"You— you want a friend? I can do that. I'll be your friend," she stammered.
Penny turned and swept an arm over the devastation in the bedroom. "This is what you chose."
"I didn't choose this!" Beth sobbed. "He tricked me. Got me drunk or something. I still don't feel right."
"You did," Penelope said. "You told me you were scared. You hated being left out and always different. You wanted to fit in. To be normal."
Beth's lips parted as her breath hissed through them. She had said those same words. She remembered it. She remembered sitting on top of one of the buildings in downtown Detroit talking to Penny. The wind and snow blew at them but they both ignored it
Beth jerked and focused on the beautiful vision of death in front of her. "Why haven't I been cold?"
Penny sighed. "First Kiss," she said.
Beth mouthed the words and then licked her lips. "That drink you gave me? Your blood?"
"A drop, nothing more," Penny said. "It opens you to me and grants you certain traits."
"Unless I drink too much? There was something about that, wasn't there?"
She nodded. "You can recover from each drink and live a normal life. The effects will fade. Until the third. After that your body craves it and you become my pet."
Beth gasped and remembered how everyone seemed to defer to her at the strip club. "The people at the club?"
She nodded. "You are perceptive. I own it, but none of them know it, they think I work there and the owner is a friend of mine."
Beth opened her mouth, anxious to learn and remember more. Anything she could do to prolong the conversation. Maybe she could talk Penny out of thinking she needed to die. Before she could come up with another question Penelope's head snapped around and she stared at the door. A heartbeat later Beth heard someone pounding on the door.
"Come with me, Beth," Penny said. "I must leave."
Beth focused on Penny and saw the woman staring at her again. "You're going to leave this, uh, mess?"
Penny turned and moved. Beth gasped as the woman blurred before her eyes. She was back almost before Beth finished breathing in her sudden intake of air. A light on the floor was smashed open and flames were rising from the spilled pool of fluid.
"Oh my god!"
"Last chance," Penny announced. "I offer you a bliss you will take into an eternal sleep. The alternative is here. Lying broken on this very bed until you are consumed by fire."
Beth whimpered and stared up into the impossibly blue eyes of the woman.
Penny held out her hand again. "Don't be afraid, you'll sleep peacefully. Forever."
Beth shook her head. "I don't want to go."
Penny frowned. Her tongue moved beneath her lips, licking her teeth. Teeth that Beth knew could be sharp enough to tear her life from her in seconds. "Very well."
"Wait!" Beth cried and held up her hands. "I mean I don't want to die. Here or there. Anywhere. Ever."
Penny's eyes narrowed. "You said—"
"I said I wanted to know what it was like to forget about monsters and be normal," Beth remembered. "Now I know what that's like. It sucks. I can't escape, I get it. I understand. I was wrong. If I want to make a life worth living I have to take risks. I have to go for it. I have to push to be what I want to be, not just like everyone else."
The flames spread and crackled behind them, catching on a rug and spreading to some dirty clothes knocked out of a laundry basket on the far side of the room. Penny ignored them and stared at her. "Tell me what you want."
"I want to be like you!" Beth cried.
"Are you afraid?"
"Fucking terrified!" Beth admitted. "I don't want to die."
"You have to."
"But…but you said you wanted a companion. Someone—"
"I died when I was a few years older than you," Penelope informed her. "I've been here ever since, unchanging. Until the world and everything on it ends."
"Oh my god," Beth whispered.
Penny ignored her and the repeated pounding on the door. Someone shouted Beth's name. "There's no escape that way. No escape at all."
Beth nodded. "I know."
"Are you ready?"
Beth gulped and nodded. She wasn't. There was a million questions she had to ask. People she wanted to talk to. Calls and texts she wanted to send. But the flames were spreading along the walls and the smoke was billowing out the open window. It was only a few feet away from Penny's feet. As she watched shapes emerged from behind Penelope, cloaking her in shadows and blocking the light from the fire.
"You've got wings!" Beth gasped. "What about your clothes?"
"I have none," Penny said.
She reached her hand out again. A third and final time, Beth knew. Just like the First Kiss drink that Penny had given her. Beth's hand trembled as she reached out and took Penny's black tipped fingers in hers.
Beth's yelp was breathless. She sensed movement and knew she was elsewhere, but everything moved in a blur around her. She felt wind and heard a rushing noise. She blinked her eyes opened and wondered when she'd shut them. She turned her head and stared through the blowing snow as a house grew smaller beneath them. The neighborhood and city followed, shrinking into the night as they flew across the night sky.
"Oh my god!" Beth cried, weightless and overcome by the sensation. "We're flying!"
Penny tightened her grip on Beth and brought them to a halt in mid-air amongst the upper reaches of the clouds. Her wings flapped, holding their station with only a little bobbing up and down. Beth turned to look at her and saw Penny's face shone with the light of the stars and moon. The vampires smiled and exposed sharp fangs in her mouth.
Beth clamped her gawking lips together and swallowed. "This is it?" she asked. She nodded, answering her own question. "Of course it is"
Beth tilted her head, exposing her neck. "This is the first kiss that matters," she said.
Penny's voice lisped around her fangs as she corrected her. "This is the forever kiss."
Beth's eyes widened and she gasped as two red hot needles drove into her neck.
###
Afterward by the Author
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About the Author
Dawn Michelle is a girl next door turned mother of two and household champion. After years of watching her husband write novel after novel and not trying to write the stories she was interested in she decided it was time she showed him how it was done.
If you enjoyed Dawn’s writing and would like to have a chance to find out more about her and her new releases, please sign up for her newsletter or hook up with her on Facebook. You can also reach out to her personally at [email protected].
Claimed by the Beast series:
Claimed by the Beast – Part One
Claimed by the Beast – Part Two
Claimed by the Beast - Part Three
Claimed by the Beast – Part Four
Claimed by the Beast – Part Five
Claimed by the Beast – Part Six
Blood Kissed series:
First Kiss (book 1)
Forever Kiss (coming soon)
Stand Alone Books:
Taken by the Beast
First Kiss Page 10