I’d like to thank LuMary for taking the time to help make this book shine and Mae I Design for creating this wonderful book cover. Also, congrats to the contest winners of this book!

idummi – A bottom feeding demon from the deepest layer under the rift. They are aggressive, easily manipulated creatures with poisonous talons.

lilit – A demonic term for a succubus.

frimar – A vampire’s blood concubine, highly respected and honored among vampires.

host – A vampire whom uses a frimar.

new moon – The time when a succubus grows into sexual maturity.

Protector – A male in charge of protecting and caring for a succubus.

rift – The division between earth and the nether-realm where demons of many kinds reside.

And to the eldest

my beloved daughter Chloe

I bequeath to you our home in Colorado

for I know you love the snow and cold winter nights;

Most importantly I

command that on the day of your birthday

in this year of 2011

you will be delivered to

Commander Tyrian en Kulev, Leader of the Atal Warriors,

Champion of the Vampires and Protector of Humanity,

to be Protected by

to facilitate a relationship with,

and to mate and breed with.

This I so order on the 8th of May 2010.

Signed, dated and ordered at the event of my death,

Sir Frances Jeremiah Bellum

May 8th, 2010

October 28

The copy of the will crinkled like dried paper in her hands. Chloe Bellum read over the lines for the eighth time, wondering if she could change the words on the page with enough passes. When she looked up at her two sisters, she realized she wasn’t alone in her complete and utter shock.

Her fraternal twin, Willow, wore an angry scowl that Chloe recognized. She was about to throw something. Leaning away from her twin, Chloe watched her younger sister’s response.

Lily looked confused but not nearly as outraged as she and her twin felt right now. Maybe the news in her part of the will was not so...unbelievable.

“Okay, who’s going first?” Chloe spoke at the same time her twin said, “What the fuck?”

“Lily, what does yours say?” Her eyebrows shot up and she smiled with a shake of her head.

“No way. You’re the oldest. You go first. I’m not starting this dig graving festival.”

Chloe looked down at the sheet of yellow parchment in her hands and winced. Was it too much to hope that it would just disappear from her hands? First Papa was killed in a terrible accident and now this, and by his own hand no less! It was insanity.

“Well?” Willow growled impatiently. Her toes tapped an incessant beat on the carpet floor.

Chloe put on her ‘big sister’ hat. “It says that Papa wants me to have the house in Colorado since I love the snow.” Her voice thickened with emotion and immediately her sisters’

eyes mirrored the emotion. “He also has commanded me to the ownership of Tyrian en Kulev.”

Collective gasps and curses sounded.

“The leader of demon slayers? The cold-hearted son of a bitch that would just as soon eat your heart if he was hungry,” Willow sputtered.

A cold knot was building in Chloe’s stomach. She felt torn between running to the

bathroom to throw up her dinner and falling on the floor in a fit of hysteria. With her sisters here, she was left with the mature choice—vomiting. Rubbing a hand over her stomach, she tried to soothe her uneasiness.

“Lily, do you think what they say about him is true? That he really did kill his wife and children? I heard that even his own army fears him.”

Lily’s big eyes widened. “I’ve heard all the same things as you two, but I doubt the rumors. What I don’t get is why papa would give you to him. This is so unlike him that I can’t even believe it. I never saw this coming.”

Chloe nodded. Lily sometimes “sensed” things in dreams. Her visions had about a 50%

chance of coming true.

“No shit,” Willow said, her entire foot now bobbing against the floor. “What’s the point in raising us to overcome the misogynistic, patriarchal ways of our kind if, when he dies, he literally gives us away to some random man?”

Chloe shot her a startled look. “He did the same to you?”

A tight nod was her response.

“Who?”

Willow’s hand tightened into a fist, smashing the will in her hand. “Someone who will never get me.”

“Who is it, Willow?” Lily asked.

“It says Alpha Lyonis Keelan, Leader of the Shapeshifters.”

Chloe gasped. “Let me see that.” She had to pry the crumpled paper out of her sister’s fist finger by finger, but she finally got it. She read over the will with wide eyes. “Oh my God.

That’s the Alpha. Like the leader and all-powerful shapeshifter in the world. Can take multiple forms, has never been bested in a fight.”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah. If you like him so much why don’t you take him,” Willow said.

Chloe understood her sister’s anger and even her reticence. Inside Chloe felt a deep fear that would have her trembling if not for the company of her sisters. Willow was untamable—a rebel in every sense of the word. To partner her with an Alpha shapeshifter, a man bound to be dominating and controlling, well, Chloe felt for her sister. She also wouldn’t mind being there to see it happen. Front row tickets, please!

“What does yours say, Lily?” Not only was she dying to know, but she really wanted to give Willow some breathing room. She was about to tap a hole through the floor.

Lily cleared her throat, opened her mouth to speak, then blushed. Chloe nudged Willow who turned to glare at her, but when she nodded towards Lily, they both broke out into grins.

“Dish now,” Willow commanded. It was good to hear laughter in her sister’s voice. Since Papa had died, none of them had been laughing. And now with this...

Lily lifted paper to cover her mouth and muttered something.

“What was that?” Chloe inquired with a grin.

“Speak louder!” Willow said, her lips twitching with a smile.

Lily lowered the paper slowly and visibly swallowed. “He has ordered that on my 29th birthday, I am to be given to Telal Dumuzi. He is my Protector.”

Absolute, stone-shocked silence filled the room.

Chloe recognized the name. Who the hell didn’t? But trying to wrap her mind around it was an entirely different feat. Willow recovered first and came to a stand.

“A demon! The demon? Papa has given you to a demon. This is...this is insane. Pure fucking crazy. First the vampire killer, then that stupid Alpha, and now a demon. I can’t believe any of this. He’s not going to get me. He’s not going to get any of you. Dammit, think of something you guys. Are we sure Papa wrote this? This is not the Papa I knew that’s for damn sure. This can’t be right.” Finally tired of her tirade, she collapsed back onto the sofa.

Chloe scooted next to her sister and wrapped an arm around her. “These came directly from Papa’s lawyer, Frank. We’ve known him since we were kids and Papa trusted him. Plus this is Papa’s handwriting and the will sounded just like him.”

“All proper and stiff,” Lily agreed with a sniffle. She stood and moved to the other side of Willow; each of them put an arm around the other.