rib cage. The sound in her temples was steady and quietly reassuring.

Two heartbeats? Okay, think. Well, she knew she couldn’t be pregnant. It took a man as well as a body capable of carrying a child. Two things she didn’t have. No, definitely not pregnant.

What about the missing chunk of time? What if … She felt between her legs and rubbed her hands over her breasts. Nothing. She’d know if she’d had sex last night, especially since it had been ages. No, she was positive she hadn’t been with a man.

Could the migraine be coming back? What the hell was happening to her? She needed to seriously calm down and figure this out. There had to be a completely rational explanation for this … this … whatever this was.

Air. She needed fresh air. She flung open the French doors of the dining room, and a rush of coolness whispered over her damp skin and hair as she scanned the perimeter of her backyard. For what, she had no idea.

The dewy green of spring was everywhere and her cherry tree was starting to blossom. Ceramic pots on the patio waited to be filled with flowers, and a swallow swooped under the eaves, its beak filled with bits of dried grass. Everything seemed the same, normal, but she knew things weren’t.

She concentrated on the slow thumping beat in her head, rather than her racing heart and was startled to find that the more she focused on it, the more comforting it became. Gradually, the tempo of the two beats got closer together and eventually meshed into one.

One rhythm. One sound. One heartbeat.

She leaned against the doorjamb, her skin flushed hot, and for some crazy reason, she imagined the crush of a man’s muscular body against hers. She closed her eyes, wrapped her arms around her toweled body, and could almost feel the strong muscles of his shoulders moving beneath her hands. The musky fragrance of his passion in her lungs. Wetness surged between her legs as if her body were readying itself for him.

Her breath came in short bursts, and drawn to the backyard by an invisible thread, she stepped onto the patio. Like an electric charge, an unseen yet shimmering presence in the air, something called to her. She wanted to respond, to answer, but she didn’t know how.

Then, just as it had started, the second heartbeat was gone. Not a gradual fading, but a tearing away. A bandage ripped from a wound. She waited a few moments, but it was gone.

Shuffling back inside, she collapsed into a chair.

What the hell just happened?

She had to be losing it. Or going completely mental—as her mother’s British friend at the nursing home would say. Imaginary orgasmic sensations? Oh great, how would she explain that one to a doctor?

“Well, I was home alone, when I heard an imaginary guy talking to me, and then I almost had a real orgasm.”

Yeah, right. Can you say crazy? She forced herself to laugh, hoping to lighten her mood so she could think more clearly.

But there was something about the voice in her head that nagged at her. Like she should know it. Like she had heard it before. She racked her brain but came up with nothing.

And what about her missing day? What the heck was going on?

She took a deep breath, squared her shoulders and pushed away from the table. No sense wasting time worrying or pondering. She would do what she always did—she’d either find some answers or she’d quit dwelling on things she had no control over and move on. She’d had a lot of practice with that.

After mopping up all the water she’d tracked in from her shower, she finished getting ready and jumped on the Triumph. Armed with a plan, she roared out of the garage.

THIS CAN’T be happening. It’s just a Hill Country legend. An old Cantabrian myth. Not real.

Dom swung his silver Porsche away from the curb and followed the woman—Mackenzie—through her neighborhood and onto a major thoroughfare. With a bandanna on her head and two braided pigtails bouncing on her back, she handled the bike deftly. Where was her goddamn helmet?

Of course, he had heard the old stories told during the Feast of the Longest Day. But that was all they were. Stories. No one actually knew anyone who became telepathic and bonded through blood sharing. And certainly not with a human. It was just a tale about sex and love told by the elders late at night around the bonfires. A gothic romance causing girls to swoon and boys to snicker. No one thought it had any basis in reality.

But what else could it be? She clearly heard his thoughts and he had heard hers. If he hadn’t made that realization and shut his mind off to her, who knew what she would have done with that knife. There were stories of that, as well. And for God’s sake, they’d practically made love from a distance. His balls still ached.

After he had nursed her through the night and most of the day, when he was confident her condition had improved enough, he planned to drive out of her life. He didn’t have time for this. So why was he following her?

He really should turn around, head home. She looked fine now. But when he lifted his foot off the accelerator, a pain cut into his gut like a blunt knife. He needed to flick the turn signal, crank the steering wheel, but he couldn’t make himself do it. He rubbed a hand over his chest, which actually ached. When he pressed down on the pedal again and the vehicle moved a little closer, the pain faded away.

What the hell was going on? This seemed much more than just a sweetblood attraction. Alfonso had never mentioned any of this shit happening to him.

And where was she going? He didn’t dare probe her mind to find out. If things felt to her as they did to him, the sounds in her head might cause her to run off the road. Could she feel him, too, and just not understand the sensation? Unlike his thoughts, his presence was something he couldn’t block from her.

She turned the bike onto the freeway on-ramp and headed north. The aching pit in his gut expanded and he knew it was worry.

Then his phone rang. Santiago. The Region Commander.

And the pit stretched wider.

“Dom, how’d it go? Get it locked up with that woman?”

“A little too locked up, I’d say.”

She wove in and out of cars like a lunatic on that bike. It was the tail-end of rush hour and traffic was still heavy on the wet roadways.

“How so?” Santiago sounded apprehensive, like he was ready to get pissed off. “Wait. Are you in the car? At this hour?”

“Uh, yes.” Dom gritted his teeth, preparing himself for the inevitable verbal onslaught. “Remember when we talked last night and I told you the woman was dying? Lips turning blue? Vital signs weakening?”

“Don’t fuckin’ tell me. Don’t you say it. I told you to just walk away.”

“Well, I didn’t.”

“And you—” Dom turned down the volume as his boss yelled.

He knew Santiago would freak out. What did he expect? Dom would be lucky not to be hauled in front of the Council. What he’d done this time was more than just a simple infraction.

Although she was five or six cars ahead of him, he could see the exposed skin on her back between her jacket and the low waistband of her jeans. Was everyone else on the road staring at the same tantalizing inch he was? White-knuckling it, he accelerated and the Porsche surged forward.

“Listen. She was going downhill fast and I thought she wouldn’t make it. It was a small amount. Just a couple drops of my blood. She appears to be doing fine now, so it worked. But there’s a little problem.”

“More than an illegal blood transfer? What could be worse than that, Dom? What in God’s name could possibly be worse?”

Mackenzie changed lanes, spraying an arc of standing water and causing the car behind her to slam on its brakes. What the hell was she doing riding a motorcycle with these road conditions anyway? He eased up on the gas and the Porsche downshifted automatically. Seeing an opening ahead, he cranked the wheel and accelerated into the next lane.

“In addition to a sudden lack of UV sensitivity, I am—She is—We’re telepathic.” There, he said it.

“You’re what?”

“I can hear her and she can hear me. Thank God I was able to set up a mental barrier when I realized she could hear my thoughts, but there was nothing I could do about her feeling my presence until I left.”

Santiago was uncharacteristically quiet.

“You still there?”

“You’re not shitting me, are you?”

“This isn’t a damn joke. I’d walk away right now and forget all about this mind-reading bullshit, but she’s still in danger.” That wasn’t the only reason he didn’t want to walk away, but he wasn’t about to tell Santiago about the stabbing feeling inside when he thought about leaving her. Hell, he didn’t understand it himself.

“Goddamn it. You never should’ve done it in the first place. You know better than to blood-share with a human. And now you put me in a position where I should report your actions to the Council. Then you’ll really be screwed. What the hell is wrong with you?”

“Whatever. Do what you need to do. Screw them.”

“At this rate, you’re going to be stuck up here forever. I thought you wanted to get back to one of the southern field offices. Where all the Darkblood action is.”

“She would’ve died without it.”

“Humans die every day. We can’t get involved in their affairs beyond just covert protection from Darkbloods.”

“Yes, well, they don’t die because of me.” Dom jabbed the climate control button and cranked the A/C, but the cold air did little to cool him off.

If Santiago launched into his standard lecture about there being billions of humans on this earth, but very few vampires, or that humans represent the grains of sand on a beach whereas the number of vampires could be sifted through your fingers, Dom was going to need another new phone. He’d been a Guardian almost as long as Santiago and he sure as hell didn’t need to hear another patronizing sermon outlining the concerns of the Council and reminding him what he should and shouldn’t do.

Santiago was silent for a few moments. “Where are you headed now?”

“She’s going back to the cemetery where she found me, if she gets there alive. She drives like a goddamn maniac.” His jaw ached from clenching it so tightly. “I think she’s trying to piece together why she blacked out. Her last memory is from there.”

“Did you sweep it yet?”

“No, and her scent is all over that place. When I brought her home, I took evasive measures and hid our trail. If the Darkbloods showed up at the cemetery last night, they wouldn’t have been able to follow us. But, if they’re slow and track me there tonight, her new scent will lead straight back to her house. I’ve got to do something to cover it up again.”

He eased up on the accelerator and concentrated on hanging back a little farther. It made him inexplicably nervous having her too far away.

“Seems a little excessive. Didn’t you use any scent neutralizing granules? They do an adequate job of absorbing the trace of a sweetblood.”

Dom choked back a few swearwords. Was he serious? “That carbon crap works only temporarily and only if the Darkblood forgets to breathe or has a sudden allergy attack.”

“Oh for chrissake, they’re effective enough. Why don’t you call someone for backup then, if you’re so worried about them tracking her? Who do you have on duty tonight?”

There weren’t many choices. They ran a lean operation.

“Foss.” But the thought of having the biggest man-whore in the Guardian ranks anywhere near the woman made him nauseous as hell.

“Hey, where the hell is that data? I’ve been waiting for you to upload it.”

Dom steeled his shoulders to prepare himself for Santiago’s inevitable reaction. “As soon as I can locate the phone I downloaded it to. I dropped it sometime after I was shot and because I floated so far downstream, the phone could be anywhere. And, most likely, it’s no longer functioning.” He should have searched for it immediately, but strangely enough, it hadn’t crossed his mind until now. “I’ll find it.”

Santiago let loose with a volley of foreign profanity Dom had never heard before. Yes, his boss definitely had a way with words.

“I’ll see if we can pick up its GPS signal. You’d better pray you find it. That mission cost us a lot. Stryker was hit after the two of you split up.”

Oh, shit. His new guy. “Is he okay? What happened?” He shouldn’t have allowed someone as inexperienced as Mitchell Stryker in the kill zone, but when they hacked into the Darkblood system, they’d been so focused on copying everything, he’d forgotten all about protocol.

“Yeah, you cut out on our conversation last night before I could tell you. He’s still in the clinic. Shot by a silvie, just like you were. But he didn’t hit pay dirt and run into a sweetblood.”

Clamping his teeth together, Dom’s pulse jackham-mered behind his eyeballs. He took a couple of deep breaths and willed himself to calm down. He wanted to acquaint his boss with some of his own favorite swearwords, foreign and domestic, but biting Santiago’s head off would only anger him more and Dom needed him on his side. The Council could kick his ass to a really remote location if he wasn’t careful.

Then he’d be even farther from him. From the whole reason he joined the Agency.

In a scene he’d pictured in his mind every night for the past century, Dom visualized his hands around his neck, choking the air from stale lungs, before he crammed a stake into his black heart and spit on the ashes. Being a field team leader all the way up here was bad enough. Where else could they send him? Anchorage?

He mentally shook off those images and forced himself to think about Stryker. “What’s his prognosis? Will he be all right?” Mitchell was a good guy. A little over-eager, but he reminded Dom of himself when he first started with the Agency. He’d visit him when he finished tonight.

“He’ll be fine in a week or two. Bullet got him in the thigh. Staff tells me he’s been asking about you. So how’s the shoulder doing?”

Dom had actually forgotten all about it. Reaching a hand into the open collar of his shirt, he shrugged, half-expecting to feel a twinge, a pull, something. But he felt nothing. Even the skin of his shoulder was smooth, as if he’d never been shot. He kneaded the muscle a few times just to make sure. “Fine, I guess.”

“Sangre Dulce blood is very healing in addition to the incredible rush, right?” Santiago dropped his voice. “So how was it? I’ve only heard the stories. I still can’t believe you did a Stop and Release on a sweetblood in your condition. A goddamn S and R.” He whistled into the phone.

“You can’t imagine. Drinking from her was so …” He searched for the right word. Utterly exquisite and complete perfection came to mind. But these were private recollections and he didn’t want to share them. “Amazing.” Generic enough, he supposed.

“What’s up with you? I can’t remember when I’ve ever heard you so affected by a woman. Sure you didn’t prong her with the sharps and the blunt?”

“Fuck no. That’s the last thing on my mind.” Did he sound convincing?

Santiago’s laugh reflected his apparent disbelief. Guess not. Oh well, his boss could think what he wanted.

“Given just its taste, can you understand why there’s such a huge black market for the shit?”

“Unfortunately, yes, I can.” And that’s what worried him. Now that he knew what it was like, he didn’t want to be tempted again. It was one thing to wonder, but it was completely different to know for sure.

CHAPTER THREE

AT THE CEMETERY, Mackenzie retied the red bandanna, flung her thick braids in front of her shoulders and grabbed her notepad. With the sun already dipping below the tops of the trees, she had only an hour or so to wrap things up.

Squinting in the direction she came, she estimated the distance from the paved road to the cemetery entrance. It was too far to pace off. A mile? Two miles? She’d clock it on the odometer when she left. After measuring the width of the gravel road, she scribbled the figures in her notebook. The camera and equipment trucks took up a lot of space, as did the large special effects trailer, but this road had no shoulder. Where would they all park? They’d have to drive the rigs in single-file. Would there even be enough room to pass another vehicle if they needed to move one closer? Access might be the real problem here.

Her research seemed correct that this was an old logging road, but she jumped back on her bike to explore a little farther.

Just around the corner, a rickety bridge spanned what was probably Bear Creek and her stomach sank. With a missing railing and cracked wooden slats, it couldn’t accommodate a heavy vehicle. The crew wouldn’t be able to park beyond the bridge, which didn’t give them a lot of room. After snapping a couple of pictures anyway, she climbed on the bike and headed back to the cemetery entrance.

At least it was only a one- or two-day shoot with none of the main actors and only a handful of extras. They didn’t need to accommodate a huge catering facility and provide private dressing rooms. Most of it was just special effects stuff. Yeah, maybe it could still work.

She licked a fingertip and flipped through the pages of her notebook. It looked like she’d gotten everything. After she tucked the pad and camera into the saddlebag, she grabbed her gun and stuffed it into her pocket. Now it was time for a different set of answers. Maybe something in the cemetery would jump-start her memory.

The clearing was cool and damp and the wind whispered through the branches of the trees, lifting them in an orchestrated wave as if welcoming her back. She took a deep breath and shivered, nervous about what she may find.

Stepping over the headstones, she swept her gaze over the pale green mounds of tufted grass and weeds that seemed to cover everything. She spied a familiar marker but wasn’t sure if she recognized it from being here yesterday or from the photos she’d reviewed back home today.

Then she spotted it. Her portable tripod. It lay on its side, still fully extended, as if she had removed the camera and left it there. How could that have happened? It was almost second nature to grab it when she did a shoot. Camera strap around the neck, unhook the camera, grab the tripod, fold up the legs. She’d done it so many times and she’d never left it behind before. Had she been distracted or startled yesterday? A chill snaked up her spine.

Distracted or startled by what?

She turned slowly, making a complete circle as her eyes combed the forest perimeter. Did this look familiar? Yes, maybe.

Drawn to the sound of water, she zigzagged around the crumbled tombstones to the edge of the cemetery. Beneath the canopy of a huge old cedar, she saw a large pile of leaves and the hairs on the back of her neck prickled. She slipped a hand into her pocket and touched the gun for reassurance.

Something crunched underneath her boot when she shuffled through the leaves. She stooped and found a hair clip. Hers? The plastic was cracked, the spring was broken, and it looked like the type she wore. But if she’d been right here, why couldn’t she remember? Had she fallen and hit her head?

She stared at the leaves and brushed her hand over the surface, stirring them up. Unlike the other piles, these were dry, protected under the thick canopy of the cedar tree. She picked up a handful. They smelled like the forest. With her eyes closed, she rubbed them against her cheek. Stiff, crisp … and familiar. But the memory was just beyond her reach—she couldn’t determine how to pluck it out. Crunching the leaves in her hand, she blew the pieces into the air and they fluttered to the ground.

She stepped through the bushes and down to the creek. Six or seven feet across and only a foot or two deep, the crystal-clear water flowed over a layer of dark-colored stones.

A small sandbar, bathed in sunlight, lined the bank on the far side and looked inviting. With the gentle sound of the running water, the hard knots of tension lodged between her shoulder blades seemed to loosen. She turned to walk upstream along the edge, but the undergrowth was thick with thorny blackberries and waist-high marsh grasses that looked like giant mop heads.

She stripped off her boots and socks, rolled up her jeans and sloshed to the other side. When she plopped down onto the sand, a gust of wind, warm with the promise of summer, ruffled her hair. She closed her eyes, just for a minute, and the ever-present tingling—an almost constant sensation since she’d woken up this afternoon—fluttered against her temples.

A twig snapped on the other side of the creek and she sat up. God, had she actually dozed off? She noticed the shadows had lengthened and the sun had dropped lower in the sky. When she bent to pick up her boots and tripod, the sun glinted off an object half-submerged in the sand.

A cell phone.

How did that get here? Even after she brushed off the sand, she had a hard time sliding it open. The touchpad screen was shattered. With a little bit of effort, she forced the phone closed again and rolled it around in her hands. Probably water damaged. She held it to her cheek; the molded plastic felt warm from the sun.

Small and sleek, it had to be a fairly new model. Maybe the contact numbers could still be extracted. Those were always a bitch to re-create. She’d take it to a cell phone store to see if they could find the owner.

With the tripod in one hand and her boots in the other, she stepped back into the creek and hurriedly sloshed through the water. But before she reached the far side, her foot slipped on the smooth river stones and she shrieked. Helicoptering her arms, she tried to catch herself, but she fell to her knees, submerging her boots and tripod.

She patted her pocket. The gun and the phone were safe. But crap, the ride home was going to be frigid.

“JACKSON, YOU all set? She’s coming.”

“Yep, I’m ready, although I think you’re going way overboard with this convoluted scent-masking scheme.”

“Just do as I say.” If only Dom could let her go straight home. Or better yet, invite her into his warm car with its heated seats. But it was crucial to confuse her trail if any Darkbloods got to the cemetery looking for him. They’d pick up her scent and follow her like bloodhounds. This was the only way to make sure they couldn’t track her.

He sensed her discomfort and wished there was something he could do. When he saw her fall in the creek, he had jumped to help, but he had to stop himself and could only watch as she got drenched.

After her bike roared past his location in the trees, he waited a few impatient moments before following.

“Where do you have the first detour?” Dom gritted his teeth as he glanced at the speedometer. Did she even know what a speed limit was?

“At Maple Grove Road. She’ll want to turn right, but I’ve got the road closure barricade set up and she’ll have to turn left. Hope there isn’t much traffic.”

“There shouldn’t be. Just don’t lose her, all right? And don’t get too close. Don’t forget she’s a sweetblood.” Why in the hell had he let Foss set up the detours anyway? He should’ve done it himself.

“Yeah, yeah, yeah. Here she comes now.” Jackson paused and Dom heard the low rumble of her bike through the phone. “Oh shit, dude, she’s pissed.” As Foss erupted in snorts of laughter, Dom bristled. “She didn’t see the sign until she was almost on it. She pulled a Uey and kicked the damn thing over. You should’ve seen her whip that bike around. And when she drove away … Man, she’s hot.”

Dom nearly ran the Porsche off the road. Cursing under his breath, he told himself to stay calm.

“Gotta get the next one ready.” Jackson laughed and the line went dead.

Dom drove straight to Mackenzie’s house, laying down masking scent as Jackson did on the long route. After parking down the block, he reclined the seat and popped in a CD. His shoulders ached and he reached back to rub the knotted muscles. Taking a deep breath, he tried to relax. The circuitous route home should put her back here in thirty or forty minutes. No big deal.

But what about that phone? Her finding it screwed up everything. How was he going to get it back? The data might not be retrievable, the device might be too damaged, but he still had to try. He’d just let himself into her house tonight and take it. That’s all there was to it. Then he’d be done with this.

He glanced at his watch, ran his fingers through his hair. She should be pulling in soon but he didn’t sense her presence yet. What the hell? His fingers drummed the back of his headrest, then the steering wheel, and he inspected his watch again. Technically, they weren’t really late. The half-hour timeframe was merely an approximation.

Fifteen minutes later, he texted Jackson. Be there soon, was the reply. After goose bumps prickled his arms and he shivered, he realized he was sensing her chills.

He couldn’t bear to sit inside any longer. When he climbed out of the car, the peppery smell of wet pavement and the sound of spring frogs hidden in the dark reminded him he was among the calm energies of the Seattle area, not the volatile ones he was used to in the South.

He paced the sidewalk for what seemed like a millennium, memorizing every crack, every stray weed, and the license plate numbers of every car on her block. Picking up snippets of her neighbors’ lives, he heard a blaring television, an argument with kids about bath-time, and one neighbor was fucking someone who wasn’t his wife. Christ.

When he didn’t think he could take it a moment longer, a single headlight flashed in the distance and he heard the low rumble of her motorcycle. He leaned on the hood of the car and his head slumped with relief. Finally, he could breathe again. Although he sensed how cold she was, she was here. She was fine. She pulled into her garage and disappeared into the house.

Minutes later, two headlights appeared and a jacked-up black 4x4 pulled in behind the Porsche. He had Foss by the neck before he could put the vehicle in Park. Dom leaned in close, his fangs extended.

“What the hell did you do to her?”

“Jesus, Dom, what’s wrong with you? Get off me.”

“Did you touch her?” His thumb and fingers tightened around his friend’s larynx as he took a deep whiff, sniffing for any sign of her. Nothing.

“No. What the hell’s your problem?” Jackson choked.

Relieved on one level, but still pissed off, Dom loosened his grip and Jackson shoved him away.

“What took you so long? You should have had her back thirty minutes ago.”

“It’s not like I’m some weakass Darkblood wanting to suck anything with two legs and a pulse,” Jackson said as he rubbed his neck, “even if she is a sweetblood. She got pulled over by the cops. No helmet. Talked her way out of a ticket though. Since when did you become so protective?”

“Why didn’t you call or text me?”

“I had a few more detours to set up. You should’ve seen her. Every time she’d come to one, she’d kick at it. God, it was hilarious. This one time—”

“You were only supposed to do three. She’s freezing, for God’s sake. Did that ever cross your mind?”

“Sorry, man, you’re right. But if you could have seen her …” Foss looked up with a dreamy smile, and Dom wanted to wipe it from his face.

Rage boiled just below the surface, threatening to overflow, and his fangs ached. He never should’ve let Foss get so close to her.

Jackson cocked an eyebrow. “What is wrong with you? I swear I didn’t touch her. She’s a hottie, but she’s yours. I get that.”

“She’s not mine.” Dom wrenched open the door of the Porsche.

“Could’ve fuckin’ fooled me.”

CHAPTER FOUR

THE BAND AT Big Daddy’s was getting ready to play their final set and most of the patrons were on their third or fourth pitcher of Friday night refreshment. People crowded the pool tables and lines formed at every dartboard.

“Can I get you anything else, sugar?” The waitress leaned over Dom’s table to adjust the location of the salt shaker and her large breasts dangled in his face.

He pushed himself back slightly and saw her tongue dart from the corner of her over-glossed lips. She was offering him more than just beer, but he was definitely not interested.

“Two Hefeweizens.”

“Two? How ‘bout a pitcher. It’s a better deal.” She put her hand on his shoulder. The rose tattoo on her right breast hovered at eye level, the name Lenny entwined in the stem. “Expecting company?”

“Yes, and here she is. Two beers. And a straw.”

“Alrighty, then.” She pulled one from her apron pocket and turned around as a lanky woman approached the table with a swagger that belonged on a Fashion Week runway. “Day-um,” the waitress muttered under her breath and walked away.

The blonde’s painted-on low-rise jeans barely covered her ass and her red heels screamed “come fuck me.” One guy fell over in his chair, gaping, as she sauntered past him, her belly-button chain swinging with each step. Dom rolled his eyes and smiled when he saw it was a diamond-encrusted arrow pointing down. Shock and awe had always been her motto. Some things never changed.

“Lily.” Dom stood and hugged her. She air-kissed him on both cheeks and rested her hands, with red-tipped fingernails, lightly on his biceps. Holding her at arm’s length, his eyes raked her up and down. She loved the admiration and, as a good friend he needed a favor from, he wanted to feed her ego. “Stunning as usual. I think there’s a collective heart attack going on in here.”

“Thanks, love.” Her breathy just-out-of-bed voice always caught him off guard. She ran a hand down her stick-straight, shoulder-length hair, flicking the ends through her fingers. Leaning in close, she inhaled with half-closed eyes. He stiffened his shoulders and got ready for what he knew was coming.

“Mmm. You smell positively mouthwatering.” She slid a hand down to his ass and, with a grunt, yanked his hips close then let go.

“Thanks.” He laughed and pulled out her chair.

She hung her purse on the seat back and sat down just as the waitress returned with their drinks.

“May I? That’s a beautiful tattoo.” Lily stretched her palms out and took the woman’s hand. She ignored the colorful Lenny tattoo and pretended to be engrossed in the plain barbed wire one on the woman’s arm, but Dom knew better. “Nice. Very nice.” Lily’s eyes fluttered and the corners of her mouth turned up.

“Uh, thanks.” The waitress lifted her free hand to her mouth and yawned.

Lily loosened her grip and the woman pulled away, blinked a few times and walked slowly back to the bar.

“Shit, Lily. You couldn’t wait?”

“Sorry. Been with the fam all week up in Whistler and I was low on energy. I was slogging.” She reached her arms overhead and her shoulders cracked. “Ahhh, much better. So what’s the job, love? Your text was cryptic.” She unwrapped the straw, put it in her beer and took a long sip.

“I need your help to close an assignment.”

The driving beat of a bass drum filled the air, followed by a screeching guitar. The lead singer straddled the microphone stand and began to sing. Not bad. Dom hadn’t heard a cover of this song before. With the loud background noise, no one would be able to hear their conversation.

“Three days ago, my team uncovered a Darkblood den. I had just uploaded some data from their computer when they surprised us. We managed to take a couple of them out, but Stryker and I were shot. With silvies.”

“You obviously had on your gear, eh?”

Dom took a drink and shook his head. “No. Didn’t see the need. Our intel hasn’t confirmed the usage of silver-tipped bullets by any Northwest cells yet. These boys are pretty unsophisticated up here. Didn’t know they had them.”

“Yet? Are you all pigheaded idiots? It was just a matter of time. All the DBs in the South are using them—you know that. Didn’t you get the Agency directive instructing all agents to wear protection when out on patrol?”

“Yes. And your point is …?”

“My point is that you could’ve been killed, or worse. Some body parts don’t regenerate as completely as others. Didn’t you hear about Eddie Bale in Costa Rica? Almost got his head shot off with a silvie and they’ve had a heck of a time with the skin grafts. Even after they flew him to that burn center in New York.”

“I hate those damn vests. Besides, a vest wouldn’t have helped Eddie anyway. Next thing you know, the Agency’s going to make us wear helmets. What we do is dangerous. If that bothered me in the slightest, I’d have chosen another line of work. Like owning a bar.”

A loud ruckus broke out near the pool tables as a couple of cops cuffed an old guy with a long, thinning comb-over and hauled him through the crowd. When he refused to walk, they grabbed him by each arm and dragged him outside to a waiting patrol car. Dom turned his attention back to Lily.

“Three days ago you were shot with a silvie?” She pursed her lips, obviously contemplating what he had said. “Impossible. You’d still be flat on your ass.”

“That’s why I called you here. A couple of DBs came after me, but I managed to dodge them early in the morning and bury myself in the woods. Then a sweetblood found me. And you don’t have to guess to know what happened next.”

Lily whistled. “Shit, Dom. Did you drain him? Her? That explains the speedy recovery. And your fabulous smell.” She grabbed his arm and pressed her nose to the inside of his wrist. “Her, right?”

He pointedly ignored her question and withdrew his hand. “I need your help. Foss and I covered up the scent trail, but in order to wrap up the assignment, I wanted to see if you could detect any lingering traces. To make sure the Darkbloods can’t track the scent back.”

She played with her straw and scowled into her glass. When she met his gaze, his gut clenched. He really didn’t want to explain it to her when he didn’t understand it himself. Besides, the whole experience seemed too personal, too intimate to discuss. He wasn’t like Jackson, or Lily, for that matter, who loved recounting their exploits to anyone with a set of ears. Not his style. Or at least it wasn’t now.

“Seems like a bit of an overkill, don’t you think? I’m sure you and Jackson covered the trail well enough.” Her hawkish eyes appraised him. He wasn’t going to get anything past her.

“I just want to be sure.” Leaning back in his seat, he forced himself to tap his fingers to the music, pretending to be focused on the band. He could almost hear the cogs in Lily’s head turning. No goddamn questions. Just take the assignment.

“It’s a woman, eh?” She reached over and put her hand on his wrist. She was too perceptive. Or maybe he was just a poor actor. He attempted to keep his face expressionless, hard. “And you have feelings for her. I’m right, aren’t I?”

He didn’t know what he was feeling. “It’s a woman.” He tried to sound emotionless.

“What’s going on? Talk. I can tell something’s up. I know you too well.”

For chrissake. Running a hand through his hair, he took a deep breath and resigned himself to the inevitable Oprah-like scrutiny. Feelings and talking and shit.

“The strangest thing happened. I almost drained her so I had to do a blood transfer.” She sat up straight and her eyes widened. “Spare me the lecture, Lil. Santiago knows about it and is probably going to report it to the Council. The bigger problem is now she and I have this weird connection, some kind of strange bond, yet we’ve never talked. She’s never seen me, or at least she doesn’t remember seeing me. I wiped her memory.”

As he recounted the incident at Mackenzie’s house, Lily listened with her head bowed, nodding at times, and picked at her red-tipped nails. He braced himself for twenty questions, but she remained silent.

“Have you ever heard of such crap? I had some unusual sensations with just her blood in my system. But now that she’s had a little of mine, it’s even more heightened. I even heard her dreams when she slept. I thought the old stories were a bunch of superstitious nonsense.”

“Enlazado por la Sangre.” Lily dropped her voice so low he could barely hear even though the band was now playing a slow ballad.

Her subdued reaction surprised him. “What?”

“Bonded by blood. My grandparents shared a blood bond, have I never told you that?”

Dom shook his head. Never heard of it.

“Hardly anyone outside the family knew. In fact, not many inside the family did, either. I’m the only grandchild my grandmother told.”

“I don’t believe it. You? Keeping secrets?”

“Yeah, well, she ended up staking herself. So we don’t talk about it much.”

“God, Lil, I’m sorry.”

“No problem. You didn’t know.” Lily took another sip of beer from her straw. “She described the bond as a joining of body, soul and spirit. They knew each other’s thoughts. Could sense each other’s energy and emotions. Kind of like tuning into a private radio signal of someone’s life force. Prana, I think she called it. Not only did they share blood, but they also shared energies and could absorb it from each other just by touching. They thrived off it.”

“What’s so earth-shattering about energy transfers?” Dom nodded his head toward their waitress still leaning on the bar.

“Between two vampires? As much as I like your prana, Dom, what’s yours is yours and what’s mine is mine. I’d take a little bit of yours if I could, though.” She flashed him a playful smile. “But my grandparents—they could share it between the two of them with just a simple touch.”

He supposed he had inadvertently absorbed some of Mackenzie’s energy at some point, although he had been careful not to touch his palms to her hands or her face. Well, when he had his wits about him, he didn’t. Had he unknowingly given her some of his? Was that even possible?

“And their emotions?” he asked.

“Yeah. My grandparents could sense how the other was feeling even from a distance. Many years ago, when my grandmother worked at a medical clinic, a DB or maybe just a run-of-the-mill freak came in demanding Sweet. Said if she didn’t get him some sweetblood, he was going to kill her. Of course she was scared. A short time later my grandfather burst through the entrance with a couple of Guardians and they staked the loser. Said he felt her fear as if it were his own and knew she needed his help. That story is one of the reasons I joined the Agency. I thought it was so heroic. Still do. And very romantic.”

Dom ran his fingers against his scalp and tugged at the roots of his hair. This was bullshit. Could it get any worse? “Anything else?”

“Well, apart from the fact that the sex is like an awakening of sorts, that’s about all I know.”

“You and your grandmother talked about sex?”

“What can I say? She was a very enlightened woman, comfortable with her sexuality. Over cocktails once, she told me that intimate relations were much more enhanced. But, no, she didn’t go into detail.” She grasped his hand, gave a reassuring squeeze, then released it. “They were so completely bonded to each other that when my grandfather died, she couldn’t bear to live without him.”

Every nerve ending seemed to shut down as his body numbed and the bar noise faded into the background. He stared at the amber liquid in his glass, twirling it gently, watching the foam cling to the sides. Was that what he was craving from her as well? Her prana? Sex? That certainly explained why he couldn’t stop thinking about her.

“But, like I said, they were both vamps. I’ve never heard of it happening with a human. Blood-bonded to a sweetblood? That sucks.” She barked out an unflattering laugh. “And you’ve never spoken?”

“No.”

“Don’t know what else I can tell you. Why don’t you go introduce yourself? What woman can resist your charms? I know I have a hard time.” She blew him an air kiss, obviously trying to lighten his mood.

“Ha. ‘Excuse me, but you’re my soul mate. Pardon me while I kill you.’ Riiiight.”

“I’d see if she’d go horizontal first, eh?” One perfectly plucked eyebrow lifted into a naughty arch.

“Very funny. For all I know, she’s a raging bitch. I’ve seen her lists, her alphabetized DVD collection, her antiseptic refrigerator.”

Not that a pretty girl’s personality quirks had ever mattered to him before. Most of the time he spent with them was between the sheets and what they did involved little talking. Maybe if they had sex, he could get her out of his system.

“I’m guessing you’re enticed by more than her blood, even if she is Sangre Dulce. My grandmother told me she was made for my grandfather and he was made for her. Not sure what that means in terms of sex, but all I know is that it’s a soul mate thing.”

“That’s insane.”

Lily fished a tube of shimmery pink lipstick from her purse, applied it without a mirror, and tossed it back into her bag. She shook her head slowly as she rubbed her lips together, and when she looked at him again, she flashed him an all-knowing grin.

From across the room, a whoop of laughter erupted above the music, momentarily distracting him. The singer had jumped onto the dance floor and stroked the microphone stand between his lycra-clad legs like a giant hard-on while an orgasmic-like guitar riff went on and on. A woman with an animal-print thong teeing above the waistband of her jeans hopped onto a man’s back and dry-humped him while the crowd cheered.

Oh, for God’s sake. He turned his attention back to Lily who was still smiling, although he knew she despised this kind of music.

“No. I’m serious, Lil. I just need to be sure the DBs can’t track her. Then I’ll close the assignment and be done with it. I need to be in Portland.”

“Suit yourself, but I think you’re hosed, love.”

“NEED SOME help, Sam?” Mackenzie’s roommate struggled through the front door holding a precarious stack of cardboard boxes. “Here, let me—”

Dropping her paintbrush, Mackenzie jumped up and they hefted the boxes to the dining room table. “What do you have in here? These weigh a ton.”

“It’s for my new internet jewelry business. It’s a bunch of supplies I ordered.” Sam shrugged out of her jacket and started to put it on the chair across the table from Mackenzie, but she pivoted back to the entry way and hung it in the hall closet instead. Fluffing her short dark hair, Sam rewound her long, hand-knit scarf a couple times around her neck before she returned to the dining room and started opening boxes.

“When did you start that? Aren’t you still working at the hotel spa?”

Sam wasn’t quitting her job to start a business, was she? Giving up a regular paycheck? It had been a while since they’d been home at the same time. But still … wouldn’t she have let Mackenzie know? She eyed Sam warily over the top of the canvas. Mackenzie had liked Sam’s company this past year, but help with the mortgage was sort of the point in getting a roommate in the first place.

“Oh, I’m still working down there, but my clients kept asking me about all the jewelry I wear, so I decided to sell the stuff online. I’ve had a ton of hits on my website already and can’t believe all the orders I’ve gotten.”

“That’s exciting. How long has it been?” Thank God for regular paychecks.

“Only a couple weeks.” As Sam reached inside a box, several large medallions hanging under her scarf clanked together like gaudy wind chimes. One-of-a-kind pieces. Definitely. Missing were her trademark dangly chandelier earrings and all the bracelets she usually had stacked on each wrist. She must even be selling the jewelry she wore because she never took the stuff off.

“You still on for Friday night?” Mackenzie asked.

“The auction? You bet. But I prolly won’t bid on anything. Been spending all my extra funds on my jewelry stuff.”

“Yeah, I’m not sure I will, either, but these things are still fun to attend. It’s at the top of the Columbia Center. You know, the one with the amazing women’s bathroom?”

“Isn’t that the one where each stall has its own individual view of the city with floor-to-ceiling windows?”

“Yup. That’s the one.” Mackenzie picked up her brush and turned her attention back to her painting as Sam sifted through the contents. “You haven’t been home much lately. So this is what you’ve been up to.” Mackenzie fanned the canvas with her hand as if it would speed up the drying of oil paint. She knew it wouldn’t help, but she did it anyway because the piece needed to be finished by the weekend.

“Yeah, and, well, I’ve been seeing someone new.”

“What happened to Ethan?”

“He’s long gone. Started getting too serious so I broke up with him. Talking marriage and stuff.”

Oh, to be that cavalier. “So who’s the new guy? Don’t tell me you picked one up at the club again.” Mackenzie didn’t begrudge her roommate’s dating habits, but she did like to tease her.

“He’s a client, actually. Been staying at his place a lot but he works the graveyard shift, so we … ah … sleep a lot during the day. Don’t say anything if Gretchen calls. If my manager knew I was sleeping with a client, she’d have a shit-fit.”

“How’d that happen? You ask the guy if he wanted a happy ending?”

“Something like that. Said I had magical hands.”

“How original.”

Sam laughed, but it sounded a bit hollow.

Mackenzie looked up. Sam was rubbing the backs of her arms, a strained expression on her face. “You okay?”

“Of course.” But the words came out a little too fast.

Sam’s eyes drooped slightly at the corners and her posture lacked its usual energetic stance. She usually was so perky. Annoyingly perky. Had she not been sleeping well? Mackenzie decided not to ask. What woman wants to know she looks tired?

Over the top of her canvas, Mackenzie watched her roommate pull item after item from the boxes. Several large spools of wire, a bunch of hand tools and an item that looked like a freestanding, oversized butane lighter.

“What’s that for?” Mackenzie had seen a smaller, yet similar, device at Corey’s, but somehow she didn’t think Sam had bought it to light doobies.

“It’s a torch. You melt the ends of silver wire to make headpins. You know, the danglies on earrings, necklaces and bracelets? It can also fire small bits of precious metal clay. Like these.” She twisted her empty wrists and laughed. “Oops. I’m so used to wearing those bracelets, I forgot I didn’t have them on. I made these silver Celtic crosses with that clay, too, but they have to be fired in a kiln at the bead store. Too big for that little thing to work.”

“What are those going for? That’s a lot of silver. And they’re so ornate.”

“Two hundred bucks apiece.”

Mackenzie whistled and reached over. “May I? Have you sold any?” Sam came around the table and moved her scarf aside for Mackenzie to examine them more closely.

“Yeah, quite a few. I take orders for them online. Four or five should be out of the kiln today. Damn. That’s right. I need to pick them up and mail them out.”

With the scarf out of the way, Mackenzie’s eyes zeroed in not on the jewelry, but on several dark bruises marring the skin on Sam’s neck. She snapped her head up, but Sam turned away and hastily covered them with her scarf again. What the hell was going on?

“Sam? You okay?”

“Yeah, sure.” Still not meeting her gaze, Sam held both palms up and shook her head as if to say she didn’t want to talk about anything.

“You’re not okay. What happened to you?”

“Mackenzie, please. I’m fine. Really I am.” Her brown eyes met Mackenzie’s and she made a sound of exasperation. “Oh, all right. Things with my new boyfriend get a little kinky, but I’m totally fine. Really. I’m not hurt. You should see what he has me do to him.”

Mackenzie kept her eyes narrowed. She wasn’t sure she was buying Sam’s story. What the hell was this new guy doing to her?

“I’m happy. See?” Sam twirled around the dining room with her hands outstretched as if to prove her point. “I’m a strong girl. I wouldn’t put up with what you’re thinking of. Promise. Now come on. I’m detecting a little envy with all your questions about my business. You totally want to set up something online, too, don’t you?”

Mackenzie tried to protest, to find out more about what was going on, but Sam interrupted. “Come on. I totally think you should get a website with all those paintings you do. They’re awesome. You should try to sell them. Maybe you could even take commissioned orders online. You know, someone likes your stuff, but wants certain colors to go in a particular room in their house or their business.”

“Yeah, I know how commissioned art works.” All right, she’d let Sam change the subject for now, but she wasn’t going to forget this.

“Well, it’s easy. Took only an hour or two to get my website up and running. Gonna be around for a while? I can show you how.”

Several hours later, although the painting wasn’t finished and she’d gotten no additional answers from Sam, Mackenzie did have a website, complete with photographs of some of her pieces. She typed a short bio for the About Me page, took a deep breath and hit enter.

CHAPTER FIVE

ON A TYPICAL weekday, area business people filled the benches in the small park near Pioneer Square, sipping espresso drinks from one of a dozen nearby coffee shops and eating takeout Thai, Chinese, Indian, Italian or pre-wrapped vegan sandwiches. Even the homeless who frequented the park drank espresso.

But in the early morning hours on Friday and Saturday, when the multitude of area clubs closed down, everything changed as humanity spilled out onto damp streets. Groups of girls who’d been prettier five hours ago stumbled down cobblestone sidewalks, while frat boys and gangbangers exchanged words, fists and the occasional knife. Some hoped they weren’t too drunk to drive and could blow less than a point-oh-eight, while others headed to all-night diners or after parties. And, like most nights, a few others looked for a different kind of trouble.

“Fuckin’ bouncer. Just wanted to finish my drink outside. If that asshole had any idea of who he was messing with, he’d be pissin’ his pants and cryin’ for his mama.” The man tugged his football jersey over his expansive middle and turned down an alley in Pioneer Square with his buddy.

“Shoulda taken him out. I would have. Can’t let ‘em treat you like that. It ain’t right.” His friend, wearing a black hoodie, bit at his nails and spat a hangnail on the pavement.

“Easy for you to say, but I swear I saw one of those Agency bastards at the end of the block.”

“Let’s wait for your bouncer friend out back and jump him when he gets off work. You can drink him in the alley and we’ll see what a tough guy he is then.” He pulled the hood of his sweatshirt up against the light drizzle and yanked at the strings. “If he apologizes, you can wipe his mind after it’s over just like a regular law-abiding Council pussy. But if not, you can leave him with a memory that’ll haunt his nightmares forever. And if he really pisses you off, well, you know what you can do. Besides, they taste better when they’re scared and dying.”

Football Jersey laughed. “Tempting, dude, but no. You can, though. I got a whiff of him when he had me pressed against the bricks. I’m so sick of O-positive, I could puke. Now if he were APoz, I’d be all over him.”

Passing a Dumpster, Hoodie pointed to the mouth of the alley. “Hey, aren’t those a couple of DBs over there?”

On the far side of the park, a man and a woman sat stiffly on a wrought-iron bench under a burned-out street-lamp.

“How can you tell?” asked Football Jersey as he stepped over a drunk passed out on a piece of flattened cardboard.

“First of all, they all wear those dorky wraparound sunglasses like those two have on. Now watch. It’s said when they go through DB initiation and are assigned a partner, they sorta start acting like each other. Check it out.”

The woman leaned forward and grabbed a hard-sided suitcase at her feet and a split second later, the man did the same. She adjusted it on her lap then snapped it open. The man’s actions mirrored hers perfectly. She pushed her sunglasses higher on her nose and so did the man.

“That’s freaky, dude,” Football Jersey said.

“Yeah, but come on. Let’s see what they got.”

The woman sniffed the air and a yellowed smile creased her face as they approached. “Hey, boys, what-cha need tonight?”

“Got any Sweet?” Hoodie elbowed his friend in the gut. “We’re lookin’ for a little sugar.”

“You gotta be kidding me. No one’s got that kind of shit right now. But when we do, it goes like that.” She snapped her fingers. The man snapped his as well but remained silent. “At this hour you boys would be way too late for the candy anyway. Gotta get here early for any good stuff.”

“Damn. When are you gettin’ more in?” Hoodie asked.

“Sweet’s been tight.” She craned her head around, as if making sure no one could hear them. Her partner did the same. “That is, since the Overlord’s coming.”

“Lord Pavlos? No shit?” Hoodie elbowed his buddy, who pushed him back and cursed under his breath.

“Yeah. Only drinks the sweet stuff, so our supply is nada.”

“That’s bullshit. Where does that leave us?” asked Hoodie.

“He’s not staying long. Hates it up here.”

“Don’t we all,” Football Jersey said as he looked around the darkened park littered with people in various stages of drunkenness. “Why’s he coming then?”

“I dunno. Doing some kind of experiment shit or something,” the woman said.

“What?” Hoodie and Football Jersey asked in unison. They looked at each other, then back at the DB pair, and laughed.

The woman shrugged and the man copied her a moment later. “They don’t tell us peons nothing, but it has something to do with Sweet. Better be worth it, that’s all I can say. So can we interest you boys in a nice BPoz? Next best thing. Real fresh. Give you a good deal.”

Laughter echoed nearby and they all looked up. Clanking dishes and the sound of stacking chairs reverberated through the back door of a nearby bar as it opened, illuminating two figures in the dark alley for a moment before slamming shut again.

Hoodie held his nose in the air and sniffed. “Dude, it’s your bouncer friend. And the girl with him is APoz. What do you say? I’ll take him and you can take her. Wanna use what your mama gave you?”

“My mama would be pissed if I used it like that.”

Hoodie shrugged. “Let’s go, then.”

“Thanks, lady, but no thanks,” said Football Jersey. “We’re gonna score some off the hoof tonight.”

“Playing with fire, boys. Better watch out. I hear there’s an Agency patrol nearby. Sure you don’t want the easy stuff? Fifty bucks. And I’ll float it with a little APoz for an extra ten.”

“No thanks. We’ll save our money for the Sweet when it comes in. And fuck the Agency. Come on,” Football Jersey said to his buddy. “I’m starving.”

Under a dark freeway overpass in a section of Portland called rough on a good night, Dom spotted a group of vampire youthlings huddled around what could only be trouble. Probably doing Sweet shots.

He glanced at the still darkening sky and cursed. It was too damn early. Usually this sort of shit happened much later in the evening, after the heavy consumption of legal and illegal substances. Someone probably just scored some Sweet and they couldn’t wait to party.

In a show of intimidation, he flipped open his hip-length leather coat to put his weapons on display and hoped he wouldn’t have to use force. They were just kids, barely old enough to have gone through puberty, when the blood cravings and aversion to sunlight began. “Okay, gentlemen, ladies. Break it up. Time to move along.”

He pushed his way into the circle, heard a mumbled “fuck you, asshole” and “goddamn Agency pig,” but at least half of the kids dispersed and left the scene. Only the hardcore losers remained.

At the center of the crowd, on the gritty pavement, a girl sat straight-legged and leaned back on her hands. With wild, unfocused eyes, she stared up at the young man straddling her as he fumbled with something in his hands.

Dom grabbed his arm. “Give it to me.”

“Fuck yourself,” the kid said, sounding way too jaded for his age. He stumbled over the girl’s legs as he tried to shrug away from Dom’s grasp.

“Doesn’t work for me. Hand it over. Trust me, you don’t want this to get any messier than it already is.”

The young man lurched around and thrust a hand into his pocket. Weapon?

In a flash, Dom clamped him into a headlock and twisted the kid’s arm behind him, shoving it upwards, and the kid howled. “I said give me the goddamn Sweet.”

“I swear I don’t have any.” The kid’s voice was raspy and he choked as Dom pressed harder on his larynx.

“Yeah, and I’m Prince Fucking Charming.”

In the struggle, a small glass vial fell to the pavement, shattering and spilling its contents at their feet. With a snarl, the gawking youthlings leaped in.

For a half-second, Dom considered pulling out his blades and scattering the crowd that way, but he decided to let them act like wild animals, scratching and clawing the dirty cement until the blood was gone. Unfortunately, the micro-cuts on their mouths from the shards of glass would heal almost instantly from the effect of the Sweet. With disgust he watched them tongue the pavement, licking up every last drop.

When the frenzy died down a few minutes later, Dom cuffed the dealer with silver-lined handcuffs and yanked him to his feet.

“Everyone else—out. You’ve had your fun, now get the hell out of here.” Turning his attention back to the dealer, he said, “I’ve got plans for you.” He punched a couple of buttons on his cell phone and within minutes an unmarked panel van pulled up to the curb. An agent dressed in black fatigues burst through the rear doors, scruffed the dealer by the neck and waistband and threw his ass inside. Dom two-patted the side of the van and it drove away.

One down, how many more to go? He ran a hand through his hair and walked slowly back to the Porsche parked around the corner.

It was the same thing, night after night, here and in Seattle. God, he was so sick of it. He didn’t know how much more of this bullshit he could take. He picked up an empty blood vial and tossed it into a nearby trash can. These kids weren’t the problem. Pavlos was the problem, and he was somewhere in the South.

When he opened the car door, his cell phone vibrated. He climbed in, glanced at the screen and cursed. Nice text. Where the hell did Santiago think he was?

Portland, he texted back.

The guy was a serious micromanager. Or maybe he just didn’t trust Dom. Especially given what happened with her. He never should’ve told his boss. It should’ve been his own twisted little secret.

He cranked the seat back and closed his eyes. Not that Dom came to the Horseshoe Bay Region with glowing recommendations, but no one—not his old commander, not the other field agents he’d led or trained over the years, or even the few humans he’d worked with who knew about the Agency—questioned his effectiveness or loyalty. But then, not all of them knew about what had happened with Alfonso, either.

Dom leaned his head on the steering wheel and his mind wandered to Mackenzie again. What was she doing right now? He checked his watch. Perhaps she was home watching a movie. Or organizing something. Or cleaning. Or maybe she was in bed early on a Friday night, curled up with a book. He rubbed that ever-present ache centered in his chest and groaned.

This is bullshit. It’s got to stop.

Irritated by his inability to keep her out of his thoughts, he jumped out of the car again, hit the alarm remote and jogged back to the freeway underpass. Usually he went weeks between live feedings, but maybe someone else’s blood would dilute the effects of hers, still present and way too strong in his system. Hopefully, the human loser he’d spotted earlier down by the river was still there. He’d take a quick mouthful, and if the guy was as drunk as he appeared earlier, Dom might not even need to bother with wiping his memory.

The phone vibrated again. Shit. Santiago had decided to call this time.

He flipped the phone open. “This is Dom.”

“Your old phone—you told me it was busted.” No “hello” or “how’s it going” for Santiago.

“Yes, and …”

“Come on, you haven’t forgotten. Let me refresh your fading memory. The goddamn one with all the DB data that landed Stryker in the clinic and you with that sweetblood.”

Dom cringed. “Yes, what about it?”

“Care to explain something to me then?”

“What? The thing was busted. I told you already.” Dom clicked the volume button down a few notches and held the phone away from his ear just as Santiago erupted.

“Tell me why in the hell a broken phone would suddenly go online again. Why a broken phone started pinging from a cell tower near the mall in the Northend today. Why a broken phone has been pinging on St. Francis Hill where it’s been sitting for the last hour.”

Mackenzie’s neighborhood. Palming his keys, he turned around and sprinted back to the Porsche.

“You didn’t get the phone back from that woman, did you?”

“No. But I told you. I thought it was broken.”

“Thought? You thought? Goddamn it. You fucking lied to me. You know how important that data is. I’m sending Foss over to get it back from her one way or another.”

He felt his pupils dilate with rage as he yanked the car door open. “You keep him away from her.” He had hoped his desire for her would wane, but the thought of Jackson getting close to her filleted his guts from pelvis to sternum. His focus narrowed to a dark tunnel and her name drummed over and over in his head. He started the car and headed for the freeway.

“Jesus, Mary and Joseph. You screwed up and I’m sending him to clean up your mess. First the illegal blood transfer and now this. What the hell is going on with you?”

“No. I’ll handle it. I’m leaving Portland now. Be there in two hours.”

“Handle it like you did the first time? That damn phone better be back at the field office by midnight tonight or I’m sending Foss. Two hours? You’re crazy. You’ll be lucky to do it in four.”

“I said I’ll be there in two.” With a snap of the phone, Dom ended the call.

Of course Santiago was right. He should’ve gotten the damn phone back from her that night by walking right into her house and taking it directly from her as she screamed. A simple memory wipe, and that would’ve been it. But he hadn’t.

He engaged the radar detection, punched the accelerator and merged onto 205 North. After bypassing the bottlenosed traffic by riding the shoulder a few times, he crossed the bridge back into Washington. By the time he hit the straightaway on I-5, he’d cranked it up to a hundred and twenty.

CHAPTER SIX

PIANO MUSIC FROM the foyer wafted into the elegantly appointed ladies’ room where Mackenzie fidgeted in her cocktail dress. If Sam hadn’t backed out at the last minute, she’d have known she had panty lines showing through the delicate green chiffon. Why hadn’t she worn a thong?

She closed herself into a stall, stepped out of her panties and stuffed them into her evening bag. She hoped she wouldn’t have to open it with anyone around. It was one of those crystal-encrusted clamshell-style clutches that puts everything on display when they’re opened, and it was hardly big enough to hold more than a credit card and a lipstick. How would she explain the pair of underwear and the two cell phones?

Slipping her fingers around the second phone, she thought about its owner again. Why had she felt compelled to carry it with her every day since she’d found it?

Today she had even gone to the cell phone store looking for a charger. At first the salesperson had been skeptical. Said the phone must be an advanced prototype because he hadn’t seen one like it before. He was surprised when they found a charger that fit.

She’d thought about just leaving the thing at the store for them to track down the owner. But the salesperson had practically salivated over it and she suddenly didn’t trust him. Or at least that’s what she’d told herself. Her stomach had tied up in nervous little knots at the thought of leaving it, so she’d bought a charger and taken it back home. She was shocked when it powered up.

She opened the device now, held it to her lips and imagined it pressed to its owner’s face, the cool plastic warming against his skin. She didn’t question why she felt the owner was male, she just knew. After stuffing it back into her tiny purse, she exited the ladies’ room.

The crowd at the annual benefit auction for the Northwest Alzheimer’s Foundation was the largest she had seen. Mackenzie had been attending and donating items ever since her mother was diagnosed.

“Mackenzie, I was hoping I’d run into you.” A loud voice behind her caused several people to turn around. She couldn’t remember the woman’s name—Tammy or Terry maybe. “Wow, you’re pretty brave to be wearing a dress like that.”

Mackenzie smoothed a hand over the skirt. It couldn’t be see-through—she’d double-checked that in the restroom. “Is there a problem with it?”

“Totally personal preference, but a simple, non-revealing black is so much more traditional at affairs like this.”

Mackenzie bristled at her patronizing tone of voice. The woman spoke as though she were giving advice to someone who’d never attended a charity auction before. Glancing around, Mackenzie saw plenty of brightly-colored gowns. Most were long, but a few women wore cocktail dresses that fell a few inches above the knee, as well. So what was the big deal?

A waiter walked by with a tray of glasses filled with red wine. Mackenzie grabbed one and swallowed the contents in one gulp as the woman continued talking. Were they serving any appetizers before dinner? She could really use—

“Mackenzie?”

“Sorry, what?” Her mind had been wandering so much lately, probably because she hadn’t been sleeping well.

“I asked if you donated another one of your pieces this year. Landon, darling, Mackenzie here likes to paint horses.”

A tall, balding man stifled a yawn with the back of his hand as he slowly turned around. From the looks of it, he had no idea what Tammy-Terry had said, nor did he care. Mackenzie twirled the stem of the empty wine glass and coughed.

“Um, yes, I did. No horses this time, though. Just a couple of whimsical landscapes and some art lessons.”

“Isn’t that sweet? Speaking of paintings, I’m dying to know. Mrs. Thorn-Steuben tells me you were the model for the nude that Martin Johanovich donated. Is that true? I could never do something like that—take my clothes off for an artist to paint.”

Mackenzie’s face prickled with heat. “Nude painting? I’m not sure I know what you’re talking about. Martin’s a good friend, that’s all.” She pointedly avoided the question. “Oh, I think I see him now. Will you excuse me? Nice meeting you,” she called to Landon as she slipped away.

How had Tammy-Terry heard that? Martin was very discreet and had promised not to reveal that she’d posed as his model. He’d sworn the piece wouldn’t be realistic enough for her to be recognized.

As she made her way across the crowded room, she grabbed another glass of wine. That first one had helped ease the tension she’d been feeling all afternoon. Taking a sip, she felt a calming sensation as the liquid slid down her throat.

Surrounded by a bunch of his adoring fans, Martin smiled at her and excused himself. His work was highly regarded and with his charming personality, he was a darling of the vibrant Seattle art scene and a very popular fixture at local charity events.

“Oh, honey, aren’t you a sight for the visually astute.” He took her hand and spun her around. She was careful to hold the skirt of her dress down. “You look positively radiant. You must share your beauty secrets with me, darling. It’s not fair for you to hoard them all to yourself. And that color screams you, you, you.”

“Not too shockingly green or revealing?”

“Good Lord, no. How’d you get a silly idea like that in your head? You look fab.”

“Thanks, Martin. You’re looking pretty smashing yourself.” He beamed and adjusted his bow tie. Lowering her voice, she said, “Where is that nude? I thought you said I wouldn’t be recognizable.”

“You aren’t, honey. Promise. Why do you ask?”

Mackenzie relayed what Tammy-Terry said.

“Oh, for crying out loud. It must be that gossip, Mrs. Thorn-Steuben. She arrived at my studio right after you left our last sitting. Did you see her? When she saw the painting I was working on, she must’ve put two and two together. It really is not noticeable that it’s you … only someone who knows your lovely back would recognize it. Go see for yourself. It’s right over there.” He nodded his head to the right. “Are you here alone?”

“Yes, my roommate dogged me at the last minute. Her new boyfriend called and—Well, you know how that is. So it’s just me tonight.”

“Well, then you must join us at our table. We have a few extra seats. Jerry and Craig weren’t able to make it, either. Table Three. Right up front.”

Mackenzie meandered through the silent auction tables, and although she hadn’t planned on bidding, she wrote her auction number on a couple of items. If she was fortunate enough to get something, she’d be excited. If not, then at least she’d have succeeded in bumping up the price and making more money for the Foundation. She saw that her two paintings and the art lessons she’d donated had several bidders already.

The live auction items were set up in the front of the room. A trip for two to Tuscany, a walk-on part in a popular sitcom, a winemaker’s dinner for twelve at a winery. Next to the display for a culinary trip to Paris was the painting of the nude.

Almost life-sized, it had been done on a large canvas using warm-hued oils applied with a palette knife. Martin was right—none of the details were very clear, and for that she was relieved. A group of people had just moved away from it and she stood there alone.

The naked figure on the canvas posed with her back to the viewer, one arm resting on the floor behind her, the other hand entwined in her hair. A gossamer cloth draped over one shoulder, pooling on the foreground in front of her backside. Just a hint of the right breast was visible and the face, turned down, was masked by a cascade of long brown hair.

Although she wasn’t recognizable in the painting, she still felt her temperature rise. Why had she worn this bare-backed dress tonight and pinned her hair to the side over one shoulder? Was everyone noticing the similarities between her back and the one in the painting?

Feeling the heat of someone’s stare, she wished she could loosen her hair and hide behind it. She was about to step away when she felt a tingling, almost a purring, flutter against her temples and the little hairs on the back of her neck stood up. She rubbed her shoulders but realized the sensation was sort of relaxing.

“It’s quite lovely.” The accented voice was deep and rich, and brought to mind dark chocolate melting on the back of her tongue. Goose bumps formed on her arms and she turned to see a man standing a few feet away.

He stood at least a head taller than her, and had dark, shoulder-length hair pulled back by a leather tie. A thick strand in the front had slipped free, as if it had been tied with the nonchalance of someone who knew perfection wasn’t important. She found herself wanting to twist it around her finger and see the tips of her nails peek out from under that thick mane. The crystalline blue of his eyes was a stark contrast to a dark fringe of lashes as he looked down at her with an air of familiarity.

God, did she know him from somewhere? Surely she’d remember meeting a man like him if she had.

Those eyes, those beautiful eyes, flanked by a few lines that suggested living rather than time, raked the inner recesses of her mind. They were gentle now, but somehow she knew they could be cruel. She took a step backward on her teetering heels, her heart hammering two staccatos—one in her head and the other in her chest.

Although his attire was more casual than the stiff tuxedos sported by most of the men in attendance, he carried himself with a grace and ease that exuded confidence. He wore a brushed silk T-shirt that draped luxuriously over tailored charcoal slacks. With a black leather coat tossed easily over one arm and a hint of stubble peppering his jaw, he looked more like he belonged on a movie screen than at a charity event. Her mouth went suddenly dry and she licked her lips.

With one brow lifted, he looked at her quizzically. God, had he asked her something?

“The painting?”

“Oh, yes.” What about the painting?

“I find it very lovely.” As he stepped closer, the heat from his body warmed her bare shoulders and the two internal drumbeats evolved into one sound. She reached a hand up and rubbed her neck. Wasn’t this the same—

“Are you familiar with the piece?” He nodded toward the canvas but didn’t take his eyes off of her.

If she stretched out her hand, she could touch his chest, he was that close. Stroke his jaw, brush a thumb over his lips. Oh God, what was she thinking? She dug her nails into the palms of her hands to keep her thoughts from wandering where they shouldn’t.

His warm breath lifted a stray wisp of her hair on the back of her neck as she turned toward the painting. When his fingertips grazed down the back of her arm to guide her forward, a jolt of electricity left a trail of heat on her skin. She found herself inching closer to him, almost instinctively, as if her body knew this man though her mind did not.

“Um, yes. My friend Martin painted it.”

“I find it absolutely captivating. It’s gorgeous. I’m Dominic Serrano, but please call me Dom.” He extended his hand and she noted he wore a thick, filigree ring on each thumb.

“Mackenzie Foster-Shaw. It’s nice to meet you. Yes, Martin is an amazingly gifted artist.” The bracelets on her wrist jingled together as she took his hand in hers.

With the touch, she felt instantly alive. Every nerve ending danced as her palm pressed to his. The background piano music, which she’d hardly noticed before, seemed to morph into a tender melody. The room sparkled with prisms of candlelight reflected off the chandeliers above. Everything looked so different. How could she not have seen the room like this before?

He released her abruptly and turned back toward the painting, his expression composed, measured.

Normally, she’d have filled the void with some sort of mindless chatter, but now she felt no need. Calm and relaxed, she waited.

“Such rich colors he used. The ethereal light.” She could get lost in the sound of his voice. “The echoing lines of the composition. From the arc of her neck, along her back to the draping fabric over her shoulder.” As he spoke, he reached his hand out and traced the lines in the air, his long fingers caressing the space in front of them. Her breath rasped unevenly in her chest. It was as if he were running his hands over her bare skin. “From her breast to the curve of her legs and buttocks. I find it very enchanting. Almost seductive. Yes, your friend Martin is very talented, but he had an equally exquisite subject.”

She stepped forward and silently read the title of the piece.

“What is it called?”

He was right there. He could read it himself, but she did what he asked.

“Where Are You, My Love.”

I am where you are. The words chimed in her head. She glanced at him but his face was unreadable.

How would his arms feel around her? Would she fit beneath his chin like a puzzle piece? He sucked in a deep breath and let it out slowly, his stare never dropping from her face. Feeling a tiny trickle of heat between her legs, she cursed inwardly for not wearing a thong.

Sweet Jesus.

That voice again. Although his lips didn’t move, she knew it was his. It rang in her head and echoed in her ears. The darkened room seemed to spin as if they were in the middle of a vortex. The clinking of wineglasses, the low din of conversation, the lovely chords of the piano—everything faded around them.

As if in slow motion, he stepped in front of her so she had to tilt her chin up to meet his gaze. Another inch or two and her nipples, covered only in thin folds of green chiffon, would have brushed against the fabric of his shirt. Her body trembled in anticipation.

“I know you, don’t I?”

His jaw flexed as he stared at her, his eyes an unfathomable glacier blue, terrifying and beautiful at the same time.

Without thinking, she reached up to brush a stray lock of hair from his face, her fingertips a whisper against his temple, and her palm molded softly to his cheek.

He caught her wrist roughly, lowering it to her side, and his mouth hardened as if he were biting back the urge to say something cruel. Fury and something else smoldered in his eyes as his pupils dilated, leaving only a ring of that icy blue.

What the hell? Don’t pupils usually shrink to pinpricks when you’re pissed?

Danger lurked behind those now-dark eyes, and she took a step back. He looked almost inhuman for a moment. Part of her knew she should be afraid. But she wasn’t. Instead, anger boiled up in her veins, matching what she felt in him.

Why had he grabbed her like that? Why was he looking at her with such intensity? It stirred her dander, like the wind fanning a flame. Evidently it was okay for him to touch her, but not the other way around. Was that it?

Squaring her shoulders, she jerked her hand away. How dare he react to her that way? If there was one thing she’d learned about men from her mother, it was not to take any crap from them. With a huff, she spun on her heel and melted into the crowd.

Forgive me, she imagined him saying.

Go screw yourself, was her imagined reply.

In a daze, she meandered over to the now-closed silent auction tables. People milled about, checking various items to see if their numbers were the winning bids. Three women dressed in sparkling dresses and precarious heels jumped up and down, squealing like schoolgirls. They’d evidently gotten the auction item they had wanted.

What the hell just happened? She felt like she knew this Dom Serrano, had met him before, had encountered his voice, even his thoughts, which was completely insane and made no sense. He was somehow familiar and yet a stranger. The thrumming in her head and chest became more and more mismatched and she almost felt nauseous.

One minute he was making love to her with his words and the next minute he changed into something wild and uncontrollable. Her actions obviously caught him off-guard and pissed him off. What had she done? It was just an innocent touch.

Although she couldn’t deny the attraction, she certainly didn’t have the fortitude for these stupid dating-scene games spurred on by misread sexual desires and hypocritical reactions. She hadn’t behaved too forwardly, had she? Maybe going pantyless had given her some balls.

Her bid number wasn’t the highest on any of the items she’d wanted. She would’ve especially loved that spa day at Ummelina downtown, but she couldn’t justify paying that kind of money for her own indulgence, only for charity. However, given the state of her financial affairs, it was probably a good thing she wasn’t the winning bidder.

She ran into a few more people she knew, friends of her mother’s whom she hadn’t seen in ages. Politely, they inquired about her mother. They continued chatting until the master of ceremonies announced dinner was being served and asked the guests to find their seats.

She zigzagged around the tables, looking for Number Three. Martin had said it was up front. She stiffened and nearly turned around when she saw a familiar figure seated at a table near the stage. Martin jumped up and ran toward her.

“Darling, I hope you don’t mind, but I asked your dishy friend to sit with us. He was stuck clear in the back and was just about to sit next to Mrs. Thorn-Steuben when I rescued him.” He grabbed her elbow and urged her forward. “He tried to protest, but I insisted. Here, right this way.”

Dom stood up as she approached, pulling out the chair next to him. As she took her seat, she jutted her chin out and ignored him. He held her napkin out for her and she yanked it from his grasp. Did he think she was a ditzy fool? That she could be swayed by a momentary act of politeness? She’d make him regret his bad attitude.

With her back to him, she offered her hand to the woman on her right. “I’m Mackenzie Foster-Shaw. You must be a friend of Martin’s?”

“Janet Forrest.” The woman gripped Mackenzie’s fingertips in the gentle handshake of the upper class. “And this is my husband, Ernie.” Mackenzie reached a hand over and the portly man clasped it in the same manner. “It’s so nice to meet you. Yes, we’re friends of Martin’s. We’ve got many of his pieces in our collection, don’t we, dear?”

“Which ones? I’m quite familiar with his entire body of work.”

As they ate their salads, the woman told her about each piece in detail and Mackenzie nodded appreciatively. She felt the heat from Dom’s eyes on her back and she purposely played with a lock of her hair and twirled the stem of her wineglass. She was so not going to turn around.

“I’m sorry,” Mrs. Forrest said. “Here I am droning on and on about myself. How about you? How do you know Martin?”

Before Mackenzie could reply, Martin’s voice boomed from behind her. She turned around and saw Dom staring at her through lowered lids. He looked dreamy and way too sensuous. Dragging her gaze away, she concentrated on Martin.

“Mackenzie was one of my best students at the University of Washington. She’s a talented young artist and I couldn’t bear to let her go at the end of the term. A few years ago I made her an offer she couldn’t refuse.” He tilted his head back with an infectious laugh that invited company, and a few others at the table joined in, including Dom. “Right, darling?” Martin asked.

Mackenzie bit back her laughter and smiled awkwardly. All eyes at the table turned to her, but the only set she was aware of was the ice blue pair to her left.

“Martin was kind enough to offer me a job teaching beginning art students—”

“Yes, and she came up with a brilliant lesson plan where she takes them on a walking tour of the various local galleries, then puts what they’ve observed into their own work in the studio. In addition to that—”

“Martin, please.”

Ignoring her protest, he continued. “In addition to being an artist, she’s also a skilled photographer. She works for a location scout in town. You know—movie locations.” Excitement tinged his voice and he sat forward in his seat. Like everyone else, he thought her part-time job was glamorous. If only she felt the same way.

“Oh, how wonderful. That sounds so exciting. Just what does a location photographer do?” Mrs. Forrest leaned forward as well, clasping her gnarled fingers under her chin.

Mackenzie squirmed in her chair and rearranged the food on her plate.

“We get a spec sheet from the production company, spelling out what they’re looking for at each shooting location. I research possible sites, taking pictures and measurements and my boss—my other boss, not him—” she inclined her head in Martin’s direction “—handles all the permits and permissions. Sometimes he has ideas for me but other times, I do the research myself.”

“So what film are you working on now?”

“I’m not allowed to say specifically, but a potential client wants to shoot some scenes at a cemetery. So that’s what I’ve been working on based on their specific needs. I’ve got a few more sites to photograph before I’m done. The port. A beach with a cityscape in the background—I’ll head over to West Seattle for that one. But it’s the cemetery I’m having the most trouble with.” She touched a finger to her forehead, remembering the migraine.

“You’d think that’d be easy,” Dom said. “There are plenty of cemeteries around here.”

Determined to ignore him, she turned to Mrs. Forrest and continued. “It needs to be somewhat dark, very oppressive, and not too far from the city. It’s expensive to take all the film equipment too far.”

“That’s a little frightening, don’t you think?” asked Mrs. Forrest. “How do you do it, dear?”

Mackenzie leaned in and lowered her voice. “When I’m out shooting remote locations, I carry a gun.”

Mrs. Forrest gasped. “Oh, goodness. Do you know how to use the thing?”

“Well, yes. I’ve been using one for years. My mother started taking both me and my brother to the shooting range when we were old enough to legally carry a gun.”

Please stop and move onto someone else. Surely someone else at this table would be more interesting to talk to.

“You must be a terrific shot. Do you have it with you now?”

“No. Not enough room in this little thing.” She winked at Mrs. Forrest and shook her clutch. “And nowhere to strap a holster on this outfit.”

Everyone at the table laughed. Good, now maybe the conversation would turn elsewhere. She threw a glance in Dom’s direction and he looked down his nose at her, his lips turned up as if he was trying not to give her a haughty smile. He was so irritating. She wondered if he practiced. She flipped her hair and turned away.

Words like fascinating and exciting swirled around the table. She shifted her water glass, aligned her fork next to her plate. Taking compliments was not something she was comfortable with, and neither was being the center of attention.

When the conversation thankfully turned to other things, she relaxed against her seat and felt the sudden warmth of Dom’s hand. Every nerve ending jumped to attention. He had casually, maybe even conveniently, laid his arm on the back of her chair. Before she could sit forward, she could’ve sworn he brushed his thumb across her shoulder blade. A trail of sparks lingered on her skin and she shivered involuntarily.

Mrs. Forrest whispered into her ear. “What’s your date’s name? I’m sorry, but I’ve forgotten.”

“Dominic … Serrano, I think. But he’s not my date.”

Louder now, Mrs. Forrest said, “Mr. Serrano, what is it that you do? I detect a bit of an accent, though not much. Spanish, is it?”

“My family is originally from Northern Spain—yes. But I’ve lived in the States for years now. I’m surprised you even picked up on it.”

“Ernie and I made the mistake of visiting Madrid during the summer months a few years ago. Remember that, honey? It was so humid …” While Mrs. Forrest continued, Mackenzie sipped her wine, not paying much attention until Dom began to speak.

“I work for a multinational corporation that has contracts with the U.S. government. We have a small presence here locally, but it’s classified, so I really can’t say much about it.”

“Goodness. We’ve got exciting here—” she patted Mackenzie’s hand “—and mysterious there. What a couple you two make. Is your office here in the city?”

Mackenzie bristled. “Careful, he might have to kill you if he tells you.”

Everyone laughed, including Dom, who rested an arm easily over the back of her chair again. She made sure not to lean back this time.

“We maintain a small field office downtown, but the majority of the region’s work is out of British Columbia. I’m in charge of things here in Seattle, and I occasionally work in Portland, Spokane and Boise. But I’m afraid that’s about all I can tell you.” Dom’s smile stretched to his eyes and seemed genuine.

Why did he have to be so charismatic? It’d be much easier to ignore him if he wasn’t. She toyed with the evening bag on her lap, turning it over and over, and the prongs of an embedded crystal caught the chiffon of her skirt. Damn. While Martin talked about one of his recent projects, she picked it loose, but the stupid thing snagged the fabric.

“Why don’t you just put that on the floor beneath your chair?” Dom said. “I’ll make sure no one steals it.”

“Everyone knows it’s bad feng shui to put your purse on the floor.”

“Pardon me?” He sounded amused.

“Purses are never to go on the floor. It encourages money to fly out.”

His faux pained look told her that was the dumbest thing he’d ever heard. “Who told you that?”

What an asshole. “My mother.”

“And you believe it?”

She gritted her teeth. “It’s a habit, okay. Is that better?”

“Well, here, let me set it on the empty chair beside me, then. We certainly don’t want anything flying out of your purse unexpectedly.”

Oh my God. Even though she was irritated, she almost snorted out loud and had to bite her lip to keep quiet. If only he knew about the panties tucked inside.

“Fine.” Without looking at him, she held out her purse and hoped she came across as indifferent, bored and completely disinterested. She couldn’t care less that he was sitting just inches away from her, that she could feel the heat of his stare on her back and neck, that he was so damn hot. No, she didn’t care at all.

“Did you find any interesting silent auction items?” She directed her attention to the woman sitting across from her. As she replied, Mackenzie found her mind wandering.

You want me, the imaginary voice whispered melodically in her ear, almost as much as I want you.

She stiffened her spine and popped a roasted vegetable into her mouth. What was it with that damned voice in her head? Her stupid wishful thinking. Who cared that she found Dom massively attractive? That she longed to feel his hand sliding along her skin again. His lips against her throat. What the hell was wrong with her? Yes, he was gorgeous, but—

She glanced at him again. He twirled a few strands of pasta on his fork and lifted it to his mouth. As his lips closed over the utensil, he looked up at her and their eyes locked. His jaw flexed as he chewed slowly, then swallowed, never dropping his gaze from her face.

The fluttering of her heart belied her cool exterior.

Too much wine. She pushed the glass away to reach for her water, but the base of the stemware caught on a fold of the tablecloth and slipped from her fingers. In an instant, Dom’s hand was there and caught the glass before a drop was spilled.

How did he move so fast? I’ve had way too much to drink.

“Finished?”

She nodded her head. With a lift of his brow, he held the wineglass in front of him in a silent toast.

To the most enticingly beautiful female I’ve ever met, the imaginary voice spoke in her head.

To the most infuriating male.

She thought she saw the corner of his mouth twitch just before he took a sip from her glass, which really made no sense. Better switch to water only.

When the live auction started, the energy in the room ratcheted up. As the auctioneer called out dollar amounts in a dizzying frenzy, people laughed and shrieked, urging the bidding higher and higher. Mackenzie’s head began to swim with too much wine and thoughts of the exorbitant amounts of money people were spending.

After excusing herself, she skirted around the tables, a little wobbly on her heels, and headed to the ladies’ room. She dampened a hand cloth with cool water and held it to her neck and wrists. She leaned against the basin and waited until the cloth was no longer cold. Although refreshed, she still felt a little light-headed. A glance in the mirror showed she needed lipstick, but she’d left that damn little purse back at the table. Hopefully Martin was keeping an eye on it, because she really needed some fresh air. She straightened her dress, smoothed her hair and left the restroom.

THE AUCTIONEER’S SING-SONG voice clipped along at a rapid pace, barking out increasingly higher dollar amounts, and with every lift of a bidder’s paddle, the crowd whooped even louder.

Dom kept an eye on the archway leading toward the restrooms and the rooftop terrace and sensed Mackenzie wasn’t far away.

“Sold to number one-ninety-three.”

While the next item was being readied, Dom leaned toward Martin and casually slipped his leather coat over Mackenzie’s evening bag on the chair beside him.

“So tell me about your painting, Martin. It’s her, isn’t it?”

Before he could reply, two burly men in tuxedos lifted the nude painting up at the front of the room so that everyone could see, and the auctioneer began to read the description. Martin stood up as the spotlight trained on him and when he bowed to the applause, Dom reached a hand under his coat and opened Mackenzie’s purse.

Quickly locating the damaged phone, his hand touched upon a silky piece of fabric. She didn’t seem like a handkerchief sort of woman, so he peered under the coat. Sweet Jesus. A pair of dark purple lace panties were wrapped around his phone. His cock shifted against his thigh for the millionth time tonight. So that was what she’d meant when he detected her thoughts about panties. He rubbed his fingers briefly against the lace before he snapped the purse shut, tucked the phone away and discreetly rearranged himself. Again. She wasn’t planning on going home with one of these bozos, was she? His pupils dilated and he ran a finger under the suddenly tight collar of his shirt.

“How did you know?” Martin sat down as the bidding started. “Did she tell you? Or did Mrs. Thorn-Steuben?”

“Who? No. Those sweeping, graceful lines of the composition could only belong to her. Although your piece is gorgeous and you’re quite talented, it’s not even a fraction as beautiful as the real thing.”

Several people around the room raised their bidders’ paddles as the tempo of the auctioneer’s calls increased, and Dom glanced around. A horse-faced letch with oversized teeth, a slovenly old man with a blond trophy wife, a barely-out-of-puberty dot-com geek. Damn if he was going to let anyone else have that painting.

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