The Vampire's Prisoner

By Scarlet Blackwell

Alex Somerville is a Victorian gentleman looking for something to relieve the tedium of his solitary life. A man who craves love and belonging, he stifles these feelings to conduct a scientific experiment on a captured vampire. But from the start, the creature in the cage in his laboratory appeals dangerously to both his heart and his body. The beautiful Raphael is a proud, ancient vampire who has managed to retain his humanity and soon teaches Alex the true meaning of love and desire...

• Language: English
• Publisher: Scarlet Blackwell
• Release date: Jun 6, 2015
• ISBN: 9781311873590

Scarlet Blackwell

MM romance with real, flawed characters and dark themes. You will get trauma. You will get heartbreak. You will get a HEA. Always.

Book preview

The Vampire’s Prisoner

Scarlet Blackwell

Text copyright 2015 Scarlet Blackwell

All Rights Reserved

Published by Scarlet Blackwell at Smashwords

2nd Edition

Smashwords Edition, License Notes

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

Table of Contents

The Vampire’s Prisoner

About the Author

CHAPTER ONE

The delivery arrived at seven that evening and Christopher directed the men to take it down to the laboratory. Alexander Somerville waited until the swearing and puffing and panting had finished and there was relative quiet and then he descended the stairs into the basement of the house.

Standing on the cold, stone floor in the open space in the middle of his laboratory, so it could be approached from all four sides, was a large metal cage. On one side of this there appeared to be a heap of black rags lying on the ground against the bars. Alex walked across the room to get a closer look.

The black rags had a shape, the figure of a man curled on his side in a foetal position. His body was covered from head to knees by a blanket, a pair of breeches and leather boots revealed below.

Alex surveyed the four men in the room, seeking Mr. Roberts, the man he had done business with. His gaze settled on a well-dressed man in cloak and frock coat, holding his top hat in his hand, no sweat gleaming on his brow, unlike those of the rougher-looking men in his company.

The journey was smooth? he enquired stiffly, because Alex wasn’t a sociable man and didn’t bother pretending that he was.

The shipment from France had taken three long weeks, during which time Alex became convinced this man was a confidence trickster who had taken his money and run. Either that or the precious cargo had escaped en route. However, he had only sent half the money up front and the man had delivered after all.

It was. The man looked uncomfortable at the question and Alex regarded him with suspicion.

Show me then, he said. Something was wrong.

Mr. Roberts glanced at his companions before he moved forward to stand in front of the cage. With the tip of his cane, he reached through the bars and flicked back the blanket.

The figure huddled beneath twitched. He half lifted a hand before it fell back as though he were too weak to move. Alex stared. The man wore expensive, fashionable clothes—cravat and stiff starched shirt, frock coat and cloak—and his hair was black and glossy as a raven’s wing, short and untidy, falling over his face. But it was impossible to tell if he was attractive because every area of exposed skin—face, neck and hands—was burned.

Scarlet in some places, black in others, it was a mass of weeping blisters and peeling flesh. In the middle of this horror, the man’s eyes were open, thick black lashes blinking over irises of a startling, violet-blue, fixed on the ground, not lifting to look at his captors, as though this was too much of an effort.

Alex whirled around to face Roberts. "What is this? He is half dead! I have not paid good money for a corpse, sir! What have you done to him?"

Roberts’ face reddened. He was caught in the sunlight, sir, he said. The damage happened in a matter of minutes before we could cover him. He will heal without scars.

Will he? Alex looked down at the man in the cage. Have you fed him?

Not since we left France, sir.

What? Alex was almost apoplectic with rage.

You said you wanted him weakened.

"Weakened not dead! Alex cried. How is he supposed to heal if you don’t feed him?"

That’s your job, Roberts replied and Alex, always quick-tempered, launched forward, gripped him by the cravat and slammed him against the bars of the cage.

Roberts growled and tried to push him away but Alex was tall and strong and he held Roberts there easily. As he opened his mouth to further abuse this horrid man, a scarlet hand shot out of the cage and gripped Roberts by the ankle.

The man wailed as though the very devil himself had him and Alex reacted with alacrity, snatching the