“You’re either brave or excessively stupid coming here,” the man said, mildly bemused. Danger leaked from his pores.
The large room suddenly felt too small. The walls started to press in. I couldn’t breathe, couldn’t speak.
Dahlia glared at them, not an ounce of fear on her face. “Where the fuck is Karson? He sent for us.”
Their lips moved back down, and both faces reverted to normal-looking people, albeit exceptionally good-looking ones like the others.
I blinked. Was this all one gigantic hallucination? Had I gone temporarily crazy? Was my delusional disorder raising its ugly head again? Or maybe there was something in the fog, some kind of drug fucking with my mind. That had to be it. Thathadto be it. Drugs—either in that haze or in those drinks Mackenzie poured me—were fucking with my mind.
“Why didn’t you say? We almost had an accident. He’s in the back room, past the bar and down the hall,” the girl crooned, her heavily made-up eyes narrowing on me, her smile cold.
An accident.
Her words shot a fresh bout of dread through my mind and brought me to a realization I was forced to comprehend. Dahlia yanked at my arm, reefing me abruptly forward.
“I—”
“Shut up, Amy.”
She didn’t need to repeat it again. Even if I could get words out, I was unsure of what I might say. I was shocked to the pointof being speechless. I followed her in a numb daze as she pulled me through a sea of people.
No, not people,vampires. Bloodsucking vampires.
Darcy, the sweet, intelligent boy, was right.
Shit, shit, shit!
What did that mean Karson was? I wanted to turn back, wanted to run. It felt like each step we took brought us closer to the gates of hell. I’d entered a world that I knew instinctively there’d be no escape from. With a thumping heart, racing mind, and quivering legs, I was pulled by Dahlia past the end of the bar into a long, thin, cream-colored hallway. I glanced up at her. She was confident; there was no fear on her face, only anger.
Which was a good thing, unless of course she was saving me for a fucking snack. That was a bad thing. Definitely a bad thing.
I whined in the back of my throat.
A couple leaned against the wall, a male vampire with his teeth deep in a young blond woman’s neck, and I watched his throat move up and down as he swallowed. The girl groaned, as if in the grip of ecstasy.
I dropped my gaze, my stomach churning, but glanced up again as a soft draft swept through the hall. A dark-haired vampire’s nostrils flared, and his head jerked in our direction, like a hawk who’d spotted its prey. His eyes locked with mine. Hollow, bottomless eyes.
I was cold and simultaneously hot. I curled my fists so tight my fingernails dug painfully into my palms, and I trembled uncontrollably all over.
“Fuck off,” Dahlia said as we swept past.
I lowered my head once more and held my breath, waiting on tenterhooks for sharp teeth to rip into my neck. My heart boomed in my head. If he touched me, I was going to fight.
I only drew another breath when we reached the door untouched and felt elated relief for the briefest of moments.Dread replaced it. I knew what we might find on the other side of the door could be something much worse. Time slowed down. Everything became crystal clear—sharp and in focus. A tapestry of dried blood stained the timber door frame, and above it there was a thin crack in the plaster. Nothing really, something I wouldn’t normally notice, but now it became a deep trench after an earthquake, ready to split apart and suck us down.
The lights in the hallway flickered. The nightclub noise droned on. But all I could hear was my own breath, my own heart, the blood hurtling through my head.
Dahlia reached out and clasped the gold handle on the red door. Red again,I thought. Carefully selected to fit in with the surroundings. Whoever had designed it had a sense of humor—or was it a supreme arrogance? A dark underworld existed in this place appropriately named “The Bite.” A place where the worst of humanity crawled into the dark depths in plain sight, not even a stone’s throw from an oblivious world. Either way, the color of the door was practical; the blood would blend right in.
My heart hammered so hard I thought it would be visible through the thin silk fabric of my top. My mind screamed.
Get out you stupid fool! Get out!
I gathered my fear and buried it. This was not the place to crumble. Intuition told me the creatures would prey on weakness. Then we stepped into hell as the walls of reality tumbled around me.
What we found surprised me; the large room was warm, welcoming, luxurious, full of slow music and laughter. It was a complete contrast to the nightclub that preceded it and filled with well-dressed people, or vampires—I didn’t know which. It could have been any upper-class bar, anywhere in the world.
Except of course it wasn’t.
