by Unknown
“I’ll go shopping with you tomorrow evening, Clariel. That is, if you and Trina don’t mind me joining you.”
“Mistress, it would be our honor,” whispered Trina in awe that their mistress would go with them and share her time. She was definitely not like Delina, and it gave them both peace and joy.
“Good. We’ll venture out tomorrow at dusk then.”
Jolie moved on to Mathew, who was lying on his side in front of the fireplace with a large pad of paper and charcoal pencils. “Mathew, are you well this evening?”
He glanced up at her with aqua eyes and a guilty look on his face.
“Yes, Mistress.” He immediately closed the pad of paper he was concentrating on and sat very still.
“What are you drawing, Mathew?” asked Jolie, as she sat beside him on the floor.
He continued to look down at the pad, afraid to answer her question. This family was still new and somewhat scary to him. Mathew had a hard time getting his footing around the three. “Nothing, Mistress. I just like to draw things.”
“He draws beautifully,” added Trina, right before she received a dirty look from Mathew. “Well, you do!”
Jolie was curious. Reaching out, she brushed his veil of hair out of his face. Again, he flinched at her touch. It was as if he expected her to hit him. “May I see?”
“Mistress, it isn’t very good,” he whispered, cheeks flushing. He could feel her mates watching him.
“Please?” she asked again. “May I?”
“Yes, of course, Mistress.” He gave up, sliding the pad into her lap. He knew he shouldn’t have drawn her, but he was so compelled to just sketch her likeness. Before he knew it, his hands took over, and he was lost in it.
Jolie cautiously opened the pad and looked down at the sketch which lay on her lap.
It was unbelievable.
“Mathew.” She was speechless. What he’d drawn was amazing, and like nothing she’d ever seen before. In his art work, she was wearing long flowing robes with a sword in her hand, as she charged into battle. Her hair whipped around her body in black tendrils. Over the top of her head she could see a pair of wings belonging to an angel. “This is unbelievable.”
“It’s how I see you,” he answered softly, unable to look her in the eyes.
Jolie continued to take in all the fine details that Mathew had drawn into the picture. “May I show my mates?” she asked, motioning toward Jacques and Brogan.
He shrugged, clenching his hands in his lap. They were covered in charcoal smudges, and he wiped at them nervously.
Jolie turned the drawing toward her mates, trusting them to help her ease Mathew’s discomfort.
“It is tres magnifique,” admitted Jacques. “I have never seen a more accurate portrayal of our Jolie.”
“Wow,” replied Brogan. “Mathew, this is amazing!”
Mathew continued to look down at his black smudged fingers. Jolie handed back his pad and took his hand, twining her fingers through his. “Thank you, Mathew.”
He looked confused.
“No one has ever drawn me before, let alone as beautifully as you have.”
“No one?” he asked incredulously. “But why not?”
Jolie just shook her head. “Maybe when you are more comfortable, you’ll share your other drawings with us.” Jolie leaned in to kiss his cheek.
When he didn't respond, Jolie looked up helplessly at Jacques and Flynn. She moved aside as they came to sit on the floor besides the young vampyre.
“Mathew?”
“Yes, Master?” he answered, knowing both men preferred to not be called that, but it was just habit.
“Will you do something for me?” Jacques asked, touching Mathew’s shoulder.
He finally looked up at him. “I would do anything for the three of you.”
“I would like to commission this drawing to a full size print. I think I would very much like to hang it in our quarters back in the states.”
He looked amazed, and then frightened. “I couldn’t.”
“Please, Mathew? No one has ever caught the true spirit of Jolie like you have in this drawing. She’s truly everyone’s champion, isn't she?”
He looked into Jolie’s eyes, “Yeah, she really is.” He picked up his drawing pad. “I’ll make it worthy of her beauty.”
“Oui, I know you will. Thank you, Mathew.”
Jolie leaned down to kiss Mathew on the cheek, and he flushed from her attention. It was an endearing quality that she had come to love over the last few days. She hoped that no matter what, he would keep his sweetness.
“Where is Chloe?” she asked, changing the subject.
“She’s in her room,” answered Mathew. “I think something might be wrong. She seems to be distraught today.”
“Distraught?” asked Jolie. “I’ll check on her.”
Mathew waited for her to leave. When she was gone, he carefully tore the picture from his pad and handed it to Flynn.
“For me?”
He nodded. “I can do it from memory. I’ll go start working, if you don’t mind.”
When he was gone, the men looked at each other.
“He’s in love,” Brogan said, recognizing the look on his face.
“Yes, I’ve noticed. It’s not happening,” Jacques said, his fangs sliding into his mouth as his eyes bled black. “I’m sorry, but…”
Flynn stopped him. “No need. We need to watch him.”
Jacques agreed.
Their union was sealed, and while he accepted Flynn to their coupling, he wasn’t accepting another vampyre.
Over his dead body.
If need be, he’d fight for Jolie.
And it would be to the death.
Jolie climbed the stairs and knocked on Chloe’s door. She didn’t answer and that worried her.
“Chloe! May I come in?”
Silence.
Jolie pushed the door open and found her donor sitting in the corner, rocking herself back and forth. “What’s wrong?” asked Jolie, rushing to the girl’s side.
“Can you feel it?” whimpered Chloe, as if she were in physical pain.
“No, what’s wrong?”
“They’re near,” she whispered, looking up at her mistress. Gone were the calm human eyes, and instead were a swirling vortex of death.
“Death will send me back to them.”
Oh shit.
Maybe France was a very bad idea after all.
What more could go wrong?
Coming Next: a sneak preview of book three in the Harcourte Vampyre Society series.
Dangerous Misery
Coming summer 2015
∞ Prologue ∞
France, 1302
Jolie sat in the dark, a feeling of complete and total loss overcoming her. Here she was, alone as she touched the burnt flesh that was once her beloved father.
He had suffered terribly in his attempt to avenge the slaying of his wife.
Her mother was his world, and it was all taken away from the family by a hunter, solely because they were the undead.
Judgments were made and death warrants signed, yet the killers didn’t take her life because she was feeding on a human, but because she had offered to help one in danger.
It all seemed so senseless.
So brutal.
By using her preternatural abilities, Rosalyn Harcourte had marked herself the undead. Still, knowing the risk, her compassion for the human outweighed her own self-preservation.
After the deed was done, the hunters reveled in the kill, and then collected their gold pieces for the information that they had offered up.
It wasn’t bad enough that her mother was destroyed for gold and greed, but her father had been staked to the ground to wait the impending sunlight.
He had fought to free himself valiantly, and had obviously been in excruciating pain, but in the end he had joined her mother. Together, they entered the next phase of life.
At least they weren’t alone.
&
nbsp; Jolie could find some solace knowing that they were no longer divided by death.
A plethora of emotions overcame her as she sat there gently touching the cremains of her father. In her heart was mourning, but in her head she was silently vowing to never let her life end like this. Her father’s life amounted to nothing more than a pile of ash and bone, running like sand through her fingers.
Now, it was only Jolie and her brother left to survive among the humans.
It would now fall to her as the one bound to protect them both at all costs. Already she knew it wouldn’t be easy. It was now her duty, and she would do it to her best ability, making her father and mother proud.
Unfortunately, as a mere child herself, and at just one hundred, her defenses were still weak.
Jolie knew in her heart that she was still far from an efficient killer. In her arsenal of survival were only the basic skills of one of her kind. There would be a monumental fight ahead of her.
With eyes closed, silent goodbyes were said to her mother and father, for she would be going to live with a new master today. One who would take over as primus of their society, replacing the position her father once held.
It was the end of the Harcourte family.
Unfortunately, Goethe was next in line for control after her parents. Now, instead of being at the top of the food chain, she and her brother were at the very bottom.
The weakest must be tricky, preparing for anything that may come their way. What was coming would be a fire storm of danger.
If lucky, one or both would survive this new family.
Jolie wasn’t betting on it.
The game was now stacked against them, and it was survival of the strongest. At least she was going in eyes wide open. There was no pretense with the oncoming danger.
She saw it for what it was.
It was time.
Jolie stood, reaching down to free her feet from her dress by lifting up the hem. Now, she would walk away from their old home.
This was goodbye to Harcourte manor.
This would be her last allowed visit to their homestead. From here on out, it would no longer be a fond memory of laughter and love, but one of death and emptiness.
Looking around, Jolie sought to find something to hold onto her past. Surely, there was something there that she could keep to remind her of them.
Although there was no doubt that they would never forget the parents they cherished. True, Benoit Harcourte was not their biological father, but he had raised, loved, and taught them the essence of who they should be as adults.
In her heart, he would always be her dad.
Then, she saw it.
Just inside the homestead was her mother’s amulet hanging from the hearth. Jolie took it as a sign that Rosalyn would always turn up in the most unusual of places if she was needed.
They weren’t alone after all.
Jolie was touched that her father had the foresight to place it there when he was told his beloved was beheaded. It was as if in that moment, he knew what was coming. This was his last gift to the children he loved.
Holding it in her fingers, the locket still had her mother’s blood dried to the chain. It was now mixed with the cremains that covered her fingers from her father’s destroyed body. It was very fitting that she carried them both with her on the new journey.
Carefully, the trinket was slid into her pocket for safe keeping. From here on out, a new life was afoot, and everything as they knew it was about to change.
It would be drastically altered and they would need to find their way.
Outside the home, her brother and Master Goethe waited for her arrival. There was no smile on her brother’s face, and the sadistic leer plastered to Goethe’s made her ill.
Possibly, it all was foreshadowing of what was to come in their new life.
“I’m ready,” she said haughtily, unwilling to give her father’s replacement any satisfaction. He would not terrify her, for the Harcourte family was powerful, and one day they again would be a force to reckon with.
It was her vow to Benoit and Rosalyn.
The phoenix would be reborn from the ash if it was the last thing she did.
“Very well, Jolie, we have prepared for your arrival,” leered Goethe, almost licking his lips in anticipation of his time to be spent with the young vampyre. He was going to enjoy being her master, and he meant in every sense of the word.
The destruction of Benoit and Rosalyn Harcourte had opened up the buffet of goodies which were their daughter. Such a lovely morsel shouldn’t be kept from the wonders of life. She should be shared.
Jolie’s brother took her hand, pushing himself protectively between Goethe and his sister as he reached for her mind.
“This is going to be bad.”
“Oui, I believe you’re correct,” she said, glad to be sheltered behind her brother’s body.
“I’ll protect you, Jolie, I swear to it!”
“I know you shall, Alexandre.”
At Goethe’s touch to her shoulder, Jolie’s stomach churned violently. Just one caress from him and her skin was crawling. Already, the instinct for survival was warning her that she should run and escape. It was a sure sign that what was coming would be ugly.
Alexandre had been dead wrong, this wasn’t going to be bad, and this was going to be hell…
I hope you enjoyed the excerpt from Dangerous Misery. Jolie, Jacques, and Flynn’s story will continue in the next book in the Harcourte Vampyre Society series. They’ll be released every summer for the next four years.
Available spring/summer 2015
Dangerous Misery
Dangerous Retaliation
Available spring/summer 2016
Dangerous Influence
Dangerous Sacrifice
Available spring/summer r 2017
Dangerous Promise
Dangerous Destruction
Available spring/summer 2018
Dangerous Renewal
Dangerous Death
Other books by Morgan Kelley:
Standalone Books
The Junction
Serial Sins
The Blood Betrayal
Romance/FBI Thriller Series
Elizabeth, Ethan, and Callen
The Killing Times (book 1)
Sacred Burial Grounds (book 2)
True Love Lost (book 3)
Deep Dark Mire (book 4)
Fire Burns Hot (book 5)
Darkness of Truth (book 6)
Devil Hath Come (book 7)
Consumed by Wrath (book 8)
Redemption is Here (book 9) fall 2014
Croft & Croft Romance Adventure Series
Greyson and Emma Croft
Celestia is Falling (book 1)
Vegas is Dying (book 2)
Christmas is Killing (book 3)
Love is Bleeding (book 4)
The Littlemoon Investigations Series
Julian and Tori Littlemoon
Blood Red Rage (book 1)
Lost & Broken (book 2)
Unthinkable Games (book 3) winter 2015
The Carter Chronicles Trilogy
Callista, Nathaniel, and Lucas
Sinner Repent (1)
Sinner Revealed (2)
Sinner Reborn (3) summer 2015
Harcourte Vampyre Society
Jolie, Jacques and Flynn
Dangerous Revelations (1)
Dangerous Choices (2)
Dangerous Misery (3) 2015
Anthologies
All the couples in one book
Illegal Fantasies—
Behind Closed Doors (1)
Romance Under Arrest—
Behind Closed Doors (2) winter 2015
Holiday Reinforcements—
Behind Closed Doors (3) 2015
Please feel free to visit her at her website www.morgankelley.com, or visit her blog at www.morgankelley.blogspot.com
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X~ pr ~ X
Unknown, Harcourte Vampyre Society 02 Dangerous Choices