Gaslight (Crossbreed #4)(32)
As he pivoted away, Shepherd had an impulsive urge to reach around and cut his throat. But not in front of the boy. Not with Patrick’s new bodyguards, who were armed to the teeth by the looks of it. Instead, he clenched his jaw and let them walk away. The boy never looked back. He put a skip in his step to catch up with Patrick, little hands tucked in his coat pockets.
If Shepherd were his father, he would have bought him gloves. Not because of the cold, but a Sensor that age was too young to be touching things in public without proper guidance. People left behind all kinds of dirty emotions on inanimate objects. Patrick wouldn’t know something like that—he wouldn’t understand the harm it could do to a child.
When the automated doors opened, Wyatt emerged. “You bunch of heathens!” he yelled over his shoulder. “Can you believe that? They were going to call the cops on me for playing a little music. That’s what’s wrong with people—they don’t know how to have fun. Rules, rules, rules. Do you think a Breed bar would toss me out or report me to the higher authority for dancing on a table? Hell no.”
“Where’s Blue?”
Wyatt hugged his bare arms. “Inside paying for everything. They wouldn’t let me help her out, so now she’s stuck with a shitload of bags. You better go in there before she gets pissed and flattens your tires with her axe. Bring my jacket out while you’re at it.”
Shepherd heaved a sigh and tried not to look back toward Patrick, but he couldn’t help himself.
Damn, he missed Maggie. It gutted him to look into that little boy’s eyes and see a piece of her staring back.
Wyatt followed his gaze to the man disappearing through the fog. “You know that guy in the trench coat?”
Shepherd managed a dispassionate reply as he lightly touched the tattoo on the back of his neck. “He’s no one.”
Chapter 9
Techno music pulsed like an adrenaline-fueled heartbeat, and bodies swayed as the weekend crowd engaged in their ritual mating dance. Christian and I had decided to stay at the club a little longer to get a sense of the crowd and how busy the evenings were. Most of the women wore painted-on skirts, tall heels, and heavy makeup. My hoodie, jeans, and lace-up boots weren’t going to cut it if I wanted to blend in.
We didn’t plan on returning until after Wyatt posted his message on the Vampire website. I could have written one myself, but I wanted professional nerd advice in case we needed to cloak the profile to make it untraceable. I knew nothing about the Vampire we were tracking and how computer savvy he was, so I wasn’t taking any chances.
I’d lost track of Christian, and the few times I found him, he was dazzling a woman with his roguish charm. Had I been a jealous woman, it would have bothered me. But flirting was the most effective way for him to go unnoticed. Loners stood out in busy clubs, one reason I was more chatty than usual with the people around me. I glued myself to the bar to avoid weirdos asking me to dance. Niko hadn’t made an appearance after I’d left him with his women, but it wasn’t unusual for him to step outside when there was an abundance of charged energy in the air. Club energy was like a heartbeat against my skin—so chaotic and wild that it reminded me to conceal my light. Even though we were supposed to flare our energy in public places, I was undercover, so waving a sign around that I was a Mage wasn’t an option.
“I like your necklace.”
I turned to the woman sitting next to me at the bar. She’d been nursing a margarita for so long that the crushed ice had melted.
“I noticed it earlier.” She twirled the ends of her short blond hair.
“Thanks.”
Over the years, I’d developed a talent for reading people. This one was in a transitional phase of her life. Late thirties, insecure, professional manicure, and she wouldn’t stop touching her hair. People usually underwent drastic makeovers when starting over. Probably a recent divorce. Either that or she was trapped in a loveless marriage and searching for a man who would give her the attention her husband didn’t. I couldn’t see her ring finger to confirm, but the desperate look in her eyes whenever a man walked by hadn’t escaped my attention.
“Did your friends ditch you?” I asked.
“No. I’m all by my lonesome. I haven’t been here in a long time. It seems different, but nothing’s changed.”
“I guess that means you changed.”
She smiled ruefully. “I guess it does. Are you waiting for someone?”
“Mr. Right.”
She belted out a laugh and raised her glass. “I’ll drink to that.” I didn’t have a drink in front of me, so she went ahead and took a sip.
I wrinkled my nose at my basket of mini pizza rolls, which had turned out to be thoroughly disgusting.
“Sorry if I’m bothering you,” she said, watching me tuck my necklace beneath my shirt.
“No, you’re the best conversation I’ve had in here all night. And that’s not saying much.” I grimaced, hoping she didn’t take it as an insult when I just meant that we’d only exchanged a handful of words.
“I’m too old to dance, and I’m too young to sit home alone. What’s a girl gotta do these days to get a man’s attention that doesn’t involve shaking her assets?”
I bristled when someone wedged between us. He leaned his hulking body against me to grab the bartender’s attention. The man had thick arms beneath his long-sleeve shirt. Not exactly muscular, but I thought he had large bones, judging by the size of the meat hooks he called hands. Why the hell was he wearing leather gloves? This wasn’t a biker bar.