Enraptured (2 page)

***

Paige sat in the hotel bedroom, idly
flipping through the channels on the TV as she stared at the
changing screens. The daytime was always the worst for her. She had
no idea what to do with herself during certain times of the day.
She’d already been to the gym and worked out for an hour, already
spent another hour having a sparring match with Nabel. Her muscles
were still sore from their session. He hadn’t taken it easy on her,
and she didn’t want him to.

The daylight hours weren’t so bad when she
was at home and had work to fill her days, but she’d taken this
week off to follow the latest lead with Nabel. She would have quit
her job if she’d had to in order to be here; she’d spent the last
four years of her life searching and waiting for this kind of a
break.

Tossing the remote aside, she rose to her
feet and strode over to the window. She pulled back the heavy
curtains to peer out at the bright day. All she lived for now was
the night, and it was still too far away for her liking. The night
was when she could hunt the monsters plaguing their world,
especially the monster that had been plaguing her.

With a sigh, she dropped the curtain into
place and turned to face the room. She’d spent far too many of her
years living in and out of hotel rooms just like this one. Over the
years, they’d all blurred into one endless array of landscape
paintings, industrial carpets, and threadbare comforters. They were
all some form of beige or white with crappy fluorescent lighting in
what was normally a pink or yellow bathroom. This one had thrown a
curveball by sporting a blue bathroom with recessed lighting, but
the rest of the tiny space was like all the rest.

Paige looked helplessly around the room; she
could go back to the gym, but she didn’t want to tire herself out
before nightfall. She should be napping, but she was far too wired
and excited to go to sleep. Grabbing some change and her room key,
she stepped into the hall and headed down to the small vending
machine area. She punched in the number for a bottle of water. She
watched as it fell down and clanked against the machine when it hit
bottom. Walking over to the next machine, she debated for a minute
before settling on a bag of peanuts.

Heading back to her room, she paused outside
of Nabel’s door where she contemplated whether or not she should
knock. They spent a fair amount of time together, but she wouldn’t
consider him her friend or someone she would normally pass the time
with. She’d bet he felt the same way about her and wouldn’t exactly
appreciate having her perched on the end of his bed talking about
the weather.

Four years ago, she would have just picked
up her sketch pad and pencils in order to keep herself occupied,
but it had been years since she’d sketched anything. She found
herself pining for her old, artistic love as she headed back toward
her lonely room. She didn’t think she’d ever draw again, that
obsession had been replaced with a new one, but at least it would
have helped her kill the time.

Opening the bag of peanuts, she popped a
couple in her mouth as she moved past his room and back toward
hers. The TV was still going and Divorce Court was in session when
she settled onto the bed again. She absently began to flip through
the channels once more before turning back to look at the sun
filtering around the edges of the thick curtains.

Only a few more hours,
she told
herself. Only a few more hours and she would be back on the hunt
for the vampires ravaging their world.

Ian tipped his chair back and leaned against the
wall of the crowded bar. Most of the occupants were college
students, a few were older, and a handful were high school students
who had managed to slip past the bouncer at the door. They must
have had some fantastic fake ID’s as he knew the bear sized man at
the door, who actually liked to be called Bear, was a real stickler
when it came to who he let in and out of the bar. Either that or
they had far more money than a kid their age should if they had
managed to bribe Bear into letting them in.

He wouldn’t exactly call the bar seedy, but
its main purposes were getting people drunk and providing a place
for college students to hook up. The edge of the campus was only a
hundred feet away from the bar; the owner had made a fortune over
the years on the crowd of young students rotating through the
doors.

The ever changing crowd was what had drawn
him here in the first place. The only problem was that the one
woman he’d mistakenly taken home twice was here tonight too; he
didn’t feel like dealing with her if she decided to approach him
again. He’d spent a night with her during his freshman year but had
forgotten about it when he’d picked her up again three weeks ago.
It hadn’t helped that it had been one of his really bad days, and
he’d drunk enough to kill three humans in order to get through it.
The girl had remembered him and mistakenly assumed his slip up
meant something more. She appeared to be occupied with another man
tonight, so he decided to stay at the bar and find someone
else.

All the women he took home knew about his
one and done rule, his reputation often preceded him, and if they
didn’t know, he made sure they did before they went back to his
place. If they had a problem with it, he had to know while he still
had a chance to take someone else home.

He found enough women who were quite
agreeable to his rule. Some were only looking for the same from
him, others hoped they could change him, while others were merely
curious. More than a few women had told him that not only had his,
“hit it and quit it,” reputation preceded him, but so had his
prowess and skills in bed. He may have no intention of sleeping
with them again, but he was going to make sure every woman he took
home had one of the best nights of their lives.

It might be better for him if he did have a
steady girlfriend, an almost guarantee of regular sex to ease him
when the pressure grew to be too much, but he liked people too much
to treat them in such a way. He didn’t deny this wasn’t the best
way to treat them either, but he’d never encountered another
vampire to set up something casual with around school.

“Someone’s on the prowl again,” Oscar joked
and elbowed Milo in the ribs.

Milo shot him a look and finished off his
beer. “Your dick is going to rot off with the way you’ve been
going,” Milo said to him before sliding the beer bottle toward the
bartender.

Ian shrugged and folded his arms over his
chest as he continued to survey the bar in the hopes of finding
someone who piqued his interest. There were a few potentials on the
dance floor, but right now they were more content to show off their
dance moves to their friends rather than anyone else.

The bartender replaced Milo’s beer and
glanced at him questioningly. Ian nodded and polished off his beer
before taking hold of the fresh one the bartender handed him. His
gaze slid over the crowd again. A brunette across the way, sitting
with her friends, glanced over the packed dance floor and smiled at
him. Ian smiled back at her and raised his bottle to give a brief
salute in her direction. She glanced away sheepishly. She could
pretend all she wanted, it would be her he left here with, sooner
rather than later. With his future date already staked out for the
night, he relaxed enough to turn his attention to his two
friends.

“I’ve found who I’m looking for,” he
informed them.

“Seriously
rot
off
,” Milo
said.

Oscar clapped him on the shoulder. “My hero.
Go get her.”

Ian snorted, finished off his beer and
placed it on the counter. His gaze remained on the brunette in the
corner. She kept glancing at him and then looking away. He knew it
was part of the game, but he’d prefer to skip the ridiculousness of
this part of the evening and get to where they both knew they were
going to end up, his bed.

Paige leaned back in her booth seat as she
scanned the crowded bar. Unknowingly her body swayed with the beat
of the dance music playing over the speakers. Maybe, if she’d been
a normal twenty-two year old this place would have been a lot of
fun to hang out with her friends. Maybe she would have gone to
college, not the one near this bar, but some other college on the
East coast. That had actually been her plan before God had decided
to laugh and squash it.

Nabel shifted in the booth. His glimmering
brown eyes were intense as he leaned toward her. “Do you see him?”
he inquired.

Frustration filled her as she shook her head
no. Due to a couple of tips from some of Nabel’s sources, they’d
spent the past three days in this area, but the man she’d spent the
past four years of her life searching for was nowhere amongst this
crowd. There were three other bars in the area, but they’d decided
to hit this one first tonight.

Across the way, she saw the tall, massive
blond man she’d seen every night here rise to his feet. She found
her eyes irresistibly locked upon him as he stretched his back. His
shoulders could fill a doorway, his biceps were larger than her
thighs; the muscles in his arms flexed when he rolled his shoulders
back and said something to the two men sitting with him. The men
laughed and the bartender handed him another beer. She didn’t know
what it was about the man, but every time she saw him she found
herself intrigued by him.

He was so incredibly fascinating and it
wasn’t just his striking good looks. Something about him…

And every other woman in the place felt the
same way, she realized. She’d seen him leave here with a different
girl every night she’d been here. Not like it mattered. She didn’t
plan to introduce herself to him, learn his name, or have any kind
of conversation with him, but she still found herself watching him
as he pulled out his wallet and threw some money on the bar. She
could see why women kept leaving with him, if she’d been a normal
college girl she probably would have at least talked to him
too.

Hell, she already was drawn to him. She
didn’t experience desire often, but every time she looked at him,
she could feel it curling within her belly. There were far more
important things right now than a man, she reminded herself as she
took a sip of her water. No matter how sexy that man was, or how
curious she was to touch one of his many muscles. Was it possible
for muscles to have muscles, she marveled as his forearms and
biceps flexed.

The black tank top he wore hugged his broad
chest and emphasized his chiseled body. Dark blond stubble lined
his jaw; he rubbed at it as he looked over the occupants of the
bar. The predatory gleam in his sky colored eyes only made her
heart beat faster. Before his gaze could drift over where she sat,
she leaned back in the booth. She didn’t know why but she would
prefer it if he didn’t see her.

Determined to ignore him, she turned her
attention to the rest of the bar. Amongst the occupants, she
spotted the woman the tall blond man had left with last night. She
stood with a group of her friends, their heads were bent close
together as they talked and laughed with each other. Paige couldn’t
see him anymore, but she could feel his overwhelming presence
filling the bar.

“Is there a chance your info could have been
wrong?” Under normal circumstances she would never question him,
she’d learned he would never reveal his secrets to her. That was ok
with her, as long as he taught her how to fight better and helped
her in her mission. She wasn’t a born hunter, not like Nabel and
his kind, and because of that she would always be on the outside.
She’d worked so tirelessly to finally be here though and didn’t
want to risk her tenuous position amongst a group she barely knew
but had come to count on. However, over the years, she’d come to
realize she had few virtues; patience sat near the bottom of the
list.

Nabel sat back in his seat and folded his
arms over his chest as he stared at her. “Our info is never wrong.”
He placed his hands on the table and rose to his feet. “We should
be going.”

Questions formed rapidly in her mind; how
did he know, who had told him that vampires were here, how had they
known it was the one she was searching for? She thought her tongue
might start to bleed from the force with which she bit into it.
She’d spent over two years trying to infiltrate the hunters, trying
to find them and get them to agree to help her; she refused to blow
it now. Not when she could be so close to finally ending it, to
finally fulfilling the mission she’d started four years ago.
Excitement pulsed through her veins as she practically bounced on
her toes in anticipation.

Rising to her feet beside Nabel, she dropped
a couple of dollars on the table. Following him toward the door,
she glanced back at the gorgeous man still standing with his
friends. A set of sky blue eyes met hers; his head tilted to the
side as he studied her. Paige held his gaze for a few steps before
Nabel nudged her elbow and she hastily looked away. The mountain of
a man at the door pushed it open for them. Paige didn’t glance back
as she stepped into the brisk April night.

Ian stepped away from Milo and Oscar when he
met the small brunette’s gaze across the way again. He’d already
had enough of the game and was more than eager to leave. People
instinctively moved out of the way of his large frame as he cut
through the outer edge of the crowd. His lengthy strides slowed
when he spotted another brunette woman making her way through the
throng.

The woman’s head turned toward him; her
striking turquoise colored eyes met his. Her black eyebrows
furrowed as she stared at him over the top of her slender, pointed
nose. The freckles speckling the bridge of her nose, and the
roundness of her cheeks, gave her a youthful appearance, but he
guessed she was at least twenty-one. Tall and lean, she had the
lithe body of a ballerina and moved with the grace of one as she
cut through the crowd. Her step hesitated when her eyes met his
then the man at her side nudged her elbow, prompting her to keep
moving toward the exit.