The Reluctant Vampire Page 0,10

you ladies with?" Harper asked, pausing behind Drina's bobbing derriere and just resis ng the urge to brush the snow from it. Really, her bu must be cold, encased in snow like that.

Stephanie glanced to him wide-eyed, but Drina s ffened, her bobbing stopping altogether. She stayed frozen for a moment, jerked her head upward, cursed as it slammed into the steering wheel, and mu ered under her breath as she backed out of the vehicle. Of course, he was right behind her and didn't move out of the way quickly enough. Her rear end rammed into his groin, and she trod on his feet. Gasping an apology, Drina immediately stumbled forward again to get off him, lost her foo ng, and started to go down. In his effort to save her from the fall, Harper managed to get his own feet tangled up with hers and found himself crashing to the icy pavement with her.

"Are you all right?"

Harper opened his eyes at that concerned query and turned his head to see that Drina had pushed herself to her hands and knees beside him and was eyeing him worriedly. Her coat was open despite the cold, revealing a low-cut silk shirt that gaped slightly thanks to her posi on. It le him an extra-ordinary view of full, round breasts encased in a lacy white bra that looked rather fetching against her olive skin. Blinking, he tore his gaze from the delectable sight and glanced past her to Stephanie, who was nearly killing herself laughing in the SUV, and then he sighed and said dryly, "I'll live."

"Hmm." Drina's eyes dri ed down to his bare chest, where his coat had fallen open, and he saw one of her eyebrows rise, but then she scrambled to her feet and offered him a hand.

"Sorry," she muttered as she helped him up. "You startled me."

"My fault," he assured her, taking a moment to brush himself down. He then straightened and glanced to the open door of the SUV. "What were you doing?"

"Er . . ." Drina flushed guil ly and turned back to the vehicle. "I need boots and a heavier coat, and Stephanie needs a few things too, so we were just going to head out shopping."

"Hmm." His lips twitched, and then he said, "So you were going to hot-wire the SUV?"

Drina clucked with irritation at being caught, and then said with exasperation, "Anders has the keys, and I didn't want to disturb him to get them."

"Ah." Harper glanced from her embarrassed and defiant face to the vehicle and back, and then he asked,

"Do you have a license to drive here? Or even a Spanish driver's license?"

"Bah!" Drina waved the ques on away. "We don't need them. If a police officer tries to pull us over, we just control them."

"Ah, yes." Harper nodded. He'd expected as much and explained apologe cally, "But you can't do that in Port Henry. You can anywhere else, even London, but not here."

"What?" She glanced to him with surprise.

"Lucian promised Teddy that his people would follow the laws while in Port Henry, and none of us would use mind control on Teddy or his deputy," Harper explained.

Drina narrowed her eyes, and pointed out dryly, "Which isn't promising he won't himself."

"No," Harper admitted with a grin. "But Teddy didn't catch that at the time."

"Hmm," she said with irrita on, and then glanced to Stephanie's worried face and grimaced. "Don't worry. We'll still go. We'll just call a taxi."

Stephanie looked dubious. "Do you think they even have taxis here? I mean, it's a pretty small town."

Drina turned to him in question. "Do they?"

"Actually, I don't think they do. Or at least if they do, I haven't heard of one," Harper admi ed, and when Drina's shoulders began to sag with what appeared to be defeat, he found himself saying, "I can take you in my car."

She appeared as surprised as he was by his offer. Truly, Harper had no idea where that had come from. He'd just blurted it without really even thinking first.

"Don't you sleep during the day?" Drina asked with a frown. "Speaking of which, what are you even doing up?"

Harper just shook his head and turned away to start back up the drive, saying, "I'll just throw on a shirt and grab my keys and wallet and be right back."

"My laughing woke him up, but he didn't want to make us feel bad by saying so," Stephanie announced. Drina turned to glance at the young girl in