A Body to Die For Read online

  “You’ve just described every town from here to the Rio Grande. That still doesn’t answer my question—why this particular town?” My town? His gaze collided with hers and he found himself wishing he could read her thoughts the way he could read those of humans.

  But she was a vampire.

  She always had been.

  A knife twisted in his gut, and he stiffened. “Why Skull Creek?” he pressed.

  She didn’t say anything for a long moment. Instead, she licked her lips again. Once. Twice. If he hadn’t known better, he would have sworn she was trying to work up her courage.

  But he knew better.

  Viv had never come up short on courage. She was a bloodsucker who took what she wanted. And discarded what she didn’t want.

  He knew that firsthand.

  “Why not Skull Creek?” she countered. “Besides, it’s not the only town I’m featuring. Just one of five I’m visiting for this particular article.” The music closed in on them for several long seconds as Bob Seger launched into “Night Moves.”

  “A travel piece, huh?” he finally said. “Sounds tame compared to the stuff you’re used to.”

  She shrugged and took a swig of her beer. “I was due for a change of pace.”

  “And here I thought you’d come all this way to see me.”

  “Actually…” Her voice faded as she seemed to search for her next words. “I did.” Her gaze locked with his, and he saw it again—the flash of desperation, along with a glimmer of fear. “I…” She swallowed. “That, is, I know you recently opened a motorcycle shop in town, and I thought maybe I could take a few pictures for my article. You know, to showcase all that Skull Creek has to offer. I’ve taken shots of Mr. McClury’s jasmine fields and the gazebo in the town square. I know a motorcycle shop doesn’t seem all that sexy, but it’s the implication. Two lovebirds riding off into the sunset.” When he didn’t say anything, she added, “It’s just a few pictures. You won’t have to do anything. Just be there to let me in and out and answer a few questions.”

  “What’s in it for me?”

  “Free promotion. In exchange for the photos, the magazine will mention your contact information and even give you a free half page ad.” She smiled and he had the sudden urge to get the hell out of there while the getting was good.

  The last thing he needed was to let Viviana back into his life, even for a measly travel article. He’d had a hard enough time putting the past behind him.

  Better to keep his distance and his sanity.

  At the same time, he couldn’t stifle the voice that told him there was something up besides his traitorous cock.

  She wanted more from him than a few pictures, and he couldn’t shake the sudden urge to find out exactly how much.

  No way did he want to spend any time with her because he still had feelings for her. Anything he’d once felt had died a long time ago, right along with his humanity. The only thing left now was the lust that lived and breathed inside of him. And that, he felt for every woman.

  A lust he’d been denying since he’d moved to Skull Creek. He was tired of the endless one-night stands. Even more, he was tired of being a vampire.

  He wanted out.

  He wanted his humanity back.

  “I’m busy with a project right now—a custom chopper we’ve designed for some bigwig up in Dallas. You’ll have to stay out of the way.”

  She nodded. “No problem. You won’t even know I’m there.”

  He sucked down the last of his drink. “Tomorrow night then. Seven o’clock.”

  Excitement lit her expression as she got to her feet. “It’s a date.”

  If only.

  He squelched the thought, sipped his beer and watched the push/pull of her denim skirt as she turned to walk away.

  Watch being the key word. A word that implied distance and perspective and hands off.

  But looking…

  Well, there wasn’t a damned thing wrong with that.

  2

  EVERY INCH of Viv’s body screamed with awareness as she left Garret staring after her and headed for the nearest exit.

  Her hands trembled. Her stomach tingled. Her nipples quivered. Heat flamed her cheeks, and she felt a buzzing awareness from her hair follicles to the balls of her feet. The chemistry between them was even stronger than she’d remembered.

  Which explained why she’d chickened out with her real proposition.

  She wanted a lot of things from Garret Sawyer—his hands on her skin, his lips eating at hers and his body full and thick inside of her—but a picture wasn’t one of them.

  Unless said picture included all of the above.

  But still shots of his motorcycle shop?

  Forget desperate. One hundred and eighty years without an orgasm had finally taken its toll. She’d crossed the line from desperate to completely deranged.

  “Hey there, sweet thing.”

  Her gaze snapped up just as a man stepped in front of her and blocked her escape route. It was one of the bikers who’d been playing darts when she’d first entered the bar.

  He slid his arm around her shoulder and leaned into her. “Why don’t you and I have a seat and get to know each other better?”

  That’s what he said, but she knew the truth. He didn’t want to get to know her. Not her mind, that is. As for having a seat…The only seat he had in mind involved her straddling his lap and doing her best rodeo queen imitation.

  “No, thanks.”

  “Aw, don’t be like that.” His thick fingers stroked her arm. “I just want to be friends.”

  “I doubt that.” Garret’s deep voice drifted over her shoulder and prickled the hair on the back of her neck.

  The man turned and his eyes went wide. “Where’d you come from?”

  “Do you really want to know?”

  The man blinked and shook his head. “Weren’t you just sitting clear across the room?”

  “I’ve got fast reflexes.” When the man didn’t look convinced, Garret added, “Shouldn’t you be at home with Liza?”

  Shock fueled the man’s expression and his gaze narrowed. “What do you know about my wife?”

  “I know she left your sorry ass because you’ve got a hair trigger when it comes to sex. I also know that the two of you are still married even though she’s staying at her mother’s.” Garret’s expression was as hard as granite. “You shouldn’t be here hitting on women. You should be begging Liza’s forgiveness.”

  The man looked confused for a long moment before an idea seemed to strike. “You’re one of them superheroes, ain’t ya?”

  “Not even close,” Garret replied.

  “What about a psychic? My Aunt Bertie was a psychic. She had forty cats and swore she could talk to every one of them. Always knew when one was getting sick.”

  “I’m not psychic either. I’m pissed. So get your hands off the lady. Now.”

  “Like hell—” he started, but his voice faded when Garret’s gaze collided with his.

  “Go home,” Garret told the man.

  And beg your wife to take you back. Viv added the silent thought when the man’s gaze finally shifted to hers. He nodded and released her arm.

  “Thanks,” she told Garret when the man finally walked away. “But you didn’t have to do that. I can take care of myself.”

  “I know.” His gaze drilled into hers, and for a split second time pulled her back, and the wall between them seemed to crumble.

  Concern sparkled in his eyes, along with a fierce protective light that stalled her heart.

  “About those pictures,” she heard herself say. “I…” I was lying. I don’t want to take your picture. I want you. Wild and naked and inside of me. She opened her mouth, but despite the moment of déjà vu, she couldn’t seem to force the words past her lips. “I—I can’t wait to get started,” she heard herself say. “See you tomorrow.” And then she turned and pushed through the Exit door.

  The sweltering Texas night sucked her up, and
the door rocked shut behind her. Gravel crunched as she headed for the silver Jag parked at the far end of a row of motorcycles. Her ears tuned for any sound that would indicate that Garret followed.

  Nothing.

  A wave of disappointment crashed through her, followed by a surge of relief.

  Relief? What the hell was wrong with her?

  She should have hauled him outside with her, shoved him up against the nearest wall, kissed him full on the mouth and made her intentions crystal clear.

  That’s what she would have done with anybody else. What she’d always done to keep up her strength and feed the hunger that churned deep inside her.

  But while she’d soaked up plenty of sexual energy from her partner’s orgasms, she’d never closed her eyes and lost herself in the feel of her own body convulsing and splintering into a thousand little pieces.

  Not since her last night with Garret.

  She’d been a vampire back then and he’d been just another mortal, but the encounter had rocked her unlike any other. They’d had phenomenal sex and she’d been hooked.

  And so had he.

  The crazy fool had actually proposed to her.

  She touched her bare ring finger. She could still feel the metal sliding over her knuckle. In her mind’s eye, she saw the ornate gold band and the bloodred princess-cut ruby. It had been small. Very small but pretty. His grandmother’s, he’d told her.

  She’d smiled indulgently and played along for a while. The way she always did when it came to men.

  She was a vampire. Charismatic. Mesmerizing. She could be dressed in baggy sweats, having the worst hair day on the planet, and men would still find her irresistible. It hadn’t been a bit surprising that Garret had fallen so hard for her so fast.

  No, what had really startled her was what she’d felt for him.

  She’d actually liked him.

  He’d been a patriot of Texas. Strong. Noble. Courageous. And from the moment he’d walked into the small saloon where she’d been working, aka feeding, she’d been attracted.

  So she’d done the unthinkable—she’d slept with him not once but several times. Even more than the sex, they’d actually spent time together.

  They’d gone on moonlit walks, held hands beneath the stars and confided their dreams to each other.

  Wild, far-out dreams of love and marriage and kids and a real home.

  She’d been a newly turned vampire back then, desperate to ignore the truth of what she’d become. Likewise, he’d been a man eager to escape the death and destruction that lived and breathed all around him.

  And so she’d pretended, and he’d pretended.

  She’d seen the love swimming in his eyes, and she’d let herself believe it was real.

  But it hadn’t been.

  Not then and certainly not now.

  He was no longer a weak human mesmerized by her vampiric charm, and she was no longer denying her true nature.

  They were both vampires, fully rooted in the present. When they had sex again, there would be no soft words between them, no foolhardy talk of happily ever after. No false promises.

  Just lust.

  Raw.

  Primitive.

  Savage.

  If they came together.

  The doubt pushed its way into her head as she climbed behind the wheel of her car and keyed the ignition.

  There could be no if.

  Sex had to be a sure thing, and the lame excuse she’d given him tonight would work in her favor. Pictures meant more than one. Which meant they wouldn’t be spending five minutes together sharing small talk. It would take hours, maybe even days, for her to set up her equipment—the cameras, the lighting, the background—and get just the right shots. She had no doubt that the more time they spent with one another, the more explosive the chemistry would be.

  Because he wanted her as fiercely as she wanted him.

  Even though she could no longer stare into his eyes and see his every thought—vamps couldn’t read other vamps the way they did humans—she’d seen the tell-tale spark in his gaze when she’d sat down at his table. She’d felt the rush of jealousy when he’d come to her rescue.

  Something was bound to happen between them.

  Eventually.

  Before Cruz and Molly caught up with her again?

  The question struck, and her survival instincts kicked into gear. She swept a glance around her, drinking in the half-full parking lot. Her gaze sliced through the darkness, pushing back the shadows, searching. Her ears perked, and her nostrils flared, but she smelled nothing except stale beer and cigarettes and her grip eased on the steering wheel.

  She was safe. She knew it. She felt it.

  For now.

  Over the past year, it had taken at least a week or two for the other vampires to track her down once she’d given them the slip.

  With the exception of their last encounter, that is.

  When they’d left her for dead.

  She’d been sensationalizing the latest in a string of serial murders in state courtesy of the Butcher.

  The Butcher had eluded police over twenty-nine murders, and he was still on the loose. While true crime wasn’t usually something picked up by a tabloid, the Butcher was the exception because he was rumored to be a Hollywood celebrity gone bad. At least that’s what he’d told the world when he’d left a bloody message on the wall of his first victim’s apartment. Every tabloid was now hot on the trail to discovery his identity first. Viv had been covering his handiwork from the beginning, from his first kill down in West Hollywood, to an elderly couple in Portland, to the recent handful of bodies found in an abandoned cabin outside of Tacoma.

  She’d been scoping out the actual crime scene when she’d been discovered by local law enforcement, specifically a hard-ass sheriff by the name of Matt Keller. Keller had been about to grill her with questions—who did she work for, how did she hear about the murders, why was she there—when he’d been called back to the police station. He’d threatened to throw her ass in jail for trespassing and then he’d escorted her off the property. His parting words? “Stay the hell away from here.”

  She should have listened to him.

  Instead, she’d gone back. She’d been snapping pictures when she’d been attacked by the two vampires who’d been hot on her trail for over three years. They’d staked her out on the front porch of the cabin and left her to fry.

  But Molly’s aim had been off. The knife had punctured her at an angle, a scant half-inch to the right. Rather than hitting her heart, they’d stabbed the inner right lobe of her lung. While not life-threatening, she’d still been hurt badly. She’d bled all over the porch, her blood mingling with that of the Butcher’s other victims. She would have burned to a crisp at the first sign of dawn if she hadn’t managed to drag herself through the front door. Inside, she’d hidden in one of the closets.

  It was there, as she’d cowered beneath a mound of stale clothes, her St. Benedict medal clutched tightly in her hand, that she’d felt vulnerable for the first time in her life. Hurt. Nervous. Scared.

  Cruz and Molly wanted their humanity back and they would stop at nothing in their quest to destroy the vampire who’d taken it from them.

  She could still see their faces, the first time she’d met them all those years ago. Eighty-seven to be exact. She’d been in some hole-in-the-wall border town looking for her next meal when she’d happened upon a white slavery ring holed up in a house on the outskirts of town.

  Molly had been chained in the cellar and Cruz had been one of her abductors. He’d fallen in love with her and tried to help her escape, and so he’d ended up chained next to her.

  After a violent encounter with the one guard on duty (the rest of the slave traders had been upstairs passed out from a case of tequila), Viv had freed a cellar full of prisoners made up of primarily women and children.

  Most of the prisoners had taken off up the rickety steps, desperate to get away before their abductors sobered up.
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  Except for Cruz and Molly.

  They’d seen the truth about Viv, and they’d wanted a different means of escape.

  The voices echoed in her head, so strong and clear, as if it had been just yesterday that she’d descended into that hell-hole prison.

  “YOU CAN’T JUST leave us.” Cruz held Molly’s hand in one of his and a buck knife he’d taken off the guard in his other.

  The man’s body slumped in a nearby corner. He was out cold. For now.

  “They’ll track us down,” Cruz went on. “They will.” He nodded frantically. His eyes glittered with the horrific memories of being beaten and locked up and humiliated. He’d watched the woman he loved being raped. Over and over. And he’d been powerless to stop it.

  He still was.

  The truth burned inside of him, feeding the desperation and fear coiling his body tight.

  “You have to help us,” he added, his gaze as pleading as his words.

  “Leave now,” Viv told him. She couldn’t do what he asked. She wouldn’t doom anyone else to the darkness. Never again.

  “You’ll have a good head start,” Viv continued. “Take Molly and go. I’ll stall them for you.”

  “Kill them?”

  But she couldn’t do that either. While she’d made her fair share of vampires, she’d never actually caused anyone’s death. No, she’d saved them from it.

  Or so she’d always thought.

  “I can’t do that.” She shook her head. “But I’ll slow them down. That’s all I can do.”

  “It won’t be enough,” came Molly’s small, hollow voice. She shook her head, her eyes wide and vacant, as if the men had stolen her spirit right along with her innocence. “They’ll find us.”

  “They won’t,” Viv reassured them. “But you have to go.” She motioned toward the rickety steps leading to the dark, cold night. “Now.”

  “You don’t know them.” Cruz shook his head, a strange look in his eyes. He let go of Molly’s hand and lifted the knife. “They’ll catch us and make us pay. And I won’t be able to stop them. I can’t. Not like this.”

  The blade flashed and before Viv could blink, he sliced through his left wrist clear to the bone. Blood gushed, spurting out onto the floor at an alarming rate.