Thrall (A Vampire Romance) Read Online Free PDF

to put the famous Welcome sign past the airport, so all I saw of it heading into town was the back, the part that says Drive Carefully.
    The sky was huge. I just kept staring up, marveling at the blue as much as the buildings. I lived most of my life in a city, so I was used to tall buildings, but the sheer mass of the Strip casinos was unbelievable. The Luxor was across from the airport, gleaming black and ominous in the sunlight, its pyramid shape a blade of gleaming onyx.
    There were fake statues and fake Venetian villas and sidewalks twice as wide as I was used to, and all of it teeming with people. People in suits, people in shorts, hawaiian shirts and dudebros in polos and a guy in a foam rubber suit that looked like a cartoony Michael Jackson and had to be as hot as hell.
    People paid other people to take pictures for them or with them and people shouting and handing out papers advertising strip clubs and escorts. Andi honked the horn as a billboard bearing a half naked woman rolled by us in the next lane over, drawn by a beaten-down pickup truck.
    A Jeep full of boys our age hooted and hollered and I had to grab Andi’s arm to keep her from flashing them.
    “Oh, calm down,” she shouted, waving at them as the light turned and we started moving.
    “We’ll get arrested.”
    “B-b-but Andi,” she whimpered, mocking me, “We might get in trouble.”
    “Andi,” I groaned.
    “Baby, what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas. This is your last forty-eight hours of freedom. We are going to enjoy it.”
    “Let’s just get to the hotel alive, okay?”
    “Pussy,” Andi snorted, and floored it.
    For a few feet, anyway. Traffic was deadlocked, between the sheer volume of cars and all the people crossing the street at the intersections. It took us an hour to drive about five miles, from the airport to downtown. Freemont Street, the other section of town devoted to tourists and gambling. Primarily, I mean. There were slot machines in the airport. The whole place was devoted to gambling.
    Looking around, I didn’t feel like we were in a den of iniquity. It felt like any other city, even with all the surreal sights like a fake Eiffel tower and a fake Statue of Liberty and the Stratosphere, a giant tower hefting a flying saucer far into the sky. I craned my neck to stare up at it as we passed under, and wondered why we weren’t staying there. Andi planned all this. I just hoped she knew what she was doing.
    The bizarre part was the section of town we drove through next. The huge casinos, bright lights and glamor all just disappeared, and it looked like any other low-rise urban sprawl. It looked like a nice town, at least in daylight. Finally Andi turned off and pulled up to the valet parking at the hotel.
    Our place was at the far end of Freemont Street, next to the gigantic Golden Nugget. It was a smaller hotel, called the Freemont Star. The valets helped us with our bags, paying particular attention to Andi. She bathed in the attention, strutting around and thrusting out her chest.
    I wanted to hide behind my ring. She gave them a tip, I guess to park the car close to the door so we could get it ourselves. Then we checked in, and again Andi greased the clerk at the counter. I was starting to think she had a stack of bills dedicated to passing out to random people.
    I’d never been in a casino before. I was just barely old enough. While Andi and Kelly (who’s Kelly?) bantered with the lady at the counter, I wandered over and stared out at the casino floor. Every surface either had a flashing colored light or was brightly polished to bounce the lights around the room. There was so much motion.
    Moving lights, moving people, dice flying through the air, roulette wheels turning. It was a little intoxicating, even if it did make me want to curl up in the hotel room with a book. I couldn’t believe I’d agreed to this. Crowds and places like this were never my cup of tea, but it was important to Andi. I stood there and wished