I raised my hands in surrender, barely breathing. How did an attacker get inside the most guarded room in the club?
“Good. Now follow my instructions exactly. I am going to calmly lead you out of here as though nothing’s wrong. If you scream or otherwise alert anyone that that’s not the case, I will kill you—don’t think I won’t either. I promise you, I mean every word.” He said this with such lethal coolness that I believed him.
But I’d also watched enough CourtTV to know that once I left the premise with him, my chances of survival drastically decreased. And that realization was the straw that broke the camel’s back. I’d had a really shitty day already, and I. Just. Couldn’t. Take it. Anymore.
From within me I felt something release, and a wave of power washed over me.
Moving fast, I grabbed the hand that held the knife to my throat and squeezed. He screamed and dropped the knife.
Using the arm I held as leverage, I catapulted him over my shoulder, vaguely impressed I could throw a grown man across the room. He hit the far wall and slid down.
I walked over to where he lay gasping, put a hand to his throat, and squeezed. “What do you want with me?”
“Abomination,” he wheezed. And then he threw me off of him.
I skidded along the floor, but before I had the chance to get up, he was on top of me. He cocked an arm back and punched me repeatedly in the face. Something crunched, and blood poured from my nose. The smell of it triggered something primal, and I felt my canines elongate in response. My nose stung badly, and my eyes teared up from the pain.
Believing me sufficiently incapacitated, he stood up and picked up the knife where he dropped it. I backed up, still on my back. My self-defense classes hadn’t prepared me for this. I didn’t know how to fight, and this guy did. But I had more to lose.
Almost casually the man walked back over to me. He kneeled down over my body. “Hmm, if you won’t leave quietly, I’ll just have to kill you now.” He ran a hand down my face, toying with me. My attacker was enjoying this. Enjoying my pain and the slow process of ending another life.
I moved quickly, kicking him swiftly in the chest. He fell back, and I followed him. We rolled together, grappling for possession of the knife. I grabbed his free hand and bent his wrist back until I heard a snap. He howled in agony, and I made the mistake of relaxing. With his good hand he sliced the dagger down my cheek and drove it towards my heart. I jerked my body to the side at the last minute, and my attacker plunged the knife into my shoulder. I screamed.
Behind us the door opened, and then a roar eclipsed my scream. I saw the whites of my attacker’s eyes a second before his body was torn away from mine and flung across the room like a rag doll. I heard the sickening crack as his body hit the far wall and the plaster gave.
Andre stood at my feet, looking like a fallen angel. A very pissed off fallen angel.
“Take him away!” I heard him order his bodyguards.
Andre bent over me, concerned. “I am so sorry,” he whispered.
Andre’s gaze flicked to the knife that was still plunged in my shoulder before shifting back to me.
“I need you to stare me in the eyes,” he commanded. “Don’t look away.”
I glanced at his hand, which he’d wrapped around the hilt of the dagger.
“No,” I whimpered.
“Gabrielle, focus on me. Focus.” I stared into his eyes and felt everything fall away. It was just him, me, and that whimsical feeling I could really get used to. And then it all shattered as Andre yanked the knife out of my shoulder.
The scream ripped from me.
“Shhhh.” Andre soothed me like I was a small child. Someone handed him a towel, and he used it to halt the bleeding. It took many minutes for the pain and nausea to become manageable.
“Aren’t you supposed to give me a drink before you go about pulling out knives?”
That earned a chuckle. “I can’t be giving alcohol to minors. I might lose my liquor license.”
I rolled my eyes. As if Andre actually followed the rules.
“I think my nose is broken,” I said.
He glanced down at my nose. “Then it already healed itself.”
“What?” I realized the pain in my face had lessened. “How is that possible?”
He picked me up, somehow managing to shrug even as he carried me.
“Vampires heal much more rapidly than normal humans,” he said.
We passed back into the VIP common room, where people huddled in clusters, some with their camera phones pulled out, taking shots of us.
“I can walk, really,” I said, struggling against him. Reluctantly he put me down. “So vampires heal quickly. But I’m still human, aren’t I?”
A crease appeared right between Andre’s eyebrows. I tried not to think about how breathtakingly gorgeous he looked.