McKenzie, Cooper - Saving Chloe (Siren Publishing Classic)

COOPER MCKENZIE

Copyright © 2012

Chapter 1

It took longer for him to get the blood off his hands than he anticipated. He’d have to let his supplier know the blood bank needed to check the quality of their bags. Of course, the fact that he was in a hurry might have something to do with the bag of blood disintegrating.

But his friend didn’t need to know that. After more than six hundred years of looking, he wanted to keep the news of finding his mate to himself for a little longer. At least until he’d met and claimed her. Once news got out that he’d found his match, everyone would want to meet her. And when they found out she was human, they would look at her as their next meal and not his mate.

Drying his hands quickly, he checked his clothes to make sure none of the blood splashed onto him. Wearing blood-stained clothes would not make the best first impression. Thankfully, he was wearing a black T-shirt with his black cargo shorts. Even if anything had spilled, it wouldn’t show.

Tossing the dish towel into the open top of the washing machine, he headed toward the front door. Tonight he would meet his mate. Excitement like he hadn’t felt in more than three hundred years bubbled up in him, and he smiled.

Stepping out onto the porch that ran around the front of his house, Declan moved to the antique rocking chair and settled in to wait. His woman was down the street again, spending time with those people who were only a couple steps above trailer trash in his estimation. She was too good for them, and from now on, he would see to it that they stayed away from his woman.

* * * *

What the hell am I doing here?

Chloe Templeton looked from the half-empty can of beer in her hand to the full one Winston Jameson held right in front of her. At forty-two, the last thing she needed was to get drunk on a Thursday night.

“No thanks,” she said. “I’m good.”

“You’re falling behind, girlie,” Winston said as he forced the can into her free hand.

The can was cold and wet, fresh from the giant cooler where he routinely kept five or six cases of beer on ice. Winston was an alcoholic and proud of it. Thankfully, he also had the sense to drink at home and not go out to a bar where he might endanger someone else as he made his way home afterward.

Instead of arguing, which would do no good, Chloe took the beer. She set it on the table next to her that already held a half-dozen empty beer cans. Standing, she walked to the far side of the porch and pulled her cell phone from her pocket. Flipping it open, she gasped when she saw it was 10:46 p.m.

Shit, another evening with no editing work done.
This was the third night this week that she had been dragged to one of these gatherings, each one longer than the one before.

She’d promised Stephanie she would have two books edited and returned by the end of the week. It was Thursday, and she had yet to get halfway through the first one. She knew the editor-in-charge would understand if they were a couple days late, but Chloe hated breaking deadlines, especially when it came to paying work.

“Hey, Chloe, come back. You can’t go home now.” Jasmine wrapped a hand around Chloe’s arm.

“I’ve got to go,” Chloe said gently as she tried to pull from Jasmine’s grasp.

Instead of releasing her, the other woman tightened her hold. Her voice was loud, shrill, and drew the attention of the others. “What are you going to do? Go home and work? Or play with that battery- operated boyfriend you told me about while you get all down and depressed about Bill’s not calling this week?”

Chloe cheeks burned as she stared the other woman in the eye. Jasmine was the epitome of a blonde bombshell, but right now Chloe didn’t see the beauty. She saw something dark and evil in the woman’s blue-green eyes. Taking a deep breath, she swallowed down the nasty comment she wished she had the guts to say aloud.
You have a husband at home waiting for you. Why do you spend your evenings hanging out with the single people?

She’d only lived in the neighborhood for three months. When she’d moved in, she had hoped to be friends with her neighbors. The block consisted of a nearly equal mix of divorced people and long-term, happily married couples. With a few exceptions, the neighbors were all in their forties and fifties.

Between her day job as a pharmaceutical sales representative and her night job as an editor of erotic romances, she had innumerable acquaintances, but few true friends. She thought this eclectic group might be a good place to start making the friends that Charles, her ex-husband, had never allowed her to have.

Instead of saying what she really felt, she swallowed the bitterness and sighed. “I’ve got deadlines, and I’m falling behind,” she said softly. “Besides, I kicked Bill to the curb last night.”

Jasmine blinked at that announcement before throwing herself at Chloe and hugging her tight. “I’m glad you finally ditched Bill. You can catch up on work this weekend,” Jasmine said as she stepped back and pulled on Chloe’s arm again. “Come on, you need one more beer so we can celebrate your emancipation from the idiot.”

“No, Jasmine, I’m going home now.”

With that, Chloe jerked her arm from the other woman’s hold. The sudden move pulled Jasmine off-balance just enough that she teetered on her four-inch stilettos and had to grab the porch railing to keep from falling on her ass. Before anyone else could speak, Chloe hurried down the four steps and across the yard to the city-maintained sidewalk that was one of the big selling points of the neighborhood.

Behind her, she heard the “Porch People,” as they referred to themselves, talking. Their tone had gone soft without the quick bursts of laughter. She had no doubt they were discussing her and whether or not she really had to work. She was certain by the time they gathered again, each would have come up with the perfect solution for her rocky love life. Like theirs were any better.

“They just don’t understand,” Chloe muttered to herself as she turned toward home. She blinked back tears of frustration as she walked down the sidewalk.

When she reached the yard of her little bungalow, she glanced over her shoulder to confirm no one had followed her. It would not surprise her if one of the regular Porch People, Jasmine, Winston, or Ray, would come down to convince her to return to the gathering. Thank goodness the sidewalk remained empty.

Looking around through the dim light provided by old-fashioned streetlights and the waning moon overhead, she saw no one except the man who lived across the street. He was the one the Porch People had warned her against being friendly with. They claimed he was strange and antisocial and foreign. That statement had made Chloe curious about him. She had seen him numerous times over the past weeks, but never had the opportunity to meet him face-to-face.

Chloe climbed the three steps to the small, square, covered stoop that led into her postage-stamp-sized house. She felt out of breath and drained, unable to go any further without resting. So instead of retreating inside behind the security of the two locks on her front door and two locked back doors, she sat down on the top step with a weary sigh. Thankfully, she had remembered to turn the living room light on before she’d left, four hours earlier.

A shadow moving across the street caught her attention, and she watched as someone ambled across the street. She didn’t have the energy to jump up and go inside to avoid a conversation.

Besides, she wanted to meet whoever lived in the big Victorian that overshadowed every other house on the block. While she had seen him several times since moving in, they had yet to formally meet.

When she had brought him up to the Porch People, speculation was that he was a strange character and right for their little clique. Even Winston, who knew everything about everyone, knew nothing about the man.

The shadow turned into a man as he came up her sidewalk. He was younger than she expected, but just as gorgeous up close as he was from across the street. His hair hung nearly a foot past his shoulders and was dark, but she couldn’t tell in this light if it was black or brown. He was long and lean with a runner’s body. His jaw and cheekbones were sharply angled. He had the most beautiful smile she’d ever seen on a man. It even shined from his eyes, which were light, but again, she could not tell their color.

In that instant, Chloe told herself that he was off-limits. He was too young and probably had a thirty-something Barbie-doll wife and a couple of kids somewhere.

The man stopped three feet from the bottom step, and he looked her up and down. “They’re draining you,” he announced solemnly.

“Who’s doing what?” Chloe asked as she realized he was right.

She did feel drained. Was it from listening to Jasmine bitch about her job and her husband and her children? Or from spending hours every week with people that she wasn’t sure she wanted to be friends with, but couldn’t stop herself from going along with when they pulled her into a gathering of one sort or another?

He half turned his body to look in the direction of Winston’s house where the hum of laughter and conversation could once again be heard. “Them. Those people who claim ta be yer friends. They’re hurtin’ you, drainin’ yer energy and spirit, and yer not fightin’ back. Why not?”

His Irish brogue sparked a fire deep in Chloe’s soul. Her nipples stiffened, and her panties dampened in response. She squeezed her thighs together to keep from jumping off the porch straight into his arms as she watched the front of his shorts bulge forward just behind the fly. So, she wasn’t the only one feeling an attraction.
Wonder what his wife would have to say about that?

Instead of answering him, she asked, “Who are you?”

“Oh, sorry. Declan Flannery,” he said as he extended his right hand.

Chloe put her hand in his, and her breath stopped as electricity flashed from his palm to hers. In an instant, heat flashed up her arm. The tingling fire spread through her entire body, and suddenly she felt a sexual hunger like never before. She blinked and looked away, hoping he couldn’t see the arousal in her eyes that flared in her body like gasoline poured on a fire.

“And you are?” He kept her hand clasped in his then turned them both as he lifted them. Bending his head, he brushed a kiss across the back of her knuckles.

“Chloe Templeton,” she whispered as her nipples leapt to attention, and her pussy filled and overflowed, wetting her panties further.

“Pretty name for a pretty lady,” Declan said as he squeezed her hand before releasing it.

Chloe’s cheeks burned. She had to look away from the pale eyes that seemed to be reading her soul. “Thanks,” she said softly after clearing her throat.

“And what do ye do fer a livin’, Miss Templeton?”

“Please, call me Chloe. I’m a pharmaceutical sales rep, and I edit books at night,” she answered, looking up again. “And you?”

Declan smiled. “I suppose you could say I’m a businessman.”

* * * *

The urge to lay Chloe down and make love to her until neither of them could move started at the base of his cock and filled his entire being in three heartbeats. Instead of giving in to the hunger, Declan shifted. He placed his right foot on the second step, a few inches from hers, which gave his cock a little more breathing room. He rested his forearm on his upraised thigh and leaned closer. Though her alluring, natural scent of wildflowers and honey was tainted by exhaustion and the beer she’d drunk, it was still enough to make his cock throb with need as his soul yearned to claim her.

He’d waited six hundred years for this woman, and his body demanded he claim her as his mate immediately, if not sooner. Her hair was dark, straight, and silky, and his fingers itched to slide through the strands to see if they were as soft as they appeared. But then, everything about Chloe screamed softness.

She was not one of those modern, skinny, hard-bodied females that exercised for hours each day just so they could eat a real meal once in awhile. His Chloe was round and soft with heavy breasts pushing at her loose T-shirt, while generous hips filled out her skirt. She was what a woman should be, a softness to balance out a man’s hardness.

She shifted, as if uncomfortable by his nearness, but Declan did not retreat. She needed to become accustomed to his presence, his closeness. Soon they would be so close it would be difficult to tell where he left off and she began. He wondered for a moment how long he would have to wait.

“Why did you say that earlier? About them draining me?” Chloe asked after the silence had extended far too long. He could hear the arousal and the confusion in her voice as she tried to deal with the instant attraction she probably didn’t understand.