Sergio had a huge build, massively muscled with deeply tanned features and black hair, and I had always been certain he could have only survived to adulthood if his genes had been strong. Poor farmers in the first century looked for females primarily as strong breeding stock since the death rate in infancy and even older childhood was astronomical. For Sergio to have survived at all would have been a near miracle. To have survived the change to vampire and subsequent abandonment of his maker as rumor had it, was in truth a miracle.
I shook myself out of my reverie as Justine let go of Scott’s neck with a loud sigh. Scott stumbled back against the glass case where antique watches and other jewelry were displayed and then slowly sank to the floor, holding onto his bruised neck, and staring at me in horror. I knew if we survived the next few moments, I would have to wipe his memory, and I cursed the arrival of the three vampires in front of me. I turned to the third vampire whom I didn’t recognize.
“Who are you?”
He stepped forward and held out a slender hand, wearing a cocky grin. He had on blue jeans—not unlike his two counterparts—and a red polo shirt open at the neck where a light dusting of golden hair poked out. The curly hair on top of his head was also blond and if I had to class him as anything on the current gay scene, the word twink came to mind. I flashed up to him and took his hand. He licked his lips and moaned as soon as we touched. If I’d been anywhere else, into fucking vampires, and ready to spend one more second with more of my kind, I might have taken him up on what he so wanted to do to me…before Romeo, of course.
“Harvey… Harvey Miller,” the blond beauty purred. “You must be Vincent. I’ve heard a lot about you.” Blue eyes swept up and down my body as he held onto my hand, clearly reluctant to let go.
I wasn’t so inclined and pulled out of his grip even though he tried to tighten his. I could already tell he was much younger than I was, American from the Midwest, and if I had to venture a guess, turned in the twentieth century judging by his name, though, names were never the best way to tell. The pod in the back of the Rolls had to be his.
“1950,” Harvey said, reading my mind. “My human life ended in 1950 and since I love older men, I’m so happy to meet you, Vincent.” He lifted both arms and tried to circle my neck.
I stepped back, not interested in engaging with this beautiful boy who had probably been in his early twenties when turned, not much younger than I’d been. I could smell his arousal which practically leaked from every pore. He dropped his arms and stuck out his pink lower lip in a pout as he moaned again, batting his eyelashes at me. “I heard you’re a Viking.”
I snorted. “A knight of the realm but that doesn’t matter,” I said flippantly. Ignoring him further, I turned to Sergio, the oldest and most deadly vampire among the three in my store. “What do you want here, Sergio?”
“I want Robert’s books, of course. You should know that, Vincent,” Sergio replied. His deep voice purred with a slight Western European lilt which would have sent a ripple of lust down my spine if he’d been anyone other than who he was. “I’ve wanted them for centuries, and Robert had no rights to them.”
“I’ve told you before, you will never have them. My maker had those tomes before I was alive and before he met the true death, we took them with us wherever we went. They belonged to him and since I am his only living progeny, they are by law, mine. You will never have them,” I repeated.
Sergio flashed in front of me, causing Harvey to stumble backward away from us as he took his place. He was almost as tall as Romeo, and when he glared down at me, the fire in his evil eyes practically shot sparks. I knew if he wanted to, he could have ended my life at that moment. The only thing stopping him was his fear of the Conclave of Eight who ruled the vampire world. The eight oldest vampires on earth resided in a Siberian castle and it would take them days to make the journey to Prosper Woods, California, but make it they would when word got back to them that vampire laws had been broken.
Punishment was cruel and came down like an iron fist from the Conclave whenever vampire laws were broken. Breaking the law was rare but it happened on occasion. When one vampire killed another without cause, they were punished harshly. A murder after an argument over property rights—especially property rights that had been settled centuries before by the very same Conclave—was punishable by the true death and Sergio knew it.
“Why are you even here? These property rights have already been established,” I stated.
“They were put up for sale,” Sergio said, smirking as he turned and swept his clawed hand out toward the eight leather bound volumes on the counter. He turned back to me. “By all rights, that makes them fair game, Vincent. You know this.”
“Sergio is within his rights,” Justine hissed, grinning widely, flashing her long fangs at me.
She had a point but all three of them knew that Scott must have opened the box by mistake. Sergio and I had faced the Conclave on this very question before, and he knew better than anyone why I’d
