Kiss of Crimson Samantha Coville (best short books to read .TXT) 📖

to tell the tale, you know? Makes him feel like the bogeyman.”

Holsten shrugged. “Jardin can kiss my behind just this once. Cause I think that little lady is going to taste divine.”

Eloise tensed on the ground in front of me, and my hair stood on end.

The game was up.

I had to make a choice now.

I couldn’t watch Eloise die. I’d denied my feelings for long enough. I hadn’t been able to sleep a wink. Thinking about her was the only thing I could do.

But if I crossed Monseigneur Jardin... I’d be betraying my master. My creator. He gave me the greatest gift any man could ask for. Eternal life.

The second greatest gift.

My body went numb as I locked eyes with Eloise. What is forever if it’s spent in regret?

My choice was made.

It wasn’t an easy choice. Not by a long shot. It’d be a lot of nights on the run. Days in hiding. Jardin wouldn’t take this lightly.

But the alternative was worse than anything Jardin could do to me.

Holsten and Leo took their first steps toward Eloise. She let out a peep of a cry. I broke.

In an instant, I was in front of her. I put myself in between her and my two coworkers. They glared at me, dumbfounded.

“You’ll get your turn with her,” Leo grumbled.

A growl formed deep in the back of my throat. I flashed my fangs. “You’re not going to get an inch closer to her.”

Holsten and his buddy got into fighting stances that matched mine. “What the hell, man?”

I lunged forward, jumping on Leo. He fell backward to the floor with a resounding thud. I threw a punch hard at his jaw, a crack ringing loud and clear in the spacious warehouse.

He yelled profanities at me.

Holsten ran forward and grabbed both of my arms, trying to pull me off the other lackey. I snapped my head back, connecting with his nose. He howled and released me as he checked his nose.

Thank god vampires are obsessed with her pretty faces.

I saw out of the corner of my eye that Eloise was crawling along the floor. It was not a graceful movement as she struggled in her tight-fitting dress. Slowly but surely, she was heading over to the carrier boy.

Leo pulled himself off the floor and came barreling toward me. I reached into my shoe and effortlessly spun to avoid the oncoming attack, stabbing my attacker with the dagger I’d had hidden.

Blood spurted from the wound in his back as he stumbled away from me. The stench was atrocious to my senses.

But Leo was already back at it. And I hissed in pain as he sunk his fangs into my arm.

“Bastard,” I spat.

Unfortunately for Leo, he had left himself exposed. I plunged the dagger into his neck, hitting an artery. His teeth unlatched themselves from my flesh and he gurgled on his own blood.

What a way to go.

There was a crash and a scream.

My head whipped around to see Holsten grabbing Eloise’s leg. Joseph, the carrier boy, was on the ground. His chair had tipped over, probably from Eloise trying to free him before she got caught.

Time to end this.

Holsten’s face was beet red as he pulled Eloise closer to him, his fangs glinting in the poor lighting of the warehouse. She was smart, though. She pulled back her free leg and jabbed her heel into his eye.

A piece of her skirt tore as he pulled away to hold his face. With the distraction my sweet Eloise had provided, I grabbed the dagger out of Leo’s body and threw it.

It whistled through the air and met its target with clean precision. The hilt of the dagger was the only thing you could see sticking out of Holsten’s skull.

He fell with a thud.

I took a deep breath as I took in the scene.

Holsten and Leo were dead.

Eloise looked terrified.

I was a dead man walking whenever Jardin heard about this.

Fifteen

Eloise

I blinked. I blinked again. My head was running faster than I could keep up with, and my hands shook as I stared at the dead bodies on the ground in front of me. Arden's chest heaved and attempted futilely to wipe the blood from his face. I looked down and saw my own ensemble had spatters of crimson. Tearing my gaze away from the sight, my eyes locked with Arden. Looking into his dark brown eyes was the breaking point, and I burst into tears.

In an instant he was by my side, wrapping his arms around me. I ignored the sticky liquid that the embrace transferred onto me. To just be held by him was more than I could have hoped for. I ran through the past fifteen minutes in my mind. If he had killed those two men... just to save me... then he wasn't too far gone. He wasn't the horrible person I had forced myself to think he was after I had learned who he worked for. He clearly couldn't be controlled by his boss. So maybe that meant he could be saved.

Maybe it was okay to love him.

He pulled back and placed his hands on either side of my face, ensuring I couldn't turn away from him. The concern was evident on his face as he spoke. "Are you okay? Eloise, tell me that you're okay."

I couldn't form words right then, so I nodded my head. Relief washed over him and he placed a kiss on my forehead. The warmth from where his lips touched my skin radiated outward, filling me with butterflies and a sense of safety. I was sore, that much was for certain, but things were going to be okay. They had to be.

My mother’s carrier boy stirred on the ground, an aching groan coming from him as he struggled against the rope that tied him to the tipped-over chair. I turned away from Arden to check on the carrier. He had been beaten pretty badly before I got there. The evidence was in the large