Kiss of Pride

by Sandra Hill

  Jasper tapped his scaly chin thoughtfully. “That is good news, to some extent.” If vangels died before their penance was completed, they did not go to Heaven, but some holding place where they would be judged later at the Final Day. On the other hand, if they’d managed to infest him totally with Lucipire blood, there was a chance they could have converted him to their ranks.

  “Even better, he could live with the Lucipire taint in him. One rotten apple in the barrel type of thing,” Gregori pointed out. “Plus it would be easier for us to track them down. A blood GPS, so to speak.”

  “This is good, this is good,” Jasper said. “We must assign some Lucipires to search that mountain area. And Transylvania, that Pennsylvania town, are we sure there is no presence there?”

  “Not totally sure,” Gregori conceded.

  “Then send a few Lucipires there as well to investigate, but not until after the Sin Cruise. We need all our ranks working on this event if it is to succeed.”

  “As you wish, master,” Gregori said, bowing his head.

  Jasper loved when his captains gave him proper respect. As a result, he softened his regard. “Go and refresh yourself, Greg. And take one of the new Lucipires to play with, if you wish. One of them is especially . . . juicy.”

  Gregori smiled at him, his fangs elongating in anticipation.

  What’ s the protocol for vampire dating? . . .

  Two days later, Alex was still at the castle, in a truce with Vikar over the cleansing ritual, for the time being. Every time she passed by Sigurd, who really was a physician, of all things, she gave him a dirty look that just caused him to laugh.

  “Shouldn’t you be off curing cancer or something?” she’d sniped at him one time when he was watching a Michael Jackson video with Armod.

  “I’m taking a break from curing cancer,” he’d replied in a mocking tone.

  All of Vikar’s brothers, those five in residence now, thought she and Vikar’s growing relationship was a great joke. Frankly, she didn’t get the joke, but that didn’t stop them. She could only imagine what Vikar had to put up with when she wasn’t around.

  “Getting lots of information for my story,” she kept telling Ben whenever he called, but what she was mostly doing was helping to set up some of the completed bedrooms with linens and the bathrooms with towels and toiletries. Comfort activity.

  In some odd way, these days here with Vikar felt like a vacation from her real life. Blame it on some crazy demon vampire taint in her blood, or blame it on her unresolved grief over her daughter’s death, or blame it on her profound loneliness, but she was happy, and it didn’t matter to her if Vikar and his clan were Vikings or vampires or angels or frickin’ Hollywood actors. Maybe later it would, but for now she was riding a wave of “What the hell!” Not that she’d use that word out loud in the vampire angels’ company, not anymore, after having been chastised for it innumerable times.

  So it was like icing on her personal happy cake when Vikar returned to his office after talking with the contractor and said, “We should go out and celebrate.”

  Like a date? she wondered, but didn’t have the nerve to ask as she continued to tap away at her story notes on her laptop. In the distance, she heard the trucks outside gun their motors and drive away. She saved her material and logged off. Only then did she glance up.

  Lordy, lordy, the man was too good-looking, even wearing his sweaty workout clothes, a tank top and shorts and athletic shoes. Muscles rippled everywhere. Especially his broad shoulders and arms, accentuated by the silver bracelets etched with wings that ringed his upper arms. He was a magnificently proportioned thirty-three-year-old male of 2012.

  “Alex! You’re ogling,” he said with a grin.

  She shook her head to clear it, not even bothering to deny his smirking accusation. “You mentioned that we should celebrate. Celebrate what?”

  “They’re done. J.D. just announced that they finished their work, or as much as I contracted for. When they come back tomorrow for me to sign off, they’ll take away any equipment or supplies still lying around. But, bottom line, no more pounding or cursing or screeching saws.”

  Vikar and his big burly brothers could use the F word or crudities like drunken sailors but they cringed like splinters under the fingernail if they heard someone use Jesus or Christ as an expletive. The workers had used lots of those.

  He smiled at her, waiting for her reaction to his news, and she marveled irrelevantly at how white and even his teeth were.

  “Now what?” he asked, noticing the way she stared at his mouth. “If you want to be kissed, you have only to ask.”

  She laughed. “I was just thinking that you must have the enamel of an elephant for your teeth to look so good after so many years, not to mention the havoc blood must wreak. If you run out of vampire angel work, you could always do Crest commercials.”

  “Alex, Alex, Alex,” he chastised her as he sat down on the edge of the desk, way too close. Even sweaty, he was temptation on the Adidas hoof. “When you look at my mouth, you think tooth structure. When I look at your mouth, I think long, slow, deep, soft, wet kisses that last three days.”

  She laughed. “You’ve been watching Bull Durham again, haven’t you?”

  He ducked his head sheepishly. “It’s Cnut’s favorite.”

  “Yeah, right. Blame Cnut.”

  “Some people claim I look like a young Kevin Costner. What say you?”

  Honey, you look ten times better than Kevin Costner. Even a young Kevin Costner. “Not really.”

  He shrugged. “I already called Molly Maids and they’ll be sending a cleaning crew in the morning,” he told her. “Thanks to you.”

  Apparently Vikar had scared off a couple of cleaning ladies one day before she’d arrived, so he’d asked Alex to see what she could do about getting them to come back. Alex had told the local manager that Vikar was an actor and he’d been practicing a scene from a play that had a sword as one of the props.

  “And the dead cow?” the woman had asked.

  “The delivery guy from Peachy’s Market had just left it in the kitchen when it should have been placed in the cooler.”

  The woman had apparently been convinced since she was sending in a crew tomorrow.

  “So you want to go out and celebrate the end of construction and the beginning of cleaning?” she teased.

  “That and Harek’s continuing improvement. He got up and walked a bit today.”

  That turned Alex more serious. “What good news! I know how worried you’ve been.” She was also aware that once Harek was well, Vikar would resume that blood cleansing thing with her. Only this morning Mordr, the crude oaf, remarked in passing that she “still smelled like bloody lemons.”

  “None of the vangels have ever been in such dire condition and survived.” The relief in Vikar’s voice was apparent.

  “Vikar . . . ?” she started to ask, and wasn’t sure how to word her question, “. . . if a vangel ‘dies’ in the course of a penance, do they go to Heaven?”

  He arched his brows at her. “Do you now believe that we are vangels and that there is a Heaven and a God?”

  “It was a hypothetical question. How can I believe in a God and reconcile the death of an innocent little girl? Brian was a grown man and danger was part of his work. But Linda did nothing wrong.”

  “There are some things beyond our understanding.”

  “That is a crock that religious folks feed nonbelievers.”

  Vikar took one of her hands in his and squeezed. “In answer to your question, very few humans go directly to Heaven; first they go to Limbo or Purgatory. There is a similar place called Tranquillity where good vangels go until the Last Judgment.”

  She didn’t believe a word he said, she couldn’t, but still she wondered where Brian and Linda would fit into that picture. Brian was no saint, but he was not a bad man, either. How harsh of a judge would God be? Would a man like Brian be in Purgatory? But where would that place Linda? And, oh my! Does
that mean Linda is alone wherever she is?

  She needed a change of subject, so she asked Vikar, “What would you like to do to celebrate?”

  “We could go to town and have dinner. Maybe listen to some music.”

  “You mean, like a date?”

  He blushed. She loved when the big guy blushed. “I have ne’er been on a date before, but, yes, I suppose it would be a date.”

  “I thought it was unsafe to leave the castle.”

  “I’ll take precautions.”

  “It’s a date then,” she agreed.

  I am going out on a date with a vampire, Alex crooned to herself as she went upstairs to change her clothes. She felt like a teenager invited to her first prom. She had to smile every time she said it to herself: date with a vampire. It could be the title of a romance novel.

  But she wasn’t feeling so romancey when she came down the stairs at six p.m., wearing her little black dress, the one that could be rolled up into her suitcase and shaken out wrinkle-free, along with four-inch stiletto sandals, hair in a neat French braid, makeup just perfect with her favorite Crimson Kiss lip gloss, gold chandelier earrings, and a spritz of Jessica McClintock perfume. Nope, nothing romancey about the sight she beheld waiting for her in the front hallway.

  There was Vikar of course, looking gorgeous in a black silk T-shirt tucked into belted, pleated black slacks, with black loafers. Thin braids with blue aquamarine beads framed his face, with the rest of his hair hanging down to his shoulders. A hunk of a date, for sure.

  But beside him stood Cnut, Mordr, Sigurd, Ivak, and Armod. Each spectacularly dressed, in his own way, whether it be designer jeans and an oxford cloth, button-down shirt, or a turtleneck and blazer. They all, including Vikar, wore identical long black cloaks with angel wing epaulettes, under which there was no doubt an arsenal of weapons fit for a Navy SEAL team. Except for Armod, who wore his Michael Jackson outfit, exposed white socks and all.

  Alex felt like screaming, but instead she burst out laughing. This was going to be the date of the century.

  Twelve

  Dancing: modern man’ s foreplay . . .

  Transylvania feature, Kelly Page 1

  Draft Eight

  What’s it like to date a vampire?

  Well, travel to Transylvania, Pennsylvania, and you might find out. On any summer night, couples stroll the streets of this quaint town, and most of them sport long black cloaks and fangs.

  Every business has a vampire slant, one hokier than the other. But on your date, you’ll want to have dinner and dancing at one of the local clubs, such as the Bloody Stake, where you can get a hamburger or filet as rare as you want, and be entertained by a band called Drac’s Disciples.

  Afterward, you can take a stroll down to the lake where . . .

  “You look beautiful,” he said to Alex as they walked down the main street of Transylvania.

  And sexy, too, truth be told. Especially with those ridiculous shoes that exposed her heels and red-painted toes, their height causing her calf muscles to elongate and her bottom to arch outward. He even liked the freckles exposed on her neck and chest by the round neckline of the tight dress, as well as on her arms beyond the short sleeves, and from her knees downward. And, help! Those miles of sheer silk stockings begged a man’s touch. Not that I’m contemplating touching. Much.

  “You’re drooling,” Sigurd whispered in his ear.

  He slammed his mouth shut, but didn’t check for drool. He was fairly certain Sigurd was teasing. All his brothers had been making mock of him with great glee for days over his obsession with this woman.

  “Did you hear me, sweetling?” he asked. “You look especially beautiful tonight.”

  Alex ignored his compliments, refusing to talk to him as she had since discovering that their date would include not just the two of them but five others as well. When her first reaction had been laughter back in the hall, he’d thought, fool that he was, that she would have no problem with a protective entourage on their date. Hah! She’d quickly let him know that she’d sooner pluck her eyebrows than get into the long black Excursion van—a vehicle she’d immediately dubbed “Testosterone Central.” Had she been implying that they smelled? Did testosterone have an odor? He would have to ask someone. No, he would look it up on the Internet.

  In any case, he’d convinced her to come along. Well, convince was not quite accurate. He’d picked her up and set her in the second row of seats where Armod sat on her other side. Sigurd was driving with Mordr in the passenger seat. Behind them in the third seat were Ivak and Cnut. Svein, Jogeir, and Dagmar were staying back at the castle with Harek.

  And now they were in town, walking down the street, away from the parking lot where they’d left their vehicle, looking for a restaurant that would please them all. He and his brothers wanted one that served beer. Armod wanted one that played music. Alex declined to express an opinion.

  “Alex, be reasonable,” he said, taking her hand in his, lacing their fingers, even though she tried to clench a fist to resist his efforts. He won, of course. “I had to have at least one other vangel with us, in case there are any Lucipires still about.”

  She looked at him. “At least one, huh? How about the other four yayhoos?”

  “Yahoo? Isn’t that someplace on the Internet?”

  “Yayhoo, not Yahoo.”

  Hmm. I cannot wait to call my brothers by that name. Later. “They asked if they could come along. Especially Armod. I could not say them nay. Must be the kind heart I am developing.”

  She made a very unfeminine sound of disbelief, halfway between a grunt and snort.

  “Besides, Armod threatened to play Michael Jackson videos and teach my brothers how to moonwalk if left at home.”

  The image brought a slight smile to her kiss-me red lips, which she quickly pressed together.

  “Just pretend we are alone.” Even he realized how ludicrous that sounded.

  “Pfff! Well, you better not be thinking any threesome, foursome, fivesome nonsense.”

  “Alex! It is a date, not an orgy I am planning.” If I were into planning anything of a sexual nature, it would not involve males other than myself with my very own strawberry-blonde temptress.

  “One never knows with you.”

  “One should know. For the love of a cloud! I may have been a great sinner in my time, but not that kind of sinner.” He would have dropped her hand with disgust, except it felt too good.

  “I can see the way you look at me, Vikar. Don’t deny that you’re thinking something sexual.”

  “I am a man, Alex. A Viking man. We look.” And enjoy. “You cannot condemn me for that. Besides, you look at me the same way betimes.” And I enjoy that, too.

  She raised her haughty nose, but he could see the telling pink tint rise in her neck and cheeks. He squeezed her hand to show her that she was fooling no one, least of all him.

  “What else has you in such a foul mood?”

  “Do you have any idea how ridiculous we look?”

  Vikar glanced around to see what she meant. Ivak and Armod walked in front of them, like the king of cool and his assistant, the prince of pop. Cnut was on Alex’s other side. Mordr and Sigurd in back. An aviator sunglass–clad phalanx in matching black cloaks that kept a close eye on their surroundings, always on the alert for danger.

  “You jest, m’lady,” he said. “Have you looked around this town? Have you truly looked? We are more sedate in our attire than most of these folks.”

  “That’s debatable.”

  “There are cloaks being sold in the shops. Ours are just a little finer. At least we do not show our fangs, or paint our fingernails black, or have weird hairdos.” Except for Armod, who had more grease on his black locks than a skinned pig.

  “The problem is that you guys are just so big. Clumped together like this, I feel like I’m at a pro-wrestler event.”

  Now he was offended, that she would liken him to one of those steroid-ridden freaks. “Do you want to go back to
the castle?”

  She glanced his way and probably saw way too much. “No. Let’s just find a restaurant where we can sit down and blend in. If possible.”

  But they were halted by the sudden stopping of Ivak and Armod, which caused him and Alex and Cnut to slam into their backs, and then Mordr and Sigurd to strike them from behind. “What in bloody hell!” Vikar exclaimed before he had a chance to catch his tongue. Mordr said something much worse. It was only by sheer strength and good balance that they caught themselves and didn’t topple over like dominoes.

  “Whoever has their hand on my butt better remove it at once,” Alex warned.

  “Oops,” he apologized. “I was just making sure you didn’t fall.”

  Five male voices snorted.

  He saw now what had caught Ivak and Armod’s attention. They’d taken off their dark glasses, and their gazes were locked on the glass front of an adult bookstore, a misnomer if there ever was one. It was the least bookish place he had ever seen.

  In the window were displayed the covers of several pornographic videos.

  “The Story of O-Positive,” Armod said aloud. “I don’t understand. Is that like HIV positive?”

  “Idiot,” Mordr said, slapping Armod lightly upside the head.

  “Ah, but I am in the mood for good literature,” Ivak said with a grin. “How about these? A Tale of Two Vampyres. The Stakes of Wrath. Or that one.” He pointed to the left. “Great Neckspectations.”

  “I still don’t understand.” Armod was frowning, although his white skin did color when he craned his head from side to side and realized what one of the pictures depicted.

  “Now me, I always did like a good classic mystery movie,” Sigurd added, also grinning. “A Tomb with a View.”

  Vikar worried that they were embarrassing Alex, but then she said, “My favorite is Vlad Really Did Impale Her.”

  His brothers glanced at him, then Alex, and burst out laughing.

  “Mayhap I will not kill her after all,” Mordr declared, giving Alex a wink that did not sit well with Vikar. Not one bit.

  “Can we buy some?” Armod asked.