Whiteout (Aurora Sky (24 page)

Buck rubbed Nicole's back. “Honestly, it's a relief Nicole's no longer working those things. We'll
find another way to save up for the homestead.”

Nicole's shoulders drooped as though procuring the necessary funds was wishful thinking.

“What about you, Buck?” Dante asked. “You still working at the A and P?”

“Yep, no men in suits bothering me there.”
Buc
k removed his hand from around Nicole's
back
and spread his arm toward the couch. “Make yourselves comfortable,” he said.

“Yes, let's eat,” Nicole said, voice lifting.

“You don't have to tell me twice,” Dante said.

Tommy's nails clicked over the hardwood f
loor as he made his way to the opposite side of the coffee table where he sat on his haunches and stared at the pizza boxes. He licked his chops.

“He's so cute,” Nicole said.

Tommy wagged his tail.

Nicole smiled big. “That's right, I'm talking about you,
Tommy Moe. You are such a cutie.”

“Want to keep him?” Dante asked.

Nicole laughed and stopped. “Wait. You're not serious, are you?”

Dante slouched against the couch. “Just for a little while.”

Buck rocked forward. “What's going on, Dante?”

Yeah, what's goi
ng on
,
Dante? I wanted to hear his explanation for this one.

“Those agents you spoke of are after me,” Dante said.

Okay. Guess this was truth night.

Nicole lifted her head. “Because of your attendance at past tastings?”

“Among other thi
ngs,” Dante answered
.

Nicole lowered her head. “I am so sorry, Dante. I told that agent I met you and Noel at that tasting back in February. He was so insist
ent I share every
name and face I'd ever come into contact with.”

My nose wrinkled. Coming here was beginning to feel
like a mistake. The second I had a chance to speak to Dante privately, I wanted to advise we leave immediately and take Tommy with us.

But Dante didn't appear concerned.

“Don't worry about it,” he said gently. “That agent who talked to you already knew No
el and I were at the February tasting. It's a good thing you didn't hold out.”

Perhaps, but Nicole hadn't known that at the time. Who knew what other arrangements she'd had to make with Melcher in order to be set free and protect her lover? She could be un
der strict orders to report any sightings of past clientele. She could have a copy of the
flyer
. Fifty grand would go a long way toward funding a homestead.

“I didn't tell him you'd been to our cabin. He didn't seem particularly interested when I mentioned
your name and that you'd been there with a human girlfriend. He waved it off and asked me for the next name.” Nicole took a deep breath and looked at Buck. “Of course Tommy can stay here. It's the least we can do.” Buck nodded his head in agreement. Nicol
e turned to Dante. “For as long as you like.”

“I appreciate it.”

With the matter of Tommy settled, Dante lifted the lids on the pizza boxes and handed out slices.

Buck, like Dante, chewed his food quickly. Seeing two vamps behave like
everyday
, run
-
of
-
the
-
mill Alaskan men was bizarre to say the least. I ate through my slice slowly
,
then nibbled on the crust.

Buck took a big swig of beer, swallowed, and asked, “You two headed out of town?”

Was this Buck's attempt at getting a location out of us? I eyed him,
paranoia returning in full swing. On the other hand, if Buck truly wanted to trade us in for the reward money, it would have made far more sense to do so when he had his shotgun pointed at us. Rather than keeping it aimed, he'd lowered it the moment Dante
called out his name. It certainly wasn't bounty hunter behavior.

“Affirmative,” Dante answered, lifting his beer to his lips.

“We'd do the same if we could,” Buck said. “It's rough around here, man.”

“How so?” Dante asked.

Nicole leaned forward. “Buck,” sh
e said in a warning tone.

“Telling them isn't going to change the fact,” Buck told Nicole gently before turning to Dante. “A friend of Nicole's went missing last month.”

“Oh, I'm so sorry,” I said.

Tears gathered in Nicole's eyes. “It's my fault.”

Suspicio
n aside, the agony in her voice and eyes made it impossible not to feel sympathy for Nicole.

Buck obviously felt the same way. He set down his beer to go to her side. “You have to stop blaming yourself. You warned her not to go there.”

“I should have never
told her in the first place,” Nicole said, her eyes clearing.

“Told who what?” Dante asked. He too seemed to have forgotten his beer for the moment. He'd set it down and left it unattended for
more than
a minute.

Nicole met Dante's eye. “Stacey. We've bee
n friends since fifth grade. I could always tell her anything. She knew about Buck and vampires before I ever worked a tasting. That girl would take a secret to her grave
.
She was also very curious. Knowing about the underworld wasn't enough. She wanted to
experience it firsthand. She asked me to hook her up with a tasting gig, said we could carpool and everything.” Fresh tears gathered in Nicole's eyes.

“I was all for it,” Buck said. “I accompanied Nicole to all the local tastings, but my work schedule did
n't permit me to attend many of the out
-
of
-
town shindigs. I liked the idea of a friend looking out for Nicole when I couldn't make it.”

“But Diederick didn't want her,” Nicole said sadly.

“Did she have AB negative or positive blood or something?” I asked.
That was the reason Valerie couldn't go in undercover as a wine girl. Diederick tested blood. AB anything wasn't allowed.

“No,” Nicole said. “She was
blond
.”

“Does that
a
ffect the taste of blood?” I asked in confusion. If so, that was news to me.

“No,
nothing like that. He preferred brunettes in the tasting rooms, said they looked classier.”

Or maybe he had Buffy issues.

“Stacey took it hard,” Nicole continued. “She was already frustrated with being single
,
and then this disappointment. She felt like vampires weren't interested in her either. So Buck and I took her to Chillers to introduce her to a couple vamps.”

“Local club,” Dante said to me.

“Local vampire hangout,” Buck added. He straightened up and went
for his beer. “It's not a place we
like to go
, but Stacey was
in a funk
and perked up at the idea of meeting some of the undead dudes I knew in town. They weren't really friends, but they weren't bad guys either. They did, however, enjoy sucking blood fro
m willing humans. Not my scene,” Buck said
,
taking a swig of beer.

“And it did cheer her up,” Nicole said. “Especially the attention the vamps gave her at the club. She started going to Chillers regularly.” Strands of silky brown hair brushed against Nicol
e's cheek when she turned her face to look at me. “There's not a whole lot to do in this town.”

“What happened?” I asked.

Nicole's lips drew back, almost in a snarl, exposing perfectly straight teeth. “She started hanging out with a group of shady vamps. O
ne of them invited her to go out of town with him for the weekend. He sounded like trouble from the moment she mentioned him. His name was enough to set warning bells off in my head
—
Jab.” Nicole shuddered.

Jab. He'd been in Nelson's list of phone contacts.
I understood what Nicole meant instantly. His name had stood out like a red flag in my head as well.

I glanced at Dante. His eyes narrowed to slits, but he said nothing.

Suddenly
,
Nicole was crying as she spoke. “I never even got a chance to talk her out
of going. I was at my last tasting when she left the message on my phone.” Her shoulders shook. Buck gave her a loving kiss on the head.

They were a sweet couple. I could see how Dante had warmed up to them so quickly during his stakeout with Noel.

“That
message is the last time I heard Stacey's voice,” Nicole said. She cleared her throat, sounding once more resigned.

Dante now sat on the edge of the couch. “What about Jab? Did you ever track him down?”

Buck folded his arms. “Unfortunately, Stacey's disapp
earance coincided with the threats made to Nicole in Anchorage. I don't want her putting herself in
any more
danger, which means staying the hell away from this vamp. I don't want it to be known that she's asking about him either.” Buck straightened his sp
ine. “And I'm not sticking my own neck out
only
to leave her unprotected if something
were to happen
to me.”

“You're right,” Dante
said
. “The two of you need to stay away from Chillers. Aurora and I will check it out.”

My head snapped up. “We will?”

“Might
as well
look into it
on our way out of town. We might find nothing—then again, we might get lucky.”

“And we might get recognized,” I said.

Nicole looked from me to Dante. “It's kind of you to offer, but we'd never ask you to do something like that.”

“You'
re looking after Tommy for me, and besides, these fangers ruin things for the rest of us,” Dante said with conviction.

Tommy's tail thumped on the floor in agreement.

Dante leaned forward, reaching his hands out to rub Tommy's back. “What do you say, boy?
Should we grab your food out of the truck?” Dante stood and turned to me. “Mind giving me a hand, Aurora?”

I stood quickly. I'd give Dante a hand all right, right along with a piece of my mind. I followed him outside on his heels. The second the cabin door
closed behind us I said, “We should grab Tommy and leave here immediately. She outed you to Melcher. What's to stop her from doing it again, especially with fifty grand on the table?”

Dante stopped in his tracks. “Nicole didn't out me. She reported all th
e names and faces she'd ever seen at tastings. Noel and I checked that one out impromptu while we were in town. Me
lcher already knew all about it
.”

“How can you trust her?” I asked.

“Nicole only met me the one time,” Dante answered. “Why would she protect
a guy she just met over her boyfriend? You or I would do the same.”