King of the Asheville Coven: Harper's Mountains Vampire Romance by T. S. Joyce

Author:T. S. Joyce [Joyce, T. S.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Wicked Willow Press
Published: 2016-07-10T18:30:00+00:00

Chapter Six

Sadey pulled the long-sleeved sleep shirt over her head in a rush, and then padded into the living room. She sidled around a stack of boxes that stretched up to the ceiling and shoved her feet into a pair of snow boots that had toppled over beside the door. She moved to leave, but on second thought grabbed the card out of her purse before she stepped outside.

Aric was on the front porch, shoving all the papers back into the box she’d shredded after her accidental Change.

She cleared her throat nervously. “It’s been a long time since I Changed unexpectedly like that. I usually have a lot more control.”

“It’s okay. I wanted to lose my shit after you left, too.”

Aric seemed like the quiet type who could go from zero to terrifying vamp in seconds. He also seemed like a man who kept himself in tight control.

“Why didn’t you?”

“Because Garret called a meeting and told my people what happened.”

“Right, because you’re King of the Winterset Coven.”

Aric huffed a breath and ran his hands through his hair. His eyes were the soft gray of a dove’s breast right now, and much less intimidating than the pitch black they turned when he was riled up. “I’m actually the King of the Asheville Coven. Or…” He frowned. “I was.”

“Are you not staying in Winterset?”

He looked around pointedly at the boxes strewn about. “Are you?”

Oh, he was an evasive, sexy vamp. Fine, if he wanted to answer questions with questions, she would play his game. “What happened at your meeting?”

He shook his head for a long time, gave his attention to the woods beside her house.

“Your coven doesn’t like me much, do they?” she asked.

With an irritated sigh, Aric sat down on the old porch swing and draped his arm over the back, kicked it into a gentle rocking motion with the heel of his boot and stared at her until she gave in and sat beside him. And then he explained. “Choosing you would’ve been different six months ago.”

“How so?”

The creaking of the swing was the only noise for a while, and it occurred to her that Aric was very careful with choosing his words. Maybe he had to be because he was a king, she didn’t know.

“I was barely able to avoid a war with the shifters.”

“Which shifters?”

“All of them.”

Sadey’s eyeballs nearly bugged out of her head. “What happened?”

“My maker, Arabella, was very old and undergoing The Sickening. She was the queen of my coven, losing her mind slowly, and she became cruel. She stalked a shifter—a grizzly. And she badgered and bribed him until he agreed to be her consort.”

“Consort?” Why did that word taste like poison on her tongue?

“Yeah. She fed from him when she wanted and paid him a lot of money. She wanted someone else to hurt. Someone strong who would heal and who could withstand more pain. She wanted something to feed on that wouldn’t die easily. She wanted something to scar on the outside and the inside.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.