Playing With Fire (Phoenix Fire #3)(39)
Author: Cynthia Eden

No, she wouldn’t.

And she didn’t think he did, either.

“How the hell am I supposed to start this thing?” Dante snarled. “There’s no key.”

She leaned forward. Pushed under the dash. Her cheek pressed against his thigh.

Dante stilled.

Her fingers fumbled with the wires, and, in a few seconds, she had the engine sparking to life.

She pulled back, aware that his thigh felt rock-hard.

“How’d you do that?” His voice was low.

Cassie swallowed. “I’ve got a few tricks you don’t know about.”

His hand rose to her arm. She flinched. She was still bleeding.

“Yes,” he said softly, consideringly, “you do.”

Cassie scooted as far away from him as she could.

But she could feel the heat of his gaze sweeping over her.

“Get back on the highway, keep driving straight until I tell you to turn.” They could sleep in shifts, and make it back to her base sooner.

Silently, he followed her orders. The black pavement started to disappear beneath the truck’s wheels.

She tore part of her shirt away and wrapped up her arm. It seemed like a trend for her—using clothing to bind her wounds. But hey, it worked. When she had the wound covered, Cassie leaned her head against the window’s glass, staring out at the night that waited.

So much for an easy pit stop.

The boy was behind them, silent in the bed of the truck. Why hadn’t he tried to get up in the front with them?

Because he’s probably terrified of us. Right. She didn’t blame him for that. Especially since he’d no doubt watched her kill his brother.

Lately, she’d started to scare herself.

“What will you do if you can’t save them?”

She jerked at Dante’s voice.

“The shifter that waits for you . . . what if you can’t save him?”

“I will save him.”

Dante shook his head. “That’s not an answer, you know.”

No, it wasn’t. Because she didn’t have an answer.

“Will you be able to put him down? Sometimes, death is the only cure.”

She didn’t want to think about that, but . . . Dante was right. She looked down at her injured arm. Death is the only cure.

CHAPTER NINE

It didn’t look like much of a lab to Dante.

He braked the truck. Checked the scrawled directions that Cassie had given to him before she’d passed out. Yes, it was the place.

It looked like a hole-in-the-wall.

His head turned, and he glanced down at Cassie. She was beside him, her head sagging on his shoulder. The boy had finally asked to come up front when the sun rose, and they’d all crammed in together.

The boy hadn’t slept though.

Not that Dante blamed the kid. When you watched your family die, it didn’t usually put you in the mood for sleep.

“What did she do to him?” Jamie asked, his voice a whisper. It was the first time the kid had talked to him since he’d joined their little road trip from hell.

Dante glanced over at him, and found Jamie’s eyes on his.

“My brother. She killed him, didn’t she?”

“He killed himself.” The minute he’d taken her blood, he’d been dead.

Jamie shook his head. “I saw . . . he was convulsing after he drank her blood.” His gaze darted to Cassie even as he kept his voice whisper quiet. “What did she do?”

“She lived.” Dante wanted to brush aside the hair that had fallen over her face, but the kid was watching him far too closely.

“What are you?” An even softer whisper.

Dante held his stare. “I’m the man you don’t ever want to cross, because if you do . . . if you do anything to hurt me or to hurt her, you won’t have to beg me for death.” The boy needed to get this message. Clearly. “I’ll kill you before you can even scream.”

Jamie’s eyes widened, nearly filling his face, and his Adam’s apple bobbed. “You don’t scare me.”

“Yes, I do.” Dante scared everyone. Even Cassie, though he knew she tried to act like she didn’t fear him. He’d caught glimpses of the fear in her eyes. “She wanted you to come with us, so you did. If it had been up to me . . .”

“You would have left me alone out there.”

Damn straight. Dante gazed steadily back at him. “Don’t ever give me reason to regret hauling you out of that swamp.”

“Dante?” Cassie’s husky voice asked. “We aren’t moving. We’re—” She sat up, snapping to attention. “We’re here!”

Yes, wherever here was.

She shoved against him, trying to get out. Dante slid over and when she hurried toward the ramshackle buildings, he followed her.

Jamie was on his heels.

“This is your lab?” Dante asked, voice doubtful. It looked like they were in the middle of an old corn field, and the buildings that surrounded them looked like abandoned barns.

“Don’t let appearances fool you.” Her voice was actually perky. “This place was set up by the government back in the fifties. They forgot about it.” She pushed aside some wood that was near the door of the barn and quickly punched in a code on a security screen. “My father didn’t. I didn’t.”

“Identify yourself,” a computer voice demanded.

“Doctor Cassandra Armstrong,” she said at once.

The barn door opened—but they didn’t head into a real barn.

The door slid open to reveal an elevator.

“Told you,” Cassie said, sounding pretty satisfied with herself. “Appearances can deceive you.”

“That is freakin’ cool,” Jamie said.

Dante frowned at him.

“Now, we’re heading down to the lab.” She bit her lip.

“I’ll send Charles back up to hide the truck.”

They were descending, a fast descent that Dante thought took them down two floors. When the door opened again, a thin man with curly hair was standing in front of them.

“Cassie!” He rushed toward her. “I was afraid you weren’t coming back!”

The man was hugging her far too tightly.

Dante decided that he didn’t like him.

“I’m sorry, Charles. It took a bit . . . longer than I’d thought for the retrieval mission.”

Charles glanced over at Dante. His gray eyes doubled in size. “It’s him.”

The him could hear.

“Is he going to kill us?” Charles whispered as he edged behind Cassie. “It looks like he wants to. It looks like he wants to fry us both!”