When she flipped on the kitchen’s overhead lights, she gasped. Two men stood across the room. They weren’t vampires, but the term unsavory fit perfectly. All of Campbell’s warnings came back to her, and she cursed herself for leaving her gun upstairs, loaded beside her bed. Which was where she’d thought she might need it during the night.
As sleep receded more, she realized who they were—the two customers who had made her so uncomfortable that day she’d called Campbell.
“We hear we can get a free meal here,” the taller one said.
She wasn’t fooled. These weren’t the kinds of lost and forgotten faces she fed each day. And did they honestly think she didn’t remember that they’d already been here once as paying customers? “How did you get in here?” She wondered if she could make it up the stairs before they caught her.
She didn’t get the chance. The man nearest her was across the room before she could make the first step. Bastard moved fast for a big guy. He pulled her arms behind her, and she winced. She struggled, determined to free herself, to get upstairs to that gun. She’d never seriously considered killing anyone before. But if it came down to it, she would shoot them before she let them drag her away to some fate worse than death.
Olivia kicked and bucked, but she couldn’t connect with her captor’s legs. The other guy moved close and ran his awful fingers down her cheek, over her neck, coming to rest just above her breasts. Her skin crawled in an attempt to get away from his touch.
“You are a pretty thing. I’d love to have you myself, but I wouldn’t live long after that. Still,” he said as he licked his lips, “it’d almost be worth it.”
She didn’t know where she got the strength, but she spit in his face.
His expression transformed to a portrait of anger just before he slapped her.
“Olivia!”
She blinked away the stars, would swear she’d heard Campbell’s voice.
“Olivia, let me in!”
She looked toward the front of the restaurant, and there he was standing on the sidewalk, his hands pressed against the glass of the front door. He looked desperate to get to her, to help, but he couldn’t pass that barrier without her inviting him in. Could she do it? Give a vampire free access to the only place she was truly safe from his kind? These creeps holding her were human, like her, so she had a chance of getting free. But if she invited Campbell in, she’d either have to move or live knowing that when he got hungry, he might come for her.
Campbell’s gaze caught hers, and his eyes blazed a brighter blue than she’d ever seen. Some instinct told her it had nothing to do with bloodlust.
Before she could utter a word, the man behind her clamped a hand over her mouth. She struggled again, but she couldn’t move her mouth enough to bite his hand.
The tall man cupped one of her breasts and looked straight at Campbell. “It must really eat you that you can’t help her, that you have to watch. Maybe I’ll just have my way with her and take my chances.”
Campbell’s face hardened and his eyes narrowed. He was the epitome of dangerous, and knowing that it was out of some protective instinct toward her made Olivia’s heart warm.
“I will kill you,” Campbell said very slowly, deliberately.
“Not if the sun kills you first.”
Oh, God! The sun. Olivia looked beyond Campbell and saw a hint of daylight working its way toward him. She widened her eyes, trying to tell him to go, to save himself. But even though he met her gaze, he didn’t move. As she watched in horror, smoke began to drift up from his back. Still, he didn’t move, not even when the increasing daylight became painful. She saw it on his face even though he tried to hide it. She closed her eyes, unable to watch him burst into flames.
Struggling did no good, but what if...? She went limp, and her captor lost his grip on her mouth just long enough.
“Campbell, come in!”
He moved so fast, she hadn’t even taken a breath before he had both of the men by the throats and was shoving them out the back door. She didn’t want to know what he did to them. All her worry was for the vampire who was risking his own existence to protect her. Campbell Raines knocked a hole in everything she’d ever believed about vampires. Good and evil, they weren’t so black-and-white as she’d always thought.
The first ray of sun hit her shoulder right as Campbell stumbled back inside, his body burned and smoking, unsteady on his feet.
“Oh, my God!” She grabbed his arm and shoved him away from the windows and into the large walk-in freezer and closed the door behind them. She fumbled in the dark for the light switch as he collapsed at her feet.
When she finally turned on the light, she gasped. Campbell looked as though he’d walked through a fire.
Chapter 14
Campbell didn’t dare think about how many layers of skin he’d lost or the pain he’d go through as it regenerated. What he had to concentrate all his strength on was not attacking Olivia, not after she’d decided to trust him. He craved fresh blood so his body would heal faster, but he couldn’t give in.
“Pull the cuffs off my belt,” he said as he met Olivia’s wide eyes. He could tell how bad he looked from the horror on her face.
“Why?”
“I need you to cuff me so my fangs won’t descend.”
“You...you need to feed?” She took a step backward, the memory of that first day they’d met plainly written on her face. He didn’t think she even realized it.
“The craving is there, to help with the healing.” He winced when he tried to sit up.
Olivia stood frozen, and he hated the idea that maybe she was doubting her decision to invite him inside.
“Please.”
She inched forward.
“The quicker, the better. I don’t want to hurt you.”
Olivia took a deep breath and met his eyes. “You won’t.”
“While your confidence in me is flattering, it’s not wise. I may be a Souled vampire, but I’m still a vampire. You know what I’m capable of.”
She knelt beside him and unhooked the handcuffs that had been dipped in holy water, her hands shaking. “I see a lot of people every day who nobody believes in, so I’ve become a good judge of character.” She snapped the handcuffs gently around his wrists in front of him then met his eyes. She lifted her hand to his burned face and gently caressed the outer edge of the damaged area. “Anyone who is willing to face a horrible death to protect someone else is the very best kind of person.”
He tried to smile but stopped when it pulled his tender skin too much. “But I’m not a person.”
She touched his shoulder, hoping it wasn’t burned beneath his shirt. “Yes, you are.”
Something moved in his chest. His heart hadn’t beat in years, but he’d swear he felt it do exactly that.
“Olivia!”
She jerked at the sound of another woman’s frantic voice. “Stay here,” she said as she jumped to her feet and headed for the freezer door.
As if he had any choice.
* * *
The moment Olivia emerged from the freezer and quickly shut it behind her, Mindy screamed and pointed a gun at her.
Olivia threw up her hands. “It’s me!”
Mindy lowered the gun and pulled her into a one-armed embrace. “Oh, thank God you’re okay!” Mindy was shaking as she stepped back, dropped the gun into her purse and grasped Olivia’s upper arms. “There are two dead bodies outside the back door.”
Nausea and dizziness hit Olivia simultaneously, and Mindy guided her toward a chair. Once she was seated and out of danger of falling on her face, she took a long, deep breath. “They broke in this morning. They...” Her voice faltered and she had to stop to collect herself and try to bring her shaking under control. “They were trying to take me.”