Vampish: Kiss of Death Read online

  Vampish: Kiss of Death

  G.K. DEROSA

  Copyright © 2022 Mystic Rose Press

  * * *

  All Rights Reserved. This book may not be reproduced, in whole or in part, in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system known or hereafter invented, without written permission from the publisher, Mystic Rose Press.

  Cover Designer: Sanja Gombar www.fantasybookcoverdesign.com

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  Published in 2022 by Mystic Rose Press

  Palm Beach, Florida

  www.gkderosa.com

  Created with Vellum

  To all my amazing readers!

  ~ GK

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Sneak Peek of Vampish: Blood Bonds

  Also by G.K. DeRosa

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  Chapter

  One

  Ransom

  * * *

  A month. An entire month relegated to this hell hole. The four walls of this cell were closing in on me, the roughhewn stone my own private torture chamber. The only time I was allowed out was to watch her. A worse form of torture.

  I forced myself off the cot and stared through the small cutout in the metal door, without getting too close. The door along with the iron bars were doused daily with vervain, not to mention the vervain smoke they pumped into my cell to keep me weak.

  This sucked. Pun intended.

  Why had I ever agreed to spy for Carmen Rosa?

  Now I was a prisoner, under the thumb of the barely sane self-proclaimed king of the Children of the Night.

  “Hello? Isn’t it breakfast time already?” I called out. The only positive side of being stuck here was my daily ration of blood, real blood, not that synthetic garbage the Etrian Assembly tried to force on us. Blud rations were at a new low according to Ronin, and the attacks on the borders were only escalating. If the assembly didn’t find a way to get more nourishment to the starving serviles they’d have two wars to deal with. A civil war within Nocturnis’s borders and a second one with the shifters.

  If I knew one thing about the supreme alpha of Marlwoods, it was that he wouldn’t stand idly by while his people were killed.

  I yawned and stretched my arms over my head. It was a good thing I didn’t care one lick about all that political crap. Especially not when the switch was off. That’s right, I was cruising along emotionless, guilt-free. I felt nothing.

  I squeezed my eyes shut and those damned emerald irises flashed across the dark abyss. Well, almost nothing. No matter what I did, I couldn’t get the images of the day Red had been captured out of my mind. It was the only tiny bit of residual guilt I couldn’t quite shake. Maybe it was because Ronin forced me to stand outside of her cell eight hours a day, every day.

  I couldn’t help but relive the moment, over and over again.

  The dark walls of my cell blurred, and my mind whizzed back in time to a month ago, to that warehouse, when I lost her.

  * * *

  That impetuous little sicari reached for the stake strapped at her thigh, and already I knew what she would do. She’d try to kill Ronin and fail, and he’d snap her neck for the effort. I wouldn’t let that happen, I just couldn’t. I lunged, smacking the weapon out of her hand before she pierced his flesh, just a few inches to the right of his heart. Red was good, but there was no way she’d make it out alive against Ronin, his top generals, and dozens of starving serviles.

  If only she hadn’t been so rash. I could’ve found a way to talk us out of this mess. I had a plan, but I could see it in her eyes. She didn’t trust me. So I did what was expected. Saving Ronin’s life had to earn me some bonus points, right?

  Red would never trust me, but maybe I could gain Ronin’s faith instead, and somehow make this right.

  As Dinah and Stark dragged Red off the floor, her eyes shot daggers in my direction. “You’ll pay for this,” she mouthed, venom spewing from her glare. Even after everything we’d been through, she still thought I’d abandoned her.

  Pain lanced across my chest, the hurt so acute it sucked all the air from my lungs. As I watched Ronin’s generals take her away, a gaping hole opened in my gut. I massaged the spot in my chest, but the agony only grew worse. It was like my insides were being ripped apart.

  The door slammed behind them, and my knees buckled.

  “Ransom?” Ronin towered over me as I drew in ragged breaths, on my hands and knees. I forced my lungs to keep pumping. Inhale. Exhale. Inhale. Exhale.

  “What?” I finally growled.

  “You said you felt nothing for the girl, correct?” Those dark eyes bored into me, daring me to lie.

  How could I?

  Gods, Red meant more to me than anything in my entire existence. Even if she hated me right now. I couldn’t abandon her here with him. I’d have to find a way to get her out eventually. But right now… Right now, there was only one thing I could do.

  “Ransom?” Ronin’s voice jerked me to the present. “Just a juice box to quote you earlier, right?”

  I squeezed my eyes shut and imagined that switch, buried deep in the far recesses of my mind. I reached for it and flicked it off. All the pain siphoned from my chest, and immediately I felt lighter, freer. I released a sigh, and the hint of a smile curled my lips. “Just a juice box,” I answered.

  * * *

  At the time it was true. But dammit if that switch wasn’t a finicky little thing. Most times I was fine, but every once in a while, when I was with her those pesky human emotions fluttered to the surface. I couldn’t bear them.

  “Dammit, Leif, what do I need to do to get some food around here?” I shouted through the bars.

  “Easy, boy.” A familiar voice swept into my cell, and a hint of hope trickled through my veins.

  I stepped back at the whine of the key sliding into place, then the click of the lock rang out. Dinah appeared at the threshold, leaning against the arch. “You’re a sight for sore eyes.”

  “I thought you’d forgotten about me down here.” I tugged at my shirt collar trying to make myself semi-presentable. Which was hard since I’d been wearing the same clothes for a week. Apparently, at Ronin’s headquarters, a once weekly change of clothes was deemed acceptable. I longed for the feel of my leather jacket. The vampire king had confiscated my most precious possession weeks ago.

  “I’d never forget about you, handsome Ransom.” She crept closer, lowering her voice. “Ronin doesn’t trust me around you, which was why I haven’t been by. He thinks you’ll smooth talk me into letting you free.”

  It had crossed my mind. However, I was so pumped up with vervain, my powers of compulsion couldn’t compel a mouse at this point. Trust me, I’d tried.
There were hundreds of the nasty critters living in the dungeons.

  “Where would I go?” I countered. “First of all, I don’t even know where we are. Judging by the bursts of magic I’ve inhaled over the past few weeks, my guess is we’ve moved more than a handful of times.” Damned the warlock that was working for Ronin and magically relocating his hideout every few days. If it hadn’t been for him, surely Red’s team would’ve found her by now, and I could’ve made my escape in the commotion. “Second of all, as soon as I stepped foot into Royal lands, the queen would capture me. At least here, I get real blood.”

  “Just play it cool, Ransom. Prove to the king that you’re loyal, and he’ll reward you eventually.”

  “I don’t know what else I can do. I’ve already told him dozens of times I knew nothing about the sicari spy within our midst. For a slayer, she sure played a good bloodwhore.” My mouth watered at the memories of her taste. Did she taste better to me because of the mate thing? I shoved the thought deep down. Nothing brought my emotions back to the surface like the M word. The less I thought about her the better.

  Dinah’s lips screwed into a pout. “I knew there was something about the girl. You men are all the same, you see a pretty face and you start thinking with the wrong head.”

  “Oh, Dinah, come here.” I held my arms out, but she didn’t take the bait. “Jealousy doesn’t suit you,” I finished.

  “I’m not jealous of that she-wolf. I’m just surprised she played you.”

  I shrugged. We’d played each other.

  “Anyway, I’m here to escort you to guard duty.” She reached into her pocket and pulled out a pair of thick rubber gloves. Once they were on, she reached behind her back to the now familiar manacles. The iron cuffs were doused in vervain and were Ronin’s favorite accessory for me. Any time I wasn’t locked in a cell, I wore the dingy bangles. “Hands, please.”

  With a huff, I offered her my wrists. The iron locks clanked shut around my arms with a depressing ring of finality. She motioned for me to go first and I trudged out of my cell, in no hurry to spend the rest of my day with Red. Her incessant murderous glares were worse than the interminable silence of solitary confinement.

  “Maybe you could put in a good word for me, Dinah. Convince Ronin I’d be an asset.”

  She swept a lock of blonde hair behind her ear as she regarded me. “Oh, he knows you would be. His concern is where your loyalties lie.”

  “Then test me again. I’ll do whatever he wants. I need to get out of that cell, Dinah. Let me out in the field. I’ll terrorize whatever border pack he chooses.”

  She nodded slowly. “I’ll let him know.”

  We marched to the opposite side of the dungeon, my feet slowing with every step closer. As soon as I saw Red, my pesky humanity would rise, that switch would attempt to click on, and I just couldn’t handle that.

  The rush of guilt that would pummel me for what I’d done, or mostly what I hadn’t done, over the past month would suffocate me.

  We reached the door to the western end of the dungeon, and I held my breath as Dinah slid the old skeleton key into the lock. One thing that hadn’t changed in the past few weeks was how much I craved the little sicari.

  The door swung open, and her scent crashed over me. My fangs immediately lengthened, and saliva pooled in my mouth. Unlike my walled-in cell, Red’s was all iron bars. No privacy. I wasn’t sure if that was better or worse. There weren’t any other prisoners in this wing, but who knew, maybe one day there would be.

  Red didn’t even look up as we walked in. She lay across the cot with her eyes to the wall. I supposed I should’ve considered myself lucky. She was still wearing the same clothes she’d been captured in. The leather mini skirt hiked up her thigh, almost exposing her cheeks. She still wore the thigh-high boots too, probably in case she needed to make a quick getaway. She may have looked like she’d given up, but I knew my little sicari; she was just waiting for her chance. I’d probably be the first vamp she staked on her way out.

  “Rise and shine, Red.”

  “Fang off,” she snarled without sparing me a glance.

  Dinah patted me on the shoulder with a feral grin. “I’ll just leave you two lovebirds to work this out.” She opened the door and spun back. “Maybe I’ll talk Ronin into letting me visit you in your cell tonight. You know, a little treat for good behavior.”

  A gagging sound echoed from the corner of Red’s cell.

  I shot Dinah a smirk, flashing my incisors. “I’d say it’s about time.”

  Chapter

  Two

  Phoenix

  * * *

  “Isn’t it bad enough that I’m stuck in this cell forced to spend every day with you? Now you’re going to make me listen to the two of you flirting?” I hissed.

  Dinah giggled, and it took everything I had to keep my breakfast from coming up. It had been a crappy slice of bread, but I’d rather keep what little I got inside me.

  “Later, handsome,” she called out before the door slammed behind her.

  Thank the goddess. For a second, I thought I’d have to endure both of them today. I’d only seen Dinah a handful of times since my imprisonment, but if I was being honest, I preferred her over Ransom. Seeing him like this was the worst part of my captivity.

  He’d turned off his emotions after he sold me out to Ronin, like a big fangin’ coward. I felt nothing from him anymore. It was probably better that way. With his wolf gone, I didn’t have to deal with my own she-wolf’s longing for him. With the switch off, he was nothing more than a soulless fanger.

  “Did you wake up on the wrong side of bed today, Red?”

  I ignored him, just like I did most days, and kept my eyes on the oversized slabs of rock that walled me in. It was also the spot furthest away from the ever-watchful camera. Leaning closer to the rough surface, I tugged on the cross that hung on my neck and used the pointy end to mark a slash on the wall. Day twenty-nine. We’d magically moved locations ten times in as many days. Ronin wasn’t messing around.

  My team had to have been looking for me, deep down I knew it, but with the constantly moving headquarters, I’d be impossible to track. Stupid Ransom had been right all those weeks ago, the key to taking Ronin down was his warlock.

  I’d seen the male a few times when he accompanied the mad king to see me. Ronin came down to the dungeons every few days like clockwork. He’d threaten me, curse me out, bite me, but I refused to cooperate with him. He wanted to make me his personal assassin, but I refused. There was nothing he could take away from me anymore.

  After the botched attack on Deacon’s tigers, I’d sent him a letter to keep Kenna hidden in case anything went wrong. I had no idea where she was, which meant Ronin couldn’t get to her. I hoped he’d never find out she existed.

  Every time Ronin tried to compel me to do his dirty work, I thanked Demetra for the countless hours she’d spent practicing evasion techniques with me. The head of instruction at the Isle of Mordis had given me a gift few supernaturals had.

  “Red? You can’t ignore me forever.” Ransom approached the bars, the slow shuffle of his feet on the stone alerting me of his movement.

  I could, and I would. Pretending he didn’t exist was the only way to survive the hurt. I’d let him in; for a second I thought he was different, and he’d betrayed me. I’d never forget that. Ever.

  “Red, let’s play a game or something. There’s no reason why we can’t make our imprisonment at least a little fun.”

  A string of curses sat poised on my tongue, but I refused to voice them. I refused to engage with the vamp-hole. That was what had gotten me here in the first place.

  “Do you want me to beg?”

  I gritted my teeth.

  “I’m kneeling now, Red. With handcuffs on. Just turn around. Don’t you want to see me on my knees for you? Trust me, it would’ve been much more fun if there weren’t bars between us, but we’ll have to make do for now.”

  My fingers curled into tight fists a
t my sides. Would I’ve liked to have seen the vampire dick kneeling? Yes. Would I give him the pleasure? No.

  Besides, I had some plotting to do. It was pretty obvious now that help wasn’t coming, which meant I was on my own. I’d spent the past month observing everything I could about the movement of the guards, Ronin, even Ransom. The problem was that the king seemed pretty unpredictable. There weren’t many patterns he stuck to. Which meant he was either smart or just a fickle bastard.

  I hadn’t been out of this dungeon since the day I arrived, but I’d been conscious when they dragged me down here with the magic-siphoning cuffs. If I could just get out of this cell, and the surrounding room, it would be a straight shot up the stairs to ground level of the warehouse.

  I had no idea who I’d encounter on the way, but from what I’d learned so far, there didn’t seem to be many guards. Besides Ransom and Dinah, it was the same two that always lurked about. Then there was Ronin, his pet warlock, and likely a few of his generals. None of them had shown their faces down here though.

  “Red, whatcha thinking about?”

  How badly I want to jab a stake into your cold, black heart. I pressed my lips together to keep the words from bursting out. Thinking about Ransom’s betrayal cut deep, so like all things I wanted to avoid, I shoved the thoughts to the deepest, darkest corners of my mind. To deal with later. Or never.