Marked: a Vampire Romance (3 page)

At 5:00 AM, Gold decided to risk going home. She was going crazy cooped up in the Chapel. She couldn’t sleep, not only because Adam Luther might come back and set the place on fire, but also because there could be a security guard doing rounds at any minute.

To treat the bite wound, she’d fashioned a bandage out of hand towels and tape, but it took more than an hour for the bleeding to stop. Damn vampires.

After a frantic call home to get Lily to login and brick her phone, she was left pacing, boredom and exhaustion warring for dominant focus. Hours and hours passed and there was no sign of Adam Luther or church security. The clock struck five and the sun hadn’t yet crested the horizon, but it was probably safe to move.

Vampires didn’t risk the light of day, finding their resting places long before the first rays of sunlight illuminated the Earth. But every step she took down the road back to her car was a cautious one. No one was out. Jasperton was a ghost town so early and would be for at least another hour.

She made it back to her car and gave it a quick once over. It didn’t look like Luther had tampered with it. Satisfied, she started it up and drove off. It was a struggle to keep her eyes on the road. It felt like there were ten pound weights attached to each of her eyelids. If she didn’t get a few hours of sleep soon, she wouldn’t be able to function come nightfall. But the drive wasn’t long and she made it home in one piece.

The Jones residence might be called a mansion by some, but they used every square inch of space. Gold, Lily, her mom, two aunts, her cousin Charlie, and occasionally her grandmother all called the place home.

The house wasn’t in Jasperton proper, but was about three miles out and into the country. It sat on ten acres of farmland that had been taken over by forest. They kept the acre around the house clear, but didn’t tend to the rest of it, letting nature take its course. On the other side of their property, farms had sprung up, leaving the Jones house to feel like a magical house in the middle of the heartland.

Gold lived in the most secluded room, a converted apartment over the garage. She had her own private entrance from the outside and a trap door that let her down into the garage. They’d moved when she was eighteen, and as the oldest of the kids, she’d claimed the room for herself.

She pulled her car into the garage and shut the door behind her. She was about to go back outside to go upstairs when the door to the house opened up and Lily came running out.

“Where have you been?” She threw her arms tight around Gold.

“I got caught up. Shouldn’t you be asleep?” She hoped that Lily hadn’t been up all night worrying. Gold had told her to sleep after they got off the phone.

Lily stepped back and looked Gold up and down. Her eyes laser focused on the makeshift bandage on Gold’s wrist. “Mom would kill you if she knew you got hurt! What was it?”

Gold hadn’t been completely forthcoming with her sister. She couldn’t risk Lily doing something stupid. Their mom and aunts were out of town on a zombie hunt in Michigan. Gold was the only fully trained huntress in Jasperton until they came back. One huntress wasn’t equipped to take on two vampires, but if she ignored them, people would die.

If she hadn’t been so tired, helplessness might have set in. Luckily, she was too exhausted for it to hit her too hard.

“We’ll talk after I sleep,” she said. She didn’t give her any more information. It would still be daylight by the time Gold woke up. She’d explain everything then. “I want to talk to both you and Charlie. Be here at 4. We’ll order pizza.”

She gave Lily one last hug and left her in the garage. Each step up to her room felt like climbing a miniature mountain, but she made it and locked the door behind her. Gold stripped off her boots and the holster holding her stakes and a few protection charms. Then she fell face first onto the bed, falling asleep before she realized she was laying down.

Gold slowly became aware of the dream, and as it settled over her, she forgot she was dreaming at all.

She sat in a bedroom, ornate walls covered in gilt and thick wallpaper. It was like something out of a historical movie. She half-expected King Louis to burst through the door at any moment.

She looked down and saw her breasts on display, propped up with the help of a tight corset. Her skirts were in a pile around her, the dress a delicate white with blue embroidery.

Gold reached forward and picked up the dainty china tea cup in front of her. She brought it to her lips and sipped. But it was too hot and she hissed, her tongue burnt.

Then there were hands on her hips and a man bent over, his lips brushing against her ear. "Does my lady enjoy the tea?" Adam Luther’s sexy voice asked.

The promise of carnal satisfaction and the slight rasp sent a shiver down her spine. She’d never called a man to service her before, to give her pleasure, but today he would do anything she asked. "It is not something I've tried before. Quite a different blend. But certainly to my liking."

He kissed along the ridge of her neck, his lips continuing on until they found her spine. "Then I will endeavor to make it splendid." She felt his fingers flit across the ribbons holding her bodice together.

Gold bit back a moan as the dress suddenly loosened, letting her suck in deep breaths she hadn’t realized that she’d been missing. Adam pulled hard, completely undoing the bindings. Her bodice gaped, revealing her naked bosom to Adam’s searching hands. He cupped her breasts, his thumbs skimming over her taut nipples.

Gold bit her lip, trying to keep in the cries of pleasure trying to escape. It had to be sinful to feel this good. Her stomach tightened with every little pull of his rough fingers. The man knew how to use his hands.

He kissed her neck again, nipping against the thick tendon. He did not prick her skin, his teeth blunt and human.

This was wrong.

She knew she should stop him, but then he used his tongue, marking her with it. Gold didn’t want this to end, not when it felt this good.

"Stand up," he commanded, pulling her up, not giving her any chance to refuse.

Gold rose with him and the dress fell, puddling around her feet. Something seemed off about it, like her clothes should not shed so easily, but the dream wiped all doubts away. He pressed his body tight against hers and Gold could feel the hard length of his cock through the fabric of his pants. She reached back, blindly stroking his hard length.

Adam groaned. "Let me pleasure you.” The request was truly a command.

"I want a partner, not a servant," she responded. She turned around, momentarily disappointed that he moved his hands from her breasts. But when she caught sight of Adam Luther, her breath froze in her throat. In the sunlight, his hair was closer to honey than the darker color she’d seen at night. And it was no longer bound, falling loosely around his shoulders, giving him a savage, sinful edge. At night, he was breathtakingly beautiful, but in the daylight, he was an angel of sin, not a demon.

He tilted her chin up and caught her mouth with his own, kissing her in a blinding act of possession. Gold threw her arms around him to keep him close.

Her heart beat fast and she could feel herself growing wet with anticipation, her entire body tightening in preparation for the consummation. Adam’s hand snaked down her body until his fingers found the delicate flesh of her entrance.

Gold jerked in shock at the sensual assault as he circled one finger around the stiff bud of her sex. He dipped his fingers into her opening, stretching her, preparing her for his cock.

She pulled away from him and pushed until he took a step back, his legs hitting the base of the canopied bed. He fell down, taking Gold with him until she ended up splayed over his clothed body.

She picked at his shirt, undoing the buttons, tearing at it when she couldn’t get it off. Then his chest was bare to her, his pants the only bit of clothing left. In a blur, they were gone too, either undone by her or him, she wasn’t quite sure.

Gold slid down until she knelt before him. His cock sprang up before her, hard and proud. She needed to taste it, needed to taste
him
. She’d never felt this aching desire before, had never been so desperate to give pleasure to someone else. But at the moment, she felt that if she did not give this to him, she’d be destroyed.

She took the length of him into her mouth, savoring his masculine taste, his scent. He groaned above her, one hand resting on her head, fingers slightly curled as if he was barely controlling himself from taking hold of her. She swirled her tongue around the head and moved her mouth over him.

His hips jerked and he cursed. She rolled her eyes up and saw him in the throes of pleasure, head tilted back, eyes closed hard, biting his lip tight.

That was when Gold let her hands join the fray, stroking him as well as sucking. He kept bucking against her, the sounds he was making almost inhuman, pure desire broken down into a few syllables.

“Stop,” he gasped out, “Please, stop.” Gold wanted him helpless before her, all pleasure wrung from him. But she pulled back and kissed her way up, climbing on top of his lap and kneeling proudly over him.

He kissed her again like a dying man sending the love of his life off one final time. He poured everything into it, claiming her and being claimed.

“I need to taste you,” he said against her lips.

“I’m yours,” she replied, the words almost a vow. She wanted him just as much.

He positioned himself above her entrance and Gold moaned as the tip slid in. But he didn’t take her. When she tried to push herself down, he resisted, instead kissing down her arm and pulling her wrist between them. He kissed in a circle around her pulse, licking at the bluish veins under her skin.

Gold was on fire, awash in pleasure and desperate for release.

Adam pushed himself deep, thrusting in. Gold cried out in the pleasure of fulfillment but it turned to a sharp cry of pain as she felt fangs dig deep into her wrist. The room went dark, the sunlight pouring in through the windows vanishing as night fell with supernatural speed.

Gold looked down at Adam. His eyes shone red and blood poured down the sides of his lips, pooling on the stark white sheets below them.

She screamed and woke up.

Gold clutched her wrist and looked around the room. The door was still locked and the window closed. Even though she rarely opened it, she got up to check that it, too, was locked. When she sat up, she moaned, her sex still tender from the arousal of the dream.

She almost reached into her underwear to finish herself off, but the thought of pleasure frightened her right now.

Gold changed into a pair of pajamas and returned to bed. The clock on her table told her it was only 8:00. She hadn’t even gotten three hours of sleep.

The curtains over her window kept it dark so when she saw a spot on her wrist, she thought she might have started bleeding again. She pressed down on the bandage to stem any flow before pulling it back to see if the wound had reopened.

Gold gasped at what she saw.

Dark lines split from the two faint bite marks on her wrist, looking like veins, or tree branches. They wrapped around her wrist, not quite making a full circle. On the inside of her wrist, two of the dark marks traveled halfway up her forearm.

A mark.

She’d heard of this, but had never thought it would happen to her. When a huntress was marked, the weight of the family’s curse settled on her. Gold had a destiny now.

She had to kill Adam Luther or die trying.

Adam woke with the dream hot in his mind, the imprint of Marigold’s lips still seared against his skin. He was on fire with desire, the evidence tented in his boxers. He sucked in a deep breath, trying to bring himself under control. Marigold’s scent somehow hung in the air. He could taste her tangy blood on his tongue.

It seemed so real. During the dream, Adam had been transported back into a fantasy version of his old human life. He’d merely been a man intent on seducing an irresistibly beautiful woman.

He glanced over at his bedside clock and saw that it was just past three. Daylight still. While legend had it that vampires were caught in deathlike slumber during the harsh light of day, the truth—as always—was much more banal. He slept like a normal man, though usually not beset by such wicked longings.

Adam rolled out of bed and walked across the dark floor to the bathroom. From the outside, his house appeared to be a modest ranch. The main floor was unimpressive, utterly ordinary. But he’d made over the basement into a palace of decadence and comfort.

His bedroom and bathroom took up more than half the space, a fresco of the rising sun painted across the eastern wall. Stars bedecked the wall, fine crystals embedded that shone whenever the light from the chandelier in the middle of the room hit them. He’d spared no expense on the bathroom, including a tub that could fit half a dozen people and a freestanding shower with a waterfall faucet.

There was no natural light in the basement, so Adam had installed subtle recessed fixtures around the ceiling. The light from those filtered in, giving him just enough to see by without needing to flip on the chandelier.

In the bathroom, he flicked the dimmer switch, which controlled the fake sunroof in the ceiling. Vampire vision was better than a human’s, but he still required some light to see by.

He turned the water on cold and stepped under the thick torrent. It shocked his system, quelling his unquenchable desires and focusing his mind.

Adam slowly lifted up his arm and held it before him. A cracked, dark mark branched up, crawling up from his wrist halfway to his elbow. It looked like dark lightning. He scrubbed against it with his thumb, but the mark didn’t fade or smudge.

Strange.

But it didn’t hurt to the touch and Adam had more pressing concerns than spontaneous tattoos. He’d worry about it if he found a few spare minutes or his arm fell off.

He had hours before sunset and there was no reason to waste them. He finished washing up and climbed out of the shower, drying and changing into a loose pair of sweatpants and a white shirt.

He picked up his tablet and pulled up the internet. Once the search engine loaded he typed “Marigold Jones, Jasperton Illinois” and pressed enter. It was time to do a bit of research.

Gold cracked her eyes open around 2:00. She threw her comforter off and caught sight of the bandage wrapped around her arm. Sick anticipation sparked through her as she picked at the tape and unwound it. There was a small patch of dried blood on the white paper towel, but otherwise she’d stopped bleeding.

The mark was still there in all its black, veiny glory.

She shoved her arm back under the covers and rolled over, trying to pretend that she didn’t see it. But it too was hot under the blanket and ignoring her problems wasn’t going to make them go away.

Gold rose with a groan and shuffled over to the bathroom. She took a quick shower and changed into a pair of shorts and a tank-top. After drying herself off, she stretched out, wringing all of the lingering stiffness out of her muscles. It was what she did every morning—well, in this case, afternoon—when she woke up. A stiff huntress was a dead huntress.

After finishing a few yoga sets, she went back into her bathroom and pulled the first aid kit out of the drawer. A bright white bundle of gauze sat next to a roll of surgical tape. She took them both out and carefully wrapped up her arm, completely covering the mark in three layers of gauze. There was no way anyone would see it by accident.

Gold didn’t want to deal with the questions, or the implications, just yet. She needed more information. And, hopefully, she could wait until her mom got home. She didn’t need anyone else to fight her battles, but she could do with a little advice.

She had to figure out how to take out Adam Luther, and the first step to any successful strategy was research.

Leaving her room, Gold let the warm beams of sunlight pour over her shoulders and arms. She paused for a moment to let the warmth sink in. It was pleasant outside, not the scorching heat that summer would bring.

When she walked in the kitchen door, she saw Lily and Charlie sitting in the living room on either end of the overstuffed sofa, game controllers in their hands. “Can you two come here for a minute?” she asked.

The house had an open floor plan, so her voice carried. For a few seconds, neither of the kids acknowledged her, but then the game paused and they both headed over without bothering to turn off the TV.

Lily was wearing one of those ridiculous fuzzy one-piece pajama suits. When she flipped up the hood, tiger ears popped up on top of her head. Charlie wore ripped jeans and a t-shirt. At 19, he was growing into his gangly height, his shoulders beginning to fill out and his face becoming more defined. Even though he was technically an adult, he hadn’t quite figured out how to comb out his thick brown hair, and it shot out in all directions.

Gold wasn’t his mom and she wasn’t going to tell him to take care of himself. Not with basic hygiene. The kids took their seats while she grabbed a piece of fruit out of the fridge. She then leaned back against the counter, tossing an apple from hand to hand.

“There’s been a complication,” she said. “So until our moms get back, you’re both on sundown curfew.” The declaration caused an immediate uproar.

“That’s not fair!” complained Charlie.

“What?” demanded Lily.

Teenagers. It took a great deal of strength not to roll her eyes. “There’s at least one vampire in town,” she explained. “I might have sensed two.” She held up her wrist and showed them the bandage. Her cousin’s eyes went wide and Lily’s mouth dropped open. But Gold kept talking before they could interrupt. “Disobey and you might die. Don’t make me call Mom.” It felt cheap to rely on her mom’s authority to make the demand, but Gold wasn’t going to risk their lives because of pride. “Any questions?”

The kids talked over each other.

“Can I help?” from Lily.

“Are you sure it’s a vampire?” from Charlie.

They shared a glare and then looked at her expectantly. Gold was glad she didn’t have kids of her own. This shit was exhausting, and she’d just woken up. “Hit the newspapers,” she told them. “Look for any suspicious deaths within a hundred miles. You know the signs.” Even though Charlie was a boy and therefore didn’t have the enhanced abilities and senses of the Jones women, he could spot a vampire attack as well as any huntress.

“And if you go out after dark, I’ll tie you up and leave you to the vampires myself.”