“I haven’t seen you here before,” the man to her right did not have to raise his voice above the music.
Alpha, she identified immediately. Something in the magic of the wolves ensured that he was always heard and obeyed by the person he intended to hear him, whether they were wolf or human, it did not matter, as long as they were less dominant than he.
He was gorgeous in a very masculine way, with his shiny, brunette curls overgrown and tumbling into his golden-brown eyes, and the stubble of several days’ growth combined with the tattoos that curled up his neck gave him a dangerous edge. He filled his t-shirt exceptionally well, the fabric stretched over broad shoulders and fabulous biceps. His long, muscled legs were well displayed in the well-worn jeans he wore, and his boots were of an expensive make, but scarred with wear. Whatever he did for a living, it was physical work.
She would bet he made an impressive wolf. He made an impressive man.
The book handed down by the women in her family stated very politely that werewolves had a strong animal magnetism. Reading it and experiencing it, however, were very different things, she thought ruefully as she felt her pulse pick up, and her skin heat.
His lips were perfectly balanced, the line and swell of them sensual, and she had a sudden urge to taste them. Instinct told her he would kiss well, and the image of his mouth on hers and her fingers in his hair had her biting her lip against a flush of lust.
Werewolves could also detect a body’s chemical and physical response to stimuli she remembered and felt a flush crawl up her neck. His aftershave, with notes of citrus and lavender, had her stomach curling with desire and that he would be able to smell it on her was just plain embarrassing.
Get a hold of yourself Lia.
“Yes, you’re my first. Table, I mean,” she babbled, and tried to withdraw hoping that the layers of aftershave, alcohol, and the sweat of the dancer on stage would disguise her reaction to him.
“What is your name?” His voice held her. She was sure that the drag of her breath was audible to his wolf-keen ears above the music of the show on stage, the sound somewhere between fear and want. She was also sure that her underwear was soaked.
“Lia.” She hoped he would let her go, or she would be in trouble before she even managed to serve another table, or, even worse, she might succumb to the demands of her body and do something completely out of character for her, like crawl onto his lap.
“I am Raiden,” he told her, and then selected a beer and leaned back in his chair.
“Nice to meet you.” She hurried back to the bar with her tray, the flight of prey from a predator, she thought, her heart pounding. Animal magnetism was an understatement. The man was like her own personal walking fantasy made flesh and blood. She would be running the battery of her vibrator flat thinking of him when she went home, she thought trying to inject some humor into the exchange.
“He is so hot,” Paris said to her as she passed with a full tray, saying out loud what Lia was thinking. “Raiden, that is. He is a regular. One of Brock’s crowd.”
Lia did not have the opportunity to reply. There was another tray waiting at the bar. She picked it up. Table one. Her path took her past table four, and Raiden, who nursed his beer and watched her as she walked towards him, his expression thoughtful.
Do not look at the werewolf, Lia, she told herself sternly. Despite her self-talk, she met his eyes as she passed and half expected him to stop her again from the way that he was watching her, but he let her pass without interruption. She approached the VIP booth against the back wall scolding herself mentally.
The men within the booth stopped speaking as she approached with the tray. Vampires, she thought with alarm and embarrassment, because their sense of smell was just as strong as a werewolves’ and she knew she would simply reek of desire courtesy of the werewolf whose eyes she could still feel against her back.
What sort of club was this, that it had werewolves as regulars and vampires in the VIP section? She avoided looking at them, knowing that a blush was creeping up her cheeks as she placed the tray onto the table surface and offloaded the carafe of red wine and glasses, collecting up the dirty glasses on the table.
“You’re new.”
She looked up involuntarily. The man that had spoken was another spectacular example of masculinity.
He would not have looked out of place smouldering on a billboard advertising aftershave, his grey eyes striking against the dark hair that he had pulled back into a ponytail bound by a leather strap low on his neck, and his cheekbones high and sharp.
He wore an immaculate and expensive suit in charcoal, and a gold signet ring on his right ring finger. The ring told her that he had been born a vampire, from one of the older lines and it fit, she thought, there was something aristocratic in his bone structure and the way he held himself, the sort of refinement bred into a person over generations of privilege.
“Yes, just starting tonight,” she dropped her eyes realizing she was staring for more than a normal human would do. His well-crafted and tasteful glamour presented him as a good looking, but not extraordinary man.
“What is your name?”
Was every table going to require a personal introduction? “Lia.”
“I am Elior, the owner,” the man told her.
“Oh,” she glanced up at him again. “Hello. Paris said you needed…”
“Yes,” he narrowed his eyes as he evaluated her much as if he were purchasing her, which, she supposed, he was in a way. “I am grateful you were able to step in on such short notice, Lia. Are you finding your way around?”
“Yes, thank you.”
“Good.”
It was a dismissal, and she stepped away with her tray, meeting Paris’ eyes as they crossed paths again. Paris raised her eyebrows. Lia shrugged as she retrieved the next tray. She delivered it to the table and made her way back through the room, aware that she was watched both by Raiden and Elior as she did so.
Being the subject of such scrutiny made her nervous. Elior, she thought, watched to evaluate her potential as an employee. Raiden, on the other hand, probably watched her as a result of her betraying physical reaction. She wondered what the werewolf thought of it, or whether women frequently melted around him, and it was nothing out of the ordinary for his day.
“Hey,” a man grabbed her wrist as she passed with her next tray. She checked the number on his table.
“Oh, sorry sir,” she told him pulling back against his grip instinctually reacting to the expression on his face. “This is for table ten, not your table.”
“I know,” his grin was the disagreeable vulpine smirk of a man used to taking advantage of those weaker than himself. “Are you a dancer?”
“A dancer?” She repeated, glancing to the stage where a pole dancer currently proved her upper body strength in a seemingly impossible pose.
She looked back at the man. He was dressed in a suit. Had he recognized her from school? There were many people of his kind that sponsored her dance academy and held season tickets and she had a moment of fear that he had identified her from there.
“No.” She decided that denial was the best response.
“Are you sure? You look like a dancer,” he tried to tuck a twenty-dollar bill into the top of her stocking as he tugged her towards him, his hand quickly moving from stocking to higher. His friends burst into laughter when she tried to squirm away from his groping hand, protesting against his groping.
“No. I am not. Let go,” she struggled not the spill the drinks on the tray, escape his grip, and avoid his roving other hand at the same time.
“Release her,” Raiden’s hand clamped on the man’s wrist, hard, jerking his hand away from her thigh and lifting the man out his seat as if he weighed nothing. The twenty-dollar bill drifted to the floor. “You do not touch the girls.” He growled the words out, the flash of the Other in his eyes as he lifted the man to eye-level, the alpha ringing in his tone so that the man could not look away.
“Hey,” the suit shrunk under his gaze. He was mankind and did not know the truth of what he faced, but he knew enough to recognize an alpha and someone who was not intimidated by his suit. “You are hurting me.”
His friends were suddenly not so amused.
“Do not touch,” Raiden growled again and dropped the man back into his seat. He leaned over, scooping up the twenty, and placed it on Lia’s tray. “Yours,” he said to her.
“Thanks,” she was breathless from the suit’s attack, and Raiden’s display of strength, the werewolf standing so close to her that she imagined that she could feel the heat of his body on her skin. She moved on to table ten, delivering the drinks, and almost bumped into Elior when she turned.
“You are unharmed?” He asked coolly, his grey eyes holding hers. The Other flashed red in the depths of his pupils.