Vampire Dragon (14 page)
What she needed, he thought, was a bodyguard in the truest sense, to protect her from Killian’s evil. “I’d rather take the handyman job, but I could still protect you.”
“That job’s taken. Ogden will be back. The apartment across from this one is for the Master Vampire I hire.”
Darkwyn thought about that. “Fine, then I’ll live with you.”
“
She
already has a roommate,” Zachary said. “Me.”
She
already has a roommate,” Zachary said. “Me.”
Out of the boy’s range, Darkwyn gave Bronte a look filled with promise. They
both
wanted more of what they’d shared last night. He needed to be near her to protect her from Killian, and to take on her life quest, still a mystery. “I will watch the vampire movies,” Darkwyn said with a sigh. “But no promises beyond that.”
both
wanted more of what they’d shared last night. He needed to be near her to protect her from Killian, and to take on her life quest, still a mystery. “I will watch the vampire movies,” Darkwyn said with a sigh. “But no promises beyond that.”
Half an hour into a movie, and two bowls of Count Chocula later, Darkwyn hit pause on the remote. “What made you get into this freaky business? Did somebody curse you?”
Zachary shrugged. “We owned the building, and Bronte needed a job where she could take care of me. This is Salem. Dracula’s Castle catered to tourists but not vamp role players or Salem’s real vamp community. We saw a need. We had a need. We filled both.”
“And,” Bronte added, “it seemed a natural choice. We grew up around blood and guts.”
So had he, fighting wars, feeding his dragon self, but—“You? Blood and guts?”
Zachary gave Bronte a look, before turning to him. “ ‘
The family
’ owned a slaughterhouse.”
The family
’ owned a slaughterhouse.”
EIGHTEEN
After the second vampire movie ended, Bronte’s heart
skipped when Darkwyn got up to stalk her. He grasped the arms of her chair and looked into her eyes. “I vant to drink your blood.” He used a corny Transylvanian accent, his attention enough to make her remember the night just passed.
skipped when Darkwyn got up to stalk her. He grasped the arms of her chair and looked into her eyes. “I vant to drink your blood.” He used a corny Transylvanian accent, his attention enough to make her remember the night just passed.
“At Drak’s,” she said, trying not to be charmed, “we’re modern vampires.”
“Do you count yourself among them?”
“No, but you’ll meet actors, writers, giants of industry, people with clout. It’ll be a regular who’s who of vampires in Salem.”
“So your vampires wear pinstripe suits and ear bugs to talk to invisible friends?”
Zachary scoffed. “Ear
buds
.”
buds
.”
“Ignore the boy, Darkwyn. Yes, some of my vampires are businessmen.”
“Do they nibble on your neck?”
“Of course not.” Though she’d let him nibble and nuzzle, lick and suck—oh the memories.
“What the heck are you two doing?” Zachary snapped. “She’s offering you a job, not herself as a meal.”
“Zachary, we aren’t doing anything,” Bronte said. “We’re—”
“Drooling in your hearts!”
Darkwyn looked from one of them to the other. “Do you two read minds?”
Zachary slammed the box of cereal into the cupboard. “I know how a man thinks.”
Darkwyn approached the boy. “Well, you don’t know how I think. Are you a man in a kid suit, or what?”
Zachary whipped his head around.
“Both of you, stop,” Bronte said. “Zachary, there’s no pretense with Darkwyn. He’s real—to a fault. What you see is what you get. You can’t blame him for having a gleam in his eye.” She stood to approach.
“Don’t touch me,” Darkwyn said, raising his hands. “The loathing in Zachary’s expression scares me.”
“Zachary, go watch cartoons,” Bronte said, and the boy left the apartment, slamming her door and another and another.
“He’ll watch in Ogden’s apartment.” She grabbed Darkwyn’s lapels and slid them between her fingers. “I may be able to read you, a bit, sort of, sense your needs is more like it, but I still don’t know whether you’ll take the job that I so desperately need you to.”
“I’ll do it,” Darkwyn said, capturing her hands, silently offering pleasure—at least she hoped that’s what his shuttered expression and bedroom eyes meant.
“I’ll be Master Vampire to your Mistress Vampiress,” he said, stepping back, “but don’t torture me with those vampire movies. Point me to the nearest stack of vampire books and I’ll learn what I must.”
“Yay.” She’d like to kiss Darkwyn, but with Zachary acting like a watchdog, she’d wait till they were alone. “I have to get you fitted for a tux and cape for
tonight
. You can’t spend the day reading. You’ll have to wing it.”
tonight
. You can’t spend the day reading. You’ll have to wing it.”
Wing it! Darkwyn aborted a surprised laugh, grabbed his fire-warm chest, and belched smoke.
“Now that’s a neat trick,” she said. “Don’t do it in public.”
“No problem, like nobody’s business, I can wing it.” They flicked glances at each other, given the fact that Zachary had returned and stood in the apartment doorway, arms crossed.
An hour later, on the way home from the tux shop, in her hearse with Drak’s and Fangs for the Memories advertised on the side, Darkwyn read the bag of vampire books she’d brought.
“Read fast much?” she asked, truly impressed.
“Always,” he said. “Little trick that surprised even Vivica.”
“I can see why.”
“What torture next?” he asked on their return. “I believe I’d take any kind of torture . . . if you wield it. Puck was wrong that first day,” he admitted. “If I had run, I believe my soul would have missed yours for eternity.”
Feeling bemused, a smile forming in her heart, Bronte sighed. “I’ll take you through Fangs for the Memories, our fun/horror house tourist attraction, then I’ll show you the fairgrounds before we get you ready for tonight.”
“No time for a quickie?”
“You learned that fast. But you couldn’t be quick, given the size of your talent, if your life depended on it.”
“My life might depend on it. Once you feed a dragon, he needs to eat more regularly.”
“Uh-huh. Tell me another.”
“This dragon would also like a long, slow look in daylight at the tattoo on your inner thigh. A black sword on scarlet dragon wings; it’s a dragon slayer tat. Are you secretly looking to kill me, your very own dragon?”
She slipped her arm through his, wishing she could keep him as her own, but even if she wanted to, life had nothing good in store. She sighed and led him down the sidewalk fronting the Phoenix. “I would gladly slay you, Darkwyn Dragonelli. I’d slay you with pleasure.”
He slowed. “So your tattoo is a symbol of riding your magick dragon?”
“Yes, a warrior dragon with a fine sword.” She batted her lashes, but she’d be lying to herself if she didn’t admit she was troubled by a few aspects of this man, like his dragon references. Yet, she found herself fascinated by him.
“Seriously,” Bronte said, “the nuclear sex we had last night, and the fact that you refer to yourself as a dragon—” She cringed inwardly. “They top the list of things we need to talk about,
sooner
rather than later.”
sooner
rather than later.”
“Anytime, dear Bronte. What about the butterfly tat at the base of your spine?”
“Ah, now that symbolizes freedom, to which I aspire.”
Darkwyn raised her hand and kissed it. “You must put ‘Bronte’s need for freedom’ on your list of things to talk about. Because if that is your goal, I am here to make it happen.”
“Like you can fly me to the stars, you can make it happen.”
NINETEEN
Darkwyn tried to stay open-minded while Bronte
pressed a number code into a little box and unlocked an outside door at the far left side of the building.
pressed a number code into a little box and unlocked an outside door at the far left side of the building.
Inside, she turned to him. “This is the entry to Fangs for the Memories. A ticket taker works here when it’s open.” She unlocked a wide, thick carved inner door with a pointed top, two halves that opened at the center with an old-world creak.
On the other side, after she locked it, he pinned her against it, read the need in her eyes, and used his new knowledge to turn a quickie into an eternity of pleasure. It took no more than a fast rise and a couple of tempestuous, mutual multiples before Bronte slid down the door beside him and placed her head on his shoulder.
Catching their breath and righting their clothes took longer than the act.
“A girl could sure get used to that,” she whispered.
As could a dragon
, he thought. Their kiss lasted longer than their mating.
, he thought. Their kiss lasted longer than their mating.
“More?” he suggested.
She shook her head and rose on shaky legs. “Tourists are due.”
Dragon’s blood!
She led him along a dark hall, his arm around her waist.
“We’re starting at the left of the building,” she said. “We’ll cross a basement of Fangs for the Memories exhibits, then exit to the fairgrounds. Tourists leave Fangs and the fairgrounds via the matching hall at the opposite side of the building.”
“Makes sense,” he said, teasing her beneath a breast.
“In this hall,” she said on a thready whisper, “are dioramas of vampire carnage.”
“Your bloodsuckers are as fake as your movies. Even the drippy candles are. But you,” he said, stroking her higher, “are magnificent and real.”
“You sure proved that.
Mmm
,” she said. “Fake candles because of Salem’s fire laws. Fangs is for tourists. Drak’s, on the floor above, now that’s as real as the vamps and LARPers, or role players, want it to be.”
Mmm
,” she said. “Fake candles because of Salem’s fire laws. Fangs is for tourists. Drak’s, on the floor above, now that’s as real as the vamps and LARPers, or role players, want it to be.”
“How can it be real?” he asked, cupping her breasts. “Vampires are
not
.”
not
.”
“The authors of those books you read earlier, and the vampires you’ll meet tonight, believe dragons aren’t real. You’ll see fake vampires, they’ll see a fake dragon. It’s a wash. Fake is fake. Though I know you’re not a fake man, because—”
“You like my tricky dick?”
She leaned in. “I do like it.”
He shrugged. “Well, I grant your point about dragons, however incorrect.” He swooped in to kiss her, but jumped when the cover of a casket popped up beside them, and a campy vamp sat up, hissed, and showed its fangs.
Bronte opened her hands toward the dummy as if she sent that sudden colorful burst of snap, crackle, and light the casket’s way.
“If cartoon fireworks are all I can conjure,” she said, “might as well make it work for me.”
Darkwyn raised a questioning brow. “Conjure?”
“I threw the bit of faulty magick at it to go with the laugh track.”
Darkwyn admired her resourcefulness. “It was rather effective and unexpected for entertainment value.”
“Maybe I’ll incorporate it into all the displays down here. I never thought my backassward witchcraft would be of much use.”
“Are you a witch?”
“In training, sort of. Mostly, I’m the class clown, a blow-it-up kind of witch and I usually end up with soot on my face. I have no natural talent for the craft. I tried to learn for self-protection, but no go.”
“Well, you have me for protection now.” He liked that her eyes went dreamy and she moved closer after he said that.
Meanwhile, Jagidy, his guardian dragon, smoke-tested the dummy and got white smoke from the lifeless thing.
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