“You forgot my underwear,” she whispered fiercely as they stepped into the kitchen.

His mouth curved. “No, I didn’t.”

Their guest was waiting in the living room, laughing over something shared with his guards. The two lycans stood at attention when he entered the room, but the lovely Asian woman who’d been entertaining them rose to her feet much more leisurely. Dressed in a pinstripe pencil skirt, silk blouse, and Louboutins, Raguel Gadara’s messenger was dressed for her secular life. In her celestial one, she favored worn jeans, a 9mm, and Doc Martens.

“Evangeline.” Adrian greeted her, clasping her extended hands and sifting through her thoughts via that connection, learning al he needed to know. “Good to see you.”

She smiled. “You say that so smoothly, I could almost believe you.”

He pivoted to bring Lindsay into the conversation. “Lindsay, meet Evangeline Hol is. Eve’s presently overseeing the interior design of the Mondego casino. Eve, Lindsay was briefly the assistant manager of Raguel’s Bel adonna property in Anaheim. Now she’s mine.”

Eve shook Lindsay’s hand. “Count yourself lucky to have dodged the bul et of working for Gadara.”

Lindsay frowned, confused by the other woman’s statement because she didn’t yet know that Gadara’s underlings were conscripted rather than indentured like the lycans. Adrian would catch her up later.

“What brings you by?” he asked Eve, diverting the conversation from explanations he didn’t want to get into now.

She pointed at the tiny biohazard cooler at her feet. “Archangel blood. I watched Gadara draw it and place it inside. He said you’d believe me that he hadn’t tampered with it or made a switch. I figured you’d mind-rape me when you touched me and prove it for yourself.”

“You know me so wel .”

Eve laughed, but her dark gaze was hard. “There’s some comfort in knowing most angels are predictable.”

Lindsay looked at the cooler. “Why didn’t Gadara give us the blood when we asked for it yesterday?”

“Control,” Eve and Adrian responded simultaneously.

“Hel ,” Lindsay muttered. “This isn’t a game.”

“In a way it is,” Eve explained. “A game Gadara doesn’t want Adrian to lose, but he doesn’t want Adrian to win without his help. Ambition is the Achil es’ heel of every archangel. In this case, Gadara knew he had the upper hand because it was his blood to give…or not. He just wanted to make sure Adrian knew it, and that Adrian understands he now owes Gadara something for giving it up—it’s always good to have a favor from a seraph in your pocket.”

Lindsay looked at Adrian. “Wel , shit.”

“Lucky you, neshama,” he teased her. “You have an entire seraph in your…pocket.”

She shoved at his shoulder. “Why not come himself and rub it in?”

Eve’s mouth twisted rueful y. “To put me in my place while insulting Adrian by sending an emissary from the bottom of the totem pole. Two birds, one stone. He’s good at that.”

“Wouldn’t it irritate him,” Adrian murmured, “if he knew how delighted I was instead?”

Eve shot a deliberate glance at the two lycans. “There are rumors. I’ve heard a large portion of your workforce has gone on strike. Gadara’s hoping to step in and help you out with that, of course. But if you’re looking to avoid his hefty commission and don’t mind working with grunts under the table, I can get you some referrals. Just let me know.”

Adrian deciphered the message clearly and was grateful for it. His Sentinels weren’t completely hanging in the wind without his lycan “workforce.”

There was help available, if he decided they needed it. Whether or not he did anything with that knowledge wasn’t as important as possessing it to begin with.

Eve moved toward the door. “I brought your paper in,” she said, gesturing at the folded newspaper in a plastic bag dotted with morning dew. “And you should have someone pul your trash cans off the curb. I figured you’re probably not used to worrying about that at Angels’ Point, but some neighborhoods penalize residents who leave them out after trash day. Mortal lives are a bitch.”

He stared at the newspaper as the door shut behind her. Air-conditioning…newspapers…trash… “Someone’s been staying here,” Lindsay muttered. “We lost track of that with Vashti showing up, but she wouldn’t mind the heat, would she? She wouldn’t even think about messing with the AC.”

“No.”

“Who would dare use someone else’s place like this?”

“Perhaps it’s not daring,” he murmured. “Perhaps it’s desperation. Navajo Lake is only a few hours’ drive away.”

“Oh.” The compassion in her eyes stirred his soul.

He could stay and wait them out, but if they feared reprisal, they’d steer clear. They would need reassurance of a different sort.

Glancing at the two lycans, he said, “Ben. Andrew. I’m going to leave you two here. You can deal with the situation. Bring whoever it is back to Angels’ Point, if that’s what they want. If not, let them know this property is going up for sale next week.”

The two guards were quiet a moment. Then one nodded; the other smiled. “Thank you, Adrian.”

“For what?”

“Trusting us,” Ben said.

“And taking us back,” Andrew added.

Adrian looked at Lindsay, at a loss for what to say. Her encouraging smile got him back on track. “Let’s pack up and get to the airport. We need to get these samples to Siobhán.”

She reached for his hand and squeezed. He wondered if she knew what that simple gesture meant to him, how much love and support it conveyed, how quickly he’d come to depend on it. On her.

He’d come to Vegas for blood and was leaving with something far more precious—a deeper connection to the woman who held his heart. In the chaos of his life, facing terrible odds and even more horrifying decisions, Lindsay was his light in the darkness. Shining even when he couldn’t see her.

CHAPTER 17

“Fuckin’ creepy,” Raze muttered, crossing his arms as he leaned into the side of Vash’s rental. “Quiet as a damn tomb.”

Elijah glanced at the vampire and nodded grimly, in accord with the sentiment. His skin was crawling. They’d split up and surrounded the residential subdivision, then worked their way inward, looking for any signs of life. What they’d found was nothing. Nothing at al .

“Where are the newspapers?” Vash asked, moving restlessly. “The mail? The overgrown lawns? You can’t have an entire neighborhood disappear and not leave a trail that someone can fol ow.”

Syre opened the back of the Explorer and began pul ing out weapons. “How do you suggest handling this, Vashti?”

“Two vamps on vantage point—rooftops, each end of the subdivision. Then three teams: one wil take the homes in the center while the other two come around the outer circle on opposite sides. We pick this place apart home by home. The lycans can do the walk-throughs for occupants, while the vamps work on gathering physical data. There has to be a loose thread to pul somewhere.”

“Al right.” He looked at two of the vamps he’d brought with him. “Crash and Lyric, you two are on point. Anything makes a run for it, take it down.”

The two minions each selected a weapon and moved off, their bodies freshly fortified against the noonday sun by Fal en blood.

Elijah waited for further instructions, grateful for the dark sunglasses that hid how he watched Vashti. Her hair was restrained in a ponytail, her body encased in her customary black—the pants he’d shoved down her thighs earlier, paired with a leather vest that zipped from navel to cleavage.

Her creamy skin and bril iant amber eyes captivated him, as everything about her did. His woman. So beautiful and infinitely deadly. A warrior whom other warriors fol owed into battle without question. He adored and valued her, even while she was driving him crazy.

She divided the remaining five vampires into teams of two, two, and one, then turned to him for guidance on how the four lycans should be divided. He put Luke and Trey with the teams of two vamps, and put Himeko under his watch. She could handle herself, but he’d lived—barely— through the Las Vegas attack. If they were facing something like that again, he wanted to be the one who had her back.

He and the other lycans began to undress. He pul ed his shirt over his head and tossed it into the cargo space of the Explorer. Then he toed off his boots and yanked his button fly open.

“What are you doing?” Vashti snapped, having paused with her katana harness in hand.

Brows lifting, he looked at her. “Armoring up, like you.”

The others continued to shed clothes and the vampires resumed the process of strapping weapons to their bodies, but he was keenly aware of their poorly disguised interest in his conversation.

Vash’s gaze darted from his open fly, to Himeko, who was now in bra and panties, then back to him. “You’re not getting naked here.”

Himeko snorted and unclasped her bra. “Nudity is part of what we are. Get used to it, bloodsucker.”

“Absolutely,” Crash said, shooting a glance at her bared breasts. “Great way to kick off a hunt.”

“Shut up.” Vash rounded on Himeko. “And you. You’ve already seen what you’re going to see of him in your lifetime.”

Himeko smiled coldly. “There’l be others. Women with fur instead of fangs.”

Vash twirled one of her katanas in a graceful arc. “Try me, bitch.”

“Vashti—” Elijah sighed, knowing tempers were high. The thril of the hunt was part of that serrated edge, but so too were Micah and Rachel’s ghosts. Animosity lurked beneath the untried and tentative truce between vampires and lycans. Keeping that enmity under wraps was a priority now, considering they were about to rely on each other in a possible life-or-death situation.

“I can get naked, too,” she shot at him. “Start a new trend.”

“Not the same thing and you know it.”

Her arched brow chal enged him, as did her fingers on the pul of her zipper.

Shooting her a look that spoke volumes, he rounded the front of the Explorer and shifted, returning a moment later with his jeans between his teeth. He dropped them at her feet.

“Thank you.” She picked them up and threw them into the cargo space with the rest of the clothes. Then she strapped on her blades, gave a nod to Syre—who sported a wicked-looking repeating crossbow—and they flowed outward from the vehicles to begin the hunt.

Elijah wasn’t surprised when Vashti joined him and Himeko, but it was a circumstance that was far from ideal. Keeping an eye on either headstrong woman was tough enough. Having two of them at odds with each other made it dangerous.

The tension between the three of them was forgotten the moment they entered the first house. The two-story single-family dwel ing was comfortably furnished and welcoming. There were no signs of disturbance. In fact, he could almost think it was a model home, everything being in its proper place…including the family photos on the mantel. He looked at them, noting youthful parents and three children, the smal est being an infant.

Loping up the stairs, he searched the bedrooms. There, he found signs of life—rumpled beds, children’s toys scattered on the floor, clothes spil ing from hampers. There was a trash can in the baby’s room that had a soiled diaper in it, and a bottle of rotting formula lay half ful in the crib.

Vash entered the nursery behind him. “There are messages on the voice mail. Cal s from the dad’s work asking where he’s been. Same with the mom and a carpool she’s got going for the kids. Looks like we’re on day four now.”

The next several homes were more of the same. By the eighth house, Elijah decided to check the backyard as wel . As with the other homes, Vash joined him after only a few moments. It struck him then that she was hovering.

He growled at her, but she played it cool. Stil , he read the anxiety in her body language—she was afraid to let him do his job.

Shifting, he confronted her. “Stop smothering me.”

She scowled and blocked the view from the house with her body. “Put your damn fur back on before Himeko comes out here.”

“For fuck’s sake. Nudity doesn’t automatical y equate to sex in a lycan’s mind.”

“She’s female. In case you hadn’t noticed, they drool al over you when you’re clothed. When you’re like this”—she gestured at his body with an impatient wave of her hand—“you’re asking to be molested.”

His nose twitched as he smel ed the first tendrils of her arousal. “Again? On a hunt? Jesus, you’re going to screw me to death.”

She flushed and shifted restlessly. “If you don’t want me hot and bothered, don’t run around naked!”

Softened by her obvious embarrassment and understanding how helpless they both were against the pul between them, he said more gently, “I don’t need a bodyguard, Vashti. Go do your thing; let me do mine.”

“You say that as if it’s easy. Those fuckers want you worse than the damn women do! I watched them tear you to pieces once. I won’t do it again. I c-can’t.”

“Vash.” His throat tightened at the pain he saw on her beautiful face. “Sweetheart—”

“Don’t.” She glared at him. So fierce and strong, yet fragile. “You got me into this mess.”

“What mess?” But he knew. And if they’d been anywhere else, he would have kissed her senseless.

“This mess!” She waved an impatient hand between them. “You and me. Us.”

“Us.”