Then her weight hit me, her body covering my length, pinning me to the floor. Her stench flooded my senses, making it hard to breathe, to think, to feel anything but darkness and evil.
“Grace, thrust up!” Ethan yelled.
I bucked with my body, dislodging her grip on me slightly. Then I shoved my arms between us and thrust her back with every ounce of strength I had. It was enough to push her up and away from me.
A gunshot rang out, and the vampire’s head exploded. Blood and flesh and God knows what else sprayed across the wall as the vampire’s body slumped to the floor. I scrambled to my hands and feet, sweeping the floor with my fingers, looking for the stakes. And finding them.
“Let me,” Ethan said, taking one from me and moving with grim resolution to the vampire. In one smooth, clean motion, he drove the stake through her sternum, into her heart.
Fire flared where wood met flesh, quickly becoming an inferno that consumed what remained of the vampire. I released a shuddery breath, and closed my eyes. At least she could no longer threaten anyone.
So why did it feel as if evil still resided in this house?
“Are you okay?” Ethan’s voice was filled with concern as he dropped to his knees in front of me.
I nodded. “It doesn’t feel like it’s over though. It still feels like this house has secrets.”
“Yeah, and that secret is just how many people have found their deaths at that vampire’s hands.”
“No, it’s more than that.”
He looked past me, nostrils flaring as his gaze swept the darkness. “I can’t smell anything beyond old death and new blood. Can your psychic senses pick anything up?”
“Just a continuing sense of evil.”
“If this vamp was a fosterling, then its creator would have appeared the minute we attacked her.”
“I know, I know.” It still didn’t ease the feeling we were missing something. Or someone.
But maybe that was merely nerves. A leftover of the evil that had been entrenched in this house for generations.
“Let’s go back to the guest house and write up a report for Frank,” he said, taking my hand and tugging me to my feet. “We’ll let him and the cops deal with the rest of this mess.”
With that I couldn’t argue.
CHAPTER 5
“WRITING THE REPORT” TURNED OUT TO BE A euphemism for getting back and having sex. Not that I minded. After all the death and decay of that house, I needed to feel life and heat and healthy emotions. Needed it to sweep away the remaining strands of darkness latched to my soul.
The minute the door slammed shut, he grabbed my hand and drew me into his arms. His body was warm and hard against mine, his gaze fierce.
“I’m so glad you weren’t seriously hurt,” he muttered, “And I have so needed to do this.”
“This” was his mouth on mine, plundering hard, our tongues tangling, tasting, the kiss urgent and hungry.
He pushed me back until I hit the wall. The thunder of his heart matched mine, and the heat of him warmed every pore. But the hard length of him, pressed firmly against my belly, was nowhere near close enough.
His hands were on me, his fingers scorching my flesh as he ripped off my clothes. I unbuttoned his pants, tore off his shirt. Then he was in me, filling me, liquefying me. His thick groan of pleasure was a sound I echoed. He began to move, and there was nothing gentle about it. His body plundered as his lips had plundered, his movements hard and fast and urgent. The rich ache grew, becoming a kaleidoscope of sensations that washed through every corner of my mind. Then the shuddering took hold and I gasped, grabbing his shoulders, clambering up his body to wrap my legs around his waist and push him deeper still. Pleasure exploded between us as he thrust and thrust and thrust.
When the tremors finally eased, he laughed softly and rested his forehead against mine. “I could get addicted to this.”
“What? Sex? I thought all werewolves were anyway.”
“Trust me, there’s sex, and then there’s sex.” He kissed me gently. “But it’s you, Grace, that’s addictive.”
“An addiction cannot be gained after only two nibbles,” I refuted, not wanting to give any credence to the tiny spark of hope that flared deep inside. The flare that dared to think this could be more than just another brief fling.
“I said you, Grace, not the sex.”
“You don’t know me well enough to get addicted.” I let my legs slide to the ground and pushed him back a little. “Coffee?”
“When are you going to learn that pushing me away only makes me more determined?” he asked, voice hinting at frustration though there was little enough to be seen in his expression. Perhaps that’s why I wasn’t willing to trust his words.
“I told you before, it’s self-preservation.”
“And I have never given you a reason to distrust me. Nor do I intend to.”
What could I say to that? That I didn’t trust the fact a werewolf could stay with one partner for more than a couple of days? That my heart wasn’t willing to give him the chance of proving me wrong, simply because I was afraid of him breaking it? How could I win what I wanted if I wasn’t willing to put anything more than my body on the line? That was a coward’s way, and up until now, I’d never been a coward.
I turned on the coffee machine and looked out the window as I reached for the coffee mugs.
And saw the thin, pale face that was almost the spitting image of the vampire we’d killed.
Felt the sudden thickening in the air, the charge of darkness and evil across my senses.
I barely had time to open my mouth and she was through that window and at me. She was thin and weedy and stinking of blood and sex and grief, and I knew I’d been right before, that it hadn’t been just one vampire who was killing the boys, but two. They were twins of darkness, one a blood vampire, the other an energy vamp.
She hit me in a rush, pushing me back and down. The back of my head cracked against the floorboards and the shock of it left me gasping for air. The vamp snarled, her breath fetid as it washed across my face. I looked up, saw fangs gleaming brightly in the pale kitchen light, saw them slash down toward my neck. I shoved my arms between us, felt her teeth slice into skin. Not to feed, but to mutilate, and maim, and kill. She twisted her head, dragging her teeth through muscle and flesh, slicing through both as cleanly as a knife through butter. Pain rolled through me, and I screamed. She sucked in the sound and an excited gleam flared in the dead, dark depths of her eyes.
This one was the energy vamp, not the other.
And then she was gone, thrown across the room like so much rubbish, and Ethan was hauling me up, thrusting me behind him.
“We have no weapons,” I gasped, cradling my wounded arm. Blood dripped between my fingertips, dropping to the floor, filling the room with its sweet metallic scent.
“Run for the car,” he said, “I’ll keep it occupied.”
He lunged for the vampire, but it moved so fast it literally blurred, swinging and kicking in one fluid movement. Ethan dodged, sucking in his gut, somehow avoiding the blow and landing one of his own. The vamp staggered back, then caught her balance and threw a punch. It landed in Ethan’s side, so hard I heard bone snap. He grunted, but didn’t back away, hitting the vamp a second time, his fist smashing into the vamp’s face and mashing her nose back against his face. Blood spurted, and she snarled in fury.