Sex and the Single Vamp (3 page)

“I already know who her Maker is.”

“You do? Do you guys have a database or something? Old family Bibles?”

“No. It’s word of mouth, legend. We don’t write that kind of stuff down.”

Andy looked even more confused. “Legend? How do you know you’ve got the right one?”

Deacon looked down at the ground, hesitating a moment before telling his best friend the words he’d never said before to anyone, living or undead.

“Because I’m her Maker.”

Chapter Three

“Your last two clients canceled.”

Cici stuttered in mid-stride down the hallway of Your Other Half headed toward the front desk where her office manager and best friend stood with a mutinous look on her face. Terressmya, known as Mya, was a true fey. She could shape-shift the way Cici changed Jimmy Choos, and it was a toss-up if she would show up at the office as a woman or man. For the most part, Cici let her have free rein and the only time she’d made her change was when she’d arrived looking like a bike club member, complete with tats, a long goatee, and mirrored sunglasses. Not the image the office was looking to project.

The only thing Cici had never seen was Mya’s true self. Fey protected that part of themselves because when they shifted into that state, they were their most vulnerable. Even as close as they were, she’d never let Cici look behind the veil. It was the manner of the fey and Cici respected that enough not to be hurt by it.

Today Mya was a fresh-faced blond and blue-eyed young woman in a pretty yellow dress. The handsome man standing next to her was David Allen, the latest entry on Mya’s extensive dating list, but this one had been around for a few months and Cici wondered if it was getting serious. But right now she had to deal with the serious body blow her business was taking.

“Both of them canceled?” Cici stopped at the antique desk in the front room of the row house in Old Town Alexandria, Virginia, where she worked; she lived in an apartment one floor up. The colonial architecture, brick-lined streets, and constant reminders of history were reminiscent of Williamsburg and comforted her as the years flew by. “That’s twenty new clients this week. How many active clients withdrew from our service?”

Mya twisted her mouth. “Five more today for a total of fifteen this week.”

“Shit.” If this kept up, she’d be out of business in a month.

“Can I help with anything?” David asked, pushing his glasses up on his nose, blue eyes blinking behind the lenses. He was cute in a geeky way and not at all the type Mya usually went for.

“Thank you, David. You’re very kind to offer, but I’ve got a team of specialists coming in to help out.”

“Good. I hate what they’re doing to you.” David stood a little taller to punctuate his support, and Cici liked him a little more for it. He was probably doing it in order to get laid, but she’d take an ally wherever she could get one at this point. “You’re a fine businesswoman, not a criminal.”

His phone buzzed and with a shy smile he excused himself to answer it across the room.

“So, when is this ‘help’ actually going to show up and get to helping?” Mya nudged Cici with her elbow, her smile telling her she wasn’t talking about the murdered client problem. Her friend had seen no problem with the sex part of the bargain with Deacon. Mya was the only person who knew the whole story about their tumultuous beginning and the years of lust that had been brewing between them. “And by that I mean when are you going to let him fuck your brains out?”

“Damn it, Mya. I need to make sure I stay out of jail first. Then I’ll worry about getting laid.”

Mya waved off her worry. “Deacon is on it and I have no doubt he’ll find the killer and make all this bad stuff go away. You know it, too—that’s why you went to him.” She leaned in close, nudging Cici’s shoulder. “I want you to move on, and exorcising this guy in and out of your bed is what you need to do it. You spend your days finding love for other people and you go home alone every night.”

“It’s not like I’ve never had anyone in my life. I lived with Aaron for five years.”

“And he left when you wouldn’t turn him.”

“It didn’t feel right,” she murmured, remembering the pain of losing and hurting a man who was so kind and good to her. But forever for her kind was a serious proposition, and if she became his Maker then they would always be bound to each other by blood. Because of her absentee vampire parent she had no clue what that would be like, and it still terrified her to venture into the unknown. “Deacon and I have totally opposite opinions about love and commitment. Sex with him is just to scratch an itch that should have been taken care of years ago. No big deal.”

“So you say. Your kind acts like sex is simply a transaction, but you still feel like you did when you were human. Sex is tied to emotion for you, and you and Deacon have lots of that pulling you together.”

“Deacon does a great job of leaving the emotion out of it.”

“He hasn’t found the right person.”

“If you say I’m the right person for him I’ll kick your ass.”

“You can try,” Mya said, her half smile way too smug. “You have a history. Something keeps pulling you back into each other’s orbit for the last two hundred years.”

“Yes. The US Government. War. Service to our country.”

“Unrequited lust. Unfulfilled love.”

“You forget that there weren’t any feelings on his part, even at the beginning. He felt obligated to marry me after the night he kissed me and I was foolish enough to mistake lust for something more.” They’d had this conversation a million times since she’d moved back to the DC area and told Mya about her past history with Deacon. “I won’t make that mistake again. This is about saving my business. Getting laid is an unexpected perk. Period.”

“But—” Mya was interrupted by the door flinging open through which six men, dressed in black shirts, cargo pants, and boots, entered. They were all Other—a mix of vampire, were, shifter, and fey—and not one of them spared her a glance as they took over her office.

“Hey! What the hell do you think you’re doing?” Cici let down her fangs and braced herself for an altercation, already on high alert because of recent events. She’d had a really shitty week and if these assholes thought she was going down without taking a couple of them with her, then they were sadly mistaken. “I said—”

Deacon hovering in her doorway looking sexy, and completely unconcerned with her office invasion situation, did nothing to calm her down.

“Hey, Cici.” He nodded in her direction before barking orders at the men. “Secure the comms, update the security, scan for intruders. Execute the full plan. You know the drill.”

“Deacon.” She took a step forward, temporarily distracted by the man settling down into the receptionist chair before starting the computer, entering a password, and accessing her client files. “How the hell does he know my password?”

Deacon glanced up from the iPad in his hands. “I hacked into your system and reset the passwords about an hour ago.”

“You did what?”

“Hello, Cici,” Andy said as he walked into the office, followed by another man carrying two large black duffel bags. “Deacon, Simon needs to know where the hub is to install the new security system.”

“Down the hall, second door on the left,” Deacon said, correctly giving directions to the room housing all the cabling for her systems. This would have been fine except for the fact that he’d never been in her office before.

Cici stepped in front of Deacon, a hand placed on his chest stopping his following Simon. “How did you know that?”

“I visited your office last night and took a look around.” He shook his head, his tone somewhere between disgust and pity. “Your security system is a piece of shit so I’m putting in another one with monitoring at my firm. And we installed software to remotely keep an eye on your computer security, too.”

“Visited? You mean broke in. I didn’t give you my permission to do any of this!” Her voice sounded shrill to her own ears. “Just who the hell do you think you are?”

“I’m the guy you asked to help you.” He cocked his head to the side, his lips twisted in a smirk that told her he was enjoying her reaction. “This is me…helping.” He swiveled to where David stood, eyes wide as he clutched his phone to his chest in a white-knuckle grip. He took the steps necessary to force David to back up and press against the wall. It was clearly a power play, and from the apprehension skittering across David’s pale skin, it was working.

“Who are you?” Deacon demanded, nothing about his body language even remotely friendly.

“I’m David Allen,” he whispered. “I’m an accountant. From Springfield.”

“No shit,” Deacon said as he gave him the once-over. “And why are you here?”

“He’s my date,” Mya said, stepping from behind the desk to stand by the cowering bean counter.

“Really?” Cici didn’t have to read his mind to know what Deacon was thinking. True fey like Mya went for Viking warriors, pirates, and the modern-day equivalent—not accountants from Springfield, Virginia, who graduated summa-sans-social-life from a state school with a degree in pocket protectors.

“Yes.” Mya met his gaze head-on, her five hundred years of ball-busting coming in handy as she faced off with Deacon. “You have a problem with that?”

“Nope. Actually, I don’t give a shit.” He pressed against a button-like device clipped onto the collar of his leather jacket, speaking into it in a low voice. “Andy, I’ve got a human up here who needs to give us fingerprints and a DNA sample.”

“DNA?” David asked. “Why?”

“To eliminate you from the list of suspects,” Mya said. “Right, vampire?”

“Correct, Terressmya, Grand Fey of Algiers.” Deacon inclined his head slightly as he addressed her formally.

“You know who she is?” Cici asked, unable to process all that was going on. She’d barely slept in over a week and her brain was in danger of imploding.

“Of course.” Deacon turned back toward her, his smile just smug enough to make her mad again. “I don’t know where the threat is coming from. I had to know everything about you, including your friends, your business associates, your routines, shopping habits…” He chuckled, a sound that made her toes curl in anticipation of what delicious things hid in the shadows of that dark laughter. He edged closer, his voice dropping even deeper, more intimate as his body heat merged with her answering warmth. “I upgraded your shipping on that hot little silk lingerie you ordered from Victoria’s Secret yesterday. If I can put in a request for our night together…that’s the one.”

Cici blinked, the realization of what he’d said sinking into her brain at the same time it heated her blood. This man made her crazy. She needed to set some ground rules or one of them might not make it to the next couple of centuries.

“My office. Now.”

…

He really shouldn’t be turned on.

Cici had some seriously bad shit going down right now and all he could think about as he followed her down the passage to her office was the amazing way her ass swayed in that short red skirt. The high heels didn’t help him focus as her long legs extended beyond the hem for what seemed like miles. A pissed-off Cici always hit him in the gut like an iron fist and brought him to his knees with desire, especially when the imperial goddess showed up and she vibrated with passionate emotion.

Yesterday, her fear and anxiety rolled off her and he couldn’t blame her. She was in deep shit and it was about to get worse if his contacts inside the police were reliable. So he needed her mad—furious.

“Deacon, you’ve gone too far,” she said, as she slammed the door to her office.

He didn’t have to look around her office since he’d spent several hours in here last night. The warm, feminine space was professional but romantic, and perfectly suited for Cici and her business. It was also easy to break into. The door, the safe, and the computer hack took him less than fifteen minutes. It made his head ache.

“What exactly stepped over the line?” he asked as he leaned against the edge of her desk. He crossed his legs and folded his arms over his chest, getting comfortable for what would likely be a long discussion.

“Everything! You hacked into my network—”

“Sweetheart, two computers from Best Buy is not a network.”

“Whatever.” She waved him off with a harsh swipe of her hand. “You break into my office. You were rude to Mya’s date.”

“What is she doing with that guy? A human and a fey like her? She’ll eat him alive.” He snorted. He’d felt the power of Mya the minute he walked into the office and he couldn’t wrap his mind around why she’d choose Mr. Number Cruncher from Springfield. “Mark my words. When she kills him, they will be the poster children for why I think your business is crazy.”

Cici was on a roll, not even hearing what he had to say. He settled back and let her have it out; then they could get down to business.

“You broke into my office and now you’re installing a new system without asking me.” She stalked over to him in those sexy shoes and poked him in the chest with a red fingernail. “How am I supposed to pay for that when I’m losing clients left and right?”

“We already settled on payment. It’s included.” He couldn’t leave her with that crap system. He’d never sleep at night.

“You railroaded me into that agreement.”

Damn, he loved it when her eyes flashed blue with the intensity of her emotion. They had drawn him in even before she was turned, and he found himself tweaking her just to experience the fire one more time.

“Yes, I did,” he said easily. “But you agreed, sweetheart, and not because you thought for one damn minute that I would refuse to help you if you didn’t.” Now she broke eye contact but he was having none of it, grasping her chin lightly and turning her back to face him. Her expression was stony, but something that resembled fear spoke to him in the slight tremor of her lips. “I think your business is crazy, and you think I’m an asshole who is ruled by his dick. But we worked lots of missions together and that counts for something. I’ve always had your back and I always will. This thing between us needs to be dealt with once and for all.”

“So why can’t it wait until all of this is done?”

“Because you and I both know that once I fix this mess for you, you’ll go back to avoiding me.”

He rose from his perch on the desk, straightening to his full height, and pressing as much of it as he could against her body. She stiffened at first contact, but as they stood and stared at each other, her body melted into his, softening and warming with the heat they created by just being in the same room. He moved his hand from her chin, skimming the soft skin of her jaw until he speared his fingers into the silken titian strands of her hair. They were slippery and cool against his skin as he burrowed in and palmed her head and tugged her forward. His movements were fueled by need and less smooth than he normally used in the seduction of women, but this was Cici in front of him with her full breasts pressed against his chest and her lips parting on a sound somewhere between a whimper and a sigh.