What the fuck?
He reached for his gun. “Get the hell away from her!”
There was a brief murmur at his yell, and one or two people glanced his way, but for the most part, he was ignored—even by the asshole who had attacked the woman.
The woman in question did look at him, though. Her face twisted into a snarl, and her lips lifted to reveal teeth that looked too damn sharp. “Fuck off, human!” she snapped, then grabbed the guy and stormed into the crowd.
“What?” He blinked, not sure what had just happened. No, an assault had occurred, he needed to help her and—
“It’s not what you think,” Cara’s soft, sensuous voice trailed along his nerve endings and cut right through the roar of the bar.
His fingers still gripped the gun. He turned slowly toward her, not sure if he was really ready to face her again, even though he’d come to be bar just to see…her.
Shit. She was even more beautiful than he remembered. Her hair was soft and loose around her shoulders. Her face pale and lovely, like something out of a damn magazine ad. Her lips were a flash of crimson, and he wanted them on his.
She wore a short black dress. A tall pair of black boots. Her legs were bare, too tempting and so damn long.
It was all too easy to imagine grabbing her, lifting her up onto the bar that was less than five feet away, and getting her to wrap those sexy legs around his hips.
And if they weren’t surrounded by a room full of weirdos who apparently got off on biting one another, well, he might just do that.
“Put the gun away,” she ordered quietly. “You’re not in any danger now.”
His eyes narrowed. “That guy attacked the woman.”
“No, they were just having a little foreplay.” She pointed with her index finger.
He glanced across the room. Saw the couple snuggled into a corner, and watched as the woman lifted the man’s wrist to her lips and bit down, hard.
“Jesus. ”
She laughed then. A soft, rippling laugh. “No, he’s one you definitely won’t find here.” Then her face slowly sobered and a faint line appeared between her brows. “What are you doing here?” The light seemed to dawn as her eyes narrowed. “Checking me out?”
Todd put his gun back into his holster and pulled his jacket over the weapon. “Already did that, baby.”
He heard the sharp inhalation of her breath. “And?”
“And your alibis held—for all three murders.” A fact that he couldn’t help but be grateful for right then. The lady was in the clear.
The faint scratches on his arm seemed to burn.
“Of course, they held,” she said, brows snapping together. “I told you, I didn’t kill anyone.”
He noticed then that her eyes looked a little red. As if she’d been crying. “You okay?”
“No, I’m not.” Her lips pressed together, then she said, “I went to see Michael’s family today. They’re really torn up.”
Yeah, he’d seen them, too. They were grieving their hearts out, and they wanted answers, answers he couldn’t give them. Not yet.
They seemed like a good family. The mother, a stylish older woman, had stared blankly at him as tears trickled from her eyes.
Michael’s father, his own eyes rimmed red, had wrapped his arms tight around the woman’s frail shoulders, his gentle hold belying the rage Todd so easily read on his face.
A good family. One that had loved their son.
Todd hadn’t belonged in a family like that since—aw, hell, he’d never been in a family like that. He was pretty much alone in the world now, and really, that was fine.
He didn’t want the kind of pain he’d seen in the Houses’s eyes.
Cara shook her head. “But if you already know I’m clear,” her husky voice wrapped around him and banished the image of the family’s grief, “then what are you doing here?”
Looking for her. He shrugged. “Can’t a guy go to a bar to unwind after work?” Seemed a simple enough explanation to him.
“Not to this bar,” she said instantly. “Not if the guy is you.”
What did she mean by that?
“I don’t really think this is…ah…quite your usual scene,” she continued. “Maybe you should leave.”
He blinked. “Excuse me?” Was the lady trying to kick him out?
The band stopped playing then as the music faded into silence.
“Hell, I’m on.” Worry flickered across her face. “Are you going to leave?”
Not a chance. Especially if Cara was about to perform. “I want to watch you.” The words came out as more of a demand than he’d intended.
“I-I’m not very good. Average, really. You won’t be missing anything if you leave—”
“I’m staying.” Yeah, the club wasn’t his usual style, and he could feel most of the patrons glaring daggers at him, but Cara was there, he wanted her, and he wasn’t fucking leaving.
“Fine.” She shoved her index finger into his chest. “Just don’t start anything, okay? Stay at the bar—and…stay out of trouble, you understand me?”
Then she was gone, pushing through the crowd as she headed for the small stage. He watched her for a moment, admiring the soft sway of her hips as she moved. The lady really had an incredible ass. One that he would love to get his hands on.
She climbed up onto the stage. A faint light flickered over her head, making her blond hair shine.
Todd eased back, grabbed a bar stool and prepared to watch. There was a tap on his shoulder. He turned around, “What—”
“Whiskey.” The bartender—a young guy, probably in his early twenties—pushed his favorite drink across the gleaming bar top.
Todd’s fingers curled over the glass. “Thanks.”
“Compliments of the house.”
The warning bells that had rung before in his head were suddenly back—ringing so loud they were nearly deafening. “Niol’s here?”
Was the bastard somewhere watching him?
A slow shake of the bartender’s dark head. “Got standing orders to have drinks available to you and the other cop.”
“Gyth?”
“Yeah.” A brief smile curled the guy’s lips. It wasn’t a friendly smile. More like a dog showing his fangs to an intruder who’d wandered into his yard. “Though if I had my way, neither of you bastards would be at my bar.”
Well, he was making friends left and right tonight. Todd lifted the drink in a small salute and wondered vaguely if the guy had poisoned him. “Good to know.”
The bartender’s eyes narrowed to beady green points. “Watch yourself, cop. You’ll find a lot of enemies here.”
Yeah, he already had.
Todd drained the whiskey in one long gulp and felt the burn of the alcohol slide straight down his throat.
Then he heard her. The first light whispers of her song spread through the bar.
The voices and the laughter died almost instantly when she began to sing.
He spun around, his gaze zeroing in on her. The band played behind her. No more grating guitar cries. Instead, the band members poured out dark, bluesy music on their instruments.
Her fingers curled around a microphone. Her voice trembled faintly as she sang, and her eyes met his.
He couldn’t have looked away then if the bartender had put a gun to his head.
Caught.
Oh, yeah, the lady had most definitely snared him.
Her voice grew stronger then. She didn’t belt out the lyrics or croon or any damn thing like that. She just…sang, with a deep, husky voice that made his body tighten.
The song was a bit wild, the lyrics lusty and free as she sang about loving a man not meant to be. Her body moved slowly, the sway of her hips gentle and easy. Her left hand lifted, brushing against the air, and he could swear he felt that touch on his skin.
She wasn’t the best singer he’d ever heard. It took him two and a half minutes to realize that. Her voice wasn’t perfect on the notes. But she had something. A fire. A power that wrapped around the words and made even the freaks back in the corner stop to listen.
When the song ended, a taunting smile curved her lips. The room seemed to tremble as everyone watched her, and for a second, the light above her flickered and Cara actually seemed to glow.
He blinked, trying to clear his eyes, and in that moment, the illusion faded.
Cara stepped into the shadows, went to whisper to one of the band members.
Again. The order whispered through his mind. He wanted to hear her voice again. Needed to hear her. When she finally stepped back to the center of the stage, his shoulders slumped in relief. Then she began to sing again, spinning her web and rousing the hunger within him.
He didn’t go to her when she finished her set. Todd just waited at the bar, watching her every move.
His stare had been locked on her since she’d taken the stage, and when she’d sang, Cara realized that she’d been singing for him.
Power floated all around her in the room. It filled her, teased her flesh. She sang to take that power. To build the tension in the bar and to feed off the waves of energy given by the supernaturals.
Since she hadn’t been indulging in the pleasures of the flesh lately, singing was her only release. Niol knew that. He’d offered her the chance to sing at Paradise Found so that she could keep up her strength. Feeding from the crowd had actually been his idea.
An experiment at first. One that had worked surprisingly well—well enough for her to decide to abstain from sex.
“Take a little from them all,” he’d told her, his eyes as black as night. “They’ll never know.”
And even if they did know, what would they do? She didn’t take enough power to hurt any of the patrons. She used her voice, injecting just the right amount of sex appeal and desire into her lyrics, and she let the crowd respond.
Then she took their excess sexual energy—it came to her as if drawn by a magnet because she was the one controlling the lust. Her lyrics made her a sexual Pied Piper, and she pulled the raw energy of the bar patrons’ lust right to her—and she used it to strengthen her own body. In a place like Paradise Found, where you could often even smell the scent of sex in the air, it was easy for a succubus to feed.
So far, her arrangement with Niol had been working very well for her.
Or rather, it had been working well, until the detective had shown up.
Keeping her focus had been nearly impossible when Todd was so close by. She hadn’t wanted to sing to the crowd. She’d wanted to be alone with him. Wanted to see if the passion between them would burn as brightly as she suspected it would.
Damn it, the man was a temptation that she couldn’t afford.
She walked to the bar. Stopped just in front of him. Her heart raced and her body trembled with the rush of power she’d gotten from the crowd. “What did you think?”
His gaze dropped to her lips. “I think every man in this bar wants you.” A statement given with absolutely no hint of emotion.
“I was…talking about my singing.”
“So was I.” He leaned back against the bar. “Why here, Cara? You could probably be singing in any club in Atlanta that you wanted. Hell, you don’t need to be on Niol’s stage—”
“This is where I belong.” She wouldn’t give him any more of an explanation.
His lips thinned. “But I don’t belong here, right?”
A little sadly, she shook her head.
“You know, I’m getting damn tired of feeling like there is some kind of secret shit going on in this town that I don’t know about.”
Understandable. For a second, she was tempted to tell him the truth.
But she really doubted the guy would believe her. Oh, yes, it would go something like, “I’m Cara, an immortal succubus. Just so you know, this whole bar is full of demons and vampires and witches. Oh, and your partner, Gyth? He’s a shifter. Yeah, he can turn into an animal at will.”
He’d definitely buy that.
“And just what is it that you think is going on?” She asked him instead, and motioned with a slight flick of her hand for a drink from the bartender, Cameron.
Cameron’s eyes faded to black for a moment as she stared at him and his glamour lessened. True demons had completely black eyes. Iris, cornea, even the sclera were all as black as night. But, so as not to scare the tender humans, most demons used a glamour to hide their real eye color.
Just as she hid hers.
Cameron pushed a martini glass toward her. Shot a glare toward Todd’s back.
Cameron had never been a particular fan of humans, but he was generally harmless. She’d known the other demon for years. The guy might look like he’d just cruised past twenty-three, but she knew the truth about him.
The two of them had so damn much in common. Too much.
She shook her head, a slight move directed at him, and Cameron stepped back.
Todd sighed, a rough exhalation of air. “Hell if I know what’s happening around here.” He caught her hand, rubbed his fingers over her knuckles. “Maybe I’m just paranoid.”
Or maybe not.
With her left hand, Cara reached for her drink. Took a quick sip to ease the dryness in her throat.
“You lied.”
She nearly choked on the sweet liquid. “Wh-what?”
His lips curved into a half smile and his dimple peeked at her. “You can sing.”
“I-um, th-thank you.”
His fingers smoothed over her hand in a featherlight caress. The band began to play again. The music was sexy, slow. Soon, she knew they’d switch into another driving, hard rhythm. Niol’s orders. He loved to mix things up at his club.