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Obsidian Depths

  A Blushing Death Companion

  Suzanne M. Sabol

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  Copyright 2013 Suzanne M. Sabol

  Discover other titles by Suzanne M. Sabol at https://www.suzannemsabol.com

  Chapter One: Nothing Ventured…

  I mocked death, standing this close to her, and I knew it. The Blushing Death was not a woman to be trifled with, no matter how captivating she I found her. The mission was too important to Ethan to mismanage. The fact that I disagreed with him was of littleconsequence.

  What is she doing here?

  She shifted her weight from one booted foot to the other with a swishof hips that left my mouth watering.

  Across the gallery, she staredup at a canvas that made me think of fire burning through a field of bright white cotton. She stood tall like an Amazon ready for battle with her shoulders back, cowing to no one. Without question the most confident person in the room and she didn’t even know it. Her brashness was delicious like cotton candy on mytongue, sweet and sticky. She shook her golden blond hair back from her face. The strands seemed soft as if silk caressed her shoulders and neck. My fingers itched to feel it sift through mygrasp, to feel it strewn across my chest.

  What is wrong with me? The Blushing Death is dangerous.

  She killed my kind, vampires, and some of my best enforcers over the years. She also had an ass I wanted to sink my fangs into like ripe fruit, long muscular legs I wanted wrapped around me, and eyes that bore straight through to the core of my being.

  I glanced at Dominique’s pet still clinging to the emissary from the Ahriman colony. Those sorry excuses for vampires weren’t a colony, they were a cult but no matter how fervent his argument, Ethan wanted none of it. So here I stood, feet away from the most dangerous woman in the city standing between me and Dominque’s idiot human. He’d finally finished his business so it would be safer. I could feel the ticking clock on the back wall like a slap against my skin with every second that passed. We had to leave unnoticed. Whatever Ethan’s ridiculous plan, I would see it through. The Ahriman Cult had delivered the incantation and the amulet as ordered. Only a few more minutes and I could forget that I’d been close enough to the Blushing Death to know she smelled.of flowers on a warm summer night.

  I turned to leave but the gallery was crowded and too confined, leaving me trapped between too many inebriated humans and the Blushing Death.

  Dominque’s greasy, disgusting servant escorted the Ahriman emissary out the back door of the gallery, far from the prying, all too perceptive eyes of the Blushing Death. Now, the only issue was to escape myself before she noticed me.

  I scanned the room for another exit, stopping, frozen in place as she moved. Her rich, intoxicating scent carried on the cool breeze as the air circulated through the room. Hellfire and damnation she smelled delicious! My body went rigid and the hard press of my instantaneous arousal was tight along my leg.

  She glanced across the gallery, spying Dominique’s servant with a sly, practiced sideways glance. The Blushing Death had seen that greasy bastard and the Ahriman emissary leave with a pretty little morsel. Confound it! I had to distract her, keep her from getting anywhere near them until the representative from the Ahriman colonycould get away. I couldn’t have her ruining Ethan’s ridiculous plan. Not at least until I figured out what the old man was up to.

  Stepping up behind her my gut churned and twisted until I breathed a long deep inhale. Her light, floral scent filled my senses, making my mind swim in delirium. It wasn’t perfume. A shampoo perhaps, mixing with her natural clean, womanly scent and the divine aroma of her confidence. Beneath all that was the honeyedsmell of fear. Exquisite. Tempting. Sweet. Fear. My mouth watered as I watched her, my fangs aching to sink into the soft flesh at her neck. Her body tightened, the muscles along her back rippled beneath the leather jacket as she tensed. Knowing that I stood only inches behind her, she didn’t move, falter, or even cower. I expected no less of the Blushing Death.

  “Beautiful,” I breathed. I was closer to her than I remembered leaning in as my words brushed her hair.The Blushing Death’s body went rigid, stiff as stone as every muscle in her body tightened at the proximity of my voice. “The painting,” I added, quick to cover my ridiculous blunder. She glanced overat the painting, tilting her head up and exposing the long line of her neck. I salivated at the soft thump thump, thumpthump, thumpthump of her blood through her veins.

  The Blushing Death was a monster to many of my kind, someone to be feared. As I stared at the soft pale skin of her neck, along the delicate features of her face, the small button nose, the full pink lips, the porcelain skin and wide intelligent eyes, I agreed. She was stunning. Dangerous in so many more ways than any vampire had thought before.

  She turned on me, quick and unexpected, meeting my eyes as if she didn’t fear my hypnotic gaze.Then again, this was the Blushing Death. I should expect anything. I met her grey eyes, allowing the hypnotic suggestion to flow from me like water from a sieve – so easy. I wanted to help her relax, make her compliant and easier to deal with. The woman glared at me with a warning churning in the dark seas of her eyes and a saucy glower that should have angered me. Instead, I found it . . . cute as some invisible band tightened around my chest. She did, however, catch me off guard. I hadn’t been caught off guard in decades. She glaredup at me with grey eyes the color of storm clouds, filled knowledge and lighting them from the inside. Her heart raced, making her cheeks pink and her generous breasts heave with each panting breath. Dear Lucifer! She was incredible!

  “If you say so,” she snapped. I had the feeling she only answered me because I’d spoken directly to her. Tuggingher jacket tight around her, she covered up myperfect view of porcelain white cleavage down her low-cut V-neck sweater. She glanced at the back of the gallery as Dominique’s pet, Mirko, escorted the Ahriman colony representative and her meal out the back door.

  “Don’t you like it?” I asked, telling myself it was to keep her away from the back. Deep down I knew I asked for another reason. I wanted to know her answer, to keep her talking. Her voice was intoxicating, deeper than I’d imagined. Dangerous and sexy as if it could lull me into capitulation. She turned those intoxicating storm grey eyes back up to the canvas before catching my gaze, not hesitating to look me in the eye. Why would she hesitate? All of my power and it hadn’t worked. She wasn’t soothed, compliant or tumbling into my arms. She was brash, brazen, and very dangerous.

  “All I see is pain . . .and death,” she said, defeated. I knew exactly what she meant, having seen and caused my share of both. It was an aspect of who and what I was. Vampires were not angels of mercy as they had lately been depicted to humans with romantic tendencies. We are killers. I’m a killer. I enjoyed the sweet metallic taste of blood on my tongue. Would hers be just as sweet, maybe even sweeter? My fangs throbbed with wanting. My cock hardened at the thought of sinking into her, thrusting into her body and the feel of her thick warm blood coating the back of my throat.

  “But death can be beautiful too,” I said, curling my lips up into a sly smile. Did she see me as a hideous monster? Did she know I’d risk the sun just for a taste? “As in Brueghel’s The Triumph of Death,” I added as an example. “But then I suppose that most know nothing of real pain or death, do they?” I asked, baiting her. I couldn’t help myself, this interaction with her was as delicious as foreplay. I wanted to know what she was thinking.
I wanted to know everything about her and especially why she radiated a power like no other human I’d ever come across. She hummed with a magicI couldn’t explain and didn’t recognize.

  Standing stark still with her fists clenched at her sides, her arm tensed beneath her jacket. I knew she had a stake in her hand. I could smell the woodsy scent of clean oiled oak. I didn’t think she would use it, not in public anyway. The Blushing Death was many things but stupid wasn’t one of them.

  “You’re probably right,” she said, frustration making her voice graveled and sultry. I liked that I’d frustrated her and caused that rosy hue to her skin.

  “Are you suggesting that you do?” I asked with a smirk on my lips, unable to hide that I was enjoying this little tete a tete. She opened her mouth to answer, taking in a quick breath. Those full, pink lips slowly closed, pursing in thought to a kissable pout. It took all my strength not to lean in to the unintended invitation. She gazed up at me from under long lashes with those mesmerizing grey eyes, sending blood straight to my cock.

  “Probably more than most,” she answered, sadness thick in her deep, melodic voice.

  “Some say that the viewer brings their own psyche to the art. Perhaps the painting doesn’t reflect pain and death but instead, you do?” I said. Her lovely face changed, all emotion gone from her expression. Her eyes darkened with warning as something died in her gaze.

  I knew immediately that I’d pushed her too far. Before me stood the monster all little vampires fear in the dark . . . the Blushing Death.

  “Fascinating,” she bit out.

  Standing straighter, I squared my shoulders, unable to relax under the warning in her glare. I had lost my mind, grabbing a tiger by the tail. She wasn’t just any human. She was as dangerous as I was. Even faced with the prospect of death a few inches away, I couldn’t deny thatI liked that about her.

  “I have to go,” she snapped. Grazing her shoulder hard against mine, she shoved me out of the way, leaving the scent of her on my jacket.

  “But I don’t know your name,” I barked, unable to resist. I wanted to see if she would give me that much.

  “Dahlia,” she quipped over her shoulder.

  Dahlia . . .

  The soft delicate name seemed like such juxtaposition from her hard exterior. I rolled her name over my tongue like tasting a fine wine. She was smooth, full bodied with a floral finish that tingled all the way down my being.

  Knowing where she was going, I should have stopped her as the natural instinct in me screamed to protect Ethan and the colony. In the back of my mind, an idea formed. A plan. She might, in fact, be the catalyst I needed to throw a wrench in Ethan’s demonic enterprises. The Blushing Death could be the answer to my problem whether she knew it or not.