Must Love Fangs

How was that possible? I raised my shirt to my nose and sniffed it. I didn’t smell anything.

Sara smacked my shoulder. “Not your clothes, dummy. You. Your skin. You normally smell like a medicine cabinet. Now you smell like a medicine cabinet and Beau’s brother.” And she waggled her eyebrows at me. “So gimme the dirt.”

I didn’t know which part made me more mortified—the fact that I smelled like a medicine cabinet, or the fact that she’d picked up on my strange situation with Josh. It wasn’t even friends with benefits. All we’d done was argue with each other and share a few kisses.

A few really hot, really wet kisses.

“It’s nothing,” I told her. “No dirt.”

Her eyebrows shot up, and she grabbed my drink. “You going to love him and leave him?”

“Something like that.”

“Ooo,” Sara said with a grin. “High five.” She raised her hand in the air and completely missed mine.

“Yeah, I think I’ll take that back now,” I told her, pulling my drink out of her hand.

She leaned over my chair, throwing her arm around my shoulders and eyeing the drink. I had the sneaking suspicion that if I looked away, she’d grab it again. “Can I give you a word of advice?”

“Oh, please do.” Nothing better than advice from drunk people.

“Josh is a nice guy. Really nice. Big soft spot for women.” She poked at my breastbone as if to demonstrate where that soft spot might be. “But he’s not what you’d call a ‘commitment’ kind of guy.”

She made drunken air quotes just as Ryder sat down again, hands empty of money.

“I know he’s not,” I told her. “But thank you.”

She nodded sagely, then brightened at the sight of Ryder’s half-full cup. “You going to drink that?”

“Get your own,” Ryder said, holding her cup protectively.

Bath returned from the bar with new drinks and began to pass them out. As she did, I glanced up at the stage. A new man had danced out, and my heart skipped a beat at the baseball cap he wore. A moment later, I relaxed, seeing the baseball uniform he wore and the tattoos going up his arm. Not Josh. Not even close.

You going to love him and leave him?

That was what I was going to do, wasn’t it? Have sex with him and then turn around and seek a vampire to turn me? And if the vampire wanted a blood mate, I wouldn’t say no.

So what did that make me? I wasn’t sure I wanted to be a player. And Josh wasn’t sure if he wanted to be played, judging by the lack of a return phone call.

Why did everything have to be so damn complicated?

One of the dancers sauntered past, wearing a wreath of bills around his waist and not much else. Sara whistled sharply, drawing his attention, and pulled out a twenty. “Lap dance!”

“Oh, no,” Bath said.

But Sara eyed us and then pointed at Ryder, who also shook her head, eyes widening.

The dancer zoomed to Ryder’s side and began to gyrate, shaking his pelvis. Bath looked mortified. Sara bounced up and down with giddy excitement.

Ryder looked . . . terrified? Confident, self-possessed Ryder?

The dancer grabbed her hand and placed it on his pectoral, shining with baby oil. And he gave Ryder a lascivious look, grinding up against her.

She shot to her feet and bolted for the ladies’ room.

The dancer staggered backward, almost knocked over by her hasty exit, and Bathsheba looked shocked.

“What’s with her?” Sara asked.

The terrified look on Ryder’s face was so unlike her. And then I thought of the . . . thing . . . that I’d seen Ryder turn into. I plucked the twenty out of Sara’s hand and stuck it in the dancer’s G-string. “She probably drank too much and had to throw up,” I told them, and pulled out another twenty from my pocket. “How about you give me a lap dance next?” I said to the dancer.

Sara whooped in response, and the dancer grabbed my free hand, rubbing it on his oiled stomach.

Ryder totally owed me for this.

• • •

We left the club a few hours later, flat broke and way past tipsy. Well, the other three were tipsy. I’d sipped the same drink all night, letting Sara chug the rest of mine. Alcohol never sat well with the anti-anxiety medication I was on to suppress the panic attacks.

Our designated driver met us outside, and at the sight of him, drunk-but-still-kicking Sara whooped and scrambled for her last dollar. She folded it in half and waved it under the surly were-bear’s nose, gyrating at him.

“Dance for me, baby,” she cooed. “I’ll give you some money.”

“No,” Ramsey said in a flat voice.

Sara just laughed uproariously and danced away, wobbling.

Ramsey snatched her from midair and swung her over his shoulder like a caveman. Sara laughed and squealed, kicking her feet.

I could have sworn that Ramsey’s mouth twitched in a hint of a smile.

“Oh, boy,” Ryder said at my side. “I hope he doesn’t keep swinging her around like that or she’s going to puke. I might puke just from watching it.”

I snorted. Bath tottered across the parking lot behind the wildly laughing Sara and big, burly Ramsey, and I took up the rear, beside Ryder. When the others were far enough ahead, I tugged at her arm and whispered, “You okay?”

Her face tightened and she nodded. “I just . . . I can’t . . . I can’t process touch. Not well.”

I immediately pulled my hand away. “I’m so sorry.”

She rolled her eyes at me. “Not yours, dummy. Men. I . . . ” She exhaled a long, deep breath. “Never mind. This is on the secret list.”

I linked my pinky to hers and nodded, then we followed the others to the car.

Chapter Ten

Well, this was awkward.

I smiled tightly at Andre as he poured me another glass of red wine and I tried to ignore the scowling bodyguard standing right behind him.

Why did my date suddenly need protecting? Who was he afraid of? Was I in danger?

And most of all, out of the entire Russell Security team, why did it have to be Josh? He loomed over our date like a ghastly third wheel.

So very, very awkward.

I downed my wine quickly. Maybe if I got drunk, this wouldn’t be so bad.

“You’re very thirsty tonight,” Andre said, his tone holding affection and amusement. “Long day?”

I nodded and held my glass out for a refill. The truth was, every day was a long day lately. I hadn’t been handling the insomnia well this week. I’d also been stressed about how things were going with Josh, so I’d fretted and checked my phone for messages a hundred times an hour.

But he hadn’t texted.

Part of me had expected it. Still . . . I had thought we were friends. Feeling abandoned, I’d even cried a little. I’d trusted him and he’d run.

And now he was glaring at me? He could go jump off a cliff, for all I cared.

“You seem distracted,” Andre observed, extending his hand across the table.

I put my hand in his, which was unnervingly cool against mine. “I’m sorry.” I couldn’t even come up with an explanation that would put his mind to rest.

“Is this a bad time for you? Should we cancel our date tonight?” He gave me a concerned look, his other