Relentless (Vampire Awakenings #11) - Brenda K. Davies Page 0,17

and missed his smile.

He’d taken her innate love of music and nurtured it into a passion. She wouldn’t be this good of a singer or love it as much as she did if Doug hadn’t been there to guide her for so many years.

After his death, she stopped singing for a time. He was her teacher, her accompaniment, and her rock. He was her friend as well as her adopted uncle, and though she loved all the Stooges, she was closest to Doug. He was the one she relied on the most, the one she spent the most time with, and the one who refused to let her be mediocre.

She didn’t know how to be a great singer with a broken heart. But not singing broke her heart almost as much as Doug’s death. It took her nearly a year to realize that giving up singing was the last thing Doug would want her to do.

He’d be heartbroken if he learned she’d given up her passion because of him. If there was an afterlife, then he was watching her, and she couldn’t bring herself to disappoint him. It took a couple of years for her to stop feeling like she was betraying Doug every time she stood beside a piano someone else played.

When Dante set his coffee down on the table, he drew Cassidy from her melancholy reverie. “Are you ready to track down some vampires?” she asked.

“I don’t think it’s a good idea for you to come with me.”

Now that he was seeing her again, Dante didn’t want to part from her, but he had a feeling they might end up in some shitty places, and he couldn’t get her involved in that.

“Do you think I’ll get in the way of your investigation?”

“I don’t think it’s a good idea for you to go into these places,” he said. “I have no idea what I could be walking into.”

Cassidy almost rolled her eyes. “I’ve got enough overprotective men in my life. I’m not a fragile little girl; I can handle myself. Besides, if Kyle can go into these clubs, then so can I.”

“There’s a big difference between you and Kyle.”

Cassidy didn’t speak as she waited for him to continue.

When the silence stretched on, Dante realized she would have made an excellent detective. Many suspects would have squirmed beneath her unrelenting stare.

“And what is that?” Cassidy finally asked.

“You’re a whole lot prettier than Kyle.”

Cassidy struggled to keep herself from blushing as his words sent a rush of pleasure through her. He thought she was pretty. And then she scolded herself for being an idiot. She refused to be kept out of this just because she was a woman.

“If you don’t think I’ll get in your way, then I’m going with you,” she said. “I can help you avoid Savages, and you’re better off having someone who can watch your back than to go in there blind.”

Dante drummed his fingers on the table as he studied the set of her jaw. Beautiful and stubborn, it was a deadly combination, but it intrigued him.

“Okay,” he said. “But at the first sign of danger, we are out of there. I’ll return on my own.”

Cassidy didn’t argue or point out that she was a pureblooded vampire who was probably faster and stronger than him. She was stronger and faster than Kyle since reaching maturity on March seventh, the day of their twenty-first birthday. Kyle was pissed when she finished aging before him; she found it hilarious.

“Then we should go,” she said as she rose from her chair. “We have to find the place.”

Chapter Nine

The back seat of the taxi was more cramped than Cassidy would have guessed before they climbed into the cab. Dante sat a few inches away, but his warm body heated hers until she had to resist tugging at her collar to cool off. His leather scent was subtle, but the coconut air freshener hanging from one of the vents was not.

Between the stifling car and the overwhelming odor, she wanted out of the taxi so bad she was eyeing the door handle. Why had breathing become so difficult?

She glanced over at Dante and almost scowled when she saw him focused on the passing scenery. Apparently, she was the only one experiencing any difficulties. She had to resist punching him in the arm; it was his fault the car felt so stifling, and he was utterly oblivious to it.

Dante kept his focus on the passing scenery as he tried to ignore the