Lisa Childs - Mistress of the Underground

“Why are you around now, Ben?”

Guilt. Fear. Love. He could have named any of them and been speaking the truth. But then he’d have to explain something that defied explanation. The damn secret society…

“I’m worried about you,” he said. “You’re in danger.”

If she was worried about him falling for her again, it was already too late—no matter that they had no future.

“You keep leaving,” she reminded him, “you just take off, with no warning, with no explanation of where you’re going or where you’ve been.”

“I have patients. I have a responsibility to them.” No matter what they were.

“What about us? You can’t protect me if you’re not here.”

“I’ll be here,” he vowed.

Dear Reader,

I am so thrilled to be writing for Mills & Boon® Nocturne™. I’m especially happy to be back in the city I created in my Nocturne Bite, Secret Vampire Society , and revisited in Nothing Says Christmas Like a Vampire , which appears in the M&B Christmas with a Vampire collection.

In Mistress of the Underground , Paige Culver discovers the Secret Vampire Society, but no mortal can learn about that secret group and continue to live. Unless that mortal is Dr Benjamin Davison, Paige’s ex-husband, who has reluctantly become the surgeon to the supernatural.

Ben can heal beasts, but his secret life prevented him from saving what mattered most to him—his marriage. When attempts are made on Paige’s life, Ben tries to protect her but worries that he’s only endangering her more. To save her, he might have to finally let her go.

I hope you enjoy your return to the Underground with Paige and Ben.

Happy reading!

Lisa Childs

www.millsandboon.co.uk

LISA CHILDShas been writing since she could first form sentences. At eleven she won her first writing award and was interviewed by the local newspaper. That story’s plot revolved around a kidnapping, probably something she wished on any of her six siblings. A Halloween birthday predestined a life of writing paranormal and intrigue.

Readers can write to Lisa at PO Box 139, Marne, MI 49435, USA, or visit her at her website, www.lisachilds.com.

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To Tara Gavin, my amazing editor, who always understands how important my characters are to me.

Thank you so much for giving me the opportunity to tell Paige and Ben’s story!

You don’t belong here…

The skin tingled on the nape of Paige Culver’s neck, and she shivered. To assure herself she was alone, she glanced around her small, windowless office. Light penetrated the green glass shade of the lamp on her desk but didn’t dissipate the shadows clinging to the worn-brick walls.

You don’t belong here…

That voice wasn’t real; it had to be only in her head. Her own voice verbalizing the doubts that had tormented her since she’d bought Club Underground. She was a lawyer. What the hell did she know about running a lounge?

Actually, she wasn’t a lawyer anymore—at least not one with a firm where she could practice. So she’d bought the club, which occupied the basement of a traditional brick office building in downtown Zantrax, the city which had replaced Detroit as the urban metropolis of Michigan. The building was the only thing traditional about Club Underground.

Music throbbed through the sound system, tempting Paige to leave the office and join the action. She pushed paperwork aside and stood up, swaying slightly on her stilettos as nerves assailed her again.

Opening night. Actually, reopening night, under new management, but yet she’d hidden herself back here, away from the club patrons. Would everyone else think, as she did, that she did not belong here?

“To hell with them,” she murmured with the flash of pride and stubbornness that sometimes irritated the people she cared about. And to hell with what she thought, too. “There’s no turning back now…”

With a slightly trembling hand, she smoothed down her flyaway strands of blond hair. Then she smoothed her hands over her hips, settling the red silk against her body.

Would he be out there? Waiting to congratulate her? Or to question her sanity? She didn’t care which, as long as he was near—close enough to touch.

Anxious now, she hurried from the office, barely remembering to turn the lock before pulling the door closed behind her. In the hall, the music played louder, the bass lower and sexier. She glanced toward the door that separated the hall from the lounge. Then she glanced back the other way. To the door in the brick wall at the end of the hall. The door that led nowhere—according to the club manager. Then why was it locked?

You don’t belong here…

The voice had to be inside her head; how else could she have heard it over the volume of the music? She shivered again, but from cold, not fear, and considered unlocking the office to retrieve her sweater. But it would ruin the effect of the dress with its thin straps and low neckline.

She didn’t regret her decision, at least regarding the sweater, as she stepped into the lounge. It would have been out of place, would have made her look more out of place than she already felt among the bodies gyrating on the dance floor. She didn’t have the tiny waist or sharp curves of the women; her curves were rounder, fuller. And she was so much older, not just in years but in experience, than those laughing, flirting girls.

They were twenty-one, at least, or they wouldn’t have been allowed inside the club. But no lines creased or dark shadows touched their clear skin. Self-conscious, Paige lifted a hand to her cheek. From her sleepless nights, she had dark circles and lines of stress. Not just because of her impetuous purchase…

But because of him…

She glanced around the bar in the lowest level of the turn-of-the-century building. Like her office, the outer walls were exposed brick, and the interior ones were dark paneled and as highly polished as the hardwood floors. The lights were dim, candles on the intimate tables and booths, strobes flashing sexily across the dance floor. She recognized no one among the crowd. Had none of her friends shown up to wish her well? Of course, she hadn’t given them much notice about the club. She hadn’t told anyone about what had been going on in her life. Not even he knew everything.

He knew nothing —actually, not a thing about this woman…but that she was gorgeous. The muscles tightened in Ben’s gut as he studied her moving around the club, as bright and fluid as a flame. He tracked her through the crowd. In her red dress, with her golden hair, she stood out among the others with their dark clothes and their darker agendas. She didn’t belong…for so many reasons.

“Hey—”

He ignored the voices calling out and the hands reaching for him and slipped through the crowd, following her. She glanced back, as if aware of his presence. From the first moment they’d met, they had always had an uncanny awareness of each other.