However it wasn’t his size or his looks thatdrew the admiration of every fang freak in the sunshine state—itwas Corbin’s eyes. Fringed thickly with dark lashes, they were adeceptively light silvery-blue that reminded me of the reflectionon the surface of a lake. A mysterious body of water that hadunexplored depths with monsters swimming somewhere down deep, justwaiting to grab you and drag you under. Pretty on the surface andfucking scary underneath.
Yeah, that was Corbin, all right.
As though feeling my gaze on him, he lookedup and smiled at me, showing just enough fang to be insulting. Imet his monster’s eyes without fear and gave him a blank look back.I can do that because I’m an Auditor, but I don’t recommend it toyour average garden variety human. Being one of the one in tenthousand who is immune to a vamp’s glamour and mind tricks comes inhandy for me in my line of work, but if someone without my giftswas to try what I do, they’d be screwed six ways to Sunday.
“Seriously, I mean this gig rocks. Whereelse do you get multiple orgasms as a bonus?”
The chirpy voice of the barmaid drew me awayfrom my staring contest with Corbin and I turned to look at heragain. She had curly hair that was done up in a lot of tendrilsaround her round face and there was a fresh set of fang marks onher neck. Looking around the club, which was decorated in red,black, and silver, I saw more than one patron with a matching set.The sex for blood trade must be hustling tonight.
“So you do the glam-sex thing a lot, doyou?” I asked, wondering about the state of her gray matter. Therehaven’t been any studies to prove that glam-sex—that is mind-sexwith a vampire—has long term side effects, but how often could youlet another being alter your brain before it turned to mush?
“Yeah, it’s great. Especially with MasterCorbin. I mean, I only got it from him once, back when I firststarted, but wow.” She waved shyly at Corbin who didn’tbother to acknowledge her. His lack of attention didn’t seem tobother his employee, however. “It’s like amazing,” shegushed, grinning at me. “I mean, have you ever tried it?”
“Can’t.” I pointed to the small black startattooed at the outer corner of my right eye—the mark of anAuditor. I use makeup to cover it up when I’m out but the lawmandates I keep it visible while I’m at work. It’s the same lawthat forces vamps to have their own tattoos—one star for everycentury they’ve been alive. Or undead, if you want to gettechnical. They use a special kind of ink—I’ve heard it’s bloodbased—in order to make a permanent mark on a vamp and even so itfades over time and they have to get it redone. Alec Corbin hadfour little blood red stars under his left eye. As far as I knew,he was the only four-star vamp in all of Florida, which was finewith me. The longer a vampire survives, the stronger he gets. Fourstars are rare and scary enough, any more and you’re getting intotruly frightening territory.
“Oh, right.” The barmaid shook her head.“Vamps can’t glam you, huh? Bummer.”
“I manage just fine,” I said dryly. “Howdoes your boyfriend feel about you having glam-sex with the fangersevery night?”
“Oh, I haven’t dated anyone since just afterI started here two years ago. I was going with this one guy—we wereeven thinking of getting married. But he got mad when I quit schoolto work at the Fang full time. He was all ‘Glam-sex is stillcheating’ and I was like, ‘As if, asshole. They don’t even touchme.’ But he totally wouldn’t see it my way and he was being a jerkabout the whole thing. So we broke up.”
“So you quit school and you haven’t had ameaningful relationship outside the confines of your own head intwo years? All just so you could work at a bar and get mind-fuckedevery night?” I asked bluntly. “Think about it—you could be marriedwith kids and a career by now and instead you’re slinging beers forminimum wage. Is it really worth it?”
The barmaid’s cheeks flushed an angry red.“You sound like my mom. Come to think of it, you kind oflook like her too.”
Okay, that hurt. Thirty was coming up prettyfast but I didn’t think I really looked my age. If anything, mybright red hair, big brown eyes, and freckles made me look youngerthan I was—a trait I hated but used to my advantage when I neededto. Probably what the girl was referring to was my choice ofclothing. I was wearing a gray tailored pantsuit with black heelsto add a little height to my five foot four inch frame. The cut ofthe suit was pretty severe and it didn’t show a bit of skin besidesmy hands and throat—a far cry from the barmaid’s daisy dukes andcut-up-to-here midriff t-shirt.
“Forget I said anything,” I told her,snapping my citation pad shut. “What you do with your life is yourbusiness.”
I was trying to make peace but she couldn’tlet it drop. “Like you’ve done so much with yours,” she sneered.“You’re just some kind of bureaucrat who goes around and tries toruin other people’s fun. Is this what you do all day? Ask peoplestupid boring questions?”
“Actually, I also kill vampires sometimes,”I said pleasantly. “So my job isn’t all boring.”
The girl’s mouth was suddenly hanging openand I had a moment of satisfaction when I thought I’d finallygotten through to her. Then a deep, cool voice behind me said, “Ithink you’ve annoyed Ms. Godwin quite enough for now, Bambie. Maybeyou should go see if table five needs a refill on theirdrinks.”
“Yes, Master Corbin.” The awe in her voicemade me roll my eyes and she bowed and actually backed away, asthough Corbin was some kind of royalty. Well, to fang freaks likeher, he probably was.
“Sorry about that. Bambie isn’t thebrightest barmaid we have here at the Fang but she’scompetent and reliable.” Corbin stepped around to face me andturned the force of his considerable charm on me like a spot light.I could feel the envious stares of the other
