Big Bad Bite (4 page)

Shooting her eyes around the room, she
assessed that none of their teammates saw the incident while also
spying a pool table in the back room. Turning around to face a
pouting Kent she gestured her head towards the back. “Do you play
pool?”

His mouth broke into another smoldering
smile. “Hell yeah. Let me show you how it’s done, darlin’.”
Grabbing her free hand with his, he dragged her back to the pool
tables. By the time eleven o’ clock rolled around Kent and Jenna
had played several games and were currently tied. Some of their
teammates had drifted back to join them at the other empty tables
while steadily placing a growing bet on who would beat who in their
little tournament. Now close to the end of what would be their
tiebreaker game, Jenna only had two striped balls left on the table
while Kent had five solid ones. As she chugged her tenth - or was
it twelfth, it started with a ‘t’ she was sure- beer, Kent sat
halfway on a barstool in front of her.

“How about a bet of our own, gorgeous?”

Cocking an eyebrow, she grinned. “Depends on
the wager. What do you want to play for? Fifty? Hundred bucks to
the winner?”

Kent smiled like a cat looking at a cornered
mouse. “Actually, I wasn’t thinking about money. I was thinking
about a kiss.”

Surprise flashed over her face. “A kiss? I
think I’d rather the hundred bucks there buddy boy.”

“Agreed then. If you win, you get a hundred
bucks. If I win, I get a kiss.”

Holding her empty beer bottle for a minute,
Jenna looked at the table debating the odds. There was a damn fair
chance she was going to whip his ass at pool anyways. Why not
sucker him for the hundred bucks to teach him a lesson? Glancing
back at Kent with a confident smile she told him, “Deal.” Walking
to the side of the table Jenna leaned over and lined her shot up
for the corner pocket. This was going to be the easiest hundred
dollars she’d ever made. Too bad Kent’s pride was going to take a
hit in the process. Seconds later a chorus of cheers erupted around
them as she sank the red stripped ball in the pocket.

Walking to the opposite end of the table so
that she now faced Kent on the far side where he still sat on his
stool, Jenna lined up a long shot to take the blue stripped ball
into the far pocket. Just as her pool stick hit the cue ball
though, Jenna felt an electric tingle race up her back. Following
the direction of the sensation her widened eyes lifted and looked
at Kent’s own startled eyes. She watched in her peripheral vision
as the blue stripped ball went wildly off the mark and missed the
pocket. Kent’s pupils were so dilated the black almost encompassed
his entire cobalt blue iris.

Oh shit.

Her Mama had taught her that feeling a wave
of electric sensation through the body, and a person’s pupils
expanding like that, only meant one thing. Kent was a
demon
.
And he had just used some kind of telekinetic power to sabotage her
shot. Cheating little bastard.

Her heart nearly exploded out of her chest.
How unlucky could one girl get? A shifter and a demon in one
freaking day? This was some truly scary shit! Hastily setting the
pool stick down, she sprinted for the front of the bar leaving a
startled group of co-workers calling after her. What was worse, she
had to pull her speed back so that she ran at what would be
considered a fast human speed instead of the preternatural one that
she could easily let rip. She had to get the hell out of here as
fast as possible. Bursting through the front door of the bar, Jenna
rounded the corner and started sprinting to her bike in the dimly
lit parking lot. One second blessed retreat was seconds away and
the next Kent stood in front of her bike, blocking the way for
Jenna to get to it. He’d moved at a speed that even her eyes
couldn’t track.

With both of his hands in the air, in an
‘I-mean-you-no-harm’ manner, she quickly slammed her heels into the
dirt to skid to a stop just a few feet in front of him. Kent looked
as shocked as she felt. By his body language, there were no signs
that he actually meant her any harm but that did little to reassure
her. “Jenna, it’s okay. I’m not sure what you know, or what you
think you know, but I swear that I’m an upstanding guy and you have
nothing to fear from me, darlin’.”

“Good. Then get out of my way, Kent, and let
me leave.”

The electric tingle traveled up her spine
again as she simultaneously felt an invisible nudge at the front
part of her forehead. This jerk face was trying to poke around in
her brain! “Stay out of me head, asshole!” She snarled. “You’re not
welcome there.”

Jenna continued to watch Kent’s startled face
before she caught a semi familiar scent on the wind, along with the
slight sounds of movement at her back. Turning her body slightly to
the left, she back flipped so that she was now a few feet further
away facing Kent and her new unwelcome party crasher. Standing in a
defensive crouch, Jenna’s eyes raked over the red headed Alpha
bounty hunter from earlier today. Pompous little jerk thought he
could sneak up on her. Jenna’s body started to tremble slightly
with rage and she realized that she was literally just seconds from
losing it out here in the middle of a public parking lot. Seconds
from blowing her secrets to hell in a hand basket. Wouldn’t that
just please her mother to pieces?

The Alpha stood there coolly with an
expressionless face, arms crossed over his massive chest. Shaggy
hair blew in the wind as his eyes one again tried to express
assertiveness to her. Keeping Kent in her peripheral, she started
to assess what her chances were of ripping out of there on her own
two feet and not getting caught.

“Jesus, Jenna! Calm down already! You had to
pop up on her like that, Adam?”

So the Alpha’s name was Adam? Well, Jenna’s
mind was already thinking of the million ways she could tell the
unwelcome, but undeniably hot, Adam to go pound sand up Kent’s ass
and then his own. Who cared if it wasn’t anatomically possible?
Adam’s eyes never moved from her own, even as Kent yelled at both
of them. He was still trying to prove that he was the big bad
dominant shifter whom she should drop to her knees, beg for mercy,
and offer her throat to in submission. She hoped he wasn’t holding
his breath for that to happen. Instead, Jenna bared her teeth to
him in a silent growl. Her Mama had not raised her to bow to anyone
and she‘d be damned if she started with him. Seemingly intrigued by
her response, Adam finally spoke with a deep baritone voice that
was graveled and sounded just shy of him growling.

“Yeah Jenna, calm down and while you’re at it
why don’t you tell us what you are exactly?” He stood there
silently gauging her reaction. “I know you’re not a vampire because
you were walking around in broad daylight earlier today. Your scent
hints that you’re some kind of shifter but that doesn’t quite make
sense either because you apparently felt Kent here trying to skim
your thoughts. So would you like to enlighten us? I have to admit
I’m extremely curious.” His molten amber eyes twinkled with a
challenge like this was some well played game he was enjoying.

Jenna had to wonder if he would think it was
a game if she slammed his head into the metal light post just a few
yards away, then kicked him in the nuts while he was down and
out.

This was bad. Very, very bad. To be caught
between two men who weren’t human was a nightmare scenario.
Especially since they were two different species of
Others
.
One a demon and one a shifter. It would have actually been much
better for Jenna if it had been two shifters or two demons instead
of this combination. The reason for that deduction was simple. If
it had been two shifters then all she would have to be on guard for
were physical attacks. Such as a shifter’s abnormal strength and
speed, or them changing into their animals. If she had been caught
between two demons it would have been the opposite. Instead of
furry bodies or extraordinary strength, she would have been on the
lookout for what their mental abilities were capable of.

Demons weren’t exactly what humans thought
they were. When someone said ‘demon’ frightened little humans
thought about the twisted, maniacal things mentioned in holy texts
or glamorized in Hollywood movies. Well that was only a fraction of
the truth. The beings that escaped from Hell were literal monsters
that scared the bejesus out of just about anything. However, they
couldn’t survive on the surface. Best they got was a twenty four to
seventy two hour vacation of biblically evil proportions before
they started to disintegrate. You could say there was something in
their genetic makeup that could not withstand the Earth’s surface.
No one knew what it was that caused them to deteriorate away, and
frankly no one with a sane mind wanted to know. Everyone who wanted
to keep living was better off if they had to go back to Hell, for
obvious reasons.

But that isn’t to say that they didn’t get
away with some scary shit while they were top side. They’re evil
beings to the bottom of their shriveled up black little hearts, so
you could guess what they did while they were out. They went on
killing sprees. They caused mass riots, sowed the seeds for mayhem,
started outbreaks of disease, and chortled gleefully over senseless
destruction. Then there were the ones who violated the humans. This
wasn’t a thing to worry about if you were a shifter or a vampire,
because frankly they could hold their own. They had enough claws,
fangs, speed and strength to protect them. But puny little humans,
especially the women, not so much.

On rare occasions these rapes resulted in
pregnancies. If the fetus survived to birth then the result was
something altogether unexpected. The fetus had now gone through a
significant evolutional change. What you had now was a child who
looked perfectly human but was something much more. They didn’t
gain any physical traits from their demonic daddies, just genetic
ones. In fact, demonic DNA was like a virus. From the moment an
embryo formed the demon’s DNA started to take over. Evolution was
smart enough to leave one thing unchanged though. The body.

In essence, what you had was a demon in a
perfectly formed human body. So they walked like humans, talked
like humans, ate like humans, and all their organs and bodily
functions were human. They even had souls like humans. The chance
to be unlike their paternal contributors and live blameless lives
filled with the good things. So not all demons inherited the urges
for causing death and despair that their paternal units lived for,
but those genetics passed on one supremely notable thing. Their
mental capabilities were off the charts. Every demon was different
with varying ranges on abilities or strength in those abilities;
however all of their talents lay in the brain.

Like telekinesis that could range from the
ability to make a spoon levitate a few inches to levitating a car a
foot off the ground. Or in a demon with high abilities, they could
lift your house right off its foundation.

Jenna knew one of those demons.

And that’s just talking telekinesis. That’s
not talking telepathy, pyrokinesis, cryokinesis, levitation,
teleportation or whatever the hell else they were able to do with
their super brains. But back to her point, Kent was a demon. He
might have just given himself away on having telekinesis but she
didn’t know the kind of strength his ability came to. He moved the
ball on the pool table but could he lift one of the cars in the
parking lot?

So being between an Alpha shifter and a demon
of unknown strength was beyond bad, bad news.

This was a fuck-up- of epic proportions on
her part.

This was why her family had never, up until
the time she’d moved to Wilmington, let her out of their sight.

Barely controlling the urge to claw his eyes
out, she spit out through her clenched teeth, “None of your damn
business! That’s what I am! I’m not bothering anyone and I just
want to be left alone. So take my advice and do just that. Leave.
Me. ALONE!”

The tremors in her body increased. The ends
of her fingertips ached with the pressure of the claws underneath
her skin threatening to release at any moment. Jenna’s beast was
hovering at the surface begging to be free. Raking its claws on the
insides of her skin, demanding to get out and defend itself.

Anyone who thought she was dangerous as a
human wouldn’t know what hit them if they caught the animal raging
within on a bad day. If she wasn’t careful, her canines would start
to elongate and sharpen at any minute. Glancing back and forth
between Kent and the douche bag named Adam, Jenna knew she’d never
get to her bike. Her only chance was to turn around, run as fast as
she could till she was out of sight, and then let her beast loose
to race to freedom. She just needed one teeny tiny distraction to
get their attention off of her for a few seconds while she made a
break for it.

Looking back and forth between the two men
she cast her eyes around the parking lot looking for her fix-it-all
shot. The problem was she didn’t see much in the way that could
help. She couldn’t just lift a car. That was way too much
information for them to have on her. Not to mention risking that a
passerby would see the event and do something stupid. Like stop and
take pictures, then spread the pictures in the internet. There was
nothing close enough to drop on them. Hell this parking lot was
devoid of essentially everything but vehicles from the street to
its entrance. There wasn’t even any trash lying around! Shifting
her right foot back in her crouch, she heard the faint sounds of
dirt grating and crunching beneath her boot soles. That was it!
Locking her mind onto the dirt particles surrounding both of the
men, she shoved her own slight telekinetic psychic powers out from
her hands so that a dense dust cloud puffed up around them from
their feet to their faces.