Kristen Painter - Blood Rights

Would the comarré be that vulnerable? Probably. The pampered creature had little chance of realizing what she possessed in that ring. Not even Algernon had fully understood it until Lord Ivan’s explanation. How would a comarré know she held the key to a prophecy that might change the world? She was nothing but a blood whore. A piece of property, no different from the ring she’d stolen.

Tatiana smiled grimly. Well now, that wasn’t true at all.

The ring had a future.

Paradise City, New Florida, 2067

The cheap lace and single-sewn seams pressed into Chrysabelle’s flesh, weighed down by the uncomfortable tapestry jacket that finished her disguise. Her training kept her from fidgeting with the shirt’s tag even as it bit into her skin. She studied those around her. How curious that the kine perceived her world this way. No, this was her world, not the one she’d left behind. And she had to stop thinking of humans as kine. She was one of them now. Free. Independent. Owned by no one.

She forced a weak smile as the club’s heavy electronic beat ricocheted through her bones. Lights flickered and strobed, casting shadows and angles that paid no compliments to the faces around her. She cringed as a few bodies collided with her in the surrounding crush. Nothing in her years of training had prepared her for immersion in a crowd of mortals. She recognized the warm, earthy smell of them from the human servants her patron and the other nobles had kept, but acclimating to their noise and their boisterous behavior was going to take time. Perhaps humans lived so hard because they had so little of that very thing.

Something she was coming to understand.

The names on the slip of paper in her pocket were memorized, but she pulled it out and read them again. Jonas Sweets , and beneath it, Nyssa , both written in her aunt’s flowery script. Just the sight of the handwriting calmed her a little. She folded the note and tucked it away. If Aunt Maris said Jonas could connect her with help, Chrysabelle would trust that he could, even though the idea of trusting a kine – no, a human – seemed untenable.

She pushed through to the bar, failing in her attempt to avoid more contact but happy at how little attention she attracted. The foundation Maris had applied to her hands, face and neck, the only skin left visible by her clothing, covered her signum perfectly. No longer did the multitude of gold markings she bore identify her as an object to be possessed. She was her own person now, passing easily as human.

The feat split her in two. While part of her thrilled to be free of the stifling propriety that governed her every move and rejoiced that she was no longer property, another part of her felt wholly unprepared for this existence. There was no denying life in Algernon’s manor had been one of shelter and privilege.

Enough wallowing. She hadn’t the time and there was no going back, even if she could. Which she wouldn’t. And it wasn’t as if Aunt Maris hadn’t provided for her and wouldn’t continue to do so, if Chrysabelle could just take care of this one small problem. Finding a space between two bodies, she squeezed in and waited for the bartender’s attention.

He nodded at her. ‘What can I get you?’

She slid the first plastic fifty across the bar as Maris had instructed. ‘I need to find Jonas Sweets.’

He took the bill, smiling enough to display canines capped into points. Ridiculous. ‘Haven’t seen him in a few days, but he’ll show up eventually.’

Eventually was too late. She added a second bill. ‘What time does he usually come in?’

The bartender removed the empty glasses in front of her, snatched up the money, and leaned in. ‘Midnight. Sometimes sooner. Sometimes later.’

It was nearly 1 a.m. now. ‘How about his assistant, Nyssa? The mute girl?

‘She won’t show without him.’ He tapped the bar with damp fingers. ‘I can give Jonas a message for you, if he turns up. What’s your name?’

She shook her head. No names. No clues. No trail. The bartender shrugged and hustled away. She slumped against the bar and rested her hand over her eyes. At least she could get out of here now. Or maybe she should stay. The Nothos wouldn’t attempt anything in so public a place, would they?

A bitter laugh stalled in her throat. She knew better. The hell-hounds could kill her in a single pass, without a noise or a struggle or her even knowing what had happened until the pain lit every nerve in her body or her heart shuddered to a stop. She’d never seen one of the horrible creatures, but she didn’t need to in order to understand what one was capable of.

They could walk among this crowd without detection, hidden by the covenant that protected humans from the othernaturals, the vampires, varcolai, fae, and such that coexisted with them. She would be the only one to see them coming.

The certainty of her death echoed in her marrow. She shoved the thought away and lifted her head, scanning the crowd, inhaling the earthy human aroma in search of the signature reek of brimstone. Were they already here? Had they tracked her this far, this fast? She wouldn’t go back to her aunt’s if they had. Couldn’t risk bringing that danger to her only family. Maris was not the strong young woman she’d once been.

Her gaze skipped from face to face. So many powdered cheeks and blood red lips. Mouths full of false fangs. Cultivated widow’s peaks. All in an attempt to what? Replicate the very beings who would drain the lifeblood from their mortal bodies before they could utter a single word of sycophantic praise? Poor, misguided fools. She felt sorry for them, really. They worshipped their own deaths, lulled into thinking beauty and perfection were just a bite away. She would never think that. Never fall under the spell of those manufactured lies. No matter how long or how short her new life was.

She knew too much.

Malkolm hated Puncture with every undead fiber of his being. If it weren’t for the bloodlust crazing his brain – which kicked the ever-present voices into a frenzy – he’d be home, sipping the single malt he could no longer afford, maybe listening to Fauré or Tchaikovsky while searching his books for a way to empty his head of all thoughts but his own.

Damn Jonas for disappearing without setting up another reliable source. Mal cracked his knuckles, thinking about the beating that idiot was in for when he showed up again. It wasn’t like the local Quik E Mart carried pints of fresh, clean, human blood. Unfortunately.

The warm, delicious scent of the very thing he craved hit full force as he pushed through the heavy velvet drapes curtaining the VIP section. In here, his real face, the face of the monster he’d been turned into, made him the very best of their pretenders and got him access to any area of the nightclub he wanted. Ironic, considering how showing his real face anywhere else would probably get him locked up as a mental patient. He shuddered and inhaled without thinking. His body tensed with the seductive aroma of thriving, vibrating life. The voices went mad, pounding against his skull. A multitude of heartbeats filled his ears, pulses around him calling out like siren songs. Bite me, drink me, swallow me whole.

Damn Sweets.

A petite redhead with a jeweled cross dangling between her breasts stopped dead in front of him. Like an actual vampire could ever tolerate the touch of that sacred symbol. Dumb git. But then how was she to know the origins of creatures she only hoped were real? She appraised him from head to toe, running her tongue over a set of resin fangs. ‘You’re new here, huh? I love your look. Are those contacts? I haven’t seen any metallic ones like that. Kinda different, but totally hot.’