Alpha Vampire Romance: Vampire’s Mate (Paranormal Shapeshifter Alpha Demon Vampire Romance) (Coming of Age Werewolf BBW Shifter Women’s Fiction Short Stories)
Authors: Rebecca Abbott
Vampire’s Mate
A Vampire Romance
By: Rebecca Abbott
© Copyright 2016 by Rebecca Abbott
All rights reserved.
In no way is it legal to reproduce, duplicate, or transmit any part of this document in either electronic means or in printed format. Recording of this publication is strictly prohibited and any storage of this document is not allowed unless with written permission from the publisher. All rights reserved. Respective authors own all copyrights not held by the publisher.
This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to any person, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
From the Author:
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Chapter 1
The air smelled of fresh wood and smoke, the sounds of the bustling village providing a soft background noise to his thoughts as Dallin worked to form a sturdy wagon wheel to match the one he’d just finished. Already calloused from years of work at the tender age of 19, Dallin’s hands moved skillfully over the nearly finished piece, smoothing bumps and knots to make it perfect.
In the six years that he’d been his father’s apprentice, Dallin’s work was already being praised by the locals. Cannon Upchurch was a patient teacher, but he never let Dallin cut corners or sell shoddy work. Cannon’s standards were high and as a result he made more than a typical woodworker. The father and son drew customers from neighboring villages as well, keeping them busy year-round.
They still struggled, living in a single, wood shack with the rest of the lower class members of South Ungerland. But they had everything they needed, and there was always food on the table. In a time when many people struggled to find their next meal, Dallin was happy to have the life he had.
He continued working, thoughts drifting off as he did. The shop was open on three sides, with the back being solid wood boards held tightly together with thick twine woven between the boards. Dallin rolled his eyes every time he thought about the back wall and its construction. He wanted to use nails, but his father was a miser. With nails being relatively new to the villages outside of the more populated cities, Dallin had been frustrated when his dad balked at the price.
“Father, why not use nails when they’re less than a single pence for one hundred?”
“I have lived since 1620 and never needed a nail. I do not intend to start now.”
Just like that, the discussion was closed and Dallin was dismissed. He tried to argue with his father that he could do so many things that were otherwise quite difficult to manage, but his father was set in his ways.
“But Father, with nails I can produce so much more.”
“Speedy is not equal to quality. If it can be done without nails, we haven’t need to be wasteful.” His father turned back to his work, signaling that the discussion was over. “I’ll not suffer another moment wasted on the topic.”
And just like that, Dallin was left to follow his father’s lead as always.
Unlike his father, whose woodworking talent leaned toward carpentry and cabinet-making, Dallin was a talented wheelwright. With the popularity of phaetons rising, the demand for his wheels was increasing steadily. Since a phaeton had four wheels, he made twice as many per customer than he would for a chaise, which only had two wheels.
Dallin was distracted from his musing by the sound of footsteps passing by in front of their stand.He watched the ground in front of him, listening to the two women as they came closer. Dallin didn’t have to see them to know that it was Esther and her mother coming around the corner.
He kept his eyes down, waiting until they’d nearly passed by to look up. Esther walked on her mother Hannah’s left side, putting herself between Hannah and Dallin.
As her mother spoke, she turned her head slightly and gave Dallin a shy smile. Her green eyes twinkled merrily. Pale-faced with a light dusting of freckles across her pert nose, her curly red hair fell around her face and framed it perfectly.
The sight of her took his breath away. He smiled back and quickly went back to work, looking from side to side to see if anyone had noticed their exchange.
“She’s out of your league, Boy. You’d do best to remember your station in life,” Cannon said, his voice low but without anger.
“She isn’t royalty and people should be able to marry for love.”
“She is beguiling to be sure, but how would you be paying your portion for her hand in marriage?”
Dallin sighed, going back to work and leaving the question unanswered. Esther’s family was wealthy in their own right, though far from nobility. His father was right, but Dallin didn’t care. He would work every hour of the day and night to provide Esther with the life she deserved, even if it killed him.
He put the finishing touches on the wheel and gave them to his father to inspect. The old man looked them over with a critical eye for a moment before returning them.
“That’s fine work, Dallin. Your mother would have been proud of you, Son.” Cannon wiped his face with a handkerchief, hiding the unshed tears from his only son.
Genevieve had disappeared when Dallin was twelve, leaving Cannon to raise their son alone. She’d never been found, and it was something that weighed heavily on both of them. There was always talk amongst the villagers about what could have happened to her, but they would never know. Her body had never been found and no trace of her had ever turned up.
It was like she’d vanished into thin air.
Dallin hefted one wheel in each hand and headed to sell his latest work to the wainwright.
Chapter 2
Esther sat at the dinner table, trying her hardest to hold her temper at bay. With her mother sitting across the table, chattering away without noticing that Esther was silent, it was hard to keep from exploding.
“And then there’s Abraham in Bradenton, who is quite brave and a good provider. He’s already offered quite a portion for you, and tis much more than most men can afford. You’d have a comfortable life and want for naught with him as your husband.”
Esther pushed her food around her plate, ignoring her mother’s chipper voice as she went on incessantly about the pros and cons of each man. Esther dreamed of marrying her prince charming. All this talk of suiters was exhausting her.
“Darling, are you ill?”
Her mother’s voice jarred her out of her thoughts, forcing her to engage in a conversation she wanted to avoid at all costs.
“No. I’m just tired.” Esther shook her head but kept it down, hoping her mother wouldn’t see the telltale pink in her cheeks and realize that she was angry.
“Well if you must, retire for the night so you can rest. We have a busy day tomorrow.”
Esther was shocked.
A busy day
?
“Whatever do you mean, Mother?”
“Our phaeton will be finished on the morrow and we need to find a second horse to pull it.”
“What do we need with a bigger carriage? Tis only you and I traveling around town in it.”
“Darling. It isn’t about need. The phaeton is all the rage in the city and we’ve the best wheelwright in the region. It’s a solid investment and I thought for certain that you would be happy with a second horse and more room in our carriage.”
Esther resisted the urge to roll her eyes, and focused on the task of pushing her food endlessly around the plate. Hannah didn’t understand her daughter and probably never would. The nice clothes, the constant accumulation of material possessions to keep up with what was fashionable now was too much for her. Esther had a simple heart and simple desires.
And the last thing she wanted to be was a kept woman for some old man in another village where she was a virtual stranger.
“May I be excused?” She asked quietly.
“Yes, of course. Shall I accompany you?”
“No Mother, I can make it to my bed.” She stood slowly, though she wanted to flee from the room. She bent low and kissed her mother on the cheek before shuffling off to bed.
She measured her pace so that her mother held onto the notion that she was tired and possibly ill. It would be easier to avoid all this talk of suiters and she could avoid the shopping trip into town altogether if Hannah thought Esther needed her rest.
Esther slipped under the large, hand-made quilt and pulled it up to her chin. She turned on her side, facing away from the door.
It wasn’t long before Esther heard her door creak open slowly, the light of her mother’s candle casting a soft glow on the room.
Hannah stood for a moment, watching Esther sleep. When she was satisfied that Esther was indeed asleep, she closed the door softly and went to her room for the night. The big, empty bed awaited her, and she was counting the days when her husband would return from the latest battle, or if he would return at all.
But fighting the growing vampire population was necessary work, and Nathaniel Hawkes was doing God’s work. Because of his leadership, vampires rarely were able to make it beyond the front line of the human resistance. As long as brave souls like Nathaniel and his men continued the good fight, the rest of the world could rest easy. The empty bed was lonely, but it was worth the sacrifice.
In the other room, Esther listened quietly through the wall. She could hear her mother moving around in the bed, trying to get comfortable. She waited for a few minutes until she was certain that her mother had fallen asleep.
Quietly, she moved the covers back and slipped out of bed. She was still dressed, wearing a heavy gown in deep red. She slid her feet into her slippers and turned to the bed. With pillows lined up just so it was easy to believe she was still lying in the bed. Unless her mother came all the way into the room, she would never know that it wasn’t Esther lying so snuggly beneath the heavy quilt.
She climbed onto the low dresser and out her window. Esther was careful to push the shutters closed completely, making it appear that they were locked from the inside.
Keeping to the shadows, Esther crept along the side of the house and through the rows of modest houses. From a few houses came the sound of quiet laughter or boisterous conversation, but most of the houses were dark and completely quiet.
Esther left the narrow row of homes and stole through the village proper, careful to stay deep in the shadows to avoid detection. She heard footsteps and quickly ducked into a narrow space between stands and waited. She held her breath as two guards passed, talking to pass the time while they protected the tiny village from intruders while the townspeople slept.
“I’ve heard tell that they’re going to start making duty compulsive.”
“That will never work. Some men aren’t born brave.”
“They haven’t a choice. More and more, the vampires are breaking through the ranks and making their way into the villages and woods beyond the battlegrounds. It won’t be long before they’ve made their way here in droves.”
Their conversation faded as they continued, and Esther realized she’d been holding her breath as she listened.
Vampires? Here?
She wondered how much of that was simply idle chatter among the men. Here and there, a vampire had slipped through their defenses, getting closer to the villages than anyone was comfortable with. But, for the most part, the evening patrols were able to catch and kill them long before the villagers were ever in danger.
Esther was willing to bet this was just a case of two young people trying to one-up each other.
She moved on, slipping through the gates and out into the clearing between the main fence and the forest.
When she reached the forest’s edge, she picked up the pace. She knew this area like the back of her hand so the soft glow of the moonlight was sufficient to guide her way. She came upon a small clearing and her breath caught when she saw a man step out of the shadows.