NINE
THE LIGHTS CAME up on the stage, and a small hush settled over the club. The dance music faded away, and men and women shifted eagerly in their seats for a better look in anticipation of what was to come. The oldest Hallahan brother leaned across Blaze’s body as if she wasn’t there, his concentration on Maksim.
“You’re going to love this,” he said. “And man, anything you want is on the menu.”
His hand dropped casually toward Blaze. Maksim caught his wrist. Showing teeth in a semblance of a smile, but his eyes were ice-cold. “Nothing here is on the menu.” The voice said it all.
I can’t stand it if he touches me. He’s so close I want to vomit. Or kill him. Blaze felt naked without her weapons. A knife. Anything. She could break his neck, but the scuffle—and there would be one—would attract the bouncers, and it was doubtful if she could snap it in time before help got to him. She had to be realistic, and it was getting nearly impossible to breathe. She’d been holding her breath since he’d slipped into the booth next to her.
Hallahan sent Maksim a toothy grin. His gaze dropped to the woman who had to mean something to the perverted man who had come to his club for playtime. A toy he’d said, but still, a treasured one or he wouldn’t care if Jimmy shoved her on the floor and used her mouth while he watched the show the other worthless skanks put on for the men. Teasing them. Showing off their bodies for money. He turned his dancers into what they were—whores. Worthless whores who were required to do whatever he or his brothers demanded. And they demanded anything they wanted. Anytime they wanted.
He glanced down at the woman again. Her face was pressed to the wealthy man’s bare belly. He couldn’t see her face, but her body was prime. He wasn’t used to being denied, but he smiled anyway. He would have the woman when he wanted her—right in front of the rich man. He’d make the old man watch for that insult.
He cannot put his hands on you, Blaze. Take a breath. All you will pull into your lungs is me, Maksim assured. The illusion of you is real enough that if he touches your thigh or your back or any part of you, he doesn’t actually feel you, but what I created. You think you feel him, but he is not touching you. I would never allow that.
Blaze took a moment more, her lungs burning. Raw. Needing air. She believed Maksim, but she couldn’t bear it if he was wrong and she allowed Jimmy Hallahan into her, even if it was just the same air. She had no choice but to breathe. She pressed her face—her mouth—hard against Maksim’s belly, down low, into the waistband of his trousers, and she took a shallow breath.
She drew Maksim deep. So deep she was almost dizzy. Her next inhale was anything but shallow because his scent, that perfect, wonderful masculine scent, obliterated everything that was Hallahan. She closed her eyes and took herself out of the club. She couldn’t be there with the man who had murdered her father pressed next to her, illusion or not. Her tongue slipped over Maksim’s defined muscles. She traced them with her tongue just to get his taste. To push Hallahan further away.
I can’t watch over Emeline in this position, Blaze said. Worried. She hadn’t expected Hallahan to approach Maksim and actually sit at his booth.
Maksim’s hand stroked a caress in her hair. Tomas is up close to the stage just in case your girl gets in trouble. One of his brothers arrived a few minutes ago. Lojos. He is standing beside the stairs leading to the apartment. Leaning against the wall, eyes on the stage. Both are like me. Carpathian. Nothing will happen to her.
The first dancer came out of the shadows into the spotlight, crawling like a jungle cat, her body in nothing but leopard paint. The paint was clever, hiding everything and nothing at the same time. It was her dancing that revealed her body to them, slow, teasing glimpses as she sensuously shimmied around the stage to the pounding music.
The entire atmosphere in the club changed. The sexual tension ramping up along with the music. Maksim’s hand tightened in Blaze’s hair.
They are pumping something through the ventilation system, Blaze. Some kind of pheromone that is subtle but with every breath these men and women take, it is affecting them just as a drug would.
Blaze kept her mouth pressed to Maksim’s bare skin. I understand now why they’re so successful. They don’t need the actual drugs to get the people stirred up to purchase the extras. The sex would be better than ever; at least they all think it is.
They are selling drugs as well, Maksim said, allowing his breathing to change so Hallahan would believe he was just as affected as everyone else in the club. Just as affected as Hallahan was becoming. It was there on his face, stark depravity. His hand had already dropped to his crotch.
“See what I mean, Maksim?” Jimmy said, all friendly, his voice tinged with need. “When you’re through with your woman, I could use a little relief myself.” Jimmy’s grin was full of confidence, now that the drug was being pumped into the club.
Maksim flashed him a quick, answering smirk, but didn’t reply out loud. He had to pretend the drug was affecting him as it was all the others in the club.
The music ended and the crowd went wild. The lights came down and the dancer rushed offstage. A woman dressed in the scanty uniform of a server picked up the money thrown on the stage and shoved it into a separate pocket on her apron.
“A thousand can buy you that dancer for an hour. She’ll do anything you want, and your girl can join in or watch or just stay and wait for you,” Hallahan offered. “I’ve had her myself and she’s a wildcat, just like her dance shows her.”
Maksim’s eyebrows shot up. “A thousand?”
“For an hour, and believe me, that’s cheap for what you’ll get. You want her all night, that’s ten large, but you’d better be able to keep up,” Hallahan said.
In between the dancers, the strippers in the cages were grinding and slowly taking off their clothes, as the music pumped adrenaline through the club. More and more, the audience was becoming as affected, and as uninhibited.
They have quite the racket going here. The drug everyone is inhaling is already affecting everyone, even without the strippers and dancers. Men are touching their partners openly. Women are beginning to respond by allowing more open public displays. Blouses open, hands on their men’s crotches. Two have already knelt down right on the floor and no one’s stopping them from what they’re doing. It is just adding to the already open, sexual atmosphere. Two uniformed cops are being serviced in the corner by two of the women serving drinks. Blaze, they have cameras in here. This place is a trap for anyone coming in. They drop hundreds on the strippers, then thousands for the extra time in the back room and the way they have everyone worked up, including the strippers and dancers, there is going to be a lot of action in that back room. They will certainly have cameras there as well. That means blackmail. Now we know how they own the police so quickly.
Blaze nuzzled his body. Emeline, she whispered into his mind. I can feel the effects and I’m not watching the show, but she’ll be dancing. She’s naturally sensual, Maksim. I don’t want anything to happen to her.
She was becoming affected. She could feel the compulsion to slide under the table with every breath she took. Her breasts ached, and a smoldering fire began between her legs. She was very grateful Hallahan could only see an illusion, the image Maksim allowed him to see, not her.
Three more dancers performed before the music changed altogether into a pounding beat—a beat everyone in the room could feel right through their already primed bodies. Men were kissing, touching, pushing partners to their knees, reaching under tables to put their hands up skirts.
They keep changing the angle of the cameras, Blaze. Zooming in. This place is all about blackmail. Hallahan is getting suspicious. Slide under the table and stay low, directly in front of me. I will do the rest. You do not move. Keep your hand on my leg so I know you are safe while I give him the illusion he is expecting. As the wealthy pervert in the room, I should be far more affected by the drug and the sights surrounding me. I am not in the least aroused.
She knew what that meant. She closed her eyes and let her hand slide over his lap, feeling the length of him. He wasn’t hard or even semi-hard, a state he had been in when he was alone with her. Her stomach churned. She knew Hallahan couldn’t see her, the real her, or even the real Maksim, but this was so insane. Trapped by the drug pumping through the air vents, Maksim had no choice but to respond like everyone else. He was shielding her, and taking the brunt of the disgusting close proximity of Hallahan. Laughing crudely with him. Assessing the dancers and strippers. Rating them. Being a sleaze—for her. She had forced him to come here with her, protecting her. Protecting Emeline. Not just him, but two other of his friends.
I’m sorry, Maksim. I didn’t know what it was like inside. I’ve scouted the place, but never saw it this way. I really didn’t know. Em didn’t know, either.
It is all right. I do not care about this man. He is already dead. He is letting little things slip while we talk. I am able to see the scope of this operation, and Blaze, it is large.
Hallahan suddenly hitched forward, his hand stilling on his crotch. The room went silent other than the heavy breathing. There were no more shouts of encouragement to the dancers, only enthrallment.
Keeping her hand on Maksim’s calf, Blaze lifted the corner of the tablecloth draped so conveniently, so she could see the stage. She knew the moment the hush fell over the crowd that Emeline Sanchez had stepped into the spotlight. There she was and she was gorgeous. Spectacular. Her hair was long and thick, shiny as a raven’s wing and a true blue black. The thick mass fell below her waist, caressing her body, a body that was all curves. Narrow waist. Tight belly with just the hint of a womanly curve, soft and inviting. Her body was covered in glitter, gold and silver. Glitter that picked up the lights and threw what appeared to be little sparks as she moved onstage to the music. She wore a tiny thong of gold, and two golden stars over her nipples, a thin gold chain running from one star to the other. Around her hips, low, was a second double golden chain, with small bells that added to the music as she became lost in the pounding beat.
She looked like a woman desperate, hungry, in so much need of a man, her hands moving down her body suggestively as her hips undulated and her breasts swayed. As she danced, she hypnotized her audience. She was sex personified. The kind of dangerous woman a man might kill for. Once he was under her spell, once he had a taste of her, he could never be the same.
Every single male in the room, and many of the women, followed the path of her hands as they moved over her body, so graceful, so sensual, the epitome of perfection.
Hallahan began to swear under his breath, and to her horror, he unzipped his trousers and pulled out his cock. At once Maksim slammed a barrier between Blaze and the man. She couldn’t see him or smell him. She huddled closer to Maksim’s protection, eternally grateful for him. Had she come into that club alone, she would have fallen under the spell of the drug as well. She had no idea what would have happened to her. She wasn’t as far gone as the others in the room, but she knew Maksim was somehow giving her as much clean air as he could, acting like a filter for her.
This has to end, Blaze said desperately. I don’t want Em to regret helping me.
That dancing is all your girl, sufletul meu; Tomas and Lojos are filtering the air for her. She is very aware something is wrong. They do not know how she is so aware. As a rule, we can read humans easily when we want, but there is something different about her. I have tried as well, but it is impossible.
“Her,” Maksim said aloud to Hallahan. “I want that girl.”
“No fucking way,” Hallahan said. Choking on his own desperate hunger. “That one is all mine. She isn’t up for sale.”
Blaze heard his breathing change, become labored, and she knew the exact moment when he relieved himself, but she didn’t smell it or see it. Still, her stomach lurched again. She detested that he could see Emeline’s body. That he thought he could touch her, have her, force her to do whatever he wanted.
Hallahan abruptly stood. “I’ll send your waitress over.” He kept his eyes on the stage. “She’ll take your order.” He strode away, straight for the stage.
Blaze immediately slid back to the seat and leaned in to kiss Maksim. She had to get rid of the terrible taste in her mouth. The feeling of having come too close to real depravity. Maksim didn’t deny her. He kissed her gently. Tenderly. Blocking out everything but the way he made her feel. Safe. Secure. Comforted. Close to him.
He pulled back, his gaze moving over her face, clearly checking to see if she was okay. “We are going to get up and walk over toward the stairs. The women’s restroom is located just beyond them. It will look as if you are heading there and that you disappear inside. You and I will follow Hallahan and your girl up to the apartment. We will have to stay close. He has guards on the stairway. Do not make the mistake of brushing against them as we go up. They will feel a presence, perhaps even the air moving, although all of them are jacked up on the drug, so they will have their eyes on your girl. Do you understand?”
She nodded. “I take him down.”
“He will not see me, but again, if something goes wrong, it will be me taking him down. Tomas and Lojos will remain downstairs in case anyone is alerted to something happening and they try to rescue their boss. It is important to remember, his brothers will turn up sometime this evening. Tariq and Mataias have interrupted one of their jobs, and they already blew it by not killing or acquiring you.”
“Acquiring me?” She was already up and sliding out of the booth, her eyes on the oldest Hallahan brother, who remained beside the stage on the side where the dancers exited on the way back to the dressing room. He hadn’t taken his eyes from Emeline. In truth, no one else had, either, other than Blaze and the three Carpathian males.
“They had no idea you were bringing the war to them.”
“I issued an invitation.”
He took her hand and pulled her tight against his side, moving her easily through the crowd toward their goal. He didn’t speak to or shove anyone, but they moved when they saw him coming. Even in his disguise, he had presence.
“Neither Tariq nor I believed they came to kill you. They came for you. Once we realized you have a psychic ability, we were fairly certain they were there to acquire you for their boss.”
They had made their way to the stairway. Maksim took them into the shadows just outside the women’s restroom and to the left of the stairs. Instantly, she found herself wearing her normal attire, dark jeans and shirt, and her soft-soled boots. Her weapons were all there, in her belt, in her boots, strapped against her back between her shoulder blades. The weight felt familiar, and she found herself breathing easier.
“How could they possibly know I have a psychic ability?”
“Did you ever go to a place that tested your abilities?”
The music was louder, leading to a crescendo. The mesmerized crowd seemed to be collectively breathing in time to the music, ragged and labored, very sexual, so that tension permeated the room. Blaze switched her gaze from Emeline to the crowd. Emeline seemed to be in her own world, a part of that music, a living flame of pure sensuality. She moved on the stage as if she was alone, calling a secret lover to her. Wanting. Needing. Her body undulating, hands moving over her curves as she danced. The crowd seemed just as hungry now, as if every movement Emeline made onstage, they felt in their own bodies. At last, because she had to, Blaze let her gaze rest on Jimmy Hallahan.
His face was flushed, eyes bright. He looked under the influence of drugs, and he probably was, but it was more than that. She knew it was. Something else drove him, and his sights were set on Emeline.
“My father, Em and I all went to this psychic testing center. We did it for fun. We all had these strange things we could do. Em tested the strongest. She was kind of off the charts. Somewhere along the line, all of us got these bad vibes, so we walked out without really completing the tests. Emeline especially was really upset, and for a few weeks she was always looking over her shoulder. She said she thought the tests were for something else. I just felt the bad vibe and Dad, well, Dad could be paranoid.”
“There is a database of women who took those tests. Vampires were after them. Carpathians recently got a hold of the database and we are sending out hunters to protect them. We just have to make certain we get there before the vampires do.”
Blaze still wasn’t comfortable with the term vampire. She believed him. She believed him because she had always believed Emeline. Emeline had described in detail exactly what she’d witnessed, and there was no doubt that two men with rotting flesh had sunk teeth into their victim and drained blood. She could see it smeared on their mouths and on their jagged, stained teeth. And of course, there was the nightmare . . .
For a short while, both women had tried to explain the vampirish-looking males as having a disease, but two with the disease? And there were killings of the homeless, of prostitutes, bodies torn and drained of blood. No one believed in vampires but secretly, she and Em, when they were young and Em lived mostly in the streets, creeping up to Blaze’s room at night through the fire escape, had believed in another world.
They had the same nightmare and in that nightmare, there were vampires, monstrous creatures chasing them through a long, dark tunnel. They would wake, both shivering, sweating, scared out of their minds. Emeline was always quiet and she stayed awake, curled into a protective ball, her knees up tight into her chest, her head resting on them, arms around her legs as she rocked herself back and forth.
Over the years, the nightmare became more vivid, the tunnel even more real. They could see the gaslights up high on the wall of the tunnels, throwing a strange, yellowish glow through the darkness. The tunnel walls were of brick. Old brick. The tunnel itself was musty and smelled evil, as if it had been used for a long time by malevolent beings for foul purposes.
There were smears of blood on the walls as they ran down them. On the bricks and on the floor. Dark and ugly. They raced through a room with ancient tools of torture and kept going. Neither spoke, but they touched hands occasionally to give each other strength and courage.
Below ground seemed to be a maze of tunnels, of dark, hideous rooms, none good, most empty, but the echo of screams had been left behind. There was a room that was all modern. Totally modern. Computers everywhere. Screens everywhere. They both knew this was the center of the maze, and they had to get out before they were seen. If they didn’t . . . They ran faster. Hearts beating wildly. Terrified. Terror grew beyond imagination as the tunnel they rushed through began to contort, the walls closing together, the ceiling lowering and the floor pitching. At that moment, as if by mutual agreement, they woke.
She didn’t know if Em still dreamt that terrible dream, but once Emeline had stopped slipping into her room through the fire escape and Sean had sent her out of the country, the nightmares had stopped.
“When this is over, we will have to protect your friend. They will keep coming after her.”
“Emeline won’t accept protection. She has major trust issues. Her life hasn’t been pleasant. She takes care of herself and she’s loyal to Dad and me . . .” Blaze trailed off. There was no more Dad. There was only Blaze. Now Blaze and Emeline.
“She will not have a choice.”
The music ended with a crashing of drums. The stage went dark. The crowd went wild. Blaze saw Emeline running toward the exit and Hallahan coming out of the shadows, shackling her wrist and jerking her toward him. Emeline struggled and Hallahan leaned in close and whispered something in her ear. She stopped struggling, but her gaze slipped passed Jimmy to scan the room.
“She can’t see me,” Blaze said, trying not to panic.
“No. If I allow her to see you, someone else might as well. Tomas and Lojos are sticking close. If we cannot get to her, if he takes her somewhere else, they will stop him.”
The Hallahan brothers were predictable. They used the upstairs apartment where they had their video equipment set up to record their perverse, depraved acts. They enjoyed hurting the women they brought there, humiliating them and forcing compliance. Still, Blaze didn’t like that Emeline might feel abandoned. Scared. She detested that Em might be frightened and afraid that Blaze hadn’t come to the club to protect her.
There were too many nights Em had climbed up to the roof and down to the fire escape, running from someone in the streets. Hiding from men who would hurt her. She’d had a shit life, even after Sean had tried to get involved. No one would consider him as a foster parent because he owned a bar, lived over it and was a single parent. A man. That left Emeline to her crazy relatives. Junkies and alcoholics. The worst. They used her as a slave in the store they collectively owned, although she preferred working there to being at home.
She was held at gunpoint four times. Shot once. Was back in the store working the night shift even when she was underage and they mostly sold liquor late at night. Sean kept an eye out, but he had a business of his own to run, so more than once she was in trouble. A young girl alone, men coming in drunk or jacked up on drugs.
Emeline, she whispered softly, trying to connect mind to mind. Don’t be afraid. I’m here for you.
Jimmy Hallahan gripped Emeline by her arm, and if anyone looked close, he had it locked high behind her back as he dragged her through the crowd to the stairs. Beside her, Maksim radiated heat. Energy. None of it was good. The power was so strong that she touched his arm to calm him, afraid Hallahan and his guards would feel the Carpathian’s buried rage.
Jimmy was so far gone, in the throes of the drug, he didn’t look right or left, but continued dragging Emeline up the stairs. He had a phone in one hand now, flipping it open, talking into it.
“Answer your damn phone once in a while. I’ve got a hot one. So hot, man. Get back here when you’re finished with your job. This whore is going to make the three of you happy.” He snapped the phone closed and thrust open the door to the apartment.
Blaze followed them up the stairs, right behind them, so close she could practically breathe on Emeline. She didn’t dare touch her, but she wanted to. Right behind her, Maksim followed. They slipped through the door as Hallahan shoved Emeline, sending her flying across the room. She stumbled, lost her balance in her crystal stiletto heels and sprawled out on the floor.
Jimmy slammed the door, locked it and turned back to her with a vicious, hungry smile.