Damn. The woman sure had one hell of a bite.

Sexy. If there wasn’t a demon standing there, glaring and threatening death, he’d lick that long column of her throat once more.

If.

“Sorry, Dee, that’s not gonna happen.” Zane glanced down at the floor, then back at her. “I got a promise to keep.”

Then he lunged forward, the stake up, ready, moving faster than a human ever could and flying straight at Dee.

Simon tried to jump in front of her, but Dee shoved him to the side. Then her left hand shot out and she snatched the stake, ripped it right out of the demon’s hand and snapped the wood in two.

The broken stake thudded onto the carpet.

She grabbed Zane, bunched his shirt in her fist, and jerked him close to her face.

He smiled at her. “I tried.”

What?

“You gonna bite me now? Gonna sink those, um, really long and what looks like freakishly sharp teeth in my neck? Gonna drain me dry?”

The demon didn’t seem particularly worried.

Dee rolled her eyes. “Don’t tempt me, asshole. Don’t tempt me.”

The smile that had curled his lips faded. “You’re still in there, aren’t you, Dee? All this…” His hand lifted, traced her lips, and Simon had to bite back a growl. “It’s just surface.”

She blinked and her head cocked.

Surface.

Being a vampire was a hell of a lot more than that.

“Not a cold-blooded killer, are you?”

Dee freed him.

“If you were, you would have drained me by now.” He straightened his shirt, then raised a brow. “Born, huh? Never saw that one coming.”

She shoved a hand through her hair. “Me either.”

Zane grunted and looked his way. “So what’s your story?”

Simon just stared back at him.

“Man, you need to bring that down a notch. Dee and I weren’t lovers. You want to get all territorial and kick-ass, save that crap for Tony.”

Simon locked his jaw and gritted, “Why are you here?”

Another fleeting smile. “I’m here because if Dee really had become some soul-less bloodsucker, I would have kept my promise.” His stare slanted to a watchful Dee. “Don’t worry, sweet, I would have made it fast and as painless as possible.” A shrug. “But the minute I saw you, I knew you were still my Dee—”

A woman screamed. Loud, high. Terrified.

The scent hit Simon then. Thick and cloying. Smoke.

Fire.

“Fuck!” Zane spun around and ran for the door. Dee and Simon raced after him.

Not another damn fire. Not again. Grim’s pack, they just weren’t going to stop, not until they killed Dee.

Not on his watch.

Zane shoved open the door at the bottom of the stairs and they walked into—

An inferno.

It should have been impossible. Fire couldn’t spread this fast. With their senses, they would have known but—

But Delaney’s burned. The flames crackled and licked at the ceiling, growing bigger, hungrier, and giving them a glimpse of sweet hell.

“Catalina!” Dee’s scream.

The witch stood behind the bar, seemingly frozen. Her eyes were on the flames that surrounded her. Bright, dancing flames.

The demon swore and charged for her. He waved his hand and the flames dimmed around the witch.

He flew over the fire and grabbed her.

“Burn,” she whispered, but Simon could hear her over the flames. “Burn so fast.” She closed her eyes and turned her head against Zane’s shoulder.

The flames shot higher. The smoke thickened, but the fire didn’t race back toward the witch. Instead, it headed right for Dee.

“Wynter!” Simon yelled. The demon could control fire. He didn’t know what kind of power scale the guy had, but right then, as long as the guy could stop the fire, he didn’t care.

Zane hoisted the witch over his shoulder, then made a fast movement with his hand.

The flames flickered, faded.

Only to start rising once again.

“Magic!”

Yeah, he’d figured that out. Dee had a tablecloth in her hands and she was fighting the flames.

“No, forget it, Dee! Get out of here!” Zane ordered.

Good plan. Simon grabbed her arm.

The demon led the way, using his power to push back the fire that just kept rising, rising…

“Her!” The demon’s snarl. He froze before the door. Simon barreled into him. So not the time for this—

But then Zane ran forward. The glass doors exploded around them. Smoke billowed up into the night. Simon sucked in sharp, clean air, choking as his lungs began to clear.

“Stop her!” He glanced up at the yell. He saw Zane struggling with the witch, and Simon glimpsed a woman with curly red hair running down the street.

He blinked and Dee took off. Fast, so fast, his little vampire. She caught the woman in two seconds and tackled her, sending her prey slamming into the pavement.

“No!” The woman’s cry. Afraid. Furious. “Why can’t you die?”

Oh, so not what she needed to be saying to Dee.

He bounded after them.

Dee flipped the woman over and pinned her wrists to the ground.

Simon saw the tears on the woman’s cheeks. Long, thin trickles that slipped over her skin, fell into her hair.

“Do it, Nina.” The whisper was on the wind. He froze. “Kill her or they die.”

Dee’s head snapped up. “What the hell? Hey, jerkoff—come out and face me!”

Another vamp. One of Grim’s men. Had to be. But he was telling the woman to kill Dee? How was she supposed to do—

“Ignitor!” Zane’s scream of fear.

No, no. Simon’s gaze snapped back to the woman’s, and he finally saw her eyes, the bleed of red.

Grim wasn’t screwing around anymore. He’d pulled out the big guns.

“Dee!”

Ignitor—a human. A very, very rare human gifted with the power of fire. She’d burn Dee, burn her with just a thought and kill her in an instant. She’d—

“Hell, no,” Dee growled when her T-shirt began to smoke. Then she slammed the woman’s head back against the cement. Hard.

The Ignitor’s eyes fell closed, hiding that deadly red, and she lay, limp, beneath Dee.

He could love that vampire.

Already did.

“I’ve got her,” Dee called. “You get that other bastard!”

Done. Simon took off, legs pumping fast. He flew down the dark street, snaked into the alley. His nose twitched as he caught the scent of blood. A woman stood, weaving slightly, her hand on the grimy wall. Alcohol fumed off her but she’d been prey, too.

Close.

“Come out!”

The woman flinched. She looked over at him with bleary eyes. “Run,” he told her quietly, flashing fangs.

She did.

That left him all alone in the alley with his prey. A Dumpster squeaked. A shoe scraped over the asphalt. Simon licked his lips. “Hiding with the garbage?”

The vamp came out, claws ready, a bit of blood still dripping down his mouth. “You picked the wrong side in this fight.”

Simon lifted his brows. He caught the whisper of footsteps behind him. His backup. No way would he ever mistake Dee’s rich scent. “I don’t think so.”

The vamp’s eyes darted behind Simon, and for an instant, fear flashed on his thin face. Then he spun around, and leapt up, clearing the brick wall behind him in one bound.

Simon lunged after him. No way was this scum getting away from him.

The man knew how to leap over a wall. Really kinda sexy the way he could move so fast.

Dee exhaled, watched a bit longer, admiring her view, then she eyed the wall. Um, yeah, she could take that. She hoped.

Dee ran—a running start never hurt anything—then leapt. She cleared the wall, but slammed into the ground below. The impact jarred every bone in her body, but Dee rolled, and came back up on her feet and took off.

A park. A big, dark, yeah, things-could-be-hiding-here park. Overgrown grass. Too tall trees. Too thick brush. Great.

The vamp with the ferret face was fast; she’d give him that. Her heart raced in her ears and her legs kicked beneath her as she charged after him and Simon. No way was this guy getting away, not after he’d set a freaking Ignitor on her.

An Ignitor. A vampire’s nightmare. A being that could raise and control fire.

Not a good way for a vampire to die.

She’d watched vamps burn before. Dee just hadn’t thought that would ever be the way she’d go out.

Of course, she hadn’t thought she’d be a vamp, either.

Simon lunged forward and launched his body at the vampire. Even from the distance that separated them, she could hear the thud when their bodies crashed into the earth.

She pushed forward with a burst of speed.

Simon flipped the vampire over—and the ferret bastard started laughing.

That’s when the hair rose on Dee’s nape. When she realized that the shadows were too dark.

And that vampires didn’t always rely on their first course of attack.

Backup plans. She wasn’t the only one who had them. Dee let her claws out. “Simon.”

His head jerked up.

“He’s leading us by the balls. It’s a trap.” One they’d walked, no, ran, straight into. The Ignitor hadn’t been the only threat.

Not by a long shot.

The vamps came from the shadows. Four. No, five. Oh, damn, six.

Simon rose slowly, no fear flickering in his eyes or showing on the hard planes of his face. His shoulders rolled and he smiled. “Guess you’re all ready for an ass kicking, huh?”

The man might be insane. This many vamps? No, hell, no. Dee was very much afraid they would be the ones getting the ass kicking. She still didn’t even understand all her Born powers. No way could she take on this many vamps at once.

Laughter. The wild, crazy kind you usually only heard in B-movies. Ferret-face rose to his feet. He spat at Simon. Blood hit the ground near his feet. “I-I knew they h-had a hole here.” More laughter. What was the deal with Mr. Giggles? “Can’t take us all, c-can you?” His back straightened and that grin nearly split his face.

Simon’s arm brushed hers.

Dee sighed and pulled out a stake. Some habits just couldn’t be broken. Maybe they shouldn’t be broken. She eyed the closing circle of vamps, looking for the head of the snake. Because there was always a head, one with dripping fangs. The alpha. The vamp who wielded the most power and who had to be taken down first, because otherwise, he’d take you down. Fast, hard, and dirty.

Just because she liked her sex that way, it didn’t mean she wanted her second death to be like that.

There. The guy with the long, dreaded red hair. The one with green eyes that glinted and stared too hard at her. The one with his claws out and his hands up. He stood before the others, just by about a foot or two. Not toss-away prey.

Threat number one.

“Got him,” Simon whispered.

Hey, if he wanted to go first. “Knock yourself out,” she whispered and her gaze dipped to the woman on the alpha’s right. Asian. Exotic eyes too dark and deadly, red, red lips, pale, smooth skin and—

The woman lunged forward.

What?

Dee snarled and brought her stake up. Fight. Survive. Her mantra. Always.

But the woman didn’t come for her. Instead, her claws ripped into the still laughing vampire’s back. Dug deep.

He screamed.

“Hold him tight, Jun.”

The vamp screamed even louder when the woman dug her claws in deeper.

The alpha stalked toward him.

“What the hell?” Simon muttered.

Dee just shook her head and kept her stake up.

“You don’t know us. You come down here, smelling of fresh blood, bringing the risen Born, and you think we’re gonna do your bidding?”

“Grim—” Spittle flew. “Grim’s gonna—”

The alpha shook his head. “Grim’s gonna die, and so are you.”

A whimper now, not a scream.

The alpha vampire jerked his head. “Make it fast, Jun. But make it hurt.”

“N-no, no, Grim—”

“Grim can rot. I’m not his bitch.”

Wow. Now that wasn’t a statement she’d expected.

Two other vampires rushed to Jun’s side. They hauled the now begging vamp away and Big Red turned to face her.

A sliver of wood bit into her palm.

His nostrils widened, flaring a bit. “Going to kill me?”

“I was considering it,” she told him honestly. “But I thought I might see your plans first.”

A short, shrill cry burst from the darkness.

Make it fast, Jun. But make it hurt.

Looked like Jun had done both.

So killing was obviously on the agenda for him. Fair enough. It had been on hers, too, but she’d hoped to force answers out of the now dead vamp first.

“You going after Grim?”

If she survived the next five minutes, yes.

“And you…” Big Red turned his green stare—green, when it should have been black, definitely a time for a vamp to switch to the hunting mode—on Simon. “That spell still working for you?”

Simon tensed. “How do you know about—”

A hard laugh. “I know about a hell of a lot.” His gaze trekked back to Dee and he smiled.

Okay, that smile had goose bumps rising on her arms. Because while his eyes hadn’t so much as flickered in color, his fangs were out and Dee could feel his power in the air. Pressing around her. No, surrounding her. He hadn’t gotten his little gang of vamps to attack them, yet, but Dee had the very distinct impression that the order could come at any moment.