“Easy there, cowboy.”
“Jesus H. Chri…”
The sudden punch to his stomach muscles left him wide-eyed and gasping.
“That’s one of the things we don’t do,” Delilah informed him ruefully. “It’s an old taboo. One that goes back to the times Christians were fed to the beasts. Our kind got a bad rap over that.”
“Wh…” He slicked his tongue over his lips and waited for his gut to unkink. “What else don’t we do?”
“You’ll learn, in time.”
Brett drank in the sight of her, her hair falling over one shoulder, her smile bright enough to light the room.
“Please tell me having vampire sex isn’t on the list,” he begged.
“Definitely, certainly, assuredly not! As I’ll demonstrate when you think you’re strong enough for vampire sex.”
Brett had to grin. “If every male felt the way I do now, Viagra would go off the market tomorrow.”
With a joyous leap, Delilah bounded off the bed and tore at her clothing. She’d lived, breathed and oozed terror through her pores during Brett’s protracted awakening. He’d lost so much blood and Sebastian had toyed with her for so friggin’ long that she’d begun to believe the trans formation wouldn’t work! But he was awake now, his skin as cold as hers and the desire in his eyes every bit as hot.
Still she tried to curb her hunger when she joined him in the bed Sebastian normally reserved for kings, queens and other heads of state. After giving him the power he craved, Delilah supposed she now qualified as royalty.
Brett didn’t buy her attempt at restraint, though. With a low growl, he rolled her over and positioned himself between her thighs. His hungry gaze roamed from her face to her breasts and back again.
“Do you have any idea how beautiful you are?”
“I’d say we’re well-matched.”
She planed her hands over his powerful shoulders, his chest, his lean hips. Her palms slid to his buttocks. She felt the taut muscle flex, felt his sex probe her sensitive flesh. She opened for him, joyfully, and shuddered in ecstasy when he thrust into her.
“Very well matched,” she gasped.
REALITY CAME WITH the sound of a door thudding shut down stairs.
While they were here, shut away from the frenzy of the conclave, Delilah had been able to keep thoughts of what would come next at bay. But Sebastian would have informed the clan about the latest awakening and his plans to induct the new recruit into their midst.
With the sound of his foot steps heavy on the stairs, Delilah knew it was time to warn the inductee.
“There’s a ceremony, Brett. A ritual pledging of allegiance.” Easing out of his arms, she pushed upright and tucked the sheet around her breasts. “It can be brutal.”
“Now she tells me.”
His lazy reply suggested he wasn’t worried. She swallowed, remembering her own induction and tried to prepare him.
“Sebastian was a Spanish conquistador. He marched through the Yucatán with Cortés and helped destroy the Aztec empire. He…he knows a number of ways to inflict pain.”
“That right?”
“That’s right.”
“Yeah, well…” His grin came out, cocky and confident. “I’m guessing your boy Sebastian never came up against an Oklahoma State Trooper.”
The foot steps grew louder. Delilah’s stomach twisted into knots. She wasn’t afraid for herself. She was prepared to take whatever her clan leader threw at her. But Brett…
He refused to share her worry. Throwing off the sheet, he rolled to his feet and held out a hand.
“We’re in this together, Delilah. No one, not even a throw back to heavy-handed Spanish conquerors, can change that now.”
She put her hand in his. Their palms joined, cool to the touch, yet fired by the un shakable bond blazing between them.
“You’re right,” she got out on a shaky laugh. “Sebastian’s never come up against an Oklahoma State Trooper. Neither have I, for that matter. Until you.”
“So stop worrying and kiss me. Then we’ll take on this ferocious clan leader of ours.”
“Together,” she echoed, falling into his arms.
“Forever,” he promised, covering her mouth with his.
THE VAMPIRE WHO STOLE CHRISTMAS
Lori Devoti
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Lori Devoti grew up in southern Missouri and attended college at the University of Missouri-Columbia, where she earned a bachelor of journalism. However, she made it clear to anyone who asked that she was not a writer; she worked for the dark side—advertising. Now, twenty years later, she’s proud to declare herself a writer and visits her dark side by writing for Harlequin Nocturne.
Lori lives in Wisconsin with her husband, her daughter, her son, an extremely patient shepherd mix and the world’s pushiest Siberian husky. To learn more about what Lori is working on now, visit her website at www.loridevoti.com.
I grew up on a dirt road where many people dumped their unwanted pets. These animals would arrive at our home covered in mange, mats and with wounds too horrible to describe here. I can remember the tears in my father’s eyes when he had to put one such animal down because its injuries were too great to be healed. I also remember the appreciation and love the ones we could help showed when my mother bathed them, fed them and found them homes—or took them into our own.
I dedicate this novella to The Humane Society of the United States and everyone who has ever taken time out of their lives to help a hurt or deserted animal. Hugs and good homes to all…
CHAPTER ONE
THE SNOW WHIRLED round and round, like tiny tornadoes. Twirling flakes found their way past Drystan Hurst’s collar and the hair that brushed his shoulders, the icy bits making it onto his bare skin. He didn’t shiver, didn’t bother to brush them away—his attention was too focused on the woman standing in his adoptive mother’s window.
The white lights of the Christmas tree shone behind her, revealing her form, lithe as a dancer’s, and the shape of her hair, a mass of curls he knew framed an almost elfin face.
Aimee Polk, the all-night-drug store clerk who had stood between a suicidal boy and seven hostages, had begged the boy to take her in their stead, had by all accounts talked him out of the mass murder he’d planned.
Aimee Polk, who’d been sprayed with the boy’s blood when he’d turned the gun on himself, had been caught on film as she stood there shocked, sobbing, mourning the loss of the boy who seconds earlier had threatened to take her life.
The media had gobbled it up.
And the Myhres had gobbled her up.
Maureen Myhre, Drystan’s adoptive mother, had seen an opportunity and sprung on it. Maureen’s son, Ben, was up for governor and Aimee was a media magnet. Maureen had wasted no time in seeking out the girl. Probably convincing her, like Maureen had convinced Drystan at one time, that she cared—in his case loved him, like a son.
He hissed, lifted his upper lip, revealing dagger-sharp fangs. How that story had changed once he’d messed up, been a kid, stupid but still worthy of love. And nothing he’d done afterward, not even saving her precious Ben at the cost of Drystan’s own mortal life, had changed her lie to truth.
Drystan had avoided the Myhres, their constant plays for press and this town, for ten years.
Maureen Myhre had left him for dead in an alley. Pulled Ben, whom he’d saved, from the scene, then called the police, claiming Drystan, not Ben, had been trying to score a fix…. She was worried.
How unfortunate for her, a vampire had found Drystan before the police, turned him before he could fully bleed to death there in the cold.
He’d stayed away for ten years, but he was back and ready to make the Myhres pay.
AIMEE POLK SLIPPED off her silver flats and curled her legs under her body. Across the room, her soon-to-be mother-in-law touched a waiter’s arm and pointed toward Aimee. Within seconds, a full champagne flute was pressed into Aimee’s hand. Even though the dry champagne wasn�
�t her favorite, Aimee accepted with a smile and took a sip. She preferred something sweeter, but knew whatever vintage Maureen Myhre had chosen was far more expensive than the spark ling wine Aimee used to buy on special at the drug store where she had worked.
She let out a sigh and glanced around the living room filled with people she would never have dreamed of meeting, much less mingling with only a few months earlier.
How her life had changed in just one short year.
“Are you enjoying yourself?” Her fiancé, Ben, slid onto the couch next to her. In navy dress pants and a V-neck sweater he managed to look classy and relaxed. Even in a silk dress that Maureen had hand-selected for Aimee, Aimee felt neither. She ran a hand over her hair.
Ben slid his arm behind her back, giving the appearance of close ness without quite making contact. Across the room a photographer raised his camera. Ben leaned a little closer and tilted her chin up with one finger. Staring into her eyes, he murmured, “With the light behind you, the world will swear I’m marrying an angel.”
Aimee shook her head. “I’m no angel.” Angels didn’t lose their charges, didn’t stand by helpless as they blew their brains out.
“You’ll never convince them of that.” Ben nodded toward one of the invited paparazzi, pulled her closer as the photographer snapped the one-millionth picture of the evening. “They have you on film talking down that killer, convincing him to let those people go.”
“He wasn’t a killer,” Aimee murmured and gripped the stem of her champagne flute tighter.
“Because of you.” Ben squeezed her hand.
Because of her, Kevin was dead. “He was only seventeen,” she said more to herself than Ben. “Who knows what he could have become?”
“A mass murderer?” Ben shook his head. “Seriously, Aimee, the kid was a loser. Destined for the needle. That bullet just saved the taxpayers hundreds of thou sands of dollars in court fees.”
Aimee flinched; she couldn’t help it. Ben’s words were callous, but he was a good man and his family had power. Power she could use to make up for her mistake, for costing Kevin his life. If she had to endure a few callous, even hurtful, words here and there, it was no more than she deserved.
Still, she couldn’t help pulling into herself a little.
To her surprise, Ben noticed. “Tired?” He took the champagne flute from her fingers. “No more of this, then. Can’t have you nodding off at your own engagement party.”
The spark of elation Aimee had felt when Ben asked if she was tired faded. “How much longer?”
Ben laughed, his gray eyes care fully scanning the people around them. “It’s only ten. If you’re going to be a politician’s wife, you’re going to have to become a bit more of a night owl.”
At that moment one of Ben’s legislative aides came over and interrupted. Seizing the opportunity, Aimee murmured a few polite noises and excused herself, wandering back to the mansion’s wide front window. She pulled back the curtain and stared out into the night, at the still-falling snow.
It wasn’t the hour she found exhausting but the people. As a daimon, an intermediary between heaven and earth, Aimee could feel humans’ needs and not just physical needs, but emotional and spiritual, too.
And the room behind her teemed with them. Needs buried so deeply beneath desires—for money, power, esteem—that Aimee was sadly confident she was the only being in the room who truly recognized them.
How did humans manage to concentrate so thoroughly on petty passing desires that they never fulfilled their true needs? How could someone confuse the need for love with the desire for power?
Aimee had never under stood humans, doubted she ever would. And that was why she couldn’t be a daimon any longer. Couldn’t risk losing another soul that was en trusted to her.
Instead, she would marry Ben, be a good human wife, working behind the scenes, using the human power he would bring her to help others, and she would block out the incessant calling of lost souls around her. She would not try to save them, not a one.
As if on cue, something glimmered from be yond the window. A shadow darker than the night surrounding it. So dark, so filled with sorrow, Aimee could feel it pulling at her, calling her.
Without thinking, she pressed her hand to the cold glass, leaned forward until her breath formed a circle of fog blocking her view.
“Do you see something?” Maureen’s voice cut through the haze that had en shrouded Aimee. She jumped as if struck, pulled her hand from the glass.
“No. Nothing.” Curling her fingers into her palm, she turned her back on the window, on the being that waited outside still calling…
THE NEXT EVENING, Aimee was back at work, her Cinderella night behind her. She ripped open a card board carton and began unloading books onto a rolling rack. It was after ten and her shift as a hospital aide had just started. She would work until six, checking in on patients who couldn’t sleep, read to them, chat, do whatever she could to take away their emotional pain.
She had taken this job a week after Kevin had killed himself. She couldn’t stand going back into the drug store where she’d worked for almost a year, made friends. The blood was gone, but the energy, the emotion left by his drastic act, hung like dark clouds under the fluorescent lights.
Besides, she’d only taken the job because she was his daimon. She’d known some event of significance in Kevin’s life would happen there—known she needed to be there as much as possible, too. And she’d been right, the most significant event in anyone’s life, their death, had struck there, but she had been of no help, not to Kevin.
A thick tome tumbled from her fingers onto the floor. The hard cover binding split on impact. She bent to retrieve it with shaking hands, then ran her index finger down the crack. Broken, like Kevin. But unlike the book, Kevin couldn’t be repaired, not anymore. At the morose thought, tears welled in her eyes.
Pressing her lips together, she shoved the book back into the box. Enough. She had to get herself together. She’d already faced that she was a failure as a daimon, couldn’t be en trusted with one being’s life. Instead she was going to forget what she was, had been, concentrate instead on doing the small good deeds she could handle, and once she and Ben were married, on using his family’s influence to do even more.
But she would not play guardian angel. She would not be arrogant enough to believe she had the power to save anyone.
“Aimee, you in there?” A knock sounded on the door, then the door edged open. “Did you find the new—” Erin Schelling, another aide, stood in the doorway, a small carton tucked under her arm. “You did. Good.” She held out the box.
With a smile, Aimee took it. “The MP3 players.” She quickly tore open the box and pulled out six brand-new players.
“I have to say having the future wife of a state legislator on staff has in creased the quality of our donations.” Erin crossed her arms over her chest and leaned against the door frame. “Although I doubt that’s all of it.”
Aimee frowned. “What do you mean?”
With a laugh, Erin plucked one of the players from Aimee’s fingers and pulled off its plastic covering. “I mean you. People have a hard time telling you no. They’d probably open the doors to Fort Knox if you asked nicely enough.”
“I don’t…” Aimee began.
Erin waved a hand. “As long as you’re on our side it’s all good in my book, girl friend.” She placed the player beside the others Aimee had stacked on the cart. “Might want to go by Mr. Belding’s room first. He was asking about you, and…” Her voice dropped. “I heard the doctor talking to his daughter in the hall. Doesn’t sound like he’ll be going home. They’re sending him to some nursing facility. They’re telling him tomorrow.”
Aimee stood. “But his dog. She’s all he talks about.”
“I know.” Erin dropped her gaze. “Listen, I gotta go. Just wanted to give you a heads-up.” She pursed her lips. “Go see him.”
When Erin was gone, Aimee finished loading
her cart and angled it out of the small room. For the millionth time, Aimee wished she had real powers, powers that would let her heal Mr. Belding, let him go home to his little one-bedroom house, his favorite chair and his dog. But all she could do was listen, hold his hand—just be with him.
It wasn’t enough.
“Aimee,” one of the nurses called. “There’s a guy looking for you. I sent him to the waiting area—but you know he really shouldn’t be up here this late. I’m not sure how he made it past the guards.”
With a nod, Aimee deserted her cart and hurried to the waiting room. When she and Ben had first started dating there had been a number of such incidents, but the guards had never let anyone past their station.
At the thresh old of the waiting area, she stopped. Standing with his back turned to her was a large man, over six feet tall with dark hair that skimmed broad shoulders. Kevin had worn his hair long, pulled back in a ponytail more often than not, but still the sight of a man with hair longer than the norm stopped her for a second.
As if feeling her gaze, the man turned.
It was then, when she could see his eyes, that she knew how he’d gotten past the guard.
Magnetism, hot and strong, like arms of molten metal wrapped around her, pulled at her.
She sucked in a breath, her eyes widened. Unable to move, she just stood there, struggled to conquer whatever had taken hold of her emotions. The man took a step forward, then faltered, too. His eyes flared.
Energy seemed to pulse between them.
Aimee lifted a hand—to protest…reach out to him…she didn’t know what, but with the gesture her daimon skills clicked in. Her eyes widened more. The magnetism was still there, wrapping around her, caressing her, warming her, but there was more—something she was sure he was incognizant of—a vortex of hurt and need that threatened to suck her off her feet, send her flying toward him.
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