Authors: Michele Hauf

The Vampire's Protector (21 page)

BOOK: The Vampire's Protector

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It had been ages. Forever. An eternity. And yet...did he still have a choice? He was
not
this creature. He did not want to be.

And when Nicolo reached for the violin and grabbed it by the neck from Summer's hands, the sound of a pistol shot clattered in the sky. Nicolo felt the hot burn pierce his shoulder. Blood scented the air.

And Summer screamed.

Chapter 26

N
icolo flinched his shoulder then closed his eyes and envisioned the bullet that had lodged in his shoulder blade being forced out. It did so, plinking onto a stone that edged the garden pond. Black blood dribbled into his white shirt, then stopped as he healed.

“Are you okay?” Summer asked. “The violin?”

He nodded. A team of three police officers yelled for them to put up their hands.

“Get behind me,” he growled as he straightened and flexed back his shoulders. He turned toward the threat. His horns were starting to emerge again, but he forced them back. He felt Summer behind him. He could smell her anxiety and taste her sweet blood on his tongue. He wanted her. And he wanted to be everything but the Dark Prince for her.

All three officers held aim on him.

Could the music from his past really affect the evil he had become? Slowly, Nicolo raised his hands, the violin neck hung in the crux of his left fingers, the bow still gripped and facing skyward in his right.

One of them shouted to drop the violin. Another quickly corrected his partner that it was a priceless instrument. Set it gently on the ground, he insisted.

Nicolo would do neither. For in that moment he felt Summer's hands clutching at his waist from behind, peering around his shoulder. He was her protector. So he would give this one opportunity a try. It may change him. It may not, for the myriad souls that lived within him could never be crushed.

He had to try it for her.

Drawing the bow across the strings, he trilled out the first few notes. A return to the time he had once held dear, an instrument that had been his constant companion. The beginning of his end. The familiar tones shivered through his system, and he answered her coy tease to play more, faster.

Two of the police officers dropped their weapons at their sides. Their mouths dropped open. The third police officer clasped a hand over his heart and whispered, “Paganini.”

Swept into the music, Nicolo found his home in a simple melody that he'd composed while on a road trip to Parma from Milan. He remembered that soft summer day distinctly for he'd called the coachman to stop so he could get out and walk into the cornflower field, where he stood amidst the blue blooms and had played to the bees, the birds, to the world.

Now sunlight filtered through the trees just behind him. Nicolo danced, his body swaying to the music's control. He caught glimpses of Summer standing nearby, tears in her eyes but a smile on her face. And he knew he could do this. Have her. Live in this realm. And not kowtow to his father.

And in a crackling burst of lightning over the pond, the water momentarily parted, tidal-waving to the edges. And there at the pond's edge stood Himself. With a gesture, the devil Himself sent the policeman away. The armed men turned and walked off, as if there were nothing out of sorts and they had been on a false call.

Nicolo stopped playing and stepped before Summer to protect her. He held bow and violin in one hand at his side. He would never again give
il Cannone
away. It was his heart, his blood and soul.

His innocence.

Himself appeared in horns and hooves. Not a wise decision to walk about in this realm as his true self, but then, he probably had the entire park warded. Though Nicolo couldn't feel any wards. And he generally sensed his father's magic as a biting prickle down his spine.

“I've had enough of that vampiress,” Himself said as he stopped before the twosome. “Summer Rosanne Santiago, you have meddled enoughâ”

“Your vow not to harm her must be honored,” Nicolo reminded. “I have served you well. That guarantees her freedom and safety.”

“Nicolo, what?” she said from behind him.

“Oh, don't you know?” Himself said to her. “He's sacrificed all for you. All these aeons he's been working under my thumb, has been to keep you safe. I thought to break him of that silly love.”

“Aeons?” Summer stepped around to stand beside Nicolo. Her eyes searched his. He felt her breath hush across his arm. The scent of her was too perfect. “How long have you been with him?”

“Too long,” Nicolo said with the heaviness of that time served. No time to explain how time worked differently in Beneath. “It's not important. What is, is that I felt the shackles release when I played this.”

“You still wear the souls of the damned,” Himself growled. “You will always be mine. I am your father!” Himself insisted.

“My father was Antonio Paganini, the man who raised me in the nineteenth century. He taught me how to play violin, he taught me good work ethics, he gave me drive and morals.”

“He turned you into a performing monkey,” Himself spat officiously.

“You say so? Coming from the Master Over All Monkeys? Be that as it may, Antonio was my father. Your evil blood may run through my body, but you will never be more than a slave master to me.”

Himself raged, spreading his arms wide, and from his hands burst out flame. Nicolo stepped before Summer once again, taking the brunt of the flame, yet she could feel the heat surely.

“If you harm her. If you take her life,” Nicolo insisted firmly, “you will mark me as your enemy. And I know you don't want that because you actually do want a son. Someone to be your progeny, to look up to you. I've put on my best performance for you. Now release me.”

“Never!”

“Then from this moment on you cease to exist in my eyes.”

Himself puffed up his chest, but his exhale looked more like defeat than he might have wanted it to. “I cannot take away the power you have now. It is your birthright.”

“Doesn't mean I have to use it for evil.”

Himself clenched and unclenched a taloned hand. “You've no idea how you crush me.”

“As you have commanded and crushed me. I have done everything you have asked of me, without question. Vile, evil things. Things I should wish Summer never learn about. Things I can never erase from my blood. But I have done so out of obligation to our familial connection and because... I do respect your means to an end. Someone must sit the throne of Dark Lord. Without you no one would recognize the good.”

“Y-you respect me?”

Nicolo nodded. He wasn't just speaking to the man's favor either. He did respect him for that reason. He was evenhanded in his punishments and tortures. And he did keep the balance as best he could.

“You will suffer upon this realm,” Himself said. “You are heavy with damned souls.”

“I'll take that risk.”

Himself eyed Summer. She winked at him. “I think this is your cue to leave.”

“Enjoy your madness, Soul Piercer. I can wait for my son to return when you have become ash. That is, if he survives the onslaught of souls. If he remains in this realm they'll want free. That won't be pretty.”

The devil swept his hand before him and extended it toward the pond. A pathway of flame formed, bridging the water and licking at the sky. Himself strode to the center and disappeared in a burst of brilliant fireworks.

“Dramatics,” Summer muttered. Beside her, Nicolo collapsed. “Shit.” Blood drooled from his eyes. And his body convulsed.

“The souls are trying to get free,” he said. “I can do nothing to stop it. They will burst through my pores...”

“No, that'll kill you. We have to get them out of you. How toâ”

She'd simply accepted it when he'd told her he had souls in him, and for reasons she had never been able to put a finger on. He was without a soul. She harmed souls. She had felt him touch her soul when he'd bitten her. If only there was a way to touch those souls within him...

“Oh my goddess, yes!”

She was the Soul Piercer. If she could pierce the souls within Nicolo then perhaps that would grant them freedom.

Without thinking twice, Summer willed down her fangs and plunged them into Nicolo's neck. Blood spurted into her mouth. So hot and it tasted vile, black. The souls he had damned shivered. She could take them out of him. Pierce them all and set them free, and save him from dying. And with hope, the souls could move on to wherever it was they had been destined.

He gripped her shirt, shoving at her in a struggle to loosen her from his neck, but Summer held tight. His blood slipped over her fingers and clothes. “Let me do this,” she managed. “It's our only hope.”

He let his head fall back. And she heard the souls, each and every one of them in succession, scream as they were opened and set free. Aeons? He had been serving Himself for so long? Mercy, but he had been through hell. The prince of Hell. Of Beneath.

But no longer. She would give him the brightness required to exist upon this realm.

“It's working,” he whispered. And then his head lolled to the side and his eyes closed.

Fearful he could die if she took too much blood from him, Summer took respite in knowing he was a changed being, someone as powerful as Himself. And what made him even stronger was his desire for good. So she took more blood until she could not bear to drink another drop. Dropping her head onto his chest, she spread a hand over his heart and felt the life beating within him. Strong, powerful. And then she knew no more.

* * *

The best case would see Summer's soul tainted by those she had tapped within him. Sure, they had escaped, but in the process had left remnants, dark smears upon her soul. Now it was Nicolo's turn to make things right.

With a visceral knowing, he lifted his lover's body under the shoulders. Her head fell back, exposing her neck, which was smeared with his black blood. He sank in his fangs to drink deeply of her soul. He could take Summer's soul into him until they bonded and shared one common soul. It would be the first soul he would wear with pride since the day she had resurrected him from the grave.

Chapter 27

A
week following the daring daylight robbery from the Genoa museum, Summer taped up a cardboard box and handed it over to a delivery service. Inside, she carefully packed in the Guarnerius violin. Technically, it did belong to Nicolo, but he was a different man now. He would find a new violin, one that sang to his new soul, an instrument he could use to speak to the world. Besides, with the press and media reporting on the stolen violin, the return of it should cause a media frenzy and ultimately increase the museum's profits.

Nicolo had decided to continue the concert tour that had been “arranged” by forces Summer still didn't want to question. But he wasn't working for his father, nor did he wield the black violin. That instrument was probably sitting on a shelf in Himself's lair somewhere. Summer got a kick out of imagining the Dark Lord pouting in a cozy little room before the fireplace. Behind him on shelves sat the failed instruments of temptation he had used throughout the ages. Ha!

Her new reality? She was dating, and living with, the Dark Prince. Yes, the King of Beneath's son. And while he had all the power and magic that Himself possessed, Nicolo was a free man and could do as he wished with the birthright that he had accepted as a means to keep her safe. He would wield that power for the good. Or Summer hoped he would. His intentions were pure and beneficent. Only time would tell if a man could honestly remain good with his history of having served in Beneath for aeons.

And she, well, she had taken a few donors since the night when she'd taken all the blood she could from Nicolo and released the damned souls from his body. She'd watched after the donors had gotten up and staggered home. And she'd checked back on them the next day, and the next.

So far? They seemed to be faring well and normal. Was she no longer the Soul Piercer? Nicolo guessed she was not. When he had bitten her they had bonded in blood and soul so he knew things about her now that even she did not know.

But she didn't need to take human donors often. In her lover's arms, she found sustenance, pleasure and happiness. And together, she the Soul Piercer, and he the Dark Prince, they would make it work. They had to. With a baby on the way, they both wanted to ensure their child grew up knowing right from wrong, good from evil, and to never be threatened with the promise of a power that could change lives.

* * * * *

Keep reading for an excerpt from
AWAKENED BY THE WOLF
by Kristal Hollis.

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I hope you enjoyed Summer and Nicolo's story!
I write most of my Nocturne paranormal romances
set in my world of Beautiful Creatures. If you are
interested in reading about the other characters
mentioned in THE VAMPIRE'S PROTECTOR
you can find any story in digital format at your
favorite online retailer.

Vaillant and Lyric's story is
FOREVER VAMPIRE.

CJ and Vika's story is
THE WICKED MAGIC.

Verity and Rook's story is
BEYOND THE MOON.

Rhys and Viviane's story is
SEDUCING THE VAMPIRE.

Johnny and Kambriel's story is
THE DARK'S MISTRESS.

Domingos and Lark's story is
BEAUTIFUL DANGER.