Diana's Hound: Bloodhounds, Book 4 (6 page)

It didn’t sound like a compliment. “You’re anxious about this trip, then? Our mission?”

“I’m anxious about riding into the Deadlands, no matter how many times I’ve done it before. But you’re not.” He leaned forward, his eyes suddenly intent. “You know you can handle it, don’t you?”

She hadn’t really thought about it, and now she couldn’t, not with him watching her with something approaching awe. “If I didn’t think I could do this, I would’ve told Emmett to find someone else. I’m not reckless, Nate. It’s only that…this is what I am.”

“This is what you are,” he agreed. “And so I’ll be what I’ve always been—an inventor following a bloodhound into battle, even if the battlefield will be somewhat unusual.”

“This will be as much your fight as mine,” Diana reminded him. “You have to play your part, whatever you decide that should be. You could claim boredom with me, though the opposite might serve you better. Tell them I’m too much trouble, and you can’t wait to be rid of me?”

He looked at his hands, flexing them several times before spreading his fingers wide. “They don’t look as weak as they did a few months ago, but perhaps I can still play the incompetent scholar. My vampire powers have faded somewhat since I replaced fresh blood with the substitute we discovered.”

She couldn’t help staring at his hands, solid and strong but graceful. Skilled. “You’ll have to feed from me, if only for the show of the marks.” The thought should have scared her—it
needed
to scare her—but instead she tingled with curiosity.

“I’d considered it,” he muttered under his breath.

“The—”
Let it go, Diana.
“Some of the humans who submit willingly… It’s said they do it for the pleasure. That it’s unspeakable. Addictive.”

He cleared his throat loudly. “I can control the pleasure. Hunter wasn’t interested in experiencing it, for so very many reasons. Though I don’t worry so much about having to prove your marks. You’re a bloodhound, so of course they’d heal. I worry about when someone asks me to drink from you to prove you’re not toxic to vampires, as a typical bloodhound would be.”

A dark flash outside the window saved her from casting about for a reply. “We’re here. Did Wilder send word we’d be arriving today?”

Nate straightened. “He told me he would. Archer should be expecting us.”

The coach rattled to a stop in front of the stable, and the door opened. But the man who reached inside for her hand wasn’t Archer. “Jesse.”

The man who’d spent most of the new moons with her tugged her from the steam coach. “You’re a sight for sore eyes, Diana.”

She stood there, dumbstruck, her hand still in his. “What are you doing here?”

Jesse smiled, slow and warm. “I was in town picking up supplies and heard you were on your way. Couldn’t miss a chance to see an old friend.”

Not long ago, he’d been more than a friend, though not quite a lover. “My manners are lacking. Nate, this is Jesse Samuels. Jesse, this is Nathaniel Powell, a friend from Iron Creek.”

Nate’s gaze took in Jesse’s grip on her hand, his too-friendly manner and the way he straightened in borderline challenge under the cool assessment. When the half-vampire smiled, it was chilly. “A pleasure to meet you, Mr. Samuels.”

Archer swooped in, a wide grin on his face. “Samuels, go get your woman a drink. Nate, how the hell have you been?”

As Jesse dragged her away, Diana looked over her shoulder and caught sight of Nate’s stunned expression. As awkward as things had been between them, she found herself wishing she could stay and explain, but what would she say?

No, better to let it lie.

Nate felt a right proper fool.

Diana had vanished with the too-handsome farmer, leaving Nate to the less-than-tender mercies of what passed for civilized conversation in Archer’s mind. “It’s nice to see you again, Archer. You look well.”

“I feel it.” Archer frowned in confusion, then glanced in the direction Diana had gone. “Why do I think I might have stuck my foot in it just now?”

Feeling as tired as a man twice his years, Nate sighed. “Because I’ve developed your knack for aggravating women.”

“Oh, you poor bastard.” Archer looped an arm around his shoulders. “Come on. I don’t have the answers myself, but I’ve got something better.”

“Whiskey?” Except no, he couldn’t even indulge in that dubious comfort. Not considering what had happened last time.

“I was going to say access to the lady’s best friend.” Archer assumed an innocent expression. “Unless I misread that look back there, and you’re not interested?”

He doubted Grace would do much to further his cause when even Satira had turned on him in Diana’s defense. “She’s a beautiful woman, but I could not think of a more dangerous time to cultivate a relationship.”

“Now that’s the damn truth. What’s this Wilder telegraphed about? You heading out over the border?”

“You’re not going to like it.” But Nate told him the details anyway, everything from Emmett’s arrival with Victoria to the mission they’d outlined, ending with, “You spent a lot of time undercover in the Deadlands. Have you seen anything like this?”

Archer’s casual demeanor had vanished, leaving him tense and angry. “Never. Hell, I rarely saw the unwilling auctioned at all. Most of the bloodsuckers who like that sort of thing keep it under wraps—for appearance’s sake, if nothing else.”

Unwilling
had too many shades of gray in the Deadlands, and they both knew it. Vampires could strip free will in so many ways. “Invitation only, I’m sure, especially with a bloodhound involved.”

“So what’s your in?”

Nate finally found a smile. “Your incompetence, as a matter of fact.”

The corner of Archer’s mouth twitched. “Glad I’m good for something.”

“Mmm. As it turns out, when you were wiping the vampire menace from Crystal Springs, you missed one. And this clever—if recently sired—vampire managed to escape not only with his own hide, but with a female bloodhound as well.”

“A hound who’d fetch a pretty price at a slave auction.”

“And as pretty as she is, they’re certain to believe a weak young vampire would prefer the coin to a companion likely to end his life. Especially when that coin could buy him a comfortable afterlife and a dozen pretty pets who
aren’t
a danger to his health.”

Archer rubbed his chin. “As cons go, it’s risky. Not much room for a backup plan, and you have to play your part and play it well.”

Nate clapped Archer on the shoulder. “Why do you think he sent me to you? You’ve a devious sort of mind, not to mention experience undercover in the Deadlands.”

“And you expect me to teach you such brilliance over the course of a few hours?”

Yes, this was what made Archer exasperating and entertaining in turns, the infuriating mixture of arrogance and irreverence. “I’m beginning to doubt that your Miss Linwood is entirely of sound mind. I can’t imagine how any woman could tolerate your insufferable bullshit.”

“Says the man with a hard-on for a bloodhound, of all things.”

“Because who could ever find one of you appealing?”

Archer gestured toward the door of the closest house with a flourish. “Don’t rightly know. Why don’t you come inside and ask Grace?”

Nate wasn’t sure what he expected. He’d only caught a few glimpses of Grace Linwood the last time he’d visited Crystal Springs, and had barely conversed with her. He’d assumed she was nothing more than a starry-eyed schoolteacher, and that Archer was another jaded man fallen victim to adoration wrapped in innocence.

But the woman who greeted Archer with a kiss was no sweet innocent. She had a worldly edge that her neat, modest dress couldn’t hide, as well as a sharp gaze Nate had managed to overlook when they’d met. Of course, given the fact that she’d been naked in a bed with Archer at the time, Nate had been trying very hard to overlook a great many things.

If Grace remembered the awkwardness of their first encounter, she seemed unbothered by it. She reached out to clasp his hand with a smile. “It’s such an honor to see you again. I couldn’t believe it when Archer told me that his friend Nate was actually Nathaniel Powell.
The
Nathaniel Powell.”

It wasn’t the usual reaction he got, especially from pretty young women. He looked to Archer for help as he stumbled through a response. “Uh, thank you. Yes.”

Archer shook his head with a laugh and poured two glasses of whiskey. “Grace follows your work. Apparently, your weapons are quite popular with underworld traders.”

Nate blinked at Grace, utterly taken aback. “You’re involved with black-market weapons smuggling?”

“Not anymore. These days I teach school.” She grinned at him as she took his hat and coat. “Though I won’t deny that the thought has crossed my mind of late. Crystal Springs needs money to rebuild, and I
am
familiar with the market. It’s a pity I’d have a hard time sneaking past the town’s lawman, seeing as how I sleep with him every night.”

“That you would, love.” Archer dropped his hat on the back of a chair and picked up his glass. “Diana’s off with Samuels. I reckon she’ll be along shortly.”

Grace made an annoyed noise, and Nate decided to like her. Especially when she said, “He certainly didn’t waste any time, for all the good it will do him.”

“A man never knows if he doesn’t try,” Archer said mildly, but with a meaningful look at Nate.

Nate took the silent rebuke without comment. Instead, he changed the topic back to the task at hand. “While you were working the Deadlands, did you ever hear rumors of a bloodhound allied with vampires?” A pointed sort of question, since Archer himself had struck a devil’s bargain with the vampire who’d turned Nate.

And Archer didn’t shy away from it. “You mean besides me?”

No, there was nothing sweet and innocent about Grace. Her eyes narrowed, and her voice took on a protective edge sharp enough to flay skin from bones. “You weren’t allied with vampires. You followed the instructions of your Guild and they left you to take the blame for their folly.”

The world had become a truly terrifying place when Nate couldn’t open his mouth without enraging a woman, but Archer was happily in love. “My apologies,” Nate murmured. “I wasn’t implying—”

“I know exactly what you were implying,” she interrupted. “You’re not a man accustomed to having to shield his thoughts and feelings, and I can read yours like an open book.”

Archer laid a hand on her arm. “Relax, honey. Nate and I understand each other.” He arched an eyebrow. “I heard rumors of hounds working with vampires, of course. I also heard rumors of Martians landing a craft out in the desert in preparation for invasion, but I wouldn’t put any stock in it.”

Nate frowned. “There was at least one rogue hound around these parts—Diana is proof of that. But if you never heard any rumors more substantial than the usual wild tales…” He shook his head. “It doesn’t add up. The sort of skill it takes to avoid notice is incompatible with the carelessness of killing humans during the full moon. How many unregulated bloodhounds can there be?”

“No clue. I don’t have the answers you want.” Archer held up one finger. “But I know who might—a fellow named Jonah Knight. He owns a, uh, hotel of sorts in Eternity. The Black Lily.”

“Of sorts?” Surely if Archer had meant a brothel, he would have said as much. A woman who had traded in illegal, modified weapons couldn’t be that easily shocked.

But Grace was frowning too. “Whose tender sensibilities are you worried about, love? His or mine?”

“His, of course.” Archer groaned reluctantly. “It’s a private club. Sex and blood, but not for sale.”

It took Nate a moment too long to understand, and when he finally did the words tripped out of his mouth, laced with disbelief. “You’re sending us to a
private sex club
?”

Chapter Four

It took Diana three hours, a multitude of decreasingly gentle hints and finally one ugly argument before Jesse stopped pleading his suit.

He wanted to drive her back to town, but with his unpleasant accusations still ringing in her ears, the ground itself would have had to be aflame before she’d have considered it. And she
still
might have punched him in the face and walked.

She kicked a clod of dirt and slipped her hand into the hidden pocket on her dress, closing her hand around the hilt of her favorite knife. The cadre of vampires that had terrorized Crystal Springs had been eliminated, but she knew better than to let herself grow complacent, especially this close to dusk.

She wanted a drink. She wanted a headache powder.

And more than anything, to her unending consternation, she wanted Nate Powell.

Grace met her at the edge of town as if she’d been waiting for her. “Diana.”

“Grace.” Seeing her friend washed away the irritation, and Diana grinned. “I’m sorry it took so long to get away. Jesse’s a very determined man.”

“I’m not surprised.” Grace hugged her tight, then pulled back to study her. “You look no worse for the trouble, though. It seems as if it’s been forever since I saw you.”

Had it truly been less than a month? Diana could scarcely believe it. “You look radiant.”

Grace flushed a charming pink, and even managed to look happy doing that. “You wouldn’t think two former criminals would have so much fun playing at being respectable, but it suits us. As long as we get to be ourselves when we’re alone together.”