Make Me
Authors: Parker Blue
Praise for the Demon Underground series:
Val Shapiro has a secret she’s desperate to keep—she’s lost her slayer powers.
“Love, betrayal, vampires, and a mystery. How much better can it get than that?”
—
That Teen Can Blog
“. . . fast paced, exciting storylines… The ending took me by surprise; I can’t wait for the fourth book to come out!”
—C.J. Harris, Vampire Librarian
“. . . big, shocking and intense.”
—Lara Taylor, Fresh Fiction
As the new guardian of the
Encyclopedia Magicka
, Val expected the books to give her powers to replace those that disappeared after she lost her “V card” to Shade. But the encyclopedia
exacts a price for every spell, making the job of guardian a tricky proposition.
When a rogue demon kidnaps Val’s roommate Gwen and Micah, leader of the San Antonio Demon Underground, Val is plunged into the middle of a Solomon’s Choice. The rogue wants the dangerously potent
Encyclopedia Magicka
in exchange for her friends’ lives; the succubus leader of the Demon Underground in Austin is demanding the books be destroyed rather than let them fall into the wrong hands and wants Shade for herself, swearing to do everything she can to prevent Val’s turning over the books.
The kidnapping isn’t the only crisis Val faces. She’s been betrayed by Fang. Demons and vampires are disappearing. The vamps of the New Blood Movement are forcing Val to keep the terms of her agreement to work for them to combat this new threat. The Demon Underground is challenging Micah’s leadership, and everyone is depending on a now-powerless Val to set things right.
Val needs all the help she can get. Even if it means forgiving Fang and spending time with a dangerously sexy cowboy-vampire.
DEMON UNDERGROUND SERIES
Bite Me
Try Me
Fang Me
Make Me
Demon Underground Series, Book Four
by
Parker Blue
Bell Bridge Books
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons (living or dead), events or locations is entirely coincidental.
Bell Bridge Books
PO BOX 300921
Memphis, TN 38130
Ebook ISBN: 978-1-61194-114-2
Print ISBN: 978-1-61194-120-3
Bell Bridge Books is an Imprint of BelleBooks, Inc.
Copyright © 2012 by Pam McCutcheon
Printed and bound in the United States of America.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer, who may quote brief passages in a review.
We at BelleBooks enjoy hearing from readers.
Visit our websites – www.BelleBooks.com and www.BellBridgeBooks.com.
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Cover design: Debra Dixon
Interior design: Hank Smith
Photo credits:
Cover Art © Christine Griffin
Spine and back cover art- C Unholyvault | Dreamstime.com
:
Mmm
:01:
My name is Val Shapiro, but they call me the Slayer since I’ve made a hobby—and a living—hunting vampires. Up until now, that’s been easy, seeing as how I’m one-eighth succubus lust demon. I call that part of me Lola, and she gives me the power to make men fall instantly in lust with me. While I was still a virgin, I had incredible power, speed and healing ability—all the better for pounding vamps into dust. My mom thought I was a bad influence on my little sister, so my parents kicked me out of the house and the family business a few weeks ago when I turned eighteen.
It worked out okay, though. I found a new friend in a part hellhound, part terrier mix named Fang. He’s telepathic with demons and keeps the snark level pretty high, but I’m okay with that. I also discovered there was a Demon Underground in San Antonio to help people like me pass in human society. They’re pretty awesome, so it’s almost like having a family again. Almost.
I worked for a while with the San Antonio Special Crimes Unit hunting vampires and had a thing going on with my human cop partner, Dan Sullivan, until he discovered what I was. He couldn’t deal with it, or the fact that I beheaded his ex-fiancée, even though she’d become an evil bloodsucker herself. And when I reluctantly helped the New Blood Movement, a vein of “good” vampires to identify and eliminate the bad bloodsuckers, that was it for him.
Luckily, I found a new boyfriend, a totally hot shadow demon named Shade. All you can see when you look at him are the interdimensional energies swirling through his body, unless he’s touching someone. Then he looks like a normal human. So, I touch him a lot. Purely to keep his demon identity a secret, y’know.
As long as I still had my V-card, I had all my slayer capabilities, but when I gave in to lust and lost it to Shade, I also lost my powers. Now I have this rep as the invincible Slayer with nothing to back it up but Lola. Doing the deed with Shade was kinda awesome, but losing my mojo sucks.
Anyway, before he committed suicide when I was five, my father gifted me with a set of magickal books,
The Encyclopedia Magicka
. Someone stole them, but with Shade’s help, I found them again and kicked the thieves—an evil rogue mage demon and his father—into a pocket universe where they can’t do any harm.
Now the books have adopted me as their keeper, and their old keeper agreed to teach me how to use them and their powers. It’s a good thing, ’cause I lost a bet and promised the New Blood Movement I’d work for them until we could find the books
and
the Movement revealed their existence to the world.
One down. One to go.
I crouched in the darkness of an ancient live oak, armed with only my wits, listening for any sign of the vampire. Nothing but the rattling of branches and the soughing of the wind through the leaves here on the longest night of the year.
Creepy.
I wasn’t hiding out of fear. I just wanted to get a bead on him before he found me first. Now that I’d lost my strength, speed, and healing ability, and I hadn’t seen hide nor hair of any of my new powers as keeper of the
Encyclopedia Magicka
,
I needed any advantage I could get. The live oak, with its leaves and gnarled branches as big around as my waist, shaded me from the revealing flood of moonlight.
“Val Shapiiiro,” he crooned, the eerie mocking sound seeming one with the breeze. “Come out, come out wherever you are…”
Too close! He’d found me.
Lust for the hunt sizzled through my blood and I whirled toward the sound. “Make me,” I growled.
He rushed me, inhumanly fast.
I leapt up to one of the low branches hugging the ground and lashed out with a
savate
kick, hoping to score a field goal with his head. He ducked.
Too slow, damn it. I stumbled for a nanosecond on the uneven surface, then regained my balance as he appeared on the bough beside me. His infuriating grin flashed in a sliver of moonlight. I struck out with my fist, hoping to smash the fangs off his face. Blocked.
I couldn’t let him take the offensive. And though I might have lost my speed and strength, I still had my martial arts training. I battered him with a series of blows, but he was so fast, none of them connected where I wanted. I tried a low blow—a kick to the ’nads, but he stopped that, too.
