Page 3 of Bullets and Blood (Hunting Hearts #1)

Chapter Three

Nix laughed at the customer’s joke and poured the next wine in the range. Of course they weren’t going to spit the wine out.

It was only a taste.

Couldn’t get drunk on that.

Hahaha.

He’d heard it all before. They thought they were being so clever and funny. Still, they were easily suggestible.

“This merlot is very silky.” He lowered his voice as the man grinned at him.

He was three sheets to the wind. How many wineries had he and his friend trawled?

They were the kind who drove and figured they wouldn’t get caught.

“Raspberry and chocolate on the tongue.” The man couldn’t look away now, and his expression relaxed.

“You’re going to want a…” Fuck it, he’d go the whole way.

He deserved a good sale from this lot. “A carton.”

The man drank the wine and nodded. “It is good.”

His friends skulled their wine without even tasting it. Heathens. They were trying to get drunk for free.

“Perhaps I could interest you in our restaurant.” That would keep them off the road for a bit. He kept the same melodic tone in his voice. “We serve beer from the local brewery as well as local wines.”

He had all their attention now. They should all buy something. That would make his sales figures even better this month. “Would you like to try the shiraz?”

They did. Now they were nodding like sheep as he let them to the slaughter pen.

“A couple of cartons split between four of you, and you all get some wine. Make a night of it or save some to take home to your wives.” All but two were married.

One still had the tan line where his ring had sat.

Perhaps this was a weekend away to soothe the sting of the divorce.

“Or new girlfriends.” He switched his attention to Mr. Tanline. “Impress her with your wine knowledge.”

They drank their wines. Almost in synch. God, he was good.

“So, which two cartons would you like?” His smile widened, but his fangs stayed hidden flat against the roof of his mouth.

There was a brief discussion, and then they bought the shiraz and the dessert wine. Not what he would’ve picked, but he didn’t care as long as he got the sale.

He rang up the wine as another man walked in.

Nix gave him a smile that became stuck as recognition caught in his mind.

He’d seen this man before, but couldn’t place him.

The calm he’d been exuding to nudge the patrons in the direction he wanted broke up.

He glanced back at his customers. “If you could type in your pin?”

The man blinked as he started to think. “Um, yeah.” But he hesitated.

Nix needed to take control again. “You should have a meal before you get back on the road. You’ve had quite a bit of wine this morning.” He gave the man a wink like they’d shared all the gossip. “The steak is fabulous.”

Overcooked by his standards, but no one catered to his dietary requirements.

He could eat all the gluten and meat he wanted, but vitamin C was his downfall like all vampires.

Once turned, the body couldn’t process it.

Another lesson he’d learned the painful way after eating a punnet of strawberries; if the intestinal upheaval wasn’t enough, watching his skin tear open into lesions had been the killing blow to his love of all things berry.

The man typed in his pin and nodded. “Steak sounds great. Thanks, mate.”

“Not a problem.” Nix kept his smile in place.

The men picked up their wine, looking more than a little confused and muttering something about how they’d agreed to only buy one bottle at each winery. Mr Tanline glanced at Nix but didn’t say anything. They made their way to the restaurant carrying their cartons.

With the sale made, Nix cast his gaze around looking for the too familiar man.

He was at the other end of the counter sampling the cheese and semi-dried grapes.

Nix had tried one grape. He hadn’t gotten sick, but he hadn’t been willing to risk more.

The cheese, though, was amazing. Especially the chili brie.

There were a few other people looking around the shop, tasting chutneys or looking for souvenirs to take home.

Tea towels and bottle openers, chopping boards and the like.

If they came over for a taste, he’d convince them to buy something, but he never interfered with their browsing.

They had to want to buy something before he would push them to purchase. So many people wanted but resisted.

Why? What did they think was going to happen to their money when they were dead? He could tell them.

No amount of money in the bank would be able to save him. It hadn’t saved his family. And now all that money sat in the bank untouched and unused because it was being watched. He’d had to beg and steal to get out of Victoria and across the country.

He drifted up the bar. The man tasting the cheese was pretty… No, that was the wrong word. The man glanced at him, his light brown eyes like gold. Maybe pretty was the right word. Pretty like a lion. Best admired from a distance because petting would lead to getting bitten.

He loved to bite; he’d loved to be bitten once. He hoped the man was a shapeshifter and they could stop faking being human for a few moments. He smiled, and the man smiled back. How could Nix have forgotten who he was?

“Busy day?” the man asked before he put another piece of cheese in his mouth. He watched Nix like he wanted to eat him next.

He might just offer; it had been a while. But only if the man wasn’t human. Faking being human all the time was tiresome.

“Always.” But he had time for a chat. The man seemed familiar… Had he seen him around town? If he was local how come they’d never run into one another before? He’d have liked to have run into him many times…or the other way around. He didn’t mind. “Would you like to try some wine with your cheese?”

Nix leaned a little closer to take a subtle sniff and work out what the man was because he definitely wasn’t human. No scent of the wild that a shifter usually had, only metal.

“Sure.” The man licked a crumb off his lip.

Nix’s careful smile faltered. The man smelled like vampire, or at least partially like a vampire. He was a bit old to be unblooded, wasn’t he? He must have been closer to thirty than twenty.

Had the Reid family sent someone to check up on him?

Nix didn’t blame them. He was in their territory—the very fringes of it as agreed, not causing any trouble and not eating and killing people.

He hadn’t bitten anyone since he’d been here.

He may have bitten a pet dog and one cow.

He could almost hear the horror that would cause if he’d told that to the people he’d once called friends and family—he’d have liked to hear their gasps at his fall, but they were all dead. Blood was blood. And he was desperate.

For a heartbeat, he missed his old life.

The parties, the pretty men he’d bite and feed on as they fucked—not that they ever remembered the biting part.

He made sure of that. No one wanted humans to know vampires existed.

If they did, they’d see that vampires had their fingers in all kinds of businesses, illegal and legal.

Amassing fortunes and buying off politicians.

It was easy to tell when a politician had spoken with a vampire.

They said their lines as told, then faltered as their brain realized what they’d said, but by then, it was too late, and it had all been caught on camera.

“Are you here for long?” Nix leaned on the bar not sure if he was being polite or looking for more.

He scanned the man’s hands, looking for his family tattoo.

There should be a red heart on his wrist if he was from the Reid family.

His own lilac fluer-de-lis near his thumb joint was faded to little more than smudge.

Tattoos weren’t forever on a full-blooded vampire, but he wouldn’t be re-swearing loyalty to his mother and getting his redone.

That day had slipped past with only him to mark it.

There was no more Hadley family. He hadn’t heard from his sister in two months; he’d been in Darwin at the time and hating every moment of the crocodile infested, humid hell hole.

The man smiled. “No. Just stopping by.”

Nix glanced at the other patrons, but they were happily chatting. “To check up on me?”

The man’s eyebrows pulled together for a moment. “You could say that.”

“Right.” He stepped back. There was no fun to be had with this one.

Nix tried to keep the sharp edge of loss safely stored away, but every so often, he cut himself on the memories.

Today was one of those days, and old wounds opened up.

He fell back into routine to keep himself together.

“Would you like to start with the white wines?”

“Sure. Going to ensorcell me too?”

Nix gave him a half smile. “Do you want me to?” A vampire could be ensorcelled, but they had to want it, and it wasn’t easy.

This man didn’t want it. He was just playing.

Nix didn’t like being the mouse in his game, but as the vampire living on borrowed space and time, he had to be nice to the Reids.

“Not a good idea.”

“Probably not.” Nix poured the first wine in the selection and went through it by rote.

The man reached for the glass. Nix caught his hand. He was far faster than a human or an unblooded vampire. Stronger, too. The man tried to pull away but failed. There was no tattoo on his wrist because it was on the palm of his hand. The outline of a diamond.

Orlan family.