She chuckled, cutting him off. “No trick, I swear. I was dying in there.”
“Dying?” A menacing whisper, the intent to cause suffering in the undertone. He leaned toward her, grabbed onto her, gaze raking her, probing for injury. “I will murder—”
“Not literally dying,” she assured him. “They were walking all over me, making me forget my purpose.” My morals. She didn’t think she would have let the bastards touch her, though. Or that she would have touched them. In the end, she would have snapped to her senses. Surely.
McKell eased off her, and smoothed his T-shirt with practiced strokes. “Understandable. The dark-haired one, the one you were groping, can talk people into anything, even things they don’t want to do. Well, humans. And he can do so better than most. The other, his brother, can hypnotize.”
The one she was groping? “If you consider breaking his nose groping, I feel sorry for you.”
“We sent them topside a few years ago, on a hunting raid for food,” he continued blithely. “Only they never returned, and I never caught word of their defection, so we assumed they were dead.”
Two years. In all that time, they would have found a way to live here, blending in, perhaps venturing out unharmed during the day, if there were a way to do so. Exactly the kind of answers McKell had been wanting. So. Her first day on the job? Perfection. Tomorrow, she could take him into AIR.
Ava ignored the twinge of regret in her chest. He’d promised. They’d bargained. She’d helped him capture a few vampires—two equaled “a few”—so all that was left was for him to turn himself into AIR for questioning. Or whatever else they had planned for him.
She no longer feared that Mia would want to kill him. Not with his potent vampire blood, his ability to scent out the Schön queen, and his kinda sorta willingness to help.
“So where do you want to take them?” she asked, thumb jabbing toward their unconscious bounty.
A moment passed while McKell considered their options. Finally, “Our place.”
Wait. What? Our place? Our place? No, no, no. That was wrong on so many levels—because she actually liked the sound of it. “One, we’re not taking them anywhere near my place.” Calm. “Two, a little fact about me: I like my stuff without blood spatter. And you do plan to beat the answers out of them, yes?”
“Yes.” McKell could have been carved from granite, so hard was his expression. “Fine. Let’s take them to Noelle’s place.”
Ava nodded, breathing in more of that calm. He hadn’t fought her about the apartment being hers and only hers. And that was good. Very good. That was not disappointing.
“Noelle’s it is.” She programmed the car, and the engine roared to life. A few seconds later they were on the road and headed toward the wealthy side of town. She switched the car’s phone on and said, “Noelle Tremain.” A pause, a crackle of static, and then the number was being dialed.
Noelle answered on the fourth ring. “What?”
“It’s Ava?”
A smack of gum. “This your new number?”
“Nah. Just borrowed a car from AIR. Listen, we’re on our way to your house. You there?”
“Nope, but I can be there in ten. Who’s we?”
“Me and McKell. We’ll be there in fifteen, so that works.”
“What’s on the menu?”
“We found two vampires.”
“I found them,” he piped in. Or rather, growled. “Ava made out with them.”
“I did not make out with them! They mind-raped me, and I didn’t know what I was doing.”
Noelle laughed. “This is going to be a fun night. I can tell.”
“Anyway. We need to interrogate them,” Ava said. “Broken bones might be involved. Spilled guts, too.”
“Awesome. I’ll get the torture chamber ready.” Click.
She wasn’t kidding, either. Chez Tremain did indeed have a torture chamber. They’d snuck down there a few times during their high school days, just for funsies and to prove their bravery. Noelle had never told her why the upstanding Tremains had one, but Ava had guessed it had something to do with the girl’s dad. He was dead now, but she suspected he’d been with the secret service or some shit, because he’d always been traveling, and on the rare times he’d been home, odd characters had been in and out of the compound at all hours of the day and night.
She’d found it very sexy at the time.
Maybe she was still that awed little high school crush-waiting-to-happen at heart, because the thought of McKell in that dungeon, throwing his strength around, probably flexing, maybe doing some cutting … sexiest image evah.
Shivering, she glanced over at him, intending to give him a good eye-fucking, but saw that he was glaring at her. Why?
No way she’d ask him. Too needy.
“Let’s stargaze,” she suggested as a distraction. Without waiting for his reply, she opened the solar panel on the roof, leaned her seat back as far as the shield-armor separating the front and back of the car allowed, then peered up at the night sky. So pretty, the pinpricks of light whizzing past, blurring together.
The perfect romantic backdrop for making out.
Damn it. New distraction. “So,” she said, trampling the silence.
“You’re determined to irritate me tonight, aren’t you?”
Irritation. Good. She could work with that. Maybe. “Don’t I do that every night?”
“Tonight you outdid yourself.”
“Well, I’m a good agent.” In training.
“That wasn’t a compliment! But of course you wouldn’t realize that. You’re clueless. First, you smell too good, but you won’t let me have another taste. Second, you touched him. I never told you to touch anyone. I told you to lure vampires outside. Outside. Without touching.”
Another jealous fit. Soothing, after the other-woman suspicion she’d harbored after their kiss, and then again while she’d waited for him to return to her apartment. She took pity on him, though, because every dark word out of his mouth made her awareness of him electrify.
“Look, he was getting away from me, and touching him was the only way to stop him. There was nothing sexual about it. I’m not going to be with anyone else while we’re … involved.” No gagging on her part. “I agreed to your rule eleven.”
“Good. I won’t be with anyone else, either,” he said, and this time, thank you God, this time, he sounded confident. “I only want you.” He grabbed her by the forearms and hauled her into his lap, forcing her to straddle him. “And by God I’ll have you.”