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“I just mean…your kind. Down there. It’s not—”
“I’m expected,” Hasik said, slapping a C-note onto the counter. Then he twisted his mouth into some version of a polite smile, his white canines gleaming under the fluorescents.
“I—Yes. Of course. This way.” He stepped out from behind the counter, then shuffled to the back of the store. He paused in front of the door to the walk-in refrigerator through which the glass display cases of soda, beer, milk, and snacks were stocked. “Through there. All the way back. There’s a door. Just past the empty milk crates. Code’s O-NEG.”
Hasik curled his lip in a snarl, just because he didn’t like the bastard. He tugged open the door, then stepped into the cold, the fine hairs that covered his body standing on end. When he reached the keypad box, he punched in the code, then slipped inside as the steel door opened. The corridor was long and damp and twisted down in a spiral pattern until it reached a small stone-hewn room three stories beneath the Quik-Stop. The walls were lined with benches, and on the benches sat at least a dozen pasty-faced bloodsuckers drinking blood through long tubes extending through the stone walls. Hasik bit back a snort of disgust. He might not have their life span, but at least he didn’t have to put up with that bullshit.
Two young-looking vampires stepped into the room from the underground entrance that fed into the LA subway system and allowed the vamps to come in and feed during the day. They eyeballed him, but he ignored their questioning glances. Not surprisingly, few werewolves ventured into vampire feeding arenas, but these two paid him little heed, moving instead to a kiosk at the far end of the room. As Hasik watched, one slid several coins in, then punched a few keys on a brightly lit pad.
The kid leaned in, studying the display, then turned to his buddy. “Gotta wait. All the stations are full.”
“Damn, I’m hungry. We shoulda come yesterday. Told you I was getting in a bad way.”
“Almost time. You’ll be fine.”
“Way I feel right now, I could suck down a human.”
The first kid’s eyebrows rose. “Whoa now, man. Don’t even think about that. That’s some seriously illegal shit.”
The hungry kid shrugged. “I didn’t say I would. I said I could. What, you think I faked the Holding? I got some serious control, dude. But, damn, it would be nice to taste something not through a goddamn straw.”
“You hear about that Division judge? Throat completely ripped out.”
“I know. Bad mojo, huh?”
“Worst. You ever lose control? Let the dark part rise?”
“No way, man. You?”
A shadow passed over the kid’s face, and he shrugged. “Fuck no. I’m solid.”
“You’d tell me, right? I mean, you wouldn’t try to work that down on your own.”
“Shit, man, I told you. I’m good.” The kid turned back to the kiosk, now beeping with a seat number, and their conversation died away.
Hasik sneered.Pussies. That’s what vamps were. All that power flowing through them, and what did they do? They bottled it up.
Idiots. Working so hard to tamp down on something that would raise them to the level of gods. Didn’t make any damn sense.
Not werewolves. With the rise of the full moon, the beast within burst free, and man and beast were one. It was glorious, and no way would the wolven Therians—the weren—ever subject themselves to some bullshit ritual. Confinement, maybe. The damn Concordat required confinement of any weren who wasn’t cognizant during the change. Young ones. A few others who lost themselves completely to the wolf. All for the protection of the fucking humans. Something else Hasik considered bullshit, but at least he wasn’t in that sorry group.
And at least he wasn’t a sorry ass bloodsucker.
Damn, but the vamps gave him the willies, and now they were all looking at him, catching his scent, knowing he wasn’t one of them.
He bared his teeth, staring them down. He’d killed his share of vamps. Watched the surprise on their supposedly immortal faces as he whacked their heads off. No, they weren’t any better than he was. Not by a long shot.
But damn if they wouldn’t stop staring.
He shouldn’t have come. Should have insisted she meet him someplace else, especially since he’d scanned the whole room and didn’t see her.Caris.The female vamp. Gunnolf’s new squeeze.
Hasik’s lip curled automatically. Gunnolf, one of the key Alliance members. Gunnolf, head of the entire Therian community. Gunnolf, Hasik’s friend and mentor, and the horny bastard went and hooked himself up with a female vampire. Fucking unbelievable.
Then again, Hasik wouldn’t turn down a fine piece of ass like Caris, either.
“You look stupid just standing there.” The female voice came from behind, and he whipped around to face her, taking in the short-cropped hair and blood-red lips. She wore a white tank top that hugged her breasts and a diaphanous white skirt that brushed the ground and revealed the curve of her thighs. The outfit of an innocent, but he knew damn well this woman was anything but.
His nostrils flared—he could smell the wolf upon her, the filthy whore. “Mind your manners, bitch,” he sneered.
