Roarin' 20's: The Vampire's Little Black Book Series, #2

By Victoria L. Szulc

Will, a single vampire in search for the love of his long life, falls for Sadie, a wild flapper in 1920's Philadelphia. She's a poor little rich girl with a beautiful, but troubled soul, and a nasty addiction.

Their playful banter and romantic interludes seem to lead to happiness, but a jealous club owner and her haunted past complicate their relationship. Will she be the one or will other people or her own emotions get in the way of their future?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Victoria L. Szulc
• Release date: Oct 5, 2022
• ISBN: 9781958760192

Victoria L. Szulc

Victoria L. Szulc is a multi-media artist and author from St. Louis, MO. She "lives" her art and has various hobbies including: drawing, writing, volunteering for animal charities, karate, yoga, karaoke, voice over work, belly dancing, and weather spotting. She specializes in pet portraiture through her company The Haute Hen. For character development she's currently learning chess, fencing, and whip cracking. Victoria blogs about these adventures at mysteampunkproject.wordpress.com. You can view book trailers and her other adventures starting here: https://youtu.be/y-Xja304rUs “Adventures abound and romance is to be had.” As always, thank you for reading, -Victoria

Book preview

ISBN-13: 978-1-958760-19-2

THIRD EDITION

For all my friends who like to get out with me.

Detroit-Present Day

I needed a break. It had been a long day at the hospital. I went to my small office in radiology, shut the door, and opened the window for fresh air.

Hospitals provide great cover for vampires. There’s an unlimited blood supply and plenty of opportunities for mercy killings. I am very selective while acting as a doctor and feeding. I’ve had enough formal training and experience to pull it off. I’ve done it repeatedly for hundreds of years. I have a good connection that supplies me with all my identities and necessary credentials. After I should start aging, usually after seven to ten years, I move on to a new hospital, new state, new identity.

I was somewhat comfortable at this current facility. It wasn’t in the best area of town, so fresh bodies came daily and easily became my meals. The only hard part about pretending to be a doctor in a modern era is that I’ve had to work. I’ve had to see patients that had no chance of dying and wonder how delicious they would’ve been.

This day however had been a rough one. Not just one, but two small children had been diagnosed with leukemia. A young father died from appendicitis that had been misdiagnosed as food poisoning. The associate that committed the error later broke down in front of me. He hadn’t asked me to do a few simple scans that would’ve saved the patient’s life.

A mother-to-be died after a terrible car accident. Her child was delivered by emergency C-section but joined her mother a few hours later. Most of these were people who didn’t deserve to die or suffer. It was days like these that humanity was almost too much to bear even if I didn’t have a beating heart or live soul.

I gazed out into the night and looked down over the promenade outside the cafeteria where the lesser staff had smoke breaks. What a nasty habit, I mused. The bright red ends of their cigarettes waved in the darkness as they inhaled the toxins. The tobacco of today was nothing like the real leaves of the past. I hated cigarettes, but they always reminded me of Sadie. She was smoking at the bar of a hidden speakeasy when I first met her in Philadelphia in 1928.      

_________

Philly, 1928

I’d stayed too long in New York and left to start anew in Philly as I’d done many times before. I had gone to a place called the Thraxton to find something or someone to drink. It was a sleepy little soda spot upstairs during the day, a secret speakeasy in the basement at night. It had become Sadie’s favorite place for a variety of reasons. An acquaintance had recommended it as a safe place to feed.

A rough-looking kid at the top of the steps greeted me. Come in and get hammered, mister. His cap was cocked to the side and tufts of his unruly dark hair peeked out. I passed him the ten-dollar entry fee.

I eased down some uneven brick steps into an underground bar. The doorman opened red, thick velvet curtains to another world. The candle table lamps were low, and a cigarette haze drifted through the dimly lit room like a fog. This would be an excellent place to feed. It was private, dark, and discreet. Surely there were ladies of the evening or a drunken fellow that could easily be taken. I checked my coat, headed for the bar, and saw Sadie for the first time. I stopped and couldn’t help but stare.

She was a flapper, dressed in a short white fringe gown, a peacock plume tucked in her blond waves, and several strands of white pearls that draped over her bosom. She sat neatly atop a barstool with elegant fingers entwined around a long cigarette holder. She inhaled an extended drag, crossed her long pale legs,