Page 3 of Bad Blood Alpha

She wore a leather bustier, laced up the front. Leather jacket over it, all buckles and chains and rivets, and too hot for a late August night in Tennessee.

You could hide a gun and several knives under that.

Her dark hair was swept up in a deceptively casual knot, speared with two long sticks with silver filigreed knobs on the ends. They looked like fancy chopsticks, but Flynn knew the tips were probably filed to lethal sharpness.

She looked beautiful—and deadly.

Then he looked in her eyes.

Dark, deep pools, full of mystery and promise.

Even from across the room, they pierced right through him. Everything seemed to stop, like the music and the noise of conversation had suddenly been hit with a mute button.

There was only her, gazing down at him. Gazing into him.

A faint smile curved the corner of her mouth. A taunt. A challenge.

She raised her hand…to beckon him? Or to warn him?

A voice broke the spell. “Hey, do you want to dance?”

Flynn started and jerked his gaze away from the balcony, flicking the handle of one of his knives automatically into his palm before he remembered where he was. How the hell had anyone gotten so close without him realizing?

A pretty blond woman stood in front of him. Her emerald green dress clung to her curves, and her bronzy hair cascaded in artful waves down past her shoulders. Her two friends stood behind her, giggling.

Fuck. Flynn slipped the knife back up into its sleeve sheath before they could see it. They were all barely old enough to drink, soft and silly and breakable. Looking for adventure—a hookup with a bad boy to tell their friends about. Probably drank fruity girly drinks and didn’t know an AK47 from a revolver.

“Sure,” he said. He held out his hand as if for a handshake. “My name’s Xander. I live with my mom. In the basement, with my collection of Star Wars action figures. Want to see them?” He tried to look hopeful. Epic fail. “You can bring your friends.” He went for the creepy leer instead. Score. “I love it when girls dress up like Storm Troopers and tell me what a very bad boy I am.”

She stepped back. “Ew. That’s lame.”

“You sure? You can be Princess Leia if you want. I always wanted to do the nasty with Princess Leia. You’d look bitchin’ hot with your hair in those side buns.”

“No thanks. Perv.” Rolling their eyes, the three of them sashayed off on their too-high heels, swinging their asses to make sure he knew what he was missing.

Flynn snorted. That was too easy. He returned his attention to the woman on the balcony.

She wasn’t there.

Before he had a chance to think or ask himself what the hell he was doing, he was moving for the spiral staircase. The metal treads hummed under the soles of his boots; he could feel the vibration in the handrail. He skirted the press of people on the central balcony and headed towards the shadows where he’d seen her last.

No one was there. Putting his hands on the handrail, he surveyed the club below.

Even in the frantic press of bodies, somehow he knew she’d stand out.

He couldn’t see her anywhere.

He was surprised at how disappointed he was. Flynn never let himself get disappointed. He’d trained himself to always expect the worst.

He glanced around. He’d cased out this club before the meeting; he’d never meet a contact without knowing where the exits were. There was a locked door behind him leading to the offices—he’d lifted a key card from one of the staff, just in case.

She might have done the same, and slipped out that way.

But somehow he knew she hadn’t. She was here for a reason. One of Fletcher’s people, maybe? Or one of his enemies. Whoever she was, she wanted something from him. He could feel it.

The desire to know what it was—the desire to know her—flooded through him like a compulsion.

He couldn’t leave until he found her.

That now-familiar lifting of the hairs on the backs of his arms brought him back to reality.

She was there. Behind him. Not close enough to kill him, unless she had a gun. But he could feel the heat of her body, the heat of her power.

The throbbing music changed to something soft. Soulful. All around the club, couples melted into each other’s arms.

He heard her voice, low and sultry, as she came up beside him. “Do you want to dance?”