“They are chaps, Stella,” Drake said with the odd air of haughty dignity that he seemed to acquire every so often. “I would think being married to a cowboy, you’d be quite familiar with them.”
Stella laughed. “Well he never wears them like that, that’s for sure.”
“See what you’re missing,” Drake stated. Clearly done with the women’s teasing, he gestured to the prone bride. “Zelda is over there. She’s breathing, but I do think she should be brought to the hospital.”
Josie Lynn wondered how he knew she was breathing. As far as she’d seen, he hadn’t gotten anywhere near her.
“Hi,” the blonde said, suddenly appearing at Josie Lynn’s side with her hand extended. “I’m Katie Cortez. I live with Drake. I’m married to one of his best friends.”
Josie Lynn ignored the wave of relief that washed over her as unexpectedly as the jealousy had.
You just don’t want to have had a potential one-night stand with a man who was involved with another woman, she assured herself, not quite believing the reasoning even as she thought it.
She accepted the blonde’s hand. Her fingers were small and cool.
“And they are also in the band together. Maybe you’ve met my husband. Cort?”
Josie Lynn shook her head. It was on the tip of her tongue to say she didn’t even know Drake was in a band, but she didn’t want to reveal to this clearly nice woman that she was in a sex dungeon with a man she didn’t really know. And again, wearing nothing but his shirt.
“Okay,” Stella said, drawing everyone’s attention to her. For which Josie Lynn was very grateful. “I know where Zelda and Saxon’s room is—”
“I’m not even going to ask why you know that,” Drake said wryly.
“Because I’ve come over to feed Waldo, you perv,” Stella said.
“Waldo?” he asked.
“The alligator.”
“You knew about the alligator?” he asked, surprised.
“Yeah, it was Saxon’s one-year anniversary gift to Zelda. Although he’s normally not hanging out in the hallway,” Stella said. “Anyway, their room is two doors down on the right. Drake, go get Zelda some clothes. And something for yourself while you’re at it.”
“Like Saxon’s clothes will fit me,” he said.
“But Zelda’s probably will,” Katie pointed out.
Josie Lynn actually smiled slightly at the horrified expression on Drake’s face. God, this was all so weird.
“Okay,” Drake said, once recovered from the idea of wearing Zelda’s clothes. “Josie Lynn and I will go do that. While you figure out the best way to get Zelda to the hospital.”
“Don’t you think maybe Josie Lynn should stay here?” Stella said, giving Drake a look Josie Lynn didn’t quite understand, but she wondered if the redhead somehow knew he thought she was a part of last night’s debacle. Although Josie Lynn didn’t know how she would know. Drake couldn’t have told her. Maybe nerves were just getting to her.
“You know she’ll be fine with me,” Drake said again with that haughty air.
Stella looked like she wanted to argue, but then just shrugged. Clearly she knew that it would be a waste of breath to argue with him. Josie Lynn had already figured that out about him, too.
“Just be careful. Waldo is a little cranky.”
Not just Waldo, all gators, Josie Lynn thought reluctantly following Drake to the door, but not before grabbing a bungee cord that dangled down from the bottom of the sex swing. She didn’t know what it was for on the swing, but she knew it just might come in handy when facing Waldo.
Chapter Seven
LOVE BITES, LOVE BLEEDS
DRAKE hesitated just slightly before he opened the door. He wasn’t scared about the alligator for himself. Shit, he was a vampire. He could take his knocks, even from a wannabe dinosaur. But Josie Lynn was another story. Being human, one bite could be fatal. And that scared him. A lot.
More than he really understood, actually. Sure, he wouldn’t want to see anyone maimed and killed by an alligator, but the idea of Cupcake getting hurt. That really bothered him.
Because you want to see her brought to justice in a way Captain Morgan never had been, he told himself. This was about a lying woman getting what she deserved. This was about comeuppance.
Or so he would tell himself.
Slowly he opened the door, and there Waldo lay, his back to them, looking more like a stuffed gator than the real McCoy. Unfortunately he was dead center in the hallway, making it hard to stay to one side of him. They were going to have to get pretty damn close to him to make it past.
So that meant one thing; he was going to have to go first. That way if Waldo decided to go all prehistoric, he’d hopefully attack Drake first, while Josie Lynn fled to safety.
“Follow me,” he said, whispering, though he wasn’t sure why. Did alligators even have ears?
“Maybe I should go first,” Josie Lynn suggested, and Drake shot her an astonished look. Was she crazy? That would be like sending old Waldo an appetizer.
“No way.” He stepped out the door, staying to the left of the hallway, since that seemed to be the side with the most space between the wall and the animal. He walked carefully, being as quiet as he could. Which was very quiet. That whole vampire thing.
Behind him Josie Lynn was being quiet, too, although he could hear the soft pats of her feet on the bare wood. He just hoped his vampire hearing was more acute than the alligator’s.
Once he reached the beast, he debated where the best place to step was. It was like a bizarre game of Twister, except in this game if you didn’t pick the right spot, you didn’t collapse into a tangled pile of limbs and laughter. In this game, you just lost a limb.
He carefully took a step over the curve of the gator’s tail. Then another over his back leg. So far, so good. Waldo hadn’t even twitched. He took another small step, bringing him up to Waldo’s front leg. At this point the best bet seemed to be to quickly step over that front leg, then run as fast as possible past his head and the long snout.
He looked over his shoulder to tell Josie Lynn his strategy, and that was the exact moment he heard the swish of Waldo’s scaly skin on the floor and a noise that was somewhere between a snarl and a hiss.
Then Drake was on the floor right beside the beast. Shit, the damn thing had swung its head and knocked him down. Now he was right near that huge mouth, stuck between the animal’s side and the wall.
He lay still for a second, debating at this angle if he could shove himself backward fast enough to avoid those teeth. His vampire abilities made him very fast, but this was a weird position.
But before he could do anything, Josie Lynn was on top of the gator, her bare legs straddling its back. She lay down on the beast, pressing both her forearms down as hard as she could on the alligator’s snout.
“What the hell are you doing?” he cried.
“Shut up,” she yelled back. “Take this cord and wrap it around his snout.”
Drake didn’t argue, taking the bungee cord from her and circling it quickly around the alligator’s long nose and mouth.
“Higher up,” she said, still using all her strength to keep his huge jaws shut. “That’s it.”
When it was secured, Josie Lynn sat up, still straddling the beast, her legs bare and her coffee-colored hair tangled around her face. Her chest rose and fell as she struggled to catch her breath.
Holy shit, she was sexy.
His dick shot straight up against his stomach, painfully hard and swollen, but fortunately she didn’t seem to notice.