Мишель Роуэн - Lady & the Vamp

The main werewolf grabbed the guy by his grease-stained apron and shoved him up against the cash register. The others stood back with their arms crossed in front of them. The manager was shaking now, and he turned and looked in Janie and Quinn's direction.

Then he pointed.

The werewolf dropped him and immediately came over to stand in front of Janie and Quinn's booth,

followed by his friends.

She pushed back the memory of the wolf's teeth in her leg and the sudden urge she got to run.

"Where is he?" Werewolf number one growled.

Janie's gaze shot to Quinn, who looked surprisingly calm.

"Who?" he asked.

"That damned coward Matthew Barkley. Where is he?"

"I still don't know what you're talking about."

Out of the corner of Janie's eye she noticed that the manager was approaching the werewolves with a tray.

"I have t-two coffees, a c-c-cappuccino and a d-decaf here," he said with a distinct tremble to his words.

The main werewolf turned and grabbed one of the mugs without a thank-you, then turned back to Quinn.

"Look, I'm in a shitty mood today. Wife's got me on decaf, and I love my coffee. Something to do with it causing my migraines."

"Sorry to hear that."

He took a sip and grimaced. "Disgusting." He smashed the mug against the floor.

"I'll g-go and make a f-fresh pot." The manager skulked away as the beast shot him a scowl.

Quinn and Janie exchanged a look.

"That your car?" The cranky, decaffeinated werewolf gestured out of the window toward the decimated car.

Quinn shrugged. "If it was, I'd be pretty pissed about what you did to it, wouldn't I?"

"'Cause that's the car that Barkley was in." His eyes narrowed. "And you were driving it."

Janie let out a long, exasperated sigh. She didn't have time for this garbage. She stood up from the booth and looked up—way up—at the werewolf.

"Why don't you go away now? Obviously the guy you're looking for isn't here."

"Who asked you, bitch?"

"How did you know my pet name?"

The werewolf eyed Quinn. "This your girlfriend?"

Quinn snorted at that. "Not by a long shot."

The werewolf moved to face Janie completely and then backhanded her across her right cheek. She fell back into the booth and hit the wall, the back of her head smacking the window.

Her eyes bugged. Why she hadn't expected that, she wasn't sure. Her cheek burned almost as much as her sudden surge of hot anger.

But before she could get back up and cram her own mug of caffeine down wolf-dick's throat, Quinn sprang up to his feet.

"That how you treat women around here?" There was a definite edge to his voice now.

"Women who get in my way."

Quinn glanced at the other men, who had placed their mugs down on the top of an adjacent table.

They sized each other up, and Quinn's upper lip curled back from his fangs in a dangerous smile.

The werewolf raised an eyebrow. "What are you going to do about it,vampire ?"

"Nothing. I was just asking." He sat back down. "You okay, Janie?"

"Just fine," she said calmly.

The werewolf snorted and then turned back to look at Janie, who now had her gun out. This timeshe smiled. The werewolf's face fell.

The familiar weight of theFirestar immediately calmed her. "In case you were wondering… yes, it is filled with silver bullets. And yes, I have killed a werewolf before. Sometimes I even get paid for it, and those aren't even the ones who lay a finger on me first. So you and your coffee-drinking friends should probably leave now, because oddly enough, I'm not in a very good mood anymore."

He didn't flinch. "I've never met a woman who didn't back down when confronted with a big strong man."

His eyes changed to wolf gold, and his lips curled back from rapidly sharpening teeth.

She lowered the gun and shot him in the upper thigh.

He howled in pain and staggered backward. The diner went completely silent.

She held out her left hand, palm up. "Give me the keys to your truck."

The other men eyed her and the gun warily.

"Now," she added.

A set of keys flew through the air, and she caught them with one hand. She tossed them at Quinn.

"Oh, and in case you've never been shot before," she said to the whimpering werewolf, "a wound from a silver bullet will take nearly one year to fully heal."

He glared at her, pain in his eyes. "I'm going to kill you."

"Honey, if I had a nickel for every time I've heard that." She glanced at Quinn. "Let's go, handsome."

He eyed her as he tossed a twenty on the table. "Yes, ma'am."

They weren't followed to the parking lot. Quinn grabbed a duffel bag from the back of the decimated rental car, and they got into the Ford Ranger. The tires squealed as Quinn peeled out of the parking lot.

Janie watched the Stardust Diner grow smaller and smaller in the rearview mirror and waited for her heart to stop pounding like a jackhammer.

Quinn wasn't exactly sure if he should be pissed off or impressed. He wanted to be the former but was feeling that more of the latter than was probably healthy.

Which left him with a sick feeling in the pit of his stomach. He was hoping for a chance to escape from

Little MissMerc as soon as possible, but the way Janie handled that gun, the way she handled those werewolves…

She was a professional. A cold, calculating professional, and she wanted the Eye. He had no idea how she knew about it. It was a secret, or at least he thought it was. He wasn't giving it up without a fight, but now that he'd seen a small bit of what she could do, he knew it was going to be a slightly more difficult one.

However, Quinn was no pushover himself.

She hadn't said anything since they'd left the diner and basically stolen the werewolves' truck. Not that he felt guilty about it. He wasn't going to take a baseball bat to it like they'd done with his rental. Then again, maybe he could let out a little stress when he was finished with it. It's not like it was a new model or anything.

He gripped the steering wheel tightly when he thought about Barkley. Had he left him at the diner earlier as he'd planned, the werewolves would have gotten him. Now, instead, he was with Lenny. He wasn't sure what was worse.

Three months ago he wouldn't have given a shit about the fate of a werewolf. But now things were different. Very different.

Damn, he thought.Why does everything have to be so complicated ?

Quinn glanced at Janie again and wracked his brain. How could he deal with this crazy chick? After going through a dozen scenarios, he decided there were only two courses of action that would potentially work.

Kill her.

That was the worst-case scenario. Was he willing to kill somebody to get to the Eye? How much did he want it? A lot. But enough to kill for it?

He wasn't ready to answer that question. Not yet.

His second option was something that caused him even more apprehension.

It was no secret that when Janie had been a kid she'd had a crush on him. All he remembered was a little blond girl with freckles who used to play with her dolls. She also took care of her adorable younger sister, Angela, quite a bit and tried to keep her from watching what he and Peter were up to. Playing

Hunter and Vampire like some kids played Cowboys and Indians. She'd protected her sister from seeing that, but he remembered catching her watching from around a corner.

So she'd liked him back then. If he went with this plan, he was banking on herstill liking him. At least enough so that he could charm her into helping him. Or just going away. Either would be good.

He almost laughed. Sure. He was a full-fledged, blood-drinking vampire. He'd been involved in her brother's death. He looked like hell and felt even worse.