“Yeah, ah gotcha,” Wade nodded. He patted his pockets. “Think ah got a spare pack in mah glove box. C’mon, ah’ll hook y’all up.” Wade turned, fishing his keys out of his pocket.
“You’re a lifesaver, handsome,” the woman said. She followed close behind Wade to the passenger side of Wade’s pickup.
The man cocked his head curiously. “Did I hear you say you’re looking for drinks?” he asked. “You know, we’re on our way to a party ourselves.”
“You don’t say,” Drew shrugged.
“Good night for that. Partying,” Jason nodded. “I can’t stand having no party to go to on, um…Monday night,” he finished lamely.
The man smiled. “We could help you out with that, you know. It should be pretty wild.”
“Jus’ right in here,” Wade said. He glanced in the side-view mirror as he opened the door. He saw his own reflection, but not the woman’s. Wade opened the door and reached inside.
“Take your time,” the blonde told him. She looked back to her companion, hoping to catch his eye.
Wade grunted as he reached inside the glove compartment. The blonde stood close to him. Wade fumbled around a bit, saying only, “Fresh pack. Lemme tear off th’ plastic.”
The tearing sound seemed a touch off base to Natalia. She had just managed a wink in Lucien’s direction before she caught the red glow of the emergency road flare. Natalia’s supernatural speed couldn’t compensate for her complete surprise. Wade caught her in the side of the neck, rather than the head as he’d hoped, but he immediately saw her flesh catch fire.
Drew tackled Lucien without hesitation. The stocky vampire staggered back but didn’t fall. He quickly snatched up a gun from inside his sport coat. Drew grabbed at his wrist while Jason rushed in to help.
Taylor glanced around, looking for something to do. The blonde screamed as her hair caught fire. Her neck continued to burn, too. She battered Wade back, slamming him up against the side of his pickup. He caught hold of one of her arms and jabbed the road flare at her stomach.
Taylor opted to help the others as Jason was knocked to the ground. Drew kept struggling with the man’s gun hand. Taylor came around their opponent’s side, swinging a wide kick at the back of his leg. Most of his weight was on it as she hit him right behind the knee. He fell back with Drew on top of him.
Drew struggled to keep that gun-wielding hand down while throwing his knee into Lucien’s groin, but such attacks meant little to the undead. Lucien managed a single back-fisted blow at Drew with his free hand. It hit like a baseball bat, even despite a poor wind-up and little leverage. Drew tumbled away.
Natalia flailed at Wade to knock him down, then battered wildly at the flames over her upper body in a vain attempt to put them out. Wade fell to the ground. His road flare fell from his hands. It had already broken in half and scattered across the pavement, anyway. He looked up to see the raging, burning woman about to lunge at him.
Then Jason was there, grabbing Natalia by the waist of her pants. He pulled hard, twisting her around to hurl her at Lucien while the other vampire rose with his gun in hand. Taylor saw it coming and shoved Lucien toward the oncoming flames. He tumbled to the ground with Natalia on top of him while Taylor scrambled out of the way.
Natalia was already beyond rational thought. She grabbed at Lucien, trying to get help from something, anything able to put out the flames. Lucien was badly burned before he managed to fight her off of him in a panic, but by then Drew was up. His foot came down brutally on the side of Lucien’s knee with a cringe-inducing crunch.
Natalia tumbled away. Her dead flesh continued to burn, but there was nothing left in her throat to sound out her agony.
Lucien could heal his broken joints, but his burns wouldn’t clear so quickly. Drew kept up the pressure, throwing blow after blow down on the vampire to keep him off-balance. Lucien’s undead strength was somewhat drained by his burns, but finally he managed to catch Drew’s wrist and twist it painfully, then kick him away with shocking force.
The vampire got to his feet just in time for Taylor’s car to slam into him. Taylor struck him dead-on from behind, sending him tumbling facedown to the ground again. She hit the brakes reflexively, but then let her car roll forward until she felt her front left tire roll up on top of him. Rather than roll the rest of the way over, she threw the parking break.
Drew got to his feet, clutching his side and huffing painfully. He looked over at the vampire pinned facedown under Taylor’s front wheel. Then he saw Jason with the vampire’s pistol in his hands. “You okay?” Drew huffed.
“Yeah. You?”
“Yeah. Where’s Wade?”
As if in answer, Wade passed between the two, pulling back the slide on the pistol he had retrieved from his truck. There was a tire iron tucked into his belt. “Ah’m fine. Gonna hold up a gas station is all,” he growled. “Watch that asshole under the car.”
Drew glanced down to see Lucien pushing up against the wheel of the car. The tire rested right below his shoulder blades and thus allowed little leverage from his arms, but he tried to brace his legs for a mighty heave. Drew kicked the vampire’s feet backward, causing him to slip and then grunt in pain as the car settled back down upon him again.
Jason watched Wade with no small amount of nervousness plain in his face. “You think he’s really gonna-?”
Wade smashed the glass of the mini mart door with the tire iron. He reached inside, threw the latch on the door, and entered. “Drop the phone, asshole!” they heard him roar. “Get out here! Right fuckin’ now! Where’s the camera feed go? Ah said the camera feed! For the security cameras, ya fuckwit!”
“Jesus,” Drew murmured.
“Yeah, I know,” Jason breathed. “I’m way uncomfortable with this.”
They heard the door of Taylor’s car slam shut. She stepped over to join them, saying only, “My vote is we waterboard this motherfucker with a gas pump until he tells us everything.”
* * *
“Has she told you she loves you?”
Alex kept his mouth shut. He stared at the ceiling. He hated himself for the way his body reacted to the lithe, sensuous woman laying on him, speaking in such an adoring yet venomous voice. He wanted to look at Lorelei, but he couldn’t meet her eyes while this woman had him so mortifyingly aroused.
He was grateful he was still dressed, and terrified at the thought that he probably wouldn’t be so for much longer.
Lydia rose to straddle his hips. She slowly rocked back and forth on her knees. “I imagine she lets you feel like you’re in charge…lets you feel like a big, strong, masterful man. Does she call you master? Does it help you feel like you’re in charge? Like you can trust her?”
Alex remained silent. Lydia grabbed at his hair, turning him to one side to lick the side of his neck, much as Rachel had greeted him hours before, only without any of the warmth.
“Why won’t you talk to me?” she cooed in his ear. “Don’t you have anything to say at all?”
“Nothing you won’t just use against me,” he grunted.
“Oh, sweet Alex,” Lydia cooed, “I thought you’d be used to that already? Admit it. You love being dominated by a succubus. Lorelei has you wrapped around her finger. Don’t you know that? Haven’t you already seen? She plays you like an instrument, and you only want her to play more and more.” Her face loomed over his, split by an animalistic grin. “Doesn’t it get you off? You have no worries. You can just lay there and let her take care of everything.”
Her hands slipped under his shirt. They were soft. Tantalizing. His mind and body fought over whether her touch excited him or if it made his skin crawl.
“You know I’m going to give you more than she has, right?” Lydia asked, still swaying against his body. “Lorelei has held back on you, Alex. I can tell. I won’t hold back at all.”
“You mean you’re going to kill me,” he sneered.
“I mean I will give you pleasures any man would die for,” Lydia smiled. “Don’t worry about Lorelei. She’ll get to share. Believe me, I want her to feel every moment of you and I together, right to the very last. I’m nothing if not generous.”