Page 4 of A Vampire Bewitched
Besides, she didn’t date. Not since the “bear attack”. Well, other than that one small fling she’d had with a Marine who’d been home on leave, she hadn’t been out with anyone since Keira disappeared. And that was just fine with her. She liked her life the way it was. Orderly, unexciting, and peaceful…and yeah, sometimes a little boring.
Okay, alotboring. But she didn’t have to worry about anyone else but herself. She did what she wanted, when she wanted, and she didn’t have to explain herself to anyone else.
Emma gave a heavy sigh. Not like she ever really did anything except work and exercise. And on the weekends she spent her time volunteering at the Women’s Center, helping victims of abuse learn skills to be able to take care of themselves and their children: Anything to keep her mind off of her lack of a sex life, and the reason behind it.
Darlene handed her some purchase orders, pulling her from her thoughts. “Are you going to sit there staring into space all day, girl?”
Emma felt her face flush. “No. Of course not. Sorry.” Shoving her personal problems out of her mind, where they belonged while she was at work, she logged onto her computer and started her day.
Chapter 3
Nik woke instantaneously right as the sun was about to drop beneath the horizon. That was the thing with vampires. One minute you’re dead to the world, literally, and the next you’re completely alert. It was kind of cool, actually. You never felt groggy or hung over. Plus, there was the added bonus of expedited self-healing. A little blood, a full day’s rest, and you woke up as good as new.
He stood up, slid on some sweat pants, and twisted his torso around to crack his back. Holding out his arms, he checked out his regenerated, unburned skin.
Cool.
Across the RV, Aiden sat cross-legged on his bed, dark head already bent over his laptop.
Aiden glanced up, eyeballed Nik, then turned his attention back to his laptop. “You know mate, I really think you need to start exercising more. You’re getting downright plump with all of this inactivity.”
Nik barked out a laugh, throwing his pillow at him. He missed the head he was half-heartedly aiming for, hitting the bulletproof shutters over the window above the bed instead. “Youwishyou had a body like mine, man.”
Actually, although Nik was slightly taller and bulkier, they were both built like MMA fighters. And they loved to fight like them too. Plus, you know, vampires…hello? Physical appearance never changes.
He returned Aiden’s once over. “I guess we could both probably use a little exercise. That is, if you think you can keep up with me.”
“Pffft. With that potbelly you’re getting? I’ll run rings around you. Just let me check in with Dante and make sure everything is on schedule, then we can squeeze in a quick match before you go meet up with Emma, yes?” Aiden didn’t wait for an answer, strutting off in his boxers toward the area of the RV that served as his mobile recon center.
Nik grabbed a T-shirt and pulled it over his head, then strolled over to the fridge to grab some breakfast. What shall it be tonight? O Positive? B Negative? Didn’t really matter. They all tasted like shit, but satisfied his nutritional requirements for the most part. He did need to drink more than he would if he took straight from the vein, but he had a great delivery service set up from one of the local blood banks, so that wasn’t a problem.
He got ragged a lot by the guys, especially his brother, for his diet choice. But they could all kiss his ass. If he wanted to drink bags of plastic-flavored blood, that was his business. And at least he didn’t accidentally kill anyone.
Not anymore. Fucking never again.
Throwing his breakfast in the microwave, Nik propped himself against the counter to wait, drilling holes in Aiden’s back as he talked to Dante, their head Hunter. “So what’s up, Aid? Everything in place?”
Aiden raised his hand and waved at him to hang on, or to shut up, or both, and finished listening to what was being said on the other end of the line. “All right, commander. Sounds good, mate. We’ll see you there.”
He threw his cell on the table and turned his chair around to face Nik, who reminded him, “You know Dante hates it when you call him that.”
Aiden grinned. “So he says. I think he secretly loves it. Anyway, all is good! In three days, they’re going to be surrounding the bitch’s lair. That will give us a little time to get Emma filled in and on board. We’ll meet up with Dante, Shea, and Christian so they can catch us up on what they’ve found there, and we can get a plan of invasion together.”
Nik chewed on the inside of his cheek as he considered the time frame. “We’re going to need more time to work with her. She’s going to have quite a challenge ahead of her to be ready in three days.”
“There is that.” Aiden leveled a cautious look at his friend. “You know Nik, I’m thinking, maybe we should keep her out of the actual fighting,” he suggested. “Although having some witchy power on our side would be beneficial to our cause, we really only need her to keep her sister out of our way while we get Luukas.”
Nik had to agree. “Yeah, you may be right. If she’s as ignorant of our kind as I think, I don’t know that she’d be any good to us anyway. She won’t be ready.” He blew out a frustrated breath. “Fucking Luukas! I knew when he walked out that day something like this was going to happen. I tried to get him to stay, to take someone with him. Itoldhim she was up to something. But he and his fucking ego think they’re invincible. And now Leeha’s got him, and we have to babysit an untrained witch.”
Even if sheisa total babe of a witch.
Pushing his hair back off his face, he voiced his worst fears, “I can’t even imagine what she’s doing to him…or fuck, maybe I can.” He grabbed his bag from the beeping microwave, but he’d lost his appetite.
“He’s still alive, Nik,” Aiden insisted softly. “She’d be daft to kill him. It would muck up all of her plans for world domination. And, she’d have no leverage.”
“But if she can kill him she wouldn’t need any leverage, Aid.” Nik felt uncharacteristically somber as he looked to his friend. He didn’t know what he’d do if Luukas was gone. Luuk was the Master Vampire, the most powerful of them all, and leader of their council. If anything happened to him, that responsibility would fall upon Nik as next in line. No damn way he was ready for that.
Although, if Leeha could manage to capture and containLuukas, and it seemed she’d done exactly that, the rest of them were thoroughly fucked anyway.
