The Vampire's Submissive by Violet Gray

Chapter One
     
    The streetlamp
flickered and popped, plunging the corner of the cobbled sidewalk into
darkness. Creepy much? Katy Foster locked the door to Bebe’s Bookshop
and peered over her shoulder. The fine hairs at the nape of her neck prickled.
“Stop it. You’re being silly, Katy,” she chastised herself under her breath.
    The scent of
coffee and pie wafted through the air. Maybe she could dart into Moe’s across
the street and scare away the heebie jeebies with a mocha and a slice of pecan
pie. No, she needed to get home. That paper on gender roles in contemporary
romance literature wouldn’t write itself. The street lamps flickered and a
whiff of cigarette smoke irritated her sinuses, but she didn’t see anyone.
Moving quickly, she walked toward the city parking lot, suddenly desperate to
be safe inside her little red banger.
    Nothing bad
ever happened in Sweetwater.
    Oh, damn,
now she’d done it . Anytime a character in a book said those words,
something bad inevitably happened. Shuddering, she tightened her grip on her
car keys and shivered in spite of the wool coat wrapped around her size
eighteen frame. Where was everyone tonight? The street was terribly quiet, even
if it was ten o’clock on a Monday night. She neared the alley between
Sweetwater Hardware and Billy’s Guitar Shop.
    Smoke, thick
and putrid, curled and danced its way out of the alley. Okay, that was weird.
Hurrying, she held her breath and dashed past the opening to the alley. An arm
snaked out of the smoke and grabbed her around the throat. In her mind, she was
screaming, but no sound escaped. He dragged her backwards into the alley, and
she gagged as his oily, filthy scent invaded her nostrils. Oh, god, she was
going to die. He threw her onto the ground and knelt over her, pressing a knife
against her neck. Tears streamed down her cheeks.
    “Please! Let
me go!”
    He laughed.
“You ain’t going nowhere. You’re a fat one, but I don’t mind.” He reached down
and pressed his hand against her knee.
    She scooted
backward, a scream finally breaking free. “Help me!”
    “Shut up!”
    He hit her
across the face and she saw stars flash behind her eyelids. The dirty ground
scraped against her legs, bared by her cute floaty deep red skirt. She’d made
it herself. It would be ruined.
    “No,” she
whimpered, disbelieving this was happening to her. A nightmare. She was caught
in a nightmare. “Help me! Oh, god, help me!” He struck her again.
    In the moment
before blackness consumed her, she thought she saw Jackson Wainwright’s perfect
face.
     
    Jackson
Wainwright heard the cries for help from several blocks away. Taking off at a
run, his nightly jog for serenity forgotten, he followed the sound of her
pleas. She sounded familiar. Keep calling, baby. Keep calling . Her cries
would distract her attacker, giving him the element of surprise. Not that he
actually needed it. His incisors had descended the moment her first plea for
help had pierced the night. He ran past Bebe’s and he knew he’d found her. He
could smell her sweet scent. The dark curling smoke gave him a moment’s pause.
Non-human. Probably demon. And not the gentlemanly sort like his best friend,
William. He heard him hit her and then he was on him, just as she fell back
against the ground, her head striking the filthy asphalt.
    Sonofabitch.
    Jackson
wrapped one arm around the demon’s chest and used his other hand to rip the beast’s
head from his shoulders. For a heartbeat, the head glared at him, then head and
body transformed into ash. Wiping the disgusting soot from his hands onto his
shorts, he knelt beside her. He recognized her beautiful, heart shaped face at
once.
    Katy.
    Dammit .
    She was
unconscious but breathing. The demon had bloodied her lip and a huge bruise had
already begun to form on her right cheekbone. He didn’t want to frighten her,
but he needed to get her out of there in case the thing had friends lurking about.
He could take her home,