Dracula's Desires

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Authors: Linda Mercury

BOOK: Dracula's Desires
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Books by Linda Mercury
Dracula's Secret
 
Dracula's Desires
 
 
Published by Kensington Publishing Corporation
D
RACULA
'
S
Desires
B
LOOD
W
INGS
LINDA MERCURY
KENSINGTON BOOKS
All copyrighted material within is Attributor Protected.
To Dr. Dad, Ph.D.
 
Dr. Brother, Ph.D. (+ 2 postdocs)
 
Dr. Sister, Ph.D. (+ full tenure)
 
I love you, you irritating overachievers.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Thank you to Cherry Adair, for her Finish the Damn Book Contest, and to Nancy Brophy, writer and critique partner extraordinaire. You went above and beyond for this one, hon. The next several rounds of Scotch are on me!
“H
OPE
”
Emily Dickinson said
hope is a thing with feathers,
delicate, light, and small.
 
I think hope is a giant beast with
fangs, claws, and fur.
It crashes into your life,
mauls and
remakes you in a form
unrecognizable, never before seen.
Then, with a final brutal, ravenous bite to
your mangled heart,
sends you out stronger than you were.
 
—Linda Mercury
O
NCE UPON A TIME
. . .
O
n a wild, evil night in 1431 AD, Vlad II Dracul's second son was born. The parents named their child Vlad, after his father. This child grew up to become one of the most famous torturers in the world: Vlad the Impaler, Vlad Tepes, best known as Dracula. The stories of his atrocities grew even greater when he refused death and became the legendary vampire.
Throughout the centuries, Vlad allied himself with leaders who promised an orderly, centralized government that would control an unruly, chaotic Europe. His goal came to the end when he died in Berlin, another dupe used by Hitler to achieve his crazed goals.
The problem with once-upon-a-time stories? They get the important things wrong.
Vlad II did not have a son. He had a daughter, one he raised as a boy in order to pretend the house had plenty of heirs.
As a youth, Vlad III was sent to the Ottomans as a hostage to ensure peace between Romania and the mighty Turks. Horrible torture became a daily event for the child, fully cementing her self-identity as a man. Many years later, close to his own death, he defied the Dark Angel in order to kill his former oppressors.
Vlad did ally with leaders as varied as Napoleon and Hitler in order to create his vision of a world where women could walk the streets in safety. Blinded by his dream, he did not question himself until it was obvious that the Second World War was a lost cause for the Germans. Vlad faked his own death. Finally, she was able to live as a woman after nearly six hundred years as a man.
Desperate for redemption for her involvement in the war, she hunted Nazis, succeeding until only her brother, Radu Tepes, was left.
That was when Dracula fell in love with a Fallen Angel and completely fucked up her life.
C
HAPTER
1
W
hat in hell was a Fallen Angel doing in Geneva, Switzerland?
That caustic brimstone stench could warn a city of half-dead humans with nose colds busily shoveling manure, let alone a solitary vampire minding her own business. She set aside the ancient manuscript she had been studying and looked out her cheap hotel room's filthy window to take stock.
Aching from yesterday's long drive from Amsterdam to Geneva, Valerie Tate put her hands on the small of her back and stretched, counterbalancing the weight of her six-months-pregnant stomach.
She wasn't interested in being a mother, but her curiosity demanded that she see what happened. Right now, an emissary from Lucifer was happening.
The Fallen appeared as a handsome young man. His sleek swimmer's build combined with pale skin, and cornflower-blue eyes gave him an innocent, wistful air. If he'd been human, she would have contemplated the taste of his blood. Unfortunately, his aura was a sickeningly depressing shade of beige. He had no passion, no flavor. He was a follower.
Valerie preferred fiery men. A man like Lance Soleil, whose aura crackled with ardor, whose hot mouth and hotter intellect had captured her dead and frozen heart.
Her eyes stung with tears. Lance's angelic blood and her subsequent pregnancy had weakened her. Not physically—she was still as strong as ever. In fact, Lance's painful gifts had increased her powers. But it had humanized her as well. Now she wept. Wept! A six-hundred-year-old vampire crying at the slightest provocation? She had executed her own wife without a single moan. Now, she whined like a puppy when she thought of Lance ascending into Heaven and leaving Valerie and his baby behind. That was nothing compared to her past.
She drew back her arm to punch the thin wall by the window, sick of her fragility. As her fist arrowed to shatter the cut-rate plaster, she regained her self-control. Her knuckles lightly tapped the faded gray of the wall.
Stop it.
Six months of her pathetically weak will letting her think of what she no longer had. That was then. This was now.
Lance wasn't worth any more of her time. There was a Fallen Angel to watch. She had to stay focused.
In addition to his dull aura, his overly neat, shiny Italian suit and highly fashionable skinny tie betrayed his vanity. The high-end narrow suit emphasized his sensual build. Honesty forced her to admit that the Angelic Host didn't exactly have what could be called fashion sense. All that gleaming white could get old for the flamboyant sort.
His lack of originality told Valerie that this was not one of the Fallen who had chosen to ride the Wheel to Redemption. He had remained loyal to Lucifer. In short, Lucifer's cannon fodder. His slow ramble toward her dilapidated room did not reveal any danger. He might be insipid, but he might also be good for a laugh.
The dusty gravel cracked and rolled under his feet. His suit rubbed against itself, the expensive fabric shushing in a pleasing fashion. He was making sure she knew he was there. If he'd been coming to kill her, he would have materialized in her room and destroyed her as she lay resting.
As the Fallen neared her door, his innately chaotic nature tugged at her already-sensitive nipples. Paranormal beings had been created to keep the Fallen company. Perhaps this one came to provide solace for her heartbroken state, one lost creature to another. She wouldn't love him, but at least they would understand each other.
Besides, she had heard the best way to get over someone was to get under someone else. She doubted it, though, since the 1400s, Valerie had bared herself to only two lavers: her wife, Ilona, and then Lance. Each of them had destroyed her, freezing her emotions with devastating regret and fear.
Sadly, she set aside any thoughts of a distracting seduction.
As he neared her door, he reached inside his suit jacket. Like a magician pulling a chainsaw from a top hat, the former angel drew a pistol the size of Valerie's forearm.
Valerie raised an eyebrow. Or he could be the universe's stupidest assassin.
She assessed her situation.
Him: Older, meaner, with the advantage of calling high-powered backup.
Her: Pregnant, tired, hungry, pissed off, and trapped in a small enclosed space.
The odds were bad.
Just the way she liked it.
She crouched in a dark corner as the former angel raised his foot and kicked the door into thin splinters.
Bright, high-altitude sunlight flooded the room. Silenced bullets thudded into her flimsy, unmade bed. From headboard to footboard, puffs of dust and feathers flew into the air as the little missiles hit. If she'd been in the bed, she would have been very dead. Shaking with fury, Valerie instinctively rested a protective hand low on her belly.
Silence fell. Gunpowder and feathers hung in the air like pristine snowflakes. In the unreal stillness, her attacker approached the now-destroyed feather mattress. He frowned, confusion all over his vapid face.
“Where is the human's body?” He prodded the ruined twin bed with the barrel of his weapon. “I must find that disgusting abomination of a child.”
Two distant emotions impinged on her battle-ready consciousness. Indignation rose first. What was he doing, striding in like a posturing movie star? This idiot actually believed she, Vlad Dracula, was helpless? As the rest of his words sunk in, wrath took over.
How
dare
he threaten her parasite? She might be less than thrilled to be pregnant, but by Lance Soleil's gleaming wings, no one hurt her child.
“
You do love me!”
the fetus crowed, making its voice known for the first time. Obviously, angel blood bred true. What other being would worry if its mother loved it?
Shut it, kid. I've got a moron to take care of.
Valerie could attack the would-be killer, disarm him, hurt him in ways not even Lucifer could imagine. She could dig her hungry fangs into his neck and feed on his immortal blood. Her claws could rip his brain out of his skull. He was stupid, slow, and careless. Even as ungainly as she was now, she would completely dominate him in hand-to-hand, until his limbs were scattered from the North Sea to the Mediterranean.
“Stop wasting time,”
the growth inside growled.
“Kill him and get us out of here”.
Valerie spared an approving thought toward her uterus. Perhaps this child was a Dracul as well as an angel.
Reaching into the back waistband of her pants, she drew her much more practical firearm.
Her spine tall with family pride, Valerie Tate shot the world's dimmest Fallen Angel right in the head.

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