Fashionably Hotter Than Hell: Book Six, The Hot Damned Series (25 page)

“If you weren’t such an infuriating blowhard asshole, I might actually like you. I usually adore cretins like you, but there’s something wildly unappealing about you,” Satan told him as he conjured a glass of wine out of thin air and took a calculated sip. “I’m a
Fallen Angel
, you imbecile. I have every right to be here,” he hissed venomously as Vlad took another few discreet steps back.

“He’s correct,” Roberto, the Angel in charge said as he closed his eyes and expelled an enormous put upon sigh. “We may not want him here, but he does have the right to be present.”

“Thank you, Roberto.” Satan winked at the annoyed Angel. “I’d say it’s lovely to see you again, but it’s not.”

“And the same to you, Lucifer,” Roberto replied dryly. “How long are you planning to stay?”

“Not long,” Satan assured a somewhat relieved Roberto. “Just long enough to stir the pot a bit—so to speak.”

“I see,” said Roberto as sparks of displeasure began to float around his body. “Satan?”

“Yes?”

“Please do whatever you need to do and be on your way. However, if it includes anyone dying I will smite your sorry ass to Hell and make sure it stays there for a few centuries,” the Angel promised with a benign smile on his angelic face.

“It’s no wonder I fell, you Angels are utterly boring, with no fucking sense of adventure or humor,” Satan said flippantly. “You used to be ssssssssssssoooooo much fun, Roberto.”

Roberto snarled. Satan grinned and blew him a kiss.

When had the Devil developed a lisp? Out of habit, I turned to ask Raquel and realized although she was next to me no one could see her. I lightly touched the air and felt her. Her presence kept me centered instead of distracted.

“Do it now, Satan. Have your fun and be gone,” Roberto snapped.

“So be it. I’ll be right back. I need to get Dracula’s buddies. I locked them in the trunk of my Aston Martin so they wouldn’t get away. It’s so difficult these days to get kidnap victims to play nice. Do you feel me, Roberto?” he asked the now fuming Angel.

“Lucifer,” Roberto growled.

“Don’t get your panties in a wad, Bert,” Satan purred, undeterred as he strolled out of the room. “Stick around. I think you’ll enjoy this. And please don’t any of you think about leaving… I’d hate to have to drag you back in for the show.”

As he left the room, impenetrable iron bars instantly appeared on all the windows and doors essentially trapping everyone in the large ballroom. The shouts of fury came fast and magic flew around the room like bullets. I had a very limited amount of time to put plan B into action, but that didn’t stop me for a second. I felt Raquel’s cloaked hand touch my shoulder and I sprang into action. The melee was actually to our benefit.

“Roberto,” I said as I took the powerful Angel’s arm and steered him to the outside edges of the room that were far less populated. “We believe Vlad is the catalyst in trying to eliminate the Royal Family.”

“Very serious accusation, Heathcliff,” he replied flatly as he glanced down at my hand that held his arm in a vise like grip. “What proof do you have?”

Slowly removing my hand, I gave him a tight smile and a shrug. “Not much at the moment, but if you follow my lead I believe you’ll be able to take the bastard into custody within the hour.”

His gaze narrowed and a small smile played at his lips. “This interests me,” he allowed cautiously. “However, if you’re wrong it will be both you and the Royal Family that will suffer.”

“If I’m wrong, the entire immortal world will suffer,” I shot back.

The Angel stared long and hard as he considered my request. His posture was relaxed, but his eyes revealed his rabid fascination. The Vampyres were not the only ones who wanted to be rid of Dracula…

“Does your King believe this to be true?” he asked.

“I speak for myself, but… ” I started.

“I do believe it to be true,” the King said as he, Pam and Jean Paul quietly approached. “My children have been cursed and disappearing. Vlad is aware of the curse which leads me to suspect his involvement.”

“He has the power to place curses?” Roberto hissed as silver and white glittering sparks flew from his fingertips about his head.

“Calm your fucking jets, Roberto,” Pam advised sharply as she doused his flames with a wave of her hand. “If you blow up the room, we all lose.”

“Pam,” he said through clenched teeth. “Your alliances are spread thin. You are an Angel mated to a
Vampyre.
Why should I believe any of this? The undead are not the most trustworthy race.”

“And neither are the Angels,” Pam added cryptically as she stared Roberto down. “I seem to have a few recollections that might interest a couple of higher ups.”

“Are you threatening me?” he inquired with a raised brow.

“Do I need to?” Pam asked innocently.

The tension was fucking palpable. The standoff was intense and if we weren’t under a time constraint it would have been interesting to watch the deadlock play out. However, time was of the essence. Forcing the hand of an Angel was risky, but the consequences of letting Vlad get away with what he was doing were far more risky.

“Can you cloak and hide you scent?” I asked Roberto, interrupting the silent face off between him and Pam.

The Angel snorted derisively. “Do you have any more ridiculous questions?” he huffed in exasperation as his eyes narrowed dangerously. “I am three thousand years old. What do you think the answer to that ludicrous request is?”

“I’m going to go with a yes on that one,” I replied as I catalogued a reminder to myself to have Pam share what she had on Roberto.

He was an uppity son of a bitch, but I already knew that. Most Angels were. But the truth was I needed him and his self-righteous ass at the moment. Unless we had a witness that wasn’t a Vampyre, we’d have information and accusations coming from only one side. His unwillingness to participate was not working for me—at all.

Wait the fuck a minute… I didn’t need Pam to
tell
me anything. I opened my mind and let it flow to Pam’s. She was ready for me. Roberto’s indiscretion was forefront in her head. Her covert wink let me know she was expecting me. Holy shit, this was good. Roberto was a bad boy.

“Garden of Eden,” I said flatly. “That damn snake was a pesky little bastard wasn’t he?”

Satan’s elongated sssss now made sense. He didn’t have a lisp, he was reminding Roberto of the role he’d played in Eden. I’d always thought the snake was Satan, but I also thought the Pope still wore red shoes.

The Angel’s hiss of rage momentarily made me doubt using the information, but winning was never easy. It would be quite boring if it were simple.

“I can cloak. I can hide my scent, and I can also kill you. Permanently,” he ground out with lips barely moving.

“Perhaps,” I agreed as I felt Raquel squeeze my arm tightly. “But I’d put up a Hell of a fight. It would stand to reason if I have this knowledge others might too. Killing me might open a can of wormsssssssss that would have you spending more time with your comrade in Hell.”

“Enough,” Roberto snapped. “I will do as you ask…
this time
. I will not be blackmailed into anything in the future. Are we clear?”

“Very,” I replied in a clipped tone. “After Satan brings in his guests… ”

“You mean his kidnap victims?” Roberto corrected.

“Semantics,” I replied smoothly, ignoring his sharp intake of breath at my insolence. “After Vlad sees the guests, I’m quite sure he’ll leave the room. Cloak yourself and follow him. I’ll be with you.”

The Angel stared at me through hooded eyes. His lips thinned and he made a low whistling sound through his clenched teeth. “You have large balls for a Vampyre,” Roberto commented.

“Thank you,” I replied trying not to wince at the pinch my mate delivered to my ass.

“Wasn’t a compliment,” he shot back. “You have a plan?”

“I have a plan,” I confirmed as he looked at me doubtfully.

“I will do this more out of curiosity than any allegiance to your Royal Family.”

“I beg to differ,” Pam hissed under her breath.

“What was that?” Roberto inquired.

“I said I feel like a heifer,” Pam lied with a serene smile. “Ate my own weight in whipped cream about a half hour ago.”

Before Roberto could reply a hush fell over the two hundred Vamps and Angels in the great room.

Satan was back and all fucking Hell was about to break loose.

Chapter 21

“No fucking way,” I muttered as I watched Satan stroll back into the room with a terrified entourage—two of them weren’t even dead yet.

“No one will believe this,” Pam said as she yanked out her cell phone and hit record.

This was not what I’d requested and my stomach clenched. I was torn between laughing at the Devil’s selection and roaring that the use of humans,
no matter how amusing,
was unacceptable.

Bela Lugosi was dead and understood the Underworld, immortals and all the rest of the shit that went on under the human’s noses. He apparently enjoyed visiting Hell on a regular basis. There was even a rumor he’d once beat Mr. Rogers at poker—a difficult feat at best. I could only assume Leslie Nielson was also up to speed on the bizarre goings on in the afterlife. His somewhat calm demeanor led me to hope this was accurate.

However, Gary Oldman and George Hamilton appeared to be on the verge of a mental breakdown or pissing themselves. Not good. Not good at all.

All of the men were clad in Dracula costumes from their respective films. The unfortunate atrocious bun—for lack of a better word—on Oldman’s head was at least twice the size I’d remembered from watching the movie. Satan was positively giddy as he lined the four men up on a raised platform at the far end of the large room.

“On three boys,” he directed.

The crowd surged forward toward the evening’s unusual entertainment, but all eyes were on Vlad. He had gone utterly still and red flames began to shoot out around him. It was highly doubtful he would incinerate the Angel’s great room, but the expression on his face didn’t bode well for a damage free evening.

“What is going on?” Roberto demanded as he waved his hands and turned all the bars covering the windows and doors in the room to ash. “What is that idiot thinking?”

I decided to keep the information that Bela Lugosi had been my idea to myself. I figured since Satan had taken it upon himself to bring four Draculas, not just one. I was off the hook.

“It’s a ploy to piss Vlad off and separate him from the Old Guard,” I explained quickly as I took his arm and pulled him to a position closer to Vlad. Losing him would be disastrous. Raquel was next to me. I could feel her even though I couldn’t see her. I made sure Jean Paul stayed close as well.

Roberto’s chuckle took me by surprise. “Fucking brilliant,” he muttered.

Damn it, if I’d known he would approve, I would have taken credit.

“Your Majesty and Pam,” I instructed in a whisper. “Find Ethan, Astrid and the rest. If Satan’s back they should be here too. Get them up to speed and have them ready to fight.”

“But I need to film this shit,” Pam said.

“Trust me. It’s being filmed,” I told her.

Cell phones were out and aimed at both the stage and Vlad. There would have to be major damage control after this one.

“Come,” the King said as he took Pam’s hand and quickly slipped from the room.

And the show continued…

“One, two, three,” Satan bellowed, barely able to contain himself.

“I vant to drink your blood,” the four men choked out in a strangled whisper.

“Louder boys!” Satan insisted. “No one could hear you.”

“I vant to drink your blood,” they said with a bit more volume.

“Better,” the Devil congratulated the frightened foursome. “Now do the thing I showed you. And Leslie, do that thing with your eyes like you did in Airplane. That just slays me,” he said as he clapped his hands together in delight.

It had the makings of a horrific reality show. Bela Lugosi, Leslie Nielson, Gary Oldman and George Hamilton spread out and became something akin to an air guitar rock band as they chanted,
I vant to drink your blood
over and over. Bela was the lead singer. Gary was on drums with his vamp-bun bouncing dangerously to the left. Leslie was on air guitar making googly eyes and I was fairly sure George was on an invisible keyboard. Fucking unbelievable.

“This is for you, Dracula,” Satan yelled as the crowd began to laugh.

Even the Old Guard was shocked enough to chuckle at the mortifying spectacle. However, Vlad was quaking—literally.

For a brief second, I was certain he was going to blow up the room. The flames engulfing his body burned so bright I had to shield my eyes. Clearly Roberto and Satan were on the same page. As Vlad raised his hands above his head in a psychotic rage, he was zapped on two sides from both the Devil and the Angel standing next to me. They weren’t killing blows. They were warning blows.