Page 15 of Hot Vampire Next Door: Season Five

The queen just stands there several feet in front of me and I keep my eyes trained on the marble floor, trying not to overthink this thing.

Just act normal.

Just act normal? How?

“Well?” the queen says. “Did you ask her?”

Maven laughs. “I forgot in all the excitement!”

“Ask me what?”

I look up and catch the queen’s eyes. Her irises are a deep shade of amethyst, almost black. I can’t read anything there. She gives nothing away other than distant distaste.

My heart thuds harder and my hands tingle with new energy. I can’t feel my toes. My stomach churns.

Don’t barf on the Queen’s dress.

“Apologies, Mother,” Maven says and then he gets down on one knee. “Jessie MacMahon, Princess of the Winter Court, will you take my hand in marriage and be my wife?”

Episode Seventy-Six

YOUR SILENCE IS CONCERNING, VAMPIRE

BRAN

The first text from Baspin comes within minutes of me entering Duval House. The asshole programmed his number to have a unique chime and the unfamiliar sound immediately pulls my attention.

His name is in bold over the notification, and then, Your silence is concerning, vampire.

I darken the screen and slide the phone in the back pocket of my pants.

Damien starts barking out orders to the room as we enter through the side door, as if he didn’t just wake from a magically induced coma, as if nothing has changed. “I need at least fifty vampires ready for battle,” he says. “No one under a hundred. Feed before we leave. You have twenty minutes.”

“Where are we going?” That from a vampire draped over one of the wingbacks in the far corner. There’s a human in his lap, head resting against his shoulder, a bead of blood running down the slim column of her neck.

“Fae realm,” Damien answers.

Damien and I leave them to discuss this revelation. It won’t be long before word spreads through the entire house. Can they feel the fae magic like I can? That discordant buzz along the neck?

In our private wing, Damien and I break at the hallway. “I’m changing,” I tell him. “Meet me downstairs in ten.”

He nods as he turns, headed for his private quarters. “I’m stopping by the armory first.”

“Grab me an iron dagger. Or two.”

When I push through the closed door of my rooms, I find Jimmy at the dark fireplace, arms crossed over her chest.

“Christ,” I mutter and bypass her for my closet.

My phone dings in my pocket. I pull it out and set it on the island in my closet. “Don’t start, Jimmy.”

Her hair is wound up in a neat bun on top of her head. She’s wearing no makeup, but there’s fresh color in her cheeks indicating she must have just recently fed.

I need blood too. I need it soon.

“You can’t just go running after her like this.” Jimmy pulls herself up on the island. It’s topped with a slab of solid marble I had shipped over from an abandoned palace in France. There are thick black veins running through it.

“That’s where you’re wrong, Jimmy,” I say, tearing my shirt away and tossing it into the corner. “I can and I will.”

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