Category Archives: 2012 releases

Paranormal Romance Books Released in 2012 – A year of erotic vampire romance, hot bad-boy angels, and a reunion with a beloved cast of vampires

I thought it would be good to take a look back at the paranormal romance books I released in 2012 and recap them all in case you missed any. As always, I had a crazy number of releases. Six in total, and four of those were the start of a new series that quickly blossomed into a firm favourite with my readers.

The year kicked off in style with a new erotic vampire romance series that immediately caught the hearts and imaginations of readers everywhere, and had many of you instantly falling in love with a certain white-haired vampire called Snow… introducing the Vampire Erotic Theatre romance series

 

Covet
Felicity Heaton
They’ve burned for each other for two years, the forbidden attraction between them growing each night. Now resisting the sinful desires of their hearts is becoming impossible.

Javier knows better than to succumb to his hunger for Lilah. The mortal female belongs to a powerful aristocrat patron of Vampirerotique, the theatre he runs with three other vampires. A single touch is all it would take to break the sacred law of his kind, sentencing himself to death, but his passion for her has become too fierce to ignore and he will risk everything to make Lilah his.

Lilah has fought her desire for Javier since arriving at his theatre as a servant but each glance he has stolen, his eyes promising pleasure that will satisfy her longing for him, has chipped away at her defences and she can no longer deny her need and her forbidden feelings for the powerful vampire male.

When they find themselves alone in a private box during one of the erotic performances, will they surrender to their passion and live out their wildest fantasies in a night of wicked pleasure or will the threat of Lilah’s master keep them apart forever?

 

Available in e-book from:
Author’s website

Amazon Kindle | Amazon Kindle UK | Amazon Kindle Germany | Amazon Kindle France | Amazon Kindle Canada

Apple iBookstore US | Apple iBookstore UK | Apple iBookstore Australia | Apple iBookstore Canada | Apple iBookstore New Zealand

Barnes and Noble | Kobo Books | Smashwords | All Romance eBooks

 

Available in paperback from:
Amazon.com (Covet and Crave in one book) | Amazon.co.uk (Covet and Crave in one paperback) | Barnes and Noble (Covet and Crave in one book)

 

 

Crave
Felicity Heaton
His mind has been set on his work for the past one hundred years. Now a forbidden beauty has stolen his attention and is threatening to steal his heart too.

Callum has come to the city of romance on business, not pleasure, but when he sets eyes on a gorgeous werewolf in a nightclub, he can’t ignore the dark carnal craving she ignites in him. His work for Vampirerotique, the erotic theatre he runs with three other vampires, can wait. The only thing that matters now is satisfying his sinful hunger for a woman who most vampires would consider an enemy.

Kristina is on the run from her pack. Her alpha is intent on forcing her to bear his child and she’s not about to live through the same nightmare as her mother had. When a tall, dark and sexy vampire catches her eye, she can’t believe the ferocity of the desire he unleashes in her or the fact that she enjoys the feel of his eyes on her and his silent pursuit of her in the clubs each night.

When Kristina finally gets a taste of Callum in a forbidden kiss, will she be strong enough to resist the allure of the vampire and his offer to share his bed for a week of unbridled, wild sex, or will she surrender to her own craving for the safety and passion she finds in his embrace?

 

Available in e-book from:
Author’s website

Amazon Kindle | Amazon Kindle UK | Amazon Kindle Germany | Amazon Kindle France | Amazon Kindle Canada

Apple iBookstore US | Apple iBookstore UK | Apple iBookstore Australia | Apple iBookstore Canada | Apple iBookstore New Zealand

Barnes and Noble | Kobo Books | Smashwords | All Romance eBooks

 

Available in paperback from:
Amazon.com (Covet and Crave in one book) | Amazon.co.uk (Covet and Crave in one paperback) | Barnes and Noble (Covet and Crave in one book)

 

 

Seduce
Felicity Heaton
Bloodlust runs in his veins, a dark master waiting for the day it will reign over him. Now a woman with a pure soul and wicked intentions has him in her sights and is determined to crack the ice around his heart, and she might save or damn him.

Antoine stands apart from the world around him, a dangerous and broken soul who must maintain rigid control at all times or risk his dark addiction finally seizing hold of him. The shadows of his past haunt him and he sees his bleak future each night when his brother wakes screaming, his blood addiction turning him savage. He cannot allow himself to feel, but when Sera walks into Vampirerotique, the erotic theatre he runs with three other vampires, to audition, she awakens dangerous desires in him—hungers that could spell the end of both of them.

Sera has wanted Antoine since the night she first saw the gorgeous aristocrat vampire. She can’t ignore the deep carnal hunger he stirs in her or the ache to know the heat of his touch. With the help of her sire, an ex-performer at Vampirerotique, she sets in motion a game of seduction, one designed to thaw the ice in Antoine’s veins and make him burn for her.

When Sera discovers the shocking truth about his past and the darkness that lurks within him, will she be strong enough to seize his heart with both hands and win him forever or will she lose him to the ghosts that still haunt him?

 

Available in e-book from:
Author’s website | Amazon Kindle | Amazon Kindle UK | Amazon Kindle Germany | Amazon Kindle France | Amazon Kindle Canada

Apple iBookstore US | Apple iBookstore UK | Apple iBookstore Australia | Apple iBookstore Canada | Apple iBookstore New Zealand

Barnes and Noble | Kobo Books | Smashwords | All Romance eBooks

 

Available in paperback from:
Amazon.com | Amazon.co.uk

 

 

Enslave
Felicity Heaton
His determination to succeed in business has left no room in his life for love. Now, a beautiful and deadly succubus has teleported into his dark, decadent world and is in danger of enslaving his heart.

Andreu’s future entails opening an erotic theatre like Vampirerotique, gaining wealth, women and power, not shackling himself to a single female, but he cannot deny the dangerously seductive succubus who stirs his anger and passion, and tempts him like no other—he will have her.

The moment their eyes meet, Varya knows she cannot have the exotic dark vampire who sets her pulse racing. His shadowed aura marks him as forbidden, but the hungers he awakens in her are too intense to resist—she must have a taste.

When an erotically-charged kiss ignites their soul-searing passion and reveals something dangerous about Andreu, will Varya leave forever or will she dare to risk all in pursuit of something she thought was beyond her reach?

 

Available in e-book from:
Author’s website | Amazon Kindle | Amazon Kindle UK | Amazon Kindle Germany | Amazon Kindle France | Amazon Kindle Canada

Apple iBookstore US | Apple iBookstore UK | Apple iBookstore Australia | Apple iBookstore Canada | Apple iBookstore New Zealand

Barnes and Noble | Kobo Books | Smashwords | All Romance eBooks

 

Available in paperback from:
Amazon.com | Amazon.co.uk

 

My Vampires Realm romance series reached the tenth book with a dramatic Creator Day masquerade featuring a new hero and heroine, and a cast of familiar and loved characters from the previous books in the series…

 

Masquerade
F E Heaton
Ten years have passed since Sophis and Vivek, two vampires of the Venia bloodline, came close to death at the hands of twin hunters Aleksis and Izabella Romanov. The events of that night turned Sophis and Vivek against each other, shattering their close friendship and driving them apart.

Now, on the eve of a centenary Creator Day masquerade and at a time when things between them are dangerously close to separating them forever, they uncover a small army of vampire hunters in Saint Petersburg, led by their nemeses, Aleksis and Izabella.

With the safety of the rulers of the seven pure vampire bloodlines in their hands and their chance for vengeance hanging in the balance, can Sophis and Vivek face their past and overcome their differences? Will they realise their true feelings for each other before it’s too late or will the hunters finally claim their lives as their deadly plot to destroy the bloodlines unfolds?

 

Available in e-book from:
Author’s website | Amazon Kindle | Amazon Kindle UK | Amazon Kindle Germany | Amazon Kindle France | Amazon Kindle Canada

Apple iBookstore US | Apple iBookstore UK | Apple iBookstore Australia | Apple iBookstore Canada | Apple iBookstore New Zealand

Barnes and Noble | Kobo Books | Smashwords | All Romance eBooks

 

Available in paperback from:
Amazon.com | Amazon.co.uk | Barnes and Noble

 

 

And my Her Angel romance series reached the fifth book, with a novel that took things to a whole new level and took us straight into the deepest bowels of Hell!

 

Her Demonic Angel
Felicity Heaton
A demonic angel with a heart of ice, Veiron walks a dark path with vengeance on his mind. Nothing will sway him from his mission to destroy his master… until he risks his life to enter Hell once more to save a mortal female. The fiery beauty makes him burn with hungers he must battle and needs he cannot deny, tempting him to surrender body and soul to her.

Erin is convinced her refusal to do the Devil’s bidding will see her die in a terrifying realm straight out of her nightmares. The last thing she expects is the lethally sensual warrior who breaks into her cell and awakens the darkest desires of her heart and a fierce longing to know the heat of his caress.

Pulled into an incredible world where war is set to ignite and darkness is on the rise, Erin races with Veiron to escape the Devil’s legions in a journey fraught with danger and filled with passion that flares white-hot.

When Erin is faced with a life-shattering realisation and an extraordinary destiny, will their love give them the strength to battle both Heaven and Hell or will they be parted forever?

 

Available in e-book from:
Author’s website | Amazon Kindle | Amazon Kindle UK | Amazon Kindle Germany | Amazon Kindle France | Amazon Kindle Canada

Apple iBookstore US | Apple iBookstore UK | Apple iBookstore Australia | Apple iBookstore Canada | Apple iBookstore New Zealand

Barnes and Noble | Kobo Books | Smashwords | All Romance eBooks

 

Available in paperback from:
Amazon.com | Amazon.co.uk

 

Which of my releases in 2012 was your favourite?

 

Posted in 2012 releases, angel romance, Covet, Crave, Enslave, Her Angel Series, Her Demonic Angel, Masquerade, paranormal romance, Seduce, Vampire Erotic Theatre, vampire romance, Vampires Realm, werewolf romance | Comments Off on Paranormal Romance Books Released in 2012 – A year of erotic vampire romance, hot bad-boy angels, and a reunion with a beloved cast of vampires

Vampirerotique Summer Book Tour – What’s next in the Vampire Erotic Theatre romance series?

Today, I’m going to talk about the series and what’s in store for you all. It’s my final date on my tour, so it makes sense to end it on a “what’s next?” vibe.

First, I need to introduce you all to the world of the Vampire Erotic Theatre romance series.

The series focuses on the world of Vampirerotique, a theatre that hosts performances for a vampire-only audience and entertains them with erotic acts between vampires and their human thralls. The theatre is run by four vampires, two of them from elite families, Javier and Callum, and two of them from an aristocrat family, Antoine and his older brother Snow. There are also two vampires who have come in to help run the theatre, and those are Andreu, who is Javier’s younger brother, and Payne. There are humans who work at the theatre, all of them owned by a vampire master, bonded to them by blood. Humans outside this small circle are unaware of the existence of vampires.

Covet, the first book in the series, introduces readers to the world and to the hero who had the initial idea for the theatre together with his fellow elite, Callum. Javier is a sexy Spanish vampire who has spent the past century running the theatre with the others and lives the life of a bachelor and has little interest in romantic entanglements, until he set eyes on Lilah. Lilah is an owned human, sent to work by her master, and the laws dictate that a vampire cannot touch that which belongs to another without breaking that law, sentencing them to death and paining the human. Javier fights his desire for Lilah for two years, unaware that she’s fighting her feelings too, until fate brings them together in a private box during one of the erotic performances. Covet is the ultimate forbidden love story and it will have you flipping pages at lightning speed so you can find out how it all ends!

Next in the series is Crave. In Crave, we follow Callum to Paris. Callum’s role at the theatre is sourcing performers and he’s come to the city of love on business, not for pleasure. When he sets eyes on a gorgeous woman in a nightclub, he tries to fight his dark desire for her but resisting her is impossible. His carnal hunger for a woman most vampires would see as an enemy, a hot sassy werewolf named Kristina, will leave you panting for more.

Antoine, the younger aristocrat vampire owner of Vampirerotique (only around a thousand years old), finds himself the target of a calculated and merciless attack on the defences around his heart in Seduce. Sera, a beautiful young elite vampire, has been watching Antoine since she first attended the theatre with her sire and now she is determined to chip away the ice that protects his heart and set him on fire, and she’ll do whatever it takes to gain an audience with him, even get on the stage herself and act out a private performance for his eyes only. Seduce is out now!

Seduce also introduces two new elite vampires, Andreu and Payne.

Andreu, the younger brother of Javier, steps into the world of Vampirerotique bent on learning all he can about it and taking it with him when he leaves to return to Barcelona and start his own erotic theatre. He’s a man who is all business and he’s determined not to fall in love like his foolish brother, but when he finds himself faced with a challenge in the form of a sexy succubus, Varya, he can’t help feeling that determination isn’t going to save him from a fall after all. Enslave is out now!

After those four stories have set your hearts on fire, I will be luring you all back to the theatre later this year with the next book in the series!

First up is Payne’s story, Bewitch, where the young elite vampire travels into the fae underworld searching for a way to help Varya and Andreu. Chasing leads isn’t his style, especially when most of them are dead ends. His final shot at helping his friend is a witch who seems to be immune to Payne’s enigmatic charms, and she wants something in return. But her price is something that Payne cannot give her because to do so he will have to embrace a side of himself he had long wished didn’t exist and face a past he cannot forget.

Book six in the series belongs to the man all hearts have been waiting for if you go by the reviews for Covet, Crave and Seduce, and even Enslave!

Snow, the older brother of Antoine and a man afflicted with a vicious bloodlust, will be making hearts melt in his story, Unleash. On the verge of losing his sanity, Snow’s battle with his affliction has intensified and become one of life and death. When a woman capable of taming his darkness appears in his bedroom, Snow must face events in his past he had long forgotten and atone for his sins if he is to find the strength to unleash his heart and win her love. But when those he loves come under threat, he must decide whether to fight for his family and lose her forever or fight for love.

I hope you’ll all follow the series and the romances as they unfold at Vampirerotique!

Be sure to follow this fantastic tour between June 28th and August 25th to learn more about the passionate heroes, wicked heroines, and life at London’s premier vampire erotic theatre! You can also find yourself in with a chance to win a $50 or $25 Amazon Gift Certificate if you follow the tour. More details, including how to enter and a full list of stops, are available at the Vampirerotique Summer Book Tour page.

Leave a comment on this post and enter the giveaway on the tour page in order to gain points. Just let me know you commented on this specific post by pasting in the URL into the extra information box.

Covet, Crave, Seduce and Enslave are all available in ebook from Amazon Kindle stores, Apple iBookstores, Kobo Books and other retailers. Covet, Crave and Seduce are also available at Barnes and Noble Nook store. Covet and Crave are also available as an anthology paperback, and Seduce is available as a solo paperback. Excerpts are available for all of the current releases in the series, so you can get a taste of these wicked erotic romances.

Books in the Vampire Erotic Theatre romance series
Covet (Vampire Erotic Theatre Romance Series Book 1)
Crave (Vampire Erotic Theatre Romance Series Book 2)
Seduce (Vampire Erotic Theatre Romance Series Book 3)
Enslave (Vampire Erotic Theatre Romance Series Book 4)
Bewitch (Vampire Erotic Theatre Romance Series Book 5) – Coming soon!
Unleash (Vampire Erotic Theatre Romance Series Book 6) – Coming in 2013!

Posted in 2012 releases, 2013 releases, Book Tours, paranormal romance, Vampire Erotic Theatre, vampire romance, writing | Comments Off on Vampirerotique Summer Book Tour – What’s next in the Vampire Erotic Theatre romance series?

Prophecy Trilogy – Now available as one ebook from Amazon Kindle, Apple iBooks, Kobo and more!

I decided to put my Prophecy Trilogy together into one very big ebook. The first three books in my Vampires Realm romance series total over 350,000 words when bundled together.

The books included on this epic vampire romance ebook are – Prophecy: Child of Light, Prophecy: Caelestis and Aurorea, Prophecy: Dark Moon Rising.

The Prophecy Trilogy ebook is available for just $6.95.

by F E Heaton

The best selling Prophecy Trilogy is now available in one gripping and epic vampire romance book!

A vampire unlike any other, Prophecy lives life in the dark until the night she encounters a sensual dark-haired vampire who is both her enemy and the man who will change her world forever.

A loyal hunter for the Aurorea bloodline, Valentine is bound by duty to report her as the vampire of the prophecy, but he cannot shake the vision of them he saw in her blood. Torn between duty and desire, and determined to uncover the truth at any cost, Valentine goes against his order to execute her and kidnaps the beautiful Caelestis female instead.

Thrust into a terrifying world where the seven vampire bloodlines and the Law Keepers are hunting her and her only hope for survival is Valentine, Prophecy battles her temptation to surrender to her forbidden attraction to him as she races to discover the true depth of her incredible powers.

As they fight to survive the mounting threat of a mysterious enemy bent on tearing them apart and unleashing Hell on earth, they succumb to the desires of their hearts and discover that love makes them stronger, but with danger surrounding them, death on their heels, and a dark evil on the rise, will they be strong enough to avert an apocalypse and fulfil Prophecy’s extraordinary destiny?

The Prophecy Trilogy is a thrilling story of forbidden love that will draw you into a dark, exhilarating world of vampires, werewolves, magic and the war to end all wars. Filled with twists, turns, unforgettable characters and undeniable passion, it will take hold of you, set your heart racing, and not let you go even after the last page.

Available in e-book from:
Amazon Kindle Stores:
USA / International | UK | Germany | France | Spain | Italy

All 32 Apple iBookstores / iTunes, including:
USA | UK | Australia | Canada

Other Ebook Retailers:
Author’s website | Barnes and Noble Nook | Kobo Books | All Romance eBooks

You can read an excerpt of the book at my website: http://www.felicityheaton.com/ebooks.php?title=Prophecy%20Trilogy

Or download a 75,000 word excerpt of the first book: http://www.felicityheaton.com/long-excerpts/prophecy-child-heatonFE.pdf

Posted in 2012 releases, Amazon Kindle, Apple iBookstore, Barnes and Noble Nook, ebooks, Kobo Books, paranormal romance, Prophecy Trilogy, vampire romance, Vampires Realm | Comments Off on Prophecy Trilogy – Now available as one ebook from Amazon Kindle, Apple iBooks, Kobo and more!

New Release! ENSLAVE (Vampire Erotic Theatre Romance Series Book 4) is out today!

It’s a release day and it’s the next sexy and oh-so-hot erotic vampire romance book in my Vampire Erotic Theatre romance series. This book will make you giggle in places and in others it will crank up your temperature to beyond boiling point.

Enslave

Felicity Heaton
His determination to succeed in business has left no room in his life for love. Now, a beautiful and deadly succubus has teleported into his dark, decadent world and is in danger of enslaving his heart.

Andreu’s future entails opening an erotic theatre like Vampirerotique, gaining wealth, women and power, not shackling himself to a single female, but he cannot deny the dangerously seductive succubus who stirs his anger and passion, and tempts him like no other—he will have her.

The moment their eyes meet, Varya knows she cannot have the exotic dark vampire who sets her pulse racing. His shadowed aura marks him as forbidden, but the hungers he awakens in her are too intense to resist—she must have a taste.

When an erotically-charged kiss ignites their soul-searing passion and reveals something dangerous about Andreu, will Varya leave forever or will she dare to risk all in pursuit of something she thought was beyond her reach?

Available now in ebook from:
Amazon Kindle Stores:
USA / International | UK | Germany | France | Spain | Italy

Apple iBookstores / iTunes:
USA | UK | Australia | Canada

Other ebook retailers:
Author’s website | Kobo Books | All Romance eBooks

I’ve already posted chapter 1 in a previous blog post as part of the Vampirerotique Summer Book Tour so here’s chapter 2 for you today. You can read chapter 1 at this blog post.

Warning: HOT excerpt, not for the shy types…

CHAPTER 2

Varya had made a terrible mistake. The delightful show had captured her attention so completely that she had revealed herself. Her tutors back home at her clan would be angry with her for making such a rookie error. Always keep one part of your mind on the glamour. Never allow anyone to see you before you are ready. They had drummed those lessons into her head and she had always managed to remember, had never unintentionally shown herself to anyone in her three centuries of life.

Damn it. What had gone wrong this time?

She perched on the wall of the box still, the theatre shimmering around her. That should have been her clue. Whenever she used a glamour to hide her presence, the world around her distorted, as though she viewed it through a dense heat-haze. The show had caught her off guard, so deliciously wicked and debauched that she had lost her focus. She had never seen anything like it in the human clubs she frequented across Europe. Not even the werewolves had shows that could compare with this one. Vampires certainly knew how to indulge their sinful and carnal nature. She had heard as much from another of her clan, a woman who had been exiled shortly afterwards for breaking clan law.

Varya’s stomach clenched. Had that law been one regarding the vampires? They were dangerous to her kind. Their senses could detect things their eyes could not. Varya had known that, so when she had found the courage to enter the building and see for herself what happened inside its walls, she had tried her best glamour, a spell so intense that it had taken several feedings for her to gain enough strength to perform it.

She could have gained the required amount of energy from only one or two feeds had she resorted to sex, but intercourse awakened her darkest hungers and resulted in her losing control and her host losing his life. It took a strong male to survive sex with her, and she feared all of them had long since left this land. Two centuries of killing her hosts had left her bored of taking that route when feeding off a weaker male. The clean up was a hassle and the sexual energy she gained left her with a bitter aftertaste. Her closest friends in the clan had told her that it was a phase all succubi went through at one time or another and that she would get over it. She hoped she did, but even then, she wasn’t sure she could recapture the enthusiasm for sex she had felt in her youth. A century of watching human and non-human couples engaging in sexual relations had caused her to wonder at the vibrancy and intensity of the passionate moments they shared, and the emotional connection that often came with them.

But that was something beyond her reach.

And it was something that made her experiences of sex seem hollow, lacking a vital ingredient that would always be denied her and left her drifting through life stealing kisses and watching others enjoy pleasure that she could never taste.
Varya sighed and then growled at herself. Her species were one of the most powerful in the fae world and the most feared, and they hadn’t gained their reputation by brooding and living on a kiss-only diet.

Her tutors scolded her enough as it was because of that. If they heard about what had happened tonight, she would be receiving lashes like the cute male in the show.

She had thought she had stolen enough energy from kissing and taking things to a safe yet very naughty level with her hosts over the past few days that she could hold the strong glamour needed to veil her tonight. It wasn’t her fault. It had drained her faster than she had anticipated and she had been so entranced by the show that she hadn’t realised her spell had slipped.

The vampire had seen her.

He still sat in his box, staring across the theatre, a puzzled look on his dark handsome face.

He was dangerous.

Varya tried to ignore him and settled her focus back on the show. Her stomach rumbled and her tongue swept across her lips, eager for a taste of what was happening on the stage below her. She groaned as sexual energy danced around her, intoxicating and enticing. She would have to leave soon to track down a suitable male host. There was a club a few blocks away, one she had visited before, full of easy feeds and even easier fucks if she really had to go down that path to replenish her energy. Maybe her excitement from watching the show would make sex fun again, at least for tonight.

Her gaze slid back across the theatre to the vampire and she shivered, hot all over and burning up inside.

When he had looked at her, the strangest feeling had come over her, an unsettling sensation of need and a hunger so intense that she had almost growled. One thought had pounded through her head in the all too brief seconds that she had held his inquisitive and passionate gaze.

Hers.

He was hers.

It couldn’t be.

His aura made that clear and she had known it the moment she had seen him, before she had accidentally revealed herself. He wore shadows. Shadows were a bad sign. Clan law forbade interaction with males who wore them and pursuing him would be a grave mistake.

Her tutors had said that men shrouded in shadows were forbidden because they tasted foul and were not an easy target. Many of her kind had fallen at their hands, lured to and destroyed by such men.

Varya had no desire to die, only a desire to live, so why was she still staring across the theatre at him? Why did she want to reveal herself again so she could see the look that had blazed in his eyes, a look that had contradicted his aura, revealing passion and desire? Was it purely the allure of the challenge he represented?

Or was there more to the need pounding deep in her veins?

He rose from his seat and walked away, disappearing through a red curtain. Varya keenly felt the loss of his beauty in her soul and dragged her eyes back to the stage. There was nothing of interest there now. The female vampire was drinking from the vein of one of the males. The other stood at the foot of the bed, obedient and docile. Varya eyed him. Could she teleport there and take the male before the female vampire saw and attacked?

She was so hungry.

She rubbed her strapless purple bodice over her stomach. She needed to get out of this place and feed before she weakened further and was forced to bed a male to replenish her energy and stop herself from becoming vulnerable.

Her gaze caught on the shadowed male vampire as he crossed the theatre, his dark hair and black suit causing him to blend into the darkness. He headed towards a small group below her and pointed up to her. She instinctively leaned backwards and dropped down from the wall, landing silently despite her heavy boots. She crept forwards and peered over the edge, her desire to see him again and see what was happening too great to ignore. The image of him shimmered as he spoke to the other vampires.

What was he saying?

There were three males with him, and the one with white hair looked up to where she hid. She ducked backwards out of sight. Her glamour wouldn’t completely work on him. He was too old and would be able to sense her if he set eyes on her. She wasn’t sure if he would be able to see her, but she wasn’t about to risk it.

Varya peeked over the wall and found the white-haired male talking to the group again. She focused on him and the others in the group until their auras shimmered into being, creating a glow around their bodies several inches deep. An aura revealed a lot about a person’s emotions and her kind used them as a type of aid when hunting, so they knew what approach to take with a male or whether to avoid him completely and try an easier target.

The audience began to file out and another male entered from below her, joining the small group.

Varya hid now, barely peeking over the curved wall.

The blond spiky-haired newcomer would easily spot her. The strongest glamour couldn’t hide her from his eyes. She sneered and bared her small sharp canines at him even though he couldn’t see the threat and didn’t seem to have even noticed her.

Cobalt blue surrounded him, tinged with gold in places. That aura frightened her more than the black one of his companion.

The female in the group had an aura bathed in shades of red, pink and gold. She looked like a sunset, a beautiful sight, as did the man holding her with her back against his chest. Love. The man who looked similar to the one who had seen her had the same colours in his aura. He smiled as he spoke to the couple, radiating warmth and affection. The white-haired male who now prowled the theatre away from the others had the aura of a beast, all shades of green and icy blue. He was old, ancient, and her fae magic wouldn’t work on him.

The one who had seen her…

Varya leaned her forearms along the top of the wall, settled her chin on them and stared down at him.

The cold edge to his aura at times, tinting it purple in places, was bad enough, a sign of an empty heart. That didn’t bother her kind. Love was an emotion that she couldn’t experience. It was the shimmering dark shades that clung to him like black smoke that warned her away. Forbidden. When she had looked at him, and he at her, those curling ribbons of darkness hadn’t changed to show signs of passion or desire, but his eyes had revealed such carnal hungers. Why couldn’t she read it in his aura? Was that why shadowed males were dangerous? Did his aura hide his true emotions?

She had never seen such a man before tonight.

Curiosity kept her gaze fixed on him, had her remaining even though hunger gnawed at her insides, pushing her to feed.

She didn’t want to leave.

She wanted to know why he was so dangerous that he was forbidden.

She wanted a taste of that fruit.

He said something to the man who was similar to him. A brother? The two seemed close and the other male showed signs of affection in his aura whenever he spoke to her vampire.

Her vampire?

He was just a target.

A host.

She would have her taste and then she would leave this place and never return.

The group below broke apart. The female remained with the male who was clearly her lover, a pale-eyed man with dark hair who seemed close to the white-haired dangerous one. They crossed the theatre to the other side and he held the door for her. The beast stalked away in the opposite direction, heading back out of the door he had entered through. Her vampire and the one she had decided was his brother split up and combed the stalls before disappearing through the rear exits.

The blond vampire remained standing below her long after everyone had left the theatre.

He raked long fingers over the spikes of his hair and then let his hand fall to his side. His head snapped up and he smiled straight at her, his dark eyes flashing with sparks of blue and gold.

Varya gasped and disappeared.

Her panic cost her. She ended up in an unfamiliar area of the theatre and had lost her quarry in the process.

“Bastard,” she muttered. It was just like his kind to take pleasure from scaring hers. She fumbled around in the small dark room.

It smelled like a store cupboard. The sharp tang of cleaning products stung her delicate nose and she grimaced at the tacky feel of the bottles beneath her questing fingers. A cool flat panel brought hope of escape and her heart lifted. She shifted her hands downwards, searching for the knob. Her fingers closed around the cold metal and she twisted it and pushed the door open. It banged against something that grunted.

Varya poked her head around the door, the bright room shimmering in her vision, and then down at what she had hit.

A nude male. Human and delirious. She recognised him as one of the men from the stage.

She grinned. Maybe tonight wouldn’t be so bad after all. She could have a quick snack to replenish her strength so her glamour held and then she could find the vampire.

Vampires moved around the room, dressing and talking, some of them sitting in front of mirrors surrounded by softly glowing bulbs and others moving between the showers and a row of lockers that lined one wall. Varya recognised a few of the vampires from the show, in particular a tall broad male with close-cropped hair that revealed scars on his scalp. The females in the audience had been most enamoured with him. His aura shone burgundy and deepest blue, colours of confidence and contentment. He would make a good feed, but charming him would prove difficult since he was already so deeply in love with himself.

Varya crouched beside the sleepy human thrall instead. He was handsome enough, although a little bloodstained and hurt.

She cast a quick glance around to make sure no one was watching him and then pressed her lips to his. He moaned and she kissed him, tasting all the pleasure he had experienced in the past hour on stage. Gods. He was an intoxicating cocktail. She delved her tongue between his lips, hungry for more, desperate to get a taste of everything he had felt. Pleasure so intense that it still rocked him now drifted in his veins like a drug, keeping him out of his head. Varya drank it down in her kiss, feeling stronger with each sweep of her lips over his. Her head spun.

“Why is that human acting like a goldfish?” a female said and Varya quickly peeled her lips from the man’s and froze, turning fearful eyes on the vampire who had spoken.

It was not the woman from the stage. This one was a diminutive brunette wrapped tightly in a crimson robe that was too long for her.

“Something is here,” the huge shaven-headed male said and Varya cursed him. She hadn’t expected him to be old enough to sense her.

She pressed her mouth to the human male’s, gifting him with strength and some of her own healing power, and then stood. The wounds on his chest closed and he shot to his feet. The room erupted into pandemonium and Varya slipped out of the door and into a double-height black-walled room.

Stairs led upwards.

Varya focused, trying to sense where her vampire had gone even as part of her, the more sensible side that had always listened to her tutors and always reminded her what they had said in their lessons, told her to get her backside out of the theatre and never come back.

She would, just not yet.

Once she had seen the vampire again and had let him see her, she would leave. She couldn’t go yet. She had to see if that strange sensation came upon her again and upon him. She needed to know if the shadows he wore obscured his true feelings.

She needed a taste.

A taste would tell her whether he held passion in his veins and whether it matched the fire that had shone in his eyes, or whether she was mistaken and he was black and empty right down to his soul.

The limited radius of her senses made tracking him difficult. He wasn’t nearby. Where had he gone?

Energy from her stolen kiss pulsed in her veins, leaving her feeling slightly hazy. Not the best of conditions for hunting while evading. The strength she had taken from the human gave her a much-needed power boost that rendered her invisible to most of the vampires in the theatre, but there were three who would easily detect her, and unfortunately they were three of the vampires who were searching for her.

The white-haired beast, the one with the icy eyes and a female constantly on his arm, and the blue-aura-carrying bastard.

When she had first sensed the bastard’s presence when passing the theatre, she had expected to find him enjoying the show and the excitement of its audience. It was why she had dared to enter the theatre. She had figured it would be safe for her because it was safe for him.

She definitely hadn’t expected him to know the vampires and now be a part of the group hunting her. Did he work for the theatre? How her clan would laugh at her if she told them that! They would think she had been imagining things.

Varya focused on her surroundings. The icy-eyed male had gone upstairs. His aura left a brilliant red trail that said he had found a more pressing matter that required his attention. His female. Varya shivered with the thought of them together. He was a powerful male, old and dark, and the female had a wicked edge to her eyes sometimes when she looked at her male. The two of them coupling would probably make what had happened tonight on stage look like a Disney movie, all cute and sweet. That was a performance she wanted to see for herself.

Varya licked her lips, tasting the human on them, and yanked her focus back to her hunt. She didn’t want to play voyeur any more tonight. She wanted to find her own plaything.

The beast prowled past her, flicking a glance in her direction, and she ducked behind a wall at the bottom of the stairs, pressing herself flat against it and holding her breath.

“I know you’re here,” he snarled, voice thick and dark, laced with venom. Her heart did a fluttering flip in her chest and her legs trembled in a bad way. “When I find you, I will kill you… slowly.”

The grim note of amusement in his final word said he would come good on that threat and he would enjoy it too. Varya swallowed. She had no desire to become this man’s ragdoll. He didn’t need to threaten her aloud for her to know that her demise at his hands would indeed be bloody, painful, and nothing short of Hell.

It would make Hell look like Heaven.

He growled and stalked closer.

A door opened and closed.

Her senses popped and the hairs on the back of her neck prickled, sending a shiver dancing down her spine.

“Found anything?” That deep masculine voice was pure honey, accented in a way that was ambrosia to her ears and had her melting against the wall.

Gods. He sounded more delicious than she could ever have prepared herself for. She closed her eyes and willed him to speak again.

“Nothing,” the beast growled and huffed, snorting like a wild dragon. “I will find it, and rip it limb from limb.”

“Antoine wants it alive, whatever it is. We’re not allowed to kill it, Snow.”

It? That stung. He had set eyes on her, had clearly felt the same intense jolt that had rocked her, yet he was calling her an ‘it’.

She had half a mind to step out from her hiding place and confront him, but her self-preservation instincts ran too deeply for her to ignore them and do anything so foolish. She pressed the back of her head against the wall.

“It is in here somewhere.” The one called Snow moved again and she tracked him with her senses, fearing he would find her. Snow. A strange name for one so impure and evil.

“I have this. Check in with Payne and Javier. Tell them we know where it is. Payne said he knew a way of flushing it out.”

Oh, Hell, he wouldn’t. If Payne was the bastard she thought he was, she wasn’t going to wait for him to show up. Snow grunted and the door opened and closed again.

“I know you’re in here, so you might as well just show yourself, whatever you are. You understand, Chica?” Her vampire’s sexy voice rumbled through her, making her shivery and hazy, and his words took a few seconds to register.

She did understand. He wanted her out in the open and visible to him so he could go ahead and take her into custody for the one he had called Antoine.

She wouldn’t let him take her in, refused to let anyone capture and enslave her, but she did want to see him again, and with Snow gone to fetch the bastard and the one she suspected was this man’s brother, she only had a limited window in which to do that, get her taste, and get out.

Varya stepped out from behind the wall.

The vampire stood in the middle of the double-height black-walled room, his deep blue eyes scanning the area around him. He was searching for her still. She let her glamour slip just enough that she would grow stronger on his acute senses but not enough that he would see her.

His gaze shot straight to her.

Interesting.

He had found a way to pinpoint her. Is that what he had been doing when he had stared at her for those long minutes after she had made herself invisible in the private box? Putting her to memory and training his senses to make them accustomed to her so she couldn’t hide from him.

Devious son of a bitch.

His aura darkened even as his eyes brightened, his pupils enlarging to show a trace of desire.

“Reveal yourself.” Those words rolled off his tongue in a sultry bass voice created by the gods for setting women’s hearts aflame.

His aura showed no sign of the conceit that the male performer backstage had worn. This vampire was far more handsome, worthy of a little male pride in his aura, but it remained black and unreadable.

Varya lifted her glamour and shimmered into being just two metres in front of him. Out of arm’s reach. If he tried to lunge for her, she would disappear in a flash. She wasn’t sure where in the theatre she would end up, but any place was better than locked in the grasp of a man who wanted to hand her over to his master.

His pupils widened, edging further into the deep sea blue of his irises, and his nostrils flared.

“What are you?” he said and exhaled a soft curse when their eyes met.

That same blood-heating jolt she had felt on first locking gazes with him rocked her again and she had to take a step backwards to steady herself. Her hunger came upon her so swiftly that it almost knocked her flat on her backside and it must have shown in her eyes because the vampire changed. His irises burned as red as the flames of Hell and his pupils narrowed and stretched, becoming cat-like.

He snarled, sensual lips peeling back off enormous fangs.

A flicker of red punctured the black of his aura.

Passion?

Varya stood her ground, legs trembling and belly heating with desire in the face of the explosive combination of his anger and arousal. She didn’t understand why she couldn’t read his aura or what it meant, and she didn’t care.

She wanted a taste.

Before he could launch an attack on her, she teleported herself right into the danger zone, not settling for even a few inches between them. Her body pressed into the delicious hard contours of his and she looped her arms around his neck, buried her fingers into his thick brown hair and dragged his mouth down to hers.

A white-hot bolt struck her right down to her soul and she gasped.

He echoed it and grabbed her waist hard, pulling her roughly against him as his mouth claimed hers.

Varya’s head spun. She had died and gone to Heaven, a place beyond the reach of all fae. This man was her Heaven.

His mouth mastered hers, forcing her into submission, tongue plundering and leaving her breathless, until she felt as though he was the one feeding on the energy that crackled between them, not her. Her hands slipped to his strong shoulders, feeling the hard muscles beneath his soft black clothing, and she frowned, the taste of him so divine that she didn’t want to give him up. There was no reason this man should be forbidden. Gods. Every one of her clan should be searching for their own shadowed male.

She could live forever on the taste of him.

He turned and shot across the room with her, slamming her violently against the wall, his body delicious steel against hers as he pinned her. Varya leapt up and wrapped her legs around his waist, hooking her feet together and dragging him closer to her, until not a single molecule of air existed between their bodies. He snarled into her mouth and ran his hands up her calves, past her over-knee stockings, and teasingly light along the underside of her thighs. His palms grazed her buttocks beneath her skirt, sending a hot shiver bolting over her skin, and then he clutched her backside, squeezing it as he kissed her. The feel of his strong hands palming her bottom, fingertips pressing in so hard she was sure he would bruise her, increased the inferno raging out of control inside her. She let slip a moan of pure pleasure, unable to hold it in. This man had been made for her. The way he dominated her, his passion and roughness, not to mention how damned hot he looked, everything about him called to her, excited her, and she was powerless to resist.

Varya melted into him and turned up the heat at the same time, matching his ferocity stroke for stroke as her tongue duelled with his and she raked her nails over his scalp. He snarled into her mouth, a hungry feral sound that sent another shiver of pleasure skating over her skin, and rocked his hips into hers. Oh my. Her heart fluttered and heat pooled in her panties. The feel of the hard hot length pressing divinely against the apex of her thighs had her writhing in his arms, mimicking his rocking and meeting him grind for thrust. He groaned and tightened his grip on her, holding her hips immobile, and pressed his hard cock against her. His breathing came out in rough ragged gasps between kisses. Not just his breathing. She panted too, breathless, but she couldn’t stop. Did he feel as desperate as she did, as though this kiss was as vital as air? No. More vital. She felt as though she would die if he stopped. It was intoxicating, drugging, addicting, and incredible. Lost in the fathomless depths of the passion that blazed between them, pleasure so consuming that she swore she had never experienced anything like it before, Varya couldn’t stop herself from stealing some of his intense energy through their kiss.

He turned with a snarl and shoved her off him so viciously that she flew across the expansive room, smacked into the wall near the staircase and crashed to her backside on the floor.

Shock rushed through her, cold, fierce and startling.

What the hell? No man could withstand her kiss. He should be putty in her hands, hands that wanted to touch every delicious inch of him, not standing there pinning her with a thunderous look that warned if she came near him again he would forget what his master had ordered and would kill her instead.

Varya stared at him in silence, her chest heaving in time with his, struggling to catch her breath and make sense of what had just happened. The vampire’s red eyes and black aura gave nothing away, concealing whatever he was feeling as he glared at her, his hands fisted at his sides.

Were they fisted because he wanted to strike her?

Or because he was resisting touching her again?

“Andreu.” The door burst open and the blond bastard entered, jogging to a halt beside her vampire. He turned cold slate-grey eyes on her.

Varya hissed at him and disappeared.

Wind buffeted her as she set down on the rooftop of a building across from the theatre, breathing hard and still reeling. She wrapped her arms around herself, rubbing her bare skin to keep the sudden chill off it. The warmly lit sandstone building of the theatre shone like a beacon in the darkness, the six columns of the facade supporting a triangular carved frieze that lent it a very elegant air. Varya focused beyond the walls even though she knew her senses wouldn’t be able to locate her vampire.

Andreu.

There was no way he should have been able to resist her like that.

There was something different about this vampire.

She wanted to know what it was.

She wanted to know why he was forbidden.

I hope you enjoyed this excerpt!

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Posted in 2012 releases, Amazon Kindle, Apple iBookstore, ebooks, Enslave, Kobo Books, new release, paranormal romance, Vampire Erotic Theatre, vampire romance | Comments Off on New Release! ENSLAVE (Vampire Erotic Theatre Romance Series Book 4) is out today!

Seduce (Vampire Erotic Theatre romance series 3) is released today in ebook and paperback

It’s the release day for the third erotic vampire romance book in my Vampire Erotic Theatre romance seriesSEDUCE!

Yes, Antoine’s story is finally here, and that means that there is a forecast of Snow! Not only that, but you get to learn more about Antoine and why he keeps himself distanced from everyone, and what he hides in his dark heart. It’s sure to melt you all!

Seduce is available now from Amazon Kindle ebook stores, Smashwords, Kobo and All Romance eBooks. It’s also available in paperback. It will be available soon for Nook, Apple iBooks, and Sony Reader.

Felicity Heaton
Bloodlust runs in his veins, a dark master waiting for the day it will reign over him. Now a woman with a pure soul and wicked intentions has him in her sights and is determined to crack the ice around his heart, and she might save or damn him.

Antoine stands apart from the world around him, a dangerous and broken soul who must maintain rigid control at all times or risk his dark addiction finally seizing hold of him. The shadows of his past haunt him and he sees his bleak future each night when his brother wakes screaming, his blood addiction turning him savage. He cannot allow himself to feel, but when Sera walks into Vampirerotique, the erotic theatre he runs with three other vampires, to audition, she awakens dangerous desires in him—hungers that could spell the end of both of them.

Sera has wanted Antoine since the night she first saw the gorgeous aristocrat vampire. She can’t ignore the deep carnal hunger he stirs in her or the ache to know the heat of his touch. With the help of her sire, an ex-performer at Vampirerotique, she sets in motion a game of seduction, one designed to thaw the ice in Antoine’s veins and make him burn for her.

When Sera discovers the shocking truth about his past and the darkness that lurks within him, will she be strong enough to seize his heart with both hands and win him forever or will she lose him to the ghosts that still haunt him?

ebook price: $3.99
paperback price: $6.99
genre: paranormal vampire erotic romance book
length: 55000 words
Book 3 in the Vampire Erotic Theatre series

Available in e-book from:
Author’s website | Amazon Kindle | Amazon Kindle UK | Amazon Kindle Germany | Amazon Kindle France | Kobo Books | Smashwords | All Romance eBooks

Available in paperback from:
Amazon.com | Amazon.co.uk

EXCERPT

Sera’s attention wasn’t on the show. While her sire sat beside her in the sumptuous red velvet seats of the dark stalls, her focus fixed on the erotic acts playing out on the stage of Vampirerotique, Sera’s gaze was elsewhere, drawn to a man who had been on her mind since the first time she had set eyes on him over a year ago. He stood to her right at the edge of the theatre near the front row, shadows clinging to him as though they too were drawn to his lethal beauty, his own gaze on the stage. Not once did it stray from the performance—not even when she prayed under her breath every second that it would come to rest on her—and never did the intensity of it lessen. His pale icy eyes scrutinised everything, watching closely, as though he was studying it so he could give a blow-by-blow description of it to someone after it had ended. Perhaps he did. He often disappeared as soon as the show reached its climax with the bloodletting, heading through the double doors that led backstage to an area she could only imagine.

Her sire, Elizabeth, had described it for her a few times but she had always been more interested in learning more about the enigma that was the vampire who ran the theatre.

Antoine.

His name was as exotic as his looks. The deadly combination of lush chocolate brown hair, those intense pale blue eyes and his lithe figure that just screamed he would look like a god naked, was too much for her. The more she saw him, the more she wanted him.


Regardless of the warnings that her sire often whispered in her ear.

“Perhaps I should arrange for a seat closer to him next time?” Elizabeth hissed across at her, amusement ringing in her tone.

Sera tore her eyes away from Antoine, ashamed that she wasn’t watching the show that had cost her sire a pretty penny. Elizabeth had been getting her better seats with each performance and Sera knew that the closer they were to the stage and the action, the more expensive the tickets became. Not only that, but she had paid for Sera’s new outfit of a lacy deep green camisole top that matched her eyes and tight black jeans that showed off her legs to perfection, and the new highlights in her long blonde hair as well as the makeover they had both enjoyed this evening before attending the theatre.

She tried to watch the show, concentrated hard on maintaining her focus on the act playing out on the black stage but she couldn’t take in any of it. Her head swam, unable to keep track of what was happening, focus diverted by the drop-dead-gorgeous man who stood barely twenty feet away from her. She gritted her teeth and frowned, forcing her eyes to follow the performers. It didn’t help.

Seats closer to the stage just meant closer to Antoine, presenting her with a much better view of him. A view she didn’t want to squander.

Her gaze drifted back to him as though he had his own gravity and she was powerless against its pull. He stood side on to her, his tailored black trousers and crisp charcoal shirt accentuating his figure, igniting her imagination. It raced to picture him naked. Long legs and powerful thighs. Firm buttocks with sexy dimples above them. A lean muscled back that followed the sensual curve of his spine and flowed into strong shoulders that would be a pleasure to study as he moved. And finally, a chiselled torso blessed with rope after rope of honed muscles down his stomach and a chest that would feel solid beneath her cheek and palm as he held her protectively in his embrace.

Elizabeth giggled, the sound so out of place during the intense erotic performance that the dark-haired man in front of them looked over his shoulder and frowned.

“You don’t want to get involved with him. It wouldn’t end well,” Elizabeth said.

Sera wished that her sire had waited for the man to turn away before saying that. Now he was frowning at them both, dark eyebrows drawn tight above red eyes.

Elizabeth dismissively waved her hand, long scarlet nails catching the bright colourful lights that illuminated the stage. “I’m not talking about you. You’ll miss one of the best bits.”

The man’s frown hardened but he turned back to the show. Elizabeth swept her wavy dark red hair over her shoulder and returned her attention to the performance too. Sera fidgeted on her seat when she caught a glimpse of the man on stage. Victor. Elizabeth had worked with him during her time at the London theatre. He had been with Vampirerotique since a few years after it had opened a century ago and was their star performer. The large brunet male was currently pumping a woman in centre stage, his fangs enormous as he growled and fucked her side on to the audience so they could witness the whole act. The petite brunette bent over in front of him was moaning with each deep plunge of his cock, her hands grasping her knees and breasts swinging in time with his powerful thrusts. Two other men were pleasuring human females a short distance from him. The men sat on the red velvet gold-framed couches, one on each, flanking Victor where he stood close to the front of the black stage. The human females under the thrall of the other two vampires were facing the audience, kneeling astride the one who controlled them, bouncing on his cock and groaning as they palmed their breasts. Sera looked away, cheeks burning.

Elizabeth leaned towards her. “Besides, he’s as frigid as a nun and as cold as ice. In the fifty years that I worked for him, I never once saw him with a woman. The only person he loves is his messed up brother, and that’s one relationship you don’t want to interfere with.”

Sera had heard the warnings so many times now that they were losing their effect. Every time Elizabeth brought her to the theatre to watch a performance, she reiterated the long list of reasons why Sera shouldn’t want Antoine. Unfortunately, those warnings only made her want him even more. According to Elizabeth, the gorgeous male vampire had been alone for God only knew how long. Sera wanted to be the woman to smash his armour and tear down his defences, and end his loneliness.

If he was lonely.

Her gaze slid back to Antoine. He stood rod straight, posture perfect, shoulders tipped back as he continued to study the performance. The first few times she had seen him, she hadn’t thought to ask her sire about him. She had thought he was just one of the crowd stretching his legs. When Elizabeth had noticed her staring, she had told her that he was one of the owners of the theatre, and an aristocrat vampire. That had explained the tilt of his chin and the air of pride he wore, and perhaps even the coldness that settled on his face at times when he was greeting the more important guests before the show started.

He was so distant, even looked miles away as he studied the show, lost in thoughts that she wanted to know.

Elizabeth nudged her and she looked back at the stage, trying to keep her eyes off Antoine. If she couldn’t recount at least half of what had happened, Elizabeth would give her an earful on their way back to the city centre apartment they shared.

Things were heating up on stage. Victor had finished with his vampire female and was now toying with one of the humans, a young redhead with full breasts. The blond male vampire that had been with the female on the couch was with them, kissing her as Victor stood behind her, palming her breasts and rubbing himself against her backside. The blond male looked into her eyes and she turned obediently in his arms, coming to face Victor. She stared at him. Or beyond him. Her glassy expression said that the male now behind her wasn’t lessening any of his control just yet. It felt so wrong to watch a woman under the power of a vampire, unable to do anything to disobey her temporary master, but she couldn’t deny that it turned her on a little. The woman wouldn’t know any discomfort or panic. She was so deep under that she was probably experiencing the purest hit of pleasure she had ever had. Exactly what she had signed on for.

Elizabeth had let Sera in on a secret. Apparently, all of the humans who participated in the shows had agreed to the erotic acts in exchange for a rather handsome amount of money. Elizabeth said it hadn’t always been that way, but modern times called for a modern approach, and it was far easier not to kill them. The humans knew they would be participating in an on-stage orgy for an audience, and most of them had done such acts before, they just didn’t know what they shared that stage with. Vampires. That meant they also didn’t know they would be doing things under hypnosis.

Not that many of the humans required hypnosis to make them fully participate. The blond male vampire had lessened his control over the redheaded female human bent over in front of him, letting her desire rule her instead, and she was moaning and writhing against him, rubbing herself against his long hard cock.

Sera stared, cheeks heating, as he slowly inched his erection into her body and Victor stepped up in front of the woman. She reached for his rigid cock and closed her eyes as she wrapped her lips around his full length, swallowing him each time he thrust into her mouth. The man behind her pumped her at the same pace, drawn out and deep, slow enough that the audience was twitching for more.

Sera stared at the blond male, imagining Antoine behind her like that, his face a picture of pleasure as he slid in and out with long deep strokes.

Her gaze shot back to the man of her fantasy and she found he was still staring at the stage with the usual detached look on his face, as though the sight of two men on one woman didn’t arouse him in the slightest. She supposed that he had probably seen enough shows that he was immune to their effect now.

A few impatient growls erupted through the theatre and he flicked a glance over the audience and then went back to watching the show.

Sera had tried to talk to him once, when he had passed her by after the show had ended with the feeding and the crowd were leaving. He had blanked her. He hadn’t even glanced her way. He had walked straight past her as though she didn’t exist. She had spoken loudly enough that he must have heard her. It was after that moment that Elizabeth had started with the warnings, revealing only a tantalising amount of information about the powerful handsome aristocrat, just enough to make Sera want him even more.

Now, she craved his eyes on her, wanted to hear him speak and know his voice at last, and above all, she wanted to look up into his eyes and try to see past the barriers around his heart so she could understand him. Was his distance from everyone just because he was an aristocrat, or was there more to it than that?

A shriek from the stage melted into a moan of pleasure and the smell of human blood spilled through the air, encompassing her. Antoine visibly tensed, his arms flexing beneath his charcoal tailored shirt, as though he had clenched his fists. His pale eyes darkened, changed just as hers did to reveal her true nature. He turned away and she feared he would leave earlier than usual and her chance would slip by once again.

She tugged on Elizabeth’s arm and her sire sighed, rose to her feet, briefly applauded and then started along the row with her trailing behind. Her legs bumped several vampires who were still trying to watch the final act, absorbing the scent and the thrill of bloodshed. She didn’t care for it herself. More important matters needed her attention.

The men and women she passed snarled at her, baring their fangs in her direction and leaning to one side in an attempt to see past her. She muttered her apologies, trying to move quickly so they didn’t attack her. Elizabeth made that impossible. She moved slowly and with grace in her long scarlet dress, her head held high and no apologies leaving her lips. Her sire was old enough to stand against these vampires should they choose to attack but Sera wasn’t. It would be years before she had the strength of her sire. They reached the last person and broke out onto the wide strip of red carpet that lined the edge of the theatre.

“Antoine,” Elizabeth called and he paused and swung back to face her.

Sera’s heart almost stopped when his deep crimson gaze briefly flickered to her before returning to her sire.

Her nerves rose as he strolled up the incline to meet Elizabeth and Sera slowed, the gap between her and Elizabeth growing larger by the second. What was she doing? It had taken months for her to convince her sire to do this for her and now that she had finally agreed, her nerve was going to fail? She wanted this man’s eyes on her, wanted to be alone with him, and the only way to get what she wanted was to get a job at the theatre.

If she made it past the interview, then Antoine would have to meet with her. Elizabeth had said that he spoke with each new performer to ensure they were suitable for the theatre. Sera just had to get the interview out of the way and then she would have the chance she wanted. Once they were alone in his office, she would take a shot at convincing Antoine that she was the woman for him. Whatever the outcome of that meeting was, she would quit her role as a performer. She didn’t intend to perform at the theatre. Hell, no. She didn’t have the right sort of personality for that. She wanted to blush whenever she chanced a glance at the black and red stage set and saw what the couples on it were doing. If it weren’t for Antoine’s presence in the theatre and her sire’s insistence that they have a little fun, she would never come to such a place.

“Callum,” a deep male voice called out, sharp with authority, and Sera stopped dead. Sweet mercy, Antoine had a voice that could tame even the wildest of angels. That voice was a drug. It went straight into her heart and raced through her veins, the effect sweeter than any amount of blood.

Sera turned towards her sire and Antoine, only to see that he was walking away, leaving her sire with another dark-haired man. He was handsome, full of smiles as he spoke to Elizabeth, far warmer and more amiable than Antoine was but nowhere near as alluring. Elizabeth signalled her to join them and she did, moving past the vampires now spilling out of the stalls and watching Antoine leave at the same time. She’d had a chance to meet him and she had blown it. If she had only kept up with her sire, she would have been close to him, maybe would have caught his attention this time and had his eyes on her at last.

“Is this her?” the vampire called Callum said and ran a glance over her. Sera kept still, feeling as though she was for sale as he moved around her, his eyes on her body, inspecting and scrutinising every inch. He came back to stand before her and looked at Elizabeth. “The summer season will end soon so we’ll have time to train her before the winter one begins but we need someone with natural talent. Does she have what it takes?”

Sera opened her mouth to speak but Elizabeth beat her to it.

“Absolutely. She’s my child, Cal. It’s all in the blood.” Elizabeth smiled broadly at him, red lips curving perfectly. Her deep brown eyes shone with warmth and she swept her dark red hair over her shoulders, exposing their bare curves. “You know I am one of your best ever performers.”

Callum nodded and the longer lengths of his cropped black hair fell down over one emerald green eye. He frowned and raked it back, and then ran a hand around the nape of his neck, drawing Sera’s eyes to a set of dark marks on it. A bite mark. It looked deep and fresh too, no more than a night or two old. Did he have a lover?

He looked at her again and Sera’s gaze leapt to his. She swallowed the desire to confess that her sire was lying and she had no natural talent for the sort of thing that he was talking about. She smiled instead, trying to look every bit as seductive as her sire. Elizabeth had been Vampirerotique’s star female performer until she had decided to quit her job and return to her family instead. They had met shortly after that, and Elizabeth had turned her into a vampire. That was thirty years ago now. It had taken Sera most of those years to become accustomed to life as a vampire.

“Come by tomorrow night when we’re closed,” Callum said. “Now, if you’ll excuse me.”

“Thank you,” Sera said and he smiled at her, nodded, and then disappeared into the crowd.

Their excited chatter filled the theatre, the people passing her by discussing the show and the finale. Other elite vampires were still in their seats, enjoying the lingering scent of blood and sharing an intimate moment of their own with their partners. Sometimes the kissing that happened post-performance in the stalls was more erotic than what occurred on stage. Sera dragged her gaze away from one couple near the front who were going at it with wild abandon. They looked as though they wouldn’t make it out of the theatre before they succumbed to their desire and took things a step further.

She glanced out of the corner of her eye at Elizabeth. “Does Callum have a lover?”

“I thought you had set your sights on Antoine?” Elizabeth laughed when she blushed and then her expression darkened. “A wife… and I’ve heard rumours that she’s a werewolf.”

A werewolf? Sera had expected the owners of an erotic theatre to be quite liberal and wild, but marrying a werewolf? She definitely hadn’t expected that one.

“You’re serious?” She never could tell with her sire. The woman enjoyed a joke more than was natural. Sera supposed that you needed to have an easygoing attitude when you chose to spend fifty years participating in an on-stage orgy with people you hardly knew.

Her stomach turned.

Thank the Devil she wouldn’t have to do such a thing to get her chance to speak with Antoine. Just an interview that she would ace thanks to her sire’s tuition and then she would be in his office, alone with him. Just the thought stirred heat in her veins. Since her sire had agreed to help her, she had spent every night trying to figure out how to win Antoine. It wasn’t going to be easy. She knew that much. She’d had lovers in her human life and even in her vampire one, but she had never pursued a man before, not as she intended to with Antoine.

Elizabeth had laughed when she had confessed that and had told her that she should probably start with easier prey and work her way up to someone like Antoine. That gave her the feeling that she was going to fail. What sort of woman would he desire? He ran an erotic theatre and watched the beautiful women performing on his stage without the barest hint of desire in his expression. If they couldn’t arouse him, what hope did she have?

Maybe he wasn’t interested in women who worked at his theatre. If that was the case, was she only shooting down what slim chance she had with him by interviewing for a position as a performer?

“I need a drink, and you look as though you could use one too.” Elizabeth grasped her wrist and tugged her towards the exit at the back of the theatre. “Come along, my pupil. You have a lot to learn before tomorrow night if you’re going to have a snowball’s chance in Hell of impressing that man.”

Sera trudged along behind her sire, weaving through the lingering crowd. Elizabeth’s warnings rang in her ears, one louder than the rest. She glanced up at the three storeys of elegant boxes that lined the theatre. The gold on the carvings decorating the curved cream low walls that edged the private boxes reflected the warm lights that illuminated the heavy red velvet curtain now closed across the stage. Matching curtains hung at the back of the boxes, some of them open now that the performance had ended. Many of the boxes were empty but beautifully dressed ladies and gentlemen still occupied the others.

She spotted Antoine amongst a group in one of the boxes on the first tier. He was smiling. She had never seen him smile. It looked forced to her. Hollow. Even among his own kind, he was still distant, his eyes devoid of emotion as he put on a grand performance of his own.

Sera wasn’t going to overcome the challenge of winning Antoine’s heart just by meeting the man.

First, she had to break through a barrier that was beginning to look impenetrable.

He was an aristocrat, and an old one at that. Although he looked barely a day over thirty-five, he was in fact over a thousand years old. His brother, Snow, was almost twice his age.

Sera was an elite.

To an aristocrat, she was some sort of filth they scraped off their shoes and nothing made that clearer than the theatres. The aristocrats sat in their boxes, looking down on the elite gathered in the stalls, separated and distant from those they saw as commoners and mongrels.

That disdain for her kind was the reason why Antoine looked so glacial whenever he had to greet the more important members of the elite, and why he had failed to hear her when she had tried to speak with him. He wanted nothing to do with the elite vampires outside the small circle that were part of the theatre. He would certainly want nothing to do with her. Not only was she an elite, but she was a turned human. She was the bottom rung of the social ladder and he was the top. The elite that he deemed worthy of a moment of his time, that he greeted with gritted teeth in order to maintain good relations with her kind, were all born as vampires into families that had turned humans within their ranks. None of them were turned humans themselves.

Even Elizabeth was born of a vampire father and turned mother.

If Sera wanted to shatter Antoine’s armour, she would have to convince him to see beyond the fact that she was a turned human.

Elizabeth had taught her a few things, weapons that she hadn’t held in her arsenal before, but she wasn’t sure if she was brave enough to risk using them on Antoine.

Could she do what Elizabeth had said it would take to shatter his defences?

Could she really seduce such a powerful man?

Sera curled her fingers into tight fists and stared at him. He paused in the middle of saying something to the aristocrat vampires in the box with him, slowly turned towards her and then lowered his eyes. They locked on her. He had felt her watching him. Her heart beat harder, thumping against her chest as her blood heated, but she held his gaze across the theatre stalls, refusing to back down.

The next time she saw him, she would be alone with him.

And she would seduce him.

Available in e-book from:
Author’s website | Amazon Kindle | Amazon Kindle UK | Amazon Kindle Germany | Amazon Kindle France | Kobo Books | Smashwords | All Romance eBooks

Available in paperback from:
Amazon.com | Amazon.co.uk

Posted in 2012 releases, new release, paranormal romance, Seduce, Vampire Erotic Theatre, vampire romance | Comments Off on Seduce (Vampire Erotic Theatre romance series 3) is released today in ebook and paperback

Seduce (Vampire Erotic Theatre romance series book 3) is now available at Amazon Kindle ebooks and in paperback!

Seduce, the third Vampire Erotic Theatre romance series book, is due for release tomorrow but is already available in Amazon Kindle ebook for those lucky readers with a Kindle ereader, or who use a Kindle for PC / Android / etc app.

It’s also already available as a paperback from Amazon.com.

Seduce will hopefully reach Barnes and Noble Nook, Apple iBooks, Kobo Books and Sony Reader Store before the month is out.

Here’s more about Seduce, a very sexy erotic vampire romance novel…

Seduce
Felicity Heaton
Bloodlust runs in his veins, a dark master waiting for the day it will reign over him. Now a woman with a pure soul and wicked intentions has him in her sights and is determined to crack the ice around his heart, and she might save or damn him.

Antoine stands apart from the world around him, a dangerous and broken soul who must maintain rigid control at all times or risk his dark addiction finally seizing hold of him. The shadows of his past haunt him and he sees his bleak future each night when his brother wakes screaming, his blood addiction turning him savage. He cannot allow himself to feel, but when Sera walks into Vampirerotique, the erotic theatre he runs with three other vampires, to audition, she awakens dangerous desires in him—hungers that could spell the end of both of them.

Sera has wanted Antoine since the night she first saw the gorgeous aristocrat vampire. She can’t ignore the deep carnal hunger he stirs in her or the ache to know the heat of his touch. With the help of her sire, an ex-performer at Vampirerotique, she sets in motion a game of seduction, one designed to thaw the ice in Antoine’s veins and make him burn for her.

When Sera discovers the shocking truth about his past and the darkness that lurks within him, will she be strong enough to seize his heart with both hands and win him forever or will she lose him to the ghosts that still haunt him?

ebook price: $3.99
paperback price: $6.99
genre: paranormal vampire romance
length: 55000 words
rating: sultry
released: June 2012
Book 3 in the Vampire Erotic Theatre series

Available in e-book from:
Amazon Kindle US/International | Amazon Kindle UK | Amazon Kindle Germany | Amazon Kindle France | Smashwords

Available in paperback from:
Amazon.com

Posted in 2012 releases, Amazon Kindle, ebooks, paperbacks, paranormal romance, Seduce, Vampire Erotic Theatre, vampire romance | Comments Off on Seduce (Vampire Erotic Theatre romance series book 3) is now available at Amazon Kindle ebooks and in paperback!

Working on Her Demonic Angel (Her Angel romance series book 5) and Enslave (Vampire Erotic Theatre romance series book 4) among others

It has been a while since I did an update post on what I’ve been doing.

The past couple of week’s have been rather busy, as always. I was working on the second draft of Her Demonic Angel, the fifth book in the Her Angel romance series. I fixed everything that really leapt out at me during the initial read through of the long novel. Some of it was hard work and required serious thinking and slaving over to get it right. As usual for me, it was the ending that had the most problems and needed the most work. It’s always difficult when it’s the ending, because it’s there hanging over my head during the edit and I want to race forwards to fix it right then and there, and that never works out for me. It’s better to flow through the story and then fix things as I come across them, because then I’m clear about what has happened and things that have already been said and done. The last thing you want to do is fix the major problems and then go through the book and realise you’ve contradicted something you already said or did in the story and you have to fix things all over again.

After completing the second draft of Her Demonic Angel, I began work on the final edit of Enslave. Enslave is the fourth book in the Vampire Erotic Theatre series. I’ve just completed the initial read through and now I’m going to find any notes I had scribbled down and check that I addressed everything in the second draft and that none of it needs addressing in this edit. I don’t think it does, but it’s always best to check. Since Enslave is only 35000 words, back to the length of the other novellas in the series, and since it’s in good shape, it shouldn’t take me too long to get this edit done.

In non-writing work, I’m putting together a huge Vampirerotique Summer Book Tour that will run from June 28th until August 31st. Yes, that’s a very big tour. There’s a reason for that though. I toured with Covet back in February, but didn’t tour with Crave, which I released in March. Seduce comes out this weekend (excited?) and then Enslave comes out on August 4th. So, I’ll be touring with all four books, and all six heroes… yes, Snow included. It’s going to be a fabulous tour as I’ve ordered in some fantastic swag for the giveaways. I haven’t decided what the main Grand Giveaway at my blog will be. I’m not sure whether it will be a Kindle again, or perhaps something different.

I’ve also been busy getting release stuff ready for Seduce, and planning other stories. My muse has been quiet recently. I’m not sure why. I think he’s feeling the pressure to perform a little, so I’ve been letting him rest. He’s started to bounce around again now though. Just yesterday, he decided to talk to me about a new series I have in the works which will be werewolf romance spanning six novels, Hunger (the next Vampires Realm book), Bewitch (the fifth Vampire Erotic Theatre series book) and other new stories that I can’t really talk about right now.

It’s all very hush hush…

Posted in 2012 releases, 2013 releases, angel romance, Bewitch, Enslave, Her Angel Series, Her Demonic Angel, Hunger, paranormal romance, Seduce, Vampire Erotic Theatre, vampire romance, Vampires Realm | Comments Off on Working on Her Demonic Angel (Her Angel romance series book 5) and Enslave (Vampire Erotic Theatre romance series book 4) among others

Paranormal Romance Books Releases in 2012 – updated!

I’ve been debating the schedule for my remaining paranormal romance book releases in 2012. Originally I was going to follow this schedule:

June 23rd – Seduce (Vampire Erotic Theatre romance series #3)
August 4th – Enslave (Vampire Erotic Theatre romance series #4)
September 15th – Her Demonic Angel (Her Angel romance series #5)

I can’t decide whether to swap Enslave and Her Demonic Angel. If I do, then the release dates won’t stay exactly the same. I would have to release Her Demonic Angel closer to the end of August, and Enslave would then be released around the beginning of October. My reason for changing them around is that I know people are waiting for the next book in the Her Angel series and I do hate to keep my readers waiting. I know I can probably get the book edited in time for a late August release date, around 3 weeks before the current scheduled release.

Of course, as I said, that then pushes the release of Enslave into October or possibly right at the end of September. At the moment, it’s all theoretical and all comes down to how long it takes me to do the second draft of Her Demonic Angel, which I’ve just started. After the second draft, it needs to sit for a while and then I need to polish it, and then finally proof it. I’ve read through Her Demonic Angel and it seems to be in good order, with only minor changes throughout and some work needed on the end and a couple of other scenes in the book. Even so, it is a 130,000 word book, so it will take time to edit regardless of how much or how little work has to be done on it.

If I do manage to get the second draft done in reasonable time, then there is every chance that the new release schedule for the rest of my paranormal romance books this year will look more like this:

June 23rd – Seduce (Vampire Erotic Theatre romance series #3)
August 25th – Her Demonic Angel (Her Angel romance series #5)
September 29th – Enslave (Vampire Erotic Theatre romance series #4)

It’s all very much up in the air right now though but I would like to see this switch around happen. It might not be possible just because Her Demonic Angel is such a huge book to edit and I don’t like to rush these things. Plus, it destroys any wiggle room that I had built into my schedule to allow for things like feeling under the weather, last minute trips, general slacking or lack of inspiration.

I am looking forward to writing again though. I think I’m stuck in editing Hell for the next few months so I’ll be crazy from desire to write by the end of it.

What do you all think? Would you prefer to get Her Demonic Angel three weeks earlier than scheduled or are you happy to wait for the original September release date?

Posted in 2012 releases, angel romance, Enslave, Her Angel Series, Her Demonic Angel, paranormal romance, Seduce, Vampire Erotic Theatre, vampire romance | Comments Off on Paranormal Romance Books Releases in 2012 – updated!

Masquerade – Vampires Realm Romance Series #10 – Now available at Amazon Kindle stores!

It has begun!

Masquerade, the tenth book in the Vampires Realm romance series that I write as F E Heaton, is slowly becoming available in the lead up to its official release day this Saturday, May 19th.

This action-packed, intense, emotional, and twisty vampire romance novel is already available at Amazon Kindle stores, Smashwords and All Romance eBooks. Just as soon as Smashwords vets the book, it will be distributed to Barnes and Noble Nook, Apple iBookstores, Kobo Books and Sony Reader Store.

I’m so excited! I absolutely love writing the Vampires Realm romance series and it seems like forever since we last had a release in it. In fact, the last release was Hunter’s Moon back in February 2011, so it has been more than a year since my darkest, deadliest, and sexiest vampires have had an outing. I swear to write more books for this series so we get at least two releases a year in the future!

If you’re a fan of the series, and have characters in previous books that you loved, then Masquerade is going to be a treat. The fan favourites all make an appearance in this one, including Prophecy, Valentine, Venturi and Hyperion!

Without further ado, here’s the blurb for the book, the links to where it is now available, and the official excerpt for you all to devour.

Masquerade
F E Heaton

Ten years have passed since Sophis and Vivek, two vampires of the Venia bloodline, came close to death at the hands of twin hunters Aleksis and Izabella Romanov. The events of that night turned Sophis and Vivek against each other, shattering their close friendship and driving them apart.

Now, on the eve of a centenary Creator Day masquerade and at a time when things between them are dangerously close to separating them forever, they uncover a small army of vampire hunters in Saint Petersburg, led by their nemeses, Aleksis and Izabella.

With the safety of the rulers of the seven pure vampire bloodlines in their hands and their chance for vengeance hanging in the balance, can Sophis and Vivek face their past and overcome their differences? Will they realise their true feelings for each other before it’s too late or will the hunters finally claim their lives as their deadly plot to destroy the bloodlines unfolds?


This book stands alone and does not need to be read in order with the rest of the series to gain maximum enjoyment.

Available in e-book from:
Amazon Kindle Stores:
Amazon Kindle | Amazon Kindle UK | Amazon Kindle Germany
Amazon Kindle France | Amazon Kindle Spain | Amazon Kindle Italy

Other Retailers:
Smashwords | All Romance eBooks

EXCERPT

Where in the Devil’s good name had the rest of her squad gone?

It was twenty minutes past ten in the evening and Sophis had only managed to locate and relay orders to five out of her group of eight guards. If Commander Tynan discovered that she couldn’t keep her squad in line and at their posts on time, she was heading for an earful and possibly punishment. She didn’t need this right now after everything that had happened so recently and with the Creator Day masquerade less than a week away. Sophis clenched her fists, her arms trembling with the rage that pounded through her, part of it directed at herself, part at her squad and the rest at a man she couldn’t think about without grinding her teeth and wanting to growl. It would have been bad enough if it had been a normal ball, but this year was a centenary and that meant two nights of celebration and all eyes on the guards of the host bloodline.

Her bloodline.

The Venia household didn’t tolerate weakness at the best of times. With the safety of the lords, ladies, and other important members of the seven pure vampire bloodlines of Europe on the line, it was imperative that every group of guards performed their duties impeccably.

With her self-esteem already severely dented, Sophis dreaded that her team were going to be the weak link, the guards that failed should there be an attack, and it set her on edge as she walked across the immaculate lawn of the Venia mansion heading towards the main house. Her recent mistake during a routine patrol had already made her appear weak and unworthy of her position as a captain in the guard. If word reached her superiors that she couldn’t control the newest members of her squad, they would lose all faith in her. She couldn’t let that happen. She had to find the missing men and bring them into line, and she had to do it before anyone else discovered they were absent from their posts.

There was one man in particular that she didn’t want to find out—the person whose name labelled the largest part of her anger.

Vivek.

Sophis uncurled her fingers, stretching them and trying to shake away the burning fury and shame she felt from just thinking that name.

She hadn’t seen Vivek since the night she had led her team on patrol in Saint Petersburg to confirm that the Validus bloodline’s reports of increased hunter activity in the city were true. She had confirmed it all right. A vampire hunter had attacked and she had leapt into action, earning herself a poisoned arrow in the back for her impatience.

Vivek had come out of nowhere and saved her life.

Again.

Sophis paused halfway across the beautiful moonlit garden as her left shoulder blade burned with the memory of that night over a week ago. She closed her eyes and pressed her right hand to the front of her shoulder, breathing deeply and slowly to steady her rising panic.

She owed her life to Vivek twice over now. Her fingertips pulled the black material of her uniform jacket tight as she clutched her shoulder and ground her teeth. His actions that night had left her confused. He had swept in and singlehandedly dispatched her attackers and had shown such concern when he had picked her up, cradling her in his arms like a princess, and ordered his men and hers to go on ahead and warn the infirmary. The sickness from the poison had come upon her then but she had remained staring at Vivek, her mind swimming. She wasn’t a member of his squad, yet he had treated her as though she was, had shown the same amount of concern for her wellbeing as she had often seen him feel towards his men under similar circumstances.

Only he never went to their rescue.

He let them fight their own battles.

Why had he interfered with hers?

Was it just to make her feel weak, to make her look feeble in front of her squad and his, to make her appear as though she wasn’t suited to the role of their leader? To prove to that small section of the guard that he was right and she shouldn’t hold the position of captain?

Or was it something else?


Her closest friend, Ella, had told her once that people who fight all the time were secretly in love with each other.

In that brief moment in his arms, Sophis had dared to hope that the care he was taking with her and his concern weren’t only because she was injured and sick. She had wondered if Ella was right. That hope still knotted her stomach and confused her whenever she thought about it. It had been nothing more than a slip, a flash of insanity caused by the poison, a fleeting feeling that Vivek had crushed. She would do well to remember that.

Vivek had looked so cold as he had carried her back to the mansion, covered in the blood of her attackers, reeking of their grim deaths at his bare hands. He hadn’t looked at her once. His icy gaze had remained fixed ahead of him and his heavy steps had echoed in her drowsy fiery mind. She had kept her attention locked on him to stave off her muddled feelings and as a point of focus so she could battle the toxin. The cold abyss of his heart had shown in the depths of his eyes, void of emotions and any shred of care for her.

Nothing had changed that night. Not her feelings or his.

He was still the bane of her life with his sexist attitude towards her and his desire to have her thrown out of the guard. He felt nothing for her now. Those times were long past. Lost forever.

Sophis had felt that then as she did now, but it hadn’t stopped her from musing the strangest thing.

Vivek never smiled anymore.

That thought had plagued her during her recuperation and even cut through her present anger towards him.

It lingered in her heart and she had spent her long empty hours of rest thinking about how he used to be and how he was now. The contrast between past and present was as sharp as that between white and black.

What had happened to the man she used to know, the one who had trained her and taught her to fight to the best of her abilities and, if those weren’t good enough for her, to practice until she didn’t have the strength to stand and then rest only long enough to catch her breath? Vivek had inspired her, supported her, and made her feel that if she tried hard enough she would be the best guard in the Venia household, surpassing even him. Where was the man with the brilliant smile that made his normally intense hazel eyes sparkle and the quick wit that had always brought out her own smile and made her feel so at ease around him? He was so serious now, his eyes as cold as glaciers and as hard as diamonds. His smile nowhere to be seen.

And he was cruel.

Two days ago, Sophis had returned to duty and this evening she had discovered that Vivek had filed a rather unsavoury report about the hunter attack in the city and her ability as a captain of the guard. He had cited her weakness, her leap into the fight without using her team, and other faults that she was already painfully aware of without his mentioning them to their commander. Her blood had caught fire as she had listened to Commander Tynan recite the report.

It was boiling now that she had discovered her men missing.

Sophis set her jaw, stormed across the damp grass and the golden gravel path and entered the elegant palatial mansion that was her family’s home, using the back entrance close to the ballroom. She moved swiftly along the short corridor towards the stone steps that led down into the basement. The hallway was plain and unadorned, with dull walls and cold flagstones underfoot, a poorer cousin of the bright cream corridors in the public spaces of the house, with their oil paintings and lamps, and antique wooden furniture that lent them a regal and warm air. These passages were used by guards and servants of her bloodline. No one of importance lowered themselves to walk them so there was no need for them to look remotely inviting.

The darkness clung to the hall, broken at intervals by a single lamp on the wall that cast insipid light in a small semi-circle around it, barely chasing back the gloom.

Sophis hurried down the stone steps to the basement, her heightened vision and her memory providing her with the position of each tread. The flat heels of her knee-high polished black leather riding boots were loud on the cold stone, echoing along the hall coming into view before her and marking the quick rhythm of her steps. She could have moved silently if she had wished, but she wanted everyone in the corridor ahead to know that she was coming. She wanted them to hear her anger before they managed to sense it.

She ground her teeth until her slightly extended canines cut into her gums, flooding her mouth with the sweet perfume of her own blood. The taste of it stopped her in her tracks and she drew a deep steadying breath, searching for some calm amongst the storm of her feelings so her fangs retracted.

This wasn’t just about her missing men. Vivek was getting to her again and she was playing right into his hands. He wanted her angry, wanted her to slip up and give Tynan a reason to lose his faith in her abilities as a captain. She couldn’t give Vivek the satisfaction of winning.

Regardless of what he thought about her, she was a good guard and a strong leader. She had fought for her position within the ranks and she wasn’t going to throw it all away, no matter what he did or said about her. She wouldn’t let him win. The guard was everything to her. It was her life.

Sophis strode along the dimly lit hallway, passing servants quarters and the blood store. The smell of it tainted the air, causing her stomach to twist and grumble. It had been days since her last feed. The preparations for the upcoming Creator Day masquerade had everyone rushed off their feet, especially the guards, and feeding hadn’t crossed her mind since she had returned to duty. She would have to soon or she would grow weak and would be of no use to her bloodline during the celebrations. After her duties tonight had ended, she would request permission to head into Saint Petersburg to hunt. There would be enough time before sunrise for her to locate, distract and kill a suitable male human. Strong blood would allow her to last through the celebrations without needing to feed again and would restore her strength, giving back what she needed to prove herself a worthy captain of the guard.

She would show Vivek that she was strong and capable, that what had happened was just a glitch, nothing more than a mistake, and he was wrong about her. She was worthy of her position. She would prove that.

The door for the guards’ rest room came into view along the grey corridor and she straightened her back, tipped her chin up, and quickened her pace. Noise came from the room, drifting out of the open door along with warm light. She focused her senses, trying to detect whether her men were there, slacking off and disobeying orders. None of the voices coming from the room were familiar to her. She stepped inside, sharply coming to a halt and drawing all eyes to her. Several of the men quickly rose from the dark couches and armchairs scattered around the dull windowless stone-walled room and saluted her by pressing their hand against the breast of their black mid-thigh length uniform jackets. She scanned their faces, realised that neither Vivek nor her men were present, and then nodded and turned away.

Heat coiled in her stomach, anger blazing there and slowly pouring into her veins like acid that ate away at her restraint, giving free rein to her desire to unleash her feelings on Vivek even when she knew it was wrong of her to aim all of her fury at him. It wouldn’t be the first time they had fought outside the training room. When she found him, she was going to give him a large piece of her mind and find out just why he had felt the need to emphasise everything she had done wrong that night in his report.

She passed another room where guards were relaxing between duties. Her men weren’t there either.

Where were they?

Sophis hurried along the dim corridor to the steps at the other end, took them quickly, and pushed the heavy wooden door at the top open. The brightly lit vestibule of the house greeted her, warm with its pale yellow walls and grand crystal chandelier. The servants were already decorating the double-height room. Elegant arrangements of red roses stood in huge antique vases on the black-cloth-draped side tables and the pedestals placed around the large room. Several women dressed in plain black clothing were threading garlands of roses through the banister of the mahogany staircase that curved upwards to the first floor. That area would become the guest suites for the most important attendees during the ball and her family had spared no expense to ensure their comfort. They had even moved some of the less important members of the Venia bloodline to the second floor where her room and those of other ranked guards were to free up their stately rooms for the guests. The theme of red roses and gold would run throughout the entire first floor and the rooms on the ground floor that remained open to their guests during the ball.

Several guards entered from the ballroom beneath the balcony to her right and she saluted their commanding officer.

“Have you seen Vivek?” Sophis stepped towards Seth, a blond man of impeccable neatness who had come through the ranks at the same time as her, although he was closer in age to Vivek. The two men had never seen eye to eye. She now shared Seth’s dire opinion of Vivek and he had grown supportive of her, even fighting her corner more than once when Vivek had chosen to start on her in his presence.

Seth waved his group of young guards on and then closed the gap between them. His deep blue eyes expressed more than his handsome schooled features. He wasn’t happy.

“Not since Commander Tynan ordered us both to patrol the grounds and ensure there were no intruders. We split up to head around the perimeter wall in opposite directions and he was not at the meeting point. I waited with my squad for more than thirty minutes before realising that Vivek was not coming.”

Sophis frowned, her eyebrows meeting tightly. Vivek was annoying as Hell when he put his mind to it but he wasn’t someone who shirked his duties. It wasn’t like him to leave a fellow officer to lead a patrol singlehandedly, especially when Tynan had given him orders to assist him. Something must have happened.

“Perhaps he finished before you and decided to return to the house.” The words sounded weak even to her ears. She wanted to give Vivek the benefit of the doubt, but it was difficult to see past her anger over his report and her missing squad members.

Seth didn’t look so sure.

“Listen.” Sophis glanced around the double-height room, making sure no one was close enough to them to hear her whispered confession. Seth would never tell on her. They had confided a lot in each other over the past ten years. She told him all the things that she would have gone to Vivek about in the years before he had turned sour towards her. “I’m having trouble locating some of my squad. Three men. They’re new recruits. I don’t suppose you’ve seen them?”

“Perhaps they are with Vivek.” Seth’s expression remained flat and serious.

“Why would you say that?” The question sprung from her lips before she could stop it. It was obvious why he would think it.

Her men had spent time under Vivek’s command while she had been recovering in the infirmary. He had probably taken the opportunity to corrupt the newest members of her squad. It was one thing to openly challenge her right to her position within the ranks of the Venia bloodline and completely another for him to convince members of her squad to mutiny against her.

Sophis closed her eyes and exhaled slowly, ignoring Seth as he spoke. She was jumping to conclusions again, basing everything on her feelings rather than fact. It was just her anger clouding her judgement. Vivek would never disobey Commander Tynan and he had only been honest in his report. It had pained her to hear the cold hard truth and know that he felt she was unfit to act as a captain. That pain was pushing her into reacting in a way that was unlike her. She was directing all of her anger at Vivek, pinning the blame on him to deflect it away from herself. This was her fault. She had acted rashly, behaved in a way unsuited to a captain, and had got herself injured and taken off duty. Now she was paying for it. If she hadn’t rushed into the fight, Vivek wouldn’t have had to rescue her, he wouldn’t have had to file a report on her actions, and her squad would have remained faithful to her.

The scar on her back burned with the memory of the scrape of the holy wood arrow shaft and the fiery heat of the toxin. Fear threatened to seep into her veins again. She shunned the emotion, unwilling to allow it to control her. She had survived and she had learnt a valuable lesson, one that would see her survive her next fight against the vampire hunters.

When she found her men, she would see that Vivek wasn’t responsible for their actions and that she was wrong to aim all of her anger at him.

She had to hold on to the faith she had in him and needed to remember what he used to be like. He was still that man inside. She was sure of it. Something had changed him and if she could discover what it was, she could set things right between them and restore the friendship they had once shared. That felt like too much to hope for. Vivek had changed so much that thawing the ice in his heart seemed impossible.

Seth was staring at her.

Sophis shunned her thoughts and looked him square in the eye.

His lips quirked into a smile. “Perhaps it is that female who distracts him.”

Female? Anger lanced her gut again, spreading fire into her chest. She hadn’t noticed Vivek chasing a female. If he was, it could prove that she was wrong and he had disregarded his orders tonight. Around twenty years ago, a female had caught his eye and he had shirked his duties then in order to pursue her. The feeling inside Sophis increased, burning through her blood, and she turned her frown on herself. What did it matter to her if Vivek was chasing anyone?

She pitied the poor female he had targeted. That was all this feeling was. She was just confusing it with something else, something she definitely wasn’t about to consider, not even for a split second.

“If you see my men, can you please come and tell me? If I find Vivek, I’ll reprimand him and send him to Commander Tynan to file his report,” Sophis said.

Seth’s look turned sour and he frowned. “The idiot will get what is coming to him one day.”

Sophis couldn’t agree more.

She saluted Seth and he pressed his hand to the chest of his crisp black jacket, nodded, and walked away.

Sophis stared after him, her focus wavering as her gaze tracked him until he disappeared down a corridor. She blew out a long sigh, her thoughts weighing her feet down. There was no point in putting things off. Her men were here somewhere. She wasn’t sure what she would do if she found them with Vivek. It would be the final blow to her already damaged self-esteem but she couldn’t stop looking for them now.

The basement guards’ quarters, the rest rooms there, and the armoury had produced no results. She hadn’t sensed her men or Vivek there. No trace of their scent lingered in the air, which meant they hadn’t been there in at least an hour. The grounds had held a hint of Vivek’s scent, but Seth had explained that for her. Regardless of what Seth thought, Vivek had been out there at some point this evening, although that didn’t mean he had patrolled as ordered.

Sophis closed her eyes and focused her senses. It was difficult to pick out a specific scent in the mansion. There were so many people coming and going because of the masquerade preparations that the scents all swirled together into one blanketing smell of roses and vampire blood.

If she were older, she would have been able to pick through the scents until she found Vivek’s masculine smell of strong blood and warm aftershave. She was on the wrong side of one hundred for that sort of skill though. Picking him out of a crowd was beyond her.

She tipped her head up and drew in a deep breath anyway on the off chance that she might detect him. The smell of roses choked her senses. Useless.

Was he on this floor? There were areas where those of their rank could go, reception rooms they could use if they wished, but Vivek rarely went there.

They had become some of her favourite places for that reason alone.

Sophis turned to face the door on the opposite side of the room to the one she had just exited. It was one of the few remaining places to check. She crossed the entrance hall and entered the elegant green reception room. None of her men were among the guards relaxing on the deep forest green antique couches around the large fireplace or those playing card games on the polished wooden tables towards the back of the room. The smell of flowers lessened and something sparked on her senses as she approached the next reception room, her favourite one where she loved to relax with a good book and find some peace.

Vivek.

She ducked to one side when the dark wooden door opened and two guards walked out, and curled her fingers around the edge of it to stop it from closing. Instead of entering the pale blue drawing room that acted as a library for the guards of the bloodline, she remained tucked behind the door, listening in. Her senses pinpointed Vivek and several other soldiers. She recognised some of them, had studied the feel of them on her senses so she could pick them out during battle and quickly relay orders or check whether they needed assistance. Her three missing men. Disappointment lurched through her, its taste bitter in her throat and on the back of her tongue.

Sophis drew in another deep breath, needing it to retain control and stop herself from storming into the room and giving Vivek a piece of her mind. Her senses stretched out and she was familiar enough with the room to be able to picture where Vivek was.

That was her favourite armchair and he probably knew it. He was here on purpose, to show her that he knew her innermost feelings and how much pleasure that place brought her, and he was going to ruin it for her. Demon. She cursed him under her breath and tried to see who else was present in the room. Several males judging by their scent, and also a female or two. Some were seated further away from Vivek and his group, towards the double doors far to her right, where crammed bookcases lined the walls. Vivek was closer to her, seated near the elegant white marble fireplace in the cluster of dark blue upholstered antique armchairs and sofas that stood on the expansive ornate blue and gold Chinese rug.

“We should probably go,” a deep voice said, gravelly with Czech accented English, and she recognised him as one of the younger guards assigned to her group.

“Perhaps you should run along and return to your mistress,” Vivek said, his voice low and teasing, his Russian-edged words filled with amusement that tore at Sophis. She wanted to shut him out and not listen, not hear the things he had to say about her because they would only worsen the pain she felt whenever she thought about how much Vivek had changed in these past ten years and how much his behaviour hurt her. “She is no doubt wondering where you have gone and if you do not return to her soon, she will run crying to Commander Tynan. Although, I thought you had all come here because you wanted to be part of my squad? I only accept strong guards who can think for themselves, not younglings who turn tail and run.”

Sophis gripped the door, her claws extending and pressing into the wood.

Not only was he trying to get her dropped from the guard but he was stealing her men too. She growled low enough that no one would hear her, venting her anger in the only way possible without open confrontation and violence.

His sexism was nothing new to her. She had endured such snide and horrible behaviour from others in the past, especially during the time when she had been working her way up the ranks. It wasn’t often that a female was elevated to her level within the guard but it had happened before, and it would happen again, regardless of what the males in the house of Venia thought about it.

Part of her wanted to go into the room and remind Vivek that the Law Keeper of their bloodline, the highest echelon of guard and the position many of them aspired to achieve, was female. Marise was strong and powerful, and deserved her position as the representative of the Venia, the one who upheld the laws of the seven pure bloodlines in their name. Sophis looked up to her and fought to be as strong as she was. Marise was a sign that a woman could achieve anything they set their heart on, regardless of what some men believed. It was because of her that Sophis had the strength to endure everything that Vivek threw at her and wouldn’t surrender her dream. She was strong and able, led her squad by example and followed the rules herself. She was the epitome of a good leader and one worthy of her position. She would keep working to prove that until even Vivek couldn’t deny it.

“You saw what happened the other week during patrol,” he said and the contents of his report echoed around her mind.

Her resolve faltered and her anger and disappointment turned back towards herself. She clung to the door, leaning on it for support, weak as she thought about everything that had happened. She had wanted so desperately to fight and prove that she was strong and worthy of her position, and she had only proven that she was still rash and a youngling in some ways. She hated that she had shown that side of herself to her team and to Vivek. She had given him a reason to believe her weak and unworthy of her captaincy, and that was something she despised with all of her heart, not because he would use it against her but because she had wanted him to believe in her, to have faith in her skills as he had ten years ago, and now he wouldn’t.

“You want to be in a real man’s squad, not hanging on the skirt of a female. Is that not so?”

Those words sent the fire in her blood to her heart. It consumed her, burning away the last threads of her restraint and releasing all of the pain she held locked in her heart, hurt that she felt whenever she thought about Vivek. She couldn’t stop herself from stepping out into the open. Her dark brown eyes widened when she spotted Vivek sitting on her favourite armchair in the middle of the room, surrounded by his squad and the three men belonging to hers, and with a woman seated on his lap. Sophis recognised the neat chignon of blonde hair and the slender curvaceous outline before the woman had even turned her face away from Vivek to look at the others.

She couldn’t believe what she was seeing.

It was Ella draped all over Vivek, sitting on his thigh with her feet tucked between his black-clad legs, her fingers running through the longer lengths of his messy short dark hair. Her friend smiled, as though in agreement with what he had said, and Sophis’s heart stung over the betrayal. How many times had Ella supported her when she had griped about Vivek and his treatment of her? Ella had agreed with everything she had said about him and his sexist ways, and now she was sitting on his lap, staring at him with adoring eyes. Ella brushed her fingers across his cheek. He smiled at her.

Was he so absorbed in Ella that his guard was down?

The others had sensed her presence, and her anger judging by how they had backed away from Vivek, leaving him open to attack. The three males from her squad were staring at their boots, huddled close together as though there was safety in numbers. She would deal with them later. After she had given Vivek that piece of her mind reserved for him.

Sophis growled, crossed the expansive room in a flash, and grabbed Vivek by the short stand-up collar of his black military-style uniform jacket. She twisted it in her grip and tore him from the blue velvet armchair, sending Ella toppling off his lap as she forced him to stand and dragged him towards her.

His hazel eyes met hers, cool and calm, unflustered by her assault.

“I’ve had enough of you.” Her words came out evenly despite the anger sweeping like liquid wildfire through her veins.

He smiled slowly, his sensual dusky lips bowing into it. Amusement shimmered in his eyes as he looked down into hers.

It didn’t fool Sophis. The tight lines bracketing his mouth and the tautness of his neck muscles warned her of his anger long before the emotion began to roll off him in tangible waves that told her to back down or accept the consequences.

Doubt settled in her mind. Right now, she wasn’t strong enough to beat him and she didn’t have any proof to lay at his feet should he demand to know what had her so riled. She was overreacting again, pinning all of the anger that should have been directed at herself on him instead. She had accused and sentenced him in one breath and she had to go through with what she had started.

“Why did you say those things in your report?” It seemed like the safest of her reasons to mention. He couldn’t deny it at least.

“Why did I tell the truth in a report to my commander?”

When he said it like that, Sophis couldn’t hold his gaze, no matter how hard she tried. Her eyes darted to his chest and the heat of shame engulfed and incinerated the anger in her heart, turning it to ashes. Vivek was right. He had only told the truth, a requirement when filing a report. What reason did he have to lie for her? None at all.

“If you want to prove that you are not weak or a liability, then do so,” Vivek said and her eyes widened.

Was he challenging her?

She raised her gaze to meet his. His intense hazel eyes gave nothing away, no sign of his feelings or any hint of the meaning behind his words. The banked flames of her anger sparked back into life, fanned to a fierce roar in her heart by the challenge he had issued and the desire to prove herself.

“I’ll fight you.” The hardness of those words leaving her lips surprised her.

The guards gathered around them moved back as one, positioning themselves at a safe distance, some of them shifting to stand behind the furniture.

A glimmer of light touched Vivek’s eyes again and Sophis had the terrible feeling he hadn’t meant what he had said as that sort of challenge. It didn’t matter. She had fought him before and she would fight him again. She would prove right here and now that she was strong and capable.

“I beat you last time we danced,” he husked in a low voice that felt too intimate, as though he was trying to speak to her alone, shunning the others who surrounded them.

She could feel their eyes on her, the spark of fear that ran through some of the younger vampires and Ella, but didn’t take her focus off Vivek. She wouldn’t give him an opening. If he made the slightest move, she was going to knock him on his backside in front of everyone. That would bring him down a peg or two but would do nothing to satisfy the deeper craving for violence that filled every inch of her.

Vivek lowered his head towards her, his sharp hazel eyes holding her motionless as though he had cast a spell on her, and carefully placed his hand over hers where it held his jacket. She started at the feel of his cool fingers closing over hers and swallowed the lump forming in her throat. She fought to tear her gaze away from his, feeling the danger of staring into his eyes, but failed. It was impossible when he was so close to her, barely a few inches away. Each flake of purest gold that flecked the transition of rich green to earthy brown in his irises held her fast and mesmerised her. She was open like this. He could attack her before she could bring her focus back to the fight let alone manage to defend herself. It would be game over in under a second.

He leaned in closer, until his mouth neared her cheek and she could no longer see his eyes. Her senses snapped back to attention, outlining the room and its contents in sharp relief in her mind. Vivek’s proximity played havoc with them. Her vampire senses bounced off everything in the room like radar but it was quickest to leap back from him. She could feel his senses on her too, monitoring, focused with intensity. The signals echoed back and forth, bouncing off each other, until awareness vibrated between them and threatened to drown out the rest of the room. Sophis swallowed again, fighting a losing battle against it and the startling effect it had on her body.

“Surely you do not want to humiliate yourself again?” he murmured against her cheek, sending unpleasant shivers down her neck as his breath washed over it. The shiver became a tingling that spread over her arms and trickled down her spine. She fought the urge to close her eyes and shoved him backwards, placing distance between them.

His gaze lost its warmth.

“I won the previous two, remember?” Sophis tightened her grip on his black jacket and he tightened his on her hand, crushing her fingers with gentle pressure, not enough to hurt but enough to remind her that he was the stronger out of them, and not only because he had fifty years as a vampire on her. Another rush of tingles swept through her, stealing the strength from her legs and turning her mouth dry. She straightened, refusing to let him affect her and denying the electric feel of his fingers against hers.

Her senses sharpened and Vivek responded in kind, his focus settling wholly on her. The intensity of it and the sure smile that tugged at his profanely sensual mouth shot her concentration to Hell. She sucked in a sharp breath, narrowed her eyes on his, and tipped her shoulders back. Vivek’s gaze briefly dropped to her chest, his right eyebrow quirking, and then met hers again.

She wasn’t going to let him fluster her. She was going to prove right here and right now that she could take him in a fight because if she didn’t, her men would never follow her lead.

Vivek’s broad build lent him physical strength that she couldn’t match, but while he could use brute force in their fights, she had intelligence and speed on her side. She had outwitted him several times over the past few fights and had won because of it.

Sophis snatched her hand back and squared up to him, tilting her chin up and holding his gaze.

“I’ll win this time,” she said on a sneer, unafraid of the darkness emerging in his eyes as the colour began to bleed from them. The flecks of gold turned icy, black gradually ringed his irises, and then pale blue emerged and subdued the hues of brown and green until his eyes were softest aquamarine, the colour that signified him as a member of the Venia bloodline.

Each of the seven pure bloodlines had different eye colours when they were showing their true face. From the obsidian darkness of the Tenebrae, through the fiery orange of the Nocens and the blood red of the Vehemens, the intense emerald of the Caelestis and striking sapphire of the Aurorea, to the royal purple of the strongest family in Europe, the mighty Validus bloodline. All of them were unique in this one way, and many thought it was this difference that divided them, that pitted them against each other in an eternal battle for dominion over their species.

Sophis allowed her eyes to transform and her canines lengthened into fangs, revealing her true self to Vivek. His pupils widened and then narrowed, and she sensed the change in him, the moment he went from treating her as a feeble woman to a potential threat. His guard came up, his focus sharpening, swamping her with a sensation that she was in danger.

She wasn’t going to back down. “You just got lucky last time.”

The group around them jeered.

Vivek glared icily at them and then his gaze shifted back to hers. His fangs showed between his lips as he spoke.

“I will not make the mistake of going easy on you again.”

With that, he threw a right hook at her.

Available in e-book from:
Amazon Kindle Stores:
Amazon Kindle | Amazon Kindle UK | Amazon Kindle Germany
Amazon Kindle France | Amazon Kindle Spain | Amazon Kindle Italy

Other Retailers:
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Posted in 2012 releases, Amazon Kindle, ebooks, Masquerade, new release, paranormal romance, vampire romance, Vampires Realm | Comments Off on Masquerade – Vampires Realm Romance Series #10 – Now available at Amazon Kindle stores!

Crave – hot vampire romance novella out today!

It’s release time again! CRAVE, the second book in my already popular Vampire Erotic Theatre romance series, is out today and to celebrate I’m going to post the excerpt here to tease and tempt you all. Crave has already received some fabulous reviews from both readers and reviewers alike. Some are even saying that it’s now their favourite in the series, which is exciting for me because after the reviews for Covet I began to feel that Crave might not live up to the hotness and intensity of that book. Phew!

So, here’s the blurb for this hot new erotic vampire romance novella and an excerpt almost guaranteed to crank your temperature up a few notches!

Crave
Felicity Heaton
His mind has been set on his work for the past one hundred years. Now a forbidden beauty has stolen his attention and is threatening to steal his heart too.

Callum has come to the city of romance on business, not pleasure, but when he sets eyes on a gorgeous werewolf in a nightclub, he can’t ignore the dark carnal craving she ignites in him. His work for Vampirerotique, the erotic theatre he runs with three other vampires, can wait. The only thing that matters now is satisfying his sinful hunger for a woman who most vampires would consider an enemy.

Kristina is on the run from her pack. Her alpha is intent on forcing her to bear his child and she’s not about to live through the same nightmare as her mother had. When a tall, dark and sexy vampire catches her eye, she can’t believe the ferocity of the desire he unleashes in her or the fact that she enjoys the feel of his eyes on her and his silent pursuit of her in the clubs each night.

When Kristina finally gets a taste of Callum in a forbidden kiss, will she be strong enough to resist the allure of the vampire and his offer to share his bed for a week of unbridled, wild sex, or will she surrender to her own craving for the safety and passion she finds in his embrace?

genre: paranormal vampire romance
length: 35000 words
released: March 2012
Book 2 in the Vampire Erotic Theatre series

Available in e-book from:
Author’s website: http://www.felicityheaton.com/ebooks.php?title=Crave
Amazon Kindle: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B007HBKNG6
Amazon Kindle UK: http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B007HBKNG6
Amazon Kindle Germany: http://www.amazon.de/dp/B007HBKNG6
Amazon Kindle France: http://www.amazon.fr/dp/B007HBKNG6
Smashwords: https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/140336

EXCERPT

Three weeks had passed since Callum had left London and headed to Paris to scout for performers for a new show at the theatre he ran with three other vampires, and it had been one week since he had last emailed Antoine, the aristocrat pureblood in charge of overseeing the performances at Vampirerotique.

He should have contacted him again by now. It wasn’t as though Callum hadn’t thought about it. He had booted up his laptop and started to type out the email every morning before retiring for the day. Yesterday, he had even reached the point of typing in his name at the end of the email before deleting the entire thing.

Callum leaned his back against the brass rail that edged the curved dark mahogany bar top, his green gaze scanning the occupants of the crowded room, picking out viable prey, potential performers, and identifying the species of each person his eyes fell on. Part of him was still working and it was that part that kept whispering that Antoine wouldn’t be angry with him for disappearing. If he just dropped a brief email or even a text message stating that he was still looking for performers but hadn’t spotted anyone worthy of joining the Vampirerotique family in the past week then Antoine would probably forgive him for disobeying his command to contact him daily.

It would be a lie though.

He had seen several vampires, both male and female, at the nightclubs he had been moving between for the past three weeks. All of them would work well in the theatre and draw the crowds. They were exhibitionists who had been more than comfortable performing private acts in front of the gathered dancers. There had been males who had groped and grinded with their human female prey, and female vampires who had engaged in acts just a whisper away from screwing in the open booths where anyone could see them. All of them had been worthy of him approaching them and giving them the hard sell. Not many of their type refused to audition when they gained an all expenses paid trip to London and the chance to try out for a place in a famous theatre.

There was one female who had stood out amongst the usual crowd last week. She was perfect for the new show that Antoine had in mind, could easily be the star performer, but Callum couldn’t bring himself to approach her and whenever he thought about mentioning her to Antoine, a knot formed deep in his gut.

Callum had ignored the feeling and just satisfied himself with watching her in the club. He had first seen her with another female, one that he had approached during a lull towards the end of the evening. She had eagerly accepted his offer of an audition, even though she knew the sort of place his theatre was and that it didn’t normally look for performers from her species.

Werewolf.

When Antoine had first told him that he would be departing for Paris in search of new talent, and that it wouldn’t just be the usual scouting mission this time but would include seeking werewolves for a special performance, Callum had almost choked on his glass of blood.

Vampirerotique had never hired werewolves before. In fact, he was certain that in the hundred years they had been running the theatre, there had never been a werewolf on stage. Their kind rarely interacted with each other, unless you counted the occasional war. Werewolves didn’t like vampires. The feeling was more than mutual.

Callum had sent three werewolves to audition so far, all female as requested.

This female would be perfect for the show too. She would steal it and make it hers, just as she stole the attention of the entire club as she moved through it with sensual grace that had the eyes of every male and some females on her, and made Callum think about some therianthropes he had met in the past. She had the moves of a feline shifter rather than a werewolf.

Callum could easily imagine her moving on the stage, how she would sidle over to the large vampire males and bring them to their knees with only a seductive sway of her hips and flash of a sultry smile.

Hell, she had Callum on his knees. He had been following her for a week now, shunning his duty in favour of tracking her down each night and watching her from a distance. His new private pleasure. The club she had chosen tonight catered to a mixed crowd, although the humans didn’t know that. One of the male bartenders was a shifter, one was human, and one was a vampire. That surprised Callum. He had never thought he would live to see a vampire working alongside a shifter, but the two young males seemed to get along. He couldn’t sense any bad feelings between them so it wasn’t an act put on for the sake of the patrons and the human bartender.


Callum’s gaze tracked the female through the club, studying how she slid between the dancers, occasionally stopping to work her body against a male. She smiled wickedly at a young human man as he caught her wrist and pulled her against him, twisting her so her back pressed against his front. She wriggled her hips and raised her hands above her head as she slid down the length of her partner and then back up again, almost as tall as he was in her heeled black boots. Her tight dark jeans emphasised lean long legs that Callum had rather disturbingly dreamed about since first seeing her, imagining their slender strong lengths wrapped around his backside as he fucked her. He had dreamed about pushing the loose flowing material of her empire-line top up to reveal the toned plane of her stomach and then kissing it, feeling her body shift beneath him, before continuing and peeling the high waist tucked under her breasts over their full firm globes. He had dipped his head and captured each sweet dusky bud in turn, swirling his tongue around and sucking them until she moaned low in appreciation.

The brunette female werewolf moved on, thanking her temporary partner with a brief brush of her rosy lips across his cheek and a saucy stroke of her palm over his crotch that had Callum ready to speed onto the dance floor and rip the human to shreds.

She was his.

He drew a long slow breath to calm himself, focusing on it and not her, waiting for the need to pass. If he looked at her now, he would be on the dance floor before he realised what he was doing and would be tugging her into his arms, using all of his strength to make it clear to her that she belonged to him now.

Callum shook his head to rid it of the desire to dance with her and feel her body pressing into his, hot and supple under his questing hands. He wouldn’t let her go as easily as the male human had.

He watched her move through the dancers again, twirling and smiling, her wavy soft brown hair dancing with her, tumbling over her shoulders and breasts. Each time she lifted her bare arms in the air, the hem of her top rose, revealing a tantalising flash of her stomach or back. Her jeans rode low on her hips, barely covering her backside and crotch.

She was a vixen, a real predator as she glanced over every man, even those with partners, looking for tonight’s fun. He had seen her leave with a new man every night. A strange urge to follow her and see what she did with them had built inside him until he had no longer been able to resist the need to know. It wasn’t what he had thought it would be and an even stranger feeling had swept through him on realising that she was luring males away to feed on them. Like his kind, werewolves enjoyed the taste of blood and needed it to survive, although they could supplement their need with nourishment from food.

Unlike his kind, werewolves couldn’t turn a human. Her bite wouldn’t change the human into a werewolf. Once she had finished with the man, she had wiped his memory and left him in the alley.

Callum had almost followed her home but had forced himself to return to his hotel instead. The sight of her feeding had given him some seriously erotic dreams and he had woken tonight with a raging erection that hadn’t gone down until he had tended to it.

It was coming back as he watched her, his thoughts diving down routes they shouldn’t be taking. A vampire had no place desiring a werewolf.

Desiring?

Hell, this hunger went beyond desire and ran deeper in his veins than lust.

He craved her.

Callum turned and flagged down the vampire bartender. The blond man smiled knowingly, nodded, and took down a martini glass. He filled it to the brim with dark liquid that was black in the flashing purple and blue lights of the club and stuck a cherry on a stick in it. Callum held out a twenty euro note at the same time as the vampire placed the glass down on an elegant white napkin and slid it across the bar to him.

“I’ll take one of those,” a female voice said right beside him, “and tall, dark and sexy here is paying.”

He was?

Callum frowned and turned to say that he damn well wasn’t paying for her drink and froze as his eyes fell on the female werewolf. He felt the vampire bartender’s gaze on him, sensed him waiting to see what Callum’s reply would be. Callum glanced at him and nodded. The vampire made up another glass of blood, stuck a cherry in it, and slid it over to her before moving away.

The werewolf raised her glass in a salute to Callum, sipped the blood, and set it back down on the napkin. Her bloodstained lips curved into a wicked sultry smile.

Callum was smitten.

She leaned closer, her bare left elbow resting on the bar, and ran her fingertips down his dark purple silk tie. Her smile widened when she curled her fingers around it, drew it away from his black tailored shirt, and tugged him towards her.

“You’ve been watching me like I’m a bitch in heat and you’re an alpha. What gives?” She wasn’t French as he had expected. Her accent was as British as his own.

Callum calmly removed her hand from his tie, straightened it out and smoothed it down. “I’m just here on business, and I’m definitely not an alpha. I’m a vampire.”

She smiled and tilted her head to one side, causing the long waves of her brown hair to shift across her breasts and cover the tempting display of cleavage the tight section of her black sleeveless top created.

“A vampire with a definite hard-on for a species most of his kind would see as disgusting and forbidden,” she said over the rapid beat of the music, lifted the cocktail stick and cherry from her drink, and popped it into her mouth.

Callum’s gaze narrowed on her mouth, transfixed by the sight of her sucking the cherry. She parted her lips and withdrew the glossy red fruit, dipped it back into her blood and swirled it around before raising it back to her mouth and teasing him by licking the crimson liquid off it again. His chest tightened and he struggled to breathe as the tip of her tongue flicked over the cherry, swirling around it. She slowly slid the fruit into her mouth, lips puckering as she sucked, her eyes closing in what looked like pleasure to him. The sight of her ratcheted his hunger up another notch, flooding him with a deep throbbing ache to feel her tongue brushing his in the way it had the cherry, to have her mouth on his flesh and to run his lips over every inch of her bare skin and drive her wild until she was sobbing his name and begging for more.

“I don’t have a hard-on for your species… just you.” Callum moved faster than she could evade, catching the wrist of the hand she held the cocktail stick in, pulling it away from her lips and claiming them for his own.

She responded instantly, her tongue thrusting past his lips and teeth to slide along his. He slanted his head, slipped his other arm around her slim waist and dragged the full length of her body against his as he seized control of the kiss. She melted against him, as supple and hot as he had dreamed she would be, her breasts pressing into his hard chest, the heat of her driving him to the edge. He tangled his tongue with hers, swallowing her breathy gasps as he dominated her, crushing each attempt she made to reclaim control. Her fight only made him burn hotter for her, made him use his strength on her and tighten his grip on her wrist and side. Her gasps became low rumbling moans. The firmer he was with her, the more of his strength he used, the lower they became and the more she struggled, as though she wanted to feel how much more powerful he was than her.

She liked it.

The female werewolf snapped out of his grasp and slapped him so hard across his cheek that he couldn’t fail to realise where he had gone wrong. His fangs cut into his lower lip. He hadn’t noticed them extending. Before he could explain to her that it was just the heat of the moment that had brought them out and that he hadn’t intended to bite her, she was striding away from him, heading back towards the busy dance floor.

Callum growled, swiftly drank his martini glass of blood to take the edge off his hunger and followed her, intent on explaining and tasting her again. The crowd kept closing behind her, blocking his way and frustrating him. He pushed through them, his senses tracking her so he didn’t lose her again. She wasn’t heading out of the club at least. The expansive dark club only had one exit and that was the other way, beyond the bar. She was either heading towards the booths that lined the edges of the room or the dance floor itself. Was she planning on losing him in the throng of people? It would be difficult to track her in amongst so many signatures. There were several other werewolves in the club tonight. Their presence would help mask hers even though he knew her scent now, had instinctively put it to memory when kissing her. Devil, she had tasted so wicked and delicious.

Callum licked the faint trace of blood off his lips and finally broke through the crowd around the bar, coming out near the edge of the dance floor. The heavy beat of the music pounded through his body, thrumming in his veins, pushing the tension mounting inside him, the need to find her and have her in his arms again.

The need to taste her lips.

He scoured the dancers and spotted her heading closer to the DJ. The lights flashed brightest there, hurting his eyes, and the volume of the music would be unbearable that close to the speakers. She knew vampires well. Her species could move around during the day so they weren’t as sensitive to light and her hearing wasn’t as acute when she was in her human form. She stopped there and danced with a male. He couldn’t tell whether her partner was human or werewolf, but he was immense, taller and broader than Callum was. She had intentionally chosen a place that would hurt him and had now selected a partner who could easily protect her. Her wiliness told Callum that the male would be a werewolf.

He only wondered why she no longer looked confident. Her gaze constantly darted about as she danced with the man, her body held at a distance from his, as though she was afraid to get any closer. Why would she fear her own kind?

That question and the challenge she had issued by choosing to dance with an immense werewolf in an area that was uncomfortable for Callum drove him onto the dance floor. He moved through the crowd, his gaze constantly on her, studying her face and the flicker of fear that was gradually surfacing in her eyes. The usual confident shine in them was gone by the time he was within a few metres of her.

The male werewolf caught her shoulders, turned her around and dragged her back against his bulky body, caging her there with a thick forearm across her stomach. His black t-shirt stretched over an obscene amount of muscle and Callum considered the insanity of approaching such a male. Although he was likely older than the werewolf, and vampires were inherently more powerful, his build was almost slender compared to him and he was a good few inches shorter too. That could be an advantage though. A lower centre of gravity gave him a more solid footing than his monolithic rival and his slimmer build gave him the advantage of speed. He could probably incapacitate the werewolf with only minimal injury to himself.

However.

There were two other male werewolves seated on the curved dark leather seat of the booth behind the male dancing with the woman, and both of them were watching the couple. Three glasses stood on the oval black table in the centre of the booth. The male was with them.

One werewolf he might be able to handle.

Three would crush him.

It should have stopped him from pursuing the woman, but his feet still propelled him forwards, towards what could only be a bloody and painful future.

He couldn’t turn back now that he had tasted her.

He hungered for another touch, another taste.

He craved her.

And he would have her.

Available in e-book from:
Author’s website: http://www.felicityheaton.com/ebooks.php?title=Crave
Amazon Kindle: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B007HBKNG6
Amazon Kindle UK: http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B007HBKNG6
Amazon Kindle Germany: http://www.amazon.de/dp/B007HBKNG6
Amazon Kindle France: http://www.amazon.fr/dp/B007HBKNG6
Smashwords: https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/140336

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Posted in 2012 releases, Covet, Crave, paranormal romance, Vampire Erotic Theatre, vampire romance, vampires | Comments Off on Crave – hot vampire romance novella out today!