Christian nodded toward the main entrance. “Now that’s a door of a woman.”
I furrowed my brow at the odd expression and glanced at a woman who could have been a linebacker. “Are you ever nice to people of the female persuasion?”
“Of course I am.” He leaned toward me and pointed. “I was nice to that one, that one, and the bonnie one in the white dress was especially nice to me.”
I blinked in surprise and he laughed, shaking his head and facing forward again.
A waitress appeared and placed a basket of food in front of Christian. “Are you the footlong?”
He slowly turned, undressing her with his eyes. “Ten, actually. But I’ve heard it feels like twelve.”
“And hot dog number three,” she said, setting a basket in front of me and strutting off.
Christian nearly spit out his drink as he looked over at my meal. “Have you got worms? A parasite maybe? I don’t see where you put it all.”
I took a bite, careful not to smudge my lipstick. “I work better when I’m fed.”
“I thought you were too good for bar hot dogs.”
I licked my finger. “If I didn’t have on lipstick, I would have ordered the Angus burger with extra cheese.”
“You could just order the whole heifer.”
We’d arrived early so as not to raise suspicion. It gave me time to hang out, have a few drinks, and mingle, which made me less anxious. Viktor wasn’t sure if Darius’s men would show up, but an hour earlier, Christian’s eyes had slanted toward three men entering the bar. He gave me a subtle nod, and I spent my time assessing the group. I wanted the weak link in the chain, so I first had to figure out who that was and then how to lure him away from his group.
These guys had their sunglasses on, making it impossible for Christian to get close enough. Even if he could, a Vampire didn’t have the ability to charm three people at once since they had to look them directly in the eye. Viktor warned us that outside the bar, they were always on alert, ready to stake or stab anything within a ten-foot radius.
This was the first time I’d sat down with Christian, so we pretended to be strangers who happened to be eating beside each other.
I’d watched him seducing beautiful women for an hour, and they were quite smitten with him. At one point, he’d backed a brunette up against a wall and placed his hand on her hip while whispering in her ear. He looked at her so differently than the way he looked at me, which was usually with cold indifference.
So much for having a guard.
Through process of elimination, I narrowed down the leader to the jerk who kept snapping his fingers at the waitress and pointing at their empty glasses. Out of the other two guys, the little one was my initial target, but he was so shy he’d look away when a woman walked past. Getting him alone would be as easy as bathing a cat.
That left contestant number three, who was tall, dark, and not so handsome. He had a face only a mother could love… after six shots of whiskey. Two missing teeth, a crooked nose, and sweaty.
Oh, how I loathed the sweaty guys. Not the ones with that fine sheen of what I liked to call “man mist” but the ones with fat drops of sweat rolling down their temples, even in a blizzard.
He was attentive with the waitress and admired the women who sauntered past their table. None had given him the green light, so he remained seated. It appeared this guy was searching for an opportunity but didn’t want to take a chance with rejection.
Separating him from his buddies was going to be a challenge that required a little ingenuity.
I hopped off my barstool and slid my plate toward Christian. “You can finish my hot dog.”
As I strutted across the bar, my peripheral caught my target’s head turning in my direction. I made brief eye contact with him and smiled coyly, making sure he saw my interest. My destination was a jukebox just a few tables over. Breed bars loved jukeboxes, so I leaned over and gave him a nice view of my ass as I studied the song selection.
After counting to ten, I straightened up and pretended to fix my hair in the mirror, searching for an opportunity around me. When I saw a man on my right heading my way with a pint in hand, I sprang into action and crashed into him.
“Ah, shit!” he grumbled, the glass shattering on the floor.
Beer splashed all over my dress, and I gasped, stepping back with a horrified expression.
Darius’s man rose from his chair and stalked in our direction. I could tell he was the kind of guy who wanted to be the badass in life, and maybe that suit made him feel more important than everyone else in a low-class bar.
“Why don’t you apologize to the lady?” he said.
The man with the empty glass didn’t look like he wanted trouble.
Especially after Darius’s goon opened his jacket and showed him a gun and two daggers.
And now I knew what he was armed with.
The man nodded at me apologetically and backed away, his hands raised in a defensive gesture.