Netherworld: Drop Dead Sexy(61)

I was getting pretty mad by now. “Gosh darn it, Augustus, I don’t want to!”





The hateful birdbrain said nothing. He nipped my hand, and though he left no damage to my ghostly form, I felt it. That beak was sharp. “Ouch! All right, all right, stop being so mean.”

I stomped after Tristan with as much bad grace as I could muster. As Augustus paced behind in my angry wake, I contemplated griffin wings in hot sauce with blue cheese dressing. I wondered if the hotel’s chef could pull that one off.

Prodded by the implacable Augustus, I followed Tristan into a room on the hotel’s ground floor. The vampire was too intent on what waited in the room to note Augustus as he shut the door between me and the griffin. And of course I remained invisible to him. I wondered how Tristan would feel if he knew Augustus wanted me to watch him feed.

Lit by a single art deco style lamp, the room appeared markedly different from the room Dan and I frequented. Rather than the ornate antiques that gave the atmosphere such opulence, this room was almost utilitarian. Double bed. Nightstand. Mirror. Dresser. Clean but very boring. The kind of room a business traveler would sleep in rather than some rich clod’s resort appointments.

It took me a moment to realize this room, like the ballroom, had been repurposed. I wasn’t looking at the hotel’s ghost. This was the physical world’s face.

Something else in the room gave me pause. A naked woman draped over the black duvet covering the bed. Her eyes glowed with anticipation as she watched Tristan move towards her.

The blond blood donor looked to be in her mid to late twenties, a little on the too-skinny side. Long and lanky, she waited for Fulton Fall’s head vampire, her hands fisting the bed’s cover as he loomed over her. Her eyes were wide, and she flicked her tongue over smiling lips. A couple of healing puncture wounds on her throat told me this wasn’t her first rodeo. She was a real blood bank, a vampire groupie.

Tristan smiled at her, his fangs shimmering into view as he let go the glamour that kept them hidden. My heart went to my stomach, but the bleeder whimpered an excited little sound. Her breathing quickened, and I couldn’t help but look. Moisture glistened on her inner thighs, confirming her arousal. Good God.

“So nice to see you again, Stephanie,” Tristan said. He unfastened his trousers as he bent close to press a kiss to her forehead.

She wasn’t too terribly ugly, I suppose … okay, Stephanie was pretty. However, her voice whined nasally, setting my teeth on edge. “I’m always glad to serve you, Mr. Keith.”

“Very sweet. Hush now,” Tristan murmured. I guess he didn’t care for that voice either.

His face hung so close to hers that his eyes must have filled her vision. I watched her gaze glaze over. She shuddered, another happy moan slipping from her lips. He glamoured her, taking her to a place of utter helplessness. I felt cold all over watching him steal her will away.





Tristan said, “It makes you happy to give yourself, Stephanie.” He pulled his half-interested sex free of his pants and lay over her slight body. “Turn your head, my girl. No pain, only pleasure.”

She obeyed, letting her head fall to one side. Her expression had gone somehow both blank and euphoric all at once. I shivered. Had I looked like that when the Ripper took me? Had I welcomed my death with the same quiet eagerness?

Tears slid down my cheeks. I didn’t want to see any more of this, but for some reason I couldn’t turn away. Maybe Tristan had inadvertently glamoured me too. Maybe not. All I knew was that I had no more power to look elsewhere than the girl under his spell.

He drove the pearly fangs into Stephanie’s throat, and she gasped. Her body arched beneath his, and she shrieked ecstasy. Peal after peal erupted from her, and she clawed furiously at Tristan’s back. I wondered if his shirt would survive the assault.

I gaped, my hands pressed to my ears to shut out some of the din. “Dang girl, they’re going to hear you in the next county. What are you doing to her, Tristan?”

The blood bank writhed in continued orgasm, her screams tapering to throaty moans. Between each expulsion of pleasure, I heard the liquid sucking sounds of Tristan feeding. He pulled hard at the wounds he’d made, his red-rimmed eyes half closed. His hand went between their bodies, readying himself for the first thrust into his donor. When he took her, she screamed with renewed climax.

He rammed against her, not gentle at all. All the finesse he’d used with me was decidedly missing. Tristan wasn’t making love, wasn’t even having intercourse. He flatout effed her, a monstrous vampire using a human to quench his most base hungers. And the bleeder enjoyed it.