Max Stops the Presses: A Gardella Vampire Chronicles Short Story

Max Stops The Presses: A
Gardella Vampire Chronicles Short Story

© 2013 Colleen
Gleason

All rights
reserved

To the Reader

I cannot tell you how many
emails, letters, and verbal pleas I’ve received in the last four
years for more about Max, Sebastian, and Victoria. I am humbled by
your love for these characters, and I thank all of you for your
insistence for
more
. You inspired me to write this short piece, and I hope this
story does your love for them justice.

Please note that if you’ve
somehow stumbled upon this short story and haven’t read the first
five books in the Gardella Vampire Chronicles,
Max Stops the Presses
will have little
meaning for you. In fact, I urge you
not
to read it until you’ve
read
The Rest Falls Away
and the four other volumes that follow.

Again, to the fans of Victoria Gardella: I’m sorry it’s taken me so
long to assuage your curiosity, and I hope you enjoy this little
clip of a scene her life after
As Shadows
Fade
.

With love and
affection,

Colleen Gleason

June 2013

+ +
+

+
In Which Max Stops the Presses
+

“That chit is the new
Venator?”
Max lifted a brow. He lowered a
glass of very fine brandy and turned to his mentor
Eustacia.

The elderly woman, whose
jet-black eyes still gleamed with the intelligence and ferocity of
a warrior, looked up at him archly. “Yes. And as you well know, she
is my great-niece. So take care what you say, my dear
boy.”

Eustacia was the only
person who’d dare call Maximilian Pesaro “boy,” and the light in
her eyes told him how well she knew it. Nevertheless, he wasn’t the
least bit chastised, and he lifted the brandy to sip.

The young woman in question
was no more than twenty, and, dressed in a pale, frothy pink frock,
she looked as if she’d blow over in a strong breeze. She had thick,
dark hair piled high at the back of her head, and it looked much
too heavy for her long, elegant neck. Jet beads and pink pearls
were woven through her curls. The gown’s bodice was cut low, as
fashion dictated, and displayed over the generous expanse of bosom
was a necklet of rosy pearl and quartz. A heavy silver crucifix
nestled just above the rise of her unarguably lovely
breasts.

She conversed, laughed, and
flirted with a variety of young men, her diaphanous gown shifting
and flowing with each movement. She looked as if she hadn’t a
serious thought in her head, other than the filling of her dance
card—which she produced with a girlish flourish for some fop he
thought was called Rockley.

Her name was
Victoria.

Max was aware of an odd
sensation as he observed this latest, much-anticipated addition to
the Gardella family of vampire hunters. At first, he couldn’t
identify it. Not necessarily interest, but not necessarily
ambivalence. Disappointment, certainly—for how was a cloud-headed,
delicate,
young
woman like her going to combat Lilith…let alone lead the
contingent of Venators?

Perhaps his reaction was
more like chagrin. After all, Eustacia was past eighty, and
soon—hopefully not too soon—her role as
Illa Gardella
would be
vacated.

“How the blazes does she
expect to stake a vampire in that bloody gown?” A good thrust with
a stake, and one of those fine breasts would pop right out of her
bodice. If she didn’t get wrapped up in her skirts and land on her
arse first.

“She’s a Gardella, Max.
She’ll manage.”

“Bloody hell, I hope she’ll
do more than
manage
.” His attention wandered to Felicity Daniels, the newly
turned blonde vampire. He’d escorted the undead to the debut of
Miss Victoria Gardella Grantworth into London Society—and what
would also, thanks to Max, be her first encounter with a
vampire.

Felicity, who had no idea
of the role she was meant to play this evening, or that she’d been
escorted by the infamous Max Pesaro, was eyeing with bald interest
the bare neck of a young woman who had large blue eyes and bright
red hair.

Max glared at the clock.
“How long do you think it will take for your niece to realize there
is a vampire present?” The sooner he was gone from this stuffy
gathering, the sooner he could get to the Silver Chalice and find
out what the devil Vioget was up to.

“I suspect she already
knows, Max. Kritanu says she has excellent instinct.” Eustacia laid
a soft, wrinkled hand on his sleeve. “Regardless, I trust you won’t
interfere.”

“Why the hell would I
interfere? If she can’t stake a vampire under these conditions, she
has no business being a Venator.” With a brief bow, he excused
himself and went to corral Felicity before she lured the redheaded
chit into a salon or parlor. He’d loosen his collar and suggest a
walk in the gardens—and perhaps Miss Victoria Grantworth would put
aside her dance card for long enough to follow them.

Or perhaps she wouldn’t,
and there would be no reason for him to ever see the chit
again.

But, alas, that hope was
short-lived…for not ten minutes later, the blasted girl tried to
stake him.

+ +
+

More than three years
later
, Max sat in his study at Grantworth
House sampling yet another glass of most excellent brandy and
considering how radically things had changed.

In the time since her
debut, not only had Victoria proved herself an incomparable
Venator—stunning even Max with her intelligence, fortitude, and
determination—but he had also married the blasted woman.

Together—and, admittedly,
with some help from Sebastian Vioget—Max and Victoria had driven
most of the vampires out of London. She’d slain Lilith—a fact for
which Max felt overwhelming gratitude every bloody damned day—and
since then, their lives had quieted into something resembling
normalcy.

A loud thud, followed by a
crash, had Max bolting from his chair with a curse. The sounds had
come from the
kalari
—the spacious room where he and Victoria practiced their
fighting skills…and occasionally other physical activities. Since
his wife was nine months pregnant, she should most
definitely
not
be
practicing anything but sitting and resting. Which, for Victoria,
were tendencies that didn’t come naturally.

Max flung open the door to
find her standing there, surrounded by a variety of weapons.
Swords,
cheruvadis
,
scythes,
kadharas
,
and, of course, wooden stakes of all sizes—along with the shelves
on which they’d been displayed—were scattered all over the floor.
Victoria spun toward him, guilt and irritation plastered all over
her face. Little wisps of black curls were loose around her
temples, and her cheeks were flushed—though he wasn’t certain
whether it was from effort or chagrin at being caught
out.

“What the bloody hell are
you doing?” He swallowed his heart back into place and stalked
over, picking up a
kadhara
dagger as he went. “By God, Victoria, don’t tell
me you were trying to get the damned
urumi
down again.”

She glowered up at him. “My
blasted belly got in the way. I couldn’t quite reach—”

“And what, precisely, were
you trying to reach that particular sword
for
?” He fixed her with a dark look,
trying not to be distracted by the lushness of her pregnant curves.
The
urumi
was not
only long and sharp, but it had a flexible, ribbon-like metal
blade—which made it particularly difficult to handle
properly.

She pressed her lips
together and glared up at him in mute frustration. Her arms were
crossed between belly and breasts, which had the effect of lifting
her cleavage in a most enticing manner. Even though she was wearing
only a loose tunic and fighting trousers, she looked
beautiful.

With effort, he kept his
attention on her face. “Victoria, of all the bloody damned weapons
you could be practicing with in your condition, the
urumi
is the worst
candidate.”

“I’m bored, Max. I’m not
used to sitting around.”

“And so you decided to play
with a whip-like sword? Here.” He handed her one of the
cheruvadis
—a long wooden
pole—and proceeded to roll the
urumi
’s sharp blade into a proper
circle. Setting the sword aside, he added, “If you insist on
thumping around in here like an—er—at least use something less
likely to wrap around your legs—”

“Thumping around
like a
what?
Like an elephant? That’s what you were going to
say, weren’t you?” She tossed the pole away and curved her arms
around her massive belly—one Max could hardly believe hadn’t caused
her to topple over yet. “I’m definitely as big as one. And about as
graceful as a—as a
potato
.”

Max barely contained a
laugh, covering it up by folding his ungainly wife into an embrace.
“You’re pregnant, darling.” He pressed a kiss onto the top of her
head. It was particularly warm, and so was she, indicating she’d
already been doing some sort of training.

Victoria struggled to free
herself from his arms, but Max held firm, greatly enjoying the feel
of all those soft, generous curves, and the smell of her hair, and
the knowledge that she was here, with him,
safe
…and that he would be damned if
he’d let anything happen to her while she was carrying his child.
Or ever.

He still woke sometimes,
erupting into a sudden, terrified fear that she was once again
Lilith’s captive.

A soft sniffle and the
dampness seeping into his shirt told him she wasn’t yet over her
pique. A non-pregnant Victoria would rage and storm about, her eyes
flashing and her hands throwing things, but as he’d discovered,
things were different at the moment.

“Shh,” he murmured. “It
won’t be long now, and before you know it, you’ll be back in here
trying to flip me onto my arse.”

“Trying
?” She bristled in his arms and he smiled against her hair.
“You know bloody well I can get you on your back any time I want
to.”

“You certainly can,” he
said, his voice dropping low and dusky as his thoughts went
elsewhere. He slid his hands down over her pert bottom and ducked
to kiss her in that special place she liked, behind the
ear.

“Max…” She sagged against
him, giving a little tremble. “Don’t be…”

Just as she lifted her face
to meet his kiss, he felt a definite nudge from her round middle.
They both stilled and waited, belly pressed to belly, as the baby
kicked and shifted inside her. A particularly sharp, hard movement
had Max’s eyes widening at the sheer force of it.