Her long blond hair was pulled back in a careless ponytail, heightening the angular beauty of her features. In pelt she was a pure white wolf with striking blue eyes. Smaller than Niki, fine boned and lithe. Quick on the hunt. Niki always ran with the Alpha, but she was always aware of Sophia whenever she ran with the Pack.
“I need to go back inside,” Sophia said quietly as she climbed the steps.“No.” Niki didn’t move, but the dominance in her voice made Sophia stop abruptly.
Sophia let her gaze drift across Niki’s face, searching but not long enough to challenge. Niki’s eyes were bright with pain, the bones in her face on the verge of morphing. She was in agony, and there was nothing Sophia could do to help her. “Niki, I can’t leave Elena alone any longer. I need to help her.”
“It’s not safe,” Niki growled.
“No,” Sophia said softly, resting her fingers on Niki’s rigid forearm. “It isn’t. Please let me go inside.” Niki trembled at the gentle touch. Her wolf stopped pacing and tilted her head, as if listening for a long-awaited call in the night. “I can’t. The Alpha has ordered that no one is to go in.”
“Drake will die, Niki.”
“Good. She should.” Niki shook off Sophia’s hand. “Go.” Sophia was not submissive, not in the ordinary sense of pack hierarchy. She could have resisted Niki’s command, at least long enough to argue. But she knew if she tried, Niki would dominate her, and at a terrible cost when her wolf was already straining to break free. Sophia couldn’t bear to add to her pain, so she turned and silently slipped into the dark.
The huge lot in front of Club Nocturne was jammed, and despite the late hour, cars still streamed in off the four-lane highway that formed an invisible barricade between the waterfront and the rest of the city.
Becca parked on the shoulder. She didn’t want to get blocked in, and she’d rather take her chances sprinting across the lot for a quick getaway than risk being stuck in her car like a land-bound turtle. Not that she had any real reason to think she’d be in danger. Nocturne was part of her crime beat and she couldn’t ever remember anything seriously bad being reported at the club. As she picked her way across the cracked and uneven pavement toward the dark sprawling edifice, it occurred to her that there might not be any crimes reported because the patrons volunteered for whatever happened to them inside.
Becca was surprised to see the club nearly full, even though post-Exodus the Vampire clubs could stay open all night. Most closed at sunrise, but not this one. In contrast to the bleak exterior, the interior was elegant and upscale. The beaten-tin ceiling was easily twenty-five feet high. Wall sconces cast muted cones of light into the cavernous space, leaving much of the room in pools of shadow. Many of the scattered glass and chrome tables, leather chairs, and sprawling leather sectionals were occupied by couples or groups who appeared to be having a very good time. She tried not to stare while wending her way to the bar that ran along one entire wall, but she could hardly avoid noticing the exposed bodies along the way. A male Vampire cradled a young woman in his lap, feeding from her neck while another woman knelt beside them and fondled the girl’s breasts through the open laces of her skimpy leather bustier. The girl’s face was a study in sensual bliss—her head thrown back, her eyes closed, her lips parted as if waiting for a kiss.
Two female Vampires caressed a man stretched out on a leather sofa as they fed at his neck and groin, while next to them three male Vampires and a human female writhed in a constantly changing configuration of arms and legs and genitalia.
“I’ll have a vodka tonic,” Becca said when she finally reached the shining black granite-topped bar. The bartender, a bald macho type with a glinting diamond stud in his right earlobe, a mass of tattoos on his chest and arms, and multiple punctures in his neck took his time looking her over. Becca stared at him, refusing to be intimidated by his blatant sexual appraisal.
“You look like a virgin.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“You’ve never been bitten, have you?”
“Is that a prerequisite for getting a drink?” Becca asked.
“Sightseeing can be a dangerous pastime.” He turned around, mixed her drink, and put it down in front of her. He neglected to slip a cocktail napkin underneath. “Five bucks.” Becca put a twenty on the bar and continued to check out the room.
She couldn’t see everyone, even if she had wanted to look carefully, but she didn’t immediately spy Detective Jody Gates anywhere. She should have been disappointed, but she was oddly relieved instead. She sipped the vodka tonic. It was decent.
“Have you seen Jody Gates?” Becca asked when the bartender came her way again.
He stopped and regarded her with a flicker of interest. “Why are you asking?”
“She’s a friend.” Becca didn’t know how open Jody was about her job in this place, and she certainly wasn’t about to announce she was a reporter.
“Down the far hall on the right. She likes the room on the end,” the bartender said with a malicious edge to his voice.
“Thanks.” Becca wondered if he thought she was the Vampire’s girlfriend, or whatever the term would be, because he seemed to take pleasure in providing the information.
She worked her way around the edge of the room, preferring not to wade through the bacchanal again, and found the hall the bartender had indicated. A series of doors opened on either side of a long, narrow passageway. She made her way as quickly as possible through the clumps of humans and Vampires and others who were neither. Most were in the midst of sex and feeding.
Becca raised her hand to knock on the end door on the right when she realized the door was ajar. Pressing lightly with her fingertips, she edged it open a few more inches. Several muted recessed lights provided just enough illumination for her to make out the figures on the bed against one wall. Figures multiple, as in three. From her angle she could see the profiles of the two women who embraced in the center of the bed. Jody was still partially dressed in dark trousers and an unbuttoned white shirt that exposed a smooth pale torso and small round breasts that might have been carved from ivory, they appeared so perfect. The curvy young blonde who writhed in Jody’s arms as they kissed was naked, one thigh thrown over Jody’s hips. A man pressed against the blonde’s back and angled his penis into her. He slowly thrust and withdrew with metronomic regularity, as if somehow detached from what was happening to the two women.
Mesmerized by the scene, Becca suddenly felt as if all her senses were heightened. The blonde’s panting whimpers were as sharp and clear as if Becca had been holding the woman herself. When Jody cupped the blonde’s breast and circled her erect pink nipple with her thumb, the woman’s cry made Becca’s sex clench. She imagined she could smell the blonde’s arousal, feel the weight of her heavy breasts in her palm and the slick wetness of her sex rubbing against her thigh. She heard a dark murmur and saw the blonde nod vigorously. Jody’s mouth was on her neck now and the blonde undulated even more frantically, driving her hips up and down on the phallus buried inside her.
Becca found herself breathing hard and forcibly quieted herself.
The deep murmur came again, and Becca realized Jody was asking the blonde a question. The blonde clutched a hand between Jody’s legs, gripping her convulsively through the material of her trousers.
“Yes, God, yes. Bite me,” the blonde wailed. “Please, do it now. I want to come.”
Jody dragged the blonde’s hand from between her legs and kept a grip on her wrist, holding the searching hand away from her body. When she reared back for a fraction of a second, Becca caught a glimpse of the crimson glow of her eyes and her gleaming white incisors. Her expression was one of unbridled hunger and fierce need.