Hellbourne

A Total-E-Bound Publication

www.total-e-bound.com

Hellbourne

ISBN #
978-0-85715-533-7

©Copyright Amber Kell 2011

Cover Art by Posh Gosh ©Copyright May 2011

Edited by Andrea Grimm

Total-E-Bound Publishing

This is a work of fiction. All characters, places and events are from the author’s imagination and should not be confused with fact. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, events or places is purely coincidental.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any material form, whether by printing, photocopying, scanning or otherwise without the written permission of the publisher, Total-E-Bound Publishing.

Applications should be addressed in the first instance, in writing, to Total-E-Bound Publishing. Unauthorised or restricted acts in relation to this publication may result in civil proceedings and/or criminal prosecution.

The author and illustrator have asserted their respective rights under the Copyright Designs and Patents Acts 1988 (as amended) to be identified as the author of this book and illustrator of the artwork.

Published in 2011 by Total-E-Bound Publishing, Think Tank, Ruston Way, Lincoln, LN6 7FL, United Kingdom.

Warning:
This book contains sexually explicit content, which is only suitable for mature readers. This story has been rated
Total-e-burning.

HELLBOURNE

Amber Kell

Dedication

To everyone who writes me notes about how much they enjoy my writing.

I always appreciate positive feedback in a negative world.

Chapter One

It was amazing that the body could still move while the heart was shattering into millions of microscopic pieces. Luc Hellbourne kicked the empty soda can on the street, idly watching it tumble across the asphalt.

All other sensations dimmed next to the pain in his chest.

A bitter laugh burst past his lips.

Homeless.

Why in his father’s hell did he ever start a relationship with an alpha werewolf? It wasn’t as if he didn’t know the man wanted to have a successor, yearned to have children of his own.

It was for the best.
He gave another sad laugh at his new mantra, whispered it to the breeze, stomped it out with each step, desperately trying to believe his own words.

He didn’t know which hurt worse, losing his lover to a woman, or losing the comfort and caring of the pack. Cutting himself away from his pack friends after twenty years of belonging ripped away a huge chunk of his soul.

Remembering the love in Betsy’s eyes when she claimed Bran as her own eased a small portion of Luc’s frozen heart. However, during the mating ceremony, Bran had looked away from his new wife and the longing in his expression as he watched Luc, hit him as if he were struck by a body blow.

He knew in that moment that the werewolf would never accept his fate as long as Luc was near. It wasn’t fair to the pack to have a conflicted alpha. One of them had to leave.

The one who wasn’t pack.

“Get it together.” Tears prickling his eyes, Luc continued his determined march to nowhere.

His guitar case banged painfully against his side as he walked, all the hard edges finding his most sensitive places. He ignored it with the same indifference he coated over his soul to keep moving. His guitar was custom made by his uncle, one of his most prized possessions, and the only thing he’d grabbed on the way out. The rest of his things he’d shoved through a portal to his childhood bedroom. He’d retrieve them when he found a place to stay.

A quick glance around proved he was in unfamiliar territory. An area of town never visited, at least not in recent memory, but then he’d never travelled around the city without companions before. Loneliness formed a hard knot in his stomach.

This was a day for new things.

So far, none of them had been good.

Loud, pounding music caught his attention. It thrummed through his body like a moving heartbeat. As a half fae, Luc felt the notes deep in his soul. Matching his steps to the beat, he turned the corner seeking the source of the sound. A music club stood before him, pulsing notes sliding through the doors each time the bouncers opened them.

The club’s ridiculously overdone stone façade had grinning gargoyles carved over the corners. Words written in bright red paint to resemble dripping blood proclaimed this building
The River Styx
.

Luc had visited, played around and once damn near drowned in the River Styx as a child, and this wasn’t it. The river that granted immunity from death never had a line of goth kids wrapped around the block and there wasn’t one creepy ferryman in sight.

Tempted, Luc decided now was the time to slack his thirst. He hadn’t had a drink in hours. His stomach rolled queasily at the memory of the wedding champagne.

Decision made, he walked straight up the stairs towards the bouncers guarding the door.

“Good evening, gentlemen.”

Damn, the men were impossibly big close up. Luc liked a large man. He let his eyes roam up and down them both. There was the off chance he’d get the crap beat out of him, but he knew how to run if things went badly.

“Good evening,” they replied in unison. The man on the left gave him a small smile, while the one on the right looked at him as if he were a chocoholic finding the world’s last chocolate truffle.

He flashed them both his best smile. “I’d like to go into your fine establishment, what’s the cover charge?”

It didn’t occur to him to stand in line. People who looked like him weren’t meant for lines. It wasn’t vanity. It was a fact. He was a perfect creation by the devil himself and blessed by thirty-six gods and goddesses. There was only one creature as perfectly formed as him.

And father was scary as fuck so he didn’t count.

“No cost for you, sweetheart,” the bouncer on the left announced with a hitch in his voice as the other one nodded mutely.

Flashing another smile, Luc let the man open the door for him.

As he passed he saw the bouncers sniffing at him.

Weird.

He shrugged before banishing the event out of his mind. Having lived with werewolves, he was used to sniffing, but these couldn’t be weres. Bran would never let another pack in his territory.

* * * *

The music was something wild and electric. Not a band he recognised, but it had a good beat and the gyrating kids convulsing on the dance floor were entertaining.

What really caught his attention was the incredibly ugly picture of the devil painted two stories high behind the stage. It grinned evilly at the dancers below, baring razor sharp teeth with two large horns bisecting its ridged forehead.

Luc felt a reluctant smile grace his lips as he walked towards the horrible caricature of the Lord of the Underworld. The temptation to send a photo of it to his father struck him hard. He whipped out his cell phone, took a picture, and with a wicked grin, beamed it to his father’s phone.

Strange, how his father could receive messages in hell when Luc could barely keep his reception a block away from the cell tower. Maybe giving in to satanic powers gave a person magic cell phone vibes. Shaking his head at his whimsical thoughts, Luc put his phone back in his pocket and headed for the long bar dominating the far side of the room. The pain in his chest eased a bit with his amusement.

Before he could raise his hand, the bartender appeared before him. Luc blinked. He could’ve sworn the man was on the other side of the long counter not two seconds before.

The bartender’s hair matched the shiny bar, both a lustrous brown. Luc received a smile with white, white teeth and sparkling sea blue eyes. He reminded Luc of a selkie he’d known once upon a time.

“What can I get for you, sir? Would you like me to tuck your case behind the bar?” the bartender asked, his smooth baritone cutting through the loud music.

Sir? Wow, his boss must be really strict.

“Yes, thank you.” Luc handed his case over.

“I’ll take the darkest beer you have on tap. Just keep them coming.” It took a lot of beer to get him drunk. Tonight, he felt properly motivated.

He ignored the sympathetic, probing gaze that came with the beer. The bartender obviously knew a heartbroken sap when he saw one.

The cool liquor soothed Luc’s throat. Sipping his drink, he turned to watch the dancers as the yeasty brew hit his tongue.

Poor kids, they really lack rhythm.
He had a brief thought of showing them how to dance, but a particularly enthusiastic frenzy made him rethink the idea.

They were beyond help. With a sigh, Luc took another sip of beer.

After a while he decided to go sit closer to the band, the people on either side of him were getting too close for comfort and he didn’t feel like being squished between hard, sweaty bodies.

How unlike him.

It took little effort to find a table. He just sent mental
go away
vibes to a group and had them vacate.

He wasn’t in the mood for subtle.

Once seated at the table a cute blond waiter, all blue eyes and scattery curls, rushed forwards to take his order. His nametag said
Jerrod
.

“Do you have any food here?”

The waiter swallowed. “You’re fae.”

“Only half,” he said, hoping the short answer would encourage the kid to take his order.

“Wow. I—I’ve never met a fae before.” The waiter stared at him with a kind of wondrous awe as if he’d run across a pot of gold at the end of a rainbow.

Damn, he forgot how his fae vibes affected those who weren’t wolf breed. Werewolves were immune to glamour. One of the many reasons he’d stayed inside the pack for so long. There was only so much fawning a man could take on a day-to-day basis, despite what father said.

“Does that mean you don’t have food?”

“Oh, sorry. Here you go.” The blond blushed brightly as he whipped out a menu from his apron pocket.

Folded accordion style it listed a miniscule amount of bar food, most of it fried.

Luc sighed. “I don’t suppose there’s a chance of getting a salad?”

“Absolutely. I’ll go get you one right now.” The waiter snatched the menu back and scurried through the crowd, making impressive speed considering the number of bodies crammed into the club.

Luc idly wondered if the blond would have to leave the building to get his food. With a shrug, he leant back in his chair to watch the crowds.

Seeing others having fun twisted the pain in Luc’s heart. Years of partying with the pack flashed through his head.

Good memories to pull out in the upcoming lonely nights. The previous years with Bran were wonderful in many ways, but he would mostly miss the daily touches, soft morning kisses and slow just-woke-up fucks.

Bran wasn’t meant to be his permanent mate. His lover wanted a ton of pups and an alpha bitch at his side. It was the suddenness of it all that hurt Luc. One day it was ‘good morning, lover’ the next it was ‘I’m going to start wooing females to find a mate’.

Luc took another sip of his beer.

Bastard
.

The worst part was that despite everything, Bran still watched him with those damned needy eyes. Luc was no one’s sidepiece of ass. Besides, he wouldn’t do that to Bran’s new mate.

Staying around would only lead to pack dissention…and big ass fights.

Setting his elbows on the table, he rested his face on his hands, rubbing his damp eyes with the heels of his palms.

Damned watering holes.

“You all right, baby?” A dark, velvety voice spoke beside him. The sound of the other man’s voice rippled down his spine and made him catch his breath. His body hardened in response to the sexy tone.

“No, I don’t think I am,” Luc said, taking his hands away from his eyes to look up at the speaker. He almost swallowed his tongue. A huge man dressed in black leather pants and a white silk shirt towered over him.

The man’s black hair, cut brutally short, exposed a strong, harsh profile like a warrior of old. There was nothing pretty or even handsome about the man. His features were too masculine, the scar on the right side of his face too prominent. However, the power oozing from him went straight to Luc’s balls, finishing the job that had started with his voice.

Always a sucker for a big man, a big man with power was like a super aphrodisiac. One more reason he stayed with that asshole alpha for so long.

“Anything I can do to help you?”

Luc gave the man a slow look over from the top of his short dark hair to the bottom of his polished black boots, pausing to admire every gorgeous, muscled point in between. “Want to be my rebound fuck?”

Nikkolai Remondi looked at the man sitting before him. In his five hundred years as a vampire, he had never seen a more beautiful creature.

The man was sleekly built with amazing autumn gold hair that cascaded down to the base of his neck in riotous curls. His features were symmetrically perfect and his sorrow-filled eyes were like brilliant emeralds shot with silver.

Fae.

In a bar with hundreds of bodies, Nikkolai had scented him from the catwalk above.

His
.

The master vampire could almost taste the sadness emanating from the sweet boy. He slid into the chair next to the gorgeous fae.

“I’m Nikkolai Remondi,” he said, holding out his hand, “but my friends call me Nikko.”

“Luc Hellbourne.” The fae gave his hand a shake. The contact felt as if an electric current went directly to his balls. Hot, sizzling and not altogether comfortable.

He took back his hand still trying to decide if he liked the sensation when a soft voice interrupted his thoughts.

“Here’s your salad.” Jerrod, one of the new wait staff, placed an enormous green salad in front of Luc. Nikko could smell the need pouring from the boy.

When did they start serving salad?

“Thank you.” Luc gave the server a smile that transformed him from a sad beauty to an incandescent star.

Jerrod shivered, the smell of spunk filling the air. “L-let me know if you need anything else.”

“I will,” Luc said with a nod, taking a big bite out of the greens.

Nikkolai growled at Jerrod, letting the younger vamp know he was out of his league. The kid wasn’t even one of his tribe, just a loaner from a master who wanted him out of sight for a time.

Mine.
He sent a mental message to the kid, making sure to stake his claim.

The waiter fled, but not before sending a pitiful look at the delicious fae.