Burn For Me (Phoenix Fire #1)(31)
Author: Cynthia Eden

The exact plan that Cain wanted to follow. Only he wasn’t just planning a hunt.

I’m going to kill you, Wyatt. He’d watch the bastard burn to ash. There’d be no escape for him.

“How are you gonna do that?” Trace wanted to know. The werewolf shook his head. “You’re not a paranormal, Eve, you’re not strong enough to—”

Cain laughed. The wolf really didn’t know her that well. “Guess again,” he murmured.

Trace frowned.

Eve’s gaze lowered to the floor.

“Eve?” Trace said her name with uncertainty. “What’s going on?”

She’s not human. She’s not your f**king sweetheart. How about you choke on that?

But Eve wasn’t talking. Fine. He’d help her out. Cain took his time walking to her side. He lifted his hand and let the fire rise above his fingers.

“What the hell are you doing?” Trace shouted and then he charged at Cain.

Too late. The fire was already sliding toward Eve. The fire whispered over her arm, right over the flesh, then vanished in a puff of smoke.

Trace shoved him to the ground. Lifted his claws—

“The fire can’t hurt me,” Eve said. Her soft voice seemed loud in the quiet room.

Trace froze. Then he looked up at her. He shook his head . . . twice. “Eve . . . how?”

Because he’d been wanting to do it, Cain punched the wolf in the jaw. Trace’s head snapped back as he fell to the side. Cain lifted his hand, eager for another swing.

But Trace wasn’t fighting back. He just stared up at Eve and looked lost. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

“Because there wasn’t a lot to tell!” Her voice rose even as her body tensed. “Fire doesn’t hurt me. I don’t know why. It just . . . doesn’t.” Her gaze flew between them. “And I don’t know what I am, okay? When you don’t know what the hell you are, then what are you supposed to say?”

“You say something to your friends. You knew all my secrets,” Trace gritted out, rising slowly to his feet.

Cain shadowed his moves.

He didn’t like the wolf ’s tone and positioned his body near Eve’s. “Back off.” They had others to attack. “My fire can’t hurt her. She’s safe with me, got it?” That was all the guy needed to know.

The anger in Trace’s eyes—anger directed at Eve—the wolf needed to dial that shit back. Or Cain would dial it back for him.

“We can’t afford to waste the dark,” Eve said. She was right. The night was coming. Hunts were always easier in the dark. “We need to get out there and start hunting him. Every second we waste just gives Wyatt more time to collect new subjects and more time to come for us.”

Cain had never a fan of sitting back and waiting—for anything—and surely not for some bastard hunters to come and attack him.

But Trace was shaking his head. “It’s too dangerous, you need—”

“I know what I need,” Eve told him. Damn, but she was sexy. Fierce. Determined. “I need to keep my friends alive. I need to make sure that no one else dies because of me.”

Trace didn’t argue. Maybe he was getting smarter.

“So I’m hunting.” She threw the words out, and they sounded like a dare. “And I’m taking that bastard down.”

Vampire bars always smelled of blood and death. They also always sported a long line of eager humans, all dressed in Goth black, who were eager to get inside and play victims to the bloodsuckers.

Charlotte, North Carolina, had two vamp bars. One on each side of the city, because the vamps were extremely territorial. From what Eve had seen over the years, those parasites just didn’t share well.

Trace had taken the bar to the north, and Eve and Cain were headed to the one down south—the pit called Blood Bath. Nice name—if you were into getting your body drained and tossed away like garbage. Judging from the winding line of humans, it looked like a lot of folks were into that scene. Some people just begged for death. Eve didn’t get it.

They’d be meeting up with Trace the next day, after they’d all had time to do some recon work. They’d picked a meeting spot and scheduled the rendezvous for the afternoon. Hopefully, they’d have good intel by then.

Eve paused across the street from the club. Her heart was pounding too fast. She’d bandaged up her hands before she left the motel, a useless precaution. Even with the bandages, the vamps would be able to smell her blood.

They always closed in when they smelled fresh prey. They were like sharks that way.

“You sure you want to start with the vamps?” Cain asked as his arm pressed against her.

No, she didn’t want to start with them. The vampires were the last creatures she wanted to face, but . . . “Wyatt had a vampire at Genesis. If he lost one, he’ll want another.” What better place to pick up a new specimen? Vamps gorged at these bars. Got drunk on blood and the alcohol in their prey’s bodies and often passed out.

Snatching a vamp from a place like this would be child’s play for Wyatt.

She inhaled a deep breath. Could almost taste the blood in the air. “Let’s do this.”

But Cain stopped her. He blocked her path and stared down into her eyes. “Why do you fear them so much?”

“Uh, because they’re bloodsuckers with super sharp teeth and an unquenchable thirst for death?” What sane person wouldn’t fear them?

He shook his head. “Try again.”

Her jaw dropped. Her line had seemed perfectly believable. Well, most folks would have bought the line, anyway. Now wasn’t the time for a little heart-to-heart. She hated those talks. She’d already managed to make Trace angry by not telling him her secrets, and now Cain thought she’d just cut her soul open and reveal all to him on this crowded street?

Not gonna happen. “We have a club of vampires waiting about fifteen feet away.” Give or take a bit. “We don’t have time to pore over my issues with them right now.” The issues didn’t matter. She’d managed to control her fear plenty over the years, and Eve wasn’t about to break down. “I’ll keep it together, all right?”

His stare told her it wasn’t. “You don’t trust me.”

No, she didn’t.

His fingers brushed down her cheek. She barely controlled a shiver. The guy seemed to like touching her, sliding his fingers over her skin.

She liked it, too.

“Don’t worry,” Cain told her in that deep, rumbling voice that always made her knees want to jiggle—even when she was standing in front of a vampire bar. “I won’t let them get close to you.”