Prologue
PROLOGUE
LEDGER
The fall of the first Vaughn brother.
June 2024
L edger listened to the sexy sat nav voice he’d chosen tell him that he’d reached Bayfield, his destination.
He slowed as he entered the town limits, and the corners of his mouth dipped in disappointment.
What he’d envisioned when he’d received the sommelier job offer at one of the most prestigious wineries in the country was not what appeared to be a ranch town.
Dust and cowboys were all he could see out of the windscreen.
Yes, cowboys absolutely were hot.
And from those he could see roaming down the sidewalks, they were most definitely falling into the category.
What wasn’t so hot was that it was all that Ledger could see.
Most looked like they wouldn’t know an excellent wine if it sat atop a saddle.
He sighed, disheartened by the fact, in his rush to escape his last boyfriend, he’d accepted a job without doing any due diligence on the area.
Vaughn's winery was synonymous with producing some of the best wines and Champagne. But how did they do that from here? In the back of bumfuck nowhere?
Having come from a family that cast him aside for being divergent—someone who couldn’t shift into their inner animal—Ledger was never one to allow a defeatist attitude. He cast off the grump wanting to descend on him like a rainy cloud. No, Ledger didn’t look at life through the lens of defeat, he looked at it, seeing opportunities to be seized. Right now, though, he was willing to admit it was a little harder than usual.
Had he jumped from the frying pan into the fire?
He slowed, allowing a car to pull out of a street-side parking spot, which he then drove into. He didn’t have the exact address for the vineyard, just the town. The internet search had given him the town's name but no exact location and again, that should have raised a red flag.
Especially when Thorn Vaughn suggested they meet in town and not at the vineyard or winery.
He cursed Sylvester for chasing him out of LA.
His ex had turned into a major creeper in the end, besides always insisting he take heat blockers to prevent any unwanted babies.
That had stung when what he actually meant was he didn’t want to chance being ‘lumbered with a divergent child’.
His words, the asshole!
Yes, Ledger had focused on progressing his career, but that didn’t mean he didn’t want children.
He most certainly did, with the right person, who most certainly wasn’t Sylvester!
Ledger was past thinking about the mistake that was his ex.
No, he needed to concentrate on the immediate issue.
Like how was he going to get out of the year-long contract he’d signed when he wasn’t sure Bayfield was the right place for him?
He moaned aloud, recalling the exact words Ky, his lawyer best friend, had said about the contract he’d asked him to look over.
“Best damn contract I’ve ever seen.”
Ky, who was impressed by the diligence of whoever had drawn up the document, basically said Ledger was stuck for the next twelve months if he signed it.
A year isn’t that long, really!
On the sidewalk minus his jacket, because of the heat being a little overbearing, he strolled down the street, looking in shop windows, working on reinforcing the positives to himself.
The disheartened feeling lessened at the artisan shops he passed.
The place wasn’t giving him a bad vibe.
A little further down his nose twitched, catching some divine scents.
He searched the line of shops and a grin appeared at the sign for Kit’s Cakes.
Result!
His stomach rumbled with delight and gave him the nudge to get something to eat since it had been hours since breakfast.
His mouth watered as he peered through the gleaming windows at glass-fronted cabinets full of delicious looking pastries, cakes, cookies, breads, and a wide selection of open-faced sandwiches that could rival any LA bakery Ledger had frequented.
“Now this is cool,” he murmured to himself, his nose all but pressing against the glass.
“A major plus for a bumfuck town in the middle of nowhere.”
“I’m sure Kit will be pleased to hear that,” came a silky-smooth voice from behind him.
Ledger spun around, blushing and all but swallowing his tongue at the hunk of stunningness gracing the sidewalk.
There was so much to take in his brain went into immediate overload.
The guy towered over Ledger’s five feet height.
Sophisticated was his first thought.
Elegantly dressed in expensive cut black slacks and a pale lemon fitted shirt, open at the throat to reveal honey gold skin.
Stylish cut mahogany waves showed off a prominent forehead, bright blue eyes, chiselled, dimpled cheeks, and the fullest lips that Ledger had ever seen in person.
Ones he wanted to taste.
No, no, I don’t!
Yes, yes, we do, his animal half came back with.
A cheeky little squirrel who had a very playful nature and Ledger suspected if he’d been able to shift into his animal form, he’d be the kind to get Ledger into trouble.
You can do that all on your own, he pointed out.
But this one, you should most definitely get into trouble with.
The smell coming from the bakery didn’t mask the spicy scent that made Ledger’s animal spirit want them to get closer, so they could stick their nose in all the intimate places to see where it was strongest.
Behave!
His sensitive nose could detect the warmness of saffron combined with Italian fruits.
It created a contrast of intense spiciness with luminous accents.
The man—alpha—didn’t fit with the town.
Heck, Ledger didn’t know where he would fit, but he wanted to find out.
No, mister, you aren’t falling for the first guy you meet in bumfuck.
Not happening, you hear me?
Why are you talking to yourself like that?
His animal was actually laughing at him, and Ledger was feeling very insulted.
Except everything about the alpha appealed on so many levels—mainly the naked kind.
All the promises he made about getting involved with an alpha that got his dick hard seemed to evaporate as the guy moved closer, offering his hand.
“And who might you be, sweetling?”
Sweetling.
I’m swooning.
Those eyes held him enthralled in their depth of blue ringed with black.
Ledger fell hard enough that his innards felt the impact.
It radiated through every cell inside him.
Spellbound, he took the hand, having lost all sense of reality when cool, long, tapered fingers wrapped around his hand, engulfing it.
“Yours,” he murmured with absolute certainty.
Thorn
“You most definitely are.” There on the main street in Bayfield—and as the sweetling with honey eyes had put it—in the middle of bumfuck nowhere, no other reply made sense.
This, Thorn could now see clearly, was what had driven him to arrange a meeting with their new sommelier in town, when he easily could have given the man directions to the winery.
Like his brothers, Thorn had enhanced senses that few outsiders of the family, and even in the vampiric community, were aware of.
As an ancient coming from one of the oldest vampire families, his abilities had been honed over centuries.
Abilities he never questioned.
Initially, he’d become intrigued at seeing a bright red corvette in town.
Not a familiar sight in these parts, where SUVs and trucks were the norm.
Then the blond-haired divergent omega had stepped out of the car and Thorn’s senses had heightened painfully as he followed the omega’s progress down the sidewalk.
A sense of knowing washed over him, and he was unable to deny that the omega belonged to him.
His senses spoke to this tiny divergent being his destiny and the need to claim him as such—now.
As a vampire, he’d heard the lore about finding his dhampir, the only problem with that a dhampir was usually female.
The cutie in front of him was most definitely not female.
As of right now, he needed to find out what the omega was doing in town and how to introduce him to a vampire family few knew existed.
While he considered if using his thrall to get the answers was the done thing, a knock to his shoulder forced him to let go of the hand or wrench the omega’s arm from its socket.
He scowled at the idiot who’d walked into him, then forced back a groan at seeing the big alpha, Brigg.
Thorn had a dalliance months earlier with the bear shifter and had no wish to repeat, no matter how persistent Brigg was.
Thorn, on a very rare occasion he chose a bed mate, wanted one that was strong enough to cope with his vampiric strength.
The bear, he recalled, hadn’t met his expectations at all.
“Thorn, what a surprise to find you in town.” The bear actually simpered, like that was an attractive trait, flirting way too obviously.
“I came to find…” Thorn glanced at the omega, then frowned at seeing him hustle off down the sidewalk, providing a view of the impressive sway of his slim hips and how his bubble butt moved in the designer jeans.
Where on earth was he going?
“Me, I hope,” Brigg interjected, stepping in front of Thorn and blocking his view.
Thorn was not quick to anger.
His brothers often said he had ice in his veins as it never heated like Dacian’s or Calvert’s.
In this moment, however, he found himself furious at how Brigg was impeding him from claiming his dhampir.
The bear would be lucky to keep his head on his shoulders.
Thorn’s eyes flashed red as his back expanded, his wings working to unfurl.
He grabbed the bear by the throat and got treated to a dose of pheromones that made his nose burn unpleasantly after the sweetness of the omega.
His thrall, if used to its full effect, could incapacitate and cause pain, and it could also remove memories.
Something he should have considered earlier with how persistent Brigg was.
Holding the other man’s gaze, he unfurled his thrall more carefully than the bear deserved.
“You will have no memory of me, of what we did together. Go about your business.” He let go quickly, noting several interested stares as Brigg spun on his heel and walked off without a backward glance.
Thorn searched the sidewalk and groaned in disappointment at not seeing any sign of the unnamed omega.
He did note that the car remained on the other side of the street, though.
He growled, his teeth dropping, wanting to rip out Brigg’s throat for getting in his way.
His phone buzzed, and he groaned again when he pulled it from his slacks to see Dacian’s name on the screen.
He swiped at the screen.
“I’m fine,” he said without preamble, knowing Dacian would have picked up his mood.
“Then why am I feeling edgy?” Dacian questioned, unconvinced.
Dacian was the more sensitive to their moods, despite any distance between them.
“I’ve met my dhampir.”
The silence was telling.
Thorn waited.
“Dhampir… are you sure she belongs to you?”
They were all bi-sexual but leaned towards male partners.
“ He most definitely does, but he disappeared before I could explain his reaction to me.”
“ He !”
“Yes. Listen, I need to meet with Ledger Rain, then I’m going to search for the omega. Can you get someone to come to town and watch a car for me?”
Two minutes later, anxious, but satisfied he’d done what he could to prevent the blond driving off, Thorn strolled quickly down the sidewalk to the café bookshop that in the evenings turned into a wine bar, where he had arranged to meet Ledger.
His nose twitched before he’d taken one step into the café.
His gaze swept the tables and his lips curved into a huge smile when they landed on the blond.
He was looking at a menu, so he didn’t see Thorn approach.
“What on earth is wrong with me? What? You listen up, didn’t you see the type of guy he prefers? We aren’t it.”
Thorn’s lips quivered at how the guy was talking to himself—or talking with his animal spirit, he suspected, when there was more than a moment of silence before the blond continued.
“Yes, I heard what he said. I’m not deaf,” he muttered, “but it must be the heat melting my brain because he’s clearly not our mate no matter what you say!”
Careful not to spook the man, Thorn moved so his lips were next to the omega’s ear.
“I most certainly am your mate,” he whispered seductively.
Blond hair that smelled of sunshine brushed his skin as the omega’s honey eyes met his gaze.
They were filled with a challenge Thorn never expected.
“Prove it.”
Thorn didn’t need a second invitation, and in a blur, they were out the door and in the back alley.
All his senses worked together, he was more a passenger to them as he had the tiny omega pinned to the wall.
The man showed no fear as Thorn’s fangs dropped.
Instead, he arched his head back, exposing more of his throat.
He was perfect.
“You are mine,” Thorn hissed, right as his teeth sank into flesh.
The first taste left him blind to the external world as he swallowed the sweetest, headiest blood he’d ever had the pleasure of taking.
Nothing compared to those first few drops he ingested.
Skin buzzing, his still heart moving with the life of his dhampir, a more perfect moment had never existed.
His universe expanded exponentially with each swallow as small fingers clung to his shoulders.
Tiny whimpering sounds were the music of his soul as he fed.
He had not fed from a shifter in many centuries, yet nothing would have stopped him, not even the threat of death.
The omega was his life force, his reason for being.
It was as simple as that.
Cum scented the air and brought with it the violent need to mate.
“Don’t stop,” cried the omega when Thorn’s fangs released, and he licked over the puncture wounds to help them heal.
His gaze didn’t stray as the marks remained and added to the truth he hadn’t denied.
The omega that bore his mark was his eternal.
The weight of it settled around his now beating heart.
He had found his one.
“Why aren’t you touching me?” The desperate demand brought Thorn from his trance.
Easily holding the omega one handed, he ripped open his slacks, dragging them and his torn underwear down slim thighs to reveal a pretty package of sexiness.
The lingering taste, the scent, the sight, the yearning he felt humming through him left Thorn wanting everything at once, except they were in an alleyway, part concealed by a dumpster with the threat of being found any second.
Could he stop?
Fuck no.
He had one goal: to finish the claim.
His need to protect was as strong as the need to claim, so he resisted his baser needs for a moment and lowered the omega to the ground.
The omega barely had his lips parted to complain before Thorn’s shirt lay at his feet.
Huge black wings unfurled, ruffling the feathers as they caught the air.
With no more than a thought, they closed around them, surrounding them in a protective cocoon.
One that was impervious to attack.
“Holy fuck,” the omega gasped, honey eyes wide, his hand reaching to stroke the black feathers.
“Wh?—"
Thorn pushed down his own slacks to reveal his arousal. The scent of the omega was driving him wild, and he had him pinned one handed up against the wall. He barely had the wherewithal to check he was slick, which cut off whatever else the omega was going to say when Thorn pushed his cock against the slick rim barely a second later.
Heat shocked his system. Then the heavenly squeeze came as the omega’s body adjusted to the invasion.
“Goddddddd… yess, mine,” the omega cried, his neck straining into the hand holding him as he strained forward, teeth bared, fingers furrowed into the feathers of Thorn’s wings, clinging on.
It was all Thorn needed. Thrusting deep, he exposed the weakest part of his body, his throat, to the teeth. They sank in and the world exploded, leaving him forever changed.
“Sweetling, forever mine, forever yours, forever eternal,” he whispered the magic enchantment, sealing their bond, giving the omega an eternity to match his own.
Yes. Yes. Yes.