Ever After Series: Paranormal Romance Box Set (Steamy Vampire Romance)

by A. C. James

  He ran a hand through his hair and tossed my sweater at me. “Get dressed.”

  A vampire with baggage. Just what I need.

  I pulled my clothes on and grabbed my army satchel. He waited in the hallway, and without saying a word, he walked toward the elevator while I followed his footsteps.

  Neither of us spoke a word all the way back to the loft but every once in a while he looked at me as if he wanted to say something and I knew he was probably thinking about her. I curled into the leather sofa in his living room and winced. Arie arched his eyebrows outwards and his mouth drooped into a frown. I crossed my arms in frustration.

  “You’ll feel better if you take a bath,” he said.

  Without a word, I walked upstairs and retreated to the bathroom. I peeled off my clothes and kicked my underwear across the tile. Unclasping my locket, I tossed it on the counter by the sink. I filled the tub and submerged myself in the sanctuary of its warmth.

  Sinking beneath the water to wet my head, my hair fanned out around me like a forest of kelp. I washed my hair and rinsed it with the handheld shower fixture. Using a washcloth, I lathered suds across my body and submerged up to my neck to rinse the soap away. Water splashed over the edge of the tub as I jumped at the sharp knock on the door.

  “Holly?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Dinner’s almost ready.”

  “Okay, be down in a sec.”

  I hopped out of the tub, towel-drying my hair, and threw on a t-shirt and a pair of sweats. I slid onto a bar stool and he poured me a glass of wine. “Do you feel better?”

  “I feel fine.” I took a sip of my wine. “I’m not this fragile thing that’s going to have a mental breakdown.” Like your ex. “I’m sorry that I remind you of the past…”

  The corners of his mouth lowered. “I’m sorry too.”

  In that moment, Arie looked as vulnerable and hurt as I felt. “It’s hard for me. There hasn’t been anyone in my life since…I couldn’t do anything to change what happened then, and I don’t want to hurt you now.”

  “Then don’t. You’re hurting me every time you pull away. Please don’t shut me out.”

  “Holly, I can’t give you what you want.”

  “And what is it that you think I want?”

  He looked hurt, and a little tired. He didn’t answer as he placed a steak and a side of green beans in front of me. Arie turned to grab a bowl filled with salad and slammed it onto the counter by my plate. Rolling my eyes, I grabbed my fork and knife, cutting a piece of steak. I forked a bite as Arie’s cell phone rang and he pulled it from his pocket. He walked across the living room toward the wall of glass before speaking.

  “Hello?”

  I listened while he spoke to someone in hushed tones.

  “No, I didn’t see it.”

  “I’ll check it. How bad is it?”

  He looked at me before walking toward the coffee table where a pile of books and his laptop resided. And he looked even paler than usual—if that were even possible.

  “I understand.”

  “Well perhaps she will come to us. She seems to be interested in–” he said.

  A momentary pause while the person on the other end spoke but I couldn’t hear them.

  “I have her staying with me at the loft.”

  “No, you will not use Holly as bait!”

  “Just wait. Let me handle this.”

  “Agreed.”

  I had stopped eating to listen to his side of the phone conversation. He turned to me, ending the call, and I blanched at the expression on his face. Somehow I knew it was vitally important that I hear this. I only wished I could have heard the whole conversation.

  Without saying a word to me, he sat on the sofa and flipped open the laptop. I stood and walked to stand next to him, looking over his shoulder at the screen.

  “What is it?”

  “Katarina. Apparently, she made headlines on some tabloid website.”

  Shit. This is bad.

  Waiting beside him in silence, I watched him surf to the tabloid’s website. The headline of the first featured story read: A Vampire is Loose in Chicago Suburbs – Lock Your Doors. My jaw hit the floor and Arie clicked on an image of a man in a heavy coat holding a bicycle while talking to a reporter. A page containing the story along with a video popped up.

  This is so bad.

  I bit my lip, leaning forward to watch the streaming video. The story gave me chills.

  “I’m reporting to you live from La Grange with an eyewitness to this bizarre breaking story. This is Troy Anderson, a local resident and longtime neighbor of Peggy Johnson, recent victim to this vicious attack. What can you tell us, Troy?”

  “I live next door.” The man in the video pointed to the houses behind them. “And when I rode my bike home I saw an ambulance and two cop cars pulled up in front of her house. I saw them bring her out on a stretcher with her neck wrapped but I’ve never seen so much blood…”

  “And why exactly do you think this is a vampire attack?”

  “I’m not sure that I do. She’s always been a little high-strung. Peggy, I mean, but she’s good people. She would do anything for anybody. I overheard those cops talking…” The man trailed off, looking down at his feet.

  “Can you tell us what they said?”

  “They were saying she had puncture wounds in her neck and that maybe some animal mauled her.”

  “The victim remains in the intensive care unit at Adventist La Grange Memorial Hospital in critical condition. Thank you Troy.”

  The man with the bicycle retreated into the background toward his house.

  “Well folks, there you have it. A vampire or an animal is on the loose here in La Grange,” said the reporter, finishing the report in a chipper voice.

  Arie closed the laptop.

  “Do you think anyone will take that seriously?” I asked.

  Arie turned to regard me, his face solemn. “It’s a tabloid, but it still doesn’t bode well. You need to call your boss and take some time off.”

  I shook my head. “I can’t lose my job, and since you’re so dead-set against me working for Tessa, it leaves me little choice.”

  “It’s fine. I’ll dazzle your boss and tell him that it’s in his best interest to keep you.”

  I nodded. I didn’t have the energy to argue with him about how I thought dazzling people was unethical.

  “I don’t want you going anywhere without me or Victoria,” he said.

  I swallowed the protests threatening to surface when I saw the grave look in his eyes, which were the color of a winter sky. “I won’t.” Unless I have to.

  Chapter 12

  I grabbed a rag to wipe muffin crumbs from the Formica countertop. Sun began to filter through the clouds. It had rained on and off all day yesterday, through the night and most of the morning. I looked out the window. It appeared to be letting up. A sigh escaped my lips as I collected the fifty-cent tip some penny-pinching customer left me. Only one customer sat in a booth, reading a magazine. The morning had been busy, but on a slow afternoon like this, it left my mind to free to think about Arie, Tessa, the Hellfire Club, and the threat that Katarina posed.

  Victoria had stopped in while I was working to make sure I was okay. The silver-haired moon faerie that waited on us at the club came with her. She hung on every word Victoria said as if she was the one who hung the moon. Although, technically I wasn’t sure if that’s what Luna did or what that would entail. Shit, I was just getting used to the idea of vampires. I didn’t want to even attempt figuring out the whole faerie bit. But either way she seemed to have the serious hots for Victoria. Not that Victoria seemed to notice whatsoever. I guess relationships were no less complicated when you had supernatural powers.

  I sighed.

  Trina walked in carrying her purse and wearing an easy-going smile. She could always find something to be happy about. I wished I had half of her enthusiasm and optimism. I had a bad habit of waiting for the bottom to drop
out, because in my experience it usually did. Looking around the coffee shop, she set her purse under the counter and greeted me with a warm smile.

  “Hey…looks like a slow one today, huh?”

  “Yeah, only a few customers this afternoon. Are you feeling better? You’ve been out all week.”

  “Ugh. Don’t remind me. I hate being sick.”

  I knew it must have been bad to put Trina out of commission. She never called off. It felt like a lifetime had passed since the last time I’d seen her. So much had happened.

  “So what’s new with you?” she asked.

  “I went on a date,” I said blandly. With a vampire.

  “So how did it go?” She looked at me with a smile, awaiting juicy details, and I couldn’t blame her. It wasn’t often I went out on dates.

  “He’s…well…it was good.”

  I could feel myself blushing.

  “What happened?”

  “Well I’m fairly certain he’s hung up on his past but he’s not like anyone I’ve ever met.” I didn’t bother adding that my life could be in danger. How could I even begin to explain that to Trina?

  “Who’s the guy? Anyone I know? No, wait, let me guess. It’s the good tipper, the handsome one who wears a leather jacket.”

  I smiled. “Yeah, that’s the one.”

  “Oh, he’s a hottie. What was your date like?”

  “Well don’t get ahead of yourself. I’m not the type he’s into.” He likes women in leather who like to flog the living daylights out of you. Of course, I had no idea if he was really into Tessa. I was probably just feeling insecure because Tessa was like walking sex and Arie was probably used to the beautiful women at the club. Not that I was bad-looking. I just didn’t wear skin tight leather that showed every curve.

  She shook her head. “I think he’s got it bad for you. He wouldn’t be in here so often if he didn’t.”

  I smiled. “He did take me to an amazing restaurant.”

  “Did you take him home?”

  I rolled my eyes. I knew what she really meant was whether or not I fucked him. I could hardly admit to her that I was staying at his loft. She’d think it was nuts. Hell, I thought it was nuts. “You could say that.”

  “Well, he kissed you, right?”

  My head started to hurt when I tried to remember how the night ended. I remembered being on top of the Aon Center, the spectacular view, and I remembered him jumping, but there was a blank spot in between. Every time I tried to focus on the blank spot, piercing pain shot through my head. I didn’t want to share the intimate details of the other night with Trina. So I avoided her question instead.

  “I’m not sure. I can’t remember.”

  Trina laughed. “A guy that good-looking and you can’t remember if he kissed you. I’d think a mouth like that would be pretty memorable.”

  I almost giggled but caught myself. “Trina! Really.”

  “I’m just saying.” She threw her hands up. “Oh, hey… I didn’t see your Beetle. I did see a gorgeous BMW. Is it yours?”

  I sighed. I’d started driving the car. Only on loan. I had to remind myself. “The Beetle died and a friend is helping me out.” I didn’t want to go into the truth with Trina. She’d never understand it.

  “I wish I had friends like that.”

  The door to Marshall’s office squeaked open and he trudged out, squinting at us with beady eyes. “If you ladies are done gossiping, there’s work to do. Trina, I need you to do inventory in the storeroom and put together an order. And Holly, the bathroom isn’t going to clean itself.”

  I resigned myself with dread to the inevitable grossness that awaited me in the bathroom. The rest of my shift flew by since it overlapped with Trina’s today. And it took hours to scrub the grime from all the crevices of the disgusting tile. I’m sure Marshall would find fault with it anyway. I couldn’t wait to get back to the loft and take a hot shower.

  I grabbed my army satchel, leaving Trina to finish her shift. Blessedly mine finished without any more disgusting demands from Marshall. “Bye, Trina.”

  “See you later.”

  ***

  It hurt every time I moved, but in a good way, and when it hurt I thought of Arie. I’d thought of him all day while I was working. For just a moment we had held each other, and in that moment the darkness seemed a little brighter. The nightmares were still out there, waiting, lurking in the shadows. And when they struck, it was almost crippling—like having your heart carved out and handed to you.

  I kept looking over my shoulder and jumping at nothing. My nerves would be on high alert until we found Katarina. I felt a little better after a hot shower to scrub all the grime of the Coffee Grind away. The door of the loft banged shut as Arie entered, and I flinched. After watching the tabloid video last night, the stillness of the loft made me nervous.

  “Hi,” I said, my voice faltering.

  “Get ready. You’re coming with me.”

  “Where are we going?”

  His face looked ashen. “It’s dark now and I’m very tired.”

  “No sign of Katarina?”

  “No. We’ll go to the club and see if Victoria can help us. I should have asked her at the club before, but between her planning the gala and helping guard you while I was doing some digging, I didn’t think there was time. Besides she stopped by the hospital today to dazzle the victim and I wanted to talk to her. See if Peggy remembered anything. With Katarina making headlines, tabloid or not, it needs to end.”

  We fell into silence as we drove over to the Hellfire Club. The club was already starting to fill up when we found Victoria busy behind the bar downstairs.

  “Victoria, can I have a word.”

  “Yeah, sure,” Victoria said, turning to a vampire sitting at the other end of the bar. “Take care of the bar.”

  She slid onto a barstool next to Arie. I listened to them discuss her visit to hospital. Apparently, she didn’t really learn anything that could help us locate Katarina.

  “I’ll be back,” Arie said as he grabbed my arm. “I want to have a word with security.”

  I nodded.

  The bar downstairs where I sat with Victoria filled with figures draped in black while I sipped a club soda. Arie had disappeared, stalking in the direction of the elevator. Heavy industrial music vibrated through the lower level. A man wearing a trench coat with black fingernail polish and long raven hair walked across the club in my direction.

  He stood in front of me and smiled, revealing fake resin fangs. “Hey, can I buy you a drink?”

  Before I could respond Victoria showed her fangs. “Move along. She belongs to my maker.”

  “Oh. Right. Sorry,” the man said, shaking his head as he walked away.

  I laughed. “He has no idea just how serious you are.”

  “Fang-fakers. Only a handful of them are unassuming and sincere. Most are pretentious and border on delusional. He thought I was another one of the role players that frequent here. None of them know—only the humans upstairs that we feed on know the truth.”

  “You don’t like them.”

  “I always find blatant imitators with their primal sexuality amusing. They are primitive and act like apes. I took to celibacy a century ago.” She scoffed.

  My eyes widened and I found this fascinating considering where she worked and the sex club upstairs. I couldn’t imagine being able to ward off temptation in a place like this. “But why?”

  “The absolute freedom from sexual thoughts and desires increases control over all the senses. My capacity for empathy and scanning auras surpasses vampires even older than I am because of my abstinence. It surpasses even my maker. That’s why he had me scan for Katarina’s aura after I stopped by the Coffee Grind and dazzle Peggy.”

  “Isn’t it hard for you to resist?” I asked.

  “Not anymore. I need very little blood to survive as a result.”

  My lips and teeth parted as my jaw dropped. “How is that even possible?”

  �
�I feed on psi, draining life energy without feeding on the basic life force of blood. I have not tasted blood in fifty years.”

  “Then why don’t all of you feed on psi?”

  Victoria smiled. “Because blood is addictive, and not all of us are strong enough to resist it. Others don’t want to resist it. It’s like questioning why some humans are vegetarian while others eat meat. Sure, it’s healthier to be a vegetarian, but who doesn’t like a good steak?”

  I didn’t care for her carnivorous comparison. “If it makes you stronger, I still don’t understand.”

  “It’s a matter of taste.”

  “You move fast like Arie, but there’s a different quality to your movement. You’re not blurry. I don’t even see you move. You’re just there and then you’re not.”

  “I can bend the flow of time, which makes our movements appear to humans so fast that we move in a blink of an eye, exceeding others my age and older. One of the many perks of my sexual celibacy. And I can walk into the subconscious dream world to manipulate or observe the fantasies of those around me with ease. But I hear you’re a lot like me.”

  I bit my lower lip. “You mean the visions? You have them too?”

  “Yes.”

  I sighed. “It’s been worse lately. I had a vision with Katarina, but it wasn’t like I was watching it happen. It was like I’d taken over someone else. Like I was trapped inside her body. That’s never happened before, but I’ve never been able to control the Sight no matter how it comes. It just sort of happens. Can you teach me?”

  Victoria laughed. “I’ll help you when you stop being frustrated by the limitations of the reality that binds us all.”

  I had no idea what she was talking about. “Please, I need to be able to control it…”

  “It gets easier with time and practice. It took me forty years before I could really focus the Sight. I’ll help you hone it when things settle down after the gala.”

  I nodded. “So do you live in one of the apartments upstairs?”

  “It would be convenient, but no. I have a townhouse in West DePaul, far away from HFC, where I can keep my life separate from the club.”

  The volume of the pumping music lowered before ceasing entirely. Tessa appeared on a stage next to the sound table and the DJ flashed red lighting onto the platform where she stood. Immediate applause broke out in acknowledgement of her arrival. With both hands she patted the air as if to silence them, and a hush came over the crowd.