Free Dark Salvation by Katie Salidas

don’t need your help. I’d fare better with the Acta Sanctorum guys than you,” she snarled. “By the way, you still have a little of him left on your chin.”
    Nicholas wiped his face and turned away. He’d tried the nice approach and that had backfired in his face. “Your choice. Have a nice life, then, however long it may be.”
    Nicholas caught the metallic clip of a gun being cocked in the distance. He pivoted and scanned the area, but didn’t see anything.
    “What now?” Kitara said impatiently.
    “Get down,” Nicholas replied in low whisper. “Lie flat against the ground. Now.”
    She dropped to the ground just as he’d instructed, and at that same moment a shot went off. The bullet grazed Nicholas’s leg. Clearly this was no sniper. He took another look in the direction the bullet had traveled and there, bobbing in the distance, trying to take cover behind a trash can, was another soldier.
    He was on the Saint before he could squeeze off another round. This death came quicker. Already sated, Nicholas snapped his neck and turned back to make sure Kitara was still safe.
     She looked around and worry replaced the disgust on her face. “Fine. I’ll go with you. Can you promise not to kill me?”
    “Don’t ask me for ridiculous things. If I wanted to kill you, I would have. Let that be enough.”
    “You’re infuriating,” she mumbled under her breath.
    “I know, but so are you.”
     

Chapter 6
     
    Nicholas heard the sounds of occupation before he opened the front door. He smiled inwardly, hoping to get a rise out of Kitara when she realized this was a house full of vampires and werewolves. Hopeful as he was, nothing could have predicted the priceless look on her face as she walked into the foyer.
    Alyssa’s half-naked ass bobbing over the top of the backside of the couch was impossible to miss, as were her pleasurable moans as she lapped up blood from Lysander’s neck. The two of them barely registered Nicholas’s and Kitara’s entrance. They were too entranced in their own activities on the sofa in the parlor.
    Nicholas couldn’t hold back his satisfied grin. The shock registering on Kitara’s face was priceless. She looked positively horrified.
    After a moment or two more, Nicholas cleared his throat.
    Alyssa’s head shot up. Bloodlust clouded her pale blue eyes. She looked more beast than beauty at that moment, with Lysander’s blood glistening off her sharp white fangs. Alyssa’s gaze narrowed on Kitara, and she let out a snarl worthy of any nightmarish creature.
    Kitara jumped in fright and grasped hold of Nicholas.
    That snapped Alyssa back to reality. “Oh shit! Sorry,” she said, embarrassed. She hid her face and threw on Lysander’s button-down shirt.
    Lysander, nonplussed, turned toward the frightened Kitara. “Nicholas, I didn’t realize you’d be bringing home guests.”
    “Late night snack.” Nicholas joked, hoping to get another rise out of Kitara. “This one has a death wish. I told her I could help with it, and send her out with a smile.”
    Kitara seemed to have caught on to his taunting and refused to respond. Pity. He was beginning to have fun with her.
    Behind her silent icy stare he picked up the rapid acceleration in her heart. Nicholas could almost smell her sudden arousal. She was intrigued by the possibility but wouldn’t admit it out loud. He’d file that knowledge away for later.
    “Ms. Vanders here fancies herself a private investigator. She’s been trying to track down her long lost boyfriend at…. wait for it… the Acta Sanctorum’s church.”
    Lysander’s lip quirked at the mention of the Saints, but his tone remained level and calm. “Well, if he’s a Saint, we cannot help. If he is one of us, then he is probably dead.” 
    Nicholas pushed Kitara forward as he walked to the parlor. “That was my first thought too, but she refuses to see reason and got herself marked.”
    She jerked away from him as if his touch burned her. “I didn’t