chapter 23
It was already late afternoon, and despite the fact that he’d slept a good eight hours, Blake felt exhausted. They had really worked him in the gym overnight. He would never admit it though, not to Wesley, who seemed totally full of himself, nor to any of the trainers. He would make it through this training if it killed him. Not that he was all that clear about what exactly he was training for. Quinn had been kind of vague about it.
But right now, it didn’t matter, because he’d just discovered that in addition to the extremely beautiful Rose there was another female trainer. She had simply introduced herself as Nina. The woman was drop-dead gorgeous with a sassy attitude to match. Oh, yeah! That was how he liked his women: ample boobs, dick sucking lips, and strong legs. He could tell that Nina had all of that and more to boot.
On top of it she was a natural blonde, her hair only reaching to about chin length. A bit tomboyish, but sexy and feminine at the same time.
Blake allowed his eyes to roam over her hot body while she projected the dullest PowerPoint presentation he’d ever been made to sit through onto the white wall in front of him.
He could tell that the room wasn’t really meant for this purpose. At one point it had probably been a small dining room, and for a moment he wondered why classroom instruction wasn’t held at the facility where he’d passed his test.
At least he was the only student. Wesley had made himself scarce after grabbing a coffee in the kitchen, and Nina hadn’t stopped him. Maybe she didn’t mind being alone with him. After all, she had given him an assessing look when he’d shaken her hand. There was no harm in trying his luck.
Nina was about his age, in fact, now that he thought of it, all the people at the house looked rather young, even the trainers. Even Quinn couldn’t be any older than twenty-five. How had they all gotten to be trainers at such an early age? Well, at least that probably meant that the company wasn’t stodgy, and it was possible to get promoted quickly. Which was just up his alley. The faster he could rise to the top and let other people do the grunt work the better.
“Oh darn,” Nina suddenly cursed.
She shook the wireless controller that allowed her to advance the slides. She pressed the button again and again, but the slide didn’t move.
Blake jumped up from his chair and approached her. “Let me see. Could just be a loose connection.”
He reached for the remote in her hand, moving a step closer than necessary. He was a good head taller than she, and from his vantage point he had a clear view at her cleavage. Her T-shirt stretched over her boobs, and he noticed that she wasn’t wearing a bra.
Beads of sweat suddenly formed on his forehead.
“Here, maybe it’s the battery.” Nina’s voice drifted to him.
Absentmindedly, he took the remote from her hand and turned it over, sliding the back covering off. But his focus was still on her breasts, making his fingers slip.
The batteries fell to the floor, the sound echoing loudly in the small room. Quickly, he crouched down to snatch them up before they had a chance to roll underneath the table.
When he reared up again, he bounced against Nina, his shoulder brushing her breast. The action wedged her between him and the table.
He lashed his practiced grin at her. “Oops, how clumsy of me.”
“I’d advise you to take a step back before you get in trouble,” she said, her eyes narrowing.
“Trouble can be fun sometimes.” He let his eyes travel lower. Oh yeah, a lot of fun.
“Second time I tell you, it’ll hurt.”
He pulled one corner of his mouth up into a smirk. “What is it, some sort of rule that trainees and trainers can’t get friendly? I won’t tell if you won’t.”
“Agreed then.” She smiled sweetly. “Then you won’t tell anybody about this.”
Her hands came up and forcefully pushed him back. Surprised by her sudden movement, he stumbled and fell against one of the chairs, taking it down with him. Before he could get up, the door burst open and like a blur, somebody entered. His eyes couldn’t process the movement fast enough.
Only once the person stopped in front of him and pulled him up by the front of his shirt, did he recognize him: Amaury.
Blake couldn’t move. He could only stare—at the glaring red eyes and the teeth that were protruding from his mouth.
“Shit!”
“Baby, I had it under control,” Nina said calmly from behind him.
Amaury ignored her, his chest heaving, his head leaning in. “You touch her one more time, you’re a dead man. She’s mine!”
F*ck! Why had nobody told him that those two were an item? Not that this was his biggest problem right now.
Nina pushed into view, arms crossed over her chest, scowling at her man. “There was no need for that.”
Amaury tossed her a quick look. “There was need.” His voice sounded more like the growl of an animal than that of a man.
“What are you?” Blake croaked.
Staring at his pointy teeth, he already knew the answer, but couldn’t process it. Vampires didn’t exist. Shit, had he gotten drunk last night and was he now hallucinating?
“What’s going on?” another voice came from the door, before the person came into view: Cain, one of the trainers.
He wore pajama bottoms, and now that Blake looked down at Amaury, he realized that he too was only half dressed. He wore a pair of jeans and nothing else. Amaury’s gaze swung back to his colleague.
“Nothing to worry about.”
Cain, dark hair messy, and clearly still somewhat sleepy, appeared to disagree. “Hate to point it out, but are you aware that your fangs are showing? I thought the kid wasn’t supposed to know.”
“Uh, merde!”Amaury let out. Then he shot Nina a somewhat apologetic look. “Sorry, chérie.”
Nina just shook her head. “You really thought I couldn’t handle a little punk like him? Puh-lease!”
Then Amaury turned back to him, set him on his two feet, which for the first time since Blake could remember, wobbled, and gingerly brushed his disheveled shirt straight as if that would make things better.
Hell, it didn’t change anything about the fact that that man was a vampire!
Blake jumped back, eager to get out of the guy’s reach, but unfortunately, this . . . thing . . . Amaury, was between him and the door. Could he make it to the window, open it and jump out? He tossed a quick look in that direction. The blinds were drawn. Nina had done that earlier to make it easier to see the PowerPoint presentation.
Maybe if he could pull the blinds up fast enough, the sun would kill the bastard. He lunged for the cord, but a split-second later, Amaury had him by the collar again and held him back.
“What’s going on here?”
At the sound of Quinn’s thundering voice, Blake let out a sigh of relief. He whirled around.
“He’s a vampire! Amaury’s a vampire. You gotta help me.”
Quinn rolled his eyes and stared at Amaury. “That’s just great. I brought you here to help, not to mess things up.”
“He accosted Nina.”
“He was trying to flirt with me!” Nina corrected him. “He didn’t succeed, but my big macho man here had to burst into the room in vampire speed and flash his fangs at our guest.”
Amaury narrowed his eyes at her. “You and I will have a word in private in a minute.”
Nina didn’t back down from the threat. Instead, a red flush crept up her cheeks.
Blake did a double take. What the f*ck? This was all just too freaking weird! He had to get out of here. Using Amaury’s temporary distraction, he ran for the door.
Cain cut him off, holding him back, slinging his arm around him. As Blake struggled to free himself, his opponent didn’t even take an extra breath.
“What do you want to do with him now?” he asked Quinn.
Suddenly the door opened and Rose entered, wearing a short robe. Blake couldn’t stop his eyes from trailing down her long legs. Yeah, shit, that kind of thinking was what had gotten him into trouble in the first place.
Rose glared at Cain. “Let him go.”
Cain looked at Quinn, asking for approval. “If I let go of him, he’s gonna run.”
“Why?” Rose’s tone was sharp.
“He saw Amaury in his vampire form,” Quinn explained.
“Oh, my god! How can you do this to him? You have to wipe his memory. Now.”
Blake twisted and turned under Cain’s hold. They wanted to wipe his memory? How on earth were they gonna do that? He knew what he’d seen, and there was no way in hell he’d ever forget that. They could inject him with whatever drug they wanted, but this memory would stay with him.
“No! Let me go. You can’t keep me here, you can’t do this to me. I’m an American citizen, I have rights,” Blake yelled.
“Join the club,” Cain said dryly. “We’re American’s too. Same rights.”
Quinn glanced at him, then back at Rose. “Maybe he should know. He has a right to know what’s going on.”
Rose vehemently shook her head. “No. He can’t know. He has a right to a normal life.”
It took seconds until Quinn finally nodded. “As you wish.” He motioned to Amaury. “Do it.”
Panic thundering through his veins, Blake thrashed about, kicking Cain, but the man wasn’t even swaying an inch, as if he was built as strong and indestructible as a tank.
“Shit!”
“It won’t hurt,” Amaury assured and locked eyes with him.
For whatever odd reason, Blake couldn’t pull his gaze from the vampire. Fascinated, he stared into his blue eyes. He’d never seen anything that blue. Even the ocean couldn’t compete with the beautiful color.
In the background he heard words, but as soon as they entered his head, they vanished again. Around him everything felt like cotton candy, soft and warm. His eyelids felt heavy, falling over his eyes. For a moment everything went dark and quiet.
When he opened his eyes again, he needed a second to find his bearings.
“Darn fire alarm,” Quinn said, yawning. “But not to worry. It was just a fuse blowing. We’re good.”
Blake nodded and looked into the round. All the trainers were assembled. The door opened and Wesley and Oliver trotted in.
“What’s going on?” Wesley asked.
“Didn’t you hear the fire bell go off?” Quinn asked.
Wesley’s chin dropped. “Huh?”
For the first time, Blake sympathized with Wesley: he hadn’t heard the fire alarm either. Maybe he’d been too engrossed watching his pretty trainer as she presented the most boring slides about the history of security anybody could assemble.
“Well, since we’re all awake now, we might as well get ready for our next training assignment,” Quinn announced.
Blake listened up. He hoped whatever it was, it was more interesting than the PowerPoint presentation. “What kind of training?”
“It’s a game of evasion.”