Vampire Mate: BBW Paranormal Romance (9 page)

She forced the words through
her constricted throat. “There are...some beasts buried
there,” she ventured. “Livestock.”

“
Livestock!” Kron
made a face. “Really, Charlene, you weren't Made yesterday!
Come on, Charlene. You can do better than this. This is not what I
expected of you,” Kron warned through his frozen smile.

She inhaled shakily and came
up with the only answer there was. “There are beasts and
bloodshed on that land.”

“
Yes! Yes! That is
right, Charlene! Do you know how so much blood came to be spilled on
that piece of land?” His eyes glittered excitedly.

Before she could shake her
head, Kron went on with relish, “During the last Great War
between vamps and weres, this land, this sweet piece of land was an
execution site for the weres that were captured by the vampires. The
vampires rounded up and executed millions, millions of weres on that
land. The executions were bloody, violent, spectacular, the way
executions should be. The vampire executioners tore out the throats
and hearts of the weres, sometimes with silver blades, sometimes with
their bare fangs. The blood of the slaughtered beasts seeped deep
into the land, permeating the whole land. The soil is rich, so, so
rich, with their blood. The executed beasts were buried or burnt at
the execution site, so their remains are mixed with the soil. Beasts
and blood, Charlene, on that prime land.”

Charlene sat in silence for a
long time. “What will happen after you get that land?”
she asked softly.

“
I'm getting on in
years, Charlene,” Kron said with a sigh. “I need more,
much more than what you and my other demons can bring me, to sustain
my power. Aging demon lords of chaos may try to engineer a
large-scale catastrophe or war to feed their waning power. Me? I
need a large injection of bloody, barbaric, beastly essence. If I
build my base on that land, I will have the essence and energy I need
for the next few decades. And you, my dear, can take a break from
hunting. How'd you like that? You can go have a holiday, enjoy
yourself...with your sister.”

At his last three words,
Charlene's entire body froze.

“
Yes, your sister,
Charlotte Cole. Lovely thing with green eyes, like you, strawberry
blond hair and a very dangerous job.”

Charlene listened to Kron's
accurate description of Charlotte's appearance. The demon clearly
had the right girl. He knew of Charlotte, and he knew where she
worked.

“
Dangerous job?”
she choked out at last.

“
Why, yes. Your sister
is an Enforcer. She hunts rogues, patrols unsavory, shadowy corners
of the city, chasing violent, beastly rogues into dark alleyways...”
Kron shook his head. “It's just not safe. No one is safe
these days. Accidents happen. Enforcers are killed. Just like
that.” He snapped his fingers to emphasize his point. “You
can ask Glenn Constantine if you don't believe me. He is a Council
member. Ask him if Charlotte Cole is a PAC Enforcer.”

Charlene fisted the fabric of
her gown and fought the urge to lunge at the demon and rip out his
throat. The threat against her sister was thinly veiled, in fact,
hardly veiled at all.

“
Or perhaps you would
like to see for yourself.” Kron appeared in front of Charlene
and before she could block him, he had scratched her neck with a
long, curved claw. Blood flowed from her wound, and Kron dipped his
claws into her blood and scattered it in the air in front of her.
The blood mist formed a sort of canvas, and moving images began to
form on the blood canvas.

Charlene let out a cry. It
was Charlotte. With unblinking, disbelieving eyes, she watched her
sister's image appear on the blood screen. It was like watching an
old, scratchy, flickering movie. The images were blurry and shaky,
but she could make out her sister's face clearly. Charlotte was in a
smart black leather jacket, the standard outfit for the PAC
Enforcers. She was walking down a quiet street with another Enforcer
by her side. The two of them were patrolling a rather deserted part
of the city, and Charlene felt her heart lurch every time she saw a
shadow move.

She saw the two young
Enforcers pause and draw their weapons from their jackets before
rounding a street corner. A demon was holding a thrashing lioness
down, his jagged fangs in the lion shifter's neck. The werelion must
have shifted from her human into her animal form, thinking that she
would be stronger and in better form to fight her assailant as a
lion. But human or lion seemed to make no difference to the snarling
demon. The demon just wanted blood, and it didn't matter if he took
it from a human or lion's neck. Charlene watched in horror as
Charlotte and her partner, who she could now see was a vampire,
charged at the rogue demon. The demon was fast, and dodged their
silver blades and bullets with ease. While Charlotte tried to help
the injured shifter, who was now lying bleeding on the ground as a
half-conscious human woman, her vampire partner faced the demon.
Both vampire and demon had their fangs out, but the demon was double,
or even triple the size of the slim, petite vampire Enforcer. The
vamp fired a shot, which only grazed the demon's scaly cheek. But
the pain enraged him, and he rushed forward and grabbed the vampire's
arm, twisting and breaking it. Flinging her into a wall, the demon
turned his attention to Charlotte.

“
No!” Charlene
screamed, and the blood mist fell and splattered to the ground. The
images were gone. Charlene reached out blindly, but the blood screen
was nothing but blood spatters on the floor. She couldn't see
Charlotte anymore.

Kron watched Charlene drop to
her knees, kneeling in her own blood, clawing desperately at the
floor, trying to erect another blood screen. He waited patiently for
her to wear herself out, and realize that her efforts were futile.
She could only see what Kron wanted her to see.

“
Where is she?”
Charlene asked in a broken voice. Her face was streaked with tears
of blood. “What has happened to her?”

Kron regarded her with a look
of mock sympathy. Bending down, he helped her to the sofa and patted
her knee. “Don't worry, your sister's fine. She's alive—for
now. That blood demon didn't have orders to kill her.”

The full import of his words
sank in.

He would order his demons to
kill Charlotte.

And she knew from the demon's
smug tone that he was more than ready to make good his threat.

Charlene slumped back, numb
with fear for her sister. Charlotte was now an Enforcer. She should
have known.

Charlotte would do that.

A part of her had known that
Charlotte would do something to try to avenge her 'death'. Charlotte
had signed up to become an Enforcer because of what had happened to
her, to them. Charlotte had watched a rogue werewolf attack her
elder sister. She'd believed that Charlene was dead, and she had
wanted to avenge her. She had made it her mission, her job, to hunt
and destroy rogues.

But...what if Charlotte saw
her now? Would Charlotte see her as a rogue? By taking the blood of
all those rogues, she had broken PAC law. Would her sister be
compelled to hunt her and destroy her? Charlene suddenly didn't know
if she could face Charlotte now, even as her heart bled and feared
for her sister's life and she ached to see and hold her little sister
again.

“
Would you like to see
your sister again, Charlene? See her alive, I mean,” Kron
asked, his form utterly and truly demonic now. He had shed all
traces of his human facade and rose to his full height, looming over
her in his terrible, terrifying demon form. It was a form she had
never seen. His body seemed to be made up of slithering, hissing
shadows, and his eyes and mouth were windows into a burning, blood
red pit.

Charlene shrank back. “I'll
do it,” she whispered. “I'll go to Glenn Constantine and
get what you want.”

In the blink of an eye, Kron
reverted to his smiling, human shape.

He smoothed his hands over his
white suit and nodded at her. “Yes. Now that's what I like to
hear. I love it when my demons get me what I want.”

A wineglass filled to the brim
with blood materialized in Kron's hand and he raised it in a toast.
“To your success!” Draining the glass, he smacked his
lips and stood up. “Now, go home, change into something sexy
and comfortable, and get started on the vampire. Work through the
night if you have to.” He chortled, then waved his hand. “I
won't be supervising your work. Just get on with it and finish it.
Go!”

Charlene got shakily to her
feet, suddenly feeling woozy.

Squeezing her eyes shut, she
teleported away before Kron could throw more commands and threats at
her.

She needed to get away from
Kron right away. If she didn't, she was afraid she might lose her
mind and her restraint and just attack that piece of shit! He had
just threatened to hurt Charlotte, and no one hurt her baby sister!

But she knew that the demon
lord would make good his threat. Hurt Charlotte to hurt her if she
didn't do what he wanted.

She teleported into the middle
of her bedroom, and collapsed onto her bed.

It was a few minutes after
midnight, and the night had just begun.

She had work to do.

Working through the night
wasn't the hard part.

It was the morning after that
she dreaded.

Glenn stood on the balcony of
his bedroom, at the very pinnacle of the luxurious Tine Towers, and
looked up at the moonless night sky. He glanced through the glass
into his dark, empty bedroom. Empty, as it always was.

The blood bar hadn't assuaged
his hunger. It didn't satisfy him. The alcoholic blood filled his
stomach, and left him feeling hungrier and emptier than ever.

He had to stop thinking about
her.

Turning away, he smoothed his
palm along the metal railing and stared out at the city.

New Moon City.

It was a dark, dangerous,
defiant city. It was a beautiful city. A brave city that wasn't
afraid of creatures that went bump in the night. Instead, the city
sought to police and protect these creatures, recognizing that while
there might be monsters among them, not all of them were monsters.
These monsters were hunted and taken down by the PAC Enforcers, who
put their lives on the line to keep the human and paranormal civilian
population safe.

The city lights winked and
stared up at him, watching him like so many pairs of luminous eyes.
Glenn sighed heavily, the ache in his heart ever present, ever
tormenting.

Why did she choose to become a
blood demoness?

Didn't she know the price?
Would he pay the price?

He swore he would never take a
blood demoness to his bed. But what if—what if she was his
mate? Could he take her, take her blood, and free her?

The air around him rippled,
but Glenn didn't move.

He kept his eyes on the city
lights below, even as he sensed a presence behind him.

He knew who it was.

He closed his eyes to breathe
her in.

“
He let you come?”
Glenn asked without turning around.

When she didn't answer, he let
out a mirthless laugh. “No, you came not with his permission,
but on his command.”

He turned his head to the side
at last to acknowledge her, her name leaving his lips on a ragged
breath. “Charlene.”

She took a step forward, and
his cool, collected facade nearly faltered. She was...breathtaking.

She was wearing a red
strapless dress that just begged to be stripped from her lush, curvy
body. Her blond hair was unadorned, framing her beautiful, blushing
face. She wore only red lipstick to match her dress, and her neck
and shoulders were bare. Glenn let his eyes drag down every inch of
her delectable body. He could smell her blood, her feminine heat,
her unique scent.

Glenn scrubbed a hand down his
face. He had been fooling himself, telling himself that he could
resist her, that he wouldn't take her. He was already hard, every
inch of him straining and aching to have her.

This strange sense of
anticipation and hope was new to Glenn. He had taken demonesses to
his bed before. The demonesses he had bedded had all come to him of
their own free will and want. They hadn't been ordered by their
demon lord and Maker to appear outside his bedroom in a fuck me dress
and looking so lost and vulnerable. He had taken those laughing,
lusty demonesses to bed with no expectation and no pressure. He had
known, even before tasting a droplet of their blood, that they were
not his mate. The attraction was purely sexual, nothing more. Just
a night of mindless, meaningless sex for all involved.

But Charlene...was different.

She was a demoness, yes, and
he saw her before as a human, and was already attracted to her then.
But his attraction to females had always been fleeting and shallow.
The feelings never lingered, grew and burrowed into him, eating away
at his heart and soul.