Authors: Travis Luedke
The Nightlife Moscow (Urban Fantasy and Paranormal Suspense) (The Nightlife Series Book 5) (21 page)
* * * *
Richard Sanguine – formerly known as Aaron Pilan – emerged
from the icy water of the Moskva River onto the boat launch platform floating
beside a behemoth, white, river yacht. Dressed in only his black, heated
wetsuit, he silently dashed up the metal staircase leading to the lower deck of
the yacht. The guard making the rounds walked by, passing within a few feet of
where Aaron hid.
His sword slipped from his back scabbard without a sound and
he severed all but the guard’s spinal column as he slashed through throat,
muscle and tendons. Aaron silently eased the dying man to the floor and checked
to see no one had witnessed him. He moved up the stairs to the upper floor
level and slipped inside the door, leaving it open a crack. His wetsuit gloves
left no fingerprints on the door knob as he waited.
Within a couple minutes a guard walked past. Aaron slashed
his throat too, then dragged the body inside the door and moved farther down
the upper deck to the aft side of the boat. Coming around the corner, he walked
right into another guard who opened his fat mouth to yell. Aaron skewered him
through his mouth and out the back of his neck, then yanked his rifle away before
he could fire any shots.
One by one, Aaron silently killed each of the five guards on
the boat without leaving fingerprints or body fluids of his own. His wetsuit
dripped with their blood, but not one drop of his blood was spilled. The
neoprene hood covering his head kept a tight grip on his short-buzzed haircut,
ensuring not one single hair was left behind on the boat. On the top level,
midship, in the entertainment room of the yacht, Aaron found them – four men in
white dress shirts and black pants. They had removed their black suit jackets,
but, they were the Black Suits he remembered from the nightclub.
There were three women in the room, completely naked,
dancing to the raucous sound of Russian folk music, some kind of polka. Natalya
was not among them, but then Gavin had already told him where to find her.
The man knew his shit.
Aaron opened the sealed zipper pouch at his side and
extracted a small black plastic box with a single button, an electronic device
Gavin had provided him. He pushed the button and waited. Within thirty seconds
a slight humming sound vibrated off the windows of the yacht and everything
electronic aboard the boat shut down. A satellite-based targeted EMP weapon.
Aaron had provided the location for the EMP targeting system.
The lights went out and the music stopped. Aaron pulled his
second sword silently from its sheath and entered the room with both blades ready.
His nocturnal eyesight adjusted quickly to the darkness, and he slipped from
man to man, laying them open from groin to throat, a noisy, gruesome slaughter.
The women screamed themselves hoarse and stumbled through the darkness. They
tripped over the quivering corpses of the dead, but none of them were harmed.
Aaron took his time capturing each woman and injecting them with one of the
three syringes Gavin had provided him. They were quickly subdued, unconscious.
The job had taken all of fifteen minutes, but this was not
why Aaron had come. This was not
shaping the world by the stroke of his
sword
or any other lofty shit. Killing these men was simply payback.
The main reason he had come to this boat was for the woman tied
in the engine room below deck. Aaron made his way down quickly, kicking through
the locked doors into the lightless space where the triple diesel engines were
housed.
A whimper signaled Natalya’s location, and he found her
floating in that in-between world of agony and exhaustion, half-awake,
half-asleep, and wishing she was dead. Her hands had been tied up high, hanging
from the ceiling. Her legs had ceased being capable of holding her body weight,
and she sagged against the ropes that had been cutting into her wrists for over
a day.
Though her body and soul were weak and broken, her heart beat
strong. Gavin had given him a first aid kit and some morphine, but Aaron left
that shit behind.
Aaron’s teeth held the key to her survival
. He untied
the harsh ropes around her wrists and gently cradled her naked, sagging body in
his arms. She didn’t smell good at all, but he ignored her unclean scent and
sunk his fangs into her bloody, raw wrist and held on for a good two minutes.
He didn’t drink her blood. She had precious little of it to
give. He saturated her bloodstream with a strong dose of his venom. She came
alive in his arms murmuring things in Russian. In the darkness Aaron could see
her swollen black eyes, puffy bruised cheeks and broken nose. She looked right
at him and tried to say his name in wheezing croaks. Her throat evidenced dark
marks and abrasions where they had choked her off several times. Her voice was
gone, but her mind told him everything he needed to know.
He sensed her burst of joy that he’d found her. She cried
with the relief that she could impart the most important thing she had to give
him before she died –
her apology
.
She’d been a complete fool to risk his life and her own, all
for nothing. Everything she needed and wanted was in Aaron’s arms. As she
drifted into unconsciousness, she prayed he understood how deeply sorry she was
for ruining his life in a Moscow prison, for ruining everything they could have
had together.
“Shush, Natalya. I’m here now. I’m here to take you home.”
As he carried her up the stairs and out to the boat deck, to
the flat black military boat waiting a few feet off the stern, Aaron knew
Natalya would survive. Though she had suffered broken ribs and probably other
fractures beyond her broken nose, this girl was far more resilient than even
she knew.
Within the pages of Dmitri’s personal diary lay a secret
Michelle had never discovered in her ninety years as a vampire. Bloodslaves
with prolonged exposure to vampire’s venom experienced a long list of
miraculous side effects. Their bodies became more resistant to disease, with
highly efficient immune systems. Their healing and regeneration became far more
aggressive than a normal human. Eyesight improved. Even aging slowed down
dramatically.
Pharzyme had nine years of intensive research on Dmitri’s
bloodslaves. Their data proved conclusively that regular doses of vampire’s
venom improved the human condition, making the bloodslave tougher, more
resilient, more capable of surviving anemia and excessive feedings, able to
heal lethal injuries, and bone breaks within weeks instead of months. The one
bloodslave who had been with Dmitri the longest, Kristina, was technically
thirty years old, but her biochemistry and all other indicators put her in the
age range of twenty three to twenty four. Kristina had only aged a year in the
seven years she spent with her vampire master.
Vampire’s venom was the fountain of youth – for bloodslaves
– if only they could survive a vampire’s mistreatment.
The lost soul in his arms, who had made so many mistakes,
had hurt herself and so many others with her callous, destructive lifestyle –
this girl was a survivor. Whether he gave it to her in the neck, wrist, femoral
artery, or straight through the lips of her slippery wet pussy, Aaron would
make damn sure this bloodslave got her venom, without fail. Natalya was not a
lost cause, and he would never give up on her.
He’d left a trail of dead bodies across four countries and
burned up all his grace along the way. In giving Natalya the grace she needed
to survive, maybe he’d scrape a little for himself. Working as a contract
killer, he needed every bit of grace he could scrounge.
THE END
Coming in 2015
A new Urban Fantasy Series from Travis
Luedke
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Nightlife Series novels
Vampires, strippers, escorts, night
clubs, pimps & dirty cops – the Nightlife New York is never boring. Aaron
Pilan’s life is forever changed when he’s shot trying to rescue a drop-dead
gorgeous woman on the streets of New York. Aaron is thrust into the shocking
world of vampiric slavery when Michelle shares her blood to save his life.
Michelle's existence as a solitary
vampire is also altered when she accepts this naive young man into her life.
Bound by her blood, Aaron is subject to her authority. He walks a tightrope of
strictly controlled feeding regimens & intense sexual adventures while
catering to the neurotic control-freak tendencies of his new master. She vows
to eliminate him if he proves too difficult to control.
This story is bold and evocative
infusing blood, sex, love and turmoil in an urban drama about two vampires
battling evil outside & within themselves.
★★★★★
“If you like your vampires vicious and bloody and your erotica with a plot,
this is the book for you.”
★★★★★
“Luedke brings his main characters to life, both incredibly flawed and powerfully
charismatic, with a wonderful writing style, in this unique twist on the
Vampire.”
★★★★★
“This is unlike any vampire tale I have ever read, as far removed from Bram
Stoker's Dracula, as New York is from Transylvania. Travis Luedke has fashioned
a compelling tale of love, passion, violence and steamy hot sex, set against
the backdrop of the Big Apple.”
Vampires, Aaron Pilan and his
master Michelle, live by one rule – no bloodslaves. EVER. Aaron breaks that
rule when he meets Anastasia. All Anastasia wants is to be loved and cherished,
but the predatory men she’s attracted to bring her only pain and abuse.
Escaping one train-wreck relationship for another, she finds happiness with
Aaron and Michelle as a bloodslave, a 'pet'. When Aaron uses his telepathy to
win thousands at the gambling tables, he attracts the deadly attention of the
Colombian Cartel and Aaron and Michelle are 'disappeared'. Addicted to the bite
of her vampire lovers, Ana is desperate to find them. But, Las Vegas isn't
ready for vampires mixing heroin, sex and vengeance. Ana is trapped in the
spiraling chaos.
Find out what happens in the second
novel of the Nightlife Series.
★★★★★
"Go grab a copy before this much fun is declared illegal."
★★★★★
"Mr. Luedke once again showcasing his considerable talent for crafting
erotic, action-packed, supernatural thrillers that leave the reader saying
"Wow!"
★★★★★
"A
no-holds-barred, easy-to-read romp that mixes fantasy, suspense, horror and
erotica, and does it well."