Vampire Bait (The Monster Misters Book 1), page 1
Table of Contents
Title Page
Vampire Bait
Copyright
Thank You!
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Epilogue
Books by Brynn Paulin
Vampire Bait
the Monster Misters
By Brynn Paulin
Supernova Indie Publishing Services, LLC
Powered by Your Imagination
Vampire Bait
by
Brynn Paulin
I work with the dead. Well, sort of. I’m security at the local funeral home. Don’t be fooled. It’s not too tough being a guard there. Creepy? Yes. Difficult? No.
Usually.
Until Valentine’s Day and the dead man who was…undead. It turns into a date I never expected. Most girls get candy, roses and kisses for V-Day. Me…?
Well…things are sure starting out with a BITE.
Copyright
© 2021, Brynn Paulin
Vampire Bait
Cover Art by Supernova Indie Publishing Services, LLC
Electronic Format ISBN: 978-1-62344-386-3
Published by: Supernova Indie Publishing Services, LLC
Warning: All rights reserved. The unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal. Criminal copyright infringement, including infringement without monetary gain, is investigated by the FBI and is punishable by up to 5 years in federal prison and a fine of $250,000.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and occurrences are a product of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, places or occurrences, is purely coincidental.
Thank You!
Thank you for your purchase of Vampire Bait.
I hope you enjoy the story and will consider leaving a review or telling a friend about the book.
I love hearing from readers! To keep in touch and follow my news, please visit me on my website at www.brynnpaulin.com.
Chapter One
~ Bellamy ~
Two days to Valentine’s Day and all’s well…
I laughed at my silly thought as I walked down the creepy road on the way to my job as overnight security at the Vanderbilt Funeral Home. Creepy job on a creepy road, but it paid well. There wasn’t a lot going on at the old place, but every once in a while, people tried to break in, so that necessitated me, Bellamy Jones, overnight security guard, not-so-extraordinaire. I mean really, mostly I just sat in the front lounge and read my Kindle.
Tonight felt…weird, though. Like I could expect a werewolf to pop out of the shadows and attack. Dear God, I hoped not. I had a book to finish reading, and werewolves were fictional. My brain was just making up weird scenarios from reading a horror-romance novel yesterday. Today’s rom-com selection about a trio of witches who’d moved to a small town wasn’t alleviating my jumpiness.
The building was empty when I got there. Apparently, the second shift workers had bugged out early, and of course, the day shift left as soon as visitations were finished. That meant everything had been deserted for a while before my walk-through.
Not for the first time, I questioned my decision to work here. I had cosmetology certification in multiple areas. I could be doing makeup over at the mall or hair over at Bunny’s salon. Thing was, I didn’t like people. Dead people didn’t infringe on my personal space, and they sucked away a lot less of my energy. I was just freaking out because I’d been traumatized by the book I’d read yesterday.
Strains of Thriller trilled through my head, reminding me it was close to midnight and evil things lurked in the dark. Yippee.
I felt it.
Even if I wanted to ignore it. Even if I wanted to suppress it.
I felt it. There really was something weird in the air tonight, and it wasn’t my imagination. I had a sense that way. No one believed me, but I’d been the kid who’d seen monsters. Real monsters. Thankfully, never under my bed or in my closet, though. Over the years, I’d learned to shield myself from it. People were people, and that wasn’t a ghoul over there. It was just the postman. Right?
That’s what I’d always tried to tell myself until monsters proved they were real, and I couldn’t pretend they didn’t exist anymore.
My keys jangled as my steps sped up, the clangs and my footsteps seeming far too loud for the dead of night. Dead of night? Nice choice of words, Bellamy.
Feeling the insane need to whistle, I quickly opened the door and let myself inside, locking it behind me again. As if it would keep out all the monsters filling my mind. As if a thin section of wood and glass would keep me safe.
Shaking, I tried to clear the thoughts from my head and think about the upbeat Dakota Rebel series I was reading.
No dice. The wind howled through the bitter cold outside, and I was sure I heard a howl.
“Just a dog,” I whispered to myself. “Only a dog. From the nearest house. A mile away.”
Gah! I needed to shut up.
And why didn’t I have a gun issued for this job? Like a standard gun worked on monsters? I knew better. Most monsters were impervious.
“Nothing to worry about, Bellamy,” I whispered.
Tonight would be the same as every other night for the past almost year. Nothing ever happened here. I was just freaking myself out. Even so, there was no way I was walking through the basement today. I wasn’t going near the coolers or the embalming room. The edges of premonition were creeping closer and closer to me. And like the monsters I’d seen since childhood, I couldn’t ignore it. Something was going to happen tonight, and I was pretty sure, it wouldn’t be good.
After checking the security logbook, which hung inside a discreet closet along the hallway running to the left of the entryway, I saw that the second shift guys had done jack all around here. Great. That left me checking things I didn’t usually need to. I mean, once something is verified locked up, with no incidents following, it’s locked up, right? An hour later, I’d checked most of the place. I cruised through the garage area beneath the building where they quietly brought in bodies from the hospital. Then I whizzed through the adjacent “storage” coolers and embalming room so fast you’d think demons were on my heels. And I’d seen those guys in action. They were indeed fast. But thankfully, they weren’t usually interested in me. I was the wrong gender, if you get my meaning. At any rate, everything downstairs was as it should be.
Dashing around a corner, I ran up the two flights of stairs to the main floor. There was no way I was taking the elevator that carried the bodies upstairs. Then I jogged up a couple more to the next story where the business offices were located. If I didn’t know better, I could believe I was in a regular office building as I walked around here at a more sedate pace. I took my time, catching my breath before I did my round of the main floor that held the family and visitation rooms, along with some storage. As expected, all the doors were locked and everything was shut off in the small kitchen. Turning off the lights, I headed to the last area, looking forward to settling into a comfortable chair and reading my book. All I’d have to do the rest of the night was listen for odd noises.
My first clue that something was wrong came when I entered the first visitation room.
Skin crawling, all my senses at me screaming to run, I came to a dead stop. No, not dead. I was very much alive, but something…
At first glance, nothing looked amiss. Nothing screeched Run! except for my intuition that had been running haywire since I’d left my tiny studio apartment tonight. The space was empty, chairs picked up, closed coffin front and center—
Wait…
My feet moved on their own while everything inside me yelled to get out of the building now. As if in a trance, I couldn’t stop my progress toward the shiny, cherry wood casket. In the same way, I couldn’t stop my hands from opening the lid.
A body. Holy fuck a body. Some young man with brown hair. He looked my age. But…but…they never left out corpses.
My surprised squeak was loud enough to wake the dead. Apparently really loud. Because his eyes popped open and the last thing I knew for sure was his eyes were gray and his teeth were sinking into my neck. My silent scream strangled in my throat while I panicked.
Monster! He was a monster! And he was going to kill me, too. Because I’d been too stupid to listen to the voice in my head when it had screamed at me, the voice that knew things, the voice that had saved me more than once. I was dead…
I was shaking uncontrollably, my vision almost black when he tore back. The only thing holding me up was his grasp on my arms.
Automatically, my hand went to my neck as I gaped at him. Blood didn’t gush over my fingers, though I felt the two puncture marks. Pain I’d been too shocked to feel before followed.
He held up his palms, only to have to catch me when I started to buckle. “Sorry, sorry!” he gasped. “You startled me. I didn’t mean to bite you.”
“Who bites someone when they’re startled? On the neck!” I gasped, still so shock by what had happened that I wasn’t trying to run like I should. Of course, so far my legs had proven they wouldn’t hold me anyway. “Who does that? What are you doing here?”
“It’s an old reflex. Don’t worry. You won’t turn. Only…true…mates… Th chose… Oh no.”
My sight faded even more, his face the only thing visible in my pinpoint vision. “Oh no? Oh no? Oh no what?” Panic rose in my throat, and I couldn’t breathe. Why couldn’t I breathe? Was I dead? Already?
“Maybe, you should sit down. Or lie down. The coffin is comfortable.”
“No…no coffin,” I whispered. This was it. A monster really had killed me. Suddenly woozy, I stumbled sideways out of his grasp as the room started shifting. Just as quickly, I finally saw his aura. Why hadn’t I seen it before? Why hadn’t I seen it even before I opened that lid? Now, I knew. Now, I knew what had killed me. “Vampire…”
Then everything went dark.
Chapter Two
~ Alphie ~
Well…fuck.
I stared at the woman in my arms, cradled against my chest as I’d always pictured my bride would be when I carried her over the threshold. Of course, that had been back…before. Before I was turned, and everything changed. You’d think I wouldn’t be so bitter about that seventy years on, but I was. And now look what I’d done. Changed this female. I’d done the same thing that had been done to me.
Though it was different.
The vampire who’d turned me, certainly hadn’t been my mate. He’d nearly ripped out my throat then left me for dead. I still bore the scars, because it had been too much to fully heal.
Turning a mate, that was easier, gentler. She didn’t need my blood because a release of hormones from my bite would flow into her, and if she was my destined partner, she’d react. Change.
I’d never intended to claim a woman as mine. I’d only been looking for a place to rest after a sleepless day of travel. This funeral home had seemed as good as anywhere. Windowless, deserted. I hadn’t figured anyone would come in, and it was dark. I’d had a sleepless day of travel and just wanted to get some rest continuing to Washington state, where I lived. I’d planned on a few hours of solitude before getting on the road again in my customized van.
Then…this woman had startled me. In truth, I really had bitten her accidentally. I only did that as a defense mechanism, otherwise I drank bagged blood. Me and Dracula…well, we’re not exactly besties. He thinks I’m weak because I don’t go for the jugular, and I just think he’s a jackass. It was really no shock to me that he didn’t have a mate. He would have drained her dry without realizing he’d found her.
Besides him being blood-thirsty, this wasn’t how things normally worked. It wasn’t usually this easy. Monsters searched years for their destined partner. They didn’t just startle awake and bite her some evening. How lucky was I?
But she hadn’t looked at me as if I was lucky. She’d been horrified.
Not to sound callous, but she’d get over it. She had to. It was a done deal. Mostly. But in an instant, I chose not to tell her about the out clause when she woke. Or ever.
And that was my own jackass move, so Drac wasn’t the only one. I could already feel her growing on me…growing into me as our souls connected. So no. No out clause.
I wasn’t sure how I’d travel with my mate, but we couldn’t stay here. I may have been willing to risk myself, but I wouldn’t risk her. My whole existence had just morphed into ensuring her wellbeing over all else. I needed to get her to my home. She’d be safe there where I had tons of high-tech security.
I usually didn’t leave there myself, but I’d had business with a scientist developing vampire survival gear. But along the way, I’d run into trouble. Now, I had a hunter on my ass. And he would be on my mate’s ass, too. Until we were safe behind our impenetrable walls.
Thing was, us preternatural creatures usually didn’t have a problem with hunters. If we behaved, they behaved. Which was to say, if we acted like law-abiding humans, they left us alone. But every once in a while, one of them would get a bug up his ass and decide all monsters needed to be exterminated. Awfully xenophobic if you asked me. Yes, we were monsters, but that didn’t mean we were bad. There were more humans hurting other humans than there were monsters doing so. Most of the time, we were just trying to live our lives—or unlives, in some cases—just like everyone else.
I peered down at the woman in my arms, her dark hair a stark contrast to her pale skin. Her rosy lips called for me to kiss them. As did her dusky eyelids. Everything about her lured me.
“Can’t stay here, staring at her,” I muttered. Knowing she’d be out for a while, I pressed my nose into her neck, inhaling her sent, then I set her on one of the room’s couches. Using the newly ingrained memory of her fragrance, I walked toward the front of the building tracking down her things. Coat…backpack… There was nothing else. And when we left it would appear she’d never arrived here tonight.
I pulled her wallet out of her purse and found her ID with her home address. We’d head there, I’d gather her belongings, and we be on our way. By the time she woke, it would look to the world as if she’d disappeared from this tiny town. I just hoped she didn’t have a lot of possessions or any roommates to deal with.
Chapter Three
~ Bellamy ~
I stirred, my head feeling fuzzy yet every sense on high alert. My senses had fine-tuned to the point I could hear someone’s heart beating. I could smell… a dog? Somewhere. Not in the same room with me.
Not a room. The vibration around me said I was in a vehicle. I almost hadn’t noticed it because I’d been distracted by being able to feel the weave of my clothes against my skin. It was all maddening. Too much! I longed to claw at it to make the sensation stop.
My panic sped up while I tried to come fully awake. It was as if a giant weight sat on my chest, and my eyes were sealed shut. Even if I wanted to tear off my clothes, I couldn’t. My limbs weren’t responding.
Wake up, Bellamy! Wake up!
“Hello, mate.”
As if the words released me, my eyes flew open, and I sat up, moving quicker than I ever had before. My gaze zeroed in on the man in the driver’s seat. We were in a van, and I’d been lying on a bed in the back. Now, all my focus was on him. His earthy scent. The strands of his messy light brown hair and slightly darker facial hair that seemed to be groomed stubble more than it was beard.
How was I this far away and I could see intimate details? I heard him swallow and was again amazed by how acute my senses had become while I’d slept. And when I focused on him, the out of control madness I’d felt earlier faded. Calm ebbed against my soul.
I wasn’t sure I liked it.
I didn’t know what it was. It wasn’t something coming from me. I knew that much.
Just…everything was wrong.
“Mate?” I finally managed to rasp. My voice sounded different. There were tones in it I’d never heard before now. “What do you mean mate? Where am I? Did you kidnap me?” I looked around seeing the articles stacked against the vehicle’s walls. “Is this all my…stuff?” My words crescendoed into panic. Fuck the calm trying to soothe me! “Who are you?”
“Alphred James—Alphie—and you’re Bellamy James.”
“No, I’m Bellamy Parker.”
“Not anymore. As soon as I bit you and you reacted, you became mine. Your life force joined with mine. That’s how it works.”
You became mine…that’s how it works. His attitude seemed a little highhanded to me. And by little, I meant skyscraper sized.
“I’m a vampire,” he added.
“Shocking,” I deadpanned. “I hadn’t figured that out.” Two of my fingers went to my neck to feel for a pulse, which was dumb since I’d never been able to find one before. I was pretty bad at that sort of thing…finding pulses…and avoiding monsters, apparently.
“Am I dead?” I asked rather than addressing his stupid claim on me. I didn’t belong to him, no matter what he thought. Stupid vampire. Stupid monster. Stupid man.
Suddenly, I hoped he wasn’t able to hear my thoughts.
Can you read my mind?
“Do you feel dead?”
Okay, maybe, he couldn’t, And what the hell kind of answer was that? “I feel…pissed off, actually.”
