by Tara Sampson
BLOOD BOUND
2013 Copyright Tara Sampson
All Rights Reserved
All rights reserved. No parts of this Publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or
transmitted, in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the publisher, nor be
otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that which it is published and without a
similar condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.
All characters in this publication are Fictional and any resemblance to real persons,
living or dead is purely inconincidental.
Acknowledgements:
I would first like to give special thanks to all of my supporters from Wattpad for their unwavering support and encouragement throughout the writing process.
I would also like to thank two very important ladies, Carey Decevito and Alexis LadyDawn St. Onge for all of their editorial advice throughout the writing process. I couldn’t have done this without them.
And finally, I would like to thank my loving and faithful husband, David for always being there when I needed to bounce an idea off of someone and for just being around and listening to me ramble on.
Table of Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 1
It was well after dark when ten year old Shelby Tanner had started her journey home. She had no doubt that her mother and father were going to be very angry with her for waiting so long to leave. Time after time, they had warned her to be home before the sun made its final descent.
It wasn’t her fault though. Her best friend Chris couldn’t handle the fact that a girl had beaten him not twice, but three times at the Super Mario Brothers game. It was Chris that insisted she play that third game which had made her late. He said that it was only fair she gave him one more shot at beating her. But now, with the darkness firmly set in, she was going to be the one in so much trouble.
Bad things happen when the sun goes down cupcake. You must always be home before the sun sets; no exceptions. Shelby recalled the stern words her father had told her just before she left home earlier that afternoon.
With that warning in mind, she pedaled her shiny new pink Barbie bike down the old dirt road as fast as her little legs could take her. Her blond ponytail swung in the nightly wind.
I’m almost home, she thought to herself. Just a little more. If she was lucky, maybe she could sneak in and her parents wouldn’t even know that she stayed out past sunset.
With her plan set, Shelby put all her focus into getting herself home. She was making headway down the road and was so intent on her final destination that she hadn’t even heard the revving of an engine coming up fast behind her. One minute she was huffing and moving her legs in perfect synchronization and the next she was hearing the yell of screeching tires closing in on her.
Shelby glanced over her shoulder just in time to see the large black truck barreling in her direction with the speed of a bullet.
“Oh no!” she screamed letting go of the handle bars just in time to cover her face.
Pain.
Shelby hurt all over. Her toes, her fingers, and even her skin ached excruciatingly. Small whimpers escaped her tiny mouth as she lay there in the grass with her face tilted up to the darkened sky.
Daddy warned her.
Daddy had warned her that bad things happen; and sure enough, something bad did happen.
She was a naughty girl and now, she was going to die.
Shelby could feel it in her bones.
But she didn’t want to die. There were too many things that she hadn’t done yet. She wanted her first kiss. She wanted to be able to go to an R-rated movie. She even hated the fact that she hadn’t had her first period yet. Now, she would have none of those things because Shelby was feeling weaker by the second. Her life was slowly draining from her as she lay so still in the grass and writhed in pain.
“Hush, little one,” a distant voice spoke from somewhere above Shelby. The voice was deep and melodic and strangely enough, calming. She didn’t feel scared or threatened of whoever was near her. She just felt safe.
Shelby had desperately tried, several times to open her eyes and see where the soothing voice had come from but her small broken body had long since stopped cooperating with her.
“W-who are you?” she managed to spit the words out between panting breaths.
A cool finger pressed against her mouth to silence her.
“I am going to help you, sweetheart,” the heavenly voice spoke again. “I am going to make you feel all better.”
Shelby didn’t know who this man was and for a moment, she briefly remembered her parents telling her how dangerous it was to talk to strangers; but this man had just told her that he was going to help her. Surely her parents wouldn’t consider him a bad stranger if he was going to help her?
Weakly, she tried to nod her head but the minuscule movement caused her a tremendous amount of pain. She cried out in her little girl voice as the pain radiated though her small body.
“Hush, little one,” the man said again and pressed his hand against her forehead. The touch was cool and soothing once again, calming Shelby instantly. “It will be over very soon,” the deep baritone voice crooned while lightly brushing back the stray strands of hair that had fallen across her face.
The man removed his hand from her face and Shelby could hear him rustling around beside her. She assumed that he was probably reaching for his cellphone to call 911 and in her small mind, she started to get excited at the prospect of riding in an ambulance with all of the bright lights and sirens being turned on.
“Here we are, sweetheart,” the strange man spoke softly.
Shelby was confused. She didn’t understand what the man meant by that.
What about the ambulance? She wondered and at that very moment, something cool and wet touched her lips.
“Drink,” the voice cooed. “Drink this and you will hurt no more.”
Shelby was hurting really bad and at the time, she would have done anything to make it all go away. She tried to open her mouth but her strength had deteriorated to almost nothing. Frustration was finally starting to get to her. Tears slowly tracked down her cheeks as she tried once more to open her mouth.
It was useless. She was going to die.
“Here,” the voice spoke again and helped to prod her mouth open. With the nice man’s help, the liquid started to pour easily down her throat. The taste was salty and bitter, causing Shelby to gag but she was determined to get it down. He had told her it would make the pain stop and she believed him.
After several minutes of the liquid dripping down her throat, Shelby couldn’t take any more. The taste was awful and she felt like she was going to be sick. Her strength was starting to come back in earnest and as it did, she tried to move her mouth away from the source of that foul drink.
“No, no more,” Shelby whined aloud, trying to close her mouth and get away from it.
“You have to drink a little more,” the man told her. “Come on, sweetheart. Just a little more and it will all be over,” he encouraged.
Shelby didn’t want to drink anymore.
“No!” she yelled out again and the man had to hold her head while forcing just a little more of the liquid down her throat.
“Good girl,” he praised her as she took the last few drops. “You’ll be better in no time,” he said as he pulled the source of the liquid away. “You will never be sick. You will never get hurt again, little one. You shall lead a healthy life. When you turn twenty-one, I will return to you. I will come and take you home.”
Shelby stilled as she slowly opened her eyes. It took some time but when she was finally able to focus on the man who had been so nice to help her, she gasped. It was her knight in shining armor. He was very handsome with his raven black hair and dark midnight eyes. She had also remarked that he sounded funny too; like he wasn’t from around there.
“But who…who are you?” she asked him scratching at her head. She was still a little dizzy but amazingly, she felt almost as good as new. At least, until she glanced down at her own clothing and Shelby could only scrunch up her nose in disgust. Her new jeans were ripped clear up the side and her shirt was covered with blood and dirt.
Mommy and Daddy are going to be really mad now, she groaned.
“I’m Leonardo Risso but you may call me Leo, little one,” he told her with his lips curling up into a hint of a smile.
Shelby wasn’t sure what to make of the handsome man that stood in front of her. He had helped her just like he said he would. Then, he told her that he was going to come back for her when she was twenty-one. That was a really long time to wait—eleven years. A very long time to wait indeed; she would be really old by then. How would he even find her after all that time?
“I have my ways,” he answered her aloud as if he had just read her mind. “You are mine now, my sweet. You are mine forever and always because we are blood bound. When you’re of age, I will complete the ceremony and gift you with something greater than life itself.”
Shelby stared back at the nice man. Even though he was friendly enough, she had a funny feeling that maybe he was a little loco as her mother had said so many times in the past. He wasn’t making any sense to her and that was just a shame because she really liked him.
“Would you like to come home and have dinner with me?” Shelby asked, suddenly remembering her manners.
As soon as the question was out of her mouth, bright headlights appeared as another car was heading in their direction.
“Not this time, little one,” he told her and kneeled by her side. “Soon though; very soon I will.”
And with those words, he pressed a soft kiss to her forehead. Shelby closed her eyes and enjoyed the way his cool lips felt against her warm skin. When she opened her eyes, he was gone. Simply vanished—he was absolutely nowhere to be seen.
Shelby jumped up in her queen-sized bed and gasped loudly for air. Her nightshirt was soaked clean through with sweat and her hair was stuck to her face in complete disarray.
“That damn dream again,” she muttered under her breath.
It was the same dream that she had been having night after night for the last eleven years; the accident, the mysterious man, and his promise—to take her to his home. Over the years since then, she had surmised that it was a bunch of crock. She held no illusions that this man would really show up on her doorstep.
She had long since moved away from her childhood home and there was no way this Leo character would be able to find her now. She was in another country for crying out loud! So why was she continuously being pestered by that god-awful dream?
Knowing that it was useless to try and go back to sleep, Shelby threw the covers off of her and got out of bed to stretch. Rolling her neck and hearing the satisfying cracks and pops, she moved towards the balcony and stepped out into the early morning air. It was still dark outside and the city was oddly quiet. In just an hour or so, the city would come to life—Paris, her beloved City of Love.
She moved to Paris instead of going the typical college route. Shelby took the money that each of her divorced parents had saved for her higher education and flew to a whole new continent in order to start a brand new life. She never did quite fit in back home. She always felt different somehow and none of the boys ever showed the slightest bit of interest in her. She didn’t understand it. She knew that she wasn’t ugly yet she had never even been asked out on a single date—not once.
Shelby had hoped that by moving to Paris, she’d be able to start fresh and maybe even finally have that little love affair she had yet to experience. She wanted to be kissed, to be held and pleased in every way that a woman should be pleased. Was that really too much to ask?
With only two days until Shelby’s twenty-first birthday, her future was looking pretty dismal. She had no handsome man in her life; no warm kisses to greet her when she walked in the door. All she had that was certain were those damned dreams; the dreams that involved her incredibly good looking knight in shining armor and his empty promise that he had made to her eleven years before. It was a stupid little girl promise that she knew better than to hold on to. But it was a promise nonetheless.
Blowing out a breath filled with aggravation, Shelby turned on her heels and stomped back into her apartment. Promises were to be taken with a grain of salt. She had learned that the hard way. Her parents had made her all kinds of pretty promises about how much they both loved her. They loved her alright. They both loved her so much that after their divorce, the both of them had completely ignored her. She was left to go through her adolescence and early adulthood alone.
Promises, she snorted at the thought of the word, they just plain out suck.
Chapter 2
It was a simple notion; the hierarchy of the food chain, that is.
He who is the strongest is the one that survives, Leo repeated the mantra.
After a century of roaming the lands of this great vast earth, he had come to accept that simple fact of life. It was much easier to do so when you were the one that sat on top of that said food chain.
Ricardo Marino stood in the shadows of the alleyway watching his master.
“I can’t believe that you’re actually going to go through with it,” he spat the words out with disgust.
The two of them were creatures that belonged to the night—predators that lay in wait; not beings that took up with a lesser species to play Betty Sue Homemaker.
When Leo made no response, he continued to egg him on.
“You are seriously going to take a bride with…with her?” he asked, unable to say the girl’s name. It was the most despicable thing to ever be done, according to Ric—Leo consorting with a human, of all things.
Leo glanced over his shoulder and glared back at Ric. How dare he belittle his bride-to-be! It had been eleven years since he had first set his plan in motion. He took great care in picking his candidate and in less than twenty-four hours, he would go to her as promised. He would complete the ceremony that made her his for all of eternity.
“She has a name but you will refer to her as Mistress and you will treat her with the same respect that you show me,” Leo stated with an air of dangerousness surrounding him. “She will be your superior and I expect you to bow to her as you bow to me. Understood?”
The warning was in the man’s every word and Ric heard them well. He wasn’t happy with his master’s decision but he wouldn’t dare challenge his decision either. He was no fool.
“Yes, Master,” he answered bowing his head and took several steps back.
The anger emanating from his master was palpable. His fury cautioned him to shut his mouth and give him some much needed space.
After searching his servant’s face for any sign of argumentativeness, Leo stated, “Good,” and turned around to peer out into the
street.
It was time to hunt.
It was time to choose his next victim so that tomorrow, he would be at full strength when he went to his bride-to-be.
It had been hell staying away from her all of those years, sticking to the shadows as he watched her from a distance. As a little girl, she mesmerized him with her unruly blond curls and soft dove-grey eyes. As a woman, she completely captivated him in every way imaginable.
Yes,Leo thought to himself, I chose my bride very well when I saved little Shelby Tanner.
“I’ve found our mark,” Leo said, quietly zeroing in on a younger couple walking down the street. The male and female were holding hands. Young love—it was too bad they had no idea of how soon that love would come to an end.
“Follow me,” he told Ric, wrapping himself in a cloak of darkness, disguising himself from the human eye.
The two stalked their prey down the street and around the corner to where the young couple stopped at a navy blue Toyota Camry in the back of a parking lot. The light that should have lit up the vast space had long since been blown out, leaving only the dim glow of the moon to see by. For beings such as himself and Ric, it was no big deal. Their eyes adjusted well to night vision. Not such a good thing for the unsuspecting couple standing only feet from them, however.
The situation couldn’t have been more perfect if he had imagined it himself. Not another soul was in sight. This was going to be like taking candy from a baby.
Removing his cloak, Leo stood just a step behind the couple.
“Hello,” he said, his tone both inviting and warning at the same time.
The female squealed at the sudden appearance of the two dark men while the male shoved her behind him.
As if that’ll do either of them any good, he smirked internally.
“W-what do you want?” the male said evidently taken by surprise and on guard. “Money?” he asked taking his wallet out of his back pocket and then pulled out a wad of green bills. “Here,” he stated nervously and thrust the cash in Leo’s face. “This is all we have. Take it and just go, please.”
