Blood and Midnight

Chapter 3

3

HALEY

I blew out a breath, seriously impressed with my ability to say the bastard’s name without crying and/or breaking something.

Progress!

The sexy bartender, however, was not impressed. Quite the opposite, actually.

“Elian,” he said flatly, folding his arms over his chest again, and I swear the temperature dropped ten degrees.

It didn’t feel like jealousy. Aside from a little teasing, he wasn’t exactly putting out any “let’s take this back to my place” vibes. So why did he clam up when I asked about Elian?

“Is he in tonight?” I pressed.

The guy sized me up with his singularly intense blue eye, which apparently found me lacking. When his gaze finally made its way back to mine, he scowled as if I’d just threatened his d**k with the stake. “Who the f**k wants to know?”

“Pro-tip, buddy. Usually, when a person straight-up tells you they’re looking for someone? Dead giveaway right there.”

Glaring. He had it down to a science. The eye, the ticking jaw muscle, the flex of those pin-me-down forearms.

I tried to glare right back at him, but when it came to squaring off with intimidating, hot-as-hell demons, I was out of practice. “You do realize the size of your tip is inversely proportional to your bullshit, right?”

“What do you want with… Elian?” His lip curled when he said the name—a reaction I understood all too well.

“I need to speak with him. It’s private and it’s important. So if you could just fix me another drink for the road and point me in the right direction, I’ll gladly—”

“Are you a dancer?”

A dancer? Was this demon for real?

I reached for my stake again. It wouldn’t take much. I could probably put it through his good eye before another insult had time to fall out of that sexy mouth.

The thought calmed me almost as much as the booze.

“I’m more of a stabby, pokey kinda girl,” I said. “With a little magick thrown in for fun.”

“Well, we’re all set on security detail and spell casters, so unless you can work that stabby, pokey bit into a cage dance, we’re not hiring.”

“You think I’m here about a job?”

“Not sure I care enough to give it much more thought, honestly.” He grinned, but I could tell he didn’t mean it. Something about all this had gotten under his skin. Something about Elian.

I opened my mouth to push him on it, but before I could utter another word, he flicked his hand to shoo me away, already turning to the next customer.

“Enjoy your evening, angel,” he said over his shoulder.

Enjoy my evening?

It’d taken me two years and the threats of a scary-ass goddess to work up the nerve to set foot in this city, a killer outfit to walk through those silver doors, and a good dose of booze just to say Elian’s name without a string of curses attached.

And this demon thought I was done?

I was on a hot streak—no way was I bowing out now.

I waited until he finished up with his other customers, then tapped my empty glass. “Still needing that second drink, friend.”

He watched me for a beat, then muttered something inaudible before clearing away the empty glass and reaching for another. “Shall I start a tab, then?”

“I’m not staying long enough for that.” I opened up the black hole otherwise known as my purse, emptying its contents onto the bar as I searched for my money.

Cell phone, lipstick, lip gloss, a vial of shifter blood.

Hand sanitizer, emergency tampons, emergency black tourmaline, breath mints.

Three vampire fangs, black eyeliner, a stun potion leftover from the Blackmoon Bay fight, Melantha’s portal spell, a hair tie, and…

Aha! Sweet, shiny credit card of questionable remaining balance. After today’s shopping spree in the Big Easy, I wasn’t too sure how much farther it would get me, but hey. Hope sprang eternal.

“Let’s give this one a whirl.” I held out the card, but the demon didn’t take it.

His gaze was on the glass vial from the goddess, utterly transfixed. The blood-red smoke roiled inside, its black and gold threads shimmering.

He glanced up at me again, and I braced for another argument. A brush-off. Anything but what flashed through that stone-cold eye.

Recognition.

The demon knew that particular magick. Which meant…

Holy s**t. Had he been to Midnight too? Was that how he knew Elian?

He reached across the bar and covered the vial with his hand, his voice turning dark. “Put it out of sight. Now.”

I did as he asked, too stunned to do anything else.

“Wait here,” he said in that same deadly tone. “Do not leave this bar.”

“Okay, but what about my—” Damn. He was already gone. “Drink,” I said with a sigh. I was just about to hop behind the bar and make something myself when the vertigo hit me again, this wave so strong it nearly knocked me off my barstool.

I fisted my stake and palmed the stun potion, slowly turning to face the newcomers—three of them this time.

My wounded bird was flanked by two of his friends, each one more despicable than the last. Whatever supernatural genetics made most vampires hot as f**k and impossible to resist? Clearly skipped this lot.

A quick scan of my surroundings and my heart sunk. No sign of the demon, and the other patrons in the vicinity were too wrapped up in their own flirtations and petty skirmishes to pay any attention to mine.

Shit.

“Sorry, boys,” I said as the vampires crowded in close. “You really aren’t on the guest list.”

“It’s not p***y we’re after tonight, witch,” my original stalker said, ever the romantic. His hand hung limp at his side, the skin black and blistering. “We’re here for—”

I shoved the stake into his chest, taking him down for the count, then hurled the stun potion at the second vamp’s feet. It exploded in a bright yellow starburst, freezing him on contact, but the third one wasn’t close enough to the blast to feel its effects. I tried to reach for one of my daggers, but he was too fast, too strong, and too smart.

He was on me in a heartbeat, hauling me out of the stool and locking me in a vise grip, my back against his chest.

“Got any more tricks, witch?” he growled in my ear.

I struggled against his hold, but it was no use. My arms were pinned at my sides, my feet no longer touching the ground, and I had maybe a minute before the stun potion wore off on the other vamp. “Let me go and I’ll show you all sorts of magick.”

“I don’t think so, pretty girl.” With a sick groan of pleasure, he clamped down hard on my neck, fangs piercing the skin. Before I could even cry out, he’d drained enough blood to make my world spin.

I fought to remain conscious, to reach the dagger in my boot, to do something other than let this asshole finish me off. The temporarily stunned vamp was already on his feet again, stumbling toward me with rage in his eyes, fangs bared, mouth practically foaming for a taste…

Someone slammed into us from behind, breaking me out of my captor’s relentless hold and knocking me to the ground as another man—the bartender, I realized—staked my two attackers in quick succession.

Guess I’m not the only one good with the stabby, pokey bit…

I caught his gaze and managed a quick smile of thanks, then turned my attention to the guy who’d knocked me down.

The fae who’d knocked me down. Half-vampire too, I realized, dressed in a three-piece black Nehru suit that perfectly hugged his leanly muscled frame.

My mind spun.

How was this possible?

He was partially on top of me from the fall, one hand cradling the back of my head, lips muttering my name like a prayer. His long hair brushed across my face, a fall of silver waves and intricate braids I itched to run my fingers through.

Only the strongest magick could erase time, and there was no magick more powerful than scent for yanking you right back into the past. It washed over me like a dark curse—the particular mix of bergamot and rain that could only belong to him.

Butterflies danced through my insides, my heartbeat quickening.

When I finally found the courage to meet his eyes, my breath hitched, and not just because his weight was half-crushing my lungs.

Five years ago, he walked out of my life without so much as a goodbye… and crushed my f*****g heart.

“Elian,” I whispered.

Accidentally.

Shit.

His molten silver gaze swept down to my lips, then back to my eyes. A cocky grin curved his mouth, tugging slightly higher on the left.

It did things to me, that crooked grin. Always had. Bad things. Stupid things. And before I knew it, I was grinning right back at him.

Elian brushed his thumb across my lower lip, eyes sparkling, his touch making me shiver. “Still dreaming of me, little sparrow?”

“I am,” I admitted.

Then, just to prove it, I did something I’d been dreaming about every day for the last five years.

I punched that sexy, silver-eyed fae-hole right in the mouth.