Authors: Theresa Meyers

The Hunter (17 page)

BOOK: The Hunter

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Lilly and Colt dutifully pulled the goggles on, and Colt made sure his hat was down good and firm on his head. Winchester started up the rope ladder and Colt prodded Lilly to follow.

“You can’t climb up after me. You’ll see up my dress.”

He grinned. “Better me than half the population of Tombstone, don’t you think?”

She nibbled her lip between her teeth.

“I just figured you’d feel safer with one of us before you and one of us after you. That’d be twice as many hands to catch if something happened. But you’re welcome to climb up after me if you want.”

Her lips twisted into a little moue of displeasure but she grabbed hold of the rope ladder. “Have it your way.”

Colt chuckled. He could only dream of having his way with her. It wasn’t ever going to happen. “Keep climbing and don’t look down and you’ll be just fine,” Colt directed.

Colt leaned over and took Remington’s hand, giving it a good hard shake, then pulling his brother to him. “Be careful. And don’t trust the shifter,” he said into Remington’s ear.

Remington pulled back and nodded. “Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do up there.”

“Well, that just leaves me open for all kinds of things, now don’t it?” Colt’s gaze drifted to China for an instant and he saw a longing there, mixed with enough anger that he didn’t envy Remy one little bit. He’d rather take his chances with a succubus than a shape-shifter any day. He grinned. “Happy hunting, brother.”

He scrabbled up the rope ladder, giving particular appreciation to the view he had of Lilly’s curvy derrière. The rope ladder swung in the breeze and Lilly gave a high-pitched squeak, but she continued climbing.

Colt grasped onto her ankle to steady her and she nearly kicked him in the face for his trouble. “You’ll be fine. We’re almost there.” The broad silver expanse of the dirigible’s underbelly looked even bigger up close. Colt could see the individual ribs that formed the frame beneath the stretch of the fabric just above the broad, flat expanse of the gondola bottom only ten feet or so above his head.

Winchester disappeared over the edge of the gondola deck for a second, then leaned over to offer Lilly his hand. “Hold on and I’ll help you up.”

Colt’s hold loosened out of shock and he slipped a little on the ropes. He made a mental note to stop gawking at the airship and hold on tighter. Winchester had never offered a helping hand to any supernatural before. Not that Colt could remember, at least. There must be something all-powerful amazing about the vampire Contessa to have changed his attitude so drastically. A mixture of worry and curiosity swirled in Colt’s gut. His arms burned with the effort of climbing. He sincerely hoped the vampire hadn’t glamoured his brother.

Lilly’s tiny black button-up boots disappeared over the edge as Winchester helped pull her onto the deck. Colt kept climbing. He waited for a few seconds to see if Winchester was planning on helping him up as well. “Hello? Anybody still up there?”

Winchester leaned over the edge, his goggles pulled down loose around his neck. “What’s taking you so long, little brother? You’re holding up the circus.”

Colt grumbled beneath his breath and reached the top of the ladder, then used the last bit of strength he had left in his arms to boost himself through an opening in the half wall surrounding the polished teak deck of the dirigible’s gondola. For his trouble he came nose to toe with his brother’s boots.

Winn looked down at him with a genuinely amused smile. “Took you long enough,” he chided.

Colt pulled the goggles down to his chest. “If you wanted me up here faster, you could have helped.”

“And risk making you look bad in front of these lovely ladies? Not a chance.”

Colt glanced to the side and saw the tips of Lilly’s scuffed and dusty little black boots right beside a pair of knee-high black boots that were polished so highly they gleamed like Oriental lacquer. His gaze traveled up an equally shiny dress of taffeta the blue-black color of raven wings with a tightly nipped waist, puffed shoulders, and a high neck to find a pair of piercing whiskey-colored eyes peering back at him. The woman’s dusky beauty was both dark and alluring, but the undercurrent of danger surrounded her like a cloud of expensive perfume.

“Another Mr. Jackson, I presume?” she asked. Her Eastern European accent made “Jackson” sound more like “Yakson” to Colt.

He sprung up from the floor and dusted off his hands on his denim pants before he took her gloved hand, covered in fine black kidskin, and kissed it lightly on the back. He flashed her a smile. “The youngest, and the most handsome, at your service, your ladyship ...”

Winn unceremoniously took the young woman’s gloved hand out of Colt’s. “Lady Alexandra Porter, Contessa Drossenburg,” he said, his tone tinged with a ripple of irritation Colt could feel, “my
little
brother, Colt Jackson.” Colt didn’t miss Winn’s emphasis on “little” as if it somehow referred to his anatomy and not just the age difference between them.

“So this is the Contessa.” She had to be an old vampire to be out this long in the bright desert sunshine even if the whole gondola hung in the perpetual shade of the dirigible’s balloon.

The woman gave the slightest inclination of her head. “It seems we are to transport you to Phoenix, along with your charming companion.” Her voice was like warm rustling silk, smooth but husky and inviting at the same time.

“Yes, we’re much obliged, ma’am, um, Lady Drossenburg,” Colt corrected himself, unsure of exactly how to address a vampire noble.

Her full, dusky, mauve lips curved into a sensual come-hither smile. “It is my pleasure to help the Chosen,” she answered, then turned away from him without missing a beat, as if she were used to being superior to those around her and his thanks a foregone conclusion. Colt bristled just a bit. Yep. No doubt about it, she was a vampire all right. Cocky, insufferable bloodsuckers.

Her head snapped around, her tawny eyes narrowing in warning as if he’d said it out loud rather than merely thought it. She looked down her long, aquiline nose at him. “Fair warning, sir, this ship is filled with vampires. And we can hear your thoughts as clearly as if you’d spoken them out loud.”

Colt gulped back a sudden uncomfortable swell in his throat. “Yes, your ladyship.”

She gave him a curt nod and turned back, heading for the large intricate Tiffany stained glass double doors that adjoined the deck. The motif of the red castle with black wings swung past Colt’s nose as Winn opened the door to let the ladies enter the interior of the dirigible first.

“Mind your manners, boy. No sense in offending the vampires before we know if they can help us find the missing part of the Book,” Winn whispered harshly into Colt’s ear as he passed.

The top level of the dirigible looked surprisingly modern, like a plush hotel lobby, surrounded by windows. Huge potted palms, their long, fringed green boughs ruffled by the breeze coming in the open doors, broke up the large open space. Heavily stuffed and elegantly carved chairs and settees were grouped like small parlors for gentle conversation or tea. Underfoot a thick oriental carpeting in rich burgundy and gold interspersed with the black points of the vampire’s crest muffled their steps. There was even a roaring fire in the grate of a marble fireplace at the far end of the room.

Colt couldn’t help himself. He was drawn to the huge fireplace. Stone cherubs held the ornately scrolled columns aloft. Upon closer inspection he saw the cherubs had fangs. A small shiver slithered over his skin and he took a quick step backward. A fire. In the air. It would certainly give Marley a conniption to have missed it.

“Fascinating, isn’t it?”

The familiar voice startled him. “Marley?”

The inventor grinned. “So good to know that I can occasionally surprise even you Jacksons,” he said with amusement.

“What are you doing here?”

“Your brother and the Contessa offered to assist me in delivering Balmora to Her Majesty.”

Colt’s gun hand itched and a slight whiff of sulfur made him draw his revolver and cock it in one swift motion, pointing it an inch from the center of the fake Marley’s forehead. “Who are you really?”

Marley sighed dramatically, rolling his eyes, and suddenly the image smeared and shifted, the white cottony hair growing longer, blond and silky, the body turning taller and curvaceous. “What gave me away?” China asked.

“First, Marley don’t like supernaturals, so I seriously doubt he’d take an offer of riding aboard a vampire’s dirigible. Second, I think it’s going to take half of the Queen’s army to pry Balmora out of Marley’s hands. He’s not going to give her up willingly. Third,” he wrinkled his nose, “I can still smell the sulfur on you.”

“So I’m a little rusty,” China groused with a shrug.

“You’re sloppy. There’s a difference. You should know who you’re impersonating better than that. And you didn’t answer my question.”

“I attached myself to the ladder as a mouse when they hauled it up. Remington wanted to make sure it wasn’t a trap. And, for your information, at least I’m not heartless like you. I can’t believe you left me behind.”

Colt turned back to the fire so he didn’t have to see the wounded look in her eyes and the angry set of her mouth.

“Look. If I’d had any chance of getting us both out, I would have. As it was, Remington came to get you. If anybody could talk you out of that jail cell I knew it would be him, not me.”

“Regardless, you still owe me.” The petulance in her voice left no doubt China intended to collect on the debt. “And by the way, I’d watch that demon if I were you. She’s already got you hooked.”

Her assessment rankled and Colt didn’t feel like discussing it, especially not with China. “Tell you what, you protect my brother’s back if you two go out searching for Diego’s map and make it back, then we’ll talk about what I owe you.”

A low growl started deep in China’s throat. For a moment he thought she was going to shift, then he sensed the female warmth standing right behind him and caught a whiff of Lilly’s unique fragrance in the air. Damn. Caught between a succubus and a shifter. Not a good place to be for a Hunter. And a hell of a place to be as a man.

“We’ll talk when we get back,” China said between gritted teeth, then turned on her booted heel and strode off across the lobby of the airship, the fringe on her jacket swinging with the motion of her hips.

“What did
she
want?” Lilly asked, her tone as bristly as an annoyed porcupine.

“Difference of opinion about a job we did a while back. Thinks I still owe her.”

“Certainly sounded like more than that.”

“Can’t always trust that a supernatural is going to stick to their word.”

“Or a Hunter, for that matter,” she said with some bitterness.

He snapped his gaze to her and stared at her hard. As much as he hated to say it, he needed to clear the air between them before anything happened that was as big a mess as the misunderstanding that had somehow happened between him and China. He needed to make her understand.

“I’m not going to let you torment my brothers.”

“Excuse me?”

She had the temerity to look surprised at his comment, which made Colt feel he needed to be even more direct. “We had a pact. You agreed not to take my soul. But you didn’t say nothin’ about leaving my brothers alone. Two out of the three Chosen wouldn’t be bad. I suppose it would satisfy Rathe. Except nothing ever does.”

“What are you talking about?”

Now his skin was starting to itch with irritation. She still wasn’t getting it. “I saw the way Remy looked at you. And the way you looked at him.”

“Yes, normally one looks at the other person with their eyes. I believe that’s rather mandatory.”

Colt cursed under his breath and glared at her. “No. He
looked
at you—undressed you with his eyes.”

The angry lines on her face softened with understanding, the scent that cloaked her growing more pronounced like roses in the summer sun so that it filled the air around him. “Think about it, Colt. It’s part of my allure as a succubus. Some are just more immune to it than others. Your brother is mortal. If he hadn’t reacted in some way, we’d have known he was a corpse, or worse yet, a vivified corpse.”

“That explains him. What about you?”

The angry flash in her eyes reignited. “Me?”

“You were
looking
at him too, hell, rubbing up against him like a damn cat. China even noticed it.”

Her lips pulled together into a tight little twist as she paused for an instant, sighed, and closed her eyes. When they opened she seemed far more serene. “While your jealousy is quite flattering despite it being Neanderthalic, it’s misplaced. I’ve always been fascinated by the Chosen. You and your brothers are all part of that mythology, whether you wish to accept it or not. And speaking of the shape-shifter—”

“So you were admiring him like a museum piece? Is that what you’re telling me?”

“Just how close were the two of you during your brief association?”

BOOK: The Hunter

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