Bloodstone Heart (Book 4 in Blood Series)

By T. Lynne Tolles

Josh Brenner is a good looking guy with an extraordinary talent he feels is a curse. He's telepathic and can't find the mute button. When he runs into an agitated, hungry vampire late one night, he is nearly killed. He confides in a woman he barely knows, when a second vampire comes looking or Josh. Fearing for their lives, Josh and Lanie head for CA in search of help from the O'Rielly's.

• Language: English
• Publisher: T. Lynne Tolles
• Release date: Oct 5, 2010
• ISBN: 9781452418421

T. Lynne Tolles

T. Lynne Tolles can be found most days, juggling one of two cat muses and a laptop, tripping over an ancient Newfoundland dog and washing a never-ending pile of laundry. When life doesn’t get in the way, she writes paranormal romances for new adults. Her passion for witches, ghosts, and vampires together with a light-hearted wit are reflected in her loveable characters and the adventures of mystery they unravel to find their happily ever after.

Book preview

Dedication

To Linda—my sister-in-law and best friend—for always being there when I needed you. I love you!

Prologue

Melanie knew she was dreaming because she hadn’t seen her beloved friend Darby since college several years ago. Even though dreams seldom made sense, the image of Darby surrounded by snow confused her. Her friend lived California with sun and beach.

This vision was disturbing. Darby wore a black coat and laid on a battered sofa, covered in blankets. Her breath condensed to a fog around her face telling Melanie the air in the house around Darby was frigid. Did the house even have electricity? And Darby looked frighteningly emaciated, like she hadn’t eaten in a month.

Fear stole through Melanie. Was this another premonition? Oh, God. She hoped not. Her dear friend never deserved to have a life so difficult. Darby was the most loving person she’d ever known. If anyone were owed love and loyalty, it was Darby.

Melanie felt crushing despair emanating from the shivering form on the sofa. Darby longed, ached, for someone close to her heart. She was searching for this lost love—sacrificing everything she had to find this person who was her heart and soul.

Heart and soul. Melanie wished for someone she could love and give her life to. She’d been self-sequestered for so many years, she’d lost count. She stayed hidden away in her small apartment in Seattle, dreaming of a life that would never come. A life with friends and family and happiness. Of love.

Suddenly, the image of Darby faded. In place of her friend stood a guy, a very tall guy. And cute. But something was wrong. As Melanie looked around in her premonition, she saw he laid on a green stone alter splattered with blood in what looked like an ancient castle dungeon or room. Was he a satanic sacrifice? Blood slid down his neck from two puncture wounds.

If the visual wasn’t so frightening, she’d laugh and say he was bitten by a vampire. But she’d never seen this guy or this place, so like Darby’s scene, this must be the near future. Oddly enough, she had nobody to warn. She only knew of Darby’s store and since Darby apparently wasn’t there, unless it snowed in San Francisco, contacting her would be impossible.

And no way in hell was Melanie leaving her safe home. Well, if Darby or someone she loved were in trouble, she would. She’d do anything for those she loved. Which were few since her parents died.

It was time to wake up, get out of this dream with a heartbroken Darby and cute stranger. She prayed that Darby soon found who she was looking for and got out of the freezing weather. As for the guy, if she was destined to meet him, she didn’t know how. She went outside only twice a week, three tops. Usually not until after midnight even.

Melanie tried to pull her consciousness away from the dream, but her mind wouldn’t budge. Instead, she felt being dragged. Her throat was tight and her wrists throbbed with sharp pain. Terror blossomed in her heart. Something horrible was going to happen.

Her mind’s eye stopped. She looked down at an image of a body tied to a small boat under several feet of water. Ripples distorted the identity of the person. Her pulse thundered in her ears. Who was the drowned victim? The water smoothed.

Her body tensed as a vision appeared green and fuzzy, clearing slowly. Familiar eyes formed from the misty scene full of terror and magnified by water atop them, but the identity remained unclear. Perhaps a woman, she thought, seeing the long hair splayed around the head, forming a halo of brown silk that gently moved with the water. Tiny bubbles emerged from her nostrils, rising to the surface, making the water around the eyes ripple. Then the vision was gone and Melanie gasped for air as if she had been the one doomed to the wet and horrible death.

Oh my God.

Chapter 1

The chill of March was in the air and the moon shone through a halo of misty fog. Even though the moon was but a sliver, it appeared ten times brighter than normal due to the refraction of the corona. Josh often walked late at night, even if just to pick up items from a convenience store. He liked this time of night, when the residents were home with their families. The streets were quiet without many about.

He had a hoodie on under his black leather coat and his iPod turned up as loud as he could stand it. This was standard practice for any public outing. Since he had been a young child, Josh could read other people’s thoughts. Though to anyone else, that may seem a gift, he felt it more a curse—a curse that had no on/off, mute, or volume switch.

Imagine being able to hear the random thoughts of everyone in your vicinity. Goofy, dumb thoughts, rude thoughts, thoughts a person never intends for anyone to hear. Everyone thinks out loud at times, but like breathing, people don’t think about it. Sometimes it’s just to keep oneself company, like having a television on in the background. Other times, it helps in dealing with scary, stressful, or embarrassing situations, but in most cases, people would be horrified if someone heard these thoughts. It made Josh feel like an outsider, a freak, to know what a person would say before they said it or to know their true feelings on any given thing. To Josh, isolation was the key and he was good at isolating himself; after all, he had perfected it over the years.

Handsome though he was, at six-foot-three, with sandy blond hair and blue eyes the color of your favorite faded jeans, he rarely spoke to anyone and kept to his home like a hermit. These outings at night were his alone, to see the world at a safe distance, the way he liked it.

With the next brisk gust of winter’s last icy wind, he lifted the hood of his hoodie over his head and pulled the collar of his jacket tight around his neck as he headed through the park.

Mid-walk, he sat on a park bench and turned off his iPod, pulling the buds from his ears. This was what he waited for all day, every day. Silence. The wind rustled through trees, whipping around him like a choreographed dance in the moonlight that humans were only privy to feel but not see. Josh savored this peace. To him, the only things better were the beach at night or the monotonous pounding of rain on the window, easing him to sleep like a lullaby. With arms up and hands clasped behind his neck, he smiled and stared at the moon and wished this could be what he heard in his head, instead of the nonsensical drivel from others around him that deprived him of his sanity most of the time.

He was starting to get cold and knew he would have to leave soon, but he wanted to enjoy all he could before going back to the isolation of his pounding music that drowned out the constant noise of other’s thoughts rushing at him. Finally he stood, rubbing his hands together and blowing into them. He started to head for the corner store for a quart of milk, Pop Tarts, and beer. With no one on the streets, he was relieved to not have to put his ear buds back in, and he was able to enjoy the quiet sounds of nature a little longer.

The corner store looked empty, just the way he liked it. One voice, the guy’s behind the counter, was better than ten. His sore ears were happy to be relieved from the ear buds that were in them so often. Just as he came to the door and held out his hand to open it, a petite young woman came around the corner bundled up like an Eskimo. Brown bangs hung over her eyes. She wore a black knit hat pulled down tight over her ears.

She was obviously startled by him as she came around the corner and this seemed to embarrass her a bit. He could tell this by her nervous smile. Her mind was quiet as she gestured for him to go first, and she never made eye contact with him. This was just fine with Josh; if he made eye contact with someone, it usually was like walking into a tunnel where all he could hear was that person’s life story. Instead of going first, though, he held the door open for her as she gave him a wide berth. Just as she took a step toward the door, she slipped on an icy patch and headed for the ground. With his foot holding the door, his left hand quickly encircled her waist to catch most of her weight and his right hand grabbed for her gloved hand, missing it and grazing her skin above the glove before grabbing at her forearm to steady her.

She looked up at him in shock with the most beautiful blue eyes he’d ever seen. Their eyes locked on one another for only a few seconds of silence before he helped her back up to a standing position. Thank you, she said, brushing at her coat in what must have been pure nervousness, because she had never hit the ground.

But what Josh noticed the most was the silence around her. Her beauty was staggering, but the peace he felt when his skin touched hers was astonishing. In that tiny split second, a loud clap like thunder hit him and melted into a peaceful serenity that was absolute bliss. His mouth hung open and having been anti-social most of his life, he couldn’t think of a thing to say. He just stood with a small, amazed smile.

Embarrassed by his gawking, she quickly turned and went down one of the store aisles. Being tall, he easily watched her snake around the store, grabbing things off shelves, and occasionally looking back to find him staring at her and smiling. He slowly walked to the back of the store to get milk and beer, but never took his eyes off of her for more than a second. She made her way to the counter, and he towered right behind her. As she paid the clerk, he set his items down, coming slightly around to her left. She made no eye contact, and the silence around her was so distracting to him that he barely heard the thoughts of the man behind the counter, noting her beauty and other things. When Josh heard the clerk’s thoughts, he jerked his head toward him with a stern glare, startling the man.

Josh pulled out his wallet, flashed his credit card in front of the FastPay terminal, and practically ripped the bag out of the clerk’s hand. He raced for the door behind the woman who had just left.

He had to run to catch up with her and when she heard him come up from behind, she turned and stopped.

Should I be worried? Are you stalking me?

Josh laughed, but then realized that probably wasn’t a good thing to do, given the look on her face. No, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you. I just thought, well, that you shouldn’t be walking around by yourself so late at night.

Why? Because someone might follow me home? You’re the only one who seems to be doing that. Again, should I be worried?

I’m sorry. You’re right. I’m not very… I…

You’re not very good with people?

Yeah.

Yeah, I saw that, uh… I…what I meant to say is I could tell. Sorry, I have my own social issues; I guess that’s why both of us are shopping at 1:00 A.M.

Yeah.

Well, uh…thank you again for not letting me crack my head open on the cement. That would have been ugly.

Yeah. No problem.

So…I’m going home now, she said and pointed over her shoulder.

Yeah. Okay.

Okay.

She spun around on her heels to leave when Josh said, Would you mind if I walked you home? I feel kind of responsible for you after your accident.

She turned around again. That’s not really necessary, besides, if you are a stalker, I’d be leading you right to my home. That probably wouldn’t be very smart of me.

Yeah. Probably not.

Okay, then…

Yeah. Okay.

Okay. I’m going now.

She turned around, yet again, when Josh said, I’m not a stalker.

She turned, smiling, and said, I kind of figured.

So…?

So? Oh! Fine. Would you please walk me home so I can get there sometime tonight?

He smiled proudly as he started walking beside her. Complete silence emanated from her. He couldn’t believe it. He couldn’t read a thought. Never had he been near someone he couldn’t read. He was out of his element, and if he hadn’t enjoyed it so much, he might have run away in fear. They walked for several blocks in complete silence. She looked up at him every once in a while only to see his silly grin.

Finally, she said, You’re not a big talker for someone who insisted on my company.

Yeah. Not really.

Hmm. Can I at least ask you your name?

Oh, yeah! Sorry. I suppose that’s rude. I’m Josh Brenner.

Well, Josh Brenner, do you meet all your women at 1:00 A.M. at the store and then walk them home?

Uhhh. No. I’ve never… I mean…I don’t get out much.

Me either. What do you do?

Umm, well, I’ve done a lot of things. I was a carpenter for a while, truck driver for some time, but I’ve kind of settled into computer programming.

Really? Where?

I work from home. Independent contractor.

Hmmm. All very isolated jobs—you like to work alone, do you?

Yeah.

They walked for another block or two in silence. Sweet silence, Josh thought. It’s so peaceful with her.

Suddenly, she stopped and turned to Josh and said, Well, Josh Brenner, this is me. She pointed her tiny gloved hand to a window on the second floor of a Victorian home painted all white. The window she pointed to was the only one lit.

Oh, yeah. Okay.

Well, it was nice to meet you. Thank you for saving me and for walking me home safely.

Yeah.

Okay then, goodnight, Josh!

Goodnight.

She turned away and headed for the door when Josh said, Oh, what is your name?

She turned back toward him and said, Melanie Harper, but you can call me Lanie if you like. That’s what my parents always called me.

Okay. Goodnight, Lanie.

Night, Josh. She smiled at him and then turned and placed a key in the lock, letting herself into the front door. She turned to see him still standing there, goofy grin intact, and waved at him as she closed the door.

He stood for a few moments, smiling and thinking about her, when it hit him. I should have asked for her number. That was stupid. Geez. What if I never run into her again? He smacked his forehead with his palm, when the door opened suddenly and Melanie ran out with something in her hand.

Here, she said to Josh. This is my phone number and email address. I kind of figured maybe you meant to ask for it but, well…anyway. Here. She held out her gloved hand.

Thanks. I’ll call you.

Yeah. That’s kind of the idea. The huge smile returned to his face and she turned and ran back up the stairs and closed the door behind her. Josh carefully folded the paper and tucked it away in his wallet, heading toward home.

Chapter 2

In no time at all Josh passed the corner store, working his way toward his house, but he would take a shortcut. Still with a smile on his face, he thought of Lanie and the peaceful feeling he had when he was with her. Head down, he continued on the street past several alleyways, thinking about all the things he should have asked her. I wonder what she does for a living. Why would such a pretty woman not shop at normal hours with the rest of the world?

Out of the corner of his eye he saw something on the concrete glimmer in the moonlight a couple of steps into a dark alley. He picked it up, but before he could look at it, he heard the all too familiar voice in his head; only this voice was malicious. He instinctively pocketed the found item and started to quietly back out of the alley, hoping whoever was there might think he had not seen anything and let things be.

As Josh retreated, he stepped on a tiny twig, barely making a sound as it cracked under his weight, but apparently it was heard by the malevolent person in the alley because Josh heard the stranger’s thoughts. Mmm. I might as well eat while I’m here. And with a force like a hurricane, Josh was yanked into the darkness and thrown hard against the bricks of the building wall. Somewhere in between, Josh’s groceries hit the ground with a splat as the milk carton burst.

Josh never saw his assailant, but the grip on his neck, as he was again hurled into the air, at least fifteen to twenty feet, was as strong as an ape’s. With the snap of splintering wood against his back, Josh was sure he must have landed on an old pallet. Blindly feeling around in the dark for anything to defend himself, he saw a large dark form coming toward him, with eyes glowing crimson. Frantically, his hands fanned out to both sides for anything he could get his hands on. The figure grew larger as it came closer. A slash of moonlight shone in the oncoming figure’s path and when it hit him, Josh saw a glimmer of white fangs below the glowing red eyes. Now only a few yards away, the dark figure seemed to smile and grotesquely bared its teeth and hissed as it started to sprint toward Josh.

Josh felt something on the ground and not caring what it was, brought it forward and pointed it toward the oncoming predator. Too late to stop his leap’s forward force toward its victim, the predator landed on a large splinter of wood that penetrated deep into its chest.

He grimaced as he looked down at his wound. His eyes met Josh’s, yet they were no longer crimson, but green, and the fangs were retreating behind his upper lip. His mouth was wide open in what should have been a scream, but no sound came out. His skin seemed to be changing. Yes, definitely changing, thought Josh. His face became shallow, his eyes seemed to recede into his head and the man seemed to be more of an ancient corpse. Within a millisecond, the corpse burst into a cloud of what looked and felt like ash.

Josh, still on the ground, holding the splintered piece of wood in front of him, gasped for air. He hadn’t realized that when the fiend came at him he had held his breath. His heartbeat was pounding in his head. It felt like it would beat itself right out of his chest. What the…?

Josh stood and dropped the wood piece. He sprinted out of the alley and into the light of the street lamp nearby, never taking his eye off the alley and listening with his mind harder than he had ever listened before for any hint of another attacker. After a few seconds of silence, he ran home as fast as his feet could take him. Once behind the safety of his dead-bolted door, he slid to the floor.

His mind was racing. What had he seen? What had just happened? Had he miraculously killed the creature? Was it a creature or a man? He looked and sounded to be a man at the end, but…

Elbows on knees and palms on his forehead, he thought about everything he’d seen as he sat on the floor for a long time. He ran his fingers back through his longish, wavy hair, relieving his head from the hood of his jacket. One hand reached for his chin and rubbed through the stubble of a two-day-old beard. He just couldn’t wrap his brain around what had happened. He mulled over all the details, trying to make some sense of what he had experienced, but no matter how he came at it, nothing about it made sense.

Who do you ask about things like these? Well, that’s stupid, no one would believe him. He wasn’t sure he believed it himself. It wasn’t like he had any friends in which to confide. Anyone who knew of him thought he was the weird hermit guy who never went anywhere, never talked to anyone, and shopped at 1:00 in the morning after long walks by himself in the park. They all think I’m crazy as it is. Now I’m seeing monsters? Can anyone say—loony bin?

He worked for a while to distract himself, but after several hours, he decided to surf the net to try and figure out what kind of creature he had seen.

He was hyper alert. The tiniest sound set him on his guard. Nothing had ever rattled Josh like this. He was a levelheaded guy. For the first time in years, he wished he had someone to talk to. He hadn’t felt so alone since he had been a boy.

On the computer, he looked up ‘vampire,’ but that seemed so ridiculous. How could such a creature be real? Search after search on every search engine imaginable, for hours, only gave him more of the same crazy results. Vampire lore, folktales, movies, thousands and thousands of hits and sites, but nothing that made sense of what happened.

The rest of the night and all the next day he searched for answers, only to find more questions. Exhaustion was setting in. He hadn’t slept in over twenty-four hours, which made him increasingly paranoid as darkness crept in like a fog engulfing the house.

* * *

Josh spent the better part of a week this way. His favorite time of the day was now painted with fear of the unknown. But when there was absolutely no food in the house, no toilet paper or toothpaste, he knew he would have to venture out to the store. He decided his best bet was to avoid the darkness, so before the sun went down, when most people were home eating dinner, Josh took a deep breath and headed for the corner store.

Looking extremely paranoid, checking over his shoulder every couple of seconds, and walking a faster pace than usual, he found himself at the lamppost near the alley where it had happened. Maybe if he checked it out while it was still light, he’d see it was all just a hoax, a hallucination, or maybe there would be a clue as to what had happened. His hands clenched into fists, he sucked in a deep breath, and took a few steps into the alleyway. He saw the bag of groceries he dropped splayed on the ground near the wall. The smell of sour milk made his stomach turn as he headed toward the back of the alley. As he neared the corner he saw the pallet that he had been thrown onto. There were broken splinters everywhere.

One more step and he cleared the corner to see the back of a man dressed all in black squatting and touching the only remaining patch of ash from the creature that had exploded. As if reading Josh’s mind, the man jumped up, turned toward him, and landed in a stance that could only be construed as defensive. Josh, too, heard his thoughts, and he didn’t want to stay around for a discussion with this guy. He turned on his heels and sprinted out of the confines of the alley and was halfway to the store before turning to see the dark figure of the man standing at the entrance, leaning against the wall staring at Josh.

Josh continued to the store, but decided he was definitely not going home that way. The dark man’s thoughts had been jumbled and hard to decipher but they all pointed to ‘What happened here?’

Josh opened the door to the store and grabbed his necessities as fast as he could. He was standing at the counter when a gloved hand came out from behind him and touched him on his right arm. He just about jumped out of his skin. Quickly turning around, he defensively put up his fist, ready to fight whatever had been there, only to find he had knocked tiny Melanie backwards off balance and she fell onto the floor.

Aw, geez. I’m sorry. Are you okay? Josh said.

Wow, remind me not to surprise you ever again, Melanie said, shaking her head.

Josh helped her up and in doing so he grabbed one of her wrists above her gloves, touching her skin. Like before, a crack of thunder sounded in his head and all went silent around him. Her hypnotic eyes stared at him and the embarrassed smile all but faded from her lips, but with its departure, came a look of shock and disbelief; she looked scared, absolutely terrified, like he’d felt that night on the way home from her place.

They stared at one another, Josh holding her gloved hand and her wrist, when she suddenly pulled away from him and answered the clerk who had been asking, Are you okay? She smiled at the clerk and said, I’m fine, thank you.

Josh shook his head to clear the fog that had taken him over. He finished paying and turned back to Melanie. I’m so sorry, he said, you startled me.

I’ll say, but the real question is, are you okay?

Astonished and defensive, he asked, What do you mean?

She wrapped her gloved hand around his arm, pulled him away from the clerk, and whispered, Something’s happened to you. I’m here if you want to talk about it.

How could you know something’s happened?

Oh, I don’t know, maybe it has to do with you jumping out of your skin and knocking me on my butt, but I dare say you are a bit jumpy. A big guy like you doesn’t seem the type to scare easily. Call it intuition if you like, but maybe a beer and a little conversation would calm your nerves. We could go to my place if you like?

Yeah. No. I shouldn’t involve you.

But I’ve asked to be involved and you need someone… I mean, I feel you could use someone to talk to.

What makes you think I don’t have someone to talk to? Josh said.

I’m sorry, Josh. I didn’t mean to insinuate…you’re right. You have my number if you need it. With that, she smiled and left the store.

What had he just done? What an idiot! He DID need someone to talk to even if it was just to check his sanity. Why was he being such a jerk? He grabbed his groceries and headed after her. If nothing else, he wanted to make sure she got home okay; he didn’t want her running into anything like he had the last time they had seen each other or for that matter, the man he’d just seen in the alley.

Lanie, stop. Wait. It was starting to get dark and he was getting very uncomfortable with that. I was a jerk. I’m sorry. I really could use a beer, if you are still offering?

She stared at him a long minute and then smiled. Okay… Come on. She turned on her heels and he followed in step at her side, and though he didn’t say a word the entire walk to her apartment in the big white Victorian house, he felt more relaxed than he had in almost a week, just being in her company.

They