Chapter 18

Cora sucked in a breath. The guy from the diner. Had to be, she’d recognize that rough voice anywhere. He was more handsome than she’d even been able to imagine. Broad shoulders. Clear, ice-blue eyes. Wide-but-shy smile. Light hair shaved close to the scalp. Nice guy his looks screamed. Conscientious, traditional, his dark jeans and button-down said. Not stuffy, just… neat. With pride in his appearance, even if he were out to have a good time.

A guy like that could distract her from more than his buddy asking stupid, wildly inappropriate questions that hit way too close to the mark.

She nibbled her lip, glancing at the group of people surrounding her, crowding her, trying to feel them out. Why did all the hot ones have to be crazy?

She’d run like a little girl from the last meeting when the sight of Mitch Garner’s picture had dredged up the desire to murder, but forced herself to come back when she’d heard about the emergency meeting. She could control herself. She would. And this is what she found.

How could hottie’s- Jameson’s- friend, the massive guy who looked like he’d been in charge of everything ever invented, know about her… incident with Councilman Garner?

She stalled. “Kill anyone?”

The intense guy with the dark hair and the silver at his temples growled at her. Actually growled! “Answer the question.”

Cora tensed. “Whoa, you all need to back up. What is this, some kind of cult? Why are you all staring at me like that?”

Skeevy shit. No hottie was worth the weirdness she felt brewing. She was out.

Jameson held out his hands and backed up, dragging people with him. “Manners people, manners.”

The group backed up, but didn’t stop staring.

Jameson pushed on the arm of the intense guy. “You, too, Carick.” Carick, what the hell kind of name was that? She had stumbled onto some nutjob meeting. Had to have. But they were backing up. Listening to her hottie.

He looked at her, smiled, oh-good-lord-he-was-handsome, then gestured to the folding chairs all around them. “We should sit, Coralie. There’s something you need to hear.” So he was in charge. Good deal, she’d be happy to do what he told her to do. He seemed off though. Reluctant? Or just thoughtful?

She sat, perched on the edge of the chair, ready to beat feet when things got weird. Weirder. He sat too. The others backed far enough away, getting coffee, gathering to talk in small groups, that she didn’t worry they’d overhear what Jameson was saying to her.

Not that he was saying much. Only staring. Okay, she would start. She gestured behind him. “What’s with your friends? You all part of some extra-creepy political action committee?”

Jameson grinned. “Sorry about the creepy. Occupational hazard, maybe.”

Ah, now they were getting to the meat of what was going on. If he didn’t spill whatever secret he was keeping soon, she was gonna let him have it, hottie or not. “What, politics? Are you one of them?”

Jameson shook his head, but kept his eyes locked on hers. “Not one of them.”

Cora took a deep breath. Something was going on between them. She felt… aroused. Incited. Like their conversation was foreplay in disguise. “What, then?”

His face smoothed out. He licked his lips. Once. Twice. “You really wanna know?” he finally said, his voice husky.

Two meanings. Everything he said meant something to her as a woman, and something to her as someone who had recently tried to kill a man and had no idea why. “Yeah, I really do.” She patted her face and wondered if he could see her black eyes under her makeup. She didn’t want him to know how she had done it.

His voice dropped another octave as he stumbled over a few words. Her clit swelled in response and she instantly imagined him naked. He looked like he might be doing the same to her as he spoke slowly: “You’re going to think I’m insane.”

Maybe insane was just her speed. Should she let him know how interested she was in him? She didn’t need the crazy shit. She set her hand lightly on his knee, keeping it there despite the electric shock that hit her as they touched. She licked her lips like he’d done, wanting to see his eyes shift to her mouth. They did.

He could be trusted. She felt that truth deep inside her, along with the lust that was flooding her panties. When she spoke, her own voice belonged in the bedroom as well. “I have tried to kill someone.”

The expression on his face startled her. A fierce longing, like her admission made him think of sins forbidden to him.

“And?” he asked, his eyes boring into hers. Holy shit, she was about to come in her capris, and they’d only been talking for a minute.

She tried to answer. “And. And I got thrown in jail.” No mention of the mental hospital. That kinda shit had to wait for at least the third date.

Too slowly, Cora realized he meant had she been successful or not. Okay, definitely different. Bordering on macabre. And yet, all she could think about was fucking him. Still. She answered carefully. “And I didn’t kill him.”

The thought of Mitch Garner caused hate to course through her, finally cooling her ardor a bit. Jameson pulled back slightly and glanced at the air above her. She looked up, but nothing was there. “His bodyguards saved him.”

Jameson took a deep breath. He didn’t seem judgmental. Not at all. He rather looked like he wanted to lick her like a lollipop. Yes, please. He leaned forward, engaging her in every way. “You’re special.”

Damned right she was, but what in the hell did that mean? “Special?” She tried not to shift in her seat, the friction of her clothes against her skin unbearable as she stared at her hottie’s ice-blue eyes.

Jameson took a deep breath, as if fortifying himself. “You’re-” He glanced around. Looking for help? Mr. Intense and Huge with the graying temples and dark eyes gave him a sharp nod. So he was actually in charge. Jameson was his second-in-command. Jameson’s voice lowered to a husky whisper as he moved in close and spoke into her ear. “I’m going to just say it. You’re a special kind of witch called a switch. Your function is to kill vampires.”

Cora stared. She swallowed. Giggled. She snatched her hand back and slapped it across her mouth. That sexual ledge was still between them, but a cold stream ran behind his words. Witch? Not witch. He’d said something else. She wasn’t even going to think about the word vampire. She’d heard that wrong for sure. Swytch, her mind screamed. She ignored so fucking hard.

“Switch? Like sexually?”

He frowned. “What?”

Cora blushed. He has no idea what I’m talking about. She babbled, uncertain about whether she wanted to hear anything else he wanted to tell her. “Switch, you know. Someone who likes to be both dominant and submissive in bed.” His eyes darkened. She blushed harder. “I read an article online.”

Jameson’s frown deepened. Not something he thought they should be discussing. Got it. “Not what you meant, huh? Sorry if I embarrassed you.”

His blue eyes fixed on hers and she couldn’t tell what he was thinking, only that he was damned serious. “Not embarrassed,” he grated.

Her temperature heated up by a few degrees. He was killing her, and he didn’t even know it. “Switch?” she prompted. She really wanted to fucking know. “Spell it for me?”

His jaw clenched, his voice deep and rough. “You’re a weapon, Cora. You’re made to kill vampires, and those-” He gestured toward a stack of TOV pamphlets on the table, showing the recent Victory party winners. “Those are vampires.”

A crazy laugh burst out of Cora, shrill and frantic. She wanted to run. She needed to stay. He wasn’t lying. His words vibrated inside her mind and the fact that they were perfectly ridiculous, and also perfectly reasonable and explained everything, was terrifying. Jameson’s watched her calmly. Quietly. Studying her.

She knew it was true. Somehow, she knew it. But she was going to fight anyway. That’s what weapons were for, right? “Lynessa put you up to this? Ha-ha, fucking hilarious. Just because I’m a little obsessed with a book doesn’t mean I’m an idiot.”

Jameson’s look said he didn’t know what she was talking about. She wished he was that good of an actor. No, he was probably just telling the truth when he said, “Nobody put me up to anything.”

Her fingers grasped for something to hold on to. She believed him. God help her, she believed every word the crazy hottie was saying. Shouldn’t the room be spinning? Something should be happening. She shouldn’t be sitting there feeling so normal, able to talk and function and think. She studied Jameson’s face, her vision doing that camera trick of pulling back while zooming in, making everything around them fuzzy and out of focus. Her head dipped as the room did spin a little.

He took her hand. “Don’t panic, Coralie. I’m here.”

She tried again. If she protested enough, maybe he’d give up. Go away. “That’s absurd. There’s no such thing as vampires. Believe me, I’d know.”

Jameson squeezed her hand, the pressure helping to focus and stabilize her swirling thoughts.

Compassion shone on his face. “There are vampires. They do exist. And you are programmed to kill them. Tell me about your hunt.”

Red alerts sounded in Coralie’s brain. She wasn’t the paranoid type, or hadn’t been before all this started, but suddenly telling this guy about when she had tried to kill someone seemed like a bad idea. Because that’s what he had to mean when he said, your hunt. It resonated.

Cora calmly removed her hand from Jameson’s, reaching to the floor beside her chair for her purse. “Uh, sure. I just need to go to the ladies’ room first. Splash some cold water on my face. This is a lot to take in.”

She took off, heading in the general direction of the bathroom. Shit was real. Shit was crazy. She had to go, hottie or not. Killer. The word pulsed in her mind. Jameson had used the word weapon, but Coralie knew that wasn’t correct. She wasn’t a weapon, she was a cold-blooded killer, vampires did exist, and her world would never be the same. Unless she ran. Denied it. Refused to believe a word.

She sensed the big man a second before she ran into him. Bryce. Grinning at her. Looking like every innocent, sweet-but-hot hero in every young adult action film ever made. Not her thing, but still nice to look at.

“You leaving already, Coralie?”

Cora was sure Bryce was a nice guy, but his timing sucked. She didn’t want to call attention to herself trying to get out the door instead of into the bathroom. “Nope, just need to powder my nose. I’ll be right back.”

She smiled breezily and moved to step around him, aiming that way.

Bryce moved with her, staying in front of her. “That’s cool. Hey, I was wondering if you’d like to go see a movie with me or something. Maybe have some dinner. What do you say?”

Ah shit. He wanted a date. That would put a damper on her running-for-the-hills thing. Ordinarily she jumped at the chance to go on dates for the sheer fun of it, but now was not the time. “I don’t think so, Bryce. Life is a little crazy right now. But thanks for the offer.”

Bryce’s winning smile deflected her rejection. “Hey, no problem. I don’t mind crazy. Keeps things interesting.”

Cora resisted the urge to list the virtues of boredom from her current perspective. But her adrenaline was fading. She glanced a look back over her shoulder. Had she overreacted? Vampires? Maybe Jameson had meant something different. Or maybe this was a joke?

Bryce grinned again. “Come on, whaddya say? Just dinner and a movie. You pick both. Just friends.”

He was sweet. She was terminally single. And things were changing too fast for her to be on sure footing. But yeah, why not? She could use more friends in her life. She smiled. “I’ll give you my number when I get back from the restroom and we’ll pick a day.”

Bryce’s face lit up so bright she felt bad for her initial tepid response. “Awesome! I’ll see you in a few minutes, then.”

Coralie finally made it into an empty restroom. She went straight to the sinks and turned one on as cold as it would go, jamming her hands under the flow. A couple of splashes on her neck did nothing to soothe the feeling of being off-kilter. How did you respond to someone who said things like vampire, witch, and switch to you, and they weren’t discussing costumes?

Cora faced her reflection, meeting her own eyes as she spoke. “Could you really be meant to kill vampires?”

Her face broke into a smile before she’d even finished. This is ridiculous. What am I even still doing here? Fuck, she should have kept running.

Cora’s instincts said Jameson was trustworthy. Her twenty-first century brain said get the hell out. She hated to think how he’d feel when she didn’t come back to finish their conversation, but better safe than kidnapped by a weird-ass cult. Flip-flop much? Much more of this and she’d need to check herself back in the mental hospital.

She wasn’t going back out there. She didn’t want to deal with Bryce, or Jameson. Two stalls faced the sinks where she stood, a small window high on the wall between. An ancient radiator was fixed to the wall below the window.

Hell yeah. Ten years of gymnastics plus parkour were going to save her the embarrassment of sneaking out the front door. Cora tested the radiator to see if it would hold her weight. When it did, she planted both feet and reached for the window, praying it wasn’t painted shut.

It opened with a lurch, but Cora held on tight and found her balance. Thank you, Coach Dover, for those hours on the beam. One good heave and she was able to get herself halfway out the window, turn to sit on the sill, then slip her legs out one at a time so that her butt rested just on the brick outside. With every breath she assured herself she’d done more embarrassing things in her time than this, surely. She was just too busy at the moment to think of any.

Cora was trying to figure out how to close the window when the bathroom door opened. Platinum hair, exotic features. One of the ones who had surrounded her before.

The woman’s eyes widened, then narrowed. She only spoke three words. “We need you.”

Cora didn’t wait to hear more. No, thank you. She had goldfish to take care of. She pushed hard off the windowsill, trying not scrape her butt on the brick, and landed at a run for her car.

At the end of the building she chanced a look behind her. The woman was out of the window and giving chase, pale hair flying behind her. What the actual fuck? Now things are getting scary. Coralie faced front and jacked up her speed.

Cora had never been a particularly strong woman, and she was petite at best, but she had always been among the fastest of her friends growing up. She could run for miles without feeling winded. This bitch ain’t catching me.

Her thighs burned but she ignored them, dashing between cars, keys in hand. One thumb on the key fob, Cora waited until the she was in front of her car door to press the button and alert her pursuer to her destination. She yanked the door open, sat down, and slapped the lock button as soon as it was closed again, her heart racing.

Hands shaking, she jammed the key into the ignition. A look in the rearview mirror showed her the platinum-haired woman two rows over and slowing. Coralie put the car in gear and pulled out of the stall, heading for the exit.

A blue glow behind her told her the woman had her phone out. Had photographed her license plate.

Shit.