Graced Read online

  About Graced

  City Guard Elle Brown has one goal in life: to protect her kid sister, Emmie. Falling in love—and with a werewolf at that—was never part of the deal.

  Life, however, doesn’t always go to plan, and when Elle meets Gray, everything she thought about her world is thrown into turmoil. Everything, that is, but protecting Emmie, who is Graced with teal-colored eyes and an unknown power that could change their very existence. But being different is dangerous in their home city of Pinton, and it’s Elle’s very own differences that capture the attention of the Honorable Dante Kipling, a vampire with a bone-deep fascination for a special type of human.

  Dante is convinced that humans with eye colors other than brown are unique, but he has no proof. The answers may exist in the enigmatic hazel eyes of Elle Brown, and he’s determined to uncover their secrets no matter the cost … or the lives lost.

  Contents

  About Graced

  Prologue

  Part I

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Part II

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Part III

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Chapter 50

  Chapter 51

  Chapter 52

  Chapter 53

  Chapter 54

  Chapter 55

  Chapter 56

  Chapter 57

  Chapter 58

  Chapter 59

  Chapter 60

  Chapter 61

  Epilogue

  About Amanda Pillar

  Copyright

  For Liz Pentland, English teacher extraordinaire, who told the 13 year old me the revolutionary phrase: “a novel starts with a single sentence.” Thank you.

  Prologue

  The familiar, warm weight pressing against Elle’s legs vanished.

  “Elle!”

  Elle spun toward the sound of her sister’s frightened voice. A man—a vampire by his purple eyes—was holding her sister aloft in the air, like a sack of potatoes. Emmie did a rather excellent job of imitating said sack, her body limp, a dead weight in the stranger’s arms. But she would weigh next to nothing for someone like him.

  Elle took a step toward the vampire, her hand instantly searching for the baton that was normally strapped to her side. But it wasn’t there. She was off-duty. No City Guard uniform, no steel baton. “Put my sister down.”

  She had nothing but her bare hands to reduce the leech to pulp for touching her sister.

  The vampire didn’t even glance at Elle; his eyes were focused on Emmie. He wore expensive clothing and looked like an aristo, but Elle had never seen him before. And she’d gotten to know the faces of the nearby vampires. Better to know your enemy and all.

  “What interesting eyes you have, little human.”

  Inside, Elle flinched. She should never have brought Emmie here—but she’d thought it was safe. They were in a human neighborhood, and it was a general store. Sacks of flour, bags of candy, pickled vegetables and scales were the standard items decking the glass counter and shelves. Most vampires wouldn’t be caught dead near such a boring and non-flamboyant place.

  “I repeat,” Elle said, taking a menacing step forward, “put my sister down.”

  That finally caught the vampire’s attention. His eyes flicked to her, scanned her up and down and then dismissed her. “She doesn’t look anything like you. I don’t believe she is your sister.”

  A sick feeling began to pulse through Elle. If he took Emmie, she might not be able to get her back for weeks. Or ever.

  “She’s my sister. If you don’t put her down in five seconds, you’ll wish you were never born.” It wasn’t a hollow threat. Elle would do anything to protect her four-year-old sibling. Their age gap made Elle feel more like a mother than sister, anyway.

  The vampire’s fingers visibly tightened on Emmie’s ribs, and the girl gave a small squeak. “I think I will take her with me. She will make an excellent addition to my collection.”

  Elle’s fists clenched. “Put. Her. Down.”

  The vampire looked around the room, suddenly seeming to notice the audience. A mixed assortment of humans stared back at the him. Women and men, some tall, some short, some in tough calico work clothes, others in prim suits. Their Brown eyes were stony though, locked on the vampire and his human prize. While Elle watched, the store clerk’s arm disappeared under the counter.

  “Yes,” the vampire said. “I think I’ll take this child. She clearly has no relations and is a street urchin in need of a home.”

  Blood turned to fire in Elle’s veins. “Try and leave. I’ll have you on so many charges for abduction you’ll be stuck in court for years.”

  The vampire laughed. “Who’s going to listen to you over me?”

  “I’m a city guard.”

  “Again, who will listen?”

  Emmie craned her head around and stared at Elle, waiting for her big sister to do something heroic. Elle was within reaching distance of Emmie. If she could snatch the child back…

  The vampire’s eyes were cold, calculating. “I will break the girl’s neck if you come any closer.”

  Elle believed him. “She’s no good to you dead.”

  “I can have her preserved. She’ll still look good in my collection.”

  The urge to vomit was overpowering. Elle doubted she’d ever get over the mental images of what her sister would look like dead and “preserved.”

  Emmie screamed, “You’re a bad man! Put me down!”

  The vampire, startled, loosened his grip on the child. He could have easily caught Emmie again, but Elle jerked forward and wrenched Emmie free. Her arms tightened around Emmie like steel bands, and then she set her down behind the store clerk, who stood holding out a wooden bat. Elle smiled.

  The vampire wasn’t laughing half an hour later, when the city coroner was called. Unfortunately for the vampire’s family, when the other city guards arrived to check out the scene, no one in the store could remember who had landed the death blow; there’d been too many people involved in the fight.

  But Elle knew.

  No one touched her sister.

  Ever.

  Part I

  May you come to the attention of those in authority

  Chapter 1

  Three years later

  “I’ll suck your cock.”

  Dante raised one eyebrow as he looked down at the woman kneeling on the packed dirt between his feet. He hadn’t even noticed she was there, until now. She was grimy, ragged and had bruises the size of fingers running up and down her arms. Her breath frosted in the air between them
. She was shivering, but he doubted she knew she was cold. He looked past her and at their surroundings; no one else was in the enclosed exercise area, bordered on three sides by tall, stone walls. That didn’t mean much, though. A handful of glass windows stared out onto the yard; the passageway that had led him here was fed by a series of corridors that wound back inside his father’s estate, to the slave pens. While they were alone now, that situation could change in oh, say, two seconds.

  She started to reach for his fly with grubby, nail-bitten hands. He took a step backward, placing a protective hand over his crotch. “That isn’t exactly the grand offer you make it sound.”

  Raising sunken eyes, she gripped his leg with enough force to leave a temporary mark. “Please, I’ll do anything.”

  Dante knew that some vampires would love an offer like that; they’d have her on her knees in the courtyard, fangs and cock buried deep. But he wasn’t one of them. She was bit-ridden, a vampire bite addict, for blood’s sake. Not to mention she was way too thin—her blonde hair looked like it hadn’t seen water in months—and worst of all, she was a normal human. A normal brown-eyed human, and for him, that was the distinction.

  “I’m not interested.” Dante tried to shake her loose without hurting her, but the pesky rat wouldn’t let go. He started walking backward, both hands cupping his groin, but she was still gripping his leg.

  “I’ll let you stick it in any hole you want.” She followed belly-first across the hard ground. Dante could smell her blood as the thin skin on her legs gave way with his movement.

  “I don’t want to stick it anywhere near you.” Dante stopped walking. “Will you just leave me alone?”

  The slave looked up at him then, actually met him eye-to-eye, and he could see the desperation in her expression. She didn’t care that she was lying in the dirt, that her one and only sackcloth dress had just obtained a few more holes; she didn’t care she was bleeding in front of a vampire or that people had started filing into the exercise yard and were staring at her as she clung to his leg. By the blood, she probably wanted to bleed in front of him. But he wasn’t a fledgling, and he was more than capable of smelling dinner and not devouring it without thinking of where it came from.

  “Let go of my leg,” Dante said when she didn’t say anything in reply.

  “I can’t.” Her voice broke as her grip tightened.

  Dante searched for a fleck of blue in those brown eyes, a smidgen of green, a dollop of gray. But there was nothing other than brown. And there was no sense of self there, no flicker of intelligence; just need driven by addiction.

  “I am not going to bite you.”

  She stared blindly at him, not really seeing him, just the hit she needed for her habit.

  He tapped his teeth, shook his head and then said slowly, as if talking to a child, “Not. Going. To. Bite.”

  She threw herself on him, and the surprise sent him back a step. She was clawing and hitting, her fingernails trying to scratch the skin from his face. Not that they made contact, he was a lot stronger than her, even bit-ridden as she was. He tried to be gentle, holding her hands away, but she kicked him in the shin, tried to knee him in the groin. There was nothing left to do, nothing in her eye color that made him want to try and help her.

  For once in his life, he decided to do the kind thing.

  *

  A low-pitched moan came muffled through the soundproof door of his father’s study. Dante stopped walking down the bluestone corridor and glared at the metal door. Yes, he’d heard right; there were definitely sounds coming from within the study. Even though dull sodium lamps lit the corridor and he didn’t really need their light to see—they were for the slaves’ benefit—he squinted at the entrance and sighed.

  Soundproof door, he thought and snorted as another moan reached his ears. It was soundproof for humans—and most vampires, he supposed—but not for him. “Sensitive,” that’s what the countess called him. “Delicate” was his father’s term. “Unlucky,” that was Dante’s.

  He could ignore the noise, but if his father found out that Dante had been walking by the study—and someone had been in there without authorization—and that Dante had known about it…

  Shaking his head, he tried the door and found it unlocked. He raised an eyebrow almost to his hairline and pushed the heavy, reinforced steel slab inward. He grimaced at the sight that greeted him. His sister, blonde head thrown back, was sprawled over their father’s hardwood desk, her skirt clumped around her waist. She seemed to be focused on the male human who was pumping between her legs, but with his sister, well, she was probably enjoying being caught more than the physical act itself.

  The human’s eyes were shut in concentration, the muscles on his neck corded up to his dark hairline. He probably didn’t realize they’d been disturbed. Blood trickled down his throat from two puncture marks; the scent was clean, aromatic. This slave hadn’t succumbed to addiction yet.

  Dante knew Misty was aware of his presence. Her moans had gotten louder—and not just because the door was now open. She’d always had a sixth sense about whether or not she was alone, vampire hearing notwithstanding. If he backed away now, she’d simply confront him about it later. Call him a pervert or something equally ridiculous, but something his father might hear about and believe. Apparently “delicate” was close enough to “unhinged” for his father to care.

  May as well get the confrontation over with, Dante thought. For some reason, his sister could never let anything go, even if she was in the wrong. Like now.

  She moaned again. Dante cleared his throat under the pretext of politeness. Although, he didn’t think there was a way to determine the appropriate level of courtesy required when one’s sibling was screwing a slave on their parent’s desk. Dante was fairly certain there wasn’t an etiquette rule designed for that situation, but he couldn’t be sure. It wasn’t like he’d ever bothered to study manners, much to the countess’ disgust.

  The human stopped moving, staring like a mouse caught in lamplight. He grunted when Misty dug her fingernails into his ass as punishment. The smell of blood became stronger. The poor slave looked tormented, caught between his need to continue his activity and fear at being discovered by the master’s son.

  “I doubt Father would appreciate you using his desk that way,” Dante said, taking pity on the creature. His sister, sure as anything, wasn’t going to.

  Misty exhaled slowly, and let go of the human. The man stumbled back a step and tugged his homespun pants back to his waist, pulling the drawstring tight. The material was having a hard time covering everything. From the muscular torso down to the tented material, Dante could see why his sister had chosen this particular slave to dabble with. Head down, skin flushed, the human stumbled from the room without a backward glance.

  Dante heard the sound of ruffled silk as Misty swung off their father’s desk. He didn’t want to watch her settle into a more appropriate level of dress, so he moved over to one of the bookstands. As he always did when in his father’s study, he stared at the three skulls that sat side by side on the top row of the shelf. They were brown-tinged with age, the bone shiny, like it had been covered in some sort of resin. Since his father wasn’t here, he could look at them to his heart’s content, without having his parent breathing down his neck.

  “You ruined a very pleasant interlude,” Misty said while Dante studied the skulls.

  “So, you’re back to being heterosexual?” Dante asked. He couldn’t keep track of her lovers. The last time she’d been caught by someone, there’d been two other women involved and possibly a guy, but he hadn’t been the one to discover her on that occasion. Thankfully. “It stinks of sex in here.” Dante flicked a glance back at her.

  Misty tossed her hair over one shoulder and shrugged. “Father won’t care. And I’m bisexual. I don’t have to have a preference either way.”

  Dante tilted his head in acknowledgment as he turned back to the shelf. “I’d make sure Father’s desk is cleaned befo
re he returns.”

  His eyes locked on the human skull. Picking it up, he twisted it around in his hands. It was cool to the touch, slippery almost. It was the same size as the other two—Typical brain capacity is the same as a were’s or vampire’s, the small yellowed note tucked under the skull read—but there were differences. The bone was thin, fragile in touch and appearance. If he tightened his grasp, he’d crush it. Dante had read about the bone density difference, of course, but feeling the skull and seeing it in real life, without the flesh, was different.

  No wonder they broke so easily.

  “Okay, Father might care,” Misty said into the quiet.

  Dante flicked another glance at her. She had a one-track mind. “He might care you were fucking someone on his prized desk? Just a tad.”

  He turned his attention back to the bookshelf and replaced the human skull. The ledge it sat on was made of wood—something that his father would call reckless if anyone else had one—and it gleamed. Just like the desk his father loved to sit behind, as if he were some all-powerful lord, rather than just a regular “lord.” Although, as far as Dante and the estate slaves were concerned, the former was true.

  Dante ran his fingers over the shelf’s surface; it was smooth to touch, almost warm, unlike the metal and stone that adorned every other part of the property. The only wood on the entire estate was in his father’s study.

  Misty had come to stand next to him, and he felt the rush of air as she re-flicked her hair back over one shoulder. “Well, he would care, but he would admire me for my daring.”

  Dante reached for the were skull. “True.”

  There were five simple facts in Dante’s life: One, his father thought that Dante was an over-educated twat incapable of even the barest of vampire duties (he thought that feeding was almost beyond Dante’s prowess); two, his sister was a maniacal bitch who constantly pushed the boundaries in order to gain their father’s approval, and it usually worked; three, their father liked Misty more than Dante as a result; four, the countess treated the Kipling children with fond neglect, which meant that five, Dante had found life was better when he avoided being on the edge of his father’s attention.