Free Dark Xanadu by Sindra van Yssel Page B

him. “I want to fall asleep in your lap.”
    Sounded good to him. “Then climb up here.”
    “So tempting. But tomorrow’s a work day. I should be getting home instead.”
    Kent mentally kicked himself. He glanced at the clock; it was already after eleven. I should have thought of that. Still, she didn’t move. “You may rise,” he told her. “And get your clothes on.” As much as he wanted to hold her all night, or at least the part of the night, he wasn’t making love to her. He had to let her go.
    She’d barely gotten them back on when Charles appeared at the door. A blush appeared on Angela’s cheeks, no doubt thinking of how close Charles had been to walking in on them. She might enjoy playing in public some day, thought Kent, but that day was still in the future.
    “Let me pick you up at your place on Friday?” asked Kent. So far, she hadn’t told him where she lived, and he was ready for her to say no. But if he’d earned a bit of her trust there, he wanted to know it.
    She hesitated only a moment. “Sure. Let me give you the address.”
    He recorded it in his cell phone, and then walked her to her car. “Friday, then.”
    Angela nodded. “Looking forward to it.”
    He kissed her through the open window of her car. He remembered when he was a teenager, holding a goodbye kiss for as long as possible, not wanting the sensation that he was actually kissing a real, live girl to end. But she did have to go to work in the morning. He reluctantly drew back.
    Kent watched Angela’s Malibu drive off into the distance, waiting until it was out of sight to head back to the club. Cute car. Cute girl.
    There was a man standing at the door to the warehouse, leaning back at the side of it like a hooker looking for business. A glowing cigarette was held idly in his fingers. He lifted the cigarette to his mouth once, and then put it down, but he didn’t blow any smoke, nor did the end flare into brightness. For a moment, though, his face was illuminated, dark and vaguely familiar. Kent didn’t think he’d seen him in the club, though. So where else? The club had absorbed almost all his attention since moving east.
    It took him three more steps until he recollected where he’d seen the man before. By then he was a few feet away, having climbed the concrete steps to the entrance. Mario. From Los Angeles. No wonder there hadn’t been any smoke coming from his cigarette. He hadn’t been breathing at all. Mario had been involved in the kidnappings. He had thought Mario had been in the house he burned down, full of vampires, but the light had been bad and he’d been in a hurry. Apparently he’d been wrong.
    “Hello Kent.” Mario’s name may have fit in with the barrio, but he wasn’t any more Hispanic than Kent was, and neither was his accent. The offspring of Italian immigrants, Kent guessed.
    Kent stopped. “Mario. Wish I could say it was a pleasure.” So much for vampires not travelling across country. Or respecting each other’s territory, unless Mario had permission from the head vampire in Washington to be there.
    “No, Kent. It’s not a pleasure.” But Mario was smiling.
    Kent’s pistol was in the desk in his office. A gun only slowed a vampire down, but that would be enough if he could get inside the warehouse, perhaps. There was something to the idea that a vampire needed to be invited in to a space to enter it, although the head vampire of L.A. didn’t seem to be governed by those rules the way his henchman did. Kent’s sword, which could inflict more permanent damage, was hanging over the door to his office. Not useful.
    Mario moved toward him with agonizing slowness, especially given that the vampire could probably move a twice the speed of a normal human if he’d wanted to. Perhaps Mario was trying to use his glamour on him, but so far no vampire had succeeded. It had been the one thing he had going for him when he’d been hunting the vampires down. They always expected to be able to