Blood Magic (Dragon Born Alexandria Book 2) (13 page)

A black streak shot across the park with supernatural speed, cutting down the vampires as though they were nothing more than stalks of harvested wheat. The streak stopped beside her. It was a man, dressed in black pants and no shirt. His face was hidden behind a mask. A wicked spark gleamed in his eyes right before he grabbed a hold of her and tossed her high into the air.

As she flew over the vampire army, she unleashed her knives, raining steel down upon them. That didn’t kill them. Of course not. Vampires were more resilient than that. But it did nail them to the ground long enough for her to unleash her next attack. She opened her mouth wide, and magic fire poured out of it like an orange waterfall, reducing the vampires below to dust.

As soon as Alex landed, the masked man was right beside her. She reached for the mask and tore it from his face.

“You missed a few,” Logan said, pointing at several vampires untouched by the fire.

Alex lifted her hand, and the fire spread, swallowing them up. “I’m hungry.” She frowned down at the piles of ashes that had once been vampires. She’d been too eager, and now there was no one left to drink from.

Well, that wasn’t entirely true. Logan stood in front of her, his blood pulsing with every beat of his heart.

“I can’t drink from you,” she said, even as she licked the blood from his cut lip. Ecstasy exploded on her tongue.

“Do it,” he said, his voice a deep rasp. His hands slid down to her hips. “Please.”

The pure need in his voice urged her forward. She lowered her lips to his and sucked the blood from the wound. It poured down her throat, flooding her with hot liquid pleasure. His deep moan almost sent her over the edge. She tugged him closer, kissing him with total abandon.

“I need you, Alex,” he growled against her lips. His hands tore roughly at her clothes. “Now.”

“Oh, God, yes. Now,” she told him as his fingers teased the band of her panties.

With a wicked smile, he tugged them down—and that, of all times, was when she woke up.

* * *

“Alex?” Naomi’s voice called from the other side of the door. “We’re about to eat breakfast.”

“I’m awake, I’m awake.” Alex untangled herself from the twisted nest of blankets. The sweet phantom taste of Logan’s blood lingered on her tongue.

“Or do you want to sleep a bit longer? You sound tired.”

More like murderous. And there was no reason to go back to sleep. It was too late to go back to that dream.

“I’m fine.” Alex took a deep breath. “I’ll be right down.”

As the soft clink of heels descended the stairs, Alex turned to her suitcase. She hadn’t had the energy to unpack her things into the closet before bed—and she didn’t feel like doing it right now either. Ok. It was time to get down to business. Odd blood-drinking aside, her dream hadn’t just shown that this was long overdue; it had screamed it in big, blinking letters.

She sorted through the mostly-folded contents of her suitcase until she found the ‘slutty clothes’ she’d told Naomi about. The top was skin-tight and low in the front, and the stretchy jeans hugged her butt and hips. She wasn’t taking Naomi’s suggestion to not wear underwear. That would have been really uncomfortable with the jeans.

You need to put on a skirt instead of the jeans if you want to play commando,
her dragon said.

Go commando, you mean.

Yeah, that too.

And give everyone a free show every time I aim a kick at my opponent? No thanks.

Her dragon snickered in her head as she pulled on her boots. Then, dressed to seduce, she left her room.

Downstairs, everyone was already sitting around the table next to the kitchen. Alex took the steps slowly to give Logan a nice, long look at her fantastic outfit. He never looked up from his computer. Marek, on the other hand, was gawking at her like she’d grown a second head. As Alex walked off the final step, Logan finally looked up. He set down his coffee cup very softly, his eyes following her closely as she approached. He wasn’t gawking openly like Marek. As he’d more than once reminded her, proper assassins didn’t gawk. But he was certainly watching her with purpose. The question was: what kind of purpose? She did catch a whiff of amusement from his aura, which was not exactly the response she’d been hoping for.

Alex took the empty seat between Naomi and Marek—the one directly across from Logan. She crossed one leg slowly over the other, turning to give Logan a better look at her profile. Naomi snorted into her coffee cup.

Logan looked across the table at her. Meeting his stare, she reached for the breadbasket—which was actually pretty hard to do without looking at it. She toppled the tower of yogurt cups before successfully snatching up a croissant. Naomi coughed. Fortunately, all of the yogurt cups were still sealed. Alex took a bite of the croissant. Silence reigned at the table.

“So,” Naomi finally said. “Alex sure looks nice.” Her eyes were dancing with impish delight.

Marek was making a solid effort not to stare at her chest. “Is that outfit part of the plan to distract the enemy?” he asked.

“It must be working. You look pretty distracted right now,” Naomi teased him.

“If she were a stranger in a club, I’d try to chat her up,” he admitted.

“Then it’s fortunate that you do know her,” Logan said cooly.

Marek looked pointedly away from Alex.

But Naomi wasn’t done teasing yet. “No need to be embarrassed, Marek. Alex is pretty. And so is her outfit.”

Logan’s expression was pure assassin.

“There’s no need to worry,” Alex told him quickly. “Marek prefers fairies.”

“Oh, really?” Naomi’s eyes lit up, flashing from her own pale blue to Alex’s cerulean. Her hair darkened and lengthened.

“Not bad,” Alex told her. “We could be sisters.”

Naomi high-fived her. “You know we are.”

Marek’s gaze shifted from her to Alex. He blinked a few times.

“If you three are finished, we can move on to business,” Logan said.

“We’ll behave ourselves,” Naomi promised.

Alex nodded in agreement.

“Good.” He swiveled his computer around to show them a dark, blurry photograph.

“What’s that?” Alex asked.

“The area around Hyde Park last night,” he told her.

“There are no lights on.”

“Exactly.”

Oops.

“You three made quite an impression last night,” he continued. “You took out the power to several city blocks.”

Naomi and Marek looked at Alex.

“What did you do?” Logan asked her.

Alex shrugged. “Nothing much. I just shot some magic lightning into some box with important-looking cables and stuff inside.”

“Those ‘important-looking cables and stuff’ were indeed important. You created a magical lightning storm in the city’s power grid.” He sighed. “Just hours after setting off a tsunami under the city. How could you do that?”

“I drank one of Marek’s magic-boosted energy drinks to recharge in between.”

“I’m not asking how you had the magic necessary to singlehandedly create two magical disasters. I’m asking what possessed you to put yourself in danger again by doing it. It’s as though you didn’t learn anything from the first incident.”

“Logan, nothing happened. Chill.”

“You’re lucky you didn’t get electrocuted.”

“I regularly summon lightning onto my hands. If that doesn’t electrocute me, then a few measly cables won’t. And besides, you’re hardly one to judge. You had me shoot lightning straight into you.”

Marek leaned back in his chair, balancing it only on the back legs. “She has a point,” he told Logan, grinning. “You’re both raving mad.”

“Your excursion got the Convictionites’ attention,” Logan told them all. “They moved several loads of things out of that building early this morning.”

“The Blood Orb?” asked Alex.

“The hybrids?” Naomi asked.

Alex closed her eyes, reaching out with her magic toward Sugar. Everything came back blank. She could no longer feel a big vampire or hybrid presence there. She couldn’t feel any supernatural activity whatsoever.

“They’re all gone,” she declared.

Marek tapped his fingers against the table in agitation. A few notes into the fingertip symphony, a bunch of flowers inside a vase in the kitchen exploded into rose-scented confetti. He looked at Naomi.

She sighed. “Sorry.”

“I didn’t know you could incinerate things,” Alex said.

“I’m still perfecting it,” replied Naomi. “Right now, it mostly just happens when I’m pissed off.”

“I’m pretty pissed off myself,” Alex said.

Marek nodded in agreement.

“That’s what you three get for being reckless,” said Logan.

“You were pretty reckless yourself last night,” Alex replied. “Need I remind you how you showed up at Marek’s house covered in blood, telling us we had to retreat right away? You were so bloody that you had to sneak into the hotel through the window.”

Marek burst into delighted chuckles.

Logan kicked out his foot, forcing Marek’s chair to go back down to four legs. “All is not lost. I’ve looked at the traffic camera footage from early this morning. The Convictionites moved several shipments from Sugar to the Silver Castle.”

“The Silver Castle? Ooh, sounds fancy,” cooed Naomi.

“My mother sure thought so when she named it,” Logan said. “In reality, it’s a modern monstrosity. A shrine to the hideousness of naked concrete. An enormous box of a building that spans an entire block. I call it the Concrete Castle.”

“Nice,” Alex said, nodding.

“I’ve been inside the building a few times. I have an idea of how we can penetrate its defenses, but I need the blueprints. This afternoon, we’ll make the necessary preparations for the infiltration. Alex and I are going to pay the Convictionites’ architect a visit to get those plans.”

“What about us?” Naomi asked.

“You two will go shopping.”

Naomi grinned. “A job for which I’m very well suited.”

Marek, who loved shopping at least as much as Naomi, was more cautious with his jubilation. “I take it you’re not sending us out for new boots.”

“Oh, no?” Alex sighed. “I could really use a new pair. Mine didn’t take kindly to trudging through underground rivers.”

“It was only
one
underground river,” said Logan.

“Are you sure? It felt like we slogged around in at least five.”

“You’ll buy magical ingredients.” Logan’s gaze shifted from Naomi to Marek. He must have decided that Alex was a lost cause. “Specifically, we require magical ingredients that will allow us to dissolve holes in metal, concrete, and any other barriers that might stand between us and penetrating the Convictionite base.”

Naomi snickered and nudged Alex, who sat perfectly still and pretended to be a responsible adult who didn’t laugh at dirty jokes.

Logan handed a folded piece of paper to Marek. “Here’s the list.”

“I don’t need chemicals.” As Marek dropped the list onto the table, flames flared up on his hands. “I can break through any barrier we could possibly come across.”

Naomi snatched the list before it could catch on fire. The corners were already a tad singed.

“No,” Logan told him. “It’s essential that we do this quietly, not with firecrackers and fanfare.”

“Logan has a point,” Alex told Marek. “The brute force attack that the two of us favor won’t work here. There are too many Convictionites, and their base is too well-protected. We need to sneak in unnoticed if we are to have any chance of succeeding. And remember the stakes. We cannot allow the Convictionites to continue using the Blood Orb to force vampires to attack other supernaturals—and humans. They’re trying to turn everyone against one another. They want war.”

“And we can’t leave the hybrids in the hands of those monsters,” said Naomi. “The Convictionites have sinister plans for them. I’m sure of it.”

“You’re right. Both of you.” The flames on Marek’s hands went out. “Ready, Naomi?”

Naomi jumped up, savage delight shining in her eyes. “Let’s go shopping.”

Logan watched them leave the apartment, then said, “Naomi looked pretty happy to go buy magic-based corrosives.”

Alex shrugged and took a big bite of her croissant. “Naomi is happy about any sort of shopping. Besides, she had some things she wanted to buy anyway, and Marek knows all the best shopping spots.”

They sat for a few more minutes, while Alex finished her breakfast and Logan sipped from his coffee cup. They didn’t even talk, which was fine with Alex. She was busy replenishing the thousands of calories she’d burned last night, and she didn’t care how many croissants she had to eat to do it. Some of them were even filled with chocolate. Mmm. Breakfast at noon—she could get used to this. All the while, Logan was watching her closely, still looking more amused than enticed by her outfit.

Finally, Alex had eaten enough croissants and chocolate to hold her over until at least dinnertime. “Ok,” she said, standing. “Let’s go grab ourselves an evil architect.”

CHAPTER ELEVEN

Infiltration

ALEX SHIFTED HER weight and stole a peek at Logan, trying not to feel extraneous. They’d been crouching outside the enormous stone wall that surrounded the house of James M. Bradford, aka Malicious Architect, for over an hour. Logan was trying to deactivate the perimeter security. Alex was trying not to go crazy with boredom. She almost wished a monster would stroll by so that at least she’d have something to do.

“Your nerdy skills sure are useful,” she commented to Logan. In the absence of monsters to kill, teasing was the next best thing.

Logan didn’t comment—or look up from his work. Apparently, he didn’t consider teasing a productive way to pass the time.

“Really useful. Almost as useful as your…” She grinned. “…other skills. Like being able to get the jump on a group of vampires, pop the heads off a bunch of them, then toss me into the air so I can rain fire down on them…and all without wearing a shirt.”

This time, he did look at her, but his face remained perfectly impassive. “I don’t recall any of that ever happening.”

“Never mind. It was just a dream.”

“You’ve been dreaming about me?” he asked. “Without my shirt on?” The hint of a smile kissed his lips.