Ellowyn Found: An MM Vampire Trilogy Omnibus Edition Books 1 - 3

by Kayleigh Sky

  When Otto arrives at the local blood center, Wood is waiting for him. The administrator and owner of the blood center is a vampire named PRYDWEN “Wen” WRYTHIN. Wen confirms that the murdered vampire had been to the center, but he’d refused him services until he could run a report on his card. If the vampire had been with somebody, it wasn’t somebody from Wen’s center, which leads to the probability that the vampire had picked up a blood whore.

  After Otto and Wood leave the center, Wen immediately contacts the prime prince of the SENARA family, which is the controlling family in the area. (This completely changed—there is no “prime” prince.) Because the murder victim was a drainer, Wen is concerned for the prince’s young brother, MORNING GLORY (hahaha—I will update the name from here out, but my sunny Jessa was originally named Morning Glory), who is also a drainer and Wen’s fiancé. He apprises Prince RUNE of the situation.

  By now, it is late in the day, and Otto and Wood split up to reconvene in the morning.

  Early that day, at Senara Castle, JESSAMINE SENARA returned home after having snuck off by himself to take pictures of a particular flower that only grows in open spaces. This is a new type of flower that arose after the earthquakes. Jessa is a florist (nope), though his family will not allow him to work with the public. The Senara’s are very protective of Jessa because of his status as a drainer. At home, Jessa goes out to his greenhouse to work until a servant arrives to escort him to the castle basement and a deep pit where Jessa is confined as punishment for leaving the castle unaccompanied (too cruel). Jessa is young for a vampire, only thirty-three (lopped ten years off him) and has few recollections of living underground so the pit is a scary place for him to be. Jessa’s people are not true vampires but a people called the Ellowyn. Though they are sensitive to light, they are capable of being out in it, and Jessa is vaguely afraid of the dark and definitely afraid of being abandoned. He depends on his family. He is half human, and his mother supplanted his brother and sister’s mother, so by all rights, they should hate him. He is grateful and indebted to them because they don’t, and it upsets him to let them down. Later, his sister, MAL, comes down to him. She’s dressed to go out and Jessa pleads to be allowed to come with her. He wants the opportunity to share time with Mal, but also, deeper down, he is restless and wants a life that is more than just serving. Mal agrees to let him out of the pit, but tells him to stay in his room. She has a date that night but will take him out the following night.

  The next day, Otto and Wood attend the autopsy where they learn that the victim’s tattoo is fake. The cause of death was drowning (no), most likely in the puddle they found him in. Vampires heal better and faster than humans, but a few methods are certain to kill them. Besides drowning, there is exsanguination and fire. Whoever the murderer was, it is definite they wanted the victim dead.

  After the autopsy, Otto and Wood get some lunch and go over what they know. Wood has a group photo taken of the victim and others at the convention. Wood decides that he will take over the interviews of the people in the photo. Wood points out the victim. The photo is a fuzzy black and white and was taken in a dark hall. The victim was ordinary looking, not even noticeably a vampire. He wore slacks, a shirt open at the neck, and a necklace with a stone that, given his profession, was probably a gem. His features are a blur. Wood makes some comment that no vampire should have to paint on a fake tattoo to get human blood. Otto knows Wood is baiting him, but he bites anyway, and they exchange a few sniping comments before Otto suggests ways in which they can avoid actually working together. Wood laughs but agrees. They plan their next moves, but before they can go their separate ways, they get a call that the car Otto requested information on belongs to the Senara family. Otto and Wood agree to meet the next day to interview the family.

  Otto has a habit of hitting multiple bars in random order. His father was an alcoholic who had a favorite hangout and never ventured from it. This is Otto’s way of not being his father, though he’s failing and knows it. That night he hits a club that caters to both humans and vampires. While there, he becomes smitten with a gorgeous (not so much, lol), long-haired boy dancing with a ferociously beautiful female vampire. Otto doesn’t realize at first the boy is a vampire too because his hair is light colored. In the flashing lights of the club, it turns from silver to pink to violet to red. He’ll see later that the boy is in fact a strawberry blond (no blond really), a vampire, and a drainer at that. When he asks one of the bartenders about him, he’s told that he is a Senara (spelling of the name changed by a letter), the younger prince, with his sister Mal. This shakes Otto up. For one thing, since whoever ran from the murder scene was driving a car registered to the Senara’s and Jessa is clearly a redhead, he is now a suspect. For another he’s a vampire and a drainer. Not to mention that Otto’s reaction to him makes him uneasy. It’s too powerful and too visceral. He is deeply attracted and knows he should stay away, but the more he drinks and the more he watches Jessa, the less control he has. Jessa is also attracted to him and watches him. In this sexualized environment, his vampire qualities come out. He’s sluttish (hardly), aware of his power (doesn’t think he has any), but there’s something pure about it, something that keeps drawing Otto to him. They dance and snipe at each other. Then Otto retreats, both because his emotions scare him and it’s unprofessional. He decides to take a position of power and says, “See you tomorrow,” taking pleasure in Jessa’s bewildered look.

  The next day, Jessa learns the police are arriving to interview the family and feels unaccountably nervous. He knows nothing of the murder and has no idea why the police would want to interview them. When he sees Otto is one of the cops, his emotions are all over the place. He keeps to the back of his family where he feels safer, but Otto’s gaze keeps seeking him out. Otto tells the family that he’ll make arrangements to speak to each of them separately. Rune already has an alibi because he just arrived back home the night before and Jessa will admit that he was there, taking pictures of a rare flower, but he only arrived after the crowd had already started to gather and concentrated on getting his pictures. When Wood asks why he ran, he admits he didn’t want anybody to know he’d snuck out. Wen will be there too. When he’s introduced as Jessa’s fiancé, Otto’s gaze darkens, and he starts making snide comments to Jessa. Angered, Jessa decides he feels nothing for Otto at all. He can’t imagine what he saw in him the night before. Besides, he has commitments to his family. During the interview, Wen reveals that Jessa’s donor, ISAAC, was at one time a blood whore. The center has strict rules against illegal blood sales, but Wen can’t rule out that it doesn’t continue to happen outside his control. Isaac’s closest friend is boy named Mateo, whom the victim had selected before Wen refused him service. Mateo hadn’t returned to work, but maybe Isaac could provide some information. Jessa is stricken to think his donor is somehow involved, and when he notices Otto’s narrowed eyes on him, he feels even sicker.

  So, after the interview, Otto and Wood return to the center to interview Isaac and see if they can get a line on Mateo. Otto is primed to be upset with Jessa and dealing with drainers is keeping his memories of his sister Maisie close to the surface. Wood is suddenly all gung ho to solve the crime, and Otto knows it’s because the victim is now a “normal” vampire. Wood despises both drainers and blood whores and treats Isaac like a whore until Isaac lashes back at him. Wood slaps him and Otto loses it. He slams Wood up against a wall, taking him by surprise because vampires are stronger than humans, and manages to get in a few more punches before a security guard rushes in and breaks up the fight. Before Otto leaves, he glances at Isaac and feels a connection. He isn’t sure he has an ally exactly, but he knows Isaac will think about trusting him. He leaves and heads for a bar.

  The next day, Otto isn’t surprised to find himself placed on admin leave. Now that he’s off the case, he suddenly doesn’t want to let it go. After he leaves the station without his service weapon or badge, he sits in his car and reviews what he knows so far. He’s also worr
ied about Isaac, and that bothers him. One, he can’t do much to help him. Two, Wood probably has it out for Isaac. If Isaac was the witness, he’s in danger. Otto’s pretty sure whomever he saw fleeing the scene on the warehouse’s security feed was not the murderer. Later, hanging out at the donor center, Otto sees Wen appear with Isaac in tow. They get in a car and drive away, so Otto heads to the club where he met Jessa, telling himself that he isn’t hoping to see him again. After a few drinks, he drives by Senara Castle on his way home.

  After everything that has happened, Jessa is forbidden to leave the castle grounds. Wen brings Isaac to him. After they leave, Jessa goes looking for Rune, who is home between jobs. Rune is a cartographer, mapping the changes in topography since the original earthquake. Even decades later, smaller quakes still shake many regions. Cracks in the earth release constant steam. Jessa finds Rune in the basement where he keeps a glass-blowing studio. Jessa watches until Rune pauses and turns to him. Then he tries to explain to Rune that he has to go out. He has a business. Rune isn’t sympathetic and merely says that it won’t be forever. He does agree, however, to let him go to the blood bank and work as long as he has Mal or a servant with him.

  The next day Otto wakes to banging on his door. He opens up to two vampires standing on his porch. They tell him they’re taking him to see Prince Dinallah (changed to King Dinallah). Otto says he doesn’t work for the Prince, but one of the vampires gives him a quirky smile. “Today you do,” he says. They take him to Dinallah Manor which is several hours down the coast. Here he meets ZEVERIAH DINALLAH, crown prince of the Ellowyn, and the vampire that secured the peace and now rules all the vampires. Zev tells Otto that he’s being reinstated to investigate the murder and that Jessa will assist him. Otto is confused and wants to know why Zev cares about this one murder. Zev says a vampire masquerading as a drainer is unusual and not the first murder of a drainer. This is news to Otto, and Zev precedes to tell him a real drainer was murdered a few years prior in another district. The main suspect, a vampire named SOLOMON, was able to provide an alibi. Coincidentally—or not, says Zev—Solomon owns an art gallery in a town near Comity. Otto also wants to know why he would work with Jessa (and why the thought of it had his guts in a knot.) Zev explains that if there is a link to drainers, Otto needs a source of information, and also somebody who knows about vampires and will be his entrance to places humans can not go. “I have imposed on the Senaras and Rune has agreed. He over worries about Jessa. You will be his protector.” Otto wonders who will protect him from the emotions he doesn’t want.

  Back in Comity Otto returns to the station to retrieve his service weapon and badge. He doesn’t plan to stay, but his boss waylays him on the way out and says, “Congratulations, Jones. You’ve graduated to lone wolf. You are on your own for real now.” Coming up behind him is Wood who predicts that Otto will fuck this up like he fucked up his sister’s investigation. Otto pops Wood in the nose, knowing that he’s untouchable now, and leaves, but it will upset him, and he heads for a bar.

  Nursing a drink he doesn’t touch, Otto spends the evening arguing with himself over the waste of the booze. He’s investigating the murder of a vampire with a drainer in tow, so why would he care about his sobriety? But he wonders—is this his chance to feel alive again? To have a purpose? He’d lost all hope when Maisie died because he hadn’t been able to protect her. He’d only learned she was a blood whore when she returned home with a necklace she couldn’t possibly have afforded on her own. Neither the necklace nor her purse were with her body, so he assumed she was robbed by the drainer who’d murdered her or by somebody else when she’d lain dead in the park where she was found.

  After giving up on his drink, he leaves for home but hears a call about an alarm at the blood bank and heads over. When he arrives, Wen is snippy with him and clearly doesn’t want him there. Otto tells Wen to get used to him because he’s on the case per Prince Zeveriah. Wen doesn’t believe him at first, wanting to know why Zev would assign a human to the case. Otto just shrugs and tells him “a human and a vampire.” Wen is clearly startled and angry and wants to know what he’s talking about. Otto says that Jessa will be assisting him. Otto isn’t sure why Wen is so upset. He imagines Wen is just possessive and doesn’t want anyone around Jessa, but Wen becomes angry at Isaac too, who was injured in the robbery. Otto hadn’t completely dismissed Isaac from his list of suspects, but he does now.

  Later, Wen meets in private with an unnamed individual. (This will be Solomon.) Wen belongs to a secret group called the Adi ‘el Lumi, and Solomon is the leader of Wen’s cell. The group want the downfall of Prince Dinallah and an end to the peace. Wen is not in the know in regard to the group’s activities. He provides free access to his blood donors and receives support and protection in return. His position as a son of one of the lesser royal families and owner of a blood center have allowed him to rise high enough in the vampire hierarchy to claim Jessa’s hand in marriage. Now he wants Solomon to get rid of Otto. But Solomon tells Wen to just go along; Solomon wants to see where Otto takes the investigation.

  Solomon’s gallery and art studio is in a small town called Coventry (changed) a few hours away. The day after the robbery Otto heads there to check Solomon out. The entire time, he’s going over all the reasons it’s a lousy idea to be working with Jessa while at the same time every cell in his body wants nothing more than to be near him. There is a vulnerability and light in Jessa’s eyes that just draws him in.

  Solomon is out of town, so Otto just looks around the gallery without announcing himself. (Changed all of this, I think.) He sees a vase with an interesting design suspended by cables from the ceiling. Because of the earthquakes, the clerk says, noticing Otto’s attention. He then spots other cables and supports holding the cabinets to the walls. “A lot to lose here,” Otto says. The clerk agrees and points out a glass design in the window. It reminds Otto of Jessa for some reason. A sinuous shape with what appears to be long hair. The clerk tells him that that piece was created by the prime Prince Senara. It is stunning and Otto wonders if Jessa is the model. “The prince displays his art here?” Otto asks. The clerk says, “No. It was bought from another gallery. But it’s beautiful, isn’t it?” Otto agrees. After staring at it for a moment, he decides to take Jessa out and get to know him better since they’ll be working together. At least that’s what he tells himself, though he knows work has nothing to do with his reasoning. But the more he thinks about Jessa, the more he wants to be with him. With his red hair and light eyes, Jessa is like no vampire Otto has ever known before. On his way out he sees a brochure for an art festival that begins in a few days and takes it with him.

  Vampires love to congregate, and Comity boasts many vampire-owned coffee shops and bookstores. Since the Upheaval, the weather is frequently rainy, though not always cold, but when the sun breaks through, the sidewalks are jammed with patio tables and umbrellas for the vampires.

  (From here on, things change a lot, and other things are incorporated into other scenes than I originally intended.) Jessa is excited and eager when Otto suggests getting to know each other over coffee. His feelings of happiness at getting away from his family and Wen make him feel guilty, however, and he has to remind himself that this is a temporary respite from his responsibilities. He is a drainer and looked down on, yet his family loves him. He owes them a debt he can’t repay, and Wen offers him the security of a ready supply of blood. Vampires eat food, but they need the occasional addition of blood to sustain them. Jessa’s life is mapped out, and he can’t let himself be swayed away, but he enjoys his time out. Otto talks about the case, and Jessa is relieved that Isaac wasn’t badly hurt. Otto assures him he wasn’t and then looks thoughtful and asks how close Isaac and Mateo were. Jessa says he doesn’t know. He didn’t even know they were friends until Wen said so. He asks why Otto wants to know, and Otto says, “No reason, just thinking things through.” But Jessa can tell Otto is still suspicious.

  For the next few days, Otto keeps watch
on the donor center, ready to follow Isaac if he emerges, but he doesn’t. He reviews all the evidence up to date. Otto isn’t sure what he’s looking for but the threads all seem loose. A vampire pretending to be a vampire. A jeweler’s convention. An assignation with a blood whore. An artist who was the suspect in a older murder of a vampire, plus Wood’s interview with the attendees at the jewelry convention.

  On the day the art fair advertised in the brochure Otto took from Solomon’s starts, he picks up Jessa, and they head over. Jessa is buzzing with excitement, and despite trying not to be, Otto is happy to spend time with him. Jessa is amazingly beautiful, dressed up with an amber amulet that compliments his hair, which he’s done up in braids. His nails are painted, and with the way he glows, he appears entirely otherworldly. Nothing that Otto ever believed about vampires seems true in Jessa’s case. Otto knows he’s falling for him and losing the ability to convince himself that it’s a bad idea. The show seems like a dead end, but Otto enjoys himself.

  Later, Jessa shows Otto around Senara Castle and takes him to his greenhouse. This is yet another surprising feature about Jessa. Unable to help himself, Otto pulls Jessa to him, and Jessa responds eagerly and passionately (oh yeah, totally not Otto’s move, lol). It takes a while before Otto remembers he shouldn’t be doing this. But then Jessa reveals that his engagement to Wen isn’t a formal contract until the acceptance ceremony, which won’t occur until Jessa is thirty-five. He has never been intimate with Wen, and is, in fact, a virgin. That takes Otto aback, and he pulls away, horrified that not only is he getting involved with a vampire, the species that murdered his sister, but that he might be taking advantage of Jessa. It never occurred to him that Jessa would be a virgin at thirty-three. He wants to keep his distance, but Jessa has other ideas. Otto tries to distract him by talking about the case and Wen. Jessa shows no inclination to talk about the case, and Otto is overwhelmed by Jessa’s surprising heat and intoxicating scent. Eventually, Otto is able to push him away and pacify him with a promise to take Jessa with him on a return visit to Solomon’s shop the next day.