Crave The Night (Midnight Breed 12)

Her penthouse was just a few blocks away from the museum, but Jordana passed her building and kept on going, heading deeper into the city, to La Notte.

8

NATHAN LED HIS TEAM INTO CASSIAN GRAY’S CLUB AT THE height of the evening’s most lucrative hour. The dance floor and bar on street level were jammed with people who’d shelled out the steep cover charge just to get in, but the real commerce—Cass’s bread and butter—was taking place in the cages below.

With fearful glances and anxious murmurs rising in their wake, the heavily armed patrol squad cut a path through the crowd upstairs and headed down to La Notte’s arena.

The fights, and the sizable bets that accompanied them, were already well under way. Rune always drew the largest numbers, and tonight appeared to be no exception. The immense, dark-haired Breed male was matched against an opponent almost his equal in size and menace.

At six and a half feet tall and 300-plus pounds apiece, the two vampires dressed in little more than leather breeches and locked in brutal hand-to-hand combat inside the cage was a sight few humans would ever see in their lifetimes.

So much the better that the Breed-on-Breed blood sport could be enjoyed from the perceived safety of the club surrounding the steel-reinforced arena.

The crowd gasped as Rune drove a hard right hook into his opponent’s jaw. Bone cracked and blood spewed from the vampire’s slack mouth.

The blow was punishing, catastrophic, given that each fighter wore titanium-spiked, fingerless leather gloves in the ring. The metal was meant to increase the savagery of the contest, but it also served to discourage the fighters from doping their performance with excessive feeding before a match.

If a Breed pushed himself into Bloodlust—the addiction only a rare few had ever beaten—the titanium of his opponent’s knuckle spikes would enter his diseased bloodstream and kill the vampire faster than any pounding he might suffer in the cages.

With the spectators cheering wildly, Rune’s opponent sank down onto his knees on a low howl of anguish. Nathan assessed the damage with a shrewd assassin’s eye. Another strike like the last one and Rune’s kill count would increase along with the stakes on him at the cashier.

Rune didn’t seem interested in beefing up his record or his worth. The big male stood back, allowing the other vampire the choice to either hit the mercy button on the cage and deliver Rune a jolt of electricity to the U-shaped steel collar each fighter wore around his neck or continue the match without the benefit of the handicap. Shouts of disapproval traveled the crowd near the cages as their champion refused to end the bout with an easy, but unnecessary, kill.

As the fight resumed, Nathan gestured to his squad to begin clearing the place out. It took only moments—and the flash of fangs from a group of combat-ready Order members—to send the bulk of the club’s clientele in the direction of the nearest exits.

But the intrusion also got the swift attention of La Notte’s security staff. Nathan and his men played rough with them tonight, no need to pretend they weren’t there to stir things up and make their presence known.

Elijah, Jax, and Rafe bounced a few Breed guards into the brick walls of the place, while Nathan soon found himself going hand to hand with a couple of the other fighters employed by Cassian Gray.

He disabled both in seconds, stopping just short of killing them. He wheeled around to face yet another of Cass’s fighters, but Syn made no move to take him on. Just shy of Nathan or Rune’s size, and handsome to the point of being pretty, the blond Breed male held his own impressive record in the cages. But he seemed to know better than to invite further problems with Nathan. All around them, the club was emptying out.

“Tell your boss we’re gonna come back every night and toss this place until we hear from him,” Nathan warned. “The longer he takes, harder the Order’s gonna push.”

Syn merely stared, unfazed, watching the arena empty further. Only the drunks and diehard fight fans remained now, a clot of about forty people still riveted to the match winding down in the cage.

Nathan stared into that crowd and felt his veins go tight as his gaze locked on to a pair of young women in the front row of the straggling spectators.

Holy hell.

Carys was easy enough to spot. Her loose caramel waves bounced around the shoulders of her form-fitted black sweater as she cheered on her man, dark denim hugging her backside. She jumped up and down on high-heeled black boots, clapping her hands and whistling as the clock ran out and Rune’s victory was assured.

The other female was a surprise Nathan neither wanted nor needed tonight.

With her back to him, Jordana Gates stood beside Carys, dressed by contrast in a soft gray pencil skirt and pale pink silk blouse. Her long white-blond hair was gathered into some kind of knotted updo at her nape.

Jesus, she looked like she belonged in a boardroom meeting uptown, not a blood match down in the cages of Boston’s least reputable club.

Except Jordana seemed as rapt as Carys with the match taking place tonight. Neither woman paid any attention as Nathan left Syn standing behind him and made his way toward the pair. He smelled liquor on them even before he was halfway across the room. And now he noticed that the women were less than steady on their feet, even Jordana in her conservative pumps.

When the bell on the match rang out, Carys and Jordana cheered Rune’s name along with the handful of spectators around them. Nathan stalked forward, idly aware that Rune had peeled off his gloves and collar in order to catch Carys as she threw open the cage door and flew into his arms.

He felt Rune’s dark gaze light on him in disapproval for the Order’s interruption of the night’s commerce, but Nathan’s focus was trained elsewhere now.

Jordana went still suddenly, then slowly turned around. Her gaze collided with Nathan’s glower, a connection he felt like a lightning strike that sent heat straight to his groin.

If he’d thought Jordana looked suited for a board meeting from behind, facing her now threw that lame comparison out the window. Her blouse was carelessly untucked in front, the first three buttons unfastened, creating a tempting plunge of bare flesh that ended just between the perfect swell of her breasts.

Her skin there was flushed, a pretty rose hue that traveled up her throat and into her cheeks now as well. He couldn’t help imagining her blood rushing through those delicate capillaries. Hell, he could almost taste it. His mouth watered at the thought, making his fangs punch out of his gums.