“I can’t leave my friend . . .”
“Your friend can come inside too. You can both rest for a while, and then we’ll find your car and—”
“Thank you,” she interrupted breathlessly. “Let me just . . .” She started to walk away, then turned back. “We’ll be right back. Please, don’t leave.”
“Of course, not,” he said. “I’ll start the fire. You go and get your friend and we’ll warm both of you right up.” He turned away, going off supposedly to light the fire—although who knew what he was really doing, preparing a roofied drink for her most likely, and maybe one for her “friend” too. Hell, maybe he’d invite Poncio downstairs and the two of them would have a private party with the stupid Americans.
Lana turned away before she gave in to temptation and punched the bastard in the face. His intent had been so obvious that she was amazed he thought he was fooling anyone. She wanted to scrub her arm where he’d touched her. If he’d been any more blatantly predatory, he’d have been rubbing his hands together like an old-time movie villain. But then, she’d played the harebrained ninny before and it always worked. So maybe it wasn’t much of a stretch for someone to believe that she was so stupid as to have gotten lost and ended up at this hacienda in the middle of fucking nowhere.
Vincent grabbed her before she’d taken three steps away from the open doorway, wrapping his arms around her and pulling her into the heat of his big body.
“Are you okay?” he murmured.
Lana shivered, grateful he was there, letting herself enjoy a moment of comfort before pushing away from his embrace. “I’m fine. It was just an act.”
Vincent studied her briefly, then nodded and stripped off his jacket. “Put this on,” he ordered, sliding it over her shoulders.
She wanted to argue. She had her own jacket, she didn’t need his. But she really was cold and she could feel the heat from his body still warming the material.
“Thanks.” She pulled it on and had to force herself not to wiggle happily. It was just as warm as she’d thought it would be, and it smelled like him, too. That shouldn’t have affected her as much as it did. Hell, it shouldn’t have affected her at all. But she couldn’t deny the reassuring effect of his scent, and she knew he’d been right. She did like him, more than a little.
“Your things,” Vincent said, snapping her back to the reality of their situation. This wasn’t the time to be mooning like a schoolgirl.
“Thanks,” she said again. Not wanting to give up the warmth of his jacket, she set the pile of her things on the ground, then bent to retrieve her Sig. Sliding it out of its holster, she worked the slide to be certain of her load, then kept it in her hand, holding it down against her thigh. “We’d better get inside before lover boy comes looking for me.”
“Right. We’ll take them both out. We can leave the guard alive if you’re squeamish, but Poncio has to die. Just like Camarillo and for the same reasons.”
“No argument from me,” she said. “How do we do this?”
Vincent grinned. “That part you can leave to me.”
Lana entered the house first, looking over her shoulder nervously, still worried about Vincent. But he crossed the threshold with no problem, giving her a playful wink as he did so.
“It’s good to have friends,” he whispered, but an instant later, he was scanning the house, his expression deadly serious.
Lana heard a thump from the direction of what looked like the kitchen. Gun in hand, she slid around the dividing wall and found lover boy slumped on the floor, a glass of water spilled next to him. She stepped closer, saw the plastic bottle of pills on the counter, and knew she’d been right. The label was in Spanish, but the drug name was the same. Flunitrazepam, the generic for Rohypnol, known on the street as a date rape drug. Nice guy. Maybe she’d let Vincent kill him. On the other hand, the best death for him might be when his cartel masters discovered that he’d failed to protect Poncio and lost the vampire, to boot.
“Lana.” Vincent’s voice was soft but urgent, and she hurried back to the foot of the stairs where he was waiting for her.
“Did you do that?” she asked him, jerking her head in the unconscious guard’s direction.
“Child’s play,” Vincent said absently and put one foot on the stairs before pausing. “Poncio’s up there,” he told her. “No one else. Are you coming?”
She knew why he was asking, knew what he was really asking. Camarillo’s death had been horrific, grotesque in its violence and gore. Poncio’s would be the same. Vincent was giving her an out.
“I’m coming,” she said. “We’re in this together.”
Vincent took her hand, squeezing it tightly before bringing it to his lips. “Thank you, querida.”
Lana flushed with a combination of pleasure and embarrassment, not sure what she’d done to deserve his thanks. She only knew there was no way she was going to leave him alone in this. They were in this house because of a mission that she’d brought to him. She wasn’t going to hide downstairs while he did the dirty work so that she could pretend it never happened.
Besides, there was that whole liking thing. She wasn’t going to send him off into danger with a kiss and leave it at that. Not as long as she could fight by his side.
“Are you going to do to him what you did to Camarillo?” she whispered as they climbed the stairs.
“That would be rather boring, wouldn’t it? Do I strike you as an unimaginative kind of man?” he asked, waggling his eyebrows suggestively.
Lana rolled her eyes, but only half-heartedly. He was cute. Granted, he was devastatingly handsome, but also cute in a clever sort of way. But then it occurred to her that he was about to use that cleverness to improvise a particularly bloody way of killing someone, and it didn’t seem quite as charming anymore.