The hulking, addled vamp backed up against the wall, holding his hands in front of him in a defensive stance. He was preparing to fight, but given the fact that he was struggling to stand, he’d lose.

Diana sighed. It wasn’t her problem. For all she knew, he might have attacked them, killed someone they loved.

She headed to the bar.

All the vampires turned to her, some baring their fangs, others dismissing her and returning to their affairs.

She supposed she couldn’t entirely ignore them. “My, my. And to think that I just came for a little drink, and maybe a game of pool. I wasn’t expecting a show.”

The bartender snarled. “The bar’s closed, little lady.”

Her eyes slid to him, fixing him with a steady stare. Little? There was nothing little about her, dammit. So maybe at five foot five, she wasn’t quite an Amazon, but what she lacked in inches, she made up for in raw ferocity when the occasion demanded it.

Diana had a tendency to naturally downplay the extent of her strength, concealing it in order to live a normal-ish life. Humans or vampires, if those around her suspected just how powerful she was, they wouldn’t see her as a friend, as someone they could have fun with. And besides, she truly did like to be underestimated by enemies. Right now, she was on edge, annoyed, and worried after her chat with Juniper and her altercation with the trio of idiots. Power oozed out of her, and she wasn’t making an effort to keep it in.

“But I’m thirsty,” she said with a pout. “And I’ve come a long way. I will drink.” There was no question. That was an order that the bartender would have obeyed if he’d been wise.

The bartender wasn’t wise.

“I said, the bar is closed.”

She shrugged, and walked forward. “I don’t like to repeat myself. Are you going to serve me, or should we do it the hard way?”

The bartender stepped forward. Two of the vampires surrounding the guy they’d attacked joined him.

“I see. The hard way, then.”

She couldn’t help feeling sorry for these idiots.

Diana moved at a leisurely pace; her breathing wasn’t even getting any faster. Resorting to her favorite trick, she leaped in the air, her long legs wrapping around the bartender’s neck, and she flipped him down to the nasty wooden pub floor, cracking his spine with her thighs, before jumping back to a crouch. Then she smiled up at the two who’d approached. They seemed to hesitate.

“He isn’t dead.” Vampires could recover from a cracked neck. So long as she didn’t cut off his head, drown him, burn him, or rip out his heart, he’d wake up in a few hours with a killer headache. “You don’t have to die either. Leave me alone, let me grab a drink, and we can leave all this behind us.”

They weren’t any smarter than the bartender. Both came for her, and another two left the drugged vampire to join them, freeing his flanks. Now that he only had three against him rather than seven, he moved from a defensive posture to a fighting stance, throwing the first punch.

Diana didn’t pay him much mind. She focused on the stupid boys crowding her. She cracked skulls, bit out arteries. Some vampires liked weapons, but as far as Diana was concerned, her teeth and limbs would suffice.

Soon enough, she was the only one left standing.

Diana hesitated before walking to the dark, tattooed man on the floor. He was struggling to keep his eyes open, and didn’t seem able to move.

“Who are you?” she asked.

He opened his mouth, looking like he wanted to answer, but the only thing to come out of his mouth was a long grunt.

She sighed, towering over the pretty, tanned pile of muscles that strongly stank of bloodbane.

This was definitely not how she’d pictured her first night back. She’d planned on a quick pit stop here for a glass of spiced blood before hitting the road again. Now what? If she left the man here, when the boys she hadn’t killed woke up, they’d dispose of him. They’d been about to when she’d walked in. She could always take him a few miles away and drop him in a ditch somewhere.

She tilted her head, kneeling at his side. Then, on impulse, she lifted him up, carried him out, and loaded him on her bike. Bloodbane was nasty; the man would be out of it for the next day at least. She could take him north with her. Someone on Night Hill was bound to know who he was, right? There couldn’t be that many vampires up in Scotland. At least he’d be safe for a night.

She returned to the pub, wincing as she took in the broken tables, shards of glass, and pools of blood on the floor. Hopefully they had insurance.

Diana hopped on the bar, and elegantly swung her legs over. She jumped down, and made a beeline to the fridge. She grinned when she spotted her favorite drink. Bingo.

Vampires went on and on about how bottled blood didn't compare to the real stuff, but as far as she was concerned, just because it wasn't the best didn't mean that she couldn't enjoy it. Sure, she preferred champagne to beer, but if she drank Moët and Chandon every day, she wouldn't appreciate it. Olla—cheap O-positive mixed with tequila—was her everyday snack. Besides, it didn’t come with as many drawbacks as true human blood. Suffering from bloodlust on a constant basis wasn’t her idea of fun.

She grabbed four bottles and left a twenty on the counter, before returning to the Ducati—and the stranger perched on it.

Change in the Air

Diana had to admit, she was impressed with her new cruiser. The weight of the man strapped over the back seat didn't affect the stability or speed of the machine purring between her thighs. Maybe this was it: the bike she'd keep when she finally settled somewhere. If she finally settled somewhere. After almost a thousand years of roaming, it wasn't certain that she'd ever pause long enough to own anything bigger than a laptop.

The night air was cool enough for Diana to notice it, though the temperature didn't bother her one way or the other. She could be affected by extreme heat or Canadian winters, but British autumns weren't harmful to her kind.

She'd been in Scotland for some time before she needed to stop for gas—and another drink. She checked on the man on the back of her bike. Still down for the count. He was going to be stiff as hell when he woke up.

Diana tilted her head, watching him as she sipped her lukewarm Olla. Maybe she should ditch him here. He was far enough from The Lion's Claw to be out of his little friends' reach. She stuck out her tongue, licking her dry lips. The fleeting idea held no appeal. She was too nosy to leave things like this. Diana wanted to know who he was, why he'd been cornered. Despite the fact that his attackers had clearly been assholes, he could still be in the wrong. There was a possibility that she'd helped out a sadistic murderer or something. If that was the case, she needed to remedy the situation by ripping out his heart, or something equally gnarly. She hadn't given the situation much thought earlier. She'd intervened because the other men had been rude to her, that was all.

And if she admitted it, at least to herself, she wanted to hear him thank her for saving his skin. It was going to be hard for him, she could tell. There was something satisfying about humbling strong, powerful men. She was twisted enough to enjoy it. Diana had never pretended to be a saint.

“I guess you’re stuck with me for now, ginger. Let’s go home.”

Home. The word crossed her lips so easily. She'd always seen Oldcrest as her home, although it had been centuries since she'd last visited it. Smelled it. She didn't doubt that the place had changed in all this time. Everywhere else had. The Industrial Revolution had seen to that. It was rare to breathe without feeling that the air she inhaled came right out of her exhaust.

The sky was turning red in the distance when she heard sirens behind her. She grinned, surprised it had taken so long for the human police to stop her; she was lugging around a two-hundred-pound guy on her back seat, after all. It would be hard to look more suspicious.

She pulled up on the side of the road and removed the helmet she’d bought just because it was black and pink. Its only use was to ensure her hair didn't look like a magpie’s nest. Even if she did end up in an accident, which was unlikely given the agility and speed of her kind, she could walk away without so much as a scratch.

"Hey there." She greeted the approaching officer with a smile that revealed the elongated canines that still hadn’t retreated. They wouldn’t anytime soon, unless she forced it.

The human froze, eyes zeroing in on her mouth. He lifted his flashlight to eye level to get a better look.

"Excuse me, ma'am. I thought you were—"

Human. He'd thought she was human, and therefore under his jurisdiction.

"It's all good, sir. I'd say I look pretty dodgy right about now."

He laughed awkwardly, starting to relax a little. Unless she didn’t like them, Diana had a gift for setting people at ease. Even those who shouldn't relax around her. Even those who were technically built to be her prey.

"Right." His flashlight traveled away from her, to the back of the bike. "And…him?"

She tilted her head. "He's one of us, I promise. I mean, you could check, but he'll be hungry when he wakes up." That much was true. Never mind that he wouldn't come to for quite a while.

The officer took a step back. "All right, ma'am. I bid you good day."

"You too." Some might have called him a coward. As far as Diana was concerned, he was smart. Smarter than anyone else she’d encountered that day.

Not every vampire was as controlled as she. The smell of blood was enough to send a starving vampire into a feeding frenzy, whether they wanted to kill or not. The handful of ancients like her needed to feed far less often than newly turned vampires, and weren't slaves to their bloodlust, but they were generally bored, twisted, and cruel enough to kill for the heck of it.

She put the helmet back on and kept going, past towns and cities, past highland hills, fields, and fluffy cows, until she reached a stretch of land by a glistening lake. Her heart beat fast, with something closer to apprehension than excitement running through her veins. She'd been away for so long. Long enough for everyone to forget about her. Long enough for her brother to not recognize her.