on his face bothered her. He felt he’d gained advantage in this round. Had he?
“I gotta go.” She swept up Joe.
“Giving up before you’ve cleaned your plate?” he called as she headed down the hallway.
“Not on your life. I want to make sure the vampires aren’t hanging around outside.”
“They’re not after me.”
“They’re not after me!” she shouted.
“If that’s what you want to believe. It’s day. Vampires don’t do sunlight, do they?”
Pyx didn’t turn to look at him. She knew he brandished a triumphant smirk like some kind of scalp claimed in battle. “Read your Stoker. Most vampires can go out during the day. I’ll be back.”
“I do hope you will be.”
She stalked to the front door and strode through, leaving it open behind her.
All right, one point for the Fallen. That meant she had to regroup and figure things out. Like how to play against someone who doesn’t know the rules.
And what, exactly, would her defensive move be should he lay another of those delicious kisses on her?
Chapter 4
Pyx wandered aimlessly. She needed to put a plan in order. If the Fallen wasn’t interested in finding his muse then she may have to find the muse and bring her to him.
How in Beneath would she recognize a woman even the Fallen wouldn’t know until he got right next to her? And if what he’d said was true, he wasn’t anywhere near her right now.
“Shouldn’t be my job. Why is this Fallen able to resist the compulsion to his muse?”
The Sinistari were usually summoned right before the moment when the Fallen would attempt its muse. Demon arrives with sharp, pointy blade.
Shoves it in the Fallen’s heart. Muse saved. No nephilim is born. Deed done.
“Do others of my breed have this same problem?”
She wasn’t going to think because I’m a woman. But she did consider her past mishap. She’d walked the earth in complete demon form then, so that didn’t apply now.
“Well, I can handle it.”
She shrugged up the tight-fitting blue jean coat she’d purchased from a woman’s store. The wrists were trimmed with thick fox fur. Along the sleeves the fabric was tugged together military-style with gold buttons and chains. She’d exchanged her male jeans for some skin-hugging black leather pants. The sales clerk had tried to convince her a corset would look stunning on her but Pyx had opted for a comfortable gray T-shirt. High heels had looked a bit dangerous, so she’d opted for a two-inch heel on some pointy-toed black crocodile ankle boots.
She could have easily assumed the costume with a thought, but the shopping part had been—fun. And it had given her clues to what women wore.
She wasn’t sure about the makeup thing, but the sales clerk had directed her to the cosmetics department where a commando clerk had attacked her with a free makeover, brushing, spraying and stroking on various types of smelly products. Now Pyx toted a bag full of more smelly stuff with the promise it would enhance her ability to attract a man.
“As long as the man is Fallen,” she muttered. “And not a bloodsucker.”
She veered down a street before a grand railway station and read the name of the building. “The Gare du Nord.” Hundreds of people filed in and out, destined for other cities, or returning from trips.
“Try Germany,” she called to a passing family of five lugging suitcases. “The schnitzel is awesome.”
The father shuffled his kids away from her as if she’d said something obscene. Pyx just smiled. She nicked a wallet from the back pocket of a man arguing with his girlfriend and inspected the contents as her path led her away from the busy area.
A hundred euros and a bunch of credit cards. She picked out the gold credit card because she liked it best, then tossed the wallet into a nearby trash can.
Eyeing a restaurant across the street that advertised wine from the Rhône river valley and fresh scallops, Pyx was distracted by a shadow moving across the street. It had been a blur, a person moving much more swiftly than mortals were capable of doing.
Feeling a twinge of instinct, Pyx decided food could wait. Striding onward, bag full of makeup banging against her hip, she angled toward the alley where she’d seen the blur go.
At the end of the alley she noticed it again. It stopped long enough so she could plainly see it was a man. He exposed fangs and chuckled, then took off to the right.
Stuffing the credit card in a back pocket, she took off after him. He moved in a zigzag pattern farther away from the city center. Eventually he blurred into a brick building where all the lower windows had been broken out.
Pyx stomped across broken glass and debris of boards into the darkness. “Here, bloody vampire. Come out, come out, wherever you are.”
She shoved off her jacket and tossed it aside, dropping her bag of makeup on top. Cracking her knuckles, she strode to the center of the empty three-story room. “You wanted me to follow? Well, here I am!”
Slammed bodily from the side, Pyx took the brunt force of the vampire’s hefty frame with ease. She twisted at the waist and pushed him away from her. The vampire stepped through the shove, circling toward her and chuckling maniacally. His blue eyes were bloodshot, and his thin lips curled.
Did he think a little flash of fang was going to intimidate her?
Pyx didn’t have to touch him; she had a few tricks up her sleeve.
She made a shoving-away gesture through the air before her. The vampire gasped and went flying, his shoulders hitting the wall, but he landed on both feet and immediately marked a determined stride toward her.
“You’re strong for a girl,” he said.
“Yeah? You’re an idiot for a vampire. Oh, wait. All vampires are idiots. My bad.”
She waited for him to charge and took the impact full force, his shoulders barreling into her chest. Okay, that one hurt. Felt like something broke, but her insides were metal so that couldn’t be. Still, this mortal flesh was too damned tender.
The two of them stumbled, Pyx backward, the vampire pushing her. They landed on the concrete floor in a grappling roll. He managed to kick her in the gut, which hurt even more. She punched his jaw, which sent spittle of crimson puddling across the floor.
“Don’t you know what I am?” she demanded, furious this insolent creature dared not show her the reverence she deserved.
“Sinistari.” He jumped up and brushed the dust from his leather coat sleeves. “I’m not much for demons. You do not deserve the respect you demand.”
“We are the kings of the demon realm,”
