He had covertly observed other hunters on a few previous occasions, when the Shadows had sent him after their own errant members. But Ante would have wagered that this particular man was not a vampire, which called into question the reason for the man’s hunt. What was he after, if not blood? Was he a thief?

  Ante sat at a slot machine and pretended to play. After a while the man stopped behind a young woman in an American flag–themed tank top. He leaned in close behind her, watching her play, apparently saying something into her ear. When she won what seemed to be a decent-sized jackpot, she jumped up to give him a sloppy hug. Then she handed him the ticket verifying her winnings—and wandered off.

  The man glanced at the ticket before slipping it into his inside jacket pocket. With a tiny grin tugging the corner of his mouth, he resumed his hunt.

  Over the next hour, Ante watched as two other women and a man handed over their winning tickets. All of them willingly, even happily, although as far as Ante could tell, none of them knew the beautiful man. And then, just as Ante was about to confront him directly, something even more interesting happened. Casino security showed up.

  The thing about casinos is that very little goes unobserved; cameras and watchful eyes are everywhere. Ante was lucky in that respect. As long as he moved carefully, he was unobtrusive even to security. But the beautiful man apparently was not, and now two serious-faced middle-aged men in matching suits began asking him questions.

  The man in the blackberry shirt smiled. He waved his hands a great deal as he spoke, his expression charming even from afar, and the guards’ shoulders gradually relaxed. After a few minutes, one of them gave him a friendly pat on the arm before both guards strode purposefully away.

  The beautiful man’s smile slipped. He closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and let it out. Then he began to walk away.

  Moving quickly, Ante intercepted him and blocked the way.

  “Excuse me,” the man said, trying to step around him.

  Ante stepped in front of him. “What are you up to?”

  “Pardon me?”

  “You are very interesting. I cannot figure out what you are doing.”

  “I don’t know what you’re—”

  Ante crossed his arms and raised his eyebrows. It wasn’t easy to affect such dispassion when Ante yearned to know all of this man’s secrets.

  The man sighed. And then that charming smile settled on him like a mask and he tilted his head a bit and—Ante would have sworn to this—actually batted his eyelashes. “I’m just a tourist, here to see the sights. I’ll be on my way now.” There was something oddly singsong about his tone.

  “That is two lies and an inaccuracy,” said Ante, and when the man frowned and attempted to walk away, Ante grabbed his arm. “Let us have a private conversation, shall we?”

  “Are you Chalet security? You don’t look like security. And you’re wrinkling my suit.”

  Grinning wickedly, Ante released his arm and quickly took his hand instead. “Come.”

  Although Ante’s prisoner looked peeved, his eyes appeared lit with curiosity. He didn’t protest as Ante towed him away from the slots, down a corridor, and to the casino’s twenty-four-hour coffee shop, where a poorly executed mural of the Matterhorn still graced one wall. Most of the tables were unoccupied, and a tired-looking hostess took them to a corner booth.

  “Who the fuck are you?” the man asked as soon as the hostess left.

  “Ante Novak.”

  “Is that supposed to mean something to me? ’Cause it doesn’t.” Somehow he managed to look even more adorable when he was petulant, with that plump lower lip sticking out and his fine dark eyebrows drawn into a V.

  “Who are you?” Ante asked.

  “Nobody. I told you, I’m just a tourist.” He wilted a bit when confronted by Ante’s expression. “My name is Peter Gehrardi, okay? I’m from a little town you’ve never heard of in Buttfuck, Arizona. You want my Social Security number and three references too?”

  Before Ante could answer, the waiter appeared. He had long gray hair tied back in a ponytail, and although a human nose might not have noticed, Ante scented marijuana. “What can I get you?” asked the waiter in the most bored voice Ante had ever heard.

  “Just coffee,” said Ante.

  Peter hadn’t even glanced at the menu, but he smiled at the waiter. “Pretzel bites. Beef noodle soup. Cheeseburger, medium-rare. French fries. And I’m going to have a piece of chocolate cake, so if you want to bring that all at once, that’s fine. Oh, and a Coke.” Even before the waiter was gone, Peter pointed at Ante. “You’re paying. If you’re going to… manhandle me and drag me around, you buy me dinner.”

  Ante shrugged. Satisfying his curiosity about this man was more than worth the price of a meal.

  “So do you work for the casino?” asked Peter.

  “No.”

  “Who do you work for?”

  “Nobody.”

  “So you’re what? Independently wealthy?”

  That made Ante laugh. “Hardly. I currently possess slightly under seven hundred dollars, the clothes I’m wearing, and a mediocre spy novel which I have already read.”

  “Then who the hell are you and what do you want from me?”

  Simple questions, perhaps, but with complicated answers. Ante opted for some of the truth. “I seduce drunken men and take their money. Sometimes we fuck. What I want from you is an explanation of what you are doing. I believe that you and I have some similarities as well as some significant differences.”

  Peter spent a few moments glaring at him, and when that had little effect, he squinted instead, as if he were concentrating very hard. He seemed puzzled when Ante simply sat there.

  The waiter brought their drinks. Ante wrapped his palms around the mug and inhaled, remembering his mother brewing coffee in a copper pot. It was one of the small luxuries his family enjoyed in good years. If the weather was nice and the day’s work complete, everyone would sit outside under the fig tree and sip the strong brew. Then perhaps Ante’s father would pour everyone some plum brandy, and the younger people might dance and sing a bit before dinner.

  “You’re spacing out,” Peter said, then slurped at his straw. “Are you high?”

  “No.”

  “Psychotic? ’Cause there’s something weird….”

  “I do not take drugs, and I am sane.” Ante wasn’t sure whether vampires were subject to the same mental illnesses as humans, given that their body chemistry differed greatly.

  “Then what do you want from me? Are you… a pimp? ’Cause I’m not turning tricks.”

  Something about the way Peter said that made Ante suspect he had turned tricks at some point. With his beauty, he’d make a popular rent boy. But that was immaterial because it wasn’t what he’d been up to in the Lucky Chalet.

  “Do you work for someone?” Ante asked.

  “Nope. I’m like you. Self-employed. Um, but are you really a hustler?”

  “More or less.”

  Peter chewed his lip. “You’re kinda old for it. Um, no offense or anything.”

  Ante was laughing. “Yes, a bit old.”

  “I mean, you’re hot. But you’re… what? Thirty? Most johns like ’em younger.”

  Ante shrugged. In fact he’d been twenty-eight when he died, but farming and war had aged him, so Peter’s guess was a good one.

  They stared at each other over their drinks until the waiter brought the food. It was probably good that Ante hadn’t ordered anything to eat, because Peter’s plates took up most of the table. He dug in with enthusiasm. Ante usually didn’t like to watch people eat, but there was something fascinating about the ferocity with which Peter attacked his meal. His manners weren’t bad, but he acted like a man who hadn’t eaten in days. And he also polished off three big glasses of Coke.

  “You want some?” he asked, waving his fork toward his nearly demolished cake.

  “No. You go ahead.”

  Peter did, then pushed the empty plates slightly away. “You haven’t even drunk your coffee.”

  “You have ingested enough for both of us.”

  “I have a really high metabolism. My mama used to say I was like a hummingbird.” Peter snapped his mouth shut as if the last bit had escaped without his intention.

  “And I have a specialized diet.”

  “Low carb? Gluten-free? Vegetarian?”

  “Something like that.” Although definitely not vegetarian.

  It looked as if Peter was going to ask something else, but then the only two other customers—a man and woman in their thirties—began arguing loudly in Russian about somebody named Yelena. Ante could follow the gist of the confrontation, if not the details. The man thought the woman had been spending far too much time with this Yelena person when she should be with him; the woman countered that at least Yelena listened to her and treated her decently—unlike the man.

  After a few minutes, the fight dwindled into mutual glares.

  “In less than an hour, those two are going to be having really wild makeup sex,” Peter said.

  “Oh? What makes you think so?” They still seemed angry to him.

  “Look at their body language. They’re making eye contact, right? And they’re leaning in toward each other across the table, just a little. And look. Their hands are almost touching.”

  Peter was right. And even as Ante watched, the couple’s stiff shoulders loosened and their mouths quirked into little grins. They began speaking again, this time quietly, but Ante could hear. The man was promising to take her to a nice dinner and a Cirque show the following night, and the woman was admitting that his plans sounded like more fun than shopping with Yelena. Soon they paid the check and left the restaurant hand in hand.

  “Told you so,” Peter said smugly after slurping down his fourth Coke.

  Ante remembered how well Peter had played cards. “You are talented at reading people.”

  “Usually, yeah.”

  “And what were you doing near the slot machines tonight?”

  “Nothing. Just… being charming. Sort of convincing people that handing over their winnings to me would make them happy.”

  “And casino security?”

  “I just explained to them that I’m harmless.”

  “Hmm.” Ante regarded Peter, who stared back. Among other things, Ante wondered why Peter didn’t bolt now that he was fed. The waiter cleared the plates and dropped off the check. Peter leaned back against the upholstered bench and tapped his fingers on the table. Long, delicate fingers with the nails raggedly bitten. What would they feel like, slipped between Ante’s lips?

  “Look,” Peter finally said with a sigh. “You and I seem to have slightly different gigs, so I’m not poaching on your territory. You say you’re not working for anyone else, so you don’t have a boss who cares what I’m doing. And it’s not like I’m hurting anyone, not really. I’m not stealing.”

  “You take people’s winnings.”

  “They give them to me—there’s a difference. Plus it’s just small-time jackpots, and it’s only pure luck that those people won them to begin with. It’s not like I’m snatching away their paychecks. They’d probably just lose that money in the slots later. This way they at least go home with a good feeling. Like they’ve donated to charity, right?”

  Ante snorted. “How long did it take you to develop that extensive rationalization?”

  “Says the guy who admits he steals from his tricks.”

  Unflustered by the gibe, Ante shrugged. “My prey also end up with fuzzy but pleasant memories. But I do not attempt to fool myself—I intend my behavior to benefit me, and me alone.”

  “Which brings us back to the question du jour. Why the hell do you care what I do?”

  “Curiosity.”

  Peter blinked at him. Then a soft smile played across his lips, and for the first time, he seemed genuinely happy instead of calculating. “Where are you from, Ante?”

  “I reside in Las Vegas.”

  “Originally.”

  “Far away.”

  Peter nodded as if that were a satisfactory response. “Yeah. Okay. Do you want to come up to my room?”

  Quite urgently, Ante did. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d so yearned to strip away a man’s clothes and bathe in the heat of his bare skin. If Ante had possessed a heartbeat, it would have raced. “Perhaps,” he answered as evenly as he could. “But I have told you what I do. You trust me?”

  “Not really. But it’s only money. If you steal it—not that I want you to—I can find more.”

  Ante didn’t mention that he was capable of stealing a great deal more than that. He could purloin a life just as easily, leaving Peter gasping in ecstasy even as his blood flooded the hotel carpet. But Ante hadn’t taken a human life for many decades and had no desire to do so now. “Yet still I am a risk,” he said. “And you are beautiful. Surely you would have no trouble finding a temporary companion who is safer. Why me?”

  Peter’s answering smile was blinding. “Curiosity.”

  Chapter Four

  AFTER Ante paid the restaurant bill, he followed Peter to the elevators. Peter moved gracefully, almost dancing in his apparent eagerness. Anyone glancing their way would have guessed they’d soon be having sex—it wouldn’t take Peter’s special perceptual talents to figure it out.

  Peter’s room was on the top floor and considerably more posh than Ante’s. The suite included a comfortable living room with sweeping views of the Strip, a bathroom big enough to host a sizable party, and a bedroom that was an oasis of comfort.

  “Expensive,” Ante commented.

  “Not really. I talked the desk clerk into an upgrade.” Peter crossed the living room and removed a bottle of cola from the small refrigerator. “Want something to drink? This is all I have, but we can call room service if—”

  “I do not want anything.”

  Peter took a swig from the bottle, recapped it, and returned it to the refrigerator. Then he took off his suit jacket and tossed it onto the couch. “I’m completely sober. You’re not going to get me drunk so you can take advantage of me?”

  “I did not think that was necessary.”

  Unbuttoning his shirt, Peter prowled closer. “It’s not. Anyway, I don’t do alcohol. Messes up my head.” He slid the shirt from his shoulders and left it as a bright puddle on the floor. When he reached Ante, who was still fully dressed, Peter gave Ante’s upper arm a squeeze. “You must spend a lot of time working out.”

  “Not really.”

  Peter slid his hand under the sleeve of Ante’s T-shirt. “You’re cold.”

  “I always am.”

  “Come with me. I’ll warm you up.” He took Ante’s hand and led him into the bedroom.

  They turned off the lights, but with the big windows, the room was far from dark. The diffuse glow of Las Vegas played against Peter’s light brown skin, emphasizing its warmth and softness. Ante watched closely as Peter kicked off his shoes and socks, then stripped out of trousers and briefs. Naked, he was breathtaking—or would have been if Ante had breath. Peter’s physique was as sleek as the well-tailored suit had suggested, his hips narrow and legs long, his body nearly hairless except for the neatly trimmed black curls at his groin. And God, Ante could almost taste the heavy vein running along the underside of Peter’s erect cock.

  “Unwrap,” said Peter.

  Ante tended to move with more power than grace, so he was certain he put on less of a show as he took off his clothes. But Peter didn’t complain, and judging from the way he licked his lips, he liked what he saw.

  Like lovers in a stupid movie, they rushed together and embraced. Peter was just a bit shorter than Ante and fit perfectly in his arms. His skin was hot enough to scorch. And his scent!

  Down in the casino, the odors of food and cigarettes and a thousand perfumes, lotions, and deodorants had overwhelmed Ante’s sensitive nose. But now he inhaled deeply against Peter’s shoulder and very nearly swooned. Peter smelled like sugar and newly cut grass, with overtones of roses and spices, and beneath it all, the rich fragrance of his blood.

  Ante licked the crook of Peter’s neck, making them both shudder.

  Then they were kissing, something Ante rarely practiced with his prey. He kept his fangs tucked into his gums, yet didn’t hesitate to press his tongue against Peter’s sharp white teeth. Peter tasted sweet, like the chocolate cake he’d had for dessert and the soft drink he’d washed it down with, and his lips were lush and soft.

  But after only a few moments, Peter, breathless, pulled his head back. “Holy crap. I don’t think making out has ever got me so close to coming.” He stroked Ante’s lips with his thumb. “You’re good with your mouth. What else can you do with it?”

  Instead of answering with words, Ante dragged him to the bed and demonstrated. It was exquisite torture to move his tongue across Peter’s nipples and belly, to suck on his inner thighs, to scrape blunt teeth delicately across the damp head of Peter’s cock. But Peter rewarded Ante’s patience with soft moans and undulating wiggles. He scratched his fingernails into Ante’s shoulders, drawing a bit of blood and making Ante groan his appreciation.

  When Ante swallowed Peter’s cock to the root, Peter cried out and arched his back.

  Over the decades, Ante had taken a good many cocks into his mouth. He’d enjoyed giving head even when he was alive—as a few furtive minutes stolen with a fellow soldier—but it had been even better after his rebirth. He had no more gag reflex, and he loved feeling a man’s pulse beating so heavily against his tongue and palate. Besides, this position placed some lovely arteries conveniently nearby. And semen was close enough chemically to blood to make a snack. Not quite nutritious but, like Peter’s chocolate cake, utterly delicious.