LEXINE LIGHTLY PUSHED on the gas pedal, keeping the car at ten miles per hour, as she moved closer to her target.
After feeding from Sterling again a few nights before, she felt more like herself and back to her normal strength, physically and mentally. She had spent all day coming up with a plan in between the forced naps that she made herself take. She wasn’t going to go into any situation weak again.
The first step of her plan was to hire a private detective. There were a few vampire private eyes she could have hired, but she’d ultimately decided to go with a human. Lucas and the others would find a human less threatening, and a human could go out during the day. She needed to find out where her parents were being held. Someone from Lucas’s group had to own property or had to be related to someone who owned property where they were keeping her parents. She didn’t really think anyone in the group would keep her parents at their own homes, but she had looked anyway. There had been no trace of them.
Lennox had gone to their parents’ home and hadn’t found anything. Lexine had thought about going out there, too, but she already knew who had taken her parents. She had hoped that maybe Lennox would find something that showed they had been kidnapped and report it to Dante. But Lucas and his gang were smart. There were no signs of foul play or anything amiss.
So, now, Lexine had moved on with her plan. She inched her way toward Steve’s house, hoping to find him and Analeigh there. She didn’t technically live there, but she spent most of her nights at her boyfriend’s. Lexine was hoping for a two-for-one deal.
She was driving at a snail’s pace because she didn’t know if Lucas would be there. She did not need him sensing her. She doubted he was at the house. But she wasn’t going to assume anything.
She was at the end of their street now and couldn’t see any other vehicles parked outside besides Analeigh’s. Lexine mentally high-fived herself, feeling like something was finally going her way.
Lexine drove past and parked a block away among a group of trees that partially hid her car. She put on her black cap, black sweatshirt, and leather gloves. Then, she made her way through Steve’s neighbors’ backyards until she reached the back door to his garage. The fool never locked it. Lexine listened for sounds on the other side, hoping that maybe the two of them were still sleeping. The darkness beyond the windows was a good sign.
After waiting several minutes, Lexine felt it was safe enough to go in. She opened the garage door just enough to slip inside. As she approached the door to the house, she listened intently. She could be wrong, but it sounded like there was a rhythmic smacking on the other side.
Lexine practically rubbed her hands together in glee. They were fucking, and she couldn’t have asked for a better distraction. It was even better than if they had been sleeping.
Once again, Lexine turned the knob without any trouble. The idiot didn’t lock this door either.
She entered the dark galley kitchen and tiptoed toward the back of the home. The house was ranch-style with the kitchen and living room in front and the master bathroom all the way at the end of the hall in the back. Their sex sounds grew louder as Lexine got closer. Hopefully, Analeigh and Steve would never hear her coming.
When she got to the bathroom, Lexine went inside. Steve’s home was older, built before en suite bathrooms had become really popular, and she hoped one of them would come in there to clean up after themselves.
She searched the mess on the bathroom counter for Analeigh’s perfume and sprayed herself with it, hoping the post-sex haze and the fragrance would cover up her scent. Then, she hid behind the door to wait.
Lexine really wanted to bust in on them fucking, but she wasn’t dumb. Even though she was a Guardian and had training, it was two against one. She wasn’t going to risk ruining her plan because she let her feelings overrun her common sense.
That was how she’d ended up in this situation in the first place. If she hadn’t agreed to the gang’s plan to try to separate the shifters and the vampires, in her hopes of getting Phoenix away from Dante, she never would have gotten involved with this group. If she didn’t make this right, Dante would never see her as a romantic partner.
Lexine listened as she heard the squeaks of the bed frame speed up, the headboard making an almost constant bang against the wall. She heard a male groan and then nothing. It seemed Steve was a selfish lover, as she hadn’t heard any female moans.
“Sorry, love. I’ll get you next time.” Steve’s voice floated into the hallway.
“That’s okay. I’m good.”
Lexine made a face at the back of the door, betting that Analeigh was lying. But whatever; it wasn’t her relationship.
“I’d do it right now, but we’re supposed to meet everyone in less than an hour.”
Lexine’s ears perked up. Could everyone be the everyone she’d come to know? Were they planning something tonight? Was Lucas going to call her and quiz her again? Shit.
She quickly took out her cell and made sure it was on silent before Lucas did call her, alerting Steve and Analeigh that she was in the house. Her phone was on vibrate, but even that could be heard, so she switched to silent.
She cursed herself as she put her phone back in her pocket because she almost missed Analeigh respond, “I’d better grab a shower then. You made quite a mess on me.”
Lexine tried not to gag or picture what Analeigh was talking about. And she really hoped she wouldn’t accidentally touch anything organic in nature when she took Analeigh down.
She heard Analeigh in the hallway, so Lexine slowed her breathing as best she could so as not to be heard. Analeigh flipped on the light in the bathroom and closed the door behind her. She let her robe slide down her shoulders just as she looked up into the mirror and saw Lexine behind her.
“Shouldn’t have crossed me, bitch,” Lexine hissed as she put one hand over Analeigh’s mouth and her other over the front of her neck, squeezing Analeigh’s pulse points.
Analeigh clawed at the gloves around her neck and made a high-pitched muffled sound, but soon, she collapsed against Lexine as she passed out. Lexine gently laid her down on the bathroom rug, so there was no noise to alert Steve that something was wrong. It was hard because she really wanted to drop her, letting her fall on her face and break her nose.
Lexine grabbed a clean washcloth on the shelf behind the toilet and got it wet. Thankfully, Steve thought Analeigh was in the bathroom, getting ready for the night. Lexine washed the area behind Analeigh’s knee to make sure it was clean because she didn’t know what the two of them had done in the bedroom.
Then, Lexine bent over and sank her fangs into the area, aiming for the popliteal vein. It was a relatively large, deep vein, so it was easy to quickly feed from, although a very unusual spot to do so, which was why she’d picked it. She needed to do this fast, and she needed a spot where Analeigh wouldn’t obviously look. Even with the healing properties in their saliva, it could be difficult to heal a wound one hundred percent. It also helped that the area was on the back of her body. When Analeigh woke up and inspected herself, she probably wouldn’t think to look there.
Lexine quickly took just enough blood in order to sense and get a read on Analeigh before she withdrew her fangs. She didn’t want to take any more than she needed because she didn’t want Analeigh to guess that she’d lost blood.
Lexine closed the bite mark, taking as much time as she could spare to heal it as completely as possible. Then, she put soap all over the back of Analeigh’s knee to hopefully wash off her scent. There was a chance Analeigh wouldn’t remember seeing Lexine in the mirror, so she wanted to remove all traces of herself if possible. Lexine used the washcloth to remove the soap and threw the wet cloth on the counter. For added measure, she sprayed the same perfume she’d sprayed on herself earlier on the back of Analeigh’s knee. Then, she turned Analeigh over onto her back and threw the discarded robe over her.
Lexine stood and turned on the shower, so Steve would think his girlfriend was in there and to help cover the sound of her footsteps. Then, she headed for the bedroom to seek her next mark.
She made her first mistake as she entered the bedroom, expecting to see Steve lying on the bed. She should have checked the same behind-the-door hiding spot she’d just used, but instead, she looked around the room and stood there, confused that she didn’t see him. She hadn’t heard him walk past the bathroom.
She looked at the closet right before she heard the door shut behind her, and an arm wrapped around her throat and another around her waist.
Fuck.
Apparently, she hadn’t covered her presence as well as she would have liked to.
Even though Steve was a male, he didn’t have the fighting experience that Lexine did. He expected her to try to wiggle out of his grip, but Lexine put her chin down, wedging it between her neck and Steve’s arm. Then, she took the arm around her waist and bent his thumb back until it either broke or went with her. Once she pulled the lower limb away from her body, she used Steve’s own height against him. She pushed her butt into his body and leaned over, and Steve started to lose his balance. Then, she flipped him over until he landed on his back.
Steve made an oomph sound as all the air momentarily left his body, and then he moaned.
Lexine lifted a booted foot to smash into his face, not caring that she wasn’t supposed to leave a trace of herself here, and brought it down on him. Except he moved, and she only got his collarbone instead. It made a satisfying crunch as it landed on his clavicle, and Steve bellowed with pain.
Her second mistake was assuming that, since he was in pain, he wouldn’t be able to fight her as strongly. But rather, he seemed to up his ante, his injury pissing him off in the process. He grabbed on to her ankle with his good hand and pulled her leg out from under her so hard and fast that she landed on her back, hitting her head. She groaned as she saw stars.
Steve quickly crawled over her and wrapped his fingers around her throat. Even with one injured side, his uninjured side was squeezing hard enough that her vision started to dim.
“Fucking bitch. You should have just left us alone,” Steve said as he squeezed harder.
Then, out of nowhere, Lexine heard a roar, and Steve was ripped off her body. She rolled over and started coughing as she tried to regain her breath. Her throat burned as she sucked in air, and she knew it would take a few days to heal.
When she finally felt like she had enough air in her lungs, she paid attention to her other senses and realized who had saved her. It was Sterling. Her blood link to him was open, and he was pissed.
She quickly turned to see Sterling in a sitting position with his legs crisscrossed over Steve’s waist. Sterling slowly choked him out with both hands around Steve’s neck.
Lexine tried to get to her feet, but her legs were unsteady, so she half-crawled, half-walked as she rushed over to Sterling. She grabbed on to Sterling’s hands. “You can’t kill him!”
She couldn’t let Sterling take a life in defense of her. She’d gotten herself into this mess. She could not let Sterling take this on his conscience. But he was in a daze and ignored her.
“Sterling, you can’t kill him,” she said again. She went around to Sterling’s back and tried to pull him away. It was like trying to move a house. Think, think, think. She had to do something.
She bit Sterling on the ear and shouted, “You can’t kill him. He’s knows where my parents are. They’ve been kidnapped.”
That finally seemed to get through to him, and he let go of Steve. Steve slumped over onto his side, but at least Lexine could see his chest rising and falling.
Sterling jerked his body out of Lexine’s embrace.
She briefly glanced at his face, and the anger there almost had her cowering in the corner. But Lexine still had a mission to finish. She wasn’t going to let Sterling stop her.
She rolled Steve to his back, and since he already knew she’d been there, she leaned over and drank from his neck. She took more than she had from Analeigh because the asshole had tried to kill her. Something she hadn’t even been planning to do to him. She wasn’t here to see him die. She’d only come for his blood.
When she was done, she licked the wound closed but didn’t bother healing him. When he woke up, she hoped the fucker’s neck hurt as much as hers did.
She sat up to see Sterling watching her.
“What the fuck is going on?”