It was not lost upon her the way that Darcy so seamlessly threw himself in harm's way, his sole concern over her overriding the need to protect himself. His body acted like a kind of shield from the potential spray of bullets that could have followed. He pulled her into him without a single thought of self preservation, willingly taking a bullet for her. Willingly taking the brunt of that danger which unfolded. How quickly it happened that she hardly had the time to register the ramifications of it. It was one thing to demand it and yet another thing entirely for it to be an impulse. Was this because of matedom? How rare it was that Risque found herself in harm's way from a bullet that she had never thought to question it. Fortunately, this one was not intended for her. But Darcy didn't know that. Acting as if it were.. What if it had been silver? Ah.. How unique.. Perhaps this was as he explained earlier.. With the tree. There was little time to consider such things as that commotion erupted like a volatile volcano and it was all too fortunate that the bullet... was not for her.. Although it had spurred a series of events that she would have rather avoided. Roscoe fell like a leaden sack of potatoes. The very weight of him crashing into the earth where he stood could have very well made the ground shake. The shot wasn't enough to kill him, the bullet wasn't silver, there was no telltale sizzle of the entry wound that could have eaten away at his brain permanently.. What a pity it wasn't.. What a waste of a good bullet and shot. Risque would not have mourned the man that so reminded her of every last being wrong with the world. How she could show him a better way.. She knew it and yet it was not worth a single consideration of her time.

How quickly Kacey moved like the snake she was. She'd known she was a fool from the start and yet... how eager she was to prove herself as the largest moron there ever was. A kept toy dog on a leash that thought herself to be a pitbull. How easily she found her opening at the expense of her lover. How little care she had for the fallen man offering little more than a glance in his direction. It was no surprise who held her leash and none too obvious that she hardly seemed as distraught as she should. What would Roscoe think when he came to? When he learned the truth of his female's little taste for rebellion. Roscoe was no Risque but even she could recognize that flaring temper... that faux smile he offered only concealed so much. A look she recognized in many a man. How easily she saw through his guise even with the moonshine. Even with an intoxicated brain she could still see.

How lucky that mouthy little woman was that she didn't stand alone. She didn't even look around, not even to pinpoint the obvious marksman who was but a distant thought, having already concealed himself without a trace. Risque refused to allow to make a case that would fall upon deaf ears. A rallied lynch mob would certainly not listen to any of it.. Not when they were so eager for the taste for blood of any kind. All spurred by Kacey's timely bark and Darcy's attempt at reasoning all but ineffective.

At the ready to defend as that violence began to boil. How she recognized that loyalty that coursed through his veins from far before this night. She had extensively tested it time and time again. Yet new places could make for questionable variables like the nostalgia of another life. So far from the one he lived now. How this could have been Darcy's coven... How wasted his potential would have been. He could fit in here as readily as chaps worked on a cowboy and yet.... He looked so much better on her. There was never a single hesitation, she was now the blood within his veins... not the south.. Not anymore... His accent was the only thing he seemed to share with this place any longer. Save for maybe his terrible taste in food. Perhaps he should taste what true French cuisine was... for him to know just what he was missing. But such thoughts were trivial things... perhaps when that mob led by a pink hotheaded cowgirl with a bone to pick. Petty violence and illogical chaos so quick to ensue amongst unintelligent sheep.

Did she not know who she was. That she was the oldest being here? That she was aware of. Even wasted she could annihilate her world with far more finesse than she could ever dream of. Risque never one to doubt herself even when the odds seemed to pile against then... Risque would decimate them all.. (or so she thought). Children were hastily rushed in an effort to keep them from harm's way. How easy it would be for them to become collateral damage. The humans too seemed to take to hiding, some kind of protection protocol to ensure their assets remained alive. Not at all the worst idea. They would have been the easiest to kill.. Yet... in an instant.. Their blood supply would have been decimated in one simple move.

Kacey made it crystal clear that she was not about to honour her incapacitated husband wishes. One could so easily believe that it was she who planned this. Yet that would require far more forethought than Kacey seemed to possess, indicated only by her rashness. How quickly Risque so traded that gun back to Darcy in order to free her hand with a weapon of her choosing.. Choosing to bring a knife to a gunfight would seem like a perilous choice.... To most... Yet most had never met her. She had taken down covens with far less. She was the weapon, the blade was merely a bonus. It was no surprise that Risque had preferred her knives. After all, she always knew just how to make things... interesting.

Yet that moonshine... it still messed with her senses.. Not even the vampiric metabolism could rid her body of that poison fast enough. What had been in it? She'd vaguely remembered Mary's flaunting ramblings about that very process they had crafted it.

The nearest from the band of fools went after Darcy first. Those backwards thinking men going for the man, or out of some notion that he was the true threat or their unwillingness to harm a woman. At least for now. They wouldn't see her coming. She was all too unaware that Darcy's own footing was uneasy. It was impossible to say how much they drank that night but it was enough to take out a whole football team of humans. She still had that bitter aftertaste like chalk upon her tongue. She had no idea that Darcy had already fled after incapacitating the first man... There was not a chance she would run from a lesser coven. Drunk or not.. She could take them all. Or so she thought.

Her powers seemed to crackle at her fingertips, like she was about to rip open pandora's box by the jugular and they would all be swallowed whole. Yet how out of touch she felt with those powers, even though they were a part of her, engrained to every fibre of her being. It hardly felt the same crisp preciseness. It was far too forceful. For all she knew she could be summoning every last stray feline within reach. That familiar torment power would have been a far better choice...it was not her first.

Little did she know that those cats would come and they would have to deal with however many felines that drew from from all their little corners well after Risque and Darcy were gone. Just as the first vampire eyed her with confusion... unwilling to hurt a woman... and yet.. Bound to Kacey's orders all at the same time gave Darcy the time he needed to return and in a fluid motion pluck Risque's slender figure so suddenly before hoisting her form over his shoulder before he fled. A slew of threats and french curses spilled from her lips. She was fine. How blinding moonshine could be. That battle would have been... costly.

The vampire queen only had a moment to toss that blade that found its mark better than any bullet she would have shot. Drunk or not.. She could use her knives blindfolded. A parting gift to the errant hostess... Risque soon after hissed Darcy's name like a curse upon her tongue. How dare he strip her from her place. He jostled her around as he ran. He was like her... a creature who did not shy away from any kind of fight. Why now? He obeyed her in all... and yet now he chose to defy her! How she tried to summon forth that familiar ire... quick to remind him... and yet... how ready she was... to curse this wretched night to the darkest cracks of hell itself.

He moved with such speed, tucking her safely into the truck before slamming that pedal to the floor with a force that could have broken it. Immediately the vehicle lurched into action.. The tires tread left a dangerous spray of kicked up gravel and dust, hitting any vampires that drew too close. They took out at least one or two by simply driving over them, their cries devoured by the monstrous truck that seemed almost eager to decimate anything that stood in its hellpath. Darcy drove recklessly and by some miracle didn't hit a thing.. His driving evened out only once they pulled out into far steadier ground of a main road. The truck took every beating like it was a tank, made for the rough terrain. The vehicle nearly flew through the air several times, jostling the pair of vampires within the car.. Risque surprisingly.... Amused how such a vehicle handled just about all her cowboy asked of it. Perhaps trucks had their uses after all a thought she would probably not have come the next evening when she awoke.

Yet without its skilled driver, it would have lacked the speed they needed to escape. Escape... How unpleasant a notion. How this night did not go at all as it should have. Not nearly enough blood had been spilled... and they had fled. She did not flee... perhaps this was what irritated her most of all... Not the fact that Darcy manhandled her like she weighed nothing... that he made decisions without her direct approval.

The few stragglers that somehow still pursued them, struggled to keep up with their speeds. Until they were well and truly alone. The car began to shift, lower to the ground, replacing what was once an imposing brute now became exotic and exceptional like her. How easily it ate up the paved road with a growling, whirring sound... the sound of every dip, crack and pothole in the road echoed. That silence echoed what only seemed like a radiating displeasure. How she reflected upon that night, tasting it all with a horrible bitter taste within her mouth.

She could sense his desire to speak and how in that moment she was sure there was nothing he could say that she wished to hear. Her icy words cut through the car silencing him.

It was at long last that the final vampire fell back... just as the Jankin sign fell from view. Good riddance to that vile place. It should have been destroyed. Let it shatter to the dust.. Risques thoughts seem to fold in on themselves further kneading in that ire through her further... all it took was a single drunken thought to take a glinting silver needle to weave its way into her mind and..... Seemingly... deter that very course she could have taken. All the names that ended with Y seemed to flash within her mind... so many of those names ended in Y.. Darcy's own included.. What a peculiar theme she wondered if it were coincidence.

They had a lot of ground to cover before the sun rose and now all she could think of why the south possessed so many names that ended with Y. It was a question that bled into the car first shattering that silent cold war. It was hardly a question that either of them would have predicted, not when she could have so easily allowed her displeasure to lash out like the savage ruthless bite of a whip. Darcy finally began to speak for the first time since they entered that car, the man seemingly safe now that she addressed him.

It would appear to be a lack of intelligence was the answer. How ready the midnight haired woman was to accept it. She made a musing sound that originated within her throat. "How pathetic and yet I am unsurprised." She uttered after a moment, before settling into her seat, her judgement latched on to another being entirely. That deadly tension that coursed through her shoulders and body seemed to all but melt slowly away. It was such a subtle shift that so few could have seen it... Darcy seemed to sense it, that similar tension that resembled her own seemed to ease all at once while the vehicle raced along in a rush to return to that much needed civilization and their creature comforts. Silence overtook the car as Risque's thoughts returned with far less venom.

How she wished only for a scalding hot shower and bed. Risque's jaw set as she peered out the window watching the country fields speed by, the radiant sky so vivid in comparison to the city. Risque once more... spoke into the quietude of the car having come up with exactly how she wished to deal with that night as a whole. If she could burn it from her mind she would have, well except for the few chosen parts she wouldn't mind keeping.... Yet it hardly worked that way. Darcy at the very least seemed quick to seize that very offering like the gift it was. That forgiveness for any of his actions she disapproved of and all the unsavoury bits of his hometown erased to no one other than themselves. If only he could forget that singular request along with it.

For as much as they might have wanted to. There was no way they would forget that night, it would forever exist. Along with the promises and revelations it provided.

They gathered enemies like playing cards... more people to wipe clean from that board. Before she could even push the memories away... just like she couldn't push the cursed sound of a laughter escaped her lips like an escaped victim she held hostage. Her shoulders shook as that true laugh overtook her... She couldn't stop the sound even though she commanded it of herself... it only made it that much worse. Darcy seemed to look, unable to hide the bafflement that drew upon his face, all but gawking at his lover like he wasn't sure she was the same woman. Such a rare sound to ever truly grace her lips and yet it could hardly be helped. How she loathed it and yet had no choice but to simply embrace it. It was the sound of Darcy's own hearty chuckle that joined her own within that too small cabin for such a potent sound...

How strange a moment... a blanket of near complete peace. A feeling so foriegn to her she had forgotten how it felt entirely.

It was never just a party for them... no matter where they went, tsunamis sprouted in the wake of their footfalls.. How she was unsure she even said the words out loud if it were not for Darcy responding to them. Risque seemed to accept that response all the same, perhaps he was right. They were born to shake that pathetic little world at its core. Their eyes caught for the briefest of moments and in that look there was a glimmer of contentment, her lips curled into a rare smile that didn't hold a promise of a plot or speak of one's demise. She didn't recognize what this was, simply allowing it to be... when she would usually tear it apart at the seams with her teeth. For a natural moment in time they simply revelled in it.. Forgetting all the things that they were. All the rules she'd implemented in place, forged in steel forged by hellfire. All the social structure gone...

Moonshine was a menace to her psyche.

A single thought crossed her mind... one she had meant to ask him about his powers. His masculine features regained those harder lines as confusion settled there, it was answer enough. He hadn't meddled with her shooting attempt. It was her... All her.. She should have never questioned it. Never even allow it to whisper in her mind. Of course she made that shot on her own accord. The gun was in her hands, her finger caressing that trigger like a lover. "It was as I suspected." She added as if she never had a singular doubt cross her mind. The sooner that vile liquid that coursed through her... faded the better it was. Satisfied with herself, she allowed thoughts to drift upon the hotel room that waited for them. How her body craved for that slice of normalcy and not barns and dust. It was like her wishes were obeyed as the looming lights from the city greeted them in the distance. It looked so glaring in comparison to the vast blanket of darkness they emerged from.

The timing of that drive was impeccable, the sleek black sports car devoured the distance, and easily passed those who drove at a snail's pace. For humans.. They surely liked to waste their time. It was not long before the car eased into the parking spot within the hotel garage, she swore it was like the vehicle seemed to sigh as it was shut down, eager to rest. How different she looked from the woman who left that hotel, polished to perfection in that little black dress.. Instead of this.. Boots adorned with dust and grime, jeans and a graphic tee.. She hardly looked like the rich hotel's normal clientele. Darcy, dutiful as always sought to open her door.. Like always. She placed her palm within his, eager to forget about that world they left behind. It was like nothing had ever happened.... She led the way as Darcy trailed behind her with bags in tow from her most recent purchases from Boot Barn. At least that had gone mostly favourable.

No longer did the world seem to move about her on its own accord, her steps far more sure, the elevator lights far more accomodating, mirrors tinted to a bronze hue that so commonly implied opulence. She stood with an impatience to reach that top floor and silently condemned the elevator for its slowness while Darcy so intently seemed to take full advantage of the view of her in that outfit. Enjoying the last glimpses of such a thing that not a damned soul that knew her would imagine her within. How unaware she was of that roving, appreciative stare before the elevator dinged. The heavy bronze door swept open, admitting them to the highest level of that building. Risque spared little expense and it showed. The suite was far larger than they would have ever needed and yet she would not tolerate anything but the best, especially upon business. It accompanied a California King with designer sheets that fitted upon a dream mattress. The bathroom possessed a walk in shower, all glass, the bedroom separate from the living area portion that would unlikely even be utilized, every moment there possessed some kind of purpose even if it was leisure. Darcy saw to the task of closing those blinds as Risque headed with single-minded purpose eager to peel the shirt from her figure, tossing it to the side, allowing it to flutter and fall gently onto those boots she'd already removed, it was like peeling away the night they had. She was just as she was about to reach for her pants, her fingers surprisingly nimble even with her freshly manicured nails.

It was like it summoned the man in the other room, how he always seemed to draw near the moment clothes were relinquished from her devastating figure. It was like he possessed another sense specifically for it. Even she could not fault him.

Yet how she simply ached for a shower and yet she had little desire to fight the heaviness of the quickly rising sun. But the allure of stripping to nothing to wash the grime of Jankin from her sooner than later was almost worth the strain.It was like the man had a built in sensor for whenever she started to undress, her vampiric cowboy moved soundlessly in nothing but his vibrant red cactus print boxers to appear behind her, his hands resting on either side of her hips as his lips found her neck. A mere kiss offering but a token to her, worshiping her like she was his religion.. his goddess. He remained there, lingering longer than any other would dare before he spoke that southern lilt brushed within her ear.

"No one has heard of Jankin anyways, Darcy. I certainly haven't." She lied smoothly like silk, her voice oddly gentle so close to dawn.

"With all that old dried up wood in that old house of hers... I bet it will make for quite the impressive fire." How she never tired watching things burn. Especially old things. Like that house. Why did people choose to live surrounded by a time long since gone. It was like people clung desperately to the past, unwilling to accept change. It was a perilous mistake. She fell silent as if musing over that final comment about roasted hearts like marshmallows. How quaint.

"Hmm. Roasted hearts.. So long as they are not over cooked.. I want the taste of blood between my teeth." Surely it beat that salty soup. Her tongue brushed between her teeth as if imagining the feel of flesh between them.

"No more directions from Wyatt.." She added as his lips pressed against her cheek now, in an overly affectionate manner. Alcohol. It would seem it affected them similarly... in that rare moment she nearly pressed her cheek into it. Almost. Her wits hadn't completely fled her. She did not cave at the faintest of attention from a lover. As he finally stepped away she turned, that vibrant silken red caught her eye, not even to bother concealing how she stared.

"Darcy." She said as he retreated to the bedroom, his figure paused at the varnished wooden door frame. Her gaze lingered upon his boxers, remembering the last time he'd worn them. "I am beginning to see the 'point'." Did she just make a cactus joke? Her gaze still lingered upon them before flickering upward to meet his mismatched eyes that now easily met her own. "They look sharp.." How her lips nearly traced into a subtle upward quirk, a spark of life entered her pale apathetic eyes before she returned to the sink like she said nothing at all. Moonshine. Cursed thing.

Sharp.. She thought of her words, shook her head before she began her beauty regimine. There was always time for skin care even though she so desperately wanted to crawl into those cool crisp sheets. After a moment she heard Darcy's question. The man was seemingly waiting for her to join him in that oversized bed.

"Soon enough.." He knew better than to rush her... yet she could feel the effects of the sun's rising. She could fight it better than him... She could have and yet after the night they had she would rather sink into that bed and think of far more pleasant things.

By the time she exited... she was in little else other than that navy lingerie.. She had no desire to sort through her things. Tonight she hardly cared. Her voice rang as she moved like silk in the dark. "When you said..." She drew near, her gaze fell to the heap of a man who had already passed out completely on that bed. He was half hanging off it. He didn't move. He was practically dead to the world. Men.. She shook her head before slipping into her side.. The same one as home. She stretched luxuriously within those taffeta sheets, synthetic... she could immediately feel the difference upon her skin. Darcy didn't stir, no he didn't even twitch a muscle. It was at that moment she missed the familiarity of a purring feline to heat her cold feet. Risque was never one to fall asleep right away. She always read a few pages, wrote a letter.. Or when she was restless she had more than a few ways to burn the excess energy. She had none of that here, nor did she have the desire to seek it out. Shifting within that bed she propped those plush pillows a comforting wedge to lean against. Risque hardly knew how Darcy could sleep like that.. Men were strange creatures with simple wants. Simple... for the most part. One hand reached to idly flick off the lamp by her bed.. The room blanketed in pitch black, save for the electric alarm clock that illuminated a faint blue halo of light.

Risque closed her eyes, sleep was far from immediate as she considered that promise she'd made. He wouldn't forget it, for that she was sure. But that was not for a time.. His birthday was a long ways away... Surely it would be prone to change. Considering for a single breath of a second what it might be like to allow him to take the lead just once. In a truck of all things.. She scoffed to herself, surely thinking of it as an absurd idea to dismiss and yet she'd never done it in a truck, a carriage yes... Over 600 years... firsts were in short supply. It was certainly spacious enough.. Explicit images flashed behind her eyes before her mind wandered.. There were plenty of places she could use restraints at least three different places and positions. Yet she doubted he would bother with such a thing, not that she would allow it.. Surely there were to be ground rules.

A final thought roosted in her mind's eye... it lingered... chaffed like cheap fabric against the softest skin. That notion of that ridiculous tree he spoke of. Love.. How her mind shifted from sex to love she hardly knew. It agitated her. How her cowboy seemed to want it from her all the same. Since when had she allowed him to get so greedy!? Was it truly greed? Or was it simply fair? Had she not given him enough? Now she offered him sex in a truck.. A truck. Her? Not to mention affording him control even if only for but a night of sex. If that was not a token of her tolerance of him, besides those titles.. She didn't know what was. Why she allowed it to bother her was another mystery that would likely never be solved.

Risque abruptly turned over to her side with a scoff, taking a great deal of those sheets along with her.

She was still drunk enough to try that silly game just to prove a point to herself that it was as idiotic as it sounded.

Close your eyes.

She did. Blackness peered back at her. A comforting thing. She feared no abyss in existence.

Picture him.. She would much rather picture those sexual images. But instead she imagined him in those ridiculous boxers and his fascination with cactuses. She imagined his strong chiselled features, his unusual eyes, his toned muscular form. There she did it.

Picture him gone.

Why? She hardly understood it. She just put the effort to conjure a man in her mind who was laying right next to her. She tried to erase him with a callousness and yet still the image of him remained. Why wouldn't he go away? He was like a tattoo... needled behind her eyes. Was that supposed to happen? How it seemed to irritate her all at once. This was foolish. A children's game. She hated it.. She couldn't even erase him from her mind even if she tried. Perhaps it had to do with him being hers.. Even in her mind she possessed him so resolutely. Hers to do with as she wished. How he willingly embraced her shackles. Dedicated his life to her like no other.

He'd uttered those words of adoration of love in an easy baffling way. How could he say those words if he hardly knew what they were himself? How frustrating he was, even asleep doing nothing but that act! How she forced him out in her mind with such force to seize back her domineering control.. Gone. Simply gone. None to understand her wicked mind... Want the pain she inflicted.. A man that put his life on the very line for her no matter the cost upon himself. Time and time again he proved worthiness in some fashion. Was it not enough? Time and time again he submitted to her at any cost, worshipped her like the goddess she was. To suddenly not have that.. Her mind seethed possessively. Mine. If he died.. Or left she would end him and bring him back... just so she could do it all over again. Whatever that meant.. Better or for worse he had no choice. He'd signed off his life to her like a one taking a one way ticket to hell with no currency. How deep her hooks were in him.. She never thought to consider if those hooks went both ways. Of course they didn't. She was well and truly in control.

"It didn't work." She declared smoothly into the dark as if saying the words made them real even though Darcy hardly heard her and even if he had, he wouldn't have the faintest of clues what she meant. Her voice low, controlled like she was. It didn't work. She echoed in the complicated chasms of her mind. She blinked.. Drawing more of that blanket to her own figure, her fingers wrapped fiercely, possessively around that blanket..leaving him mostly exposed... the blanket hardly kept them both warm... they were creatures who lived off taking from others. Stolen heat, stolen blood and the list trailed on. Humans were no better, only their wants were different.. They stole just as much and called it democracy. But vampires were superior in every way. Vampires were simply more honest with their intentions.. They wasted no time in being something else.. Well most of them. Some lived in denial. Weak. Oppressed. Not her.

Her eyes narrowed even though no one could see that potent death glare before a sigh woven with a vibration of sound deep within her throat escaped her. She allowed him some of those sheets back, just a little, the meaning behind it just as baffling as the woman herself. She shifted and settled.. Wary not for sleep but for something intangible she couldn't touch and crush within her hands. Tangible things were the only thing to be trusted, they could be possessed, they could be seen, they could be destroyed...she knew better... being a creature who wielded illusions. If one controlled the perceived tangible.. they controlled everything. How she loathed these thoughts.

Moonshine.

It had to be. She could still feel its lingering effect. When sleep finally embraced her in a manner that was nothing short of tentative. Oh did she dream. The strangest of dreams.. Dreams so vivid that she had wondered if her illusions had turned upon herself. Such dreams that were so far from her own, like they weren't her thoughts, it was like they were anothers dreams. Another woman in another life so distant from her own. She sprawled out in that bed, taking space, blankets in what appeared like greedy excess bunched around her sleeping form. How deceptively peaceful she looked. No hard lines, no tension, flicker of the mercurial she-devil. Her lips parted just so as if she were breathing and yet no breath slipped beyond that threshold.

She awoke in a rotten mood.. Her body suffered the closest thing to a hangover that her divine body would ever feel. She didn't speak to Darcy for at least half the early evening. She refused. It was only made fractionally better by blood... lots of blood. How she hunted with ruthlessness, like she wished to carve some unspoken vengeance out on the world, dragging her mate along with her to observe her brutality. Like some unspoken threat he would unlikely receive. It was fortunate for him and perhaps the rest of the populace when her mood finally shifted...

Gone was that sour, hellish mood in an instant as her eye caught a glimpse of a newspaper that was once clutched within her victims hand. It was blood spattered on the floor. That headline glaring... STRAY CATS ATTACK. It said in bold black ink, front page with an image that she would not soon forget. Small town in Georgia awoke in a state of emergency... over run by angry stray felines the article said. Scientists shared their findings to this unusual event. Trying desperately to make sense of the nonsensical. Nonsensical to them. No one was to leave their homes. Several dead. Peta apparently had been on the scene all morning refusing that any felines be harmed, even at the harm of themselves... Still those animal activists stood strong like a small army even though they too were attacked by feral cats if they got anywhere close to the town of Jankin. Hashtag movements spread like wildfire.. Perhaps... she reached a little further than she realized that night.

So much for no one hearing about Jankin...The world it would seem... talked about it.