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And now this?
I shove Ryker away from me. “Back off.”
His eyes flash, suddenly turning molten as if I’ve tripped his switch of something. “Excuse me?”
“I said back off, Ryker. I can’t do this. Not with you. Not now. Especially not so soon after my run-in with Shane.”
My wolf wants blood. She’s not picky about who she gets it from, either, and I don’t want another situation where I go for Ryker’s heart.
So, rather than stay on that corner with me, I turn and start to jog across the street.
He just about catches up to me in five strides.
“Where are you going, sweetheart? You running away from me again?”
Whirling on him, I jab my pointer finger into his chest. Only when I hear his thin shirt rip do I realize that my claws are out.
I hurriedly fist them so that I don’t mark Ryker up again.
“Don’t chase me.” My words echo with an alpha’s command. I doubt it’ll do shit to Ryker, but my wolf needs to find her voice regardless. “I told you I’ll go with you to the townhouse. I’m going. Just… let me walk there alone. I need some time to think.”
For a moment, I think he’s going to fight me on this. But he doesn’t. Grabbing me by the chin, he holds my head steady long enough to give me a claiming kiss, then lets me go.
“If you’re not at the townhouse when I get there, the hunt’s on.”
My lips tingle from the force of the kiss. Even so, I force them into a rueful smile. “You’ll never make it there before me.”
It’s another dare, and when Ryker’s eyes seem to blaze in acceptance of the challenge, I wonder if that was my smartest move. He turns and sprints away, already looking to take a lead when I remember to shout after him, “Skin! Stay in your skin!”
The vamps already had to deal with one wolf tonight. Ryker got lucky that no one caught him running to the apartment earlier, but I don’t want to take any other chances.
Then, when his bark of a laugh tells me that he’ll still beat me while in his human shape, I take off in another direction.
One bonus to calling Muncie home? I know all the shortcuts. Ryker’s long legs and incredible speed as a human might give him the advantage, but I know how to get to the townhouse quicker than he does. And, after I threw down that gauntlet, no way will I let him beat me there.
That’s the plan. Too bad someone else has a different one for me.
Later, I’ll accept that taking the shortcut through the abandoned part of the downtown area was my mistake.
There’s a three-block radius that was the site of a rogue vampire massacre nearly a hundred years ago, back when Muncie was a total Fang City, more vamps than humans. The previous leader of the Cadre tore through half the population of humans over the course of three nights, and a good chunk of the vampires who lived here.
All of his carnage was contained to the former site of the Cadre headquarters. After they caught him and destroyed him, the blood washed away, but the vampires considered it cursed. No one would willingly live near the site of the massacre. When more humans moved to town, the property still sat there vacant. Vincent, down at the bar, would tell stories about the screams he heard that night after he had a few blood-and-whiskeys, and he swore some nights, he still could hear them.
Normally, I avoid this part of Muncie because it gives me the freaking creeps. But, well, I had a race to win, and cutting through this part of the downtown would guarantee it.
Because it’s abandoned, it’s easy to sense when it’s not. Though vampires don’t register as alive to my wolf, I’ve gotten good at knowing when one of the undead is near thanks to their bloody scents and their icy auras. It’s not usual for one of the fanged supes to hang around here, but I’m not too concerned when I realize that one’s nearby.
The living being I pick up on? Yeah. That one has me pausing for a second.
No scent. Unless they’re approaching me from downwind—and they’re not, I can tell—the imposing male figure has no scent. He’s hiding it, but even if I can’t figure out how he’s pulling that off, it doesn’t extend tohisaura.
There’s an alpha wolf out there—and it isn’t Ryker.
I immediately drop to a defensive crouch, taking in my surroundings. Like most of the downtown area, the blocks are filled with tall buildings, shops squeezed alongside the skyscrapers, apartment buildings reaching up to the nearly full moon. They’re all empty, though, their windows covered in dust, the stink of old, forgotten blood still clinging to the cement.
“Ruby…”
It’s that name. That fucking name.
