Cover Reveal | Vampire Lee

We have a cover!!! Vampire Lee is on the way 🥳   

We’re running a little late, but I’m sure it’ll be fine. The edits aren’t done, and I’m waiting for preorder links. It will be released on May 18th, though. Never worry about that. We’ll get it done.  

For now, I’ll let you gaze upon the cover 😍   

Vampire Lee is a sequel to A Vampire Chew Toy. If you remember the blood slaves in the underground mansion, you may remember Dillon. This story is about him and Vampire Lee. Lee is a bartender in a shifter bar, a nobody, no one important at all, nothing special, but he hears something he shouldn’t, and he can’t ignore it. So he contacts the only people he believes can do something about it. And there he meets Dillon.  

But, as I said, all I have at this point is the cover. 

Vampire Lee

Can you chase away imaginary monsters with real life monsters?  

Dillon Ross lives in a huge mansion together with six other people. Four of them turn furry, one drinks blood regularly, and one is a former blood slave, just like him. Seven months ago, he was rescued from a fate worse than death, and he’s been doing his best to avoid people ever since. Which is hard when you have well-meaning but nosy roommates.   

Lee Dowell is a vampire working in a shifter bar. One day, he hears something he wasn’t meant to hear, and while his first reaction is to ignore it, he reaches out to the supernatural version of the police. It might not have been his smartest move, since he now has a target on his back.  

Dillon isn’t pleased to realize he is sharing a floor with a vampire. There are enough monsters in his head, he doesn’t need one in his space too. But Lee has put himself in danger by trying to help some people held captive, and his roommates are trying to keep him safe. Lee doesn’t do humans, but when Dillon’s nightmares wake him time and time again, he wants nothing more than to gather him in his arms and chase away his fears. But can you chase away imaginary monsters with real life monsters?

Release Day | Rufus the Dead

It’s release day!!! 🥳 Rufus the Dead is out today! We have a claustrophobic vampire who’s been stuck in a coffin for the last seven years. When the coven leader wants someone to form a blood bond with a psychic for reasons unknown, Rufus’ best friend volunteers Rufus.   

A blood bond lasts forever, and there is no way out of one, but Rufus is losing his mind in the coffin, so he agrees.    

Jaki, our psychic, has lived all his life in an underground facility where the warden is selling the seers’ services. He never believed he’d leave the facility alive, so when a tall, red-haired vampire in a long black coat, a frilly bloodstained shirt, and Doc Martens, tells him it’s time to go, he doesn’t know how to react.   

And the world outside is overwhelming. Especially since he finds himself in the middle of a conflict between back-stabbing vampires, power plays for the throne, and… eh… staking.   

This is the first book in the House of Horrors series. The second will be out in June, so yay! The day we’re celebrating is Kiss Your Mate Day, and it’s a traumatic past, hurt-comfort, arranged mating kind of story.   

Rufus the Dead

Rufus will do anything not to remain staked in a coffin, including stealing a psychic and forming a blood bond with him. 
 
Rufus Mabuz was a badass assassin until his coven leader had him staked and stored away in a coffin for seven years. He was still a badass assassin, only he couldn’t move. Then one day, the coven leader makes him an offer — bond with a psychic or stay in the coffin for years to come. 
 
Jaki Sage is kept prisoner together with a group of psychics. He’s a psychic too, but a crappy one. He can’t foresee anything. The only thing he can do is look back in time to see what the weather was like around a certain event. Not useful. But then his friend, who can foresee things, tells him to go with Rufus the Dead. 
 
Rufus isn’t sure why he’s stealing a psychic and forming a blood bond with him, but anything is better than being staked. Jaki might not know much about vampires, but he thinks he’s better off with Rufus than if he hadn’t run away with him. But then the coven leader demands he uses his skills to find someone, or she’ll put Rufus back in the coffin. How will Jaki be able to find anyone when all he can see is weather?

Buy Links:

Gay Paranormal Romance: 50,659 words 

JMS Books :: Amazon :: Books2Read

Excerpt:

Rufus glanced at Jaki as they walked through the gate of the estate. If he’d understood it correctly, he’d seen the gate from outside the door of the house. He’d seen Orla. Pain stabbed at his heart. He’d never see Orla again, and he wanted Iris to die a gruesome death if she’d been the one who’d taken her out.

“What are we to expect?” He didn’t much care, but he asked Gregory anyway.

“I have no idea. I don’t know why we had to go to the facility and grab a seer, but I guess we’ll find out.”

Jaki took half a step in Rufus’ direction. It shouldn’t please him, but it did.

“If she wanted a seer, she’ll be sorely disappointed.” Jaki grimaced.

“She can’t have you anyway. You’re mine.” Rufus grinned at him with fangs and all. Jaki was his.

They entered the big hallway. Rufus hadn’t been there since he and Gregory hurried out the door to look for attackers, but it looked the same. A little colder, but it might be his mood.

Walking toward a double door leading into what Orla had referred to as the ballroom, Rufus took Jaki’s hand. He didn’t know who he was trying to soothe, Jaki or himself. He didn’t want to be there.

Right as they reached the door, it opened from within, and Rufus stared at two vampires he hadn’t seen before dressed in black suits. He sent Gregory a questioning look which was met by pursed lips and wide eyes. New to Gregory too then.

“Rufus.” Iris sat on a throne at the far end of the huge room, dressed in a baby blue dress with lots of frills, making her look like a little girl.

“Iris.” He met her gaze without so much as nodding his head.

“How’s the fresh air treating you?” She ended the question with a huffed little laugh.

“Haven’t had much time to enjoy it yet.”

“Hmm. Where’s my seer?”

Jaki’s grip on his hand tightened, and Rufus made a show of looking around. “I didn’t know you had one.”

Snorting, Iris got to her feet. “The one you were to get me. It was the deal. Your freedom for a seer.”

Rufus struggled to keep a blank face. It wasn’t what she’d said when she came to the mausoleum to release him. She’d said he had to bond with the seer she’d booked a meeting with.

Jaki’s grip on his hand loosened, and he tried to pull away, but Rufus didn’t let him.

“You said to bond with the seer you’d set up a meeting with.”

“I did.” She chortled. “Where is she? You were meant to bring her.”

For a second, Rufus wondered if Jaki had some magic trick to make him invisible since she hadn’t once looked at him despite him standing right next to Rufus.

“This is Jaki.” He raised their linked hands. “Bonded as ordered.”

If Jaki understood what they were talking about, he didn’t show any emotion. This was not how Rufus had wanted to tell him, though he should’ve known Iris would force him to. Had he been smart, he’d broached the subject this morning before Gregory arrived. Jaki would have questions.

“He’s a man.” Anger flashed in Iris’ eyes.

“The psychic you set up a meeting with.”

She sneered. “No. They said on the phone they had a Jackie or a Kendra or something, but Kendra is a stupid name.”

Rufus said nothing. He could’ve been bonded to someone named Kendra. He was pretty sure Kendra was a woman.

Tell a Story Day | Saved by the Bear

It’s actually not National Tell a Story Day today. It’s tomorrow, but I’ve managed to write stories for two days that are very close to each other. Tomorrow, when National Tell a Story Day is, is release day for Rufus the Dead. Which means we’ll just have to celebrate Saved by the Bear today instead.  

This is a short story, and it was part of last year’s Top Ten Gay Romance anthology from JMS Books, yay 🥳 The Top Ten Gay Romance anthologies gather the ten best-selling gay romances of every year that are less than 15k words, so short stories.  

Since we’re celebrating National Tell a Story Day, you can count on there being a book. It’s a magic book, one that will tell you your story, and then your future. It’ll even show you how you’ll die.  

Frode inherits the book, but it shows him dying the next day, and he can’t let that happen, so he tries to change his fate. Not an easy task, plus it’s hard knowing what’s true and what’s not. Especially since the book shows him strange things, like his neighbour being a bear and such.  

It’s a short, fated mates story with a bear shifter. 

Saved by the Bear

Would knowing how you die change the way you live?

Frode Hall inherits a book that promises to tell his story, and it does. It starts with a recap of his childhood, leads him through his teens and into adult life. Then it turns a page and shows how he dies in a car crash the following day. Frode panics, but can he trust the book? It’s showing a huge Grizzly sneaking around the garden, and there are no bears in the garden, only Imre, his neighbor.

By not being in his car when the predicted car crash was to take place, he survives another day. But someone has learned he has the book, and it’s showing ninjas breaking into his apartment to get it. Unsure of what to do, Frode turns to Imre. Frode doesn’t know what to believe about his growling and talk of mates, but he trusts Imre to help him. They leave the city in a hurry, but will the book give them enough warning to keep them alive or will their journey end in a gruesome prophecy?

Buy links:

Paranormal Gay Romance: 14,970 words

JMS Books :: Amazon :: books2read.com/SavedByTheBear

Chapter 1

Frode Hall double-checked the lock on the front door of his apartment. It wouldn’t keep Imre Warrick, his downstairs neighbor, out if he wanted in, but it made him feel better.

He didn’t believe Imre would break in. He growled and grunted every time Frode was nearby, which was way more often than it should have been, but he hadn’t shown any tendencies of wanting to hurt him.

Imre had a sixth sense for when Frode would enter the building. He was the biggest man Frode had ever had the pleasure of being wary of, but he was convinced it was his imagination that painted Imre in a bad light.

And things could’ve gone spectacularly bad a couple of weeks ago when Dario had found his apartment. He wasn’t hiding from Dario, but he hadn’t let him know where he’d gone either.

When Dario had banged on his door and shouted at Frode to let him in, Frode had opened but not moved out of the way. He didn’t want to be alone with Dario behind closed doors ever again. Then Imre had come up the stairs. He hadn’t spoken, but by a miracle, Dario had left.

If Imre was the biggest man Frode had the pleasure of being wary of, Dario was the first man he’d been afraid of, at least in his adult life. He had no idea how things could’ve gone as badly as they had.

Dario had swept him off his feet. He’d been kind and charming and made Frode want to do everything he asked for. It was fine in the beginning, but then Dario had wanted him to do things he wasn’t comfortable with, had wanted him to stop seeing his friends and family, had wanted him to dress a certain way, to eat and drink what Dario wanted him to eat and drink, and so on.

Like one of those horror stories you read about in the paper, and Frode was too ashamed of having bought Dario’s lies to talk to anyone about it.

The final straw had been when he’d lied about having had coffee—Frode loved coffee—and Dario had slapped him hard enough to split his lip and then smashed all their cups on the kitchen floor. He’d told Frode to clean it up since it was his fault Dario had been forced to destroy the cups.

With a stinging cheek, a pulsing lip, the taste of blood on his tongue, and tears running down his cheeks, Frode had cleaned up the mess. The next day, he’d called every number of every landlord he could find. It didn’t matter where he moved, but he had to get out.

He’d finally gotten hold of Julieta Bedolla, a rapid-talking woman who had a small flat that had been vacated the day before despite there being two months left on the tenant’s contract. It wasn’t until Frode had signed the lease for six months, she told him the reason the previous renter had moved was because the downstairs neighbor scared away all their friends when they came to visit.

Luckily—perhaps not the word he’d used a few weeks ago—he didn’t have any friends left for Imre to scare.

Heaving a sigh, he slumped on the ratty couch he’d picked up at the thrift store. It had been a weird day. He’d been halfway through his first cup of coffee and had been staring at the toast he was working up to take a bite of when his phone rang.

The woman calling claimed to be Norman Hall’s lawyer. Norman was Frode’s dad’s uncle, and he hadn’t had any contact with his dad’s side of the family, his dad included, since he was a teen.

The attorney had told Frode to come to her office, and since it was his day off work, he had. Norman had died peacefully in his bed two months prior, and Frode was one of the heirs named in his will. Frode hadn’t believed her. He hadn’t spoken to Norman since his parents’ divorce, and he’d believed him long gone already.

The lawyer handed him a flat paper box. Inside was a set of keys, some papers about an old cabin in Draymoor, which was about ninety miles outside of Pinedale, and an old leather-bound book with brass-colored letters forming the phrase Will Tell Your Story. Frode stared at the book, the hairs on the back of his neck standing on end, while the lawyer kept talking as if nothing had happened. He shut the box and shuddered before forcing himself to listen to what she was saying.

She apologized for not having gone to the cabin to check. She believed it was still standing but in need of fixing. The way she grimaced gave Frode a sinking feeling. The damn cabin would cost him a fortune, he was sure of it. Maybe he could sell it. There was some land attached to it, so perhaps it was worth something.

When he’d exited her office, he’d had a voicemail from his father. He’d made sure to block the number, but what the heck was he doing calling Frode? Maybe he too had inherited something, but it was no reason for him to call.

It was all too surreal for him to deal with right now. Instead, he reached for the box with the book. Part of him wanted to grab it and never let go while another wanted to throw the entire box out the window, making keys, papers, and the book disappear.

Now his heart was hammering in his chest as he opened the box. His hands shook as he reached inside.

It was the creepiest, most glorious book he’d ever seen. A shiver went through him as he stroked the cover. Will Tell Your Story. Nonsense.

Carefully, he opened the book and stared at the first page.

It was blank.

What the fuck? A laugh bubbled out of him. An unwritten book. He slumped against the backrest. A diary. He was so silly. All day he’d been buzzing with anxiety over the freaking book. Will Tell Your Story made sense if you wrote your story in it.

Frode had never kept a diary in his entire life, but maybe he should. Maybe this was a push from the universe. Why the hell had Norman wanted him to have it? An unwritten diary.

He bent the pages and allowed them to fall one at a time—blank, blank, blank.

A sentence.

He almost dropped the book, then tried to find the place again where he’d seen something written. The pages turned on their own to the middle of the book where he read Frode Hall sat on his ratty couch in embellished writing.

He stared. Could Norman have guessed he’d sit on a couch when he opened the book?

The words changed. His heart beat fast as he read.

Around him, the apartment spun, his stomach lurching as if he was on a roller coaster, and Frode was watching himself from above. The words on the page changed again, but before he could read them, he shrieked and slapped the book shut.

He hadn’t more than closed his lips around the shriek before feet shook the staircase.

“Frode!” Imre banged on his front door. “Frode, open up.”

Oh, shit. Frode put the book back into the box and went into the hallway.

He stared at the ugly brown apartment door as it shook under Imre’s assault. “I’m okay.”

The banging stopped. “Open.”

“I’m okay.” This time, he whispered it.

“I want to see for myself, so please open. I won’t come inside.”

Frode’s heart picked up speed again. Were the doors so thin Imre could hear him whispering through them? He unlocked the door and opened it to a small gap. “It was a spider. I don’t like spiders.”

Imre gave him an unimpressed look. His blond hair was tousled, and he was dressed in nothing but worn jeans and a black tank top, despite the chilly April temperatures. He looked like a Norse god, which was highly unfair considering Frode was the one with Scandinavian blood in his veins.

“A spider?” Imre didn’t look like he believed him.

“Yes, a spider. I squashed it.”

Silence stretched. “A spider?” This time, he spoke slowly.

“Yes.” Frode dragged it out. “I didn’t mean to disturb you.”

“You screamed.”

Taking a deep breath, Frode nodded. “Sorry.”

Imre studied him until Frode squirmed.

“Let me know if you see more, and I’ll help you.” He turned around and walked down the stairs, barefoot, leaving Frode to gape at his descending back. Had the mean-looking Norse god below offered to kill spiders for him? Maybe Frode had misjudged the level of meanness.