Angel's Guardian: A Contemporary Vampire Romance

by Zeecé Lugo

  Pretto considered his captive’s words. They made sense. He himself only had two people he trusted, and even they were not privy to all his affairs. He also had dozens of safe havens in case of need, and a few his own men did not know about.

  Discretion and care in whom to trust were key to survival. If Denisov was a smart man, and he had to be if he was rich and powerful, he would keep his eggs in different baskets.

  “Felix, get some paper and pen. Mr. Travers here has a list to give us. I want every apartment, house, building, warehouse, or property that Denisov owns or leases. Can you do that, Mr. Travers?”

  “Yes, ...I think... I can.”

  “You think?” Pretto nodded to Felix who flicked his lighter on.

  “Yesss... Yesss... I can,” Jonathan cried, fear and pain etched on his handsome face. In his mind, Max kept him company.

  You did well. You did well. Now, give him locations of my properties in New York only. They will show up in public records, which is the first place they’ll check. That will take a few hours to research, and at least a day to physically clear.

  What if they decide to kill me once they have their list? Jonathan asked.

  Pretto is a devious and cunning creature. He will not dispose of his only asset until he’s confident he has what he needs. Even then, he knows you’re valuable to me and may be used as leverage. Relax, we’ve bought us another day. Max was doing his best to reassure his friend.

  That’s easy for you to say. You’re not the one having the bottom of his feet roasted. I tell you, that Felix guy is salivating at the thought of my dick well done.

  ******

  “These are transactions that Travers and his office carried out in the last month,” explained a glowing Claus to his boss. He knew he had succeeded beyond expectation. “An expensive but well worth it hack into their data systems. This one here, especially, is very interesting. The purchase of a home in a small town in Northern California. It was expedited and paid for, not with investment funds but with personal funds.”

  “A hidey hole for our mouse, maybe?”

  “At the same time, a personal account was opened and funded also from the personal account of Denisov. Two hundred thousand dollars transferred to the newly opened account of one Lina Pavel Denisov. Not a hidey hole. A complete new identity. We would have never found her.”

  “You have done excellently, Claus, and without any of the nasty stuff and its risks. It is a wonder what this technology can do.”

  “Our guest very conveniently failed to mention that location,” said a sullen Felix.

  “Yes, my friend. But do not fret. He may yet tell us a great deal about it, being that he did all the transactions. We will wake Mr. Travers this evening and spend some quality time with him. Meanwhile, Claus, call our west coast people and dispatch a team to this quaint, little town. I want my property and her brats in custody now!”

  CHAPTER 28

  Her neighbors stood at the door, apologetic looks on their faces. They were the perfect image of the quintessential senior citizens, brittle and fragile.

  “We are really embarrassed to have to ask you this. You just barely moved in, and already we come to beg a favor.” The old woman was sweet and anxious. Her hair was totally white, cut short, curled in that old-fashioned way that old ladies seem to favor. Her small hands gestured in front of her like fluttery butterflies.

  Behind her, the husband hovered, obviously also in distress. He was short, pudgy, his bold pate and pale blue eyes giving him the look of a cherub. He felt the need to intercede.

  “Our granddaughter just went into early labor; she was not due for three weeks. The Martins, our neighbors on the other side, agreed to keep Charlie for us when the time came, but they’re out of town and won’t return for two more days.”

  Angel smiled kindly. “It will be no problem. Charlie seems to have taken to Nina very well, and we do have a large, empty dog house. Besides, neighbors should help each other.” She was actually happy for the chance to interact and to make friends, to live the typical suburban life.

  “Thank you,” answered the old woman, obviously pleased. “If you ever need us to babysit, we’ll be more than happy to do so. My Marty loves children.”

  “We’ll just pop over the house and pick up Charlie’s food and things. As soon as the baby is born and everything is settled, we’ll come pick him up. It will be no more than two or three days,” said Marty. He’s a good guard dog.”

  The couple brought back all the dog’s things, and hurriedly left for the hospital. Angel watched as Nina played with the dog, totally enraptured. There was no way around it. They would have to get a dog after this. Her daughter would insist, Angel was sure.

  The young mother went to the playpen and picked up little Marco. She took the baby where the girl sat on the couch with the Golden Retriever at her side, his head on her lap as she petted him.

  “Let’s see how well he does with the baby. I want to feel comfortable that little Marco is safe around him.” Without pause, the beautiful dog lifted his head and began sniffing the baby. Little Marco wiggled and reached out to grab one of the dog’s ears. Angel tensed, ready to pull the baby away, but Charlie was well-natured and eager to interact with the baby. When Angel was satisfied that the dog and the baby had accepted each other, she took little Marco back to his pen, and got busy in the kitchen, but her thoughts returned to her vampire.

  She missed him so much. She wondered how he was faring all alone. Would he keep shaving and grooming his hair? Would he watch TV in the couch, or would he revert to his old, hermit ways and keep to his bedroom? Was he thinking about her, or was he glad to be rid of her and not giving her a second thought?

  She went to the drawer in the kitchen counter where she kept the cell phone he gave her before she left. It was an unregistered prepaid phone no one could trace back to her. It was for special emergencies. It had one number stored: Max’s private number. Angel fingered the small phone, her hands itching to dial the number and hear his voice.

  It took all her strength not to dial. She had pride. It was the man who should chase the woman. She needed him to call, to show that he needed her, that he could not be without her. She dropped the phone back in the drawer and snapped the drawer shut. She wiped the tears that trailed down her face, and began planning lunch.

  ******

  He strained at the ropes dangling him from the ceiling. He felt groggy, finding it hard to surface from the drug-induced sleep. The sharp, stinging bite of a whip to his back sent shards of heated pain through his system and jolted him back to reality. He shook his head and sent his body on a spin that added dizziness and nausea to the onslaught of pain waves reverberating through his body.

  “Mr. Travers. Mr. Travers,” a loud voice insisted. Hard fingers pressed into the fleshy part of his thigh. “It is time to wake up and play our game again.”

  Jonathan lifted his head a few inches with effort and looked down at an immaculately dressed Pretto wearing a pinstripe charcoal suit with black silver tie on a black shirt. “You lied to me, Mr. Travers. You broke our deal.”

  Oh, Jesus. Max, Max, I’m in trouble!

  What’s wrong? came the answer instantly.

  They have me hanging again. Pretto is here. He says I lied.

  A whip lashed with incredible force and wrapped itself around Jonathan’s torso, the tip striking his right nipple, breaking skin. Jonathan screamed and then took long gulps of air as the burning pain engulfed him. A dozen times the cruel lashings came, as he twisted and screamed in agony and then sobbed like a baby.

  “Now, Mr. Travers, you’re out of time. One question, and a count of five for your answer. If at the count of five, you have not started to answer, Felix will start again. Do you understand?”

  “Yes, yes, I do,” squealed the man whose body was now a patchwork of purple bruises, crusty scabs, and now, raw, open angry welts.

  “Well, then. Let’s start. A few weeks ago, your firm bought a property in nor
thern California and paid for it with funds from Denisov’s personal accounts. In addition, two hundred thousand dollars were deposited into an account under the name of Lina Pavel Denisov. Who is this woman?”

  “I don’t know. Maxim is private about his women.”

  Pretto gave a slight signal and the whip cut through the air with a sharp snap. Jonathan screamed and shook for long minutes, his screams interrupted only by the short, staccato bursts of the whip as it flew over and over. Maaax! I won’t make it. I can’t. I’m on fire. I’m not strong enough. And they know about the house and the Lina account. In his mind, Max went silent, probably in terror for Angel and the kids. Oh, God, I’m alone. I will die here.

  “Wrong answer, Mr. Travers. We now know more about you. You’re not the hands-off, play-it-legal kind of lawyer. No, you deal in secrets, power plays, brokering private transactions, expensive discreet solutions. You know more about Denisov than anyone else alive. Who is Lina Denisov?”

  “His sister,... a new arrival... from eastern Europe,” he spit out through teeth clenched tight against the fiery pain covering his body. Even his eyes burned as his salty sweat ran into them.

  “Another lie, Mr. Travers. Claus here did his work. While her passport does show her having entered recently, there is no trace of her entry anywhere. She did not fly in, nor did she arrive on any ship.”

  Once again, the whip cut the air, wrapping itself around the lower body, the tip flicking against the penis, leaving a red, bloody welt across it. A high-pitch sound, like one made by a pig being dragged to the knife, came from Jonathan, and he struggled to pull his knees up to protect his vulnerable manhood, but his strength failed him, and the only thing he succeeded in doing was the further strangling of his hands which he could no longer feel.

  Jonathan writhed in agony, his body going into uncontrollable spasms much like an epileptic seizure. Claus pulled over a stool next to the hanging prisoner, and with a cold bottle of water, poured some into the man’s mouth and then allowed the rest to drip over the man’s tortured body. He stepped down and took the stool away.

  “Mr. Travers, are Lina Denisov and Angelica Ferrars the same woman?”

  Jonathan was beaten. “Yesss,” he spit out between sobs.”

  “Is she at the California house already?”

  “Yesss.”

  “Good. The men I have on the way will not be making a wasted trip. Now, Mr. Travers, you should not feel bad. You only confirmed what we already knew.”

  CHAPTER 29

  They boarded the yacht in stealth, incredibly fast, climbing over the grappled ropes with almost acrobatic agility. The last man up, Armand, was helped over the railing by Max. After giving Armand a meaningful pat on the shoulder, Max discreetly fell back, allowing Devian and his men to take front stage.

  He pulled close to the sheltering wall and followed Armand. As soon as Devian and his men silently spread out, Armand quietly moved to the door that led to the lower deck. He opened it, stepped in, and turned to face Max with a smile. “Please, come in, Sir,” he whispered.

  Max smiled widely and stepped in like a hot knife slicing through butter. Where there had been an impenetrable force field before, now there was only empty air. “Find a nice, deep shadow to hide in. I will call you when I need you.”

  “Yes, Sir. A hero, I’m not.”

  Max looked down the stairs. He reached and turned off the stairway lights. He had perfect night vision, and lighting would only help his enemy. With supernatural speed, he dashed down and quickly turned the landing lights off too.

  He was now on a middle landing, a corridor led to his right to what was usually crew quarters. The one to the left was possibly extra cabins and utility rooms. He chose the left, betting that the torture room would be as far away from listening ears as possible.

  He listened at the first cabin. Nothing there. He kept turning lights off as he went, and listening at every door. Nothing. There was only one door left. He noticed a thin line of light seeping from underneath the door. He came in slowly and placed his ear to the door...

  “Yes, they are,” Jonathan said between choked sobs.”

  “Is she at the California house already?”

  “Yesss.”

  “Good. The men I have on the way will not be making a wasted trip. Now, Mr. Travers, you should not feel bad. You only confirmed what we already knew.”

  Fury suffused Max’s mind. Men on their way to hurt his woman, his babies, and he was 3,000 miles away! The door exploded in shards as the mad vampire came through it. The only thing the brothers Felix and Claus saw before their necks were snapped was a flash of movement, a flicking shadow and nothing else.

  Then, he stood silent and burning with hatred before Pretto. “Do you know who I am? Do you know what I am?”

  “How? How’d you move so fast? How’d you get in here? Who are you?” Pretto looked at his men, lying on the floor, necks bent unnaturally, eyes open but empty. His thoughts raced, looking for a solution to a situation he could never conceive.

  “I’m Maxim Denisov. Did you not want to see me? Did you not call to me?”

  Max allowed his fangs to lengthen, his eyes to glow red, and saliva to glisten on his lips. He tilted his head and hissed like a feral cat in that terrifying way that screamed “unnatural.”

  For the first time, fear showed in Pretto’s eyes. “What the fuck?” he spit out, jumping back, but the vampire was not having it. Reaching for Pretto’s arms, he held them in his iron hold.

  “You should have asked that first, before you decided to come within my reach, trying to take back what was never yours. Max struck fast and hard, drinking deeply and savagely, tearing flesh and bone and slurping noisily in a show of furious savagery. When he’d had his fill, he took his blade and cut the man’s throat swiftly and deeply. Max was not one to waste time, and neither was he a lover of torture.

  Getting Jonathan down was truly a heart-rending labor. Poor Jonathan was not built for torture. It was a miracle he had survived. As soon as Jonathan was down, and Armand had him, Max zipped up to the deck and pulled out his cell. He was desperate with fear, and he was all thumbs with it.

  ******

  Angel had been feeling on edge for a while. It was the dog. It had begun barking about fifteen minutes earlier and looking out the window expectantly. No matter what she did to settle him, he kept running back to the window, and her brand new curtains were getting abused. The baby was now awake due to the dog’s barking.

  “Here, Nina, hold the baby and give him his bottle. I need to see what Charlie is barking about.”

  Strange, thought Angel as she pulled the curtains to the side and scanned the usually quiet and empty street. No one parked along the street, normally. The houses all had driveways and garages. On such a grey, cold, and miserable day, everyone parked as close to the entry as possible.

  But now, there was a black SUV with dark tinted windows parked up the street, and it was one she’d not seen before. Obviously, one Charlie had never seen before, and that was why he was barking.

  Angel was not clairvoyant by any means, but she had a highly refined sense of preservation honed by the years of running with her husband. He taught her never to dismiss her sense of danger, and now she felt strongly that something was wrong.

  She went over to the hallway closet and pulled out Nina’s Jacket. “Nina, put the baby down, and put on your jacket.”

  “Are we going somewhere?”

  “Do as I say, now!”

  Nina’s danger alarms went off. In her very young life, her mother had only taken that tone when bad guys came. Without another word, she placed the baby back on the playpen and took the jacket. Angel took a quilt from the playpen and wrapped little Marco tightly. Nina finished putting on her jacket, then her mother handed the baby back to her.

  Angel went back to the closet and pulled out the spare baby bag she kept stocked in case they had to run. She took it to the kitchen and placed a few more things in it. She was about t
o run upstairs, when she heard the ringing. At first, it did not register in her mind. It took a moment to realize that what was ringing was the emergency phone in the drawer. Angel ran to pick it up.

  “Hello!”

  “Angel, love, get out of the house and run. Go to a neighbor, the nearest police station, a public place with lots of people. Don’t lose the phone. I will come for you, I promise.”

  “Max, I think it’s too late. They’re here. There’s a black SUV with tinted windows parked a block away; one I’ve never seen before.”

  “Call 911 and tell them someone is trying to break in. Do it now.”

  ‘Max, they’ll come in and shoot us before the cops get here. Besides, I don’t trust the police. Never have. I’ll call you when we’re safe. I have to go.”

  Angel placed the phone in her back pocket and ran to the living room.

  “Give me the baby and take the bag. Come, quickly, and bring Charlie.” She went out the back kitchen door into the misty and damp back yard. Gratefully, most of the back yard was not visible from the street front. She went to the dog house.

  “Get inside, baby. Get deep to the back.” Nina looked uncertain, but did as she was told. Angel then handed her the baby. “Give him the bottle. He’ll fall asleep once he’s done, as always. Put the bag to the back, tucked in. Now, call Charlie and keep him in front of you. I will put his water and food out here. If he barks and gets out or you hear voices, you stay in, deep and quiet. You don’t come out until I come back or Max finds you. You understand?”

  “Yes, like the other time Max found us.” Nina focused serious, worried eyes on her mom, the memory of that night still haunting her little heart.