Мишель Роуэн - Lady & the Vamp

He also had the soul of a poet. A bad poet.

And unfortunately, he had a massive crush (unrequited) on Janie and wrote a great deal of that bad poetry about her.

They'd been working together for almost a year. She'd recently requested a change in partners, but the

Company took its own sweet time when it came to things like that.

She turned around in the black Mustang convertible to check the back seat.

Five wooden stakes. Check.

Two silver daggers. Check.

Stun gun. Check.

Gun with garlic darts that worked as a tranquilizer to temporarily knock out any unsuspecting vamps.

Check.

Her favorite gun—a sturdy and reliable Firestar with silver bullets for the werewolf companion. Check.

She decided to carry the gun with silver bullets. The bullets would work on vamp or werewolf. She turned around to grab it and put it in the shoulder holster under her new navy blue Anne Klein jacket and added two wooden stakes and the stun gun to her designer handbag arsenal, just in case. As a last thought, she added the gun withtranq darts. It would weigh her down a bit, but a girl could never be well armed enough when it came to fighting monsters.

"How will we know who they are?" Lenny asked, scanning the area of the diner.

It was a good question. The Stardust Diner was a busy location, right next to the heavily traveled highway. A good place to grab lunch or take a bathroom break while on the way to one's final destination. Vamps and weres could easily blend in with regular humans, and the Boss hadn't given her a heads-up on their appearance.

It was noon. She knew that sunlight didn't bother vamps, contrary to the popular myth. Most could go out at any time of the day or night. Usually they were a little weaker during daylight hours and also quite sun sensitive, so they could typically be spotted wearing sunglasses even on an overcast day. But today the sun was blazing bright in the sky and everyone in the area wore sunglasses. No help there.

Vampires definitely didn't have reflections. That might be a clue. The diner was surrounded by windows that reflected the surroundings.

She twisted her turquoise necklace until her fingers felt numb. "Just watch for anything out of the ordinary."

"So when we find them, you want me to beat any information out of them?"

She shook her head. "Too many witnesses. Let me handle it, and you be there for backup. The note said they'd be here by now, so keep your eyes peeled."

"While we're waiting, you want to hear my latest?" Lenny flipped through his ever-present notebook.

"Not particularly."

"Oh, come on."

She sighed. It's not as if he ever took no for an answer. Why did she even bother trying to resist?

He cleared his throat. "It's called 'Janie's Got a Gun':

Janie's got a gun

She's got the bad guys on the run

If you're a Were…

Beware

If you're a vampire ain't no liar

'Cause Janie's got a gun!'

That, surprisingly enough, was one of the better ones she'd heard lately.

Janie nodded. "Great."

Lenny beamed. "Thanks."

A car pulled up across from them. A blue Ford Escort. The doors opened up, and two men got out.

Janie gasped and sank down in her seat. "Oh, shit."

Lenny turned to her. "What's wrong?"

She grabbed his arm to make him sink down below window level. "Shhh."

Then she raised herself up just enough to peer over the dashboard. Her stomach began to churn.

Well, there was her sign.

One vampire and one werewolf, right on schedule.

The vampire was broad shouldered. His clothes, a simple dark green T-shirt and faded blue jeans, fit his lean but muscular frame perfectly. His dark blond hair was shorter than she remembered it. She could see only half of his handsome face and square jaw which was speckled with stubble, and those lips—she'd dreamed of those lips many times before—beneath a straight nose. Dark sunglasses that covered eyes she knew were a dark ocean blue turned her way as he scanned the area before entering the diner.

The werewolf was a little taller, about the same build, with black hair. He was smiling. The vamp wasn't.

Lenny elbowed her. "Hey, don't you know that guy?"

Janie didn't answer. What were the odds? The Boss must have known. This had to be another test to make sure she was loyal to the Company.

A dozen years ago, Michael Quinn had been her brother's friend and Janie's childhood crush. She'd seen him recently and had the chance to kill him once she'd realized he'd become a vampire. But she couldn't do it. Instead she knocked him out with garlic darts, since he was blocking her way to what she was after at the time.

But her sister's life wasn't at risk then. It was now.

She didn't give a damn about any vampire, no matter who he used to be.

She'd do what it took to save Angela.Whatever it took.

"Hamburger, fries, Coke." Barkley finished scanning the menu and glanced up at the waitress, giving her a charming smile. "Do you still have that fantastic apple pie here?"

"Sure do, hon."

"Gimme two pieces of that. With ice cream. Please."

The waitress turned to Quinn. "And for you?"

"Coffee. Black."

"You should eat more than that. You look a little thin. And pale."

Quinn frowned. "Coffee. Black."

She raised an eyebrow disapprovingly, closed her order pad, and gave them the back of her ample frame as she went toward the kitchen.

"You do know how to charm the ladies." Barkley played with the salt shaker and glanced absently out the window at the parking lot.

"It's a gift."

Quinn tossed the car keys on the table and leaned back into his side of the booth, letting out a long sigh.

He already felt guilty about abandoning Barkley at the diner, and he hadn't even done it yet. It felt like he was throwing a puppy out of the car and driving away without him. But Barkley wasn't a puppy. He could take care of himself.

Besides, he'd noticed that there was a bus stop right outside the diner. When he left, Barkley would hop on a bus, headed to wherever he wanted to go. Everybody would get what they want. No problem.

What would he do once he found the Eye and made his wish to be human again? It's not like he could go back to his regular life, was it? He'd learned the hard way that hunting vampires was wrong. He was one of the very few who'd had a chance to see both sides of the coin.

He'd been a hunter for ten years. In training before that, but he was twenty when he made his first kill.

He shuddered at the thought. His father had brainwashed him since he was a kid that all vamps were evil. Different from humans. Killers who needed to be stopped by any means necessary, no matter how human or innocent they appeared. What he didn't fully realize was that his father was a zealot who relished the chance to wipe out anything different from himself from the face of the earth. Who had used the fears of others to strengthen his case against vampires. He'd convinced Quinn that it was a vamp who'd killed his mother when he was only six years old. But it wasn't. His mother had fallen in love with a vampire, and become a vampire herself, and when his father learned of this, he'd ended them both without a moment of mercy.

Quinn's whole life since that day had been a lie.

He'd killed a lot of vamps in his time. He knew without a shadow of a doubt that some of them were truly evil. When the thirst came upon vampires they lost their minds, and become black-eyed monsters who didn't care who they hurt to get to their next meal. Some vamps were plain evil, just as some humans were. Serial killers existed in all walks of life. But most vamps weren't evil. Just different.

He'd killed them all, figuring that their begging and pleading had been a ruse—that if he'd turned his back on them they would have ripped out his throat.