“Slade, how will I know whom to feed on and whom not to?” I wanted to know everything about my new life, but food was high on my list of importance.
“You’ll know. You won’t even have to ask.”
We reached the part of the city that never slept, where the nightlife I was never allowed to partake in before my death occurred in secret basement hideouts. Slade guided me expertly through the maze of hallways and doors until we reached the entrance to one of the underground clubs. The band played, the patrons drank sweet wine or hard liquor and danced, while men bought ladies of the night for a quick rendezvous in one of the dark corners of the club.
When I caught the scent of a young lady walking by me, Slade’s words made complete sense. I knew she was the one who would be my first kill. Slade knew, too. He smiled knowingly and guided me behind her, falling in line with her footsteps. The man she was hanging all over couldn’t wait to get her in one of the private back rooms so he could fuck her.
Part of me wanted to wait and watch.
But I was far too hungry to do that. When they reached the dark corner of the back room, the man locked the door behind him. Slade chuckled lightly and turned to me.
“Concentrate on moving through that door without opening it. Change into a puff of smoke and walk through it.”
I focused as he instructed and walked effortlessly through the thick, wood door. Slade followed immediately behind me. We stood in the nearly pitch-black room and watched the couple undress each other as easily as if we were in a brightly lit room. Then I understood my vampire eyes could see better in the darkest night than during the brightest day.
She dropped to her knees and drew his cock deep into her mouth. Her head bobbed back and forth while his hips rocked into her, matching her rhythm. His hands gripped her hair, holding her head still while his hips picked up speed. She moaned, loving the feel of his slick cock sliding against her tongue and hitting the back of her throat.
My gaze drifted up to meet Slade’s, and I saw in his eyes what must have been a mirror of my own thoughts. Desire, for each other. Hunger, for their blood. Excitement, for the thrill of the hunt. Thirst, for the anticipation of the kill.
“Take her now, my love. She’s ready. Her blood will taste sweet.”
I moved from the door to where my victim knelt in less than a blink of an eye. Confusion and fear marred her features. Her heart raced and sounded as loud as stampeding horses. I opened my mouth, preparing to feed as I lifted her to her feet with one finger, and my fangs extended on their own.
Before her screams could fill the room, I’d drained half of her blood and Slade fed on her companion. When I’d taken all she had to offer, I watched her slump to the floor, her breathing slow and labored, her heart barely beating. Slade’s hands covered my cheeks, and he drew me in for a searing hot kiss. The taste of our victims’ blood lingered on our tongues and mixed with our own essences, creating a new and exciting flavor.
While they drifted into unconsciousness and eventually death, my husband and I finished what they’d originally entered this room to do. I assumed her position on my knees in front of him and guided his cock to my lips. I ran my tongue around the head and up and down the length of his shaft.
With our clothes shed, his fingers found my pussy already swollen with desire before he thrust them deeply inside me. “Alea, you have no idea what it does to me to know how much you want me.”
“I do want you. I want all of you.”
He turned me around and pushed on my upper back until I bent all the way forward. “I’m going to give you all you can fucking take of me, and then I’ll give you even more. Every day of your immortal life.”
My lips were poised to respond, but he slammed into me from behind before I could mutter a single word. The sensation of him filling me to the point of painful stretching was the most deliciously erotic sensation. In an instant, I realized just how much he’d held back when I was still mortal. Now that he could lose control and not risk hurting me, his thrusts became more powerful and his drive took him deeper inside me.
Wave after wave, his hips surged into me and my pleasure sensors soon overloaded. With his name on my lips, I tumbled over the edge of ecstasy and into the arms of complete bliss, and he immediately followed.
An eternity of this with him will never be long enough.
After we left the underground club, we walked and talked about the events of the night and how we’d handle what Ramses had done to us.
“I didn’t want this for you so soon,” Slade said, his tone full of remorse. “I had to change you to save you, though.”
“I’m glad you did, Slade. I don’t regret it or hold you responsible at all. Our eternity as a married vampire couple may have started a few years ahead of your plan, but all that matters is we’re together.”
My words seemed to help him accept what he’d been forced to do. What Ramses had forced him to do. But I meant it—there’s nothing I wouldn’t do to ensure we stayed together.
Finding what Ramses had done to my parents was beyond devastating. I don’t even know of a word that describes the hurt, anger, and betrayal I felt. Seeing them left not one shred of doubt in my mind that his sole intention was to kill me too. He wasn’t just after blood—his acts of treachery were very personal and meticulous.
He struck at my parents’ house first from what we could tell from the condition of their bodies. The hardening that occurs in the deceased had already set in. As I stood there, I remembered when my grandfather died. It took a few hours for that to happen to his body, but it scared me when it did. My father patiently explained the same thing had scared him as a child when his own grandfather died. I suddenly realized I’d never hear my parents share stories from their childhoods again. I’d never hear their voices, feel their embrace, or tell them how much I loved and appreciated them.
As if he read my thoughts, Slade wrapped his arms around my waist from behind, rested his chin on my shoulder, and quietly comforted me. “I feel the heartbreak and grief radiating from you. I’d bear the full burden of your pain if I could. What can I do to help? Say the word, and it’s yours.”
His words struck another chord in me, bringing another conversation to the forefront of my mind. Slade and I can never have children of our own, and though I would’ve chosen him regardless, I was suddenly relieved it was impossible. I would never want my children to feel the soul-slashing torment of losing a parent.
“There is one thing you can do, Slade,” I replied after several silent moments. “Make me strong enough to kill Ramses myself.”
The way his entire body tensed behind me spoke volumes before he said a word in response. Our connection was strong before he changed me, but now it felt like we were one person split into two bodies. The way he felt my pain—I felt what he felt.
Hesitation. Concern. Doubt. Empathy. Rage. Regret.
It’s strange to think vampires have all the same feelings humans have, when all the fictional stories cast such a blackness around them. Now that I can speak from firsthand experience on the subject, I’d say it’s actually the complete opposite. As with our enhanced senses, our feelings seem to be multiplied as well.
Slade dropped his forehead on my shoulder and shook his head from side to side while he released a deep sigh. My grief was far too great to appreciate the irony of that act at the time. The deep sigh—a human reaction that concedes defeat to do something we’d rather not do, while knowing the alternative would be worse.
Acceptance of the lesser of two evils.
That somewhat amuses me—now, at least, as I write this entry in my journal. Am I the lesser of two evils?
“You’re worried I won’t be able to stand against him,” I spoke his thoughts for him. “That Ramses will kill me and take me from you. You’re angry with him for what he’s done, and part of you wants to kill him yourself. But he’s your brother, so another part of you doesn’t want it at all. I understand why, and I can’t blame you for being con
flicted.
“But he took my family from me, then tried to kill me. I remember the things he said to me when I thought he was you. He must have had a part in Sean’s death for him to know about that. The last thing I want is to hurt you, but I can’t let him live.”
“What things did he say to you? I came in and found him feeding on you.”
I knew when I repeated Ramses’s words, Slade would be furious and hurt at the same time. Though I suspected his rage would burn hot enough to eclipse the pain of his brother’s betrayal. In a way, I hated to tell him any of it because he’d been with Ramses for over a century before I came along. Ramses is his brother in more than one way—by family name and by vampire clan. Losing that connection would be just as difficult as what I’m experiencing with the loss of my parents.
What I didn’t expect was the quiet and composed demeanor Slade displayed when I finished detailing the exchange prior to his arrival. I expected to feel his muscles tense and for his body to become rigid. But that didn’t happen. I thought he’d yell, break things, and curse. But he remained eerily silent. I pictured him bolting from the house on his own quest to find and kill Ramses, yet he remained in place.
But when he gently turned me around to face him, his appearance shocked me. The love and warmth I’ve always seen and felt in his eyes was gone. In fact, had I not known my husband the way I do, I wouldn’t have believed he was the same man. The icy blue hue of his eyes matched the layer of frost that covered his heart before a flash of deep red flared in them. His vampiric features were more defined than when we fed just a short time before. They were fierce, dark, and inherently lethal.
The timbre of his voice was naturally deeper when his true nature was displayed. But the voice that emanated from my love stunned me with its underlying ferocity. He’d long surpassed upset, mad, angry, furious, or enraged—and welcomed the burn of pure, bitter hatred with his arms wide open.
“I will teach you everything you need to know. I will make you the most feared vampire in the history of vampires. But his head is mine. You can burn his body one piece at a time if you want.
“For your loss, I wanted to give you the pleasure of doing it yourself. Hearing what he said to you changed my mind, though. I have to live an eternity knowing what he said to you, but it’s even worse knowing that you, my love, have to live with an eternity of knowing I wasn’t there to protect you. That was intentional on his part, attacking when I was away. I can’t erase it from your memory, but I will make him wish he’d never been born.”
Chapter 10
Ramses Barnett, 1790
As I write this, I feel as if I have two completely different people warring inside my head. What I did to my brother, the one who’s been by my side and helped me at every turn, was unforgivable even in the cutthroat vampire world. That kind of betrayal just isn’t tolerated against family or friends. If I somehow escape the wrath of my brother’s revenge, other vampires will step up and relieve me of my head for him.
No one wants a traitor in their midst.
They won’t care how terrible I feel for the pain I’ve caused him. They won’t listen to my pitiful excuses for what pushed me to do that to him and his wife. And his household servants. And her parents.
I’m so fucked—and not in the way I prefer.
Here’s where I have to face my own demons. The ones I hide from the world—even my brother. My faults I can barely admit to myself, much less to anyone else. The characteristics that make me who I am are the very things I’m most ashamed of.
He’s my younger brother, but he’s always been the more mature one.
He was supposed to look up to me, but I’ve always admired him.
He was supposed to learn from me, but he has taught me more than I’ve ever taught him.
He was supposed to emulate me.
I wasn’t supposed to want to be him.
I wasn’t supposed to want his life.
I shouldn’t envy my brother and his success, his drive, or his wife.
So there it is—well, part of it anyway. Part of what propels me to insanity. My feelings of being inferior and how I constantly feel the need to prove my worth. The more reckless I became, the more I had to brag about. The more others were afraid of me, the more powerful it made me feel.
I love my brother.
And I hate him.
Because I’m not him, and I desperately want to be.
To make sense, I suppose I should start at the beginning and confess to the things I’ve been doing behind his back. The secret deals and meetings he never knew anything about. The secret plans I’ve crafted and built a team to help me execute every facet.
My team. My army.
My vampire army.
I originally started building it for both Slade and me. I’d planned to speak to him about it and convince him it was the best course of action, but it never seemed to be the right time to broach the subject.
By the time I decided to move ahead with it, my idea had taken on a life of its own. And once I get fixated on something, it’s impossible for me to move on from it. It becomes my obsession.
Thomas has always been an excellent assistant and can run our business almost as well as we can. But for this task, I needed someone else—someone who could keep my secrets until I was ready to reveal them. I needed someone Slade didn’t know and therefore couldn’t control with his powers.
That’s why I found Patrick and befriended him. It didn’t take long to reveal myself to him and show him what I could do. He immediately wanted in, so I turned him, and he helped me build a powerful new clan. Patrick managed my secret house while I traveled. My obsession with Alea threatened our business—and my ability to be in the same city with her and not drink her dry was completely lost. The more I resisted the urge, the more it became unbearable. With her family’s societal standing, I would’ve ruined Slade and myself professionally and personally, along with revealing our kind to the new world.
So I left, and Patrick stayed with Richelle and Corinne while I was away…while I went back to England to ruin Alea’s family’s name along with her precious friend Sean and his family. After Clarence forbade her from seeing me again, my anger ran through me like a rampant fever. The more I dwelt on it, the more it consumed me and pushed me to make the rash decisions that brought me to the state I’m in now.
Sean was the first in a long line of my regrets. I knew it would hurt Alea and make her feel responsible for his demise. That day is forever seared in my memory.
“Hello, I’m Ramses Barnett. You are?” I asked as I approached the handsome young man at the pub.
“Sean Naster. Pleasure to meet you.” He replied with the politeness expected of his station, but he wasn’t sure of my intentions.
I ignored his unease and continued speaking as if I were a long-lost friend. He visibly relaxed and soon engaged in conversation. We spoke of the usual boring pleasantries as we became more and more acquainted. He told me all about his family and their estate. I shared similar stories of my fake family. He excitedly shared the plans his father had for turning the family business over to him, and I voluntarily shared my business experience and offers of advice and help should he need it.
Eventually, we worked our way around to the very subject I was there to speak to him about.
“Which of these lovely ladies around here has caught your affections?” I asked, flashing my warm and friendly smile.
He hesitated and appeared genuinely uncomfortable. He nervously cleared his throat before answering. “My betrothed moved to America and annulled our engagement. I’m in between love interests at the moment, I’m afraid.”
“That had to smart. My apologies for summoning such a painful memory.”
“It did hurt, actually. We were good friends before our parents arranged our marriage. She was the best friend I’ve ever had, and I miss her companionship.”
“You weren’t in love with her, though. Were you?”
“No, I suppose I
wasn’t. I loved her as a friend, but neither of us was too keen on marrying the other. The friendship was solid, but the deeper feelings were not there.”
“I’ve found it’s better to stay unattached for as long as possible. It’s much more fun that way. You’re much too young to be married now anyway.”
“Not according to my mother,” he chuckled. “She’s been inconsolable since the wedding was canceled.”
“Sounds like you could use a long night out with the guys to have a little fun and get away from the pressures of home. I’m sure you have friends who could throw you a fun anti-stag party.”
I watched while my suggestion took root in his mind and became its own living entity. It was the perfect excuse he needed to plan a getaway with his secret lover. His parents would understand his need to escape for a few days with his friends and forget how he was humiliated after losing his fiancée via letter. He could make up any story he wanted about their adventure, and his parents would never know the difference. It was finally his chance to spend an entire night, or several, with his friend.
“You’re right. That’s exactly what I need—to get away and have some fun while I’m still young and single. A night in London, tracking from one pub to the next, checking out the ladies, without responsibilities or a mother obsessing over me, sounds like heaven.” He smiled the first genuine smile of the night as his mind plotted out the details.
“You know, you should go this weekend. The London Festival starts tomorrow, and it should be a howling good time,” I suggested and waited for him to catch up.
“The London Festival? You mean the masquerade party that lasts a fortnight? The one that makes the whole city buzz with excitement? With festivities on every street corner? You are absolutely brilliant. I’m ready to make plans to leave tonight.”
That was my plan—to encourage him just enough that my intentions weren’t obvious. A covert suggestion to persuade him, tempt him, and ultimately trap him. He played right into my hands.
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