Bloodstorm (Heart of a Vampire)

by Amber Kallyn

  “My brother is here to apologize.” She gave Shane a sharp glance. “Aren’t you?”

  “Yes.” He rubbed his hands together, staring from his sister to the werewolf on the couch. “I will no longer deny what the two of you have together. I cannot.”

  Glory patted his cheek. “I love you, brother. Though I would have never wished such a tumultuous relationship as with the Arcaine on you, I’m happy you can finally see how I love this man.”

  Though misgivings for their relationship roiled in his soul, Shane knew his feelings for Niki were pure. He didn’t care she was vampire. Niki was his fate. And he wasn’t about to fight fate. It had given him the only woman on this earth who was perfect for him. Now he just had to convince her of that.

  Shane stood straighter, glaring at Blake, daring him to do anything that would hurt Glory. He kissed his sister and left her home, his thoughts consumed by the woman he was going to make his.

  ***

  Niki slipped out of Shane’s grandmother’s house without running into anyone. She headed through the forest and toward town. Outside Shane’s home, Niki used the protective cover of the trees to sit and watch.

  After thirty minutes or so, she felt certain no one was home. Inside, Niki headed upstairs to the guest room to grab her things. She walked in and jerked to a stop.

  Jordan MacDougal sat in the rocking chair in the far corner, still and silent as a hunting cat. “Took you long enough. You should have needed only seconds to verify Shane wasn’t home.”

  Niki shrugged. So what if it had? She’d wanted to be very, very sure.

  Jordan rocked the chair, staring at her with a watchful gaze. “Skipping out of town are you?”

  “I’ve done what I came to do. Besides, you told me I only had a week. I’m over that.” Inside, she shivered at what he could do to her, but somehow, she was sure he wasn’t here as King or a Master.

  With that thought, Niki headed to the bed and shoved the stray items in one of the suitcases. “How’s Robby?”

  Jordan stopped rocking. “The boy is fine. Learning and growing used to his new life. Do you wish to take him with you?”

  She stilled. “I told you before, it will be his choice.”

  “And if I tell you he wants to stay with me?”

  Niki met his gaze, assessing him silently for long moments. “If I asked to hear it from him, would you let me?”

  His eyes shone with amusement at her pushing. “Of course.”

  “I’ll take your word.”

  “How kind.”

  “It’s not kindness. I think you’re honorable.”

  Jordan dipped his head. “That pleases me, and is, I believe, a rare thing on your part.”

  She shrugged again, not quite sure what to say to him.

  “You know, you are welcome to stay.”

  Her eyes widened and she gaped at him.

  Jordan nodded. “Shane is my friend. I see how the two of you feel about each other. If you wish, I would offer you independence from the clan, yet the protection of our territory.”

  Which, if she wasn’t imagining his words, meant she would be welcome, yet unbound by politics. Still, in a way, she would be clan. He was offering her a home without strings.

  Her heart thudded and she wiped her hands on her pants. For one precious moment, hope bloomed. But it faded as she came to her senses. She bowed her head to the King. “I thank you for your offer, but must decline.”

  “Why?”

  “You offer me this because of Shane.” She sighed. “But there is nothing for the two of us.”

  Jordan winked. “There you are wrong. My offer stands, whenever you want it.”

  She blinked and he’d disappeared. Damn vampire.

  Shane’s truck rumbled up the drive and Niki stuffed the rest of her things into a suitcase, zipped it up, and fled down the stairs.

  ***

  Shane felt Niki’s presence and thanked the gods she was still there. He hurried around the house and to the back door, just as she slunk out onto the porch. He cleared his throat, wondering if she could hear his thundering heartbeat.

  She jumped with a squeak, spinning to face him. Clutching her suitcases, her wide gaze raked over him.

  “No goodbye?” he asked.

  She fidgeted. “Thomas is dead.”

  “Yes.”

  She looked around, at anything but him. “How’s your deputy?”

  Shane’s gut churned at the thought of Chase. “He turned. Jordan is helping him now.”

  “I’m sorry,” she whispered.

  “Not your fault.”

  “Still...”

  Silence filled the air, making it thick. It was all Shane could do to keep from grabbing her and taking her back into the house, making love until she was weak, then tying her up until he could convince her to stay.

  “So.” He cleared his throat. “Where do you plan on going?”

  She blinked. “I’m not sure.” Her grip tightened on her suitcase. “I owe you thanks. I don’t have to worry about the Council coming after me now.”

  He pushed past the painful lump in his throat. “You don’t owe me anything.”

  She nodded. “Well...”

  He bit out a curse, ripping the suitcases from her hands and throwing them to the ground. Drawing her into his arms, Shane devoured her mouth. He wanted her, needed her with his very soul, and he was damn well not going to pussyfoot around any longer.

  ***

  His heat, his passion, surrounded Niki. It was insistent, filling her heart. Shane broke off the kiss and stepped back, breathing heavily. “You push the limits of my control.”

  She didn’t understand why he’d kissed her. A good-bye maybe? His words echoed in her mind, Shane telling his sister to never trust an Arcaine. “I-I’ve got to go.” She reached for her suitcases again, frightened to her very core.

  Shane grabbed her hands and rested them on his chest, over his heart. “Stay.”

  She avoided his gaze. “Look. What you said to your sister earlier--”

  “Was bullshit. I’ve spoken with Glory and let her know how wrong I’ve been. How stubbornly blind.”

  Her knees weakened and she nearly fell. His heartbeat pulsed beneath her palms, racing as fast as her own. “N-no. You were right. We have no business together.” She took a shaky breath. “It wouldn’t work out anyway.”

  “Why?” he asked softly, leaned closer until she had to stare into his glowing golden eyes.

  “Because you’re a Keeper and I’m a vampire.” And a coward, she thought. Then added, “I have nothing inside me to give.”

  He stared at her. “I don’t care about the first. And, Lady, you have everything to give me. I want it all--your heart, your love. The Fates have spoken--”

  “The Fates,” she cried, struggling against his hold. “They are nothing to me and they can be damned. If the Fates had any care, my family would not have been slaughtered in the first place.” And she would have never fallen in love with a man she couldn’t have.

  Shane pulled her to his chest, wrapping his strong, comforting arms around her shaking form. “Life happens, Darling.”

  “The Fates exist or they don’t. What have they ever done for me that I should be ordered about by them?”

  “If you had not been turned, I wouldn’t know you.” Shane leaned back, tilted her chin up. “The Fates may have started this thing between us, but it is up to you and me to embrace it, to help it grow.”

  She sagged against him for the shortest second, then pushed away. “I can’t,” was her whispered reply. Could she? Did he really want her?

  “Who said I would give you any other choice?”

  She looked away from him.

  “Do you care for me?”

  It took every ounce of courage she possessed, but she answered truthfully. “Yes.”

  “Then stay. Let us see what we have together. I swear to you, even if you run, I will hunt you down until you agree.”

  She glanced shar
ply at his smiling face. “You don’t know what you’re asking. I’ve spent two hundred years on the move, never settling down, never letting anyone close. It works for me.”

  “It worked for you then. Now, let me show you a different way of life.”

  “But--”

  He brushed his lips over hers and she sighed as his warmth invaded her, refusing to give up.

  “Stay with me. Give us a chance. You should know by now I can track you no matter where you go. I swear, I will make up for the hurt my stupid words caused.” He took a deep breath. “I will never love anyone as much as you make me feel. I need you.”

  Her last bit of resistance melted, leaving her feeling lighter than she could ever remember. She felt too safe, so right with this man. Almost, as if she had found a home once more.

  “Then maybe I should save you the trouble of tracking me down.”

  “Maybe,” he replied with the grin she found so irresistible. He drew her closer.

  Niki only hesitated for a moment before reaching up to meet his kiss. She didn’t know what the Fates had in store for them, or even if she truly believed they existed. But perhaps, hope wasn’t pointless after all.

  Scroll down for a preview of Hungerstorm, Heart of a Vampire Book 2

  Coming Summer of 2012

  Thank you for reading. I hope you enjoyed your time with Niki and Shane as much as I did. If you liked this book, would you please go to Amazon and leave a review for me? Reviews are what helps authors sell more books, which in turn means I get to keep writing more for you.

  Also, I’d love to hear from you. You can find me at the following:

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  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  One of those rare breeds, Amber Kallyn is an Arizona native who can trace her family's history through six generations in the state. She lives with her husband, and their four very active children. Included in the menagerie are two cats (though there's always room for more) and two dogs. We won't count all the fish. She also writes urban fantasy.

  Amber loves the paranormal, from dragons to werewolves to vampires. She's currently at work on her next book, probably running around the house acting out a fight scene with her collection of swords and daggers. Or maybe, wishing she had claws to practice the other fight scenes.

  A voracious lover of the written word, Amber found at an early age that she could read fast. Really fast. She devours novels by the day, novellas by the hour, and is always looking to get her hands on more.

  Website: www.AmberKallyn.com

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  Hungerstorm

  Heart of a Vampire, Book 2

  Coming Summer 2012

  Chapter One

  The woman chained to the steel frame bed hadn’t stirred in days. Soon, she’d wake.

  Jordan MacDougal sat in the inky blackness of the basement, waiting. The dark room didn’t bother him. He could see as well at night as any mortal could in the sun.

  He spun a wooden match between his fingers, turning it around and around, unable to tear his gaze from the bed. After three days, he still couldn’t figure out what exactly it was about Dalia Jensen that had captured his attention in the first place.

  He should have let her die.

  In the millennia he’d been a vampire, he’d only turned a handful of people. He regretted each and every one. Yet watching this woman wasting away in the overlarge hospital bed, knowing she’d been put there by a vampire the epitome of evil, Jordan hadn’t been able to stop.

  She was so young. Only twenty-one according to her driver’s license tucked in his back pocket. And even in a coma-like state, her vibrancy drew him.

  He forced himself to stand and stretch, to glance from the woman. His hands fisted and the match stick cracked. Sighing, he dropped the two pieces next to the candle on the table.

  Yet, like a magnet, he couldn’t stop from looking over the woman once more.

  Her white-blonde hair was short, curling to just below her pixie chin. Amazing to one as old as he, large stripes of it were bright pink.

  In his time, women hadn’t painted their faces with make-up, or dyed their hair unnatural colors.

  It was sometimes disconcerting to be faced with how much things changed over time.

  The woman lay beneath a thick quilt hiding the curves of her body. Though the dungeon rooms were kept warm, the newly turned needed the extra heat until they learned control.

  Screams of an old friend who’d been recently turned echoed through the walls, piercing the soundproofing. Jordan ran his hands through his hair, frustration snaking through him. Chase had been turned by the same vampire responsible for Dalia’s near death.

  And like all newly turned, Chase was crazed with his bloodlust, even three weeks after his awakening.

  Staring at Dalia’s face, he memorized the lines and curves. She would wake soon, only to face a huge change. Hunger would turn her, like Chase, into a ravenous creature needing to kill, to drink. His powerful blood would hopefully help the new vampire calm. And his duty every night was to be here, to feed her and try breaking through to the remnants of her humanity.

  If she survived the final change.

  Yet, once she became lucid, they’d have ‘the talk’, one of the duties being clan King he despised.

  Horror and disappointment would fill her eyes as he explained what she was--and how her old life was forever lost.

  This time, he’d have to add how it was his fault.

  A knock pounded on the cell’s thick metal door.

  Jordan strode across the room and slipped into the hall. It took a moment for his eyes to adjust from pitch black to bright light. He looked into a feminine version of his own face.

  “Fionah? I’m busy,” he said cautiously, unable to read which mood she was in this time.

  His little sister grinned. “Aye, brothair. When are you not?” She swept her long, silk skirts back and headed for the door at his back.

  He held his arm out, blocking her. “What do you want?”

  Fionah raised one blonde eyebrow, her eyes widening. She giggled and Jordan realized she was a child today, rather than a thousand-year-old vampire.

  “To see your new pet,” she replied with a smile.

  He sighed. “You know well she’s not a pet.”

  “What else then?” She twirled her skirts around her ankles. “You’ve not turned a human in hundreds of years. Why now?”

  If he had an answer, he might have spoken. Instead, he merely crossed his arms over his chest and stared at his sister.

  At the other end of the hall, one of Jordan’s Viking guards rushed down the steps and hurried toward him. Eric stopped abruptly when he caught sight of Fionah.

  Jordan’s guards never knew what to make of his sister, either. She could switch from child-like to screaming fury in a blink, even without cause. Her mind was a strange thing, had been since they were children growing up on clan lands in Scotland. A thousand years had only made her a little more touched in the head.

  A whisper of movement came from the room at his back. He scowled, the urge to rejoin Dalia pressing. “It there a party going on down here I wasn’t informed of?”

  Eric turned from Fionah and met his gaze, eyes usually full of laughter instead worried. “Luci is missing.”

  Jordan straightened as heat fired his veins. Not again. “Where?”

  “She was making the blood run to the hospital.”

  Jordan barely refrained from slamming his fist into the stone wall. Who in the hell was still taking his people? He’d thought the problem solved when the rogue vampire responsible for Dalia’s condition had been killed.

  “Did Luci make it to the hospital?”

  Eric shook his head.

&nbs
p; Fionah stepped forward, brushing long blonde curls over her shoulder. Her eyes held more intelligence and her child-like grin was gone. “How do you know?”

  Eric shot her a glare. “’Tis my duty.”

  Jordan rubbed the hilt of the dagger at his belt. “Get some men together. We’ll--”

  The sound of stirring inside the cell stopped him. He glanced from Eric to the door, torn. He couldn’t leave Dalia, not during her wakening.

  Eric’s eyes flashed. “I’ll get a group together. We’ll find Luci.”

  Jordan nodded. “Report to me on your return.”

  Eric glanced at Fionah before headed down the hall to the stairs.

  She stared at Jordan, her blue eyes flushing with red. Waving at the door, she demanded, “You put that woman before the clan?”

  “I turned her. It is my duty to help her tonight.”

  “Why?” She shook her head. “What’s so special about this girl?”

  “I don’t know.”

  Fionah studied him, then shrugged and glided down the long hall. Jordan sighed, relieved she hadn’t continued her questions. He didn’t have any answers.

  He slipped back inside the room. The woman was barely stirring, but it wouldn’t be long now.

  ***

  She woke with a start. Agony seared through her, nearly bringing a scream to her throat. Her heart beat a deafening rhythm and her stomach clenched in fiery hunger. She jerked up, staring into the darkness, her thoughts scattered like petals on the wind.