Ashe snorted. “You know how to make a girl feel welcome.”
Caravelli shrugged and Holly winced. Mac felt sorry for Holly. She was the one caught in the middle. He looked for a diversion.
“What do you ride?” he said, nodding at the helmet.
“Ducati Monster 1100S.”
“Nice. I’m more of a Harley man myself.”
She looked him up and down. “How many strokes is your engine?”
Unfazed, Mac gave Ashe his most charming smile. “Trust me, the ride’s smooth, and the mileage is great.” And the scorching finish is a hair-raiser.
She stretched, sinuous as a cat, the jacket falling open to show off anything the see-through shirt hadn’t already disclosed. “I’m just tire-kicking tonight, or I might take a test drive.”
Mac wasn’t sure he was flattered. He sure as hell wasn’t interested, but it kept the conversation on a lighter note.
“Any reason you’re here besides hello?” Holly asked, her tone cool.
“We got off on the wrong foot, Hol.” Ashe looked at her sister, who was finishing the mineral water. “Is it okay if we try again?”
“Of course,” Holly said, more cheerfully. “We can do that. Do you want to meet for lunch tomorrow?”
“What’s wrong with here and now?”
“I was in the middle of something.” Holly pushed her glass away, looking weary.
Ashe’s fingers twitched, as if she’d been stung. “I’m family.”
A flash of temper lit up Holly’s face. “The world doesn’t stop because you decided to drop by and stake my boyfriend.”
Caravelli sat forward, his gaze on Ashe. “Perhaps it’s time to go.”
“You stay out of this, fang-boy.” Ashe turned on the vampire, and Mac saw the face of a predator every bit as dangerous as Caravelli.
I hate domestic disputes. “Is there something that can’t wait?” Mac asked tentatively.
“She wants to stake me,” Caravelli said, his tone mocking. “I tremble.”
Ashe leaned across the table, all but snarling at the vampire. “Sure, I want to. Why wouldn’t I? Swear to me you’ve never, ever bitten her,” she grated out, her voice barely audible above the noise of the other patrons.
“Ashe!” Holly snapped.
Caravelli sat like stone, his expression saying that he was guilty as charged.
Ashe gave a cold smile. “Thought so.”
She slowly got to her feet and picked up her helmet. Caravelli stood, tracking her every move. Her body said more of rage than any curse. Then she turned to Mac, her expression venomous. “And where do you fit in?”
Mac took in the violence in her eyes. Carefully, he resurrected the charming smile. “I’m a nice, quiet guy, but if I find out you’re going all Van Helsing on my friends, then I’m your worst nightmare.”
Ashe gave a lopsided smile. “I’ll look forward to it.” She turned, recoiling when she nearly bumped into Caravelli. “Get the hell out of my way.”
He fell back a step and she swept toward the door. For the second time that night, the whole pub turned to stare.
Holly looked shell-shocked. “Oh, Goddess, what just happened?”
“We tried to reason with a madwoman,” Caravelli said, dropping to one knee beside her chair and raising a hand to her cheek. “I’m sorry, cara, but she won’t be happy until I’m dust.”
“She’s my sister,” Holly said quietly. “I want her to be the way she was when I was little. I want that Ashe, not this one.”
Caravelli hushed her.
It was time for Mac to go. He was a third wheel. He put money on the table for his dinner and got up. He touched Holly’s shoulder lightly, but he addressed Caravelli. “I’m going to make sure Buffy isn’t hanging around outside.”
The vampire nodded. “A sound idea.” His face was unreadable.
Mac headed for the door, pushing aside the headache bashing the inside of his skull. With all the angry energy flying around, his demon should have been straining against its leash, but instead it lay queasy and still.
The fresh night air felt delicious against his baking skin. It was doing the raining-but-not-quite routine, tiny droplets stinging the skin with icy pinpricks. Mac ducked into the pool of shadow beside the Empire’s door and scanned the street. A Ducati would be easy to spot. He didn’t see it, but it wouldn’t hurt to take a tour of the block to be sure. He’d been listening and hadn’t heard a motorcycle.
Hunching against the dark, he walked to the corner, turned left, and went as far as the alley that led past the Castle door. The iron gate stood open and Nanette’s neon sign blinked an antiseptic blue from the other end of the passage. The flashing light made the dark corners of the alley even blacker. He could smell the damp bricks and the heavy pall of age that seemed to rise out of the ground—or maybe that was his imagination adding color to the scene. He’d heard once that the old town gallows had stood nearby.
They knew how to get rid of troublemakers back then.
Mac nearly passed by, but he took one last, closer look into the alley. Ashe was standing in front of the Castle door. He’d nearly missed her, except the faint light had caught the sparkles on the front of her shirt. He started walking toward her, the old cedar bricks sounding hollow under his feet.
“You really don’t want to mess with that,” he said, using the firm-but-friendly community cop voice.
Ashe didn’t look up, but laid one hand against the door. “What do you want?”
She didn’t wait for an answer, but moved her hand over the surface of the door. “There’s power here. Even I can feel it.”
“If you snuggled up to a nuclear reactor core, maybe you could feel that, too.” Mac jammed his hands into his pockets. “It’s about as dangerous.”
She trailed one hand down the wood like a lover’s caress. “What’s behind the door?” she asked. “It feels amazing.”
He suddenly realized the hellhounds were absent. Don’t those guys ever work? “It’s the back entrance to Nanette’s,” he lied. “She had a sorcerer put a spell on the door so no one walks in to see the bondage shows for free.”
Ashe pulled away from the door with a disgusted noise.
“I’d thought maybe you’d like that sort of thing.”
“It’s no fun unless I get to hold the whip. Besides... werecats? That would be like watching a kitten play with duct tape.”
That surprised a laugh out of Mac. Ashe gave a warped smile.
“Speaking of werecats, I heard something on the radio,” she said. “I think it was the university station. Something about a door in an alley leading to a big secret called the Castle.”
“Leave it alone.”
“You shouldn’t lie. It doesn’t suit you,” she said, and walked toward the other end of the alley. Crap.
Mac watched her go past the kitchen exit of a Chinese restaurant, the door propped open with a big white pail. In the brief pool of light, her slim back and fall of blond hair looked like a teenager’s. The swing of her hips did not.
Mac had no reason to stay, but he lingered for a mo ment in front of the door, suddenly tired. It was time to go home and sleep off his headache, but he hesitated. What was Constance doing? Was she still in the Summer Room, thinking up new ways to bite him?
A twisted corner of his soul hoped so. It was a very stupid, twisted corner.
Mac bowed his head. He couldn’t need her. He shouldn’t want her. But he did. It wasn’t as simple as falling in lust with a set of fangs. There was also a woman there, just like he was still a man. He had looked into that woman’s eyes, and been smitten.