“Lettie called.”

  “Hell. What did she want?”

  “To know if I was upset with her because she is dating Van, and she didn’t like that I was at the restaurant where my mother, hers and Van’s, and others were having lunch. Anyway, the final upshot was I told her that I’ll go where I please anywhere that I’ve been before.”

  “Which is the way you should feel. No one should have the ability to dictate where you go or don’t go.”

  “So you don’t think it’s too early to go to the hunters’ club? Or maybe we could go to one further away?”

  “No. At least I feel we’re going in the right direction—if you want to call it that—in our recovery. Or at least trying to normalize the changes in our lives.”

  “Okay, that’s what I was thinking, until I got the call from her. And then I thought maybe I wasn’t looking at this clearly.”

  “Everyone’s coming tonight. We won’t be alone,” Dane said.

  “Everyone would probably be disappointed that we didn’t go, don’t you think?”

  “I’m sure they would understand if we didn’t go,” Dane said.

  “Yeah, I agree. I think Lettie just made me feel unsure of myself.”

  “Don’t let her, or anyone else like her, make you feel that way.”

  “Okay, I’ll see you at five then.”

  “See you then.”

  She finished vacuuming, then put away the vacuum. She loved teleporting from place to place, but it sure confused Princess. She would see Jacqueline disappear in front of her and then she went looking all over the house for her. Jacqueline appeared in the bedroom where Princess had been sleeping on the bed, startling her. She meowed at her as if telling her not to do that to her, and then she came over and rubbed against Jacqueline’s legs to show her all was forgiven.

  She petted Princess’s head and then began looking through her fancier club outfits. Because of her red hair, she preferred wearing black, emerald green to teal, any shade of blue, red, royal purple, and crisp white—like the wedding gown she had chosen to be married in.

  But which of her dressy dresses were the best to wear to show off in tonight? Long? Short? Something in between? Lacy? Sequined? Velvety? Or satiny?

  She decided to go with the long teal gown that had a lacey bodice, fitted waist and gown, showing off her curves, and a long slit up the side that would make it easy to dance.

  14

  Dane had been so irritated that Lettie had called Jacqueline and had made her self-doubt her intentions when she had every right to go anywhere that she wanted to, just like anyone else did. Technically, they could also go to vampire clubs, but he wasn’t sure they would be welcome there. He had never really talked to Adonis about whether he and Zachary and the others went to vampire clubs after they had been turned. He wondered if they did so as a group, would the vampires feel threatened as in the hunter part of them was looking for rogue vampires at the club?

  Dane suspected it would be hard to turn off that part of their nature, if they spotted someone in a vampire club who was on one of their termination lists. He still thought it would be easier to fit in with the hunters at a hunters’ club since they’d been born hunters and knew so many of them.

  He finally dressed in black dress trousers, black dress shoes, and a black button-down collared shirt. But then he wondered what Jacqueline was wearing. Wouldn’t it make a relationship statement if he wore a shirt that matched her dress? As long as she wasn’t wearing peach. He didn’t have that color in his wardrobe. Pink, yes. No purple either, though. Lots of different shades of blue because of his blue eyes.

  “Hey, I hope I’m not interrupting anything,” he telepathically said to Jacqueline.

  She said she was laughing. “Are you practicing your telepathic communication with me or are you⁠—”

  “Okay, you might think this is silly, so feel free to say so, but I could wear a shirt to match the color of your dress if I have one.”

  She didn’t say anything for a moment, and he figured maybe he was going a little overboard with wanting to show they were a couple. But he thought it would help her feel that he had her back while they were at the hunters’ club no matter what happened tonight.

  “Do you have a teal shirt? Aqua? Turquoise? Or you could wear another shade of blue that would work.”

  “I have a dark teal shirt.”

  “Oh, perfect. That will be so much fun.”

  He sighed with relief. He was glad she sounded like he had made her night. “All right. As soon as I pull on my shirt, I’ll be on my way over.”

  “See you soon. I’m just putting my hair up.”

  “You can keep it down, if you would like.”

  “Okay, that makes it even easier.”

  “Great. I love your hair. See you in a few.” Once he finished dressing, he drove over to pick up Jacqueline, trying to anticipate how she would look. She looked fabulous in everything he’d seen her in while hunting rogue vampires or at the therapy meeting. No matter what she wore, he knew she would look sexy. He wasn’t disappointed as he knocked at the door, and she let him in.

  “Princess is waiting to see you.”

  He laughed. “Hey, Princess. I’ll have to give you another good brushing one of these days.”

  “She would love it.”

  “Man, you look gorgeous. I mean, you always do, no matter what you’re wearing but dressed like this? I can’t imagine any man not wanting to call you his date. My brothers are going to be in seventh heaven when they get to dance with you.”

  She blushed a pretty shade of red. “Thanks. You’re pretty dashing yourself. I can’t believe our teals are almost the same shade.”

  “Yep. We definitely look like we are together.”

  “Yeah, that’s nice.”

  “See you later, Princess,” Dane said, then he shut the door and walked Jacqueline to his truck, opened the door for her, and once she had climbed in, shut the door for her. He climbed into the driver’s seat and buckled in. “Well, are you ready for this? My brothers said they would meet us there.”

  “Yeah, I’m ready for this. Though I would be lying if I said I wasn’t somewhat nervous about this. What about you?”

  “Oh, yeah, I think I wouldn’t be honest with myself if I said I was feeling totally fine about this. In the past, it would be just a fun outing. Now? It’s a whole other story. I keep anticipating a fight from some of the hotheads who might want to keep the club patronage strictly to hunters who haven’t been turned.”

  “Then what do we do?”

  “We’ll play it by ear. If push comes to shove, and we don’t want to make a scene, we can disappear and drive off into the sunset. Or we can stay and force the issue. But I really don’t think we can plan what will happen until we see what happens. I kind of doubt Zachary or Adonis would back down if any hunter gave them issues.”

  “Why would you?”

  Dane glanced at Jacqueline. To protect her.

  “Don’t you back down on account of protecting me. I’m just as likely to stay and make them eat their words.”

  He smiled. He could see her doing it too.

  “Oh, I was thinking about Stacey and how she said her brother had come to her aid when she had been turned. I wonder if he’ll be there to back her up on this.”

  “Maybe, since my brothers are. But you never know. For him, taking down the rogue that had turned her was really important. Allowing a bunch of half vampire, half hunters into an all-hunter club might be another story. He might even feel pressured by his hunter friends to go along with keeping us out.” Then Dane pulled into the club parking lot and saw his brothers there. To his surprise, so were Stacey and her brother, Richard. Zachary and his mate Pasha were there. Danai and Michael were also there, along with Adonis, and his mate Rachael.

  Dane smiled. He was glad they had such a nice turn out. The club wasn’t really busy at this time of night, so they would grab seats in a section of it, claiming their bit of territory, and have the wall to their backs.

  Then they went inside. Five hunters were there, all male, all sitting up at the bar, three of them there on their own, two sitting together talking. They didn’t pay any attention to Dane and his friends’ arrival as they took their seats at the perfect spot. They could watch everyone coming into the establishment. A window was situated on their right side. They weren’t going to be sitting hidden in the back because they wanted everyone to know they were there, and they had every right to be.

  Through the window, Dane saw two more cars roll up into the parking lot, and Zachary said to Stacey and Jacqueline, “The blue Cadillac is my dad’s. Tobias’s brothers, my uncles, Brent and Curt, are with him. In the other car, that’s my cousin Ferris and his mate, Mary, and his twin, Ned, and his mate, Trish.”

  “Wow, this is a great turnout,” Jacqueline said, taking hold of Dane’s hand and squeezing it. He leaned down and kissed her mouth.

  He was glad to see her so cheerful when she had been so apprehensive before. Of course, it didn’t mean that they wouldn’t have trouble from some of the hunters when they arrived. But it felt good to be at the club like he was still a hunter and belonged here just as much as anyone else.

  Everyone greeted everyone and more introductions were made to let everyone know who Stacey and Jacqueline were.

  Tobias said, “You ladies must not have gone to this hunters’ club much or I would have noticed you.”

  Stacey said, “I usually go to one that’s a little closer to my home, so this one is new to me.”

  “I’ve been with my ex-fiancé here a few times. We probably just were here on nights that you weren’t,” Jacqueline said. “I had seen Zachary here before, but I didn’t know him at the time.”

  “With a huntress?” Pasha asked, looking askance at Zachary.

  Jacqueline smiled. “No, with Michael, I believe, though I didn’t know his name either at the time. And I had seen Dane once.”

  “With my ex-fiancée?” Dane asked.

  “Yeah.”

  “How did I not notice you?” Dane asked.

  She chuckled. “You were with your fiancée at the time.”

  Everyone seemed of good cheer, dressed to the nines, happy, smiling, ordering cocktails except for Rachael who just got flavored water.

  “Have any of you been to a hunters’ club since you were turned?” Jacqueline asked.

  “No,” Zachary said, all the others in their family who had been turned agreeing.

  Zachary’s uncles and other cousins hadn’t been turned, but they had backed the family once the changes had occurred. It had been hard for them to deal with it at first, but necessary. And their family was family, still the same personalities, but just having vampiric abilities that made them stand out from the rest. At least that’s how Tobias and his brothers had finally come to view it.

  “Are we doing the right thing?” Jacqueline asked, looking at Rachael who had recently had a baby.

  Rachael smiled. “Oh, absolutely. This is a long time in coming. We’ve been busy hunting, well, until I couldn’t hunt any longer, but yeah, it’s something that we had talked about doing and the family finally is home from Florida for a little while, so…it’s perfect. If we have any trouble, we’ll take care of it as we see fit. If worse comes to worst, we can vanish and reappear somewhere safe.”

  “Which is the only reason I said it was okay for Rachael to come, since she had our baby not that long ago,” Adonis said.

  Rachael laughed a little. “As if you could keep me away from having fun dancing with you.”

  The music was playing, no live band yet, but after they all ordered their drinks, the mated couples began to dance, joined by others as Trey took Stacey to the floor, and Dane took Jacqueline.

  When she was dancing with Dane she felt as if she were dancing on air, he was such a smooth dancer, completely in control. She loved how gracefully he moved.

  “I don’t know about you, but I swear I’ve never danced so well in my life,” Dane said.

  “Oh, me too. Is it because we are vampires also now?”

  “Or maybe we just gel because we’re meant to be together. I feel like I’ve been taking lessons for years.”

  “Me also. This is so nice. I want to dance all night long,” she said.

  He did too, but they still had to worry that they were going to have trouble with some of the hunters once the club began to fill up. But the distance between them soon changed and he was holding her close, the dancing become much more intimate, sexy, turning her on. God, was he a hottie. She swore when he looked at her with his heated gaze, he was seducing her with his piercing eyes.

  More than that, she felt his arousal growing and he pulled away a little in a gentlemanly gesture, but she wanted the heat between them and dragged him close again, telling him she was enjoying that part of the dance and not to distance himself from her.

  He smiled with that sexy smile of his that bordered on total seduction. “You’re a captivating dancer, so sexual, so beautiful.”

  She smiled at him and wrapped her arms around his neck. “You make it easy to feel that way—and believe me, I’ve never felt this way while dancing with any other guy.”

  “The same with me with any other woman, and I don’t believe it all has to do with being vampires.”

  “I agree. I’m just so…I don’t know, attuned to you,” she said.

  “I feel that way about you and feel so much more spontaneous. I normally wouldn’t be this…forward with a woman I had just met, but with you…”

  “No holds barred.”

  He smiled and leaned down to kiss her. “Yeah, no holds barred.”

  Their lips were nearly touching again, their eyes focused on each other’s mouth and then they were kissing again.

  Then Lettie and Van walked into the club with two other couples. Jacqueline pulled her mouth from Dane’s, and he felt Jacqueline tense in his arms. He ran his hand down her back, and she quickly relaxed.

  “Sorry about that,” she said.

  “Don’t be sorry about it. If my ex walked in with a new guy on her arm, I would be tensing too.”

  “You’re so good for me. I never thought I would be dancing with anyone, or spending the night in his bed, any of this, so soon after being turned and after the breakup,” she said.

  “Ditto for me. But spending time with you has been great. I wouldn’t have wanted it any other way. You have really opened my eyes to what being with someone as special as you is like.”

  “Thanks so much. I really feel the same way about you. Not at first when you came into the meeting half dressed, but I overcame that pretty quickly.”

  He laughed. “I had gotten that impression.”

  “I couldn’t believe you would ask me if I thought you should remove your bloody shirt at the meeting.”

  He smiled. “I couldn’t help but want to get your reaction. All I’ve got to say is that you are so beautiful. This gown on you, the color and style, are just gorgeous.”

  “We look good together.”

  “I agree.”

  “I love your teal shirt. You look very dashing.”

  “Thanks.” Dane glanced at Van sitting with Lettie and their friends at one of the tables. They were drinking their cocktails and watching him dancing so intimately with Jacqueline.

  “I want to tell them to get a life,” Jacqueline said. “I mean, we can’t be all that interesting to them, can we?”

  Dane leaned down and kissed her. “Apparently so. Maybe your ex is not so over you.” But as soon as Jacqueline gave him a deep kiss back, her hands cupping his face, he felt his teeth extending. He tried to pull his mouth from hers, not wanting to worry her that he was losing control, but she held him tight and caressed his fangs with her tongue. When he deepened the kiss, he felt her own canines had extended and he measured them with his tongue, intrigued. Maybe she was just as fascinated with his as he was with hers.

  Then they pulled their mouths away from each other, smiled a little, their hearts pumping hard, their breathing fast. The song ended and she cleared her throat. “Would you like to get another drink and cool down a bit?”

  He nodded, afraid to show off his extended canines further. As soon as they returned to their table, Adonis and Rachael smiled at them. The others were still dancing.

  “Fang trouble?” Rachael asked.

  They chuckled.

  “Yeah, when do you get control over your fangs when you’re kissing?” Jacqueline asked.

  “I still don’t have control over it,” Rachael said. “You know it just happens when you’re…really happy to be with someone.”

  “Or angry with someone,” Adonis said.

  “Sometimes even if you’re startled,” Rachael said.

  Dane had to admit that he loved stroking Jacqueline’s extended canines with his tongue. There was something totally erotic about it and another part of him was seriously becoming engaged also, which had just made them extend even further.

  They ordered margaritas and the cocktail waitress leaned over the table and said, “So you are all vampires?”

  The music was loud and only they heard her words.

  “Yeah,” Adonis said, “but we’re also hunters and have been for much longer than vampires.”

  “That’s sooo…well, cool.” She smiled and then left to put in their drink orders.

  “Well, that’s one vote for us,” Adonis said.

  “I think there are more who aren’t happy with us being here.” Rachael sipped on her chilled glass of strawberry-flavored water.

  “Aww, hell.” Dane hadn’t expected his ex-fiancée to show up at the club with a date. And she was with a guy Dane had never liked—to top that off.

  “Oh, that’s your ex,” Jacqueline said, sounding surprised.

  “Yeah, and that’s a hunter I never got along with. He was always a bully. Moose Warner. I can’t believe Wendy would go out with him.”

  “Maybe she didn’t think he was a bully.”

  “She always agreed with me, but I guess things have changed for her.”