The sea of bodies undulating to the driving bass was a sight to behold as it always was when I braved the Dungeon. One had only to glance at their various states of debauchery to know the human authorities didn't rule here and that was
before
I'd spotted the blood. I gnawed my tongue within my mouth for fortitude. I couldn't afford to be squeamish. Not here.

An unmistakable electronic guitar riff echoed across the club's smoky interior. My attention snapped to the DJ's booth where a shirtless man in tight black leather pants had jumped atop the dividing wall with a primal shout. He lifted his red tattooed hands to the black roof, shaking them in time to the beat while a glowing seed formed from nothing in the middle of his right palm. The seed unfurled into a flickering bud of fire that lit his skin from within.

"I'm a Firestartah!" He managed to bellow out over the pounding music while he held his prize up for all to see.

I took the brief distraction he posed as a sign to move. Somewhere in this building was a nefarious individual.

No, scratch that.

Everyone
in this building was nefarious. But this one was special. This one had hurt someone I love.

Where the hell was this asshole hiding?

With keen eyes I scanned the room for clues. As they swept over the left section my eye was once again snagged by the tattooed guy on the DJ booth. The Fire witch had moved on from juggling fireballs to setting his date's arm aflame while she writhed in pleasure. It took a good deal of effort to mask my disgust. I'd never understand these creatures.

Focus, Laura
, I silently chided myself.

An inspection of the wall in front of me proved that the thing I'd been looking for had been in front of my face all along. Directly across from the entrance was a dark space that held none of the club's trademark torture device themed decorations. On either side of the space stood a goon with biceps the size of watermelons crossed in front of an equally inflated chest. These must be the famed Dungeon guards. They looked positively massive and twice as mean.

With a renewed chant for
focus
I lifted my chin, pushed my shoulders back, and attempted to look as badass as a five foot six inch woman could. The outfit I was sporting might help. My curvy body was covered in a crisscross of black leather strips that managed to form a cat suit.

The ridiculous outfit had been a gift from a particularly lecherous benefactor. That same benefactor had tried to get me into a pair of stiletto heels as well. Tonight I'd settled for a more practical set of platform boots with chunky heels that raised me from five foot six to five foot nine, five foot eleven if I counted the extra volume my sable hair added. Stiletto heels would be an unfortunate fashion accessory when the shit hit the fan. And I planned on that happening very soon.

The press of bodies was tight enough between me and the opposite wall that I had to sidle up to two-dozen people to travel half that in feet. I'd never been particularly comfortable in cramped spaces. The fact that I was wearing a skintight outfit that emphasized every slight brush certainly wasn't helping matters. My frustration grew with each new obstacle until I was reduced to screaming at a stubborn figure that refused to budge.

"Move!" My eyes narrowed to slivers as they traveled up the length of the loftier barrier.

The first thing I saw was the lithe bronzed body that was lovingly poured into a pair of form fitting silver vinyl pants and a matching vest. The next feature that struck me was the warm honey hair that fell to the body's waist in a cascade of shimmering loose curls. Those curls led me to a face that skirted the edge of masculinity with a curious mix of soft lines and hard edges. But it wasn't until I'd reached the eyes, a pair of silver irises set within pure white corneas, that I realized who I was looking at.

A devilish smile curved his pale lips upward. He held my gaze for two-seconds too long before bending his head the inch down to my ear. "Miss Denham," his lyrical baritone voice slid into my ear canal, threatening to draw a shiver across my body.

Had I not recognized him by his eyes, the greeting would have clenched it. No one referred to me as "Miss Denham" but Aiden Bruce. There was a very good reason for that. No one here was supposed to know who I was.

I made an incoherent hissing noise to shut him up. Against my ear I sensed his lips lift even higher.

"I have need to speak with you," he said.

"Kind of busy, Mr. Bruce," I replied in equal parts haste and formality.

"Aiden," he corrected in his too-patient way. "I insist that you call me Aiden." Once he was certain I wasn't going to argue, he added, "And I know what you're doing."

I didn't doubt he knew what I was up to. He was freaky like that. A few years ago I'd have been irate by that kind of line. Aiden had earned the right to use it. He'd saved my ass twice since I'd moved to Boston.

With a petulant sigh I took a half step back to give myself breathing room before I did something I'd regret. It hadn't helped. Even though Aiden wasn't a large man like the behemoths guarding the private area of the club, he held himself with a regal air that gave him the illusion of breadth. There were a half dozen people literally crowding us but all I could see were his hooded silver eyes, soft ghostly grey lips and the bronzed shoulders that extended past his vinyl vest.

"Make this quick," I said in a snappish tone to hide the fact that I was more than a little attracted to him.

"Outside," he said with a nod of his head toward the entrance I'd just waded twelve feet from (with considerable effort, I might add).

"You know my policy on going outside with strange vampires."

"I am neither strange nor subject to your policies," he said with characteristic deadpan.

I couldn't tell if he'd realized my response had been sarcastic and was screwing with me or if he legitimately believed what he was saying. Neither would have surprised me. In the end I shook my head, turned on my chunky heel and then waded toward door.

The trip back the way I'd come was surprisingly easy. I hadn't had to shove anyone, threaten bodily harm or body surf two dozen half-naked people. I suspected it had a lot to do with the vampire at my back.

Aiden was a senator on the vampire Senate. He represented New York, the entire state, not just the city. That meant he was a muckety-muck among the circulation challenged. What little I knew about him was common knowledge in Boston's supernatural community because I hadn't had the guts to ask him anything personal.

What I didn't know was if his position of power meant he killed a whole lot more people than the average undead flunky. If so, we had a serious conflict of ideologies.

I was a Diakonos, a bastard child of the divine who had been "gifted" with supernatural powers in an effort to keep the innocent safe from the scourge of the Underground. Most days it felt like a curse rather than a gift. The jury was still out on today.

The frown that was steadily forming on my lips increased when I began considering why the vampire was so interested in what I did. One would think a senator would have more important things to do than follow a twenty-five year old to an Underground club on a Friday night. He could be off arguing for more blood banks for his constituents or kissing demon babies -- if there were such a thing.

I stopped just outside the seemingly deserted door that served as the Dungeon's facade. A miasma of ill will floated here like an invisible swarm of stinky insects. Were any vanilla human foolish enough to cross to this side of the street they'd be assured a serious nightmare and an extra long session on the therapy couch the next day. And whatever spell was in place to keep the oblivious masses out of the club was also serving to dampen the thumping bass down to a mere buzz of flies.

Aiden stepped around me to walk toward a street lamp to my right. I folded my arms in front of me stubbornly but allowed myself the pleasure of watching his well-formed back end as it moved. Only after he'd disappeared into an alley a half a block away, and his ass disappeared with him, did I go after him with the sick hope that he'd be waiting to take me in his cool arms for some serious face sucking.

There was definite sexual tension between us. I hadn't wanted to admit it to myself for a long time. And it hadn't been because I'd been strictly warned away from the vampire. A good part of it as Aiden himself. From what I could tell he was arrogant and high-handed, one of those old-world guys (literally) that thought women should be barefoot and pregnant rather than fighting the good fight. Apparently I had a soft spot for that kind of asshole.

Which was why it came as a surprise when the first thing out of the sexist pig's mouth after I'd walked into the alley was: "We need your help."

I let my eyebrows drift upward but didn't dare ruin the moment with speech. Aiden was waiting for me to say something, probably expected I'd jump at the chance to assist him. At least that is what I hoped the firm gaze fixed on my face meant.

"We believe someone is trying to summon a demon," Aiden explained moments later.

Maybe there
were
demon babies.

"A good number of packages have arrived here that we've reason to believe contain rare desert shale from the Cradle of Civilization. It is a rare shale that is used in the ritual summoning of a specific demonic entity my associates and I would rather remain in the Realm of the Fallen."

The question I'd left unasked was why didn't he and his associates just take care of it themselves?

Aiden answered it without my prompting. "We have reason to believe a key member of the Covens is behind this. We can't risk our fragile accord by personally getting involved."

The Covens. That was a group I tried to avoid at all costs. The idea of going up against humans with magical power didn't particularly appeal to me. Giant slobbering monsters with brains the size of walnuts were more my genre, or at least it had been until I moved to Boston.

I asked my first question in a wary voice, "What do you mean when you say 'we'?"

"The undead community," Aiden said simply.

That wasn't good enough for me. I pressed with, "We talking Boston?"

He nodded his head, an action that made his honey hair ripple around his shoulders, shoulders that were somewhere between broad and narrow -- actually, they were just about perfect. I did my best to ignore it and the delicious scent of something sweet that hit my nose a moment later from his movement. He was just a little too...I didn't even want to think about it.

These unwelcome reactions put me on the defensive, which for me translated into becoming confrontational. In a wary tone I asked, "So you work for Boston?"

"Boston" in this context referred to the collective rulers of the city's vampires. There were always three. In Boston's case those three were two males and a female. I'd been laboring to stay under their radar since I'd arrived.

I'd had to ask Aiden the question because it seemed odd that the vampire senator for the state of New York would be taking orders from rulers of a single city, even if that city
were
the undead equivalent of Washington, D.C.

Aiden's silver irises slid to the side almost guiltily. It was such a human response that I instantly suspected foul play. But a vampire wouldn't do something that obvious unintentionally, would he?

"It was suggested that we contract the work out," Aiden explained. "We naturally thought of you."

This time there was no drifting to my eyebrows. They'd shot up along with the height of my eyes. "Oh?"

"I volunteered to make the proposition." Aiden's gaze returned to my face while he spoke the final word.

I was trying my damnedest not to hear that as an innuendo. There was no way I could reply to it without sounding stupid. I decided silence was the best response.

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