me and as much as I hated to accept it, if it was the only way out?
Fine. I’d take it.
The question was, how fast could he get to me?
Maybe I should have asked him that.
“Tone it down,” Damon said from the seat next to me. He was drumming a hand on his knee, staring out the window. “You’re driving me nuts.”
I ignored him as I started to mentally plot my escape route.
He still underestimated me. That was a good thing. So far, in the past few days, I’d played it quiet, never once calling my blade to me even when I wanted it, when I all but thought I was going to die. So he didn’t know I could summon it at will. That was an ace in the hole.
I hadn’t needed to pull any of my other little tricks, either. Most of them just included the subterfuge skills, invisibility and all of that—skills suited to assassins and thieves, but useful all the same.
He could track my scent if he had to, but I knew that and I could compensate, and scent trails only lasted for so long.
All I needed to do was buy time to reach Jude.
Granted, I’d be going from one problem to another. If I was alive, though, I could figure a way out.
Alive was better than the alternative.
It was a mantra I had told myself very often during a certain point during my life. It had gotten me through hell before. I could rely on it to do the same again. Alive was better than the alternative and if I was alive, I could figure a way out.
Okay.
So that was the plan.
Stay alive.
Absently, I flexed my wrist again. It didn’t hurt anymore, but I’d swear I could still feel the press of his fangs, and damn it, I didn’t like it—
Suddenly, Damon’s hand on my arm.
I hissed out in pained shock before I could stop it. Clutching at the steering wheel with my left hand, I tried to keep my focus on the traffic. “Damn it, you prick, I realize a car wreck isn’t going to damage you much, but it will hurt me pretty bad. Would you stop it?”
“You drive like a fucking racecar driver,” Damon snapped. “Pull over.”
“I’m trying to get to Banner HQ, remember?” I jerked on my arm. “They might have the kid there? On ice?”
“Pull over,” he said again. “Or I’ll fucking make you.”
I sighed and pressed on the brakes, easing through the traffic until I could turn off International Drive. I ended up in the parking lot of one of the many vacated restaurants, although judging by the looks of it, it wouldn’t stay vacant much longer. Lately the packs had been buying up all the land and turning out some seriously profitable enterprises for use among the were packs.
“Okay, asshole.” I pulled over. “What now?”
He didn’t respond.
Instead…he reached over and grabbed my left wrist. The one Jude had bitten. I hissed out another startled breath as he jerked it to his nose.
My heart beat jacked up to about ten thousand beats a minute, or so I thought, as he opened his mouth. Oh, hell no—
But all he did was inhale.
“Did you let him bite you?”
“What the hell?” I twisted my arm and tried to pull away.
“Did you?”
Again, I tried to pull away from him but it was like trying to pull something out of concrete. “You son of a bitch, you seem to forget something…I’m working a job for your Alpha. That doesn’t mean I owe you answers on everything damned thing I do.”
“You little idiot.” He jerked and thanks to the seat belt, I thought he was going to pull my arm out of its socket. “You don’t get vampires very well, do you? Once you let them bite you, they own a piece of your fucking soul. He can call you, whenever he wants. Can whisper into your dreams…and you can’t fight him. You can’t say no.”
“Oh, please.” I sneered at him. “He’s been fighting his way into my dreams for years now and I’ve been saying no just fine.”
Damon’s eyes narrowed.
“You haven’t fed him?”
“What I have or haven’t done isn’t your concern. But here’s the thing.” I jerked on my wrist, and as I expected, he jerked me back, until I was nose to nose with him. “I’m about ass-deep in alligators right now, and not because I invited it or wanted it or even did anything to warrant it. I’m trapped. Whether I like it