The Redemption of Boaz Pritchard Read online

  The Redemption of Boaz Pritchard

  Hailey Edwards

  Copyright © 2021 Black Dog Books, LLC

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author's imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  Edited by Sasha Knight

  Proofread by Lillie's Literary Services

  Cover by Damonza

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Have You Met Hadley?

  Chapter One

  Join the Team

  About the Author

  Also by Hailey Edwards

  One

  I poured another shot from the tequila bottle and tipped it down my throat. And then another, and then another. “Is it still an arranged marriage if you arrange it yourself?”

  “You can’t be serious.” Dad dropped onto the mattress beside me. “Boaz Pritchard?”

  “He’s desperate.” I drained the dregs then set the bottle on the nightstand. “So are we.”

  “We aren’t that far gone,” he harrumphed. “Not yet. We still have—”

  “I won’t let it come to that.” Our only options were pawning Mom’s jewelry, selling the family home, and asking relatives for help. More help. Again. Most of them no longer returned our calls, and I would not beg in person. “This is a solution to everyone’s problems.”

  Chin down, Dad peered at me over the wire frames of his glasses. “Will he make you happy, Addie?”

  “What is happy? Can you even remember?” I laughed darkly. “I’m not sure I can.”

  “Happy for me was the day you were born, the day Hadley was born.”

  The mention of my little sister punched the air from my lungs, and I choked for oxygen.

  “Happiness comes nine months after the wedding night,” I said, voice broken, and set my glass aside. “Gotcha.”

  “We have options,” he insisted. “You don’t have to sell yourself to pay our debts.”

  “I gave my word. It’s done.” I flopped back onto the mattress where Hadley had wasted away to nothing but fragile bones and paper skin, and let my eyes close. “Make your peace with it.” I pressed my face into the pillow that still smelled like the lavender children’s shampoo the nurse had used to bathe her. “I have.”

  My future husband left for his home in Savannah, Georgia, hours ago. There was no turning back now. For three weeks, I had waffled over his proposition to merge our households. Meeting him in person hadn’t changed my mind, only reassured me he was decent and earnest. That was good enough for me.

  “Get some rest.” Dad collected the empties to take with him, and I crossed my fingers he didn’t sniff them. The drunk act was tough to pull off after your dad realized you were tossing back shots poured from a handwashed bottle topped off each night with filtered water. But drink was a demon he was familiar with and wouldn’t ask questions. The fewer, the better. He was safer not knowing how I spent my nights. “We’ll talk about this again at dusk.”

  “Mmm-hmm.”

  Lingering in the doorway, he watched until my even breaths convinced him I had drifted off to dreamland. He murmured a prayer to the goddess, asking her to watch over me, and I wondered, just for a second, if he knew how I had paid the bills the last few years.

  No.

  He would never let me out of his sight if he had a clue. Not after we lost Hadley. He would be terrified my job would get me killed. He never needed to know how close I had come on more than one occasion.

  “I thought he’d never leave,” the vampire hiding in the closet sighed before flinging open the doors.

  “You could have texted me.” I shifted onto my side, facing her. “You didn’t have to show up in person.”

  Her impromptu visit was the reason I had to shove her into a closet without so much as a hello.

  She tended to sneak in through Hadley’s window unannounced, and Dad happened to be coming up the stairs when he noticed me duck into her bedroom. The drunk act was my only saving grace, but I hated turning his demons against him. It was a cruel but effective means of protecting him.

  “Cellphones broadcast radio frequency waves.” Cassandra made the sign of the cross. “The International Agency for Research on Cancer classifies RF fields as ‘possibly carcinogenic to humans’.”

  “You’re not human,” I pointed out, “and vampires don’t get cancer.”

  Because they were already dead, putting them well out of the disease’s merciless reach.

  The Catholic thing was a gray area for me. As a necromancer, I worshipped Hecate. As a resuscitated human, Cass had a more complicated relationship with her god.

  “I used to be human,” she countered. “Besides, you can never be too careful.”

  “You’re the next best thing to immortal.”

  “And I want to stay that way.”

  Giving it up as a lost cause, I got down to business. “What’s on the agenda for tonight?”

  The slender vampire exited the closet dressed in black leather pants and a corset top that allowed her boobs to defy gravity. Her hair was dyed a shade of neon yellow that made highlighters everywhere jealous. I preferred the peacock blue from last month, but I wouldn’t say so.

  “I assume we’ve got a gig,” I continued, “since you’re skulking in my little sister’s closet.”

  As often as I reminded myself Cass was a product of her time, that the whole corset-and-plumped-breasts thing was a holdover from her human life, I wondered if she wasn’t just an exhibitionist at heart. Why else would she give her boobs a pep talk whenever a hottie entered her line of sight? Or kiss their rounded tops when they did a good job of luring in a donor? Or have more wardrobe malfunctions than most strippers?

  “We’ve got a runner.” Her smile bared fangs sharpened to vicious points. “You game for a hunt?”

  “How are we going to blend into the night when your hair is radioactive?”

  “There’s this amazing invention called a beanie.” She produced one from her matching leather backpack. “You slip it on and—” she pinned her eye-popping braid on top of her head while she tugged on the knitted cap, “—voila!” She cocked a hip and rested her fist on the curve. “They even come in black.” She winked. “Stealthy.”

  “You’re a goober.” I snorted as I rose and circled the bed to plunder Hadley’s hope chest. “How old are you again?”

  Figuring it was the last place Dad would look, I had boxed up the wedding dress, the shoes, and the veil Mom had chosen for Hadley upon her birth—the whole shebang—to make room for the black leather outfit I wore whenever Cass came calling.

  “A lady never tells her age,” she said with the haughty disdain worthy of a vampire.

  “Mmm-hmm.” I tugged on the slinky-stretchy undershirt and pants first, the
n pulled on the skintight leather suit, thankful my top was long-sleeved with a collar for protecting my throat against fangs. “Give me the deets.”

  “The newest member of Clan Willis. A Mr. Ron Turner née Willis. Apparently his boyfriend, Angelo, paid to have him resuscitated, making him a member of Clan Willis. They broke up when Ron’s fledgling vampire libido caused him to step out on his lover, who’s older than him by about ninety years. Cue drama.”

  We had both heard this story before, and it always ended in tears or in blood or in tears and blood.

  “So,” I cut in, “Ron realized he still loves what’s-his-name and can’t live forever without him.” That was usually how it went. Baby vamps really couldn’t keep it in their pants. Their hearts had nothing to do with it. The decision was handed up to the brain from south of the belt. “Rather than face the sun, which likely wouldn’t kill him at his age, he ran away from home to avoid spending eternity with the clan of the man he can no longer have.”

  “I can’t decide if you’re an utter romantic for that bit of fiction,” Cass said, “or if you’re the bitterest, most twisted soul I have ever had the great fortune to meet.”

  I paused in stomping on my boots. “Can’t I be both?”

  “Uh, no.” She popped me on the butt. “You either believe in love, or you don’t.”

  “I believe in—” I yelped when she smacked me again, harder this time. “Quit that.”

  “I meant romantic love, and you know it.” She rubbed the sting from my bottom until I danced out of her reach. “What? I can’t resist your pert little butt in leather.”

  What she couldn’t resist was unnerving me. Vampires had twisted senses of humor, and Cass’s was an endless downward spiral.

  The joke here wasn’t that she thought a woman touching me would get under my skin, but that anyone touching my private bits made me squirm.

  Playing nurse full-time for Hadley so Mom and Dad could keep up appearances meant I’d never had much of a social life. I had kissed boys, sure, but that had never convinced me to let them go any further. Lucky for me, the rumor mill swore my future husband had enough practice in that area for both of us. I could just lay back, relax, and allow him to inseminate me.

  “Save it for your clients.” I pointed the blunt end of a stake at her. “I’m engaged.”

  “Your lip curled on the word. Try it again.” She fluttered her lashes. “Mrs. Boaz Pritchard. Matron Boaz Pritchard.” She considered the Society hierarchy for a moment. “Matron Adelaide Pritchard? Whatever.”

  “Matron Pritchard.”

  The new title hurt my ears, the position more curse than blessing. I should have been Matron Whitaker, I should have inherited the mantle of matron from my mother—not Boaz’s—but should have beens didn’t pay the mortgage, buy food, or keep the lights on. They sure didn’t pay for medicine or for nurses to hover over sickbeds like angels come to Earth.

  “You’re grinding your teeth again.” Cass frowned. “Forget Pritchard. Let’s hunt.”

  Relief eased the tightness in my shoulders, and I strapped on my knives. “That’s the best idea I’ve heard all night.”

  Two

  Cass and I didn’t bother sneaking out of the house. I could no longer afford to pay a maid or a cook or a driver, and Dad had retired to his room. There was no one to catch us making our hasty exit.

  As fake as my drinking act might be, his was very real and had been since Mom died. Yet another reason why I trusted him to ignore my faked drunkenness. Confronting my bad habits would mean facing his own issues.

  Our bloodline brushed as close to High Society as any Low Society family could boast. We had power in our blood, and we could work small magics. Not that the past few generations of Whitakers had honed those talents or put them to good use.

  The Pritchards might be as Low Society as it got, but their matrons were savvy, and their coffers were full. I might not want to exchange my last name for Boaz’s, but I had done worse to keep my family fed and clothed. Even if I tasted bile when I thought about losing what I had fought so long and so hard to preserve.

  Maybe Boaz would consider hyphenating his last name? Whitaker-Pritchard or Pritchard-Whitaker was easier to swallow than erasing my identity altogether.

  “You’re thinking about marriage again,” Cass singsonged. “You realize he’ll want to have sex with you. That means he’s going to touch you, kiss you, nibble on your—”

  “How many years were you a prostitute again?”

  “Plenty.” She leaned in, bosoms heaving. “Would you like to see what I learned?”

  “I’ve watched porn with you and listened to your critiques.” I shooed her out the door. “I’m set, thanks.”

  “Now that’s just mean.” Popping out her bottom lip, she pouted. “That wasn’t porn. That was an adult film.”

  Cass was the rare vampire who relished dumping her past identities and embracing new roles. Most clung to what they knew and went mad from it in the end. She would never have to worry about that.

  “As much as I enjoy discussing my best friend’s sexual exploits, we have a job to do. Remember?”

  “You’re about to be married.” She sighed dramatically. “Have fun while you still can.”

  “Anonymous sex isn’t my idea of fun.”

  “How do you know until you try it?”

  “I’ll make you a deal.” I spun it around on her. “Keep it in your pants for thirty days, and I’ll have the one-night stand of your choice.”

  “It’s a…” She wet her lips, tried again. “It’s a…” Her mouth moved, but no sound emerged. “It’s a…”

  “Deal is the word you’re looking for,” I said helpfully. “Come on, say it.”

  “Damn it, Addie. That’s not fair. I have needs.”

  “And I don’t.” I had made it this long without sex. I wasn’t in any hurry to rectify the situation given who the rectifier would be. “So stop bullying me.”

  “I don’t mean to push.” She picked at her manicured nails. “I just worry.”

  Vampires her age didn’t express affection the way necromancers did. They mostly bit or sexed up the ones they loved. Since I wasn’t interested in either, she was at a loss as to how to show me she cared. I tried letting her hug me once, but she took off her shirt first and pressed my face into her boob crack. It was a very nice boob crack, but it didn’t do much for me except give me perkiness envy.

  “You don’t have to anymore.” I tacked on a smile. “I’m engaged, and Prince Charming will fix all my problems. Haven’t you read any fairy tales?”

  “I was alive when a few were written,” she said dryly. “Trust me, the writers took artistic license. Except with the prince-kissing-sleeping-princesses thing. Sure, he claimed he was attempting to wake her, but he didn’t have to stick his hand up her skirt to find her mouth.”

  “You ruined one of my favorites for me. Thank you for that disturbing mental picture.”

  “Men are pigs.” She shrugged. “What did you expect?”

  “Them not to put the moves on unconscious women?”

  “You’re so adorable.” She stroked her fingers through my hair. “You and all your cute little ideals.”

  The hunger in her eyes wasn’t new. She would bite me in a heartbeat if I let her. That’s the danger of being friends with a vampire. She would also dry hump me if I stood still for too long. Again, the danger of being friends with a vampire.

  From what I could tell, even those with firmly entrenched sexual identities as humans reached an age where they became gender blind. Bodies became bodies to them, and pleasure could be found in either form. Since I was a stick in the mud—her words, not mine—any pleasure she derived from me came from annoying me until I reminded her of my flawless aim with a stake.

  “Any idea where we can find Ron?” I swatted her hand. “Or are we starting from scratch?”

  Cass knew most of the local vampires, which made tracking runners that much easier.

  “He wa
s last seen near the railroad museum.” She made a production of pulling a shiny new key fob from her cleavage. “The engine section.”

  Careful to avoid a clear line of sight from the front windows, in case Dad heard us and decided to check in on me, we hiked across the overgrown yard to a hidden nook in the woods I had cleared for her particular use.

  The trees hid her car from passersby on the main road, and more importantly, from Dad, who never left the house. She parked there when she visited then let herself in through whatever window or door struck her fancy that night. I had offered her a spare key, but she preferred sneaking around, and I didn’t care as long as the weirdo picked locks without breaking them.

  Around the final bend, I got an eyeful of her latest acquisition. A sleek black Ferrari I only recognized because of its prominent branding. Her master gave it to her as a bonus last week for bringing in the most money to the clan ten years running. Thanks, in part, to me. But did Javier buy me a Ferrari? Nope. Not even a pine tree-shaped air freshener.

  Cass stalked to the driver side and slid behind the wheel, doing a happy wiggle as she settled in.

  The heady combination of premium leather and new-car smell made me dizzy with lust no man (or woman) had yet to inspire in me as I claimed the seat beside her.

  “I would give you this car…” she cranked it, and the engine purred, “…if you would use it and enjoy it.” She threw it into reverse, and gravel sprayed from under the tires. “But you would sell it and bank the proceeds. I can see the dollar signs in your eyes.”

  The mental picture of all the zeroes I would have left in my bank account gave me butterflies in my stomach. Green ones. With pictures of Ben Franklin dotting their wings.