Venice Vampyr - The Beginning (26 page)

“My love.” Dante’s endearment jolted her out of her observations. “This might seem strange at first, but there’s something important I have to tell you.”

Viola raised her hand and cupped his cheek. The knowledge that he was alive and well was all she needed. Nothing else could be as important.

Dante turned his head and kissed her palm. “I made you into one of us.”

Dante’s words made no sense. “One of you?”

“Yes, you’re like me and Raphael and Lorenzo now. Immortal.”

She let out a soft laugh. “You’re funny.”

“No. I gave you my blood so you could live. Viola, I’m a vampire.”

At his assertion, she jolted, her hand slipping from his face. She couldn’t have heard right. “Sorry, can you say that again? I think I misheard.”

Dante gave a slow shake of his head. “You heard right. I’m a vampire. And I turned you into one, otherwise you would have died. Even if you hadn’t gotten shot by Salvatore. I’m sorry, but there was no time to explain. I had to act. Swiftly.”

Viola listened to his words. Slowly, they sunk in.

“You were slipping away. I couldn’t let you die. I had to change you instantly.”

She tried to understand the implications of his words. “You’re a vampire? Immortal?”

He nodded.

“And I’m one too? But my brain tumor ... I’ll still die.”

A warm smile curled around his lips and spread over his entire face.

Hope bloomed inside her. “Won’t I?”

“No. Any illness you had was eradicated by the turning. You’re healthy. Your tumor is gone. You’re immortal.”

Your tumor is gone.
Those were the only words she truly understood. She would live. Her life wasn’t over. She had another chance. Her heart filled with joy, making it so full it would burst if she didn’t give her emotions free reign.

Tears pushed forward and escaped. “Oh, my God.”

Dante’s face twisted as if in pain. “I’m so sorry, Viola.” He dropped his head and avoided looking at her. “Forgive me.”

“Forgive you?” He’d given her a new life, the greatest gift she could have ever wished for. She’d never been happier. She took his chin and made him look at her. Regret was evident in his eyes. He’d misunderstood her tears. “I would like to give you an answer to your question now.”

“My question?”

She smiled and drew closer to him. “I want to be your wife. For eternity.” Before she’d even finished the last word, his lips were on hers, kissing her breathless. He only lifted them long enough for a murmured “yes” against her mouth before he claimed her with his tongue, forging deep inside.

Only the clearing of throats in the room made her realize that they were not alone. Dante severed the kiss and turned his head briefly to the others in the room. “Go away.”

Viola chuckled. “That’s rude, Dante.”

“I don’t care. I want to make love to you now.”

Raphael laughed out loud. “Last time I checked, you did have a bedchamber, my dear brother. I suggest you use it.” He hesitated for a brief second before he continued. “And, Dante, the storage room next to my chamber is off limits from now on. Get your kicks somewhere else.”

Chapter Twenty

The door closed with a loud thud that echoed through the entire house. Dante didn’t care what anybody thought. He wasn’t even surprised Raphael knew that they’d watched him and Isabella make love. After all, Viola had been quite vocal that night, and Raphael would have picked up the sounds with his superior vampire hearing.

But none of that mattered.

Viola was alive, and she’d accepted him for what he was.

Dante captured his soon-to-be wife between his body and the door at her back, pressing her against it.

“Is your brother angry with us?”

“Raphael? Hardly. I’m sure he got a kick out of it himself, knowing we watched him and Isabella.”

“But we can’t do it again?” A wicked smile curved around her pretty mouth.

Dante pressed his hardening cock against her soft stomach. “No. But I’m sure I can arrange other things for us to watch if you’d like.”

His heart skipped a beat when he saw Viola raise an eyebrow in interest. Her breathless voice only underscored her excitement. “Yes?”

“Anything you want, my love. Because keeping you satisfied is my mission.” He willed his fingers to turn into claws. Slowly, making sure she saw what he was about to do, he placed his claws at the spot where her décolleté revealed her lush breasts.

She inhaled, the action pressing the flesh closer to his sharp claws, but she didn’t pull away. “What are you going to do?”

Not a question—not the way she said it. It was a challenge. One he was more than happy to meet. Faster than a human’s eye could process, he sliced through the front of her bodice, ripping it in half.

“You mean what
did
I just do?” he corrected.

Viola looked down at her torn dress then raised her head and looked at him, her eyes shimmering golden. He sensed the power in her, the power of a vampire, and the knowledge that she was his—that she would be his for eternity—overwhelmed him.

“God, you’re beautiful.”

She raised her hand. Before his eyes, her elegant fingers turned into claws. She touched his neck with it, stroked down to where the top button of his shirt was undone. With a wicked smile, she sliced it down the middle. And her claws didn’t stop there, only paused for a moment of anticipation.

Dante growled out his approval. She was his match—fearless, daring, and insatiable.

Viola sliced through the fabric of his breeches, carefully avoiding his hard length. He sucked in a breath when cool air hit his arousal and her suddenly soft fingers curled around him.

“You’re beautiful,” she whispered in that husky voice he’d come to love, because it gave him a window into her soul, laying bare what she felt for him.

Unable to hold back, he tore her dress off her and exposed her nakedness to his hungry eyes. “Mine, all mine!” Pressing her harder against the door, he captured her thighs with his hands, and spread and raised them. The scent of her arousal was drugging now, overwhelming, impossible to resist.

With a deep groan, he positioned his cock at her core and thrust into her heat, pounding her against the door.

“Yes!” she cried out, her arms slung around his neck, her legs wrapped around his hips.

Lust and desire coursed through him, as did the knowledge that he didn’t have to hold back anymore. It fired his loins to pound harder. Viola was a vampire now, as strong as he was and as indestructible. He couldn’t hurt her. Now he could finally show her everything he felt: the ferocity with which he loved her, desired her, and needed her.

She was his everything.

“Tomorrow,” he ground out, “you’ll be my wife.”

Her eyes blinked in agreement.

“But tonight, I’ll make you my mate.” He raised his hand to her face and rubbed his finger over her lips, nudging them open wider.

“I want you,” she said breathlessly. As if she knew what he wanted, she opened her mouth and bared her teeth.

“Yes,” he encouraged her as his cock pistoned harder into her.

Her fangs lengthened as instinct guided her. Her irises were a pure golden hue now, just like his.

He tilted his head to the side, offering her his neck. “Later, I’ll take you out hunting,” he rasped, “but right now, I want you to drink from me.”

Dante would always remember the exact moment when Viola’s fangs drove into his flesh for the first time. It was a moment of pure and utter bliss, and ecstasy. A celebration of love and passion, lust and desire. When she sucked his essence into her, his orgasm broke, washing over him like a tidal wave drowning Venice forever. And with it came another wave, as powerful as his: Viola’s climax, her muscles clenching around his length, milking him, asking for the last drop of what he had to give.

And he would give her everything he possessed. His wealth, his body, and foremost, his heart.

For eternity.

“Forever,” Viola whispered and kissed him with her bloodstained lips.

The End

Venice Vampyr: Sinful Treasure (#3)

Chapter One

Lorenzo was late, yet he was sure his friends would forgive him, considering the good news he had.

Only a few weeks earlier, an attack by a Guardian had almost killed one of their own. With the Guardians of the Holy Waters, the secret society of vampire hunters in Venice, becoming more and more daring in their attempts to eradicate each and every vampire within the island city, he and his fellow vampires had decided on drastic measures to protect themselves against their threats.

Dante, his best friend, had suggested buying up all dwellings within the city block on which he and his brother Raphael lived, and turn the entire block into a fortress of sorts. By purchasing the houses that bordered each other, they would be able to create secret walkways between the buildings, thus being able to meet without having to exit to the streets or the canals. It would also provide them with easy means of escape and a way of coming to each other’s aid during daylight hours without being exposed to the burning rays of the sun.

Tonight was their second meeting to discuss strategy on how to achieve their goal.

Lorenzo smiled to himself as a servant opened the heavy entrance door to Dante and Raphael’s home. He was way ahead of the game. His friends would be very pleased with him.

There was a chill in the night air, and despite his vampire body not being as susceptible to the cold as humans were, he didn’t like the damp, cold air that reached his lungs as he inhaled. He much preferred the subtle scent of the wood fire in the parlor that drifted into his nostrils as he stepped inside. He handed his gloves to the manservant and allowed him to take the heavy black cloak from his shoulders.

His sensitive hearing had already picked up the voices of his friends. His enhanced sense of smell was able to distinguish them further: there were a dozen of them assembled.

Lorenzo entered the parlor and swept his gaze across the room. Besides the brothers Dante and Raphael and their wives Viola and Isabella, several of his fellow vampires were in attendance: Nico, Silvano, Enrico, Francesco, Paolo, Andrea, Carlo, and Marcello. While there were more vampires in Venice, the ones assembled represented the leaders of their various units. They would instruct their followers on what to do.

As usual, his nostrils flared when he took in Isabella’s scent. Raphael’s wife was the only human among them, and her delightful scent always made his gums itch and his fangs tingle. His friend was one lucky son of a bitch. Not that Lorenzo would have liked the trappings of marriage, but to drink from a human without having to use his powers to make the woman forget what he was doing to her was a treat he’d never partaken in. The thought of having a human woman underneath him and fucking her while she willingly offered her neck to him, fully aware of his intentions, made him hard.

“Evening, gentlemen,” he said louder than was necessary, trying to distract himself from his debauched thoughts. Not that it would do any good. He’d have to venture out later and slake his lust with whatever trollop he could find at such late hour. But while he would have no problems finding a willing woman who’d let him fuck her, taking her blood would have to be done under the veil of his persuasive powers, which would erase her memories of his act. A shame really, because a vampire’s bite only heightened the arousal—both in the host as well as the vampire.

“Somebody tie you to a bed?” Dante chuckled and looked at him.

Nico laughed. “More like he needed seconds.”

Lorenzo’s appetite for women was well known among his friends, and instead of getting annoyed about their little jabs here and there, he wore them like medals of honor. “She simply couldn’t get enough of me,” he lied, making his friends roar with laughter. There was even a twinkle in Isabella’s eyes. He winked good-naturedly. “But I had to take care of her friend too.”

The second lie earned him an even louder reply.

“That’s my boy!” Paolo proclaimed and slapped his own thigh.

And at most times, what Lorenzo was dishing his friends up tonight would have been the plain truth, but he’d had more important things to do during the last hours. The negotiations he’d entered into had taken longer than expected and not allowed him to indulge in his favorite pastime: women.