Midnight Rising (Midnight Breed 4)

He had to get the fuck out of there.

"Get up," he growled. "Get off me, all of you."

They scrambled back like they'd just provoked a wild animal. One of them tried to be brave. "You want something different, baby? It's okay. Tell us what you like."

"Nothing you've got," he said tightly, giving them a long, hard dose of the ruined left side of his face as he shot to his feet.

None too steady, he staggered out of the private room, out of the throbbing, musk-heavy club. He found the quiet back entrance where he and Reichen had come in, shoved past the bouncers who wisely moved out of his way when they saw him coming.

The street outside was dark. The summer night air was cool on his heated skin; he drank it in through his mouth, breathing deeply in an effort to calm his roiling head. Cursed when it didn't do anything to soothe him.

His vision was sharper out here in the darkness, but it was more than just his basic nocturnal acuity giving everything a crisp edge. His pupils were narrowed from his anger and need, the amber glow of his transformed irises throwing faint light on the concrete under his feet. His steps were uneven, the limp he'd almost overcome now creeping into his gait.

His fangs filled his mouth. One look at the glyphs on his forearms and he knew he was in bad shape.

Damn it. He should have taken the vein of one of the females back there. He needed to feed hours ago, and now his shit was getting critical.

Head down, fists shoved deep into the pockets of his pants, Rio started walking at a fast, none-too-graceful clip. He thought about heading for one of the city's parks, where the homeless and itinerant made easy prey for creatures of the night like him. But as he cut up a side street off the main drag, he saw a young punky woman puffing on a cigarette at the head of the alleyway. She was leaning back against the side of a brick building, picking at her fingernails as she blew out a cloud of noxious smoke.

If her black platform stilettos and tight miniskirt didn't give her away, the gravity-defying tube top she wore over her large breasts certainly would. The low-rent version of what Rio had just left behind glanced up and caught him watching her.

"Ich bin nicht arbeiten," she said, her voice a caustic snarl as she went back to massacring her nails. "Not at work right now."

He walked toward her undeterred, a wraith moving out of the shadows.

She snorted, getting annoyed. "My work tonight is done, ja ? No sex."

"That's not what I need from you."

"Huh," she scoffed. "Well, then, fuck off - "

Rio moved on her so fast, she didn't even have time to scream. He crossed the several yards' distance in a blink and flipped the woman around so that she was facing the bricks. Her dark hair was short, making easy access to her neck. Rio struck with viper speed, sinking his fangs deep into yielding flesh and drawing hard from her vein.

She struggled only at first, twitching through the initial shock. But then she loosened as his bite drew out and the pain gave way to pleasure. Rio drank quickly, gulping down what his body so desperately needed. He licked the wound he'd made, sealing the bite with his tongue. The mark would be all but gone in a few minutes, and as for her memory of what just transpired? Rio reached around her head and placed his palm over her eyes.

It took only a second to erase the last few minutes of her recollection, but it was time enough for a man to come around the corner of the building and see the two of them standing there.

"Hey! Was zur H?lle ist das? "

He was beefy and bald, and he didn't seem happy at all. Wiping his hands on a stained bar apron, he barked something at the whore in German - a stern command she jumped to follow. Evidently not fast enough for Big Man. As she scrambled away, he lashed out and cuffed the side of her head with his fist. When she yelped and ran off around the corner of the building, Big Man started approaching Rio in the alleyway.

"Do yourself a favor and leave," Rio growled in a voice that no longer sounded human. "This doesn't concern you."

Big Man shook his jowly head. "You want sex with Uta, you pay me."

"Then come and try to collect your piece," Rio said, low enough that anyone with half an ounce of sense would have taken it as the warning it truly was.

But not this guy. He reached behind him and withdrew a knife from somewhere at his back. It was a deadly mistake. Rio saw the threat, and he was still too far gone to let it slide. As the pimp came forward like he meant to cut some cash out of Rio's hide, Rio sprang at him.

He took the human down onto the pavement, his hands wrapped around the thick neck. A frantic pulse hammered against his palm, beat after beat of warm blood rushing beneath the rough skin.

Distantly, Rio registered the drum of the human's heart, but his mind was not fully his own. Not anymore. His blood hunger was temporarily appeased, but rage had him firmly in its grip. The squeeze on his mind, on his own will, was relentless, bringing on the darkness he feared the most.

Maldecido.

Monstruo.

He felt himself sliding into that oblivion...