Story Excerpt
Forever And A Day

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Samuel Erickson glanced up when he heard a soft knock on his bedroom door. He wasn’t surprised when the door opened a moment later, even if he didn’t invite anyone in, and Sully walked inside, shutting the door behind him. Sully looked over at him for a moment then stepped over to the wall next to the door and slid down until he was sitting on the floor.

Samuel could almost predict what the vampire would do. Sullivan Buckley had been coming into his room almost every night for nearly three months. The only time he didn’t show was when he was on a mission for his prince—another vampire.

Sully would search the room until he saw Samuel and then slide down the wall to sit on the floor next to the door. He usually brought a book or something to read, sometimes his Ipad.

Sully stopped trying to get Samuel to talk after the first week.

Samuel still couldn’t figure out why the vampire continued to come every night when he knew Samuel hated vampires. He loathed them. Every damn last one of them needed to be staked through the heart, slowly. Several times. Then maybe burned at the stake or drawn and quartered.

Well, maybe not all of them, but most of them. His brother Danny was mated to a vampire. Prince Dominic Xavier Lucian Ruelle seemed somewhat okay. He made Danny happy and kept him safe. Samuel was grateful for that. The danger they were in on a daily basis from their psychotic monster of a father never seemed to lesson.

Maybe that was why Sully visited every night.

“Why are you here?” Samuel needed to know. He was no longer afraid of Sully, for the most part anyway. He still got a little nervous around the vampire. Despite the fact that Sully had rescued him from a life of hell as a blood slave and never made a single threatening move toward him, the man was still a vampire. He still drank blood to survive. Having been a blood slave for several months, Samuel could honestly say that it was something he never wanted to experience again in his life.

Sully’s eyebrows were raised as if the man was shocked to hear Samuel speak. “You sleep better when I’m here.”

Well, that much was true. Samuel woke up screaming in the night if Sully wasn’t there. When Samuel had been a blood slave, the nighttime had been made of nightmares even when he was awake. That was when the vampires would come for him, after the sun set.

Samuel didn’t remember any of his nightmares, and for that he was thankful. But he knew they were bad. He woke screaming in a cold sweat. It took hours to calm down and feel like his heart wasn’t going to jump out of his chest.

Sully’s presence made him feel like he could breathe.

“Did you feed today?”

Sully’s dark eyebrow went up, just one of them. “You know I did.”

Samuel reached down and rubbed his stomach when it clenched. He tried to understand that vampires needed blood to survive but he just didn’t understand it. It was gross and terrible and humiliating.

Everyone tried to convince Samuel that it wasn’t a horrible act, that they weren’t forcing some poor soul to bleed for them. Samuel didn’t believe a word of it. He had seen how vampires fed. He had experienced the excruciating pain involved with being a blood slave. No one was going to convince him that it didn’t hurt or make him wish he was dead. Not even the vampire that chased his nightmares away.

“Is he alive?”

Sully’s dark eyes rolled, a smirk twisting his lips. “She is fine.”

Samuels gut tightened as Sully’s words scraped over his skin like a razorblade. He knew enough from eavesdropping on conversations and the things Sully said to know the man was straight as they came. He even preferred his blood donors to be female.

Samuel turned back toward the window. His thoughts were jumbled, sporadic. He was having a hard time pulling one together enough to have a complete thought. It shouldn’t have bothered him that Sully was straight, and yet it did. The man was a vampire. Despite what Danny said, Samuel knew nothing could ever come of the draw he felt toward Sully.

Hell, Samuel didn’t even know what the draw was. Just that it was there. His heart always beat a little faster until he saw Sully, his stomach knotting until the vampire was in the room with him. He felt…something when Sully was around. Safe, and yet afraid at the very same time.

His feelings toward Sully were confusing. He anticipated the vampire’s arrival in his room like the coming of the sun. And yet, the only way he could truly think of Sully was by not thinking of him as vampire. He didn’t really think of Sully as human, either. It was readily apparent to anyone looking at the physically imposing man that he wasn’t human. There was something feral about him, an uncivilized edge.

It was as attractive as it was terrifying.

Samuel’s entire body seized painfully as a series out loud pops sounded from somewhere outside of his room. The brash bangs were quickly followed by an earsplitting scream and several voices raised in volume.

Sully was on his feet and pulling the door open before Samuel barely got turned around. “Stay here!” Sully ordered as he hurried out of the room, slamming the door closed behind him.

Samuel pulled the edges of his blanket up to his chin. The sounds of violence were growing louder, more dangerous. They were growing closer.

His heart pounding faster with each sound he heard, the fear building inside of him started to make his chest ache. Samuel jumped up and ran across the room, turning the lock on his door. It might not keep anyone out but it would slow them down some.

He hoped.

Samuel backed away from the door, watching the door handle intently. He wanted to know what was going on, and yet he didn’t. The fear of what might be happening was almost paralyzing. Samuel backed up until he hit the far wall, and then he wedged himself down into the spot between the dresser and the wall, trying to make the smallest possible target.

Samuel slapped his hand over his mouth to keep from crying out when someone kicked at the door. Fear clogged his throat, blocking the air trying to escape in a blood curdling scream. Whoever was on the other side of the thick wood continued to kick at it until it splintered and the door crashed open.

“Samuel!”

For a brief moment, every horrible thing that had ever happened to him flashed before him. Samuel thought he was going to be sick.

Then the voice that was calling out for him took on a name and Sully’s face appeared before him. “Samuel, snap out of it,” Sully snarled as he grabbed Samuel by the arms and yanked him to his feet. “We need to go.”