Into Death's Arms (23 page)

     I nodded slowly and slid my
Sig
back into its holster.
I didn’t want to be in a firefight with Laurna
here. B
ullets have a nasty tendency to be indiscriminate. They kill just about anybody, fickle bastards.
Beneath the
table,
I pulled one of my long knives
and
slipped it
between his legs. “We’re going to pl
ay nice or someone’s going to di
e a
eunuch
, you hear me?” I smiled
,
mostly a showing of teeth.
His eyebrows rose but that was the only indication he gave that his manly parts were being th
reatened with a very sharp blade
.

   Laurna joined us.
“Mace, sorry but traffic out
there is…” she noticed the man-
candy
Shifter
sitting across from me her mouth mad a big oh of surprise.
She pulled herself together in record time. “Hi,” her voice was
low
and sexy
as
she held out her hand.
I had to hand it to her she liked men and they liked her right back. God I wish
ed
I could do that.

     He took it
and brought it to his lips
,
eyes on me the whole time. “Nice to meet you,” he said like he meant it. Of course he did
Shifters
kept harems and weren’t
too
particular about species and Laurna was prime harem material. She also seemed to have a knack for attracting supernatural attention.
We were going to have to do something about that.
“Normally I would rise and give you my seat, but the AoD has a very large blade resting on my manhood. I hope you will forgive my rudeness this once.” Smooth, blah, I hated
Shifters
.

  
He placed his lip
s
against her knuckles his eyes flared that gold again he looked up in askance at her than back to me. I nudged him with my blade. Reminding him, I could really hurt him if I wanted to
,
and right now, I wanted to.

     She smiled one of her most dazzling smiles
,
“Macyn does like to make life difficult Mr.?”
she let her hand linger in his longer than was strictly necessary bah and I liked to make life difficult umm, not the one who has the
Shifter
/
Vamp
magnet planted somewhere in my…oh well you get the idea.

     “Laith,” he supplied, “I find myself without a last name at the moment.”
Shifters
took their pack name as a last name.
Therefore,
no last name meant
he really was outcast.
That knowledge shouldn’t make me feel guilty but right
now,
it was doing a number on me. I had seen his past. I knew why he was outcast. He was exiled because he refused to kill me.

  
Wonder why that was, not the Kinsley want me dead part, I got that. The refusing to kill me part, why would he refuse it’s not like they didn’t kill people every day, right?
   

      “Laith,” she took her hand back
slowly like she was reluctant to let go of such a gorgeous creature
and sat to my left. “I believe I could be induced to forgive you, this once.”
She held up one finger. The waitress came back around and s
he ordered wine, with lunch? The owner came back out.

    She beamed brightly
,
“you girls finally brought a man with you!” I could see the matchmaker every elderly woman carries within her flare to life. “What wi
ll you be having today handsome,
” she winked at Laurna.

    “I’ll have…” he started.

    “He
’s leaving,
” I flicked the knife
under the table just a little so he’d get the point. Ha, I was funny.

     Unfortunately, this
Shifter
was made of stern
er
stuff. “The veal,
” He continued,
“
I hear
it’s
excellent.” The woman praised his choice and gave Lau
rna another wink. What the hell, s
ure, I was less
likely to pick up a hot guy than
Laurna but I wasn’t completely without my charms. The
Shifter
was actually here to see me.

       I opened my mouth to tell him to get lost but Lauran had other ideas.
“So what kind of creepy crawly are you as Ma
cyn has a blade
curled up next to your manly parts.”
She leaned in toward him letting him know at the moment he was the center of her universe. I’d seen her do it before. The girl had never once had to pay a speeding ticket
. S
he pulled the same number she was pulling now and the cops let her slide. I guess it helped that her daddy had more money than God and doted on her like a princess but money will only get you so far. Charm gets you the rest of the way.

      He looked directly at her, “I’m a
Shifter
.”

     “Ohhh,” she cooed at him. “So you’re like a werewolf?” S
he eyeballed him speculatively, like she liked a little animal in her man. Hell for all I know maybe she did.
Eww, I was pretty sure my best friend wasn’t into bestiality I was going to have to r
emind her later that
dating a
Shifter
would be
bestiality
.

      He nodded sending that newly cut blond hair into his eyes. “Like a werewolf, without the wolf.”
He
said softly, almost a purr.
Damn apparently, he’d played this game before and from the seducer’s point of view.

     She crinkled up her face in a questioning expression. “What you mean without the wolf?”

   He shifted in his chair so my blade was closer to his thigh than his manhood and leaned toward her. “
Shifters
have a couple of forms, a fight form, a flight form, a human form, and a mixture of the fight form and human form.”
He explained softly watching her mouth while he spoke.

     Laurna nodded at him and watched him as if he were to most interesting person alive. I thought about complaining again but she was getting so much real information out of him and hearing it from him was much more interesting than reading about it.
I’d seen the fight form but I’d never seen the mixture. I guess that was what they always showed in the movies.
I decided to keep my trap shut. The food arrived.

    They both dug in. I couldn’t figure out how to eat one handed so I didn’t eat.

    “
Mmmm
,” he moaned, “This is good.” He gestured at the food with his fork.
He chewed swallowed and continued with his lesson
. “
Anyway fight forms are all based on natural predators, wolves, tigers, lions, bears, even snakes. Wolves are the most common
. I’m not a wolf.” He shrug
ged, like he hadn’t just told her
one of the big
Shifter
secrets.
Usually you had to torture a
Shifter
to get anything out of him. His being so cooperative was making me nervous. Was he planning to kill us? That was the only reason I could think of for the honesty.

    Laurna finish
ed off her drink. “What are you,
” she licked the rim of the glass. Damn she was a good
examiner.
I mean it wasn’t stuff I didn’t already know but if he answered this next
question,
it would be.

     His eyes narrowed on her mouth. “Lion,” he said a little breathlessly. Okay, Laurna lets not bait the big lion much more because I was starting to get the feeling he was going to pounce her if she didn’t quit.

     “Laurna
um
, tact,” I suggested tilting my head toward the
Shifter
.

      She ran her hand down the stem of the wine glass kind of stroking it. I blinked I couldn’t believe she was still pushing it. “What’s your flight form?” relentless. That I respected but this situation was seriously making me sweat.

     “Raven, Jesus
,
Laurna are
you trying to get me killed,
” his face was flushed. I nudged him again just for good measure.
He didn’t even look at me.

       She blinked those big blues innocently at him. “What am I doing Laith?”

       He growled, “You’re flirting with a
Shifter
. A
Shifter
who ha
d to give up his entire harem, w
e don’t go without well.” He moved his legs trying to get comfortable with my blade nestled against
,
well hell I don’t want to think about what it was nestled against.

     “Was I flirting,
” she asked softly. “I didn’t mean anything by it.” She bit her bottom lip. Damn she was still doing it.

      He laughed it was a short bark of sound,
“If I thought you meant anything by it I would have bent you over this table and had my way with you already. Don’t worry I can smell your man all over you and I
only
do single women.
I especially don’t do women attached to men like yours I learned my lesson the hard
,
” Who
a, Laurna had a man? Since
when this was all news to me
,
o
kay this sucked
.
I was missing way too much and the
Shifter
seemed to have the inside track.

  
Wait she had a man the lion
Shifter
didn’t want to piss off? What kind of man?
What kind of man scared a
Shifter
? I was pretty sure I didn’t want to know the answer to that question.

     Laurna blushed, Oh my god it was true she did have a man. I managed to refrain from demanding to know who he was. Oh, what if he was a
Shadow-born
? She had asked if I thought they could be good
,
she
had kept on
me about it.
How had I missed that?
That dream cam
e back to me in full force Laur
n
a
kissing that
Vamp
ire
. What if I hadn’t been seeing the present
,
but the future? “You’re n
ot fucking
Bouncer
-
Vamp
are you,
” yeah, I know, tact I had just said it, I need to work on my self-control.

    
Laurna spluttered Laith choked on his laughter.
I got so flustered by thei
r reactions I lost control of my blade and it slid to the floor making a very distinct clinking noise. Great just what I needed I’d lost
control around a
Shifter
because my best friend w
as slumming it. “It’s not funny,
” I glared at the
Shifter
. “Are you,
” I looked beseechingly at her. Please say no
,
please say no
,
I thought.

    “Desert,
” the owner popped up behind me.
I jumped about a foot.
What was with all the spry old people around here must be the
weather?
  “Oh Macyn, you didn’t eat.” She scowled at me. I didn’t explain it’s hard to eat pasta while holding a blade on a
werewolf’s
junk. I should get bonus points. “Is it too hot
? Too cold? Did you not like it,
” she seemed so concerned, leaning her plump body over my plate like she could look at it and figure out why I hadn’t eaten.

     “No, no,” I explained. “I’m just having some
issues
.” I glared at Laith.
He was my issue. Laurna at the moment was my issue. Hell I even had mental contact with
Vamp
ires
’ issues.

    She patted my sho
ulder, “Just like your mother.
She could never eat when she met with her young man here.”  She
nodded
at Laith.

   
I felt like my brain was bleeding, what the hell was she talking about? 
Laith turned three shades of white and looked at the door like he was thinking about sneaking out.  I crinkled my e
yebrows at him. “What young man,
” I asked the woman.
“You don’t move,
” I demanded pointing my finger at Laith as he started to scoot back his chair.  He gave me a smile th
at would have charmed most
girls, not me, but most girls.