High Stakes (Vegas Vampires #1)(9)
Author: Erin McCarthy

Though she had a point, he supposed. He didn’t imagine mor-phing into a chimp would be attractive to women. And Ethan did like attracting women.

"I guess I can see that, if you take out the whole sucking blood thing. The werewolf attraction I never got—I mean, they have fur and crawl on all fours." She bit her lip."Though my boyfriend in law school could pass for that on a bad night after drinking vodka. So what do you call your group?A family?A coven?"

"Conservatives."

She didn’t seem to hear him. Retrieving her shoes, she said, "So who are you supposed to be? Angel? Lestat?Dracula?"

Those pansies?None of them had seen battle in the Crusades. None of them had fought through a wall of human flesh to defend God and country, women and children.

He was a bit insulted that she thought he was playacting, pretending to be a vampire. And he certainly would never pretend to be any of the men she had named.

"I’m not supposed to be anybody."

"You should go for Drac . After all, he had three wives and one true love what more could a guy ask for? As long as you leave my sister out of it, you can vamp to your heart’s content." She glanced around the room, high heels dangling from her fingertips. "Do you have a coffin?"

"Maybe," he said cautiously, not sure which answer she would prefer. He had the bizarre, primitive urge to impress her. To force her to admit she found him attractive.

"Must be nice to have so much time and money that you can just goof around.It’s like war games, isn’t it?Or playing paint-ball."

She had reduced nine hundred years of living to being hit in the thigh with a blue paint pellet.

"Do you like blackjack?" he asked, a bit off-kilter and fumbling to regain some control.

The question stopped her bizarre tangent.

"Huh?Blackjack?"

"Yes." He kept a supply of chips behind the bar. He grabbed a Pile and held them out to her. "Why don’t you go try your hand at the tables? I’ll send Brittany to talk to you." win points by sending the sister, giving her exactly what she wanted yes, he was very clever.

Alexis narrowed her eyes in suspicion, but she took the chips from him. Their fingers touched, and Ethan felt a wave of human emotion that shocked the smile off his face. He couldn’t read her thoughts, but he could feel her loneliness passing into him through her skin.

What was even more shocking to him was how easy it was to recognize. Because the low, trembling tenor of it matched his own.

Brittany discussed theWestminster dog show with Seamus Fox and wondered if she had the courage to drive a stake through his heart. She really doubted it.

But the problem was, she really liked Seamus, just like she was fond of Ethan, and she hated to think that their souls were bound to rot in hell. It seemed like she should either find a way to convert them or kill them, freeing them from an eternity of damnation.

"I bred terriers for years," Seamus was saying, sipping a glass of red wine.

She knew it was really blood, even though it was bottled up as a Merlot. When she’d asked for a glass, she’d been discouraged that it didn’t match the meal, and had had a Chardonnay shoved into her hand.

"Oh, I love terriers. I had a Jack Russell, but he died of cancer two years ago. Brownie was a present from my sister, Alex, for my sixteenth birthday." Alex had always tried to compensate for their lack of parents, and she’d made Brittany ‘s birthdays special.

She hoped Alex wasn’t mad at her, but she really couldn’t go home. Aside from the fact that she still had dental appointments with some of the hotel and casino staff, she needed to figure out it there was some way to save the dozen people who were in Ethan’s inner circle and who were all clearly vampires.

"Your appointment with me is tomorrow," Brittany reminded

Seamus. "I think it’s really generous of Ethan to provide on-site dental services to his staff."

Seamus grimaced. "We can give my slot to someone else. I don’t really need a cleaning."

"Afraid of the dentist?"

"No, of course not."He looked affronted, his dark eyebrows drawing together. "I’m just busy, and I think that I saw the dentist recently."

"When?In this century?" Brittany nudged his arm, and wished they would just admit to her that they were vampires, so they could discuss their salvation. But every time she had broached the subject with Ethan or Seamus that first week in the hotel, she had suddenly found herself confused and talking about something else. They were obviously controlling her thoughts—vampire trick—but in recent days she was sure she’d been successful in locking them out.

"No, probably not," he admitted with a grin.

Now that it had all come out in the reception room, Brittany didn’t see why Seamus and Ethan didn’t admit the truth—that they had probably both been alive when dentists and barbers were one and the same.

"How long?" she asked. "I mean, specifically."

The sudden urgent need to use the bathroom overcame her. Brittany shifted uncomfortably in her seat.

"Not long enough," Seamus said.

Obviously, she wasn’t going to get a straight answer. She glanced around the room. There were ten or so of them dining in this private room tonight, though she was convinced she was the only one really eating. She suspected Seamus of sipping the wine and bisque and dumping the salmon in his napkin, since she hadn’t actually seen a single bite go past his lips. Yet somehow it was disappearing from his plate.

"I wonder what’s taking Ethan and Alex?" she asked. "I hope Alex isn’t giving Kim a hard time. She can be very overprotective."

"I’m sure Ethan can handle the situation."

The pressure on her bladder overcame her good manners. "Will you excuse me for a minute, Seamus?"

"’Certainly."He stood up when she did, which always startledher a little.

Most guys in Vegas wouldn’t know chivalry if it bit them in their gambling arm.

""How old are you?" Maybe his good manners were the result of being reared in Regency England or something.

"’Thirty-seven."Times ten.

Brittany heard the words as if they’d been spoken, but they hadn’t. She was sure of it. Dropping her napkin to the table, shesaid., "Times ten?"

Seamus’seyes went wide. "Pardon me?"

"’Times ten.What do you mean?" She knew what he meant, she just wanted to hear him say it out loud—that he was somewhere in the neighborhood of three hundred and seventy years old.

Still standing, Seamus just stared at her. "I don’t know what you’re talking about."

Jiggling in place, Brittany decided she couldn’t pursue it. She was going to wet her pants. Or cocktaul dress. Did she have a bladlder infection? Good grief, things felt urgent.