Sever the Crown: Vampire Reverse Harem Complete Series

by Mysti Parker

  Yet, here we were.

  There were only a few cars parked out front, the night too young yet for all but the hard-core clubbers. No one seemed to be dying or on the verge of death, so that was good.

  When we retrieved Wren’s guitar from the taxi trunk and it drove off without us, I turned to Wren. “Does anyone even know the password?”

  “Isn’t the password always password?” Zac asked, and I couldn’t tell if he was fucking joking.

  Wren put a hand on my chest. “Relax.”

  “I doubt that’s happening.” But like I always did, I tried to blend in with my surroundings, make it not only look like I belonged but was damn happy to be here. It was a struggle, let me tell you.

  We walked up to the tornado shelter door, and a big bald guy sitting nearby in the bed of his truck. Zac crossed over and flashed him what looked like a business card, and the guy waved us on without a word.

  All that worrying for nothing.

  We strode down the shelter steps and inside the bar, the music thumping louder from both above ground and below.

  A guard with a harelip scar who was dressed in a blood-red three-piece suit stepped in front of us and held his hand up. "Leave your weapons at the door."

  Shit. There was a reason to worry.

  "What weapons?" Zac asked, playing dumb.

  The guard gave him a "cut the bullshit" look.

  Another guard walked around behind him. "Hands up, wide stance."

  Zac rolled his eyes as the guy patted him down and (of course) found his holstered gun. He took the gun and handed it over to his partner, then patted Zac down some more. It wouldn't take much for the guards to discover that we were in disguise, but a few impatient women who clomped down the steps behind us made him speed up the search.

  He patted me down, finding nothing, because I had no weapons apart from my good looks.

  Then it was Wren's turn. When he got a little too close to her breast, she growled, "Hey, watch it if you want to keep that hand."

  The guard finished quickly and waved us inside. If all went as planned, we wouldn't need a gun anyway.

  Only a few high-top tables were occupied, and even fewer booths along the right wall. The bar stood to the left with two vampires behind it slinging drinks, and straight ahead through the curls of cigarette smoke sat an elevated stage. The colored overheads spotlighted the duct tape holding the microphone to the stand and the scuff marks through half an inch of dust on the stage floor.

  I caught Wren’s eye, and she shrugged.

  “I’ve performed in worse,” she said.

  “I’ll go find the manager. Let her know you’re here.” Zac stalked off toward the bar.

  Wren and I sat at a nearby table. She propped her guitar case on a chair, her attention straying to the mildly curious faces turning toward us.

  “Nervous?” I asked.

  She craned her neck to look at those sitting at the bar behind her and then flicked her stunning gaze at me. “I don’t get nervous before a show. I just…” She rubbed at the symbol on her wrist with her thumb.

  “Yeah.” I felt it too. A prickling sensation centered in a different spot on my symbol, not unlike the feeling that runs up the back of your neck when someone’s watching. Which I hoped to Vampire Jesus they weren’t.

  Zac came back a second later. “Okay. It’s showtime when you’re ready, Wr—Melody. One song to see how these yahoos like you.”

  “Just one?” I asked. “Should you wait until these guys are good and hammered?”

  “At least give me a little credit.” Wren gave me a teasing smile as she stood.

  “No, that’s not what I—” I started, but she’d already headed toward the stage.

  Well, shit. My intent had come out all wrong.

  Zac slapped me in the chest while giving me a go-to-hell look. “You’ve never heard her sing, roadie. Now, come and help me do whatever it is roadies do.”

  Zac and I followed Wren up the few steps onto the stage. I carried her guitar so it looked like I was actually useful and set it down by a speaker. The music quieted, the loud voices softened some, and chairs scooted behind us in anticipation. Zac went straight for the taped-up microphone which had flopped down to the side like a sad dick, grabbed a nearby roll of duct tape and wrapped it around the microphone until it stood up like an excited dick. He ripped the tape strip with his teeth, grinning up at me as if to say I wasn’t the only one with a dangerous bite.

  “Wren, I’m sorry,” I whispered as I swooped in on some extension cords that lay on the stage. They didn’t seem to be attached to anything but each other.

  She touched my shoulder and smiled, the colored lights reflecting the excitement in her eyes. “It’s fine. Really. I knew what you meant.”

  I deposited the bundle of cords behind a speaker so she wouldn’t trip over them. “Then break a leg.”

  “I will.” She broke out in a grin, an infectious one, and I couldn’t help but notice how at home she appeared up here, about to perform. “Have a seat and relax.”

  Some guy came up to the stage and asked her a question about the sound and some other technospeak. She hooked up her guitar to the amp, and then having no idea what else to do, Zac and I made our way to the bar to enjoy the show.

  A burst of feedback squawked through the microphone. Wren winced, then leaned in and introduced the song. “Good evening. This is one of the lesser known songs by Janis Joplin, called ‘Little Girl Blue.’” And then, without any introduction, Wren opened with a soulful guitar riff.

  The chatter died down as the bar patrons started paying attention. Low and throaty, Wren’s voice filled the bar with a song I’d never heard before. She sounded like smoke and silk and sex, like light and dark, all coming from inside a place I hadn’t known existed in my favorite vampire queen.

  Wow.

  When she’d said she could sing, I didn’t imagine it would sound like this.

  I turned from my seat at the bar and looked around at everyone else’s expressions. Most leaned forward and listened as hard as they could. Some wore dreamy smiles, and others tapped their feet in time with the music. She had all of them under her power, including Zac sitting next to me, his gaze aimed at the steps leading toward the stage and a relaxed version of his kill-you-later expression on his face. That was a first, all because of Wren.

  When the last note faded, the bar erupted with applause and glass-banging on the tables and bar. She’d definitely grabbed her one-song chance by the balls. I didn’t know it was possible to feel this proud of anyone in my life.

  With her excited grin still locked in place, she made her way off the stage but got caught up by several of her new fans.

  Zac hopped off his bar stool. “I’ll go make sure nobody gets too friendly.”

  I nodded, about to join him, but an image on the TV screen on the wall above the bartender caught my attention.

  A still shot of my sister on the local news channel.

  Questions flooded my head so fast I went numb. I sat, unmoving, every part of my body tensed while I tried to grasp what I was seeing. Not once had I said she had to go to the news station, just to send them the videos proving my innocence. So what was she doing in a cinderblock interrogation room that looked like the one I’d been in after I was arrested?

  “Can you turn on closed captioning?” I asked the bartender, my voice surprisingly collected while worry chewed its way through my gut. Whatever was happening, I didn’t want the sound on so the whole bar could hear.

  The bartender did at the same time the still shot turned into a video.

  “My brother didn’t kill Queen Bronwen or Devin,” my sister said, her words scrolling across the bottom. “If these videos I’ve shown you don’t clear his name of Queen Bronwen’s murder, then I have something else that will clear him of Devin’s. Email exchanges, money transfers, all to an anonymous assassin hired to take out Devin. Hired by me.” She glanced up at the camera in the corner of the room, her eyes so muc
h like mine looking right at me, a sad smile on her face. She patted what looked like her closed laptop that sat balanced on her knees. “All right here.”

  I covered my mouth with my fist so I wouldn’t make a sound. Jessica, my own sister…had hired an assassin to kill her ex-boyfriend. This was insane. Almost as insane as her younger brother wanting to do it first. That explained why Devin was already dead when I got there. Had this assassin nearly killed me, too, in their hurry to get out of there?

  This was too much. All this time, I’d been obsessed with making sure Jessica didn’t make the same mistake twice with Devin. I’d made the choice to save her the second I saw her beaten and broken. Just like she’d made the choice to come forward to the police and save me now. My own sister had stepped forward to take the blame off of me.

  My chest seemed to cave in with frustration, with love, both the same side of the coin when it came to Jessica. My eyes stung, and I was glad I was alone to feel all of this.

  Jessica and I had made a choice to save each other. Hadn’t I just said something similar to Wren about her mom? Life—such as it was—seemed to be a series of choices all revolving around the people we loved. I’d already chosen to save the Southern Clan of the Vampire Nation by putting Wren in power. Yet another choice I’d made out of love.

  All right here, Jessica had said, and maybe I was reading too much into it, but the way she’d said it, facing the camera with a smile, made me think it was a message. All right here. But she wouldn’t be. Not if she was already in an interrogation room. The police would charge her with murder if they hadn’t already.

  The symbol on my wrist tingled, announcing Wren’s presence before she touched my shoulder.

  “Hey, you okay?” she said, her voice concerned.

  I nodded and cleared my throat, blinking hard to regain some composure. “All right here.”

  Her grip on my shoulder tightened at the same time my wrist prickled again, sharp and unpleasant. Her wide eyes aimed past me.

  I turned to look and was met with a wall of vampire topped with a dusty leather fedora.

  Charles Fucking Ford. Liar. Lady killer. Wren’s kidnapper. The bane of my existence.

  He yanked up his brick-red shirt sleeve from around his wrist and slapped his arm down on the bar in front of us. A faintly glowing symbol inked his skin. A symbol just like mine.

  “Looks like this gets me in your club?” he said.

  My jaw fell into my lap as I faced Wren. “Him?”

  “I sure as hell didn’t choose him.” She flicked her gaze to him and glared. “I’d hoped he was dead.”

  He grinned, a real shit-eating one too. “Sorry to disappoint, darlin’. All I know is, ever since you took off with her, she’s done nothing but give me wet dreams.”

  I dared a look at Wren to gauge her reaction, and I wish I hadn’t. Her eyes were glued to his, her tongue flicked across her lips as though she wanted to jump his bones right there on the bar.

  No, this couldn’t be right.

  With someone like him in Wren’s harem, someone with fewer morals than a rock and zero fucks given other than for dollar signs, we stood no chance putting Wren on the throne. With him, we were Fucked—capitalized, outlined in red, spotlighted, and placed on a pedestal.

  “About the not being dead thing…” I rose and faced him, my fists clenched at my sides. “Maybe we could fix that. Right here. Right now.”

  Now on to Book Two...

  DEFIANCE

  Sever the Crown Book Two

  MYSTI PARKER

  LINDSEY R. LOUCKS

  Chapter One

  Wren

  I should have known it was too good to last. The first gig I’d had since finding out I’m queen of the Southern Vampire Clan had gone off without a hitch. No one questioned who we were in that dim, smoky underground bar called the Stake and Dagger that had a real Dungeons and Dragons feel. Even though the place was teeming with vampires, none of them recognized me (aka Melody Songsmith) or Ashe, my vampire mate, whose gorgeous mug had been all over the news, accused of murder. They didn’t even bat an eye at Zac, the only human there besides a few designated blood donors (aka DBDs) who did double duty as waitresses. All thanks to my vast assortment of makeup, wigs, and colored contact lenses.

  But let’s face it. I rocked the shit out of the opening song. Janis Joplin’s “Little Girl Blue” never failed to impress. I’d come off stage to meet some of my new fans and even sign some autographs. That hardly ever happened. Okay, so it never happened. Of course, I didn’t get to bask in that glow for long.

  When what to my wondering eyes did appear, but a fedora-wearing vampire with a bloody beer.

  Yes, none other than Charles, not Charlie, Ford, who I had almost, kinda hoped was dead. The one who was apparently meant to be number two out of five in my growing harem.

  And Ashe was having none of it. He and Charles stood nose to nose, having a stare-down with their blood-red eyes, while Zac took a piss in the restroom.

  I stepped between them like I’d done in the woodshop where Charles had held me prisoner. One hand on each of their chests, I pushed them apart and glared them both down until they averted their eyes. “Listen here. I will not be making this a habit. Is that understood?”

  They both nodded, Ashe more reluctantly.

  “He doesn’t deserve you,” he hissed.

  “Yeah, like you do,” Charles hissed back.

  “He owes me money, too,” Ashe added. “Give me five minutes, and I’ll beat it out of him.”

  “Yeah, I’d like to see you try,” Charles fired back. “You’d have better luck squeezing rocks into diamonds.”

  “I really don’t care who owes who money.” Grabbing them by the shirt collars, I tightened my grip so they felt the fabric squeezing their necks like nooses. The red in their eyes faded, replaced with a hint of fear. “But I swear I will beat the unliving tar out of both of you if you keep acting like children.”

  A slow grin spread across Charles’s face. “Promise?”

  I let them go and pointed at the bar stool that Ashe had vacated. “Sit.”

  Eyes narrowed and jaw tight, he did as I said. A twinge of guilt pinched my conscience. I wasn’t used to ordering anyone around, especially someone I loved. And yeah, I loved Ashe. Sure, it started as pure lust, but had grown into a bond that went beyond whatever hocus pocus had ensured we’d be together. He was an incredible lover and just wanted to protect me, even though I’d almost killed him a few times already.

  Oops.

  Which made it all the freakier that Charles, my kidnapper, now lit up a second point of the star-shaped symbol that glowed on my arm. Freakier still that I could already picture myself riding him like a derby horse. He picked up his blood-foam beer before I grabbed his arm and pulled him to a far corner of the bar. Not to ride him, mind you, but to grill him. I still had some self-control, though it sure had been a fickle bitch lately.

  “You have a lot of explaining to do,” I said as we both settled onto rickety chairs. “First of all, how are you not dead?”

  “How are you not dead?” Charles asked.

  “Are we answering questions with questions?”

  He leaned closer, giving me a once-over with a sweep of his warm amber eyes. “Are you as horny as I am?”

  “Cut the crap already,” I said, smacking him in the chest.

  Charles winced and shrank back in his seat. He rubbed the spot where I’d struck him. Either he was a big baby, or he was seriously wounded.

  “It’s nothing,” he muttered as he crossed his arms and pulled his fedora down until it shaded his eyes.

  “No, it’s not nothing. What happened? Did Ashe hurt you?”

  Charles huffed a laugh. “Hardly. Let’s just say I’m a little slower to heal than some vampires.”

  “The motorcycle gang?”

  He didn’t answer, just picked his beer up off the table and sipped it.

  “Show me.”

  “Here?” He set hi
s beer down and arched his eyebrow. “I’ll take my shirt off if you will.”

  I leveled a look at him.

  “Fine.” He lifted his hands in surrender. After glancing over his shoulder, he unbuttoned the first few buttons of his shirt and pulled back the right side. A jagged red scar, scabbed with black blood, stretched across his shoulder and pec. From what I could see past the scar, he had impressive pecs, firm abs, and smooth skin that looked entirely lick-worthy.

  But that wound was ugly, and if it had happened just a few nights ago, it should have healed by now. Then again, what did I know about vampire biology?

  Even though I sounded like an idiot, I had to ask. “Was it a poisoned blade or…?”

  “Sawblade.”

  “Like Friday the 13th? They had chainsaws?”

  “No.” He lowered his head, clasping his hands in front of him on the table. “It doesn’t matter now. What matters is that you have no business being in a place like this. We should get out of here. Let me take you somewhere safe.”

  The bar manager, a silver-streaked vampire with a thick mustache named Vinny, cleared his throat behind Charles. Charles shot to his feet and stood in front of me, clearly blocking me from whatever perceived danger he felt Vinny posed. Which seemed unlikely – Vinny looked like the vampire equivalent of Mr. Rogers.

  “Excuse me,” Vinny said, wringing his hands nervously. Vinny’s gaze lingered on Charles for a few seconds. “I do believe you are behind on your bar tab.”

  Charles sat back down and lit a cigar. “I do believe you’re mistaken.”

  “We’ll see about that.” Vinny frowned, then turned a warm smile on me. “Miss Songsmith, everyone enjoyed your performance. We’d love you to sing a few more, if you would be so inclined.”