She placed a hand on his shoulder. He flinched from the contact, then sighed. Rinna knew humans felt something between fear and pleasure from a banaranjan’s touch, an involuntary reaction to the epinephrine flooding their system.
The hormone was ambrosia to a banaranjan, not necessary to live, but coveted all the same. While many of her kind had no problem scaring adrenaline out of humans, Rinna much preferred to seduce a rush from her “samplers”.
Cade trembled again. They had moved closer to the safety barrier that prevented dancers from accidentally falling into the Pit. Rinna pressed against him, running her hands over his back just above his kidneys. “So Cade. . have you ever been down in the Pit?”
His heart triple-beat in his chest, and another burst of adrenaline hit his blood. Delicious.
“Sure, babe. I go in all the time,” he said, false bravado clear in his voice. “What about you?”
She pinned him with a stare, hoping her eyes hadn’t flickered yellow with excitement. “I’ve gone in a couple of times. It’s a surreal experience.”
“Yeah.” Something flitted across his expression, something apprehensive, dark, and excited. “It’s definitely something else.”
Rinna nodded, but decided to trust his body instead of his words. People had called her type adrenaline junkies long before extreme sports became vogue. While banaranjans didn’t need adrenaline for daily sustenance, it was a necessary component of their survival. She didn’t think humans needed to jump out of airplanes or fight bulls or watch horror movies, but they did. When they did, banaranjans were there to collect the carelessly released adrenaline for themselves.
Cade was probably an adrenaline junkie. He certainly looked the part with his carelessly spiked hair and athletic build. Rinna had seen plenty of guys like him base jumping, free climbing, and free running. It was all about the rush, the brush with death. For these junkies, if there wasn’t a near fatality, they didn’t feel alive.
If Cade wanted a brush with death, Rinna would be happy to oblige him.
He jerked his head toward the Pit. “Wanna go in?”
Rinna sucked in a breath. Enough humans had finally entered the Pit to spike the thick club air with the musky sweetness of adrenaline and other hormones. She could filter more if she went in herself, but she wasn’t ready for that. Not that she couldn’t hold her own; she knew how to get in, get what she wanted, then get out. But there were plenty of hybrids and Shadowlings in the black maelstrom who would be thrilled to fight her for her human companion. Plenty of beings much bigger, much meaner, and much more disposed to push the club rules.
The music crescendoed, then stopped. Rinna turned toward the stage, cheering and applauding with the other club-goers. “Looks like it’s last call,” Rinna told Cade. “People are coming out of the Pit.”
They watched, silent, as several humans staggered up the stairs to the main floor. Ripped shirts were the least of the injuries. One man had to be helped up the stairs by two others, the left side of his head bloodied. Club employees immediately gathered to help the humans to small recovery rooms out of sight.
A quick movement caught Rinna’s attention. She looked over Cade’s shoulder, her gaze falling on a darkly handsome man in a rust-coloured shirt coming up from the Pit. Where most of the others staggered and clearly showed evidence of the brutal experience the Pit could be, this male looked as if he’d thoroughly enjoyed his time in the lawless underbelly of the club.
As if he felt her gaze, the man turned to look at her. Rinna didn’t need the yellow glint in his black eyes to tell her he was a hybrid. Tiny hairs stood up along her arms, and her own heart kicked into a faster rhythm.
He was a banaranjan, gorgeous and in his prime. She’d seen him around the club before, but she’d always kept her distance. She had no way of knowing his clan affiliation, which meant she had no way of knowing whether he was friend or enemy. Since she’d come to Atlanta specifically to escape confrontations like that, she’d decided avoiding the male banaranjan was prudent.
Apparently he had a different opinion. His gaze flicked to her left, to the human beside her. If the menacing frown was any indication, the male banaranjan didn’t like what he saw. He changed direction, making his way towards them.
By Hetache’s flame, no, Rinna thought. She did not want to be intercepted by this guy, or the DMZ’s security wards. It was time to go.
Cade’s heart rate increased, distracting Rinna from the other banaranjan approaching. The blond man’s expression balanced somewhere between fear and aggression. “Friend of yours?”
Rinna blinked, turned her attention back to the irritated human. “Not even.”
“Good to know.” He caught her hand, his smile returning. “This is supposed to be the part where I ask for your phone number so I can call you later. But that would mean saying goodbye, and I’m not ready for that yet.”
Rinna hid a smile. She hadn’t put out a strong lure, but she hadn’t needed to. If she were into humans, this man would be high on her list of suitors. She hadn’t taken in nearly enough adrenaline to satisfy her craving, but she wasn’t a fool. She had no intention of going any farther than the parking lot with the handsome blond, but getting away from the other banaranjan was definitely a good idea. “Neither am I.”
“Awesome. What do you say I buy you breakfast or a cup of coffee at the Majestic?”
Rinna considered it for a hot second. There was only one place to go after a night of feeding off human energy at the DMZ: the Majestic. At three a.m., a good mix of humans and hybrids crowded the landmark twenty-four-hour diner in Virginia-Highland, most drunk on one thing or another. It was unofficial neutral ground after midnight, simply because most patrons were too tired, too hungry, or too high to be confrontational.
“Sure. A little Majestic sounds good.”
They made their way through the middle doors, joining the bulk of the crowd making its way out of the bar. The sky hung dark and glittering above the DMZ’s protective shields, tinged fluorescent orange by the city’s ambient light. It was one of those travelogue-worthy spring nights in Atlanta in which the pollen count was down but the temperature was up. It was close to three in the morning, the time when Normals relinquished the night to the things that liked to “go bump”.
Cade surveyed the mix of club-goers clogging the sidewalk — an eclectic mix of hybrids that passed as human and humans who looked liked hybrids.
They headed southeast from the club, leaving others behind. The club’s parking lots filled quickly most nights, and Rinna had learned to park a couple of blocks away to avoid the traffic dumping out on to North Avenue. The distance made it easy to determine if someone had followed her out of the club, and it enabled her a final chance to walk through throngs of club-goers to filter their hormones one last time.
Rinna kept her attention on Cade’s adrenaline levels. His excitement was a palpable thing, filling the air between them. She breathed deeply, drawing the heady pheromone into her throat. So tasty. Much better than that stale, synthetic stuff.
“There’s something about you, Rinna,” Cade said softly, his face turned up to the sky. “Something that tells me you’re different from other women in the club.”
“Thank you.”
He scrubbed at his gelled hair. “I mean, when I saw you, I was like, ‘whoa’. I mean, you’re hot, smoking hot, but it’s more than that.”
She could tell. His heart was beating at a rapid pace, his chest rising and falling with his quickened breath. “Uhm, is there a compliment in there or something?”