Primal Instincts (7 page)

“That’s her. And she is an old-time movie star,
the
Rose Cameron.”

“But Rose Cameron would be ancient for a mortal. Shouldn’t she be dead? Or at least in a nursing home?”

“I think she may have been both.”

She looked at him suspiciously, but he didn’t seem to be the joking type.

“I’m not good at guessing mortal ages, but the person I saw was very young. And there was bond energy arcing between her and Tony,” she recalled after scouring her memories. “Just a beginning thread of it.”

“Yes. The beginnings of the bond is the problem I need your help to get around.”

Francesca prepared to be indignant. “Don’t tell me you want me to seduce Tony Crowe away from this woman?”

A dark shock of jealousy washed over her, quickly cut off by Strahan’s tightening his shielding. “You think far too well of your charms if you think you can break a bond.”

“I would never try to!” she shot back. “But it’s the damn fool sort of thing somebody might think I would try to do. Femme fatale Flare, Flare the vamp—wait, I am a vamp. But I’m not a home wrecker.”

Strahan held his hands in a T sign. “Time out, lady. Let’s start over.”

His gesture was another reminder of Patrick, of the type of sports-loving jock her mortal warrior had been and Dark Angel Strahan was.

“Do you like football?” she asked.

“Who doesn’t?”

“You military types are all alike.”

“No, I think it’s just a man thing.”

“I like football. Basketball. Hockey.”

“Baseball?” he asked hopefully.

“Best of all.”

“But you’re—”

“Yeah, yeah, snooty bitch princess Flare. There’s more to me than getting my claws manicured.”

“Really? For example?”

“I don’t get polo and I’ve never been on a yacht. I have a pilot’s license and—” She decided it would be self-serving to tell him about the charity she worked for.

Strahan eyed her with solemn curiosity for a moment. Then he laid his big hands flat on the
table and took a calming breath. “Meanwhile, back at Tony and Rose . . .”

She repeated his gesture and fought off the temptation to reach across to him. Fortunately, the table was too wide for that. “What do you want me to do about them?”

“Rose was a captive of our bad guys. She was experimented on by them. Tony, Sid, and Joe rescued her last night. I haven’t had a chance to talk to her yet. I need to know what she knows, and I need to know it from her, especially the information she doesn’t know she knows. But Tony won’t let a Prime near her.”

“Of course not, he’s bonding with her.”

He nodded. “But he would let her talk to a female vampire. Allow one into her head.”

“That’s why you recruited Sid Wolf,” she said. He gave her a speculative look that told her he was waiting for her to figure it out. “Ah,” Francesca said, “you’re not willing to risk Sid’s relationship with her sire.”

“There’s no reason to make trouble within a family if it can be avoided. You’re a female telepath.”

“And if Tony Crowe ends up angry with me what difference will that make to anyone?”
Except maybe to my friendship with Sid.

“Precisely,” Strahan answered. “Will you talk with this mortal woman?”

“Will I mess with her head and bring you everything inside it?”

“I believe that’s what I implied.”

“And interrogate her in such a way that no one will suspect the Reynard heiress did it for the Dark Angels?”

“Do it in a way that no one knows you did it at all. And be gentle with her. She’s a good guy and has been put through hell by the bastards we’re after.”

Does he think I’m inept enough to leave burn marks all over some nice old lady’s mind?

“You have to spend time at the clinic anyway,” he added. “It should be easy for you to find some private time with Rose. Will you do it?”

It was a straight-up question, no puppy-dog little-boy pleading in his big brown eyes. Most Primes she knew were more the cajoling type when it came to getting what they wanted out of females. His method of simply asking worked far better than anything else would have.

“All right,” Francesca said. “I’ll give it a—”

Boss! Situation developing!

The shout came out of nowhere, not from the earpiece Strahan had put away or the phone in his jacket pocket. It was simple, effective telepathy, aimed at Strahan, but Francesca heard the alarm as well.

Attack on the Prime actor’s house
, the Dark Angel added.

On our way
, Strahan answered. He rose to his feet, shouting, “Dee!”

Then he grabbed Francesca by the wrist and dragged her along.

“What are you doing here?” Tobias asked Flare.

Dee spoke up from the backseat. “That’s what I’ve been asking.”

“She has,” Flare said from the passenger’s seat. “You haven’t been listening.”

It hadn’t been a long drive from Lancer’s house to an even wealthier part of Malibu. Tobias had concentrated on getting to their destination with the greatest amount of speed while dealing with the developing situation telepathically. If Dee had said anything in those few minutes he hadn’t noticed, which he didn’t understand and didn’t like. The ability to multitask was essential in his job.

And how had Flare Reynard sneaked into the car with them?

“Sneaked?” She held up a bruised wrist. “You did this, Strahan.”

“You did,” Dee said in agreement. “You dragged
her along, boss. Can’t you stand to have her out of your sight?”

It was not a facetious question, and Tobias didn’t like the answer that sprang instantly to mind. That he
couldn’t
bear to have Flare out of his sight. Away from his touch. To be away from constant intimate awareness of her mind, her body, and her blood.

Damn instinct!
Didn’t it know he had an op to run?

“Stay here,” he told Flare. He ignored her flash of annoyance. “Let’s go, Dee.”

He filled the mortal woman in on his telepathic communications as they walked toward the actor’s gated mansion two blocks away. He’d parked far enough back not to draw the attention of the attackers. It wasn’t an attack yet, but the Purists were gathering for one, cautiously avoiding any contact with the police and private security teams that patrolled the streets of the wealthy community. One by one mortals were slipping through the shadows, massing for an assault.

Of course, the point was that the Purists wanted the mansion’s security system to be triggered. They wanted all those police and private security people to head straight for the house. They wanted the alerted
media to rush to the scene. They wanted to draw attention to the supernatural community, just as they’d tried to do with their other attacks over the last several days.

“Theater,” Tobias muttered.

What were the bad guys really up to with these distractions? He’d find out eventually, but he had all these little fires to put out first—before some of his own kind really got burned.

Jake and Jerame were stationed on the estate’s grounds, monitoring the approach of the enemy. His Crew was spread thin tonight.

“I had only Jerame guarding the house because it’s the last place I thought would be attacked,” Tobias informed Dee. “When I told a movie star to go about his business I thought he’d spend his off hours out partying, safe in the embrace of pretty girls and watchful paparazzi.”

“I thought he had a reputation for drunken brawls and sexual excess.”

“Turns out he’s a domestic sort. His bad rep’s a product of his publicist’s imagination and media manipulation by our very own Corbett twins.”

Dee tsked. “Is nothing sacred anymore? Young movie stars are supposed to be bad and reckless.”

“So are young Primes.”

“And what is a virile Prime doing lolling around his home? Please tell me he has a live-in harem. And
if so, how do I join it?”

“Don’t let Jake Piper hear you talking like that. Our ex-Tribe boy may believe you. As for our actor friend, he told Jake he’s having a business dinner.”

Dee was disgusted. “I bet his name’s not even James Wilde.”

“I don’t know of any vampires named Wilde. He lives too out in the open to be anything he seems to be.”

“Purists busting in on an orgy would be more fun.”

“It would be. But Purists busting in on a meeting of powerful Hollywood types is far more dangerous.”

“I’m sure they only believe in vampires at the box office.”

“For now,” he said in agreement. “But there’s a fine line between rumors and reality in these parts.”

“Better not to get vampire rumors started. What’s the plan, boss?”

“The Purists’ attack will be planned to start when the gate opens for the guests to leave. Putting film executives in danger will not endear our boy to the moguls, even if they don’t believe he’s a vampire. However, they’ll be much more understanding of pretty girls and watchful paparazzi.”

“I think I see where this is heading, boss. Want me to call Sasha Corbett, then get naked in front of the gate?”

“Call Sasha,” he said, “but you’ll be too valuable
in a fight.” He glanced up the street where the seething energy of a pouting princess radiated from the darkness. “I’ve got another pretty girl in mind for the diversion.”

Mom’s going to kill me if she finds out about this
, Francesca thought as she pranced up the street—and prancing while barefoot, swinging her shoes in her hand, wasn’t easy.

But since she’d been wearing flats, which were decidedly not sexy, bare feet looked better. Her black skirt was hiked up nearly to her hipbones. She’d been wearing a lacy black sweater over a cami. Now she was wearing only the lacy black sweater. Her nipples were not appreciating the cool night air, but she was sure the watching males were appreciating her nipples peeking out through the sheer lace.

She carried a champagne bottle in her other hand. How the witch had gotten her hands on the wine at such short notice was a mystery. When she’d asked, Strahan had grinned proudly at the red-haired mortal and said, “Delilah McCoy is the most resourceful woman you’ll ever meet.”

“I am, you know,” Dee said, grinning back at Strahan.

The pair’s camaraderie ground against Francesca’s shield of indifference. Strahan and McCoy liked
each other; maybe it was more than liked. They certainly shared a purpose. They were Dark Angels and she would never be. She was an outsider Strahan only turned to for a moment’s help.

Jealous much, are you?
Francesca asked herself as she strutted up to the closed gate.
Yes
, she admitted.
But not going into the who or what.

Heads up, woman!
another voice said in her mind.

She could sense far more than Strahan’s attention on her, but his were the thoughts touching hers. She recognized the sparks of Dark Angel minds in the darkness but could also pinpoint the hostile attention of other watchers as well.

She had an audience. It was time to play to it.

Francesca smiled into the eye of the security camera to the side of the gate, dropped her shoes, and coyly waved her fingers. “Hello, Jimmy!” she called. She pressed the buzzer. “Jimmy Wilde, come out and play! I’m here!”

She heard cars approaching and caught the glow of headlights from the corner of her eye but carefully kept her back turned to the street. In a moment there was more to the light than headlamps; she was illuminated by glaring flashbulbs and the click of cameras at her back. The media sharks had come looking for blood—the poor dears had no idea—and it wouldn’t be long before the police and rent-a-cops pulled up to join them.

A riot is a terrible thing . . .

Pay attention!
Strahan’s order was stern, but she could feel his amusement in her head
. . . . to waste
, he added.

“What are you doing here?”

The disembodied voice this time issued from a speaker beside the security camera and had a rich Irish accent.

“Jimmy!” Francesca bounced up and down and waved the champagne bottle while cameras clicked and recorded. “You told me to stop by, remember? Let me in! Or come out and play.”

“Oh, I’m coming down all right.” The angry Irish voice issued loudly from the speaker.

He’d been telepathically briefed to play along with this nonsense.

There was a solid wall of hungry anticipation behind Francesca. The paparazzi’s excitement almost overlaid her awareness of Angels and enemies alike.

Soon the gate swung open and two dark cars pulled out into the street before James Wilde stepped into the firing line of flashbulbs and shouted questions.

She hadn’t expected him to grab her and kiss her in front of the crowd, but it made sense for dragging out the diversion a little longer. The kiss looked fierce and hungry, but there was no passion in it. Francesca barely remembered to lean against him and put her arms around his neck. She did remember to drop the
champagne bottle.

Which was when the fight between the Dark Angels and Purists started.

She had no idea what sort of potion the witch had put in the bottle, but the fumes from it kept the media bloodsuckers’ attention on her and Wilde instead of the fight—even after Wilde spun her through the gate and closed it behind them.

“Stay here,” the actor Prime ordered her before rushing off to join the fray.

Of course.
It was an order she was getting used to hearing. This time she didn’t mind obeying it. Let the boys have fun without her. Francesca knew just how far she dared go in helping the Dark Angels, and the last few minutes had come very close to crossing that line. If any of the photos about to hit the tabloids showed her face she would be in very deep trouble with her Matri.

Then again, her mom was enthusiastic about the prospect of having a grandchild from her. So even if she was going to get locked away in Idaho for the foreseeable future it wouldn’t be until that deed was accomplished.

She was not perturbed when a scream issued out of the darkness near the house. The sound did make her fingertips tingle, claws wanting to come out. A faint scent of blood perfumed the air and she ran her tongue over her slightly extended fangs.