Fangs in Frosting (4 page)

The wall is empty, the paint a shade cleaner where the muffin pan hung. It’s gone. I’m too late. I double up with grief and loss, holding my tummy, the mental blow on top of everything else I’ve experienced excruciating. My mother’s pan is gone. Some bastard stole it. I’ll suck his damn blood too.

I look around the shop I’ve put my heart and soul into, memorizing every shelving-filled corner, and painstakingly planned inch. I can’t leave. I won’t leave.

Then sirens wail, announcing the arrival of the police, and I realize this is a lie, because I love Viktor and life more than I love my shop. I run through the back door, barreling down the alley at a speed my built-for-TV-watching form has never before traveled at. I turn the corner, the heels of my practical pumps bending under the strain, and I face the blinding lights of a police cruiser. I meet the officer’s startled gaze as he slams on the brakes.

This is exactly the situation Viktor warned me about, and I freeze, paralyzed by fear. Will the cop shoot me? Arrest me? Stake me?

I’m plucked out of the alley, and a hand covers my mouth, stifling my screams. “Silence, child,” a deep voice murmurs in my ear.

I don’t recognize the voice, but I don’t struggle because the officer has left his vehicle to investigate. I’m held against a hard, leather-clad body, while the young man searches the alley, a gun in his hand. He passes so close to us, I can hear the pounding of his heart, and the blood, the rich, gorgeous-smelling blood, rushing through his veins, but we remain undetected, and eventually the officer gives up, returning to his car to drive away.

I relax. I’m safe. Sort of.

The stranger’s hand drops to my shoulder, his arm remaining across my neck, restraining me. “Who is your maker, child?” His breath blows warm on my cheek.

I don’t hear his heart beating, so I suspect he’s a vampire like me, except he has a few more skills. Okay, he has a lot more skills, but give me a break. I’ve only been a vampire for a couple of days. The skills will come, and then I’ll be a bad ass, especially when I master the bat shifting.

“Child?” the vampire repeats.

I stay silent because I don’t know this guy, and I can’t trust him not to tattle on me. Plus I don’t do what Viktor, the vampire I love, tells me to do, so I’m certainly not obeying a complete stranger’s commands.

His chest pushes against my back as he sighs. “He must be powerful as I can’t read your thoughts.”

Wait a minute! I frown. Can Viktor, that stinker, read my thoughts? If so, I’m in deep frosting as he’ll know exactly where I am.

“I do know where you are.” The vampire himself steps out of the gloom. “Nico. Thank you for taking care of her for me.” Viktor looks extremely pissed off, his face even grimmer and paler than usual. His lips are drawn back, revealing razor sharp fangs, and claws are extended from his fingers.

The vampire behind me stiffens, all his muscles tensing. “I never thought I’d live long enough to meet a child of yours, Viktor.”

“Continue to touch her, and you won’t live to tell about it,” Viktor threatens, his gaze fixed pointedly on Nico’s arm. I shiver at the darkness in his tone.

I’m released, and Viktor pulls me behind him, placing his big body protectively between me and the other vampire. He’s ready for a fight.

Nico’s chuckle holds no levity. “Not a child then, a beloved, and you should thank me.”

I peek around Viktor’s body. The vampire, Nico, is tall and lean, with hair as white as his skin. A deep scar slices his otherwise perfect face in two. He’s a nasty piece of work, yet this tough man is wary of Viktor. I gaze at my lover with new respect.

“Your beloved was seconds away from disaster, putting us all at risk, and your precious blueblood council won’t like hearing that.” Nico’s eyes are shrewd and cold.

“And what do you want from me to keep this quiet?” Viktor cuts through the posturing, and I inhale sharply, realizing now what I’ve done to him. Because of my carelessness, the love of my life is in this heartless vamp’s debt.

“I want your help when I need it, and I will need it. That’s a certainty,” Nico states his terms with a cool indifference.

The two male vampires stare at each other, the animosity between them palpable. This isn’t slightly ticked off. This is a hatred that takes years and years to build up. Viktor is so going to resent turning me.

“You will have my help.” Viktor nods, his face tight, and his jaw jutting. “Come,” he barks at me. He doesn’t use my name or call me his beloved or touch me, and his eyes glow red with rage. After issuing his command, he strides away, not looking back, discarding me like a used cupcake wrapper.

I follow him, my head bowed, all rebellion temporarily snuffed out of me. I stay subdued for a full three blocks, which is a personal record. “Viktor?”

“Not now,” he growls. I didn’t know vampires growled. I thought growling was the exclusive domain of werewolves.

If vampires exist, does that mean werewolves exist also? They could provide insight into the bat shifting. I wait for another three blocks, channeling my inner-bat as I trail him. “Now?”

“No.” Viktor sounds more exasperated than cranky, and my spirits lift. He still loves me, and that’s a good thing because I love him to bits and pieces. He gives me one of his knowing looks.

I remember he can hear my thoughts, and my face heats. It makes no sense to hold back now.
I love you, you big grumpy grump of a hunkalicious vampire, you
.

Not now
.

Holy hazelnut. I can hear his thoughts.
You can’t stop me from thinking, sunshine. When we get home, I’m going to cover you with icing, and lick you clean, starting with those big shovel-toes of yours
. I flood my brain with sexy thoughts and silly endearments as I skip along the curb. Being a vampire is so much fun.

We don’t go directly home. Viktor stops at a cute little bungalow located a block away from his big house. He knocks on the door, and I ring the doorbell, helping my technology-inept vampire lover out.

A gorgeous woman answers. She doesn’t say anything, not one word of welcome, studying me with a dead expression on her face, her dark gaze sweeping over the smudges on my battered yellow shoes, pausing on the manly shirt I’m half wearing, the gaps between the buttons exposing my freckled flesh, before resting on my sure-to-be crazy hair.

Did I mention I hadn’t expected to meet anyone tonight? I look like hell, and she looks perfect. Tall and thin and everything a vampire should be, she even dresses the part, wearing a skin-tight black leather catsuit I could use as a belt.

The vampire chick and Viktor look like they’re made for each other, and I don’t buy that they’re not talking. I’m thinking they’re doing that mind reading thing, intentionally leaving me out of their conversation, and this hurts.

No toe sucking for him, I decide, and I’m not waiting around while he mentally flirts with some undead babe. I walk away, putting an extra wiggle in my walk, shaking more booty than she’ll ever have. Maybe I’ll go find that Nico character, and we can be bitter and evil together. I’ll ask him about the bat shifting. He might know.

Viktor catches up to me easily. He has a big black velvet bag slung over his shoulder, like an evil Santa Claus. “Helena is a friend.” Suddenly he is Mr. Chatty.

“I don’t care.” I sniff, pointing my nose in the air. Then I ruin the effect by tripping over a crack in the sidewalk. Viktor catches me, preventing me from doing a facer into the cement, and I jerk away from his touch.

I’m stressed and angsty, and I really need to bake something. That’ll make me feel better, especially since Viktor’s good “friend,” Helena, is a vampire and vampires don’t eat so they sure as hell can’t bake. I’ll whip up a batch of banana-walnut muffins, making the house smell divine, and I’ll spend hours icing them, losing myself in the joy of creation. When the cupcakes are absolutely perfect, resembling miniature works of art, I’ll feed them to the pigeons because the thought of eating anything other than blood makes my stomach heave.

“You had better have bananas,” I threaten.

His mouth flattens as he holds the front door open for me. “I wasn’t prepared for you.”

If he tells me this one more time, I’ll scream. I get it. He hadn’t planned on turning me. He likely had his red-rimmed eyes on a woman like his friend Helena. Despite my grumbling, I take a deep whiff of his earthy aroma as I pass, because the man smells good.

“That wasn’t what I meant.” He slams the door shut with a loud bang.

I meet his gaze, surprised. Viktor is normally so controlled. “I can’t read your mind, Viktor. I haven’t mastered that skill yet.”

He pulls me to him, our hips bumping together, his hard cock pressing against my stomach, and we turn as one, until my back is against the wall. He has me captured, his dark eyes pinning me into place as surely as any restraints.

His desire hits me first, the emotion so forceful I’m thrown backward. Concern follows, and a heavy sense of failure tempered with regret. Underneath that vortex of feelings is love, a breathtaking fierce yet tender love, a love a woman would search eternity for.

The room swirls around me, disappearing. In its place is a brightly-painted kitchen. I’m in the middle of the space, wearing a bright yellow apron, with a big mixing bowl in my hands. The mix is red, redder than any batter I’ve ever seen, and it smells of blood. Hanging on the wall, displayed proudly, is my mother’s muffin pan. The other me, plump with crazy out-of-control hair, is laughing.

The vision disappears but the joy is left, the joy and the love, and then this vanishes also, as Viktor takes a ragged breath, sucking his feelings back into his soul, concealing them from me once more. “I thought we had more time.”

He pulls my mother’s muffin pan out of his black velvet bag. On top of the rusted cups is a spiral notebook.

“Oh, Viktor.” I blink and blink and blink but this doesn’t stop the tears from rolling down my cheeks. He has my mother’s pan. “I thought it was gone. I thought… I thought…” I slap him on the chest, the contact muted by his shirt. “You broke your own rules, you stinker.”

“For you, Charlotte, my beloved.” Love and desire is reflected in his dark eyes. “I would break all the rules.”

Sweet butter-cream. The man doesn’t speak much but when he does, he turns me into a mushy, half-baked cake. I push my mother’s pan away, and bury my face in his shoulder.

I’m Viktor’s beloved, that was what the bad vampire Nico called me. I’m not up on all this vampire lore, having devoted most of my life to baking the yummiest cupcakes ever, but it sounds like a good title to have.

“It is the best title to have.” Viktor places his finger under my chin, tilting my head upward. “It means you hold my heart for all eternity.” He swipes his thumb over my wet cheeks.

I hold his… “Wait a minute!” I narrow my eyes at him, feigning irritation so I won’t break down and cry again. I can’t take all this emotion. “You’re giving me your non-beating, defective heart? That doesn’t sound like a great deal.” I think about the parts I’d rather have. “Hmmm…” I slide my hand down his chest, reaching the bulge in his pants. “Can I have another part of you instead?” I trace the outline of his broad cockhead and thick shaft.

The corners of his mouth lift. “You can have all of me.”

06 Viktor’s Journal

“I’m thinking a happy yellow.” Charlotte spins around our darkened bedroom, the notebook in her hands, as she ponders painting possibilities. I’ve given her free rein to redecorate because, although I’m now a vampire, I was a man first, and men don’t care what color curtains are. “Something bright and cheerful.”

She’s my something bright and cheerful. I peel off my clothes, as she turns and talks. She’s bubbling over with excitement and happiness, despite my woeful lack of baking supplies. Charlotte wished to immediately try the very first recipe Helena had transcribed for her, but I, according to my beloved, squashed her plans with my depressingly bare pantry.

That was news to me. I didn’t know I had a pantry.

Charlotte tilts her head, a fine red eyebrow raised. I have no idea what she’s asked me. I should have been listening to her instead of watching her breasts bounce.

“You look beautiful in yellow.” Her chattiness must be contagious as I’m not one for effusive compliments. Now completely naked, I strip her of my large shirt and that grubby green skirt.

“That reminds me.” She sticks up one finger. I close my lips round it, sucking on her skin. “I need clothes.” Her voice softens.

I reluctantly release her finger. “But not today.” I lift Charlotte onto our bed.

“But not today.” She sets aside the notebook, her green eyes glowing.

I hand the notebook back to her. “Read, Charlotte.” What I plan to do is best accomplished without the help of her busy little hands. I kiss down her body.

“But I --”

“Read.” I swirl my tongue around her belly button.

Her chest lifts and falls with her small sigh. “Well, if you insist, sunshine.” She opens the notebook, and I watch her expressive face, as I nibble and lick over her hips, exploring every indent and curve.

“Viktor, did you see this?” I get smacked in the head with the book. “The blood tarts weren’t the only desserts they have. Some of these… ohhh…”

I comb through her private curls, finding her heat, and she wiggles under me, her ass swishing against the sheets.

“Some of these cake recipes… Oh, sweetheart…” She squirms as I dip my fingers into her wetness. “Some…” Her voice is breathy. “Some I can tweak…” I flick her clit, and she cries out. “…into cupcakes.” I finger her folds as she thumbs through the pages in the book. I’m looking for her luscious cream. I don’t know what she’s searching for. “Reduce the baking…” I extend my tongue, and lick the glistening moisture off her pink flesh, tasting the most intimate part of Charlotte. “…time. Oh, Viktor.”

The notebook drops on the mattress, and she buries her fingers in my hair, as I bury my tongue in her tight hole, searching for more flavor, more of my beloved.

I almost lost her today, that disaster averted only by dumb luck and the renegade vampire Nico’s presence, and I need to reassure myself that she is here, eternally undead and forever mine. I stroke into her with my tongue as I yearn to stroke into her with my cock, and she pants, pulling at my hair, the pain in my scalp proving this isn’t a dream. I am feasting on my beloved, my Charlotte, and I’m no longer alone. I’ll never be alone again.