Chaos and Moonlight (Order of the Nines Book 1) (8 page)

“Perfect,” he whispered to himself. Placing the PDA in his coat pocket, he slowly walked back to her. Her heart began to pound even faster as she got a good look at him for the first time. He was tall, lean, and muscular, and the recessed lighting in her dressing room glinted off several things she knew had to be knives. His leather pants clung to his thick thighs, and his leather vest was made to fit his long torso like a glove. He was murder and pain, cleverly wrapped in eye shadow and cowhide.

“Getting a good look, are we, Maven?” he asked as he came to stand behind her. He placed his large hands on her shoulders and gently began to knead the muscles at the base of her neck.

He was on his knees behind her. She could feel him shift his weight when he lowered himself to the floor. His breath was hot on the back of her neck. His large hands slid from her shoulders, down her arms, his purple-polished fingers tickling her skin as they descended lower. They grazed her hips, moved farther down to her thighs. He wrapped one arm completely around her waist and dipped the other underneath her skirt, barely touching the silk panties.

“I scare you. I can feel it. I can smell the fear running through you, you know that?” He moved the thin fabric aside with two fingers, gently stroking her soft cleft. Her breath caught in her throat. He could feel her pulse quicken. “I wonder if I could taste it.”

* * *

Taris’ eyes shot open. He wasn’t sure how or when he’d drifted off or for how long he’d been crammed into that closet, staring at the back of his eyelids, but before he could move, a low heat surged in his gut. It spread through his entire torso, down into his feet, and all the way up to the top of his head. He could feel his heart beginning to pound, faster and faster as the heat grew warmer, turning itself into a blazing fire that lit every single warrior instinct he possessed. He hadn’t felt that heat in centuries, but it was an old flame, one he could never or would never be able to forget.

But how could that be? Wasn’t he supposed to be
dead
? Weren’t they all dead? It was impossible.

Taris was buried under a boxed-up vacuum cleaner and Sarah’s coat. He simultaneously pushed them off him and swung the door wide open. He wasted no time in running down the short hallway and throwing open the bedroom door. Taris didn’t care that the noise would wake her up. It didn’t matter. All that mattered now was that they both got the fuck out of Dodge, and fast.

Her room was lit by the glow of a DVD menu. She was sprawled out on her bed in nothing but a T-shirt and a pair of old, ratty boxer shorts that rode up so high they could have passed for a pair of faded flannel panties. Her brown curls were spread out all over the bed. Her face was soft and plain, but in the light of the TV, she looked small, angelic. The heat in his gut from the very real threat of danger mixed with something else, and he let out a curse as he felt his cock slam against the zipper of his jeans with an unexpected
smack
.

“What the…” Taris hissed between his teeth.
What the hell kind of a reaction was that?
He was there to save her from the devil incarnate that would soon be busting through her door and he got a hard-on? If that wasn’t the
Merriam-Webster
definition of inappropriate, Taris didn’t know what was. Regardless of how tacky it was that the little head wanted sex, his big head prevailed in the odd libido showdown, and he stepped closer to the bed, losing his footing on a pile of spiral-bound notebooks and a tacky romance novel with a vampire on the cover. He fell forward, catching himself on the edge of her mattress. The jostling caused her to stir. Her eyes fluttered open for a moment and fixed on him but closed again just as quickly.

“That’s right, honey, you just keep sleeping. It’s better for both of us if you do.” Taris stood up and leaned forward, lifting her off the bed. She was light as a feather. When she nuzzled into his chest, what little relief he had in his pants disappeared, and they tightened again.

“You unruly bastard,” he cursed. His cock seemed to answer him, twitching against his pants in a violent
thud
.

She began to stir again, but there was no time to wait for her to go back to sleep. They had to leave now. The blaze in his stomach was growing into an inferno, which meant the danger was coming closer. The nervous anticipation that welled up in him was partly the danger factor, but it was partially because he recognized that feeling.

Taris was out of the apartment door with doctor in hand. Leaning down, he pulled open the stairwell access door. His long legs took the stairs two at a time. He was on the landing of the ninth floor when he heard the door at the bottom of the stairs kick open. As it did, the heat turned into a violent wave of nausea.

“Taaaarrriiiisss.”

The sound of his name stretched out as that heinously melodious and ominously familiar voice floated up the nine stories and stopped him dead in his tracks. He couldn’t resist the urge to look over the railing, and as he did, his body went numb.

Looking up at him, making his way slowly up the stairs, was a vampire like none other on earth. His methods were violent and abhorrent. His bloodlust was rivaled only by one other person Taris had ever known. Staring up at him from behind a mask of menacing red eye shadow and terrifying leather was Bane.

“Son of a bitch,” he whispered. “I thought you were dead.”

“You do know I can hear you, right? Even from down here, on the,” Bane paused and looked at the wall, “second floor.”

The terror Taris felt at the realization that his brother was alive melted away. A flood of memories came back to him, and a blistering rage took over, squelching the fire that was there and replacing it with a cool, centered anger.

“You are supposed to be dead, you little bastard,” Taris said, never taking his eyes away from the piercing crimson that glared up at him. “I thought you and that hellhound were gone for good.”

Bane let out a laugh that rattled the metal of the railings. His boots hit the concrete steps with heavy
smacks
that mixed with his maniacal chuckle.

“Didn’t die, not at all. Got scuffed up a bit, though. You know, you guys should really be more thorough when you light off a powder keg. We managed to slip out the back room, pretty as you please. Been living back home since then, flying under the radar as much as hell on wheels can, of course.” Bane touched his leather-clad shoulder. “Still have a scar or two, though.” His hand slipped underneath his jacket, and he quickly withdrew a Glock, taking aim straight at Taris.

“And that hellhound sends her regards, fuck you very much.” He squeezed the trigger, sending a shot barreling toward Taris. He barely had time to dodge it as it sent a spark through the stairwell. A scream ripped from somewhere, and he looked down to see a pair of bloodshot brown eyes staring up at him in absolute horror. She was frozen solid, gripping onto his trench lapels.

“Shit. Just…look, just do me a favor, and don’t scream anymore.” He ran up the remaining stairs, all the while the tinkling of bullets hitting the walls and metal pipes, sending white flares all around him.

“Where are you off to, big brother? Off to save the world, you pathetic bastard? I’ll make sure to take good care of Kalin after I hand Morrigan your head.” Bane’s voice bounced off the walls and rang in his ears, chilling his veins to ice. “I’m just here for the girl. Throw her down, and I’ll make sure I don’t ruin your pretty face.”

Taris could hear Bane laughing behind him as his maniacal-looking boots tromped close on their heels. He kicked open the roof access door and slammed it shut behind him, trying to buy them some time. He looked down at the small woman still clutching on to him.

“I need you to hold on tight and close your eyes, okay? First, reach behind me under my coat and grab the knife that’s at the small of my back.”

She was petrified. Her pink eyes were wide with shock, shock that prevented her from moving at all.

“You want to die or not?” Taris bit out, the urgency in his voice shaking her loose from the panic-induced paralysis.

She shook her head.

“Then hand me the damned knife!”

Her hands shook as she slid one from around his neck, down the length of his torso, and around to his back. She reached underneath his trench and found the loop at the base of his spine where his low-slung jeans met his cotton shirt. Her fingers fumbled with the loop at his belt that held the blade in, but she eventually managed to jerk it free, and she held it up to him.

“Good girl,” he said as he removed one arm from underneath her legs. “Now I need you to wrap your legs around me and grab onto my neck. And for the love of God, no matter what, don’t let go, you understand?”

She nodded again and buried her head in his neck as she gripped his waist with her legs. To make sure she had a firm hold on him, she locked her ankles around his hips. He moved quickly, taking them to the opposite side of the roof before she heard the door being kicked open. A little scream tried to escape her, but was stifled by his chest. She gripped him tighter as he dragged in deep breaths.

“It’ll be okay. You’re safe,” he said before he began to run, hard and fast. She squeezed her eyes shut again as they drew closer and closer to the edge of the building, until finally, he leapt off the edge.

* * *

Sarah wasn’t sure when it happened, but she opened her eyes just long enough to see the guy with the eye shadow on the top of the roof, aiming a giant gun right at them. From his side, the gigantic guy holding her flicked his arm, and in an instant, the menacing man on the rooftop went down, clutching at his leg.

“You can’t hide from me, Taris,” the other man yelled. “I’ll find you. And when I do, I’ll take that bitch from you, too!”

“We’ll see about that, RuPaul!” Taris yelled as they hit the gravel rooftop on the opposite side of the street. As Sarah clung to him, he wasted no time in getting them down off the building and into the truck he had parked in the alleyway behind it.

It was several minutes before Sarah realized she wasn’t dreaming. The tall guy in her room, the creepy guy on the stairs, all of it had been real. After about five miles of telling herself to wake up, then looking at the tall guy who was driving, then pinching herself, then telling herself to wake up again, then looking at the tall guy some more, reality and the promise of a full-fledged panic attack set in.

“I swear, if you let me go, I won’t tell anyone, okay?” Sarah finally found her voice. She had a moment where she thought that maybe this was a dream again, judging by the way the driver of the car looked. He was dark and mysterious, chiseled from head to toe—she should know, she all but crawled into him when they were running away from that other guy. She couldn’t make out much in the dark of the truck’s cab, but even in the faint light of the street lamps, something about this guy made her feel different. Maybe it was his voice—that deep, gravelly, slightly British voice. Maybe it was the smell that came off him, that man-mixed-with-leather-and-aftershave smell.

“Who are you?” Her damned voice box rebelled against her and her question came out in a whisper.

He was focused on the road, his eyes never leaving it as he maneuvered the giant diesel truck in and out of the one a.m. traffic. “I’ll explain everything when we get to where we are going. In the meantime, just sit back and try to relax, okay?”

“Relax? Okay, yeah. I was taken out of my bed in the middle of the night by some guy I don’t even know, and then I was chased up the stairwell by a Sherman tank of a drag queen, and you tell me to relax? Yeah right, pal! Listen, seriously, whatever ransom you’re asking for, I can pay it. Just bring me to an ATM, and you can have whatever you want, okay? Just let me go.”

“It’s not that simple, Dr. Bridgeman.”

“The hell it’s not. Look, just let me out, and anything you want, it’s yours. Cross my heart, I won’t tell a soul you took me.” She made a little crisscross motion over her heart.

“Like I said, Dr. Bridgeman, it’s not that simple. I don’t need your money. I need you to do a job for me. That Sherman tank drag queen apparently wants you to do the same job. I think, circumstances being what they are, you might want to consider working for me.”

“Work, my ass.” Sarah mumbled to herself. “Who the hell are you, anyway? And what job could I possibly do for you? I’m a medical researcher, you dickhead.”

He didn’t bother looking at her. He took in a deep breath and let out a long sigh.

“My name is Taris. I’m an eight-hundred-year-old vampire, and I need you to use your medical research to help me stop the slow yet brutal extinction of a race of people who really do exist but are made into horror movie villains and romance novel heroes.”

When he was met with silence, he glanced over to see her passed out cold in the seat.

“I knew it wouldn’t work.”

* * *

This was bad. It was obviously going to take some time to convince her he had snatched her for her own good; it wasn’t going to be a cakewalk. Damn, how was he going to get her to agree to help them now? She had been throwing off some major bad vibes. What would she say if she knew he’d been camped out in her coat closet all night and was halfway smitten with her already? Once he got her back to the safety of his home he would explain everything to her and hope her logical side would take over and see reason. Yeah, that made a load of sense. Logically, vampires didn’t exist, right? So how in the name of all that was sweet and feathery did he think he was going to be able to talk her into this?

As much as his mind swam with all of the arm-twisting possibilities, there was a greater fear looming on the horizon.

Bane and Morrigan were alive and on the hunt for the woman in his passenger seat. Things were about to get ugly, lightning fast. He was going to need to bring in reinforcements to keep her safe.

He carefully maneuvered the quad cab diesel onto the narrow gravel path that led to the house. After slowly making his way down the thin strip of road, he finally stopped at a large, wrought iron gate. He rolled down the window and was about to enter the code into the keypad when he heard her shift in the seat next to him. She was still passed out cold, slumped into the seat like a rag doll. The sleep softened her face. A wayward curl had fallen over her eyes, and without thinking about what he was doing, Taris leaned over and pushed it away from her forehead. She caught her breath, hitting the top of his hand. It made him pause. He studied her, and as she shifted again, he caught the scent of her shampoo. It was vanilla, warm and sugary, the same intoxicating scent that had been on her coat earlier that night. It whirled around in his nose, and he closed his eyes, inhaling it, taking it deep into his chest. It was that smell that had made his pelvis jerk the first time he looked at her. Now it was permeating every inch of him, and damn him if it didn’t spell trouble with a capital T. When he realized he was still stroking her hair, he jerked his hand back and turned quickly to the window. With a few beeps, the gate began to creek open, and Taris drove the truck through.