Blog Tour and Giveaway: Sanguis City by Morgane Jane Mitchell

Ever wonder what happens after the world ends?
Lilanoir Rue did. A mere by product of the destruction, she never knew what happened before hand either. Banished from the only place she called home, the Human Reservation, she wipes her tears and never looks back.
In a world gone dead, life has never been so good, for some. While others
live in chaos, the chosen call Sanguis City home. The rich and powerful
found a way to survive The End and enjoy every minute of it, for eternity.
On the brink of a gruesome death from starvation, disease or a hungry
mutant, humans flock to sell their blood for peace.The city of blood, made for and by vampires, welcomes Noir; her kind are in high demand. Neither Human nor Vampire, Bleeders take care of the city in the daylight. Draining humans by day and dating Vampires at night leaves Noir little time to think about her past, or much else, until it finds her.Three years in the city has earned her a promising career, future and just maybe a love life. Noir's chaotic life is finally on the right track. When Noir falls for her sexy new Professor, an Authentic Vampire she also falls into a web of nightmares. Unable to escape painful memories, she uncovers more than her own secrets. Some secrets just won't stay dead, and others are bound to kill her.

Buy link:
http://www.amazon.com/Sanguis-City-ebook/dp/B00E7TKHR6/ref=tmm_kin_title_0?ie=UTF8&qid=1376330641&sr=8-1

Excerpt

Aubrey laughed, “I know now why Keanton wanted your company. Meet me in an hour for drinks?” He stepped in close with his hands on his hips and looked around like he didn't have time for this.

My back touched the door. I put my books between my chest and him. “Sure. Where?”

“Dante's just off Main, on Fourth Street. Do you know the place?”

“Yeah, an hour.” Nerves made me, of all people, weak, but I found the strength to push the heavy door open and almost stumbled into the night.

What the hell was I thinking? Clare, my roommate, dolled me up in one of her skin tight black dresses. She was as dark as night with a cute page boy haircut. Bubbly and happy all the time, she gave me a head ache. She was also two sizes smaller than me; my breasts were spilling out of her dress.

“I look like a whore,” I told her as I admired my hair in the mirror. It was ginger red down to the small of my back and recently layered. Clare had curled it in ringlets, making it look almost as good as Savy’s hair, but one strand kept poking out. I blew out a rough breath as I tucked it behind my ear.

“That's the point, everyone at Dante's looks the part,” she giggled.

I knew the vampires loved a theme, and I hated it. You couldn't go from place to place in this city wearing the same outfit at night. Dante's, of course, was Hell. There was a strict dress code, and I despised dressing up unless it was my idea. That’s why I had never been. Plus, my mother told me about Hell, and the thought of going there to party was not something I fancied. I applied my makeup one shade darker so I wouldn't be turned away.

“The heels!” Clare reminded me, and I stepped in.

“Off to high class Hell,” I muttered under my breath as I grabbed the small clutch Clare lent me.

“You have to go, Noir, a professor asked you, and you said yes. If you didn't want to, you should have said no and switched your schedule,” Clare beamed with the ability to say anything cheerfully.

I took a deep breath. “Of course I’m going. I'm protected.” I waved a vial in front of her before downing the ingest that would help me control myself. Then I gave Clare my best effort and smiled.

“That a girl, but save that sexy smile for the professor, you aren't my type.”

It was early March and cold, so I pulled my black trench coat around me tightly as I made my way down the street. The bus had taken forever. Being Friday, this part of downtown was packed. I was late, and it was vampire rush hour, or happy hour by the number of bars. Industrial music thumped as the bouncer inspected me.

“Take it off, sweetheart,” he demanded, and I slipped my coat off and twirled.

Judging the size of him, I figured he was probably an ex-wrestler. It meant he had to be a new vampire, one that bought a chance to become immortal because all the accidents, people transformed by The Cure originally by accident, stayed as thin and frail as they were on their death beds, forever. I showed the big guy my hand and watched it glow as he waved his scanner over it.

Inside Dante's was dark, darker than normal which meant it was a vampire favorite. My eyes would adjust a little because I could see pretty well in the dark. My ears were ringing, as well. The blasting music was also a dead giveaway that the undead liked it here. They could hear even better than me, and the deafening beat gave them the privacy they craved.

Before my senses could adjust, I almost walked right by him. I shook from a shiver and wondered what he was doing to me. What was his unique vampire power? We all had something that made us exceptional, but an authentic vampire like Aubrey would have a power ten times better than mine. I filed the fact away that, as much as I tried, I couldn't get any straight answers about the old vampires.

Aubrey stood before I took my seat. He was dressed in a straight cut black leather jacket over more black. I looked around at the crowd and was thankful he wasn't wearing spikes and chains.

“Noir, is it?” He had asked in my ear before I sat opposite of him at the too small bistro table. This bar didn't serve food of any kind, even if it was advertised as a take-out place.

Sitting in the middle of the table was an oil candle. The flame danced illuminating him in a spooky way as Aubrey lit a cigarette. Yes, vampires could smoke, drink and do drugs, even if those things didn't affect them like it affected us. And they affected me a lot less than a human. I would have to drink twice as much to feel anything.

Aubrey's face had the character I associated with an old vampire, but he didn't look a day over twenty-five. You would never know he was undead, nothing stood out. Pale but no more than your average white man, he had imperfect white teeth, no fangs like mine. His would only come out when he needed them too. Neither long nor short for a guy, his dark hair, covered his eyes for a moment when he moved.

I smiled without showing my fangs because showing fangs would be a sure sign I wanted more. Then I spoke loud enough to hear myself over the music, “Yeah, unofficially Lilanoir Rue.” I put out my hand and brought it back. “I know, people don't do that anymore, germs.”

“And what does a vampire have to fear from, germs?” Aubrey challenged back.

“I know, right?” I had blurted out too casually before I straightened. The new vamps were particularly cautious lately, something that seemed ridiculous to me. But no one dared speak of it.

Aubrey smiled briefly then his face returned to politely waiting.

“Yes, it is Noir,” I finally gave in.

“Aubrey,” he said reaching for my hand, and I gave him an awkward finger shake. It was customary in this city to tell a vampire your name, your official name, before starting any private conversation. Weird, but I should have been used to it by now. It essentially meant we were speaking as equals, unlike our words in class. He scooted his chair closer to mine. “So Noir, what brought you to Sanguis City?”

Able to hear him, finally, I didn't have to shout. Maybe that's why he closed the gap? I tried to act naturally when his arm went around my back. I expected this was going to be the normal interrogation all the teachers put me through until his thumb brushed my bare shoulder. Something in me shifted, and I found myself even more attracted to him.

“You first,” I said full of confidence. I could play the game. If I were to give into him and answer, without anything from him first, I would be treated just like Jef treated poor Savy. A vampire only treated you as well as you required.

Aubrey hesitated and drew his eyebrows together, his steely eyes studied me. They were beautiful but wouldn't break me. I didn't waver but waited. He leaned back in his chair and gestured causing a waitress to appear. She was a bleeder dressed as a devil, complete with horns and a tail. “What do you drink?” Aubrey asked me while returning her smile.

“Mascato, please,” I told the barmaid, not him, thinking that wine was an excellent choice.

“Morgan, on the rocks,” Aubrey told her, and suddenly I was craving Rum. “New York isn't what it used to be.”

“Oh,” he had answered my question. “I heard, zombies…” The elixir that turned humans into vampires had once sold to the highest bidder until the authentic vampires put a stop to it. Since then people were producing copycat drugs trying to become immortal.

Aubrey laughed, “They're not zombies, and there is no such thing. These things are way too fast.”

I almost choked; I had heard that line before. Instead, I nodded and laughed a little too. I knew too much about zombies from living on the outside. I shook my head trying to forget.

Aubrey told me that New York had taken the longest to fall and would eventually be built back up like Sanguis City. In the three years I had been here, I had learned that it was the new vampires that had taken over the world after the majority of them destroyed it first. But what else do you expect when the wealthiest, most powerful people could buy immortality, strength, lethality? The authentic vampires had opened up Pandora's Box by giving human scientists a supposedly dormant virus to save them. The vampires had no idea that it was their vampire DNA that humans were actually after.

The brunette in red leather strutted back over to sit our drinks on napkins. Aubrey pressed real money into her bosom. I didn't know anyone still used cash, but he had just come from outside the city. He immediately held his glass to his nose and sniffed. “Ah, this is why I am here; you can't get a good drink anywhere but here anymore.” Holding it up, he swirled the drink around.

“We didn't have much to drink on the reservation, only what we could grow, herbal tea and honey, milk,” I started.

“Real milk, that's something you just can't get anymore.” Aubrey finished his drink as I started sipping my wine. “But what about you, the world is falling apart, and you leave one of the most heavily armed, healthiest, purest places?” He shook his head.

“Where else could I have gone,” I pointed at my fangs. “They didn't want me anymore.” I looked away toward the crowd dancing.

“So you never met a vampire until when, when did you leave?” Aubrey rested his chin on his fist truly fascinated.

“When I was eighteen.” I left out the part about Jack, of course, and Sander. I had too many secrets. “My mother said it was where I should go. The city the vampires built,” I lied while imagining my mother saying it. I studied his face. Aubrey couldn't tell I was lying. Tombs had said it may be one of my abilities, not being read.

“And your father, did he approve of sending you to the City of Blood?”

“Dead,” I answered simply. I had no feelings about it one way or the other. He had died from the plague before I was born, like a lot of people.

“And you never saw a vampire until you got here? Amazing.”

I let him answer his own question, and then added, “If you don't count the movies. But I have had fangs all my life. It is not like I didn't know vampires existed.” I lit one of his cigarettes if you can't beat them and all. Yes, Sanguis City was just like an old movie to me.

“So, you didn't grow up in the dark? It's dark upstate now, real dire conditions.”

I looked around at the neon illuminating the bar at the edges. “No, we were lucky; we had electricity for a few hours every night. Off the grid, of course,” I said a little too proudly. My mother had probably only been invited to the safe haven, pregnant and widowed because she was a Green Engineer. Then it hit me, a feeling of guilt. Charmed by a handsome man stroking my back, I wasn't being careful. Telling vampires about the human reservation was something I did willingly all the time but never the specifics. Life at the reservation was all about survival. We were walled off from the world, by actual wall or by mountain. 56,000 acres of the Qualla Boundary were protected by armed guards, tanks, helicopters, you name it. Even after what happened, I was not about to betray them by giving out too much information.

Before he could ask me another question, I smiled at him showing all my fangs. That usually shut a vamp up. Besides, I felt comfortable. He was laughing; no one seemed to laugh much anymore. No man I had gone out with had ever put his arm around me, like they were just happy to be with me. Aubrey's eyes shifted from my fangs to my cleavage and back to my eyes. He motioned for more drinks, and his hand went lower down my back. I arched my back a smidgen in response to his cold touch, placing my hand on his leg. He moved into to me, lightly kissing my lips. It was instant, I wanted him. Maybe I should have taken two ingests?

The moment he locked eyes with me in class, I had imagined him kissing me. His cool lips gave way for his forceful tongue to explore my mouth, and I melted into his hold. The hand that had been stroking my back moved up to steady my head as he attacked my mouth. My hands ran up under his jacket in response. I could feel his firm body under his cotton tee. Aubrey's other hand went to my stray hair, gently placing it behind my ear. Then his finger ran down my neck and the curve of my bosom. I literally fought for air. He didn't need to breathe, but he pulled back. His fangs were out, and he looked at my neck longingly.

“Not here,” I responded in a whisper. I had never done it in public before, let someone bite me. Yes, Dante's did take out. Meaning Aubrey could drink from me at the table, but I wasn’t that kind of girl. My legs were trembling as he pulled me to stand. He grabbed my coat and purse and quickly but carefully maneuvered us through the crowd.

website: http://www.themorganjane.com