Hunt Me by Shiloh Walker Page B

the shadows she’d just learned to call,
because she had to get control. Yeah. Dakota was being dumped. For
another woman. She could smell the other woman, even above the
smoke, the alcohol, the food…and that lovely, male scent that was
uniquely Drew’s.
    Now it was for another woman to enjoy.
    Mine .
    Everything inside her screamed it. But she
pushed it aside. Yeah, she had feelings for the guy. She’d had them
for a while, but Drew was human.
    Dakota was a vampire. Her heart might still
very well be human, but she’d stopped being human forty years ago.
Tears pricked her eyes. She blinked them away. Nothing like leaking
blood-tinged tears to really freak him out. She waited until she
knew her eyes would be normal. Even though she knew they hadn’t
slid from their sheaths, she checked her fangs with her tongue.
    He didn’t know. Oh, he knew she had secrets.
She could see it in his eyes. She had no doubt that was part of the
problem between them. But what could she say? Honey, I’m a
vampire. I’ll be around as often as I can, but…
    He was a mortal who wouldn’t even believe in
her world. She’d always known it would have to end. Now it was
time. As she slid from the booth, she released the shadows. She saw
the way he stiffened when he saw her, caught off guard. She allowed
herself a small, pleased smile. She’d seen him looking for her, and
he was a cop—he’d have looked well .
    But nobody could hide like a vampire.
    She came to a stop in front of him, smiled at
him lazily, careful to keep her mouth closed. Now that she was
closer, she could smell the other woman more clearly and she wasn’t
going to risk losing that oh-so-precious control.
    “Hey there.” He bent down to kiss her, not
that he had to bend much with the four-inch heels she wore.
    Dakota turned her head to the side so that
his lips brushed against her cheek. Her heart shuddered in her
chest and she eased backward, avoiding his gaze as she headed
toward the bar. “I need a drink,” she said over her shoulder. Not
that she expected it would do her much good, except maybe the
familiarity of it. She’d have to down a vat of it before she could
really get tanked.
    She slid onto the stool and called out to the
bartender. “Hendrix and tonic with a cucumber slice! Make it a
double.”
    “Sure thing, beautiful.” His smile flashed
white in his dark face. White…with rather sharp teeth. She rolled
her eyes. Bo was a shifter. It was one of the reasons she liked
this pub. He was a decent sort. If she had to slip out sudden-like,
he’d help cover her retreat. As he brought the drink down to her,
he focused on her face, his nostrils flaring a bit.
    “You’re unhappy, Hunter.” he said, his voice
too low for Drew to hear. That didn’t keep him from trying. He slid
onto the stool next to her, gaze narrowed on Bo. The shifter
ignored him, stroking a finger down Dakota’s cheek. “I don’t like
to see a pretty Hunter unhappy.”
    “Can’t be helped.” She smiled brightly. Then
she reached out and patted his hand. In a voice just as low as his,
she said, “Now stop trying to piss him off. This is going to be
hard enough, ’kay?”
    Bo stared at her, then, with a sigh, he
walked off. She took a sip of her drink. Distracted, she glanced
around and saw a business card somebody had left on the bar. It had
a phone number on it. For some reason, it made her even sadder to
see it. Somebody else had struck out tonight.
    Taking the business card, she absently
started to fold it up, turning it into a neat triangle. She kept
fiddling with it until Bo slid a Guinness in front of Drew.
    Dropping the business card, she took a
healthy drink from her glass and then turned, crossing her legs as
she studied Drew’s face. His gaze dropped, quick as a wish, to her
legs and then shot right back up to her face. Oh, yes. It was
over.
    He reached for the business card, unfolding
and it smoothing out the creases. “You did that the first time I
gave you my