Of Masques and Martyrs Read Online Free PDF

that the big, cruel-eyed man wrapped her right bicep in a crushing grip. Nikki cried out, less in pain than in fear that he would break her arm just by holding on to her.
    “Hey, asshole!” somebody shouted from a nearby table. “Why don’t you leave the lady alone?”
    A tall black man appeared next to her and reached out for the steel fingers that had trapped her there in the middle of the club. The big man who held her wasn’t about to let go. His other hand shot out in a flash. He grabbed the tall man by the throat, gave a jerk, and her would-be savior’s neck snapped with a gunshot crack.
    “Oh my God!” Nikki screamed.
    The killer leaned in close to her, pulling her to him in an almost intimate embrace. He spoke softly, snarling, but she felt no breath on her face.
    “That’s your fault, bitch,” he whispered. “You killed that fella, sure as I’m standin’ here. And I was only tryin’ to be nice. Now, you gonna be nice or do I have to start gettin’ mean?”
    He smiled, waiting for an answer, and she could see his fangs. Nikki whimpered, unable to scream, barely able to breathe. Even as she cringed away from him, she was ashamed of her fear. This was a tyrant, like so many other men she’d known, an animal whose basic instinct was to inflict pain on others to feed its own delusions of power.
    She was terrified. There was no getting around that. Perhaps she was about to die. In the few seconds that he waited for her response, her emotions were in turmoil. But she knew this: he might take her life, but she would never surrender her dignity again. She wouldn’t give him that.
    “Last chance, darlin’,” he drawled.
    Nikki Wydra balled her left hand into a fist and swung it as hard as she could into the big vampire’s face. Felt it give way beneath her knuckles. Smiled as she saw the blood squirt from his now broken nose.
    “Fuck you,” she growled.
    With a roar, the vampire yanked her hair, pulling some of it free of her scalp. He drew her head back, bared his fangs with a hiss, and shot his mouth toward her throat. Tears burned at the corners of her eyes, but she knew she would be dead before they fell.
    “You want to see mean?” a soft, commanding voice asked.
    She heard the vampire grunt in surprise and pain, and forced her eyes open. A hand was twined in the huge monster’s hair, his own head yanked back, throat exposed.
    It was him. The man from the bar, the man with the lopsided grin who’d come to see her night after night. The vampire towered over him, was double his size, but the handsome, goateed man easily held him down, biceps bulging but not straining with the effort. How? she thought. How could he . . .
    Then she knew.
    “This isn’t the way things are done in New Orleans,” the man from the bar said quietly, sternly, as if he were reasoning with a small child. “If you’d wanted to live like this, to behave like an animal, you should have stayed with Hannibal’s clan.”
    The huge vampire slapped the man’s hand away and rounded on him. Nikki backpedaled, unable to look away but frantic to escape further attack.
    “What makes you think I’m not still part of that clan?” the huge vampire sneered. “You think I’m gonna take orders from a pussy like you, man won’t even take what’s his by right?”
    The man’s eyes widened at the vampire’s words.
    “Oh,” he said amiably. “A spy, eh? Did it ever occur to you to wonder why I’ve been hanging around Old Antoine’s for the past few nights?”
    Now it was the vampire’s turn to register surprise. Nikki didn’t understand what kept him from attacking the man. They were so close, he could have reached out and killed him just as he’d done to the other man who’d tried to help her. And the way he moved, nervously, from side to side. It was almost as if he were afraid.
    But that was ridiculous.
    “No? I didn’t think so. I begin to doubt Hannibal’s vaunted wisdom. Only a fool would send an idiot like you to