"Really?" he asked as he looked over his shoulder and examined his rear end. "I think you're right. Maybe I'll take the pockets off of all my pants."

"You do that," Hank said with an exasperated sigh. "We need to go, Essie. You ready?"

"Nope, but I'm coming anyway," I said with a grin.

"That's my girl." Hank grabbed my hand and gave Dwayne one more slap to the head.

"What the hell was that for?" Dwayne griped as he tried to swat Hank back.

"The gauchos and the photograph, asshole," Hank said with a smirk as he successfully avoided Dwayne's counterattack.

"We're out of here." I pulled Hank to the front door before one of them lost a limb. We simply did not have the time to regrow anything. "Call me every few hours about Granny and let me know how she's doing."

"Will do, doll."

"Do you need extra protection in Michigan?" Hank asked as he paused at the door. "I can send some of the Pack from Georgia for reinforcements."

"Got it covered," Dwayne mumbled and began to frantically straighten the pillows on the couch.

Crapcrapcrap. Dwayne only straightened things when Armageddon was approaching.

"Spill it," I said as I marched back over to him.

"Fine. I called a few Vamps to help guard the compound in Michigan. Too dangerous for anything but dead people and Cows to be around for a while."

"I thought you told me Vampyre get-togethers end in decapitation?"

"Occasionally," he hedged. "However, I made some deals."

"They owe you?" Hank asked.

"Um... not exactly. I kind of sort of might owe them now."

The story just kept getting worse...

"We. We owe them now," I stated firmly.

"Sweet Jessica Simpson on a skinny-ish day, I will not allow you to owe a Vampyre anything. Ever," Dwayne said so loudly even he winced.

Hank's sharp intake of breath and audible groan shook my confidence a little, but the was no freakin' way in hell Dwayne was going to bear the brunt of the consequences for taking care of my granny.

"I'm serious," I said loudly. Loud was good. Loud sounded confident-or certifiable. I was going with confident. "How bad can it be?"

"Um..." Dwayne started.

"Stop," I shouted and slapped my hand over his mouth. "I don't want to know. I feel it would be better if I use avoidance on this one until it's in my face. We clear?"

"Yep," Dwayne said with wide eyes and a small scream.

"Alright, Hank, don't say anything and don't look at me for five minutes until I'm past imagining what owing a Vampyre a favor means. You got that, big guy?"

Hank inhaled deeply and blew the air out of his mouth. He held onto his anger by a thread. It made my brain run wild with thoughts of being chained to a coffin in a dank basement for a decade and performing blood slave duties for a pale-skinned, stinky Vamp with long fingernails, putrid breath and a weird bun head. I really needed to stop watching TV.

Hank nodded curtly and picked up the camera Dwayne had hidden on the couch and crushed it. Dwayne's shriek of dismay made me grin and forget for a moment that I might be beholden to a Vampyre who wasn't my beautiful, gay best friend.

Thank god for senseless destruction of property... it really did take your mind off of your problems.

"Well, have a good time and don't die," Dwayne said in a cheery voice as he snapped another shot of Hank with a second camera and hustled us out of the front door.

"You take care of Granny," I said as I hugged him tight.

"With my life," Dwayne promised and kissed my cheek. "With my life."

Chapter 13.

"I need to do something life affirming," I said as I searched for a song on the radio I could deal with. Meditating was out. I couldn't find my center in a moving vehicle. "Do you want a blow job?"

"Oh my god, Essie," Hank groaned with a pained laugh. "You have just made a long drive much longer." He shifted uncomfortably in his seat and gripped the steering wheel like it was going to fly away.

"Does that mean no?"

"Yes."

"Wait," I said as I settled on a top forty station that would make Dwayne proud. "I'm confused. You do want a blow job or you don't?"

"I always want a blow job," he said tightly. "I just don't want a life endangering blow job."

"Are you saying that because I'm so good at blow jobs or because any blow job would make you wreck the Hummer? Pun completely and totally intended."

"The only person I want a blow job from is you," he said as he tried to readjust his now tight pants.

"Because I'm so awesome at them?"

After a brief pause and a chuckle he said, "Yes. Yes, you are."

"Thank you."

"You're welcome."

"How about a hand job?" I tried again.

His grunt of agony was music to my ears.

"How about we wait until we get to Chicago and go for broke?" he suggested with a sexy half-smirk that melted my panties.

"Works for me."

"And I just want to thank you for still being attracted to me in gauchos," he added with a shudder.

"Hank, I would be attracted to you in a strapless beaded gown and a boa. You're all kinds of hot and all kinds of mine no matter what you're wearing."

"Back at ya, baby."

Indiana was flat and kind of mind-numbing. However, the miles of windmills kept me busy as I tried to count them, much to Hank's amusement. The outskirts of Chicago were industrial and stinky. We bypassed the city, got on 94, and arrived in Lincolnshire just as the sun was setting. Apparently Dwayne kept this particular abode because there was an in-the-round dinner theater he enjoyed performing at. The thought was alarming and yet also strangely comforting. His biggest credit was playing the king in The King and I. I'd lay money it was due to the fact he was bald and hotter than Hades, because his voice was more suited to Lady Gaga than Rogers and Hammerstein. Plus most Vamps preferred big cities and he was relatively safe from friendly decapitation in the 'burbs.

"I say we call Angela and her Dragon in the morning," Hank said as he pulled the Hummer into the garage.

It was a four-car garage and Dwayne had a hot little silver-blue Mustang that had my name on it. I prayed the keys were in the house.

"Sounds like a plan," I agreed. "What do you want to do now?"

"Hmmm, I suppose we could think of something if we tried hard enough," he said with a sexy lopsided smile.

"Pun intended?" I asked suggestively.

"One hundred percent."

"Oh my god," I hissed. "Do that again."

Round three of going for broke was going to turn either my mind or my legs to mush. Honestly, I didn't care. I was having way too much fun losing all my brain cells as I rode Hank like I was at a rodeo.

"Bend over the couch and pull up your dress," Hank ordered as he steered me toward the leather couch facing the fireplace.

Dwayne's house in Lincolnshire was far more modest than his mansion in southern Illinois, but it was clear the Vamp had money and good taste. The two-story brick Colonial home was in an upper middle class neighborhood. Not in a million years would I have guessed a Vampyre lived amidst the perfectly coiffed and properly dressed families of the affluent suburb. The furniture was all in neutral tones with lots of leather and overstuffed comfy chenille chairs. He had overdone it a tad with the crystal chandeliers hanging in every room, but it made me happy because it was very Dwayne.

"Shouldn't I be naked?" I asked as I flopped over the arm of the couch with my dress over my head.

"Nope," Hank said in a husky voice as he gripped my hips and ground himself against my delighted body.

We'd been so intent on getting down to business neither of us had removed any of our clothing. Thankfully Hank had exchanged the gauchos for jeans and a t-shirt back in Indiana. Even though he was hotter than asphalt in August, it might have been a bit unsettling to have sex with him looking like a metrosexual, gay Vampyre fashionista. The jeans were around his ankles and his shirt was shredded from round one when it had gotten a little out of hand and my claws had come out. It was all kinds of sexy and all kinds of out of control.

"I am so in love with you," he whispered in my ear as he slid into my body and began to pound me like there was no tomorrow.

I arched my back and met his wild thrusts with screams of pleasure. I sure as hell hoped Dwayne's neighbors weren't home.

"How does this keep getting better?" I cried out as I felt the familiar tingle begin to coil in my body.

"Don't know. Don't care," he ground out as his thrusts became frenzied.

"I'm close," I gasped as I clawed at the couch and gripped him within my body like a vise.

"Come," Hank demanded as I felt him grow larger inside me. "Now."

I came with a shriek as I closed my eyes and brilliant color ripped across my vision. I gasped for air as every nerve ending in my body shuddered with pleasure. Hank's breathing was labored as he planted kisses all over my shoulders and neck.

"Love you... love you so much," he muttered as he pulled out and gently cradled my still quivering body in his strong arms. "Never gonna let you go."

"I'm not going anywhere, big guy," I whispered as I pressed my kiss-swollen lips to his cheek. "You're stuck with me forever."

"Damn right," he said as his head fell back on the couch.

We cuddled in silence. In this moment my world was perfect. My worry for Granny was still there, but I felt safe, loved, and cherished.

"Hank, can I ask you something?" I asked as I reluctantly crawled off his lap and straightened the dress I'd never removed.

"Anything."

"Did the Vampyre blood affect you? Do you feel different?" I asked as he followed me to the kitchen and watched me rummage through the cabinets for something to eat. We'd used up an enormous amount of calories and I was starving.

After a long pause he sighed. "I do feel strange. The murderous streak I felt in the battle was disconcerting. I couldn't quite control it-it felt like it was controlling me. My need to kill verged on psychotic."

"How does Dwayne handle that?" I asked as I gave up on finding anything edible in a Vampyre's kitchen.

"He's three hundred years old," Hank reminded me. "He's had time to rein it in... or he has some secret serial killer life we don't know about."

I considered the possibility for a moment. It was a surprise to me how much property he owned. However, the thought of Dwayne going out on pleasure murders was ludicrous. Was Dwayne just different from other Vamps? The thought of owing a favor to a bloodsucker who didn't have his shit together like Dwayne did give me pause.

"I couldn't let Dwayne take all the responsibility for Granny's safety," I said quietly. The ramifications of what I'd done by taking on the responsibility of the debt to the Vamps was starting to really sink in.

"You were correct. As much as I don't like owing Vamps, we take care of our own."

"Maybe it won't be too bad," I said in a cheery tone that didn't fool either of us.

"Uh huh," Hank shot back with a small shudder. "Let's just go with that one until we find out differently."

"Deal. Wanna go find food?" I asked, happy to change the subject.

"Drive thru or sit down?" he asked as he played with my post sex messy curls.

"I don't know," I said. "Either. Why?"

"Sit down-we have to change." He smirked like a dude who'd gotten majorly laid as he glanced down at his shredded shirt. "Drive thru-we can go looking like we've just had sex for several hours."

Looking down at my wrinkled and torn dress, I grinned. "I'm hungry. I'm not changing."

"Then drive thru it is." He chuckled as he grabbed my hand and we ran out of the front door.

"I'm having a hard time dealing with the fact I just ate ten tacos. I'm pretty sure I have a food baby," I muttered as I patted my full stomach.