Cargo in the form of honey he was taking to his grandmother, who lived in one of the cabins. Étienne stayed in the quarters with the other single men closer to the main house, though many nights he wished he were still in his grandmother’s cabin.
That would never happen. The overseer had a special brand of hatred for Étienne. Maybe it was because his skin was so light. Maybe it was because his heritage was whispered about, if not confirmed. Or maybe it was just plain old meanness, as others often said.
The night was dark, the moon barely a sliver, with sounds of the nightlife that surrounded the swampy lands outside the city of New Orleans. Just a few more yards. He stuck close to the trees and cabins, staying in the shadows, his senses on high alert for watchful eyes that could bring hell to him tomorrow morning.
If I’m caught.
Yes, if he were caught. Which he’d do his damnedest not to be.
Finally, he was in front of Nana’s door. He raised his hand to scratch on the wood lightly, to make no more noise than a rodent.
The door opened before he could touch it. Nana’s beautiful dark face, eyes wide, peered into the darkness. She always opened the door as if she knew he would be there. As if expecting him.
Every time.
Recognition shone in her eyes. They narrowed as she smiled, teeth emerging in a broad grin. “Étienne.” Her voice was a mere whisper, not rising above the din of crickets and toads.
Étienne nodded and held up a tiny container. The viscous amber liquid glowed in the candlelight behind Nana.
She reached through the crack, a tiny hand on an arm that was thinner than Étienne would have wanted, and she pulled him in with a strength that belied her age and size.
“Come.” She closed the door behind him softly, then whirled on him, arms wrapping around Étienne’s waist. “What did you do to get that?” She raised her eyes to his.
It was then he noticed the white hairs coursing through her dark ones at her temples.
It pained Étienne to see his grandmother with signs of age, and the signs grew more and more prevalent with every visit he paid her.
Truth was, Nana, known to everyone else as Marguerite, was more than his grandmother. Nana had raised him from birth.
Étienne squeezed her shoulders, not too tightly, bearing in mind her frailty, then placed the prized cargo into her palm.
“You’ll stay. Let me get you something warm to drink.” She winked at him conspiratorially. “I have tea grounds.”
“Just how did you get those?” Étienne smiled at the sheer joy on her face.
“I have my ways. And the hot water is ready.”
The hot water always was ready. Nana kept water heating all hours of the day. She never knew when she’d be called on to make a poultice or boil herbs. Everyone came to Nana for healing.
Moments later, Étienne was sitting at her table made of rummaged lumber, on a chair made of more rummaged lumber, his feet digging into the dirt floor.
Nana put a biscuit before him, a layer of the honey he’d just brought slathered liberally on each half.
“No, Nana. You eat.”
“Don’t be silly.” She showed him two more biscuits in a basket under a rag.
Étienne took a bite, knowing it gave her pleasure to watch him eat. He followed the bite with a swallow of the hot tea. She’d put honey in there too.
Nana sat across from him. “There’s blood on your back.”
He winced. Not from the physical pain, but from Nana knowing what he’d been through.
“Too bad Old Mister Arceneaux doesn’t know the ways of his new overseer.”
It’s not like he really knew the ways of the old one either, Étienne thought, but only shrugged, causing himself pain. Resisting the urge to flinch when he moved forward. The lashes he’d taken the other day did more than smart.
Étienne’s mother had died in childbirth, and when asked, Nana had claimed to all that did not need to know that her newborn had died too. Nana raised Étienne as her own. She wouldn’t have managed this if she hadn’t been so trusted, and not kept under close watch. Old Mister Arceneaux—as she called him—had a special fondness for her.
The man who Étienne resembled, his father Phillip—Young Mister Arceneaux—though no one would say so out loud, had left to go to college, his long forgotten tryst with Étienne’s mother had remained as such—forgotten.
As had the child they’d had. When Phillip had come back for break, he’d asked about Étienne’s mother, thinking maybe one day they could have something, move far away where the scourge of slavery did not taint their lives, but he was told she’d died. And he was never told about the son he’d fathered.
Phillip never came back to the plantation. Étienne had no knowledge of what his father looked like, no idea of hair color, eye color, the sound of his voice, nothing.
And if he were honest, at this stage in his life, he didn’t care. It didn’t matter to him that Phillip Arceneaux didn’t know he existed. What did matter was that his mother died giving birth to him, and Phillip Arceneaux wasn’t even aware of it.
“I have to go before I’m caught here.”
“Go. But…” Nana hesitated. Her fingers worked the rag in her hands, over and over, twisting the threadbare fabric.
Étienne waited patiently for her to start again.
After a deep breath, she did. “I’ve been visited,” Nana said.
He knew what that meant. She’d had a visit from the dark visitor, the one that heralded death. It was said amongst the others that Nana had the gift. The dark visitor would tell her of a death.
“Who now?” Étienne had humored Nana over the years, though to be truthful, he’d found her predictions had been mostly accurate. It was eerie, but he always pushed her gifts aside. Étienne wanted nothing to do with the preternatural or supernatural world. The idea of dark visitors made his skin crawl.
“My turn,” Nana said.
He shook his head. “No. You’re too young.”
And she was, in spirit, though at eighty-something years, her body denied her the privilege of youth.
He kissed her on the cheek. “I’ll stop by soon.”
If he could.
If he could sneak away.
If he wasn’t shackled again.
Why he irked the overseer more than any other on the plantation, Étienne had no idea, but he dealt with it. As best as a man who had no choice and no rights could.
Chapter 2
Latrice Mathieu, the dark-skinned high witch of the Black Glade Coven skulked around the wooded area behind the slave cabins of the Arceneaux Plantation. Latrice was free. She had no master and she belonged to no man.
Too bad her mind wasn’t as free.
The man she’d found herself unable to free from her mind?
Étienne.
Étienne, the one who carried himself like a king, no matter what task he was about.
Étienne, whose heritage was a hushed subject, though Latrice had her own suspicions.
She watched Étienne sneak into Marguerite’s cabin. She smelled the blood, knew it was Étienne’s. Then when he’d slip out of the shadows and allowed the sliver of a moon to illuminate him, she saw the dark stripes of dried blood along the back of his shirt.
Latrice would see to that overseer. She’d see to him the way she saw to the last one. Étienne’s days of suffering, the others’ days of suffering, she’d put an end to that.
Again.
One spell, that’s all it will take.
The idea gave her comfort, knowing that though she couldn’t do much, she could rid Arceneaux Plantation of the abusive overseers.
Latrice waited for a long time while Étienne and his grandmother visited within her cabin. Their hushed tones were a soft murmur as Latrice parked herself beneath a live oak tree with a trunk thicker than two men put together.
She waited, as she always did, for Étienne’s visit to come to an end and make sure he made it back to his own quarters safely.
For though she couldn’t protect him from the overseer, there were things—beings—that roamed the nights in the bayou that could prove far more harmful to Étienne than the overseer. Beings that could drain him of his very essence, or if they were wont to, beings that could rip him to shreds before he knew he was under attack.
For this, she waited, any night Étienne decided to venture on forays, for whatever reason—usually to visit his grandmother Marguerite—for this Latrice waited.
For him.
For the lives she knew he and she would both affect.
Chapter 3
Étienne was in the fields the next day, dawn to dusk, and when he returned, he was shackled to a post, left in a lean-to. The overseer had heard he’d been out the night before. Heard or guessed. Étienne didn’t know. All he knew was he was shackled.
The metal cuffs jangled every time he moved, a reminder of his punishment. He stopped moving so he wouldn’t have to hear the sounds of his imprisonment.
He sat in the dark. Alone. Cold. And he’d not had a chance to have a meal. Nothing.
All day, none had talked to him for fear of rousing overseer Jasper’s anger. Étienne shrugged in vain to make a buzzing mosquito leave him alone. He scratched against the post where the mosquito had dined and raised a welt on his already mosquito-bitten flesh.
A shuffling sound caught his attention.
Étienne froze.
“Your Nana is gone. The dark visitor she said had visited her has now claimed her,” a voice whispered to him from outside.
Étienne knew that voice. Old Achille. His grandmother’s second or third cousin.
“What? What did you say?”
Silence followed.
It can’t be. No. Not Nana.
Étienne yelled. He raised his voice in a challenge to the very nature and all that any would hold holy. Étienne held nothing holy. He knew there was no holiness here. There was no light, no matter how much the sun shined. He yelled and yelled until the sound of a branch hitting the lean-to’s tin roof startled him.
The overseer stood before him, silhouetted by the light of a torch carried by someone behind him.
“Stop that yelling, or you’ll taste Ol’ Reverend again.” Yes, the overseer had named his whip.
“My grandmother’s dead. She’s gone.” Étienne paused to catch a breath, as yelling had left him without.
Before he could continue, the overseer said, “So?”
Fury raged through Étienne. But he knew fury wouldn’t serve him. No emotions would serve him now. “I’d like to be there when she’s buried.”
Surely no decent being would deny him that. She was as much a mother as any mother could be.
The overseer was no decent being. He laughed and stomped away.
Étienne stayed silent. For more than an hour, he grieved privately, shackled to the wooden beam, sitting on the dirt floor.
A voice came out of the darkness again. Achille, once more. “She was buried. As twilight gathered darkness.”
Without me. “Achille, help me.”
“Help is coming your way. In the still of the night, wait and be ready.”
Chapter 4
Latrice was in the woods again, same as she was last night. But this time, she knew Étienne wouldn’t be escaping. She watched him being shackled in the three-sided lean-to at the far edge of the grove that held the cabins.
She’d watched them bury Marguerite, watched them while Étienne was shackled and had no idea what was happening at the other end of the clearing.
They opened the ground, placed Marguerite’s coffin within, then piled dirt on top. Achille, a distant relative of Marguerite’s had said a few words, sung a song softly, his deep voice carrying the sorrow to Latrice. Then they’d all returned, heads low, each to their own abode.
All had been there.
All but Étienne, the one who should have been there.
He’d be crushed, she knew this. She knew much about this man because Latrice had watched him. Watched his rebellious ways, watched his strength, and witnessed the love he had for the grandmother who raised him.
Latrice had cared for Étienne as long as she could remember. Months ago, she’d visited one of her cousins, told her about Étienne.
Her cousin, a seer, told her it wasn’t meant to be. That their lives would be intertwined forever, but he wasn’t the one for her. Mystified, Latrice had left her cousin’s place.
Latrice had lost her mate, one of a neighboring coven’s sorcerers. He’d been the first love of her life. But there was something different about Étienne, something about him that called to her.
And there was something about him that pulled at her because she knew their paths and their futures were intermingled.
Chapter 5
Achille told Étienne to be ready.
And ready, Étienne was. Sure enough, at the hour when no human wanted to be walking in the swampy, mosquito infested, water-moccasin-crawling land near New Orleans, Étienne was released from his shackles with a key on a ring that surely belonged to the overseer.
Étienne asked no questions and wanted no answers. Answers would be hard to keep secret under the overseer’s whip. Though Étienne would wager on his ability to withstand the torment that could drive a lesser man to tell the source of the key, Étienne didn’t want to tempt fate.
Achille’s expression was somber. “Marguerite is in the graveyard, buried with her head to the west, at the north end, under the large oak. A wooden marker with her name marks the spot. We’ll do better by her later.”
Later. Who cares about later?
Étienne nodded, not wanting Achille to read his expression and think he was anything but grateful. “You’ve—you—Nana appreciates, I am sure.”
Except Étienne wasn’t sure. He wasn’t sure what existed where, and did it matter if facing east, west, north, or south? Who knew if you really needed to be facing a certain direction when Gabriel blew his trumpet? Who knew if Gabriel really existed?
Safe to say, Étienne no longer believed in anything good. And he was fine with his belief system.
“I’m going to visit Nana.”
“Don’t get caught,” Achille muttered.
Giving Achille another nod, Étienne headed toward the cemetery to see his grandmother’s grave and pay his last respects. She’d been right. She’d received that visit from the dark visitor, and now she was gone.
He approached Nana’s grave, the fresh mound of dirt a different color than the older graves. A white luminescent object caught his attention. Étienne bent down to study it.
It was a shell, a sea shell that Nana’s grandfather had given to her grandmother long, long ago, when they’d been in a country far different than this one. The shell had made a long voyage, and managed to be handed down, despite hardships and moves.
A wave of melancholy floored Étienne momentarily. He swallowed down the knot of emotions.
Chapter 6
Latrice watched Étienne from the shadows, but a feeling of unease made her senses prickle. The tiny hairs at her nape raised. He bent down to study something on Marguerite’s grave, and seemed completely oblivious to his surroundings.
Oblivious until a peal of laughter filled the tiny cemetery. The sound was hollow and ethereal. And out from the shadows stepped an elegantly dressed man, his hair pulled back, his nails immaculate, his skin perfectly flawless and without pores.
Vampire!
Latrice was filled with dread.
Étienne’s head flew up, his eyes widened, then narrowed as he studied the preternatural creature. He showed no fear, and yet, no belief in the horrors this nightwalker could inflict upon him.
Surely he wasn’t so ignorant. Surely he knew. Surely.
The vampire smiled, revealing fangs that glistened in the moonlight.
Étienne’s posture changed as if now he realized what the creature was.
“Go away,” Étienne hissed low, because clearly there was still the oversee
r to fear.
Before Latrice could fully process the events, Étienne had taken off at a run, heading toward the bayou. Behind him, the vampire walked slowly as though enjoying a day in the park. Every few paces, the vampire would move at preternatural speed and close the distance between himself and Étienne.
Latrice ran after them, at an angle, as quietly as she could manage, steering clear of low branches and undergrowth obstacles.
She heard a splash, and picked up the pace to find a sight that made her heart seize as though a fist had been clenched around it.
Étienne.
In the vampire’s arms.
Limp.
There, at the bank’s edge with the alligators, raccoons, and water moccasins as witnesses, the vampire was draining Étienne’s blood. His long hair made a curtain, blocking Latrice’s view, but she didn’t need to see to know what was happening.
She couldn’t sit back idly, simply couldn’t.
Standing to her full height, which wasn’t much, she flung her hair behind her much the same way a warrior takes a stance in the midst of battle.
She knew she didn’t need to make a sound, that the vampire would feel her.
She took a step closer, revealing herself and losing the cover of the shadows.
Latrice’s dark eyes picked up the light of the silver moon’s beam. White stripes emanated from her pupils to the outer edge of her brown irises like the spokes of a bicycle.
The vampire’s head flew upward, his fangs exposed, a hiss coming from deep within his chest. His eyes rimmed in crimson, the whites dark from the feeding.
“Go.” A tiny drop of blood lingered on the corner of his mouth. “He’s mine. Mine.”
Latrice lifted her hands, raising them to the moon as if in supplication.
She clenched her jaw with the force of the power she was pulling in and pushing out toward the vampire. The power surged through Latrice, forging through her like a force of nature, it picked up all her powers, then jetted through her hands lethal and invisible to human eyes, making a beeline for the vampire.
Taming the Vampire: Over 25 All New Paranormal Alpha Male Tales of Contemporary, Military, Shifters, Billionaires, Werewolves, Magic, Fae, Witches, Dragons, Demons & More Page 70