Four years ago, Mathias Larsen broke siring laws to save a lover’s life.
Four months ago, that lover turned on him, leaving him for dead.
Now, Mathias has followed her path of death to Las Vegas, straight to the last vampire who wants to see him: his sire. The man he left for a woman who stabbed him in the back.
Edmund has found love again in nightclub owner, the very human Darby Bell. He doesn’t want to believe Mathias’ warnings, but a murder that hits too close to home gives him no choice. While he struggles to keep Mathias and Darby safe, emotions run high as old love collides with new. But the clock is ticking. The vampire Assembly is coming to town, the local police are alerted to Mathias' nocturnal activities, and passions are flaring. Time is running out. By the time death strikes again, all bets are off.
EXCERPT
...By the time he pulled into the parking lot, he was humming along to the radio and tapping the rhythm out on the steering wheel with his thumbs. No more reason to hide the car. The Mustang was nowhere to be seen. The Cure filled the car while he waited for the song to end, but the lyrics and Smith’s voice lingered even after he’d killed the engine.
Though his cock was still hard and his mind filled with images of Darby’s succulent curves and fiery hair, Mathias hesitated. He was actually nervous about this. For four long, glorious years, the only woman who’d captivated him was Tatiana, and she’d repaid his devotion by trying--inexplicably--to kill him. Now, there was another, different from Tati in so many ways, enticing him to forget logic, forget his plan, forgo what he knew for a few moments of bliss. How could he know whether following an attraction wouldn’t lead to another disaster?
He curled his fingers into a fist around his keys. This was different. He wanted to fuck Darby Bell, not share eternity with her. She was just a means to an end.
To Edmund.
The front door was out of the question. He’d briefly considered waltzing back into the club with some excuse about forgetting something, but he didn’t want to give Darby the opportunity to do something stupid, like call the police. There was also the whiff of the desperate in lying just to see her again. Mathias might be many things, but that was not one of them.
He skirted the building, looking for the rear service entrance, and melted against the wall when he spied the outline of one of the waitresses near the door. Cigarette smoke haloed her head, obscuring the wisps of dark hair, and her fingers fidgeted with the cellophane on her Camel Lights. He didn’t need to be able to see her nametag to know that her name was Sheryl. He’d learned her name at the same time he’d learned everything else about Darby.
The muffled sound of applause from inside the club startled Sheryl into dropping her cigarette to the ground and tamping out the glowing tip with her scuffed shoe. Yanking out the beer can she’d been using to hold the door open, she bolted back inside, and Mathias flew forward to grab the edge before the door could slip shut again. He slipped into the murky shadow of the back hall and paused, listening for stray heartbeats to assess who might be near.
There was only one. Considering the voice he heard singing in the distance wasn’t Owen’s, that meant it was likely the singer in his dressing room.
Closing his eyes, Mathias inhaled, drinking in the scents soaking the air. The pungent tang of alcohol. The hot salt of living flesh. The lemons and limes of cleaners beneath those.
But mingled in with the aromas of life was one he couldn’t forget no matter how many years separated them. Edmund had been through these hallways more than once, often enough, in fact, to leave a discernible trail, and Mathias turned in its direction, following it to the source. It would be Darby’s office, he reasoned. Where they met. For privacy.
His groin tightened at the thought of what else they probably did in there. Would she have a sofa? Or did Edmund bend her over the desk? Did Darby ride him on a chair? Sitting next to her at the bar, he hadn’t detected the smell of sex on Darby, but his senses had been clouded by her proximity. There would be no hiding it in her personal space, however. The office would likely be drenched in it.
His eyes glittered in the darkness as he approached the door he knew was hers. A woman’s laughter rang from the main club, and his head tilted slightly toward the sound. The blur at the corner of his eye came too late, darkness separating from itself to launch toward him. Mathias twisted, but the solid weight slammed into his shoulder and drove him face-first into the wall, wrenching his arm up between his shoulder blades in order to prevent him from fighting back.
“Looking for friends, were you?”
A shiver ran through Mathias. Edmund’s voice still sounded like dark chocolate melting over a low flame. It didn’t stop him from putting up a perfunctory struggle, but Edmund tightened his hold to painful proportions, pinning him in place with his larger body.
“Unlucky for you, I guess,” Edmund growled. Fangs scraped along Mathias’ neck with a familiar sting. “Because you found me.”
