Once Bitten: A Paranormal Vampire Romance (Arcane City Book 1)

by Tilly Hart

  Greyson and I parried, each taking chunks out of the other. I caught him on the shoulder with my fangs, spitting out a lump of hairy flesh as he swept at me with his great claws, catching me on the thigh as I grimaced. I threw him into walls and tore out fistfuls of fur, while he systematically shredded my skin in multiple places.

  We were evenly matched. Either I’d need to outmanoeuvre him until morning brought him back to human form, or lop his great ugly head off. All the while I monitored Rebecca, keenly aware of the blood dripping from her arm as blood thirsty monsters surrounded her. Her blood was distracting, tempting, and hard to ignore.

  I snatched the knife and stormed behind Greyson, throwing myself at the back of his head, knife ready to hack his head from his body, no matter how many strokes it took. The blade bit into his flesh at the side of his neck, causing Greyson to rear backwards, tipping me off balance. I had barely managed a second slash when he backed into a cage where another werewolf tore at my back. I kept hacking desperately at Greyson’s neck, despite the blinding pain engulfing my back from the claws dragging through my ancient flesh.

  Greyson reached back over his shoulder and grabbed me by the neck, his sharp nails sinking into my throat. In a fit of anger, he slammed me into the floor. The hard stone floor caused waves of excruciating pain to throb along my torso.

  Greyson pinned me to the floor beneath his hulking weight and his snout pulled into a wolfish grin, the row of razor-sharp teeth bared in full.

  ‘We could have run this city together, the vampires and werewolves together. The paranormal should have united to put the humans where they below. Like rats kept as playthings. The eat, to fuck, to kill at our leisure. If your bitch doesn’t die tonight, I might just keep her around to grow the litter, replace all the wolves you took tonight. A communal pack mate to be enjoyed, and bred, by all.’ His voice made my stomach churn, not the sane musings of a man but the wild growl of a beast.

  Rage gave me renewed strength as I reached up and pulled Greyson down on top of me, sinking my teeth into the already bloodied gouge on his neck. I loved her, and if there was thing I wouldn’t let him do, it was ever to lay a finger on her again. The price she’d paid to be with me was already too high.

  The acrid taste of his blood went through me, bringing me a jittering, toxic response rather than the sublime energy human blood gave me, but I infected him with my paralysing venom, as the repulsive beast quivered on top of me. It was worse knowing I’d be giving him supreme pleasure he didn’t deserve.

  I drained as much as I could, but he was too big in his werewolf state. There was nowhere for the rest of the toxic blood to go. I couldn’t absorb it, I couldn’t regurgitate it. I had to release him.

  The moment I did, he pinned me to the floor by my throat and hissed at me.’It’s time to die. I’ve got too much to do tonight to be playing with you any longer.’

  His beastly fists gripped either side of my head and pulled upwards, my spine creaking at the intense force he created. Taking his blood had weakened us both, but me more than him.

  ‘I love you,’ I muttered through the pain, hoping that Rebecca would hear me before Greyson decapitated me.

  ‘I know,’ she replied as the pain tripled in the based of my neck. I closed my eyes, ready for it to end. Ready to give up after three hundred years of death and misery. Rebecca had come like a bright light at the end. It was enough.

  Shots rang out, echoing around the cavernous room as Greyson’s eyes widened and his grip loosened on my throat. It took another two shots for his body to fall forward, landing heavily on my face and chest. His body jerked on top of me, twitching in the last throws of death. The pupils in his yellowed eyes dilated, as blood streamed out of his wolfish nose, landing in a patter of drops on my chin. Slowly, his body shrunk to that of his human form, the wolf driven out of him at the expense of the human beneath. He laid, curled in a naked foetal ball with a chorus of wounds marring his human flesh.

  All around us the werewolves howled in a joint grief, mourning the loss of their alpha, the pack leader. Even the were-Calvin joined them in their sorrow. I pulled myself out from beneath the dead man and crawled over to the bars which held my love.

  She’d crumpled against them, both Calvin and the vampires still overwrought by her blood on either side. I cradled her head in my hand and kissed her through the bars.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ I said, ‘I’m so sorry.’

  ‘I love you too…’ she whispered before her body went heavy in my arms.

  ‘No, Rebecca, don’t you dare. I’m getting you help, you aren’t allowed to die. Let me turn you, I can save you.’

  ‘No,’ she said as her eyes fluttered to a close. ‘Never.’

  I placed her down and ran to find a phone. I dialled the club number and waited desperately for someone to answer. Where were they all?

  ‘Dad?’ It was Emmeline, hope fluttered in my chest.

  ‘Emmeline, it’s over, but Rebecca is injured, I need to to get a doctor to me now, a surgeon!’

  ‘Where the fuck am I going to get a doctor to come to a club full of, I’m guessing, wigged out werewolves.’

  ‘I don’t care where you find them, use compulsion if you have to, but get them here now. She needs blood, and surgery, right now.’

  ‘Okay. I’ll find someone sympathetic. Hang in there. Is my dad okay?’

  ‘Yes. Locked in a cage, but safe.’

  I lay on the ground and pressed myself up against the bars, cradling Rebecca in my arms as best as I could despite the metal separating us.

  All I could do was wait.

  And hope.

  The trauma surgeon Emmeline convinced to come into the club worked all night, struggling through the bars of the cage. He did what he could under the gaze of baying werewolves, his pale face quivering as he stitched and repaired and transfused blood all night. Rebecca’s face was white and blotchy as she laid still on the floor for hours. Despite the blankets I’d shoved under her, through the bars, and covered all but the arm the doctor worked on, her skin was deathly cold.

  ‘You can do this,’ I whispered near her ear, ‘Come back to me Rebecca.’

  But she was heavily sedated, and though the doctor claimed - in the early hours of the morning - that he’d done all he could, she hadn’t yet roused. The werewolves stalked their cells, ready to rip into anyone who ventured within claws reach. I’d watched Calvin through the night, ranting and raving and desperate to wreak destruction, the polar opposite from the man I knew. As morning drew closer, they fell asleep one by one, returning to their former human selves as the moon disappeared for the day.

  Emmeline used strong compulsion - after we’d downed the extra blood bags the surgeon had brought to heal our wounds and renew our strength - to erase the doctor’s memory, leaving him believing he’d had a heavy night drinking at the biker’s club, and that it would be a bad idea to ever return.

  He was long gone by the time the sun came up and the releases on the cages opened, letting their occupants stumble out, mostly naked and confused. Pres, Emmeline, the other vampires and I had to wait it out in their club until sunset before we could go outside, sit amongst the mourning and bad feeling, taking up space in their clubhouse.

  All the while I wrapped Rebecca in my arms and poured my soul out to her. I whispered my past in her ear until my throat grew hoarse, wanting her to know me as intimately as I’d grown to know her while infusing myself with her blood. It had allowed me a brief glimpse into the depths of her humanity, and what I’d found there only made me love her all the more.

  Despite some grumbles from a few of their pack members, life in the Sons of Cerberus went on around us, Calvin becoming the new pack leader. Pres had a lengthy discussion over the phone with the governors, who were satiated, for the time being.

  And as that day, the first day of the rest of our lives, came to a close; I carried Rebecca out into the night.

  To bring her home.

  Nineteen

 
; rebecca

  Lamplight glowed in the corner of Jed’s room as I opened my eyes. Everything hurt. Sharp pain, dull aches, throbbing and thumping seemed to emanate from every part of my body.

  I reached for a glass on the bedside table and brought it to my lips, letting the lukewarm water wet my parched mouth.

  ‘Easy there.’ Jed came over to the bed and sat down on the edge. ‘If you take too much you’ll throw up.’

  ‘What happened?’ Then it hit me, I pulled my other arm out from the blanket as tears filled my eyes, dripping down over my cheeks. There was an emptiness where my hand had once been.

  ‘No. No!’ I squealed while my heart thumped in my chest.

  Jed gathered me in his arms and kissed my temple, rocking me as I gave way to the torrent of grief which encapsulated me. Not just at the loss of my hand, but at the loss of so much life. At the taking of so much life.

  ‘You should never have come,’ Jed whispered into my hair. ‘I’m sorry, they tried all they could do to reattach your hand, but you were losing too much blood. If I hadn’t taken some, you may have been strong enough for the surgery, but you weren‘t and it’s my fault. I’ll be sorry for the rest of my days.’

  I looked up at him through wet lashes. ‘ I’d rather have you than have my hand. I can live without it. I can’t live without you. What am I going to do?’

  ‘We’ll do whatever you need to do to get this. We’ll find a way, Rebecca. I’ll be here to help you every step of the way.’

  ‘How long have I been out?’ My words were intersected by sobs, as the previous days came crashing back to me in waves.

  Jed handed me a tissue to mop my wet face. ‘Three days.’

  I sniffled and leaned back into the pillows, cradling my stump, it seemed impossible to be true. Everything that had passed had changed my life, changed me, completely. Rather than agree to everyone else’s plans, I’d done what I had to do and stood up to a real-life monster to save the people I’d cared about. I’d taken charge of my destiny, and though I’d sacrificed a literal part of me, I had a man who adored me, a new family and a home where I felt I could be myself, at last.

  ‘Did Angus make it?’ Last I had seen him, Emmeline was fang deep in his throat.

  A dark cloud passed over Jed’s face. ‘He did. In a way.’

  ‘Emmeline wasn’t draining him, was she?’

  Jed shook his head, and my heart sunk. I’d hoped that Angus would live, not become the living dead. He’d said no.

  ‘Emmeline did what she had to do to hold on to an old friend, but Angus is a new vampire, he his hungry, he is blood crazed and more than anything, he is furious with Emmeline.’

  ‘Will he be okay?’ I asked, closing my eyes as my head throbbed.

  ‘That depends how you define okay. He knows more about vampires than most people who are newly turned. He knows what to do, and what not to do, the rest is down to him. It’s up to him whether he will join us, or whether he’ll become a lone predator. Will you be okay?’

  ‘I think so, eventually.’

  ‘Rebecca, for as long as I live, and that’s a very long time, I promise to let no one hurt you again. I will spend my life protecting you.’ Jed’s face was dead serious, his eyes set in grim determination. I pulled my aching body up to his and kissed him gently.

  ‘Just promise to love me, that’s all I need.’

  ‘I’ll love you for the rest of your life, and mine. And I’ll show you again, and again.’

  ‘I can think of some ways,’ I said while raising my eyebrows and planting a series of slow kisses along his jaw.

  ‘Oh no you don’t, strict bedrest for you. Doctor’s orders.’ Jed placed me back down in the bed and tucked the soft blanket back up around me. ‘You’ll be lucky if I ever let you leave the damn bed again.’

  I giggled through my sobs. ‘I could deal with that.’

  ‘I really do love you, Rebecca, I don’t know if you remember…’

  ‘Before I shot Greyson. I remember.’ I reached out with my remaining hand and held his fingers in mine. Butterflies returned to my stomach, and though I’d been to hell and back, though my body lay bruised and mutilated, my love for Jed had only solidified. ‘I meant it too. I love you Jed, damned vampire or not, you’ve stolen my heart.’

  He kissed me, gently, but his touch flooded my body with warmth. ‘I’ve searched for you for centuries, Rebecca. I didn’t know it was you I needed, but now I do, I want to spend the rest of your life showing you how much you mean to me.’

  His words filled me with hope for our future, as unplanned and unmapped as it remained.

  ‘I can’t promise a life without danger though, so I’ll understand if you leave.’

  I sat back and eyed his face, the rim of dark lashes framing those questioning green eyes. His cheekbones and firm jaw, and his mop of mahogany hair. The way his tattoos glimpsed over the top of his tee-shirt. ‘I can cope with a little danger,I think. Though let’s not go hunting for it, huh?’

  ‘Deal.’

  ‘Deal. And you think you’ll be able to resist sucking me dry again?’ I asked, remember the pure explosion of delight as he’d bitten me, and feeling the draw of it flickering somewhere deep inside.

  ‘Oh, I’ll suck you dry forever, just not your blood.’

  I blushed at his words and shoved his shoulder. ‘I’m serious, Jed. It was intense… and I need to know I can trust you whenever you are near my neck.’

  ‘You had a lot of transfusions, your blood is not the same as it was. It’s a muddle of many peoples, and we’re not linked by it. Any more than we were before. I’m not the worry, it’s whether you’ll want to beg for it remembering the pleasure it inflicts.’

  ‘And if I beg?’

  ‘I must find some inventive ways to please you just as thoroughly.’ Jed’s cocky smirk returned until I yawned, and with all the bossiness of a three hundred-year-old, he ordered me back to sleep. ‘Though I’ll enjoy the begging,’

  As I lay, he curled round me protectively.

  I drifted off, one arm less, but an entire heart more.

  It was strange at first, living openly amongst the Guardian’s of the Underworld MC club. Not only was I new to the vampire way of life, but I was new to the biker way too. After the losses, and with Angus going AWOL, I took on a lot of the roles he had fulfilled. I learned to enjoy the sun on my face as I walked alone during the day, and I learned to enjoy riding into the night on both the chrome and the flesh beasts which rocked my world. Adventure beckoned, and life with Jed was easy, mostly.

  Over the months that passed the vampires accepted me, though Emmeline, and I mostly avoided one another. I still blamed her for forcing Angus into a life he did not want, even if a tiny part of me was glad he was still around. Somewhere.

  I relaxed on the sofa, with my feet in Jed’s lap, the TV still playing old game shows, despite their instigator being missing. The strife between the governors and the werewolves had gone to a truce, and with each passing day, normality resumed. Pippa still came, ignoring her issues with a greater and more risky high with each bloodletting. There was no way she’d be able to sustain the amount of blood she was giving for long before her heart would give out.

  Pres walked into the room, the tiniest hint of a smile crossing his lips as he threw a leather jacket into my lap.

  ‘What’s this for?’ I asked.

  ‘Think you earned your place in the club.’ The leather jacket was stiff, not yet worn in by years on the road like the others. I grazed a finger over the intricately embroidered cat’s head, the bloodied fangs still sending a chill up my spine.

  ‘Thank you,’ I whispered, hugging the jacket to my chest and inhaling its leathery scent. ‘Does this mean you like me now?’

  Pres coughed and looked at Jed with exasperation. Jed shrugged in response and grinned.

  ‘I don’t hate you, if that helps,’ he responded, finally.

  ‘It’ll do, for now,’ I said. I tried on the coat, and pride sift
ed through my stomach. I finally belonged.

  ‘Going somewhere?’ Jed asked as Pres headed for the door. The elder vampire turned around and faced us, a wicked grin on his face. ‘It’s her twenty-first birthday, it’s time to go hunting.’

  ‘Good luck.’ Jed waved him off.

  ‘I don’t need luck, I’m a mother fucking vampire.’

  After he’d gone, I stood up to look at my jacket as best as I could in the mirror-less room.

  ‘Check the pocket.’ Jed’s eyes glinted as he looked up at me, waiting with bated breath.

  I slipped my remaining hand into the pocket, and my fingers closed around something hard. I pulled it out and gasped; the ring was ancient, and stunning, a black diamond set in an ornate golden surround. By the time I blinked up through misty eyes, Jed had dropped to his knees.

  ‘Rebecca, I love you, and I want to be the man you call your husband. Your life partner. The man, the vampire, who cherishes you above all others. I love every inch of you, and I will find you in this life and next, as soul mates, destined forever to belong to one another. Will you marry me? '

  I glanced down at the ring as he took it and held it at the tip of my ring finger. ‘You’ll love me even when I’m a one armed senior citizen and you are sporting abs of steel? Can you even get married?’

  ‘I’ll love you even more and where there is a will, there is a way. We have connections in high places.’

  And without pretence, or ultimatums, or restrictions, Jed laid his heart on the line.

  I was all in.

  ‘Yes, god yes!’

  He picked me up by the waist after slipping the ring onto my right ring finger, being that I had no left one, and pressed me tight to his chest, kissing me with all the fire we’d shared all those months before.