Enticed By Blood: A Sweetblood World Vampire Romance (2 page)

T
he instant Juliette’s
feet touched solid ground in front of the hotel, she doubled over and tried to regain control of her roiling stomach. Andre had been telling her he wasn’t married, then, without warning, he’d swept her into his arms and ran so fast it had made her head spin. She couldn’t even say how they got through the wrought iron gate surrounding the courtyard, because, suddenly, they were just here.

“What…happened?” she gasped.

He stared into the darkness as if he expected the boogie man to jump out, then he jerked open the leaded glass door and shoved her inside.

A shiver ran down her spine when she noticed his eyes. They looked so...strange. Unlike most people when you move from the dark into the light, his pupils were huge, eclipsing all but the thinnest ring of his golden irises.

“Andre, please, you're scaring me. What is going on?” Something out there had spooked him and she wanted to know why.

“I’ll explain later, but I have to take care of a few things first.”

As he spoke to a guy behind the front desk, she stood there, dripping wet and numb, and looked around.

Overhead was a large crystal chandelier hanging from the second story coved ceiling. A baby grand piano stood opposite a small women’s boutique, and high backed chairs were scattered around the brocade carpet in several seating groups. Plastic blocked off the arched hallways on either side of the front desk, reminding her that the place was undergoing renovations. She wondered if there were even any guests here.

Andre soon disappeared, leaving her to follow the hotel clerk upstairs.

A few minutes later, she stood in the middle of a suite located in a private wing on the third floor. Somewhere along the line, she’d been given a thick towel, so she absently blotted her wet hair.

Given the men’s running shoes in the corner, a copy of
Le Monde
on the bed, and the faint hint of Andre’s cologne in the air, this was not a normal guest room. It was his own personal suite.

He expected her to stay with him.

Before she could decide whether she was okay with these arrangements or not, a woman from housekeeping showed up at the door with toiletries and several changes of clothes, including pajamas.

“That was fast,” Juliette said, reaching into her handbag for a tip.

The woman shook her head. “Thank you, but Mr. Lescarbeau has taken care of everything. He left instructions saying if the clothes don’t fit to please call down and we’ll send up something else.”

It sounded like he expected to be gone for a while, which was hard to imagine in this storm. “Did he…ah…say when he’d be back? I…um…didn’t get a chance to ask him.”

“No, ma’am.” The woman reached for the door and hesitated. “When Mr. Lescarbeau goes out like this, he doesn’t come back for quite a little while.”

Juliette wanted to know if he did this often, but she was struck with a different thought. “How long have you worked for him?”

The woman had a faraway look in her eyes. “Oh, let’s see. About ten years, I suppose.”

A long time. Juliette nodded and bit her lip. “Can I ask you a question that may seem a little…unusual?”

With a grin that lit up her whole face, the woman crossed her arms over her chest, lifting her ample bosom. “I’ve seen a lot of
unusual
in my day. Both my grandmother and mother practiced the voodoo arts. Nothing surprises me.”

The housekeeper’s demeanor was non-judgmental, so Juliette continued. “Has Mr. Lescarbeau ever been…married?” She hoped to God the answer wasn’t, “
Oh yes. In fact, he’s married now.
”

“Not to my knowledge,” the woman replied, shaking her head.

Relief rushed over her. So he had been telling the truth. But why had he left San Francisco without even a goodbye in the first place? And tonight, when she’d made several references to him having a wife, why had he not corrected her?

The housekeeper was looking at her with an expression Juliette could not decipher. “That is not such a strange question, dearie.”

Juliette waited for the woman to say more, but she didn’t. “How about girlfriends?” she asked.

“Ah, well, he’s brought a lady friend or two here, but not for quite some time.” It looked as though the woman was going to say something else, but instead, she reached into her pocket and produced a flattened lump of silver roughly the size of a dime. “Here, take this.”

“What is it?” Juliette asked, examining the piece. It had a cross stamped in the center.

“It’s an amulet blessed by the priests at the St. Louis Cathedral.”

She remembered the taxi driving past Jackson Square where vendors sold trinkets and psychic readings right outside the church. She wondered if the woman had actually got it from the church. “What is it supposed to do?”

“Gives you protection,” the woman answered.

Juliette frowned. “Why would I need a protection amulet? Protection from what?”

“To ward off evil spirits. They’re all around us, you know.”

Clearly, this woman’s voodoo roots were showing. She decided to humor her. “What do I do with it?”

“Keep it with you at all times and hold it if you get scared. It will drive away the darkness.”

“The darkness?” Juliette had an odd feeling that this had something to do with Andre.

The housekeeper opened the door and stepped into the hallway. “Yes, be careful, because the nights here are often filled with more than just shadows.”

I
t was well
after two before Andre headed back to the hotel.

He’d circled the property multiple times but had found no trace of the three vampires who’d been watching them. Melding with the shadows to move faster, he’d expanded his radius, combing the nearby cotton fields, the banks of the river and even to the edge of the bayou. A few times he thought he’d picked up their scent in the wind, but by the time he got there, it was gone.

Less than a week ago, he’d tracked the same small group—two men and a woman—to their den, an old cabin in the bayou, where he found empty vials of Sweet littering the rotted floorboards. Unlike most vampires today, they were reverts, choosing to live like their ancestors did by killing and feeding from humans.

Knowing they’d hunt for live human hosts, which would put his neighbors, employees and guests at risk, he’d kicked out several boards in the siding to allow in sunlight the next day. Upon their return, if there wasn’t enough time to seek shelter elsewhere, they’d be weak and miserable once the sun hit their skin. Like having an infestation of rats, if you made their current home unlivable, they’d find somewhere else to live. At least, that was the hope.

He hadn’t heard anything from the reverts after that, so he assumed they’d left the area.

He pulled out his phone. At least his texts to his friend in the local field office had gone through. Guardians were tasked with enforcing vampiric law as set forth by the Governing Council, and reverts praying on people was never tolerated. Mateo was wrapping up a few storm related issues on Canal Street but would come as soon as he could.

He pocketed the phone and trudged up the driveway.

So Juliette knew the truth now…or at least part of it. In an odd way, he felt relieved. This whole time, she’d thought he was the kind of man who would cheat on his wife. That, alone, had been almost unbearable. Honor and respect were very important to him.

But she was going to ask why he left, and he had no idea what he was going to tell her.

J
uliette awoke
with a start in a pitch black room. She bolted upright, unsure of her surroundings, then everything came back to her in a rush.

New Orleans. The storm. The hotel. Andre.

She slid a foot over to his side of the bed. He wasn’t there and the sheets were cold.

Had he not come back yet or had he decided to give her this room and sleep somewhere else?

She groped the nightstand for her phone. Two-thirty.

Reaching for the light, she turned it on but nothing happened. Just the empty clicks of the knob. Maybe that had woken her—the sound of a blown transformer or a tree hitting an electrical line.

She got up, found the robe she'd used earlier, and threw back the heavy curtains on the window. Even though it was dark, she could see outlines of huge branches littering the grounds. Had one of them caused the power to go out? The wind and rain had subsided. Maybe the storm had finally passed.

Curious, she unlatched the window and pushed it open a few inches. A fragrant ripple of air whispered across her face. Jasmine and something else. She loved the smell after it rained. Her mother had too, saying it was the trees and flowers celebrating being alive.

She opened the window wider and inhaled again. As she thought about her mother, her heart grew heavier. It had been four years since she died, and it had rained then, too. When the world was quiet like this was when she missed her the most. And then she thought about her dad. His chemo treatments were going well and the doctors were hopeful, but she still worried about him. Maybe when he was feeling better, she’d bring him down here. He’d like New Orleans. The culture. The food. The beautiful architecture.

Movement beyond the wrought iron fence caught her eye. Under a huge live oak was a small grey structure that appeared to be made of stone or cement. Its open door was banging against the frame in the dying wind. A rhythmic, lonely sound. Somewhere in the distance, a dog barked.

Squinting, she saw other low-lying structures organized in rows behind it and realized she was looking at a cemetery. She shivered and pulled her robe tighter.

And then she heard voices.

Glancing around, she spotted three dark figures off to the left. One was gesturing wildly and pointing at the other two who were wearing long coats that flapped in the wind around their ankles. Although she couldn’t be sure, the first person looked like Andre.

What was he doing outside in the middle of the night during the storm? Were they trying to figure out how to restore power to the hotel? According to the guy from the front desk who showed her to the room, there weren’t many guests on account of the extensive renovations. Just a few people on the first floor. “You’ll have the whole place to yourselves,” he’d said with a smile.

Looking out the window, she couldn’t tell if the three of them were arguing or if Andre was giving them instructions.

She shoved her hands into the pockets of her robe, and her fingers touched the amulet there. She thought about what the housekeeper had said and how worried Andre had seemed earlier. A chill ran through her body and lodged at the base of her spine.

Something wasn’t right. The conversation looked too heated.

As if on cue, one of the figures lunged at Andre. He shot a hand up and moved out of the way so quickly that he was practically a blur. If she blinked, she would’ve missed it.

Then there was a flash of something metallic. With a stabbing motion, the same figure lunged at him again. This time, Andre wasn’t fast enough and he staggered backward.

“Oh my God,” she gasped. Had he been hurt?

She grabbed the hotel phone, intending to call security, but the line was dead. Damn.

Andre held his arm as the two figures circled him.

“Get the fuck away from him!” she screamed, swinging the window wide.

She didn’t wait to see if they’d heard her or if it had any effect. All she knew was that she needed to get help.

As she spun toward the door, something stirred in the darkness behind her. The little hairs on the back of her neck stood up.

She was not alone.

A
ndre jerked
his head in the direction of the scream. The third revert—a woman—the one he’d been asking these two about, was clinging to the side of the hotel. On the ledge, right above his window.

His blood ran cold.

Juliette.

She was in terrible danger. He needed to get to her.

A surge of anger shot through him like a drug, making the pain from the silver blade all but disappear.

With a growl, he launched himself at the nearest revert, the one who had stabbed him and knocked the guy off balance. Unsheathing his own knife, Andre was on him in an instant, slashing and jabbing. The instant the blade struck home, he pushed it to the hilt and twisted. With his heart muscle pierced by silver, the vampire would soon turn to dust.

Andre pulled out the weapon and jumped to his feet, ready to take on the next asshole standing between him and Juliette.

To his surprise, the other revert held up his hands and backed away. “I don’t want any trouble, okay? These two aren’t—” The guy grimaced as he glanced at the body withering at his feet. “—Aren’t my friends. I just met them a few weeks ago.”

He was young. Probably only a few years past his Time of Change, when a born vampire’s cravings began, which would put him around the same age as Etienne. His brother had made some poor choices, too.

“Then get the fuck out of here.” Andre hesitated just long enough to ensure that the guy was indeed leaving and not planning to double-cross him the minute his back was turned, then he sprinted to the hotel and Juliette.

Not wanting to waste time using the door and the stairs, he scaled the wall, just as the vampire had. He’d reach Juliette faster this way.

The muscles in his injured arm cried out with every movement, and energy drained out of his system.

He needed blood. A lot of it. But he couldn’t stop. Not until he got Juliette away from that monster. It would only take a vampire a few minutes to drain a human, so he didn’t have much time.

He reached for the ledge and his hand slipped. “Fuuuuck!”

Hanging on by only the fingertips of his other hand, he willed himself to keep going. Juliette needed him. And he needed her.

With a loud grunt, he pulled himself up and swung inside.

But the room was empty.

Juliette’s sweet scent was mixed with that of the revert’s, the putrid, rotted meat smell of a vampire who only drank human blood.

Heart hammering in his chest, he dragged himself to a locked cabinet in the closet and punched in the code. Grabbing the gun, he jammed in a clip with silver bullets, chambered a round and headed out the door.

On the far side of the hotel’s center staircase, the plastic film sealing off the north wing of the hotel had been torn away.

The revert had taken Juliette there. Half-running/half-staggering, he headed in that direction, each step harder than the last.

He’d been fooling himself, pretending he’d never loved her. That he could go on with his life and forget about her. Once you fall in love, it’s hard to go on without it, no matter how much you try to convince yourself otherwise. And now that she was in danger, he’d risk everything to save her.