Firstly V and I would like to wish all our followers an incredibly Merry Christmas and the best of the holiday season...live happy, love lots, love hard, love kinky...*winks*
This is something I wrote for V, for Christmas, I started it late October and it is the prequel to our lives..it is mostly my life..some of you may know some of these things, if you have followed us from the very start, but I hope you all enjoy it...
V, you are my life, my love, my pyrocant, my soul and my entire world...thank you for being you. I couldnt have asked for a better mate...or a better Christmas.
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Strange what you think about when nursing your young, how your mind can flick to the past and dwell there with a soft reminiscence that speaks nothing of nightmares and everything of Fate. She'd beaten me, abused me, and I'd borne it silently. She'd taken my life and I'd fought for it, reclaiming my soul in the hopes someone out there had the skill to piece it's fragments back into a single essence. I had always been fractured. Never perfect, in my eyes or anyone else's...no matter what I said, how I held myself, how I looked, no matter how beautiful I was, to everyone I was always flawed. And that's before the lithe lines of my body became a canvas for cruelty, the novel of my sadistic, tortured initiation into mated life scribed in silver lashes, mercurial flames lingering the scars of sunlight on my skin and scored deep, a portent to the century I would live willingly etching death into the fabric of my life.
You kill once, what is the difference when done the second time, or the third? Who is going to naysay you when you wield the hand of their destruction? When you control their fate? Nothing. Absolutely nothing. Primitive, soul-destroying anguish and pure power freed me from the bondage of hell, taught me to take my agony and use it against others, to protect...so no one would ever suffer as I did...would ever...lose...what I did. My torture was unleashed. First on my tormentors, their friends...My father, for delivering me in a satin dress with a goddamn fucking bow into the hands of evil, ignorance no excuse. For years his son had been preparing me for pain, for the darkest humiliation, for the fucking subjugation of everything I was...weakening me, to that pathetic snivel of a female who cowed at the slightest male movement, who ran from shadows when they came to her bed. But she died along with her daughter and was reborn in a christening of fire and blood, chains her armor, scars her clothes, ink and crimson life a warpaint that ran rivers through the household and seeped into hell, an ensanguined message to Evil that she would not be its slave anymore.
I became...a phantom, a legend that abused females whispered of and the Glymera hunted with silver bullets. Fucking boogeyman, naught but a whisper on the wind, breezing through states, no trace, my life scattered in lockers, stopping to ink my skin with the swirling tally of lesser jars building all over the country. But it never lasted. My skin ate up the swirls with a deadly hunger, pigments losing the black, shucking it off like a bad dream. Never. Fucking. Permanent. Every stop, topping up the tats, adding more, an unending cycle of pain that morphed into the ecstasy of a theoretical orgasm. What you read about. Blissed out, floating. I got that. From the bite of the needle, the slash of a blade as lessers came out of the woodwork to take on the weak little female...I lived for it...the pain, it grounded me in heaven and kept the nightmares at bay with euphoria...until it wasn’t enough. No mere scratch could deafen the demons. I needed...more.
***
The night was empty...nothing but heavy footfalls on rain-slick sidewalk. No point disguising my tread, the thunder crashing overhead was enough to drown out a herd of elephants tramping through Caldwell in metal booties, humans and civilians alike scurried for shelter in their homes, gathered in door wells, and clubs, waiting for a break in the torrential downpour so they could hasten to their houses and sleep dry, curled under thick sheets, comforters pulled up to their chins, warm, safe. And for that reason I hoped the rain never stopped, hoped they got drenched through to bone and had to stick it out stood next to a stranger, huddled together for warmth as the power flickered, lights spasming sharp glows, music blaring the dulcet thrusting tones of Elvis Presley, or the Marvelettes screeching about postmen. My brain throbbed. Too much noise, too many people, the advancement of technology a curse bringing grainy images to screen and leaving silence a thing of the past. I hated cities. Wished I'd stayed in Romania and left the New World to the humans and sheep civilians. But a century later and I still hadn’t found the balls to go back...and now I had a reason to stay. A rumour, that the Brotherhood were making their home here. It gave me hope. Surely the honor guard wouldn’t traipse across sea and country to track me to the doorstep of their warrior superiors? Surely they wouldn’t be allowed to carry out their plans of execution? Provided they could find me...I hadn’t heard tell of them for ten states. I would not let them kill me. My life was mine to dictate, I would leave it when I damn well fucking chose.
The one thing about wandering into a new city was finding a light tight space to stay. None of my race could be trusted to put me up, they could be bought and they were the chattiest when money talked. I'm not an idiot. The Glymera would (try to) kill on sight, the opposite end of the spectrum, the homeless, the drug users, were likely to rob me for the $3 in my pocket and cause me to slit throats left, right and centre. Attention I could not afford. But I HAD to be here. The civilian in Ohio hadn’t been the only one telling me to go to Caldwell, that that's where my ink would be. In the hands of a male few thought to mess with. Oh Joy. He'd be about as ready to ink me as kill me then...that or try to fuck me and then there would be one less male on the planet. The females I'd met had been surprised that I wasn’t mated, settled down, at least scratching that biological itch that seems to take over every species, humans and vampires alike constantly seeking the orgasmic pleasures another person can bring. And maybe I was broken. That heavy handling had torn that part of me that craved sexual contact. No. I wanted pain. My lover was agony, war, I cosied up with shadows and fought my way to satisfaction. Blood was the only thing that ran in the wake of bliss. And I was content to keep it that way.
Passing old warehouses and abandoned factories, I'd moved away from civilisation, treading into ever darkening swells of shadows, and where fear or anxiety would take a human mind in the grip of nightmares, my body relaxed for the first time. The world shut out with the bright lights fading and the noise diminishing to a low hum before concrete and miles consumed me in the night recesses of dilapidated buildings. Tomorrow I would search for holiday abandoned civilian homes, the human Christmas season a time for our kind to gather with family, take a trip to the motherland, leaving expensive homes up for grabs for the likes of me. I'd scope them out, pick where to sleep on what night, never staying long enough for my scent to establish a lingering trail, but this coming dawn, the warehouse would be my shelter. Thick soled Doc Martens, conveniently stolen on my brief pass through Munich a few years back, kicked through the termite-weakened wood of a door frame, access granted, and with the lithe, fluid stealth of a feline, my body slid through the tiny gap, forcing it wider, pressuring it off its hinges and sighing into another concrete cave of dust. The warehouse was an expanse of forgotten crates, an old set of dresser drawers toppled beneath a fallen beam, rats scurried from my growling sneeze and my footfalls disturbed bats in the rafters. God I was a stereotype. Vampire living in a dank place with only rats and bats as companions...feeding on anyone I could when the hunger struck. But Dracula got nothing on me. Making up a small pallet of dust covers, my body slides down the concrete wall in a soft whoosh of stolen clothes, the tight pull of my ponytail released from its band to cushion my head in a fall of inky waves, resting back with a low sigh, knees drawn up to stave off a chill only felt in the preceding days of impending hunger, my thoughts far away from confined brick and dingy settings. Whisked into a realm of tales my father told my brother as I hid outside the door and listened. Tales of the ultimate fighters ripping lessers limb from limb in brutal gory detail, storing their hearts in a tomb no one had ever seen and few believed existed. But my father believed. He believed his son should have been inducted into the Brotherhood, believed I would have been one if only my anatomy had been slightly more masculine. Hence the fancy Brother name he insisted on putting before the Glymera appellation. He would be turning in his grave, (if he had one) to know I, his eternally inadequate offspring, was in the city of the Brothers. Maybe as I hunted for this male, V, I would run into the notorious warriors of the Black Dagger Brotherhood...I certainly hoped I didn’t. No telling if they would side with the Glymera and take my head to the Council.
Dawn came and went a hundred times over Caldwell, my life rising and falling with the change of night to day, settling into the stride of the city with loud growls and colouring the streets with the inky blood of the enemy. Everywhere I went the cities would run black as I hunted, the insane urge to eradicate this threat from our world a roar in my blood ever since I freed myself from the freak show of my mating, and I well equipped myself to do the job. Arming myself with all the combative and defensive skills anyone could ask for, fluent in the language of weaponry, a new mission settled on scarred shoulders.
***
The first time I saw them, those Brothers people whisper of, I was hunting my own smelly fuckers, blades cool against the skin of my wrist, hilts hot in my palms, prowling over the rooftops of Caldwell, eyes locked in a cat-like glimmer of bright narrowed emerald onto the backs of four lessers...the fuckers had helped my hellren torture me...I was going to destroy every last one of them until the Omega himself came to see where his children were disappearing off to. With silent footfalls, battered military boots tread the slick concrete of flat roofs, leaping small alleys with the grace of a predator, stalking saccharine scented prey with death in my eyes....and then my night went to shit. Three larger than life males materialising not ten paces from the quad of lessers and throwing my plans into a growl of anger. Fuckers!!! This kill was mine! I didn’t wander the chill night for kicks and giggles...well ok sometimes I did...but not tonight.
Tonight I wanted my hands to hurt from punches, my ribs to bruise from jabs, my body to ache from the thrill of the fight and these assholes, are stealing my night out...Crouched down, I watched. Not much more I could do and I want to see my competition in action. A new aspect to my game, now I'd be hunting for the win, beating them to their prey, and my future nights just got a whole lot more interesting. Fingers curling over the edge of the roof, hunkered low...waiting....and then it kicks off in a whir of fists and fangs, black blood arching in all directions, the blade in the large meaty hand of an arrogant blonde haired male...too perfect, his looks didn’t detract from his lethality, but that finely honed beauty set me on edge. The others, an incredibly tall male with hair almost as long as my own and just as black and a shorter male who...holy hell...who had more visible scars than I.
A streetlight illuminated a face...an 'S' shaped curve cutting his face in half and snaking his top lip up in a permanent sneer. Both screamed menace, it was bleeding from their very pores as they hacked and slashed with brutal skill, leaving inky blood to run free. Spectacular killing machines of muscle and well-bred strength. I won’t compare them to thoroughbred stallions, 'cause I find that a little creepy....Tigers, they were, feral, fanged tigers, bred for their power, their muscle, their agility, their ability to kill if unarmed. And I watched, fascinated from my rooftop, any annoyance over my territory being stolen lost to the awe of seeing such fury unleashed by such as they. The lessers didn’t stand a chance. Oh don’t get me wrong. There was no hero worship of any kind, but I have eyes and the predator inside me saw them as a threat, and could respect them...if only for their fighting. I would encounter them again and again in the half century that followed, in different trios, different places, sticking to the shadows that never failed to disguise my presence and moving my hunting grounds elsewhere in the hopes they wouldn’t track a lone female and find any reason to delve. But Fate, once again, denied me this anonymity and set up her own plan for a collision with a Brother I would never have thought could have any impact...let alone change the entire course of my life.
***
Four years. It took me four years to find what I had come to Caldwell for, and the finding of it wasn’t all that pretty. But fuck, was it worth it. As all good dark stories start, it was raining...no, wait...it was flooding...like someone up there had just tipped over a giant swimming pool and was trying to drown the ants scurrying below. Torrential. Fucking. Downpour. It always seems to be raining, but the winters are where most of my encounters occurred, longer nights, shorter days, more time to hunt and kill and bleed, when evil comes out of the woodwork to play in the dark while the sun hides from the chill and leaves us nocturnal predators to rule our realm under the adoring glow of an icy moon. I was soaked through to bone once more, my original scraps of clothing exchanged for new threads, whipped off the back of a thrift store pickup as it pounded along the road at high speed...and by whipped, I mean WHIPPED...black, leather, longer than my body twice over, the thing came in handy for more than lashing my skin to smithereens...it could steal bagels from plates, pastries from early delivery trays, strangle lessers from a distance before I play up close and bloody with their insides. And snatch bags from trucks...but even half decent clothes couldn’t stop the water from freezing to my skin in a sopping drench, and waterlogged, already baggy jeans hung off battle sculpted curves, Doc Marten's splashed through puddles, heading for an address I hoped really turned out right this time.
Fuck you for wondering why I'm walking, dematting is hard on an empty stomach and since the neighborhood was new to me, I didn’t want to end up materialising in someone's bathroom and scaring a naked human to death...nor did I want to risk being blinded by such a sight. So I prowl, stalk...Okay, I sulk towards this address with all the finesse of a drowned rat, every gated domicile passed with nary a glance...the numbers were too low, I needed to get higher, winding down into an area of barking dogs that shrank back at a growl from my throat, iron link rails barring entry from doorways, curtains twitched by nosy fingers...My warehouse looked better than some of these places and that's saying something. Nostrils flaring out as a tendril of baby powder crept across my senses, head whipping around, eyes scanning the gloom with the intensity of a X-ray, penetrating shadows with an emerald glare that finds nothing but darkness...just a trace then, whatever had been here was long gone. And then I'm there...the scent unmistakable. Masculine, powerful, disappearing into the tucked away building wired in with barbs and steel spikes, a tall wall glassed on top...not at all civilian...different, potent...my fangs ache for it, but I'm not here for blood. I'm here for ink.
And my break comes quickly, far quicker than I could have expected, I was ready to huddle down and stake the damn place out, but the minute the door opens and tall, broad, and admittedly handsome steps out, my mind switches to immediate planning. Well, half of my mind does, intent of collecting the ink people say this male possesses, the other half...admires. Roaming appreciatively over strong jaw, the brush of stubble framing a firm mouth, the dark slash of black brows over impossibly beautiful eyes and a hint of ink curling at his temple...mesmerized, the male moved before I'd caught up with the fact, his head snapping in my direction, my body split flat to the muddy shallows of a puddle a split second before...waiting to be hauled up on my feet and quickly dispatched...but nothing comes...cautious emerald eyes peeking up over a ridge of earth and rubble...nothing...no one.
Gone. The rage of male presence, like sunlight in the dark of a nocturnal existence, had simply disappeared. Delicate brows pulled together, a deep frown of confusion, scuffed boots kicked me to my feet and took the strides through building debris to the chain link fence and the new gap opening up at the tug of a dirty hand, easing open weak spots until I can scuttle in and take shelter in the alcove. I was wary. The male had been...large...sinister...if he came back...I shut down my thoughts, leaving weakening doubt to drift away with the faint strains of a strange tobacco, and turn a focused mind to infiltrating this run down tight lock of defenses. Seals ran around the windows, bars jailing the inhabitants from the outside world and subsequently, the outside world from them. With my senses cast out, my palm hovers around the pane...trying for electrical pulses that would signify a fairly primitive means of security system...hmmm...something...head shaking in a flick of whipping silken strands that melt into the shadows and dismiss the idea. Too risky. The door. Wood, metal knocker, pretty standard key hole. Open. Wait. Open? A fingertip nudge and the door swung wide into dusky hall, lit by old fire sconces, sparse furniture...drawn deeper, my feet carried me with a drying wipe on the too homely mat into the unknown dwelling, dripping muddy droplets to smooth wood floor with each step, honed in to the beacon of warmth shimmering in the depths of dark cold. A wild fire, logs fresh and sparking, blistering black with the licking flicker of orange light, so welcoming to frozen, wet skin that my hands stretched out like I was in some damn Christmas scrooge movie, craving the heat...and I was so caught up in the radiating pleasure of feeling my fingers that I didn’t notice the tiny vials at first, settled on a corner stone of the fire place, all lined up, stoppered and prepped for toasty hands to lift and vanish with. Black, such an inky black, that emerald eyes had to adjust, refocus to bring the colour out of the shadows.
And it was perfect. The small glass shimmered in my hand as I gripped it in two fingers, shaking it in front of my eyes with an almost awe. This was the stuff that would stick, if I believed what people had told me. This is the stuff that would bury my regrets, my battles, the tally scrolls of death deep into my skin and keep them there. No more time wasted getting the hundreds re-done before I could add more. No more travelling miles trying out different inks. I'd found just a small piece of something that lifted snarling lips into an almost soft smile...pocketing three of the clinking glasses, eyes alit on wet footprints in a sweeping gaze, more than certain I'm alone and thankful for the first time that the heavens have opened again...The male would know someone had been in, but I'm a veritable Houdini at disappearing acts, and he could hunt, but the rain would be like my shadows, washing away my scent, disguising any trace with muddied remains...I'd be invisible once again...and I never thought that one day I'd actually WANT to be found.
***
For fifty years, my fingers lifted the ink from that house, on the days I'd been lucky and managed to find lessers with green-lined pockets, I'd stuff myself with human food and purchase clothes that would suit my lifestyle, that would protect me, and I watched. The Brothers, mainly. The Glymera, for any hint that they were still looking for me. I found myself longing, at times, for a future where I could stop running. I was exhausted, had a permanent crick in my neck from looking over my shoulder. Hunted. Hated. Haunted. A trio of loveliness that just made my days perfect...and let’s not forget...Hungry. It had been mounting slowly, first a few pangs, twinges in my gut, growling from my stomach to the point that human food wouldn’t cut it, human blood wasn’t an option, I'd kill them and have another warrant on my head..No, I'd have to hunt my own kind, seduce a few pints from some civilian throat, or just plain take it at gun point. Not something I particularly liked doing, and as I set myself up in the alley behind Zero Sum, knowing the Reverend would leave me be if I didn’t kill ON his property, I could taste the lingering remnants of my last meal. Could feel him inside me, part of my blood. And it disgusted me, to have someone else running through my heartbeat...always the same, I loathed feeding, the intimacy, the closeness, the grabby hands and groping fingers, pushing under my shirt as I took from them, trying to work themselves into my pants as my fangs drove into their throats...how was it any different from what I had escaped from? They all wanted something from me...they wanted my body, they wanted to own and tame, use me as property, the pretty bad girl on their arm to boost their rep...I'd heard them, the males in the clubs I frequented, the brave ones who'd approach and buzz around me like mosquitoes, whining in my ear and making me edgy as all get out.
I hated them. Every single one. I wanted to cut and bleed them until they left me alone, I wanted to drink myself deaf to their lusts, I wanted to hide away and never come out...but the females needed me, they needed protection from these assholes, they needed someone who would listen, would fight for them. I couldn’t do that if I hid myself underground. So I fought, killed smelly pale fuckers, stashed their hearts in lockers or storage units, stole and bartered with my homicidal tendencies...fed...And the time had come again. Bare shoulders pressed back into the wall, spine curved, hips cocked out from damp brick, I was a cross between seductive and threatening, all coiled tension and concealed weapons in leather and a mesh tank, a dark shadow of hungry energy devouring the light around me with an aura of Fuck You.
"You're looking tense there, female." The male voice crept from the shadows, loaded with a menace I didn’t want to touch on, but it made my hands inch for my daggers, lightly caressing hilts...one wrong move and whoever would be shish kebabbed on the damn wall.
"Not tense..." Eyes narrowed, trying to focus through the shadows in the direction of the voice....searching. "I'm as relaxed as a sloth right now." Lying through my goddamned teeth, my body was a twitch of tension, hardwired to prowl and attack, to take prey where it's found, and starving as I was, this male was a threat.
"Yeah, I'm believing you, female. You look all spa massaged and shit."
"Don’t call me female again...warrior..." Clouds had shifted to spill light to the scarred face of a Brother, the one people believed was a female killer. But something kept me from signing on to that theory. He was brutal, yes, didn’t particularly care for my kind, but he was damaged. And emerald eyes scanned the lean, barely filling out his tee body, as though the answers would be written there...all mine were, scribed into flesh by the lash of a cruel past.
"Don’t try to fucking read me, female." A large hand went over hair trimmed down to the skull, a nervous tick that pulled the scarred sneer higher with the agitated words. "You're hungry. Don’t deny it, you'll just piss me off. Now you been creeping around Brotherhood biz, and that shit could get nasty fast. Your scent is at every scene we go to. I'm not quite sold that you're the one leaving the lesser mulches, but you keep leaving that stinking shit out?" A tongue click, an exhaled growl, leaving consequences up to the imagination.
I'd taken an angry step, blade in hand, before the motion registered. "Do not fucking threaten me. I'm not scared of your king. I'm not scared of you." I wasn’t, he pissed me off, made me edgy, but not scared. "I know a few things your damn King might be interested in. Seems his civilians aren’t all that fucking civil." And his eyes were doing the same scan that he'd growled at me for doing. I cocked a brow, tightened my hold around the hilt of my dagger and turned, offering my back, hair pulled over my shoulder to display the scars marring a silvery lattice on porcelain skin. "My name is Tory, and you can’t do anything to me that hasn’t already been done. So drop the threats, and leave me the hell alone."
"No can do, fe...Tory. You're dangerous like this...to them." His jaw jerked towards the people just starting to spill from the club in a riot of too short clothes and raucous laughter. My fangs throbbed, all that blood rushing through intoxicated veins...should be disgusting, it was, under the gnawing hunger."If you need an in with Wrath, I can talk to him, set up a meet...as for the feeding..." These words were bitten out, pushed from between clenched teeth. "I can help you."
"I can’t feed from you." It was a bite of sound shaping words through a growl, barely a voice, just a snarling refusal that flicks up the blades of my defences.
"I can’t feed you." There goes the hand scrubbing over that skull trim again, the warrior's shoulders hunched, his eyes haunted eyeing the scars crisscrossing my back. Hair falling to conceal, my expression is...confused, turning emerald eyes to coal black. " I meant, I can have someone come feed you. One of my brothers. The ones that don’t have females, I'm sure would be happy to help a damsel in distress. They're the fucking hero type." He sneered the words, that scar more pronounced in his derision, cutting his face in half in a serpentine slash, and the damsel in distress had my lip curling up off wicked elongated pearly blades in a snarl of protest.
"Like I fucking need your help. There are plenty of willings up in here." My turn to chin jerk, eyes hard as the gem they were coloured with.
"But none strong enough to satisfy. The Brotherhood bloodlines are pure. For the most part. Don’t be an idiot. You kill anyone and the Brotherhood will be gunning for you. Your meet with Wrath will go down, and end in blood you can be sure."
He was deadly serious, that sneer gone even though his lip was still cranked up that way. My booted toe scuffed the floor, my eyes wandering to watch it's leather back and forth as I weighed up my options....my voice was a thread of conceding sound. "Not the pretty blonde." I'd watched him in action. He devoured females like his dragonian side devoured lessers, and I'd hate to be pulled up for removing the male's hands when they wandered.
A short nod, black eyes glittering a dim sort of respect, for my wounds, for my past, for the daggers still caressed in my palms like razor security blankets. "No Rhage. Got it. Hang tight, Tory. I'll see what I can do."
And then he's gone. Blinking out of existence and leaving me with a head full of confusion. There was no reason for him to offer blood aid, other than the marks on my back and the haunted look in his eyes that I'd seen a million times over in the mirror, woken from nightmares that choked the life from you in terror. Sighing a ragged exhale of tension I didn’t know had wound so tight, I dematerialized, abandoning my blood hunt for the time, and stalking a trail of saccharine sweet henchmen of the purest evil.
***
And I'm back to haunting alleyways. This one in particular 'cause I was waiting for some damn fast food of the walking variety. A stumbling civilian, hell, a fucking human would do about now. The warrior hadn't come through...pathetically desperate of me to believe he would but I'd been hungry then and I was fucking ravenous now. No doubt he couldn’t get any of his brothers to feed a starving psychopath female with a warrant on her head...and I was famished, my stomach a cramping hollow pit, fangs a permanent throb punched from my jaw at every enticing scent. And I was weak. My pre and post transition blood bag impression left me susceptible to crazy hungers. Where those of my race could generally last a month easily without feeding, with the injuries I incur on a regular basis, I was a rabid mess after that time, muscles cannibalising themselves in a bid to keep me alive. Human food, human blood, only took the edge off, it wouldn’t save me from going Cujo and tearing into people when it got too bad. I needed a male of my own race, someone strong enough to take my hunger, before I was too far gone to care if they'd survive my (as it would be) assault. Growling, my body trembling, hand dragged roughly through mussed midnight hair, scrubbed down my face, to anyone else, I would be an addict looking for her next fix, strung out and twitching with withdrawal...they couldn’t be farther from the truth. And my head was pounding, the low bass beat from the club drumming my brain into a dull throb, hammering against my skull in an attempt to free itself from the hunger pangs riding my body like a wave of rabid sharks.
Backed into the shadows, consumed with holding back the beast yanking at its chain of hunger, I almost didn’t notice the other presence taking up space in the otherwise abandoned alley, everyone inside gyrating in a blood rushing mass of life...tall...but not much taller than the warrior, Zsadist, his body broader, stacked with muscle that rippled under a jacket and thighs bunched in corded columns of strength encased in leather...fuck, he was humming with vitality, with a power that called my fangs to drop full length, unbidden, aching to punch deep into the pulse beating like a throbbing target in his throat...the shadows coiling fingers around my body blending black leather and midnight hair into the fold of darkness, I made like I was invisible...this male would not give me what I wanted, and taking it would result in a death far quicker than starvation I was sure...but fuck, he called to me, like lines threaded and pulling taut in my lower stomach, a heat winding low to pool slick between my thighs, a base, primal yearning to get closer making a step before I caught myself. But a shaft of light from the moon had already cast me in its glow, a fucking spotlight catching on porcelain skin and the vining tally of death marking me...and a diamond glare cut to pin me in the scorching ethereal glow of warrior power...fuck...him?
This is a male I know. One I have known for half a century...and only with the shadows lifting from his face does my mind lock in on features I studied from afar. He was a Brother? My ink saviour was a Brother? And there's no doubt of it now as a glimmer of movement turned my gaze to the far end of the alley...streetlight bouncing off a skull trim, throwing scarred, distorted lip into sharp relief. Zsadist, his head inclined in a meeting of black and emerald, acknowledging our agreement with a slightly apologetic smirk. Maybe my imagination, maybe just searching for some reassurance when faced with someone who makes me...tense, my insides burning, my skin flushed to pink and my hunger snapping its jaws to be locked into that heartbeat, to drink deep and share the power radiating off a silent mammoth of a male. Dark hair falling in a raven's wing of shadow across the glowing beauty of those eyes, another step taken, as though control isn’t a word in my body's vocabulary. It doesn’t understand and wont obey, shifting in a sinuous feline sway and fluid ripple of lithe muscle, blades caressing my palms, stroked into being from my sheaths and nestled in my grip, a sharp comfort in this disconcerting encounter, attitude bleeding from my pores, my mask in place, a defense against one who doesn’t know just how much I've taken from him.
My name fell from my lips, an offering into the deepening silence as the tension rises, a heat in the air that negates the chill bite of a wintery wind and warms my insides with a fire I've never known the warmth of before. His eyes closed, shutting me off from that gaze and leaving me strangely bereft, my soul had stirred, curious, looking into those eyes and it mourned the loss...until a deep inhale snaps them back open, flooding me in the spotlight beam of stunning diamond.
"You're hungry." A statement. No question from this male. He was all fact. No hint of warmth in that deep growling timbre and yet my lower body clenched, my tongue wet dry lips, subtly stroking a soothe down my fangs, the throbbing incessant, so strong it reverberated between my legs.
"I'll survive, warrior." I would not let on to the depth of my starvation, not even Zsadist had correctly estimated just how hungry I was. But he'd come through after all, though this male seemed less than pleased to be playing blood bag. Diamond eyes narrowed, casting me in slits of disapproval, and...concern? Wishful thinking, Tory.
"No. You'll break and there will be a trail of civilians scattered through Caldwell looking like a tiger went at their throats, true." Like I care...I'd target the Glymera. Incestuous fuckers could always use culling...any thoughts of further resistance were silenced on a wave of rabid hunger with a few short sentences. Invitations. "Feed. Take. I offer my blood freely. No strings attached." And my imagination told me his voice was a little huskier, deepened to a growl because he felt what I felt, he could sense all the heat boiling through my veins on a wave of hunger that had nothing to do with feeding and everything to do with something I'd only ever really read about. Lust.
Arms spread wide out from heavy muscled, broad shoulders, this male was a feast for my senses, emerald eyes stroking over a purely masculine form, the harsh bold shock of black surrounding a perfect, hard, slightly cruel edged mouth in a sinister goatee, the ink I'd only glimpsed on occasion in full view, screaming warnings that fascinated and compelled, those ethereal eyes watching me closely with a carefully cultivated poker face that seemed to flicker with the dark shadowed heat of something I dare not touch on...nostrils flaring out a scenting growl that drags the musky aroma of leather and something else...something that would always mark him apart from any other. Fire and ice, steel, the taste of cold metal on a kiss. A fragrance unlike any other infused in his clothes, his skin. Unique.
And resistance was futile from that point on. I could front disinterest as a fire flamed through my veins in waves of burning starvation but even trying to walk away would bring more agony than taking him up on his offer ever would. I'd moved closer, silent steps overshadowed by the pounding of my heart, the beat of lust pulsating at the apex of my thighs, skin tight hide welded to the lithe honed curves of my body suddenly tighter, containing all my heat under my skin and setting me aflame, so sure I'm incandescent with the fury of my needs and flickering a glow in the dark privacy of a shadowed alleyway. A delicate hand reached out with a tentative grip to leather lapels, curling around the open edges of a weapon weighted jacket, drawing him closer, a looming male that dwarfed my frame, rendering me feminine, so very female in the shadow of his masculine power. The pink tip of my tongue sweeps out on a nervous moan, his scent so close, that pulse pounding under his skin like a beacon calling me home. Up on my tip toes, I was drawn the length of his hard body, radiating heat like he had a furnace under his skin, instinct in control, shutting down doubt and focusing with a single-minded predatory hunger on that heartbeat. My breath was a purr to stubbled skin, tongue flicking out a tentative taste that shuddered into a moan of pure ecstasy.
"Fuck, warrior, are you sure?" I had to check. My fangs grew impossibly longer, the wicked killing hardware of a sabre tooth tiger pressing to his jugular with the soft growled words.
"Very. Fucking. Sure. No strings attached." A repetition of his offer, as though he knew the connection this would form scared me, drew fear up on my skin in a glisten of sweat.
"No strings attached." And then his scent filled my head to capacity, shorted out the part of my brain that allows control and unleashed the full force of a starved female to his throat, tongue sweeping once, twice, testing the skin that jailed the rhythm of his life and sinking deep in a vicious hissing fury. Like a blade through butter, ivory canines scored stubbled flesh and freed the bubbling gush of crimson wine in a hard punching attack that drowned me in the well of this male's essence...Vishous...the name whispered into my head, deep, dark, stroking the recesses of my mind with the sinfully erotic timbre of his soul. Far from disgusted, my body melted at that first taste, rushed through with the nourishing strength of his blood, filling out my cells, injecting power into weakened muscle, coaxing my heart to hammer out a beat of arousal and delirious pleasure as I gorged myself on the intoxicating musk of salty hot liquid emotion.
"Fuck!!" Pained, maybe, but that growl shivered down my spine in a masculine snarl of loaded something else. Cant translate the animal sounds, my head is buzzed, drunk on the furious potency of such a powerful, pure-blooded male, my body voraciously drawing on the well of that strength, tapping deep and hooking into the life it provides in an aggressive attack of desire-laden hunger. My hands aren’t part of me, not the sane part anyway, off on their own exploration, moving, shaping, caressing of their own accord, my brain switched off and instinct taking over, controlling the clawing of nails under black muscle shirt, raking lines of illicit desire to hard, ripped muscle. Fuck...I couldn’t stop, couldn’t stop touching, couldn’t stop feeding, my mouth sealed over the deep twin punctures in a heavy drinking, rough suctioning rhythm of passion, alight with the flames of an emotion I couldn’t quite pin down. And as large hands gripped the leather clad curves of my ass, grinding me to the unmistakably large ridge of arousal straining against the warrior's...Vishous'...zipper, my own were fumbling with said fastening, my brain zoned to the beat inside me, a primal, primitive drum demanding I dance to the tempo of my lust and take what I want, blood...sex...it was synonymous for the first time in my long life. I couldn’t decipher which was which, which was stronger...which one would win. I didn’t get the chance.
"I think that's enough...Tory...Stop."
Maybe it was my name growled in a shiver-deep timbre from his lips or the strong hands circling my wrists that had my palms eagerly grinding over rough hide as my fangs were drawn with a vicious toss of straining, corded muscle from the sanctuary of a thudding life essence, ripped from their hooked lock on hot flesh, cut off from the potent source of blood, the sudden disconnection leaving me weaving, intoxicated. Yanking my hands from the vise of long fingers to plant on my thighs, bent, breathing hard, heart a gallop in my chest, gasping down lungfuls of aroused, blood scented alley air...and I was burning. Sizzling under my leathers, my body was alive with a vitality never felt before, weakness run into remission, if it was any darker by fuck, I'd be glowing, an incandescent blaze of sensation riding me hard with a storm of new emotions.
The red haze cleared from my vision, emerald eyes took the chance to glance from under thick ebony lashes at Vishous, his body tense, practically humming with a strain that flexes power in a ripple under his clothes, staunching the blood staining the black of his shirt with gloved fingers, diamond eyes ablaze with an ethereal inferno that brightens the dingy graffiti molested alley as surely as though there were streetlights down there. Fuck. I was either in very big trouble....or in very big trouble. His mouth was a slash of blood stained lips, fangs dimpling out over his lower one to flash lethal ivory in the midst of black goatee...his face masked with something I had no words for, such a blend, it was a dangerous cocktail that captivated me, hypnotised me...I was a mouse caught in the eyes of a cobra, daring to stare down a possible death...
"Well...that was..." A husky cough, that gloved hand riding around to his nape, pulling the arm of his jacket tight over cut biceps and tugging his shirt up to reveal the smooth ripped muscle bunched under golden skin...my tongue slipped out involuntarily to sweep my lips with a gloss of lingering heat, imagining my mouth following the line of his hip...Erotic thoughts wound through the blood ecstasy, disturbed by words I half missed. "....Tory, are you ok?" Yes I'd zoned out, too focused on exposed flesh that his mouth had been moving and I'd been staring, deaf to his words.
"I'm solid, Vishous. Thanks to you...Did I...hurt you?" I pulled my gaze back to the hooded diamond of his, those unearthly eyes probing under the surface of my skin with warm fingers, seeking out my thoughts, tugging at inner strings that led to the juncture of my thighs and worked up a dull ache. Fuck. Lessers...ugly, gross, disgusting lessers, think about that Tory, not warm skin, the rush of blood pounding under stubbled flesh...shit. He knew, he must know. I swear he was in my head, stroking those thoughts to bright erotic images I never could have formed on my own, making me feel. Or it was the blood. His emotions, his thoughts, what he had at some time felt influencing my body with latent memories and stirring up lusts that weren't originally mine.
And I could be deceiving myself. Desire is a thing heard of in songs, read about in books, watched on TV, not experienced by someone like me. Cold, my heart encased in ice and barbed wire. But there was no denying the heat spreading through me, the fire in my blood, the scorching arousal bloomed between my thighs.
"No, you didn’t...hurt me, true." His head inclined, a wicked glint of fangs catching the light from a stray moonbeam on a barking laugh. "You're welcome Tory. I'd say anytime but..."
My head shook, arms wrapping around my chest, a self-embrace, keeping hands that wanted to touch to myself, the offer slipping from crimson stained lips before my brain could filter the bizarre urge. "Do you need to feed?"
"No, Tory. No strings attached, remember? You owe me nothing." There went that smile again, a flash of fangs that drew a breathy growl from my lips. "But I do need to go, true. Brotherhood biz. You'll try to stay out of trouble?" His brow quirked up, a dark slash above bright eyes. That was the first time he said that to me, it wouldn’t be the last. I'd had a taste of something that would haunt me in the best possible way.
My smirk curling off the pearl dagger of a fang. "Cant promise anything, warrior..."
Laughter, low, dark, wicked. "I'll see you around, Tory." And then that incredible burning presence blinked out of existence, dematerializing and leaving me standing in the darkness, my emotions thawing, my sex molten...surrounded in the masculine scent of fire and ice, steel and the potent drugging aroma of his blood. Fuck.
***
The months passed in flashes of fighting and inky blood, the glint of a blade, the sunsets and sunrises casting pinky purple hues across my vision in a watercolour of existence, my ink supplies dwindling because I'd lost the balls to go back to his place after...Yeah...fuck knows my days had been sleepless since then, the power coursing through my veins a high I wasn’t used to, no lethargy that comes with hunger, just a pure undiluted strength that kept me out hunting 'til the rays of daylight tinged my skin with a flush of pain. I could kill in a blaze of razor mercury and it never be enough, something was missing and my brain nudged me with images of diamond eyes. No. Just no. I would not be distracted from my mission by a male that I was only feeling through a one sided blood link. I couldn’t figure if this shit was mine, or a projection of what biology wanted from me.
The moon mocked me from her cradle of stars, the pluming mist of my breath let out sighing exhales with every step I took into the tree inhabited park, limbs of wood reaching to stroke my cheek, to snag skin tight clothes in thorny grasps as I moved through the undergrowth. Paths are for the humans, for the civilians. The monsters lurked in the darkness, and I belonged with them...a predator of predators, hunting down lessers with a single mindedness that shut out whatever fuzzy feminine feelings Vishous had loaded into my blood with his dose of power, focused on shifting shadows as they made their way towards a wandering couple. Moonlight romances, kissing in the dim light. Stupid idiot. He was a civilian, a vampire, thought he was safe with his little human thing, unaware as he slipped his tongue into her mouth that four albino ass motherfuckers were staked out waiting for a moment of utter distraction to...pounce.
Fuck! My body launched into a full on sprint, lithe legs powering me forward with the lethal grace of a feline, vaulting fallen trees to reach the couple seconds after the lessers started in on them. Never seen someone so startled as when they are suddenly face down, crumpled under the surprise attack of a tiny 110lb female, a single purring slice spilling inky blood to the moonlit concrete in a smile to the skin of their throats. Two lessers went down that way, immobilised for a later dispatch as I found my footing in the oil slick of their blood and flashed a deadly threat of ivory fangs at the two remaining.
"Hey, boys...You..." Turning to the slightly beaten male and his human, black dripping blade pointed towards the busy streets beyond the tree line. "Run..." They did, tripping over heels and shiny black loafers in a scurry of fear to the well lit streets, my attention lingering only long enough to see them safely to the other side before switching to the predatory zone where only blades and blood made sense. Startling speed had me on the pale smelly fucks in a half blink, a screaming silence following the daggered dance of lithe, deadly curves...I didn’t even want to shoot them. Close up felt better, channeled the fury of emotions in my soul down the silvery razor blade of perfectly weighted, admittedly stolen, knives and gutted the fuckers, navel to nose, a flash and pop sending sweet disintegration into the clear nights air. It wasn’t even a fight; the idiots had given in to the surprise and just stood there open mouthed. Not much of a thrill when there was no aggression to it.
No fear of being overpowered making you fight for your life as well as the innocents around you, no real adrenaline pumping your veins up...it dissipated too fast, that rush, leaving me spine to treeing it and breathing in the fresh scent of a just falling snow storm like I'd just come up from drowning...with a gash the size of Central America colouring my curves crimson...Ahhh...Fuck....
The park's towering trees gave way to the tall thin guardian lamposts, shedding light on the stalking sway of my leather clad form as I made my way home...well...to the luxury hotel room I'd managed to sneak a few days stay in, the stories that it was haunted keeping people from ever really wanting to acquire it. But it would do...the winter months were harsh even on our kind if they were stuck in a large drafty warehouse as snow drifted in to cage an igloo of ice around the doors. I was dripping, leaking lifesblood to the smattering of white on the sidewalk, my side an agony of heat throbbing my heartbeat through the curved gouge slipping under my waistband, the leather shredded to the top of my thigh in a scything line of pain. A frozen bite stumbled my steps and had me caught on the wall with a fanged hiss. Yeah. No way I could walk the entire way without drawing attention, I was teetering like a damn weeble for some goddamn reason, and it served to piss me off. I hadn’t even felt the attack, hadn’t felt the blade point slip through my flesh and carve me up to bleed precious crimson to the floor. The wall was cold, my hair sticking to the stippled brick as I fought to calm, to focus through the pain and organise my molecules to shatter and reform on the balcony of my borrowed room.
Home. I needed to get off the streets and sew this up pronto before I leeched life like some bizarre juicer stuck on squeeze, the pounding of my heart driving my blood through the gash at a frightening pace. 1....2....3....vapor, a hum of energy split off and disconnected, my soul apart from my body and streaming through the universe to rejoin corporeality on the solid setting of a 12th floor terrace.
Sliding glass doors parting at a faintly pushed command, a bare sliver of energy directed and unlocking the latch to admit me entrance to the soothing warmth of the minimalistic modern room, a suite of sorts, the couch littered with torn leathers, blades most probably slipped between cushions to hide in case of a surprise attack of maids, stashed down in one of my many panics of discovery. I was half dropped to the welcoming sofa when a buzz ran through my bloodstream, like I was plugged up to a game of Operation and someone had tapped the metal to my insides, setting off alarms that tweaked at my desire and fight and brought both to the forefront. Only one presence could have such a dichotomic effect on my being, and the groan that fell from my lips was his welcome, the hiss of the glass doors a shush for the third time, an opening swoosh delivering him to the mess of my suite. Fuck it. My body dropped to sprawl in a growl of pain to the plush cushions of the sofa, words murmured in his general direction as emerald eyes danced to look anywhere but at him. The warrior. The Brother. Vishous.
"What are you doing here? I don’t remember sending out an invite."
"You're hurt." Dead to the point again, he didn’t mince words, his harsh inhale letting on to more than just the fact I was bleeding on a borrowed couch, the heat that curled at the juncture of my thighs an immediate and uncontrollable response to his proximity. Something, some inner female part, was thrilled by his...concern? Or maybe he didn’t want me ruining his streets with the taint of my blood. Probably more to the point. Not good PR for our race if a dead female was found frozen to the sidewalk...
"Are you always Mr. Obvious? It gets annoying...Are you here to watch me bleed, warrior?"
A laugh barked into the suite, powerful arms rippling muscle as he shed the heavy leather of his jacket and moved closer, tossing weapon laden hide to the back of the couch and hunkering down in front of me. "No." Head shaking, diamond eyes were fixated on the bloody mess of my clothes, X-Ray sights seeking beneath fabric. "Now let me see, I'm handy with a needle and thread, my brothers can attest to that, true...let me see..." Like he's coaxing a wild animal from the buried depths of the cushions, I'd backed up so far as his hand moved to peel blood soaked clothes from torn flesh. My fingers batted a smack to gloved knuckles, rising in a hiss of pain to stand over him.
"You make me look like Frankenstein and I'll be gunning for your ass." Fighting words, scars....couldn’t bother me, it would just be another war wound if he fucked it up...but at least I wouldn’t be bleeding. Slowly, forcing the material of my shirt to part with my skin in a wet slip and shedding it to the floor, eyes caught on a spot behind his head as my cheeks rose a bright pink flush. Fuck, thank the Dear Virgin Scribe I'd worn panties, was my only thought as I scraped the scraps of leather from my thighs, peeling bloody hide to land in a heap at my feet and standing in an aura of self consciousness before a male who made porcelain skin pink with embarrassment and desire.
He laughed softly, and I swear I imagined the gloved finger stroking gently over the curve of my hip, deluded myself that the murmured words from his lips were, "Silly female, you know full well you could look like Quasimodo after a run-in with a Sushi chef and you would still be the most beautiful person I have ever seen," and not the louder, clear spoken, "Scars don't bother me..." His smile really knocked me for a loop, no smirking, no darkness, just pure, out of the blue, amusement as he swept a hand in the direction of the couch. "Cop a seat. We need to stop this bleeding, true. You got supplies?" He was quick working to my instructions, my body laid out on the couch in a line of bleeding curves by the time he returned with the medi-kit I'd swiped...oh, months ago. "You want something to kill the pain?" He was already threading the surgical wire through a wicked hooked needle, eyes narrowed in diamond concentration.
"No, you won’t hurt me. Just...do it." Fingers clenching around the soft pillow stuffed at my side, I twisted, exposing the ripped laceration slicing down my abs and kissing the flesh of my upper thigh in a harsh arc, offering my body to the skilled healing hands gently pushing the torn pieces of skin together. He hesitated, and tension vibrated through me on a wave of pain. "Do it. You said you could help. So help. And...Don’t stare."
His gaze was hot as it roamed the lace covered dips and hollows of my inked form, turning to an icy growl as his hands steadied at my waist, and the tip of the needle penetrated my skin, spearing the valley sides of the gouge together and threading them closed...one stitch...two, three...I lost count after a while, a lull of throbbing pain shutting my body down and focusing my brain on the rhythmic pierce and pull, fascinated by the flashes of diamond that lit off in his eyes as he thought of something displeasing. He never wavered, sealing the long gash with a talented hand, the pattern of stitches corseting my flesh and caging my blood back inside my body. It was hours, maybe, of meticulous work, but eventually he sat back on booted heels, leathers creaking faintly as the wire was cut from its needle partner and my skin was gently washed down, turning pale under the wipe of a wet cloth.
His throat cleared, his eyes running from my hip to meet my gaze...and the world...stalled. It ceased to turn and kept us in a moment that fairly trembled with something that constantly evaded my understanding. I had no knowledge of this...feeling, and could not name it. Would not name it. "You're done. Your couch is now safe from bloodstains...more bloodstains, true."
"Not my couch," Winking as a grin exposes the lethal points of my ivory fangs, "but on behalf of the hotel....thank you...And on behalf of me...Thank you...I appreciate it, my sewing isnt up to snuff and I would have looked like a badly crocheted Kruger." Easing myself into a half sitting sprawl and eyeing the neat curve, the pad of one finger trailed the puckered skin and studiously avoiding the fact that I was still half naked and he was watching my every move with those stunning eyes. "What?"
"Nothing, true. Just admiring the artwork."
"It looks better under my clothes." His smile widened as I lift ragged strips of fabric up, useless, they wouldnt cover an inch of my flesh and piecing anything worth wearing together was impossible under the weight of his gaze. Until it flicked to the clock hung on the wall and faint lines furrowed his brow in a shadow of a frown.
"It's almost dawn, Tory. I should go, true. You'll be ok?" My nod may not have reassured him all that much, slow as it was, but it moved him to the glass doors, jacket shifted up long arms and bunching over honed power. "This time, promise me you'll stay out of trouble? I'd hate to find your body in a fucking alley, true."
"Can't promise anything, warrior. Trouble...tends to find me." A tic worked on a muscle in his jaw, those diamond eyes catching emeralds in a tight nod.
"Just. Try. True." And then I was left alone, again, the whoosh of the glass doors the only indicator I'd had anyone else in the room with me. Infuriating male. Just...disappearing with a lingering command I wanted so badly to be able to obey. But Fate often cast me in the role of trouble-magnet, a draw for monsters...and that wasnt the only thing she had in store for me. Through war, pain, memories, plain ass stubborness, Fate drew me away from monsters and closer to a warrior male I wanted more than I knew....
***
Good thing about VIP, I didnt have to interact with anyone, I didnt even have to speak, the waitresses fluent, knowing exactly what drink went with what facial expression. And today, I wanted the touch of the Green Fairy. Just a bad, bad night...and my day hadnt fared any better...damn fucking sunlight. I sensed him before I saw him, a tingle in my blood, a stroking in my veins, like a feline arching it's spine for it's owners caress, my body responded, tied to him by a biological string that hummed his presence through every nerve. The dainty glass of Absinthe in front of me belied its potency, and I'd half convinced myself it was the alcohol heating my skin by the time he parted crowds, a mammoth male dwarfing civilians as he moved through the sea of gyrating forms. Emerald gaze fixed firmly on the swirling green liquid dutifully refilled in front of me, my body moves of it's own accord to the beat the kick ass female is owning, doing her thing on the big screen mounted up on the wall, the tune more than appropriate. I could do as well as any male...better sometimes...and proved it damn often. He took his time, the heat rolling under my skin carefully concealed by a cool disinterest that flashed emerald eyes up to the diamond towering over me. My lip lifted in a smirk, brow quirked up in a silent question.
The warrior's laugh rang out, low, rumbling, touching dark places with heavy vibrations and I ashamedly wanted to hear it again. Goatee'd jaw tilted to the female on screen, still doing her biz, and getting down like a dude, his lips shaped words that had my brow raising higher. "She has a nice mouth, true." Was that a wink? I wasnt going to count on it in the darkness.
My grin was a flash of pearly white blades in the shadows of the club, the dancing lights skipping on the other side of the curtain, never touching the low lit serenity of the VIP area.
"She's awesome...and she got it right...Do it like a Brother..." I had a strange moment as diamond seemed to pierce through to my soul, a thrill that had me testing the exits and wondering if I should get the fuck out of there before I got my head ripped off.
"You know it, true?" His smirk was a thing of wicked beauty in a savagely handsome face.
"Too true..." I let my fangs glitter out again as my lips took on a smiling curve, a hint of a smirk shaping drawled out words,"But then again...its sooo easy to do..."
Well that elicited a response from him that had my heart skipping a beat and my legs crossing under the table, a shift freeing my blade into my hand, in full view planted on the table. Vishous' growl was just that...vicious, low, pinning me in a narrowed gaze . "You implying I'm easy?"
I swear my eyes rolled, a scoff in the back of my throat, my anger roiling up and curling my lip off fangs in no hint of a smile. "I would NEVER call anyone easy after the shit I get, feel me?" The word whore bounced around in my head, I'd been called it far too many times, by jealous females, frustrated males that turned nasty when they didnt get what they wanted.
But the warrior's stare had gone from growling to...smiling...his lips definitely switched up with the ghost of amusement, his stare locked to the curling half snarl reshaping my mouth.
"Do that again Tory. I like it." If that hadnt surprised me, the quiet chuckle that followed totally would have.
And something inside me played along, teasing out a full blown snarl not at all edged with menace, a snarl glowing with laughter...for his pleasure. "You're such a lovely freak...I'll be sad when you try to kill me..."
Another grin, flashing wide in the cage of his black goatee, daggered hardware glinting ivory points. "So many delicious ways to die, true? I might have to play with you before I finish you off..."
My smile was well hidden, those words lighting up sensations that really shouldnt have sparked at such a double threat. "Uh huh...I don't play...sorry...don't know how...unless it's with knives..." Smirking, emerald eyes danced with a laughing dare, watching contemplation flicker over his face, his thumb riding the line of his stubbled jaw in an absent tic.
"That could be arranged..."
Setting my brow up high, my blade was tapping the plump flesh of my lower lip before I could catch the tell, my poker face never lasted long with this male. He'd caught my masochistic side with that comment and it was poking for more..."Mmm...really?"
Those eyes, those otherworldly ice white eyes, were fixated on the glinting of metal kissing my lips, his words low, edged with a darkness that both excited and scared. "I'm...creative...with daggers, true."
Too close. The fear won out, my past so much stronger, the lock on memories keyed open by the alcohol...there was a flash of black replacing emerald in the mirror of my blade. "I'll just fucking bet you are...but I do the carving, got enough pretty pictures on me already..."
A bold gaze swept over the exposed swirls vining my skin in a cemetery of kills, loaded with appreciation. "I am creative with ink too..."
Soft purrs thrummed out in a gentle anticipating pleasure, feline emerald glittering a wild heat. "Now THAT you can do...I still have room somewhere...maybe some like yours..." My chin jerked to the patterning at his temple, curving at his eye, tiny characters of our mother tongue emblazoned in vivid warnings.
The wrong thing to say? Vishous' eyes darkened, shadowed over by some obscure emotion. "You should come with a warning, true."
"A warning? I'm all unicorns and puppy dogs...nothing deadly about me...you gonna ink me?" My words light, almost catching on a swallow as images bombard my senses...his hands on my skin, the tattoo gun piercing my flesh...
The slash of a dark masculine brow cocked up, warrior eyes still fixated on my dagger. "Hmmm...I'll think about it...what did you have in mind?"
Repeating my indication, nodding to his eye, the ink fascinating me in the flicker of low lighting, almost alive moving around his bright lit iris. "I like them...do you have more?"
Seems I'm wrong question girl, this one met with his stifled growl, but tendrils slipped out in a hum, reflecting a turmoil turned inwards by the caged sound. "Nothing to like about my ink, feel me?"
"I can read, warrior I know what they say," quiet, a hush of understanding layering the air, "but I like them no matter how wrong they are…you can choose what to put..."
The brow went again, quirking up as a grin cut across Vishous' face. "You'd trust me? That could be...interesting..." Low laughter filled the air around my booth and turned the heads of a few nosey civilians, the dark narrowed eyes of a bitch female trained in my direction...Caith. Female always provoked me, and one day, I just might take her threats to heart and scare the silly bitch senseless...
Emerald eyes dismissed her and switched a smirk up to the still looming Vishous. I hadnt offered the warrior a seat and he hadnt taken one, an intimidation, maybe, but I had the angle to drive my blade between his legs if he took any sort of attack against me. My grin was all fangs. "I trust you not to write fuckwad or anything ridiculous on my inner thighs, warrior, yes..."
Fuck. His eyes changed so quick, I was left staring into orbs of hypnotic, swirling diamond ice power, a heat, navy blue flames flickering at the rims of pure crystal eyes. His voice stroked me where his words lay. "Inner thighs? Ummmm..." My mistake, a trick of the light, I convinced myself...but those lethal blades in his mouth seemed to elongate...as mine did
.
Gathering nonchalance about me like a cloak of disinterest, my shoulder lifted in a delicate half shrug of inked porcelain skin. "Only real space I have left..." But the mask slipped again, the cloak falling away to flash images of fire and desire as they unfurled under my skin, the images crawling through my brain, uninvited...and ultimately there to stay. What I was imagining...my words ran dry."Fuck...mmm yeah...space..."
He dipped low, my body's betrayal an evidence he'd CSI'd all over, and a growl whispered against my ear, stirring an ache in my lower half. "If the King lets you live, come to my Penthouse, I'll do you there, true?"
Oh...fuuuuckk...so many ways to take that, and the animal half of me was on board with all of them as the female, sentient part tried to rein in baser instincts and focus on the 'If the King lets you live' part...my lip curled at the deadly reminder, but my words addressed blatant curiosity. "The Penthouse?" A laugh purred out, "any idea what you're gonna ink?"
A black leather gloved thumb smoothed along a dark brow as his thoughts ticked over. "That I'll have to consider carefully, true."
"True that...don't want a load of bullshit scrolled over my thighs do I?" My grin was the point of a blade trapped by pearl daggers, tongue strumming the caged tip of razor metal as emerald eyes stalked his every expression.
And flared wide as his growl rolled out, an image...mine or his, I dont know, creeping into my brain, just a glimpse of blood and sex and bare creamy skin on a canvas of black silk. "Careful Tory. Don't cut yourself..."
"Never..." The heat lingering from that flash image of carnality strayed into my eyes, tracing down the hard ripped height of the oh so tempting warrior. "I could carve pretty pictures on you though..."
"Carved up any of the Glymera lately, Tory?" Bullseye. He struck a nerve with one well placed shot and had my hackles up and an entirely new fire in my blood in a matter of seconds, my lips curled in a snarling display of elongated canines, a hissing spit of words turning me to feline aggression.
"They're fucking Glymera...who cares if they die?!!"
I was levelled in a diamond hard stare, his voice a bite of sound, commanding. "Put those away Tory. Yes, fucking Glymera. Read: untouchable."
With a smirk laden with disgust, my words were still spitting, the Glymera a sore fucking subject guarenteed to put me on the defensive. "Yeah also one of the ones that were..." Defensive and mouthy...my trap shut so fast my teeth chattered in my skull, but it had already drawn a frown to furrow his brow.
"The Brotherhood couldn't give a fuck about the Glymera, but without evidence Tory..."
"Evidence? That's the reason I wanted to meet your fucking king. I got females being hurt by lessers and males.." So zipping my lips hadnt worked out, and didnt have the desired affect.
Vishous' smirk lit up the masculine beauty of his face with dark edged humour. "You're a feisty one, true?" His eyes smouldered blatant diamond fire,voice lowered to a whisper that thrilled my senses with four little words, "it turns me on..."
Inhaling sharply, it took every bit of self restraint to tackle back the sensual growl rising in my throat, to tamp down the molten rush of heat welling between my thighs. "Fuck you…"
Fucking infuriating male that he was, he was determined to turn me on, and piss me off.
Locks of silky dark hair fell over his forehead as his head cocked to the side and a devilish grin spread across his face. If the hint of erotic evil playing over his features wasnt enough to warn me, the tantalising glimpse of tongue stroked wicked daggers dimpling his lip was a sure temptation. "What, right here and now?" Lighting up a smirk, his face was pure provocation and my reaction was too hard wired to stop, pinning him in the slits of emerald fury...yes, it was furiously annoying desire for this male, but fury nonetheless...my fist was balled and slamming into the bone edge of his jaw with a cracking, frustration powered impact. Either that or back him up into a wall and finish what I'd started when he fed me.
"Go to hell."
Warrior eyes flashed a startling light, soothing his slammed jaw with leather encased fingers as fangs glinted a grin that should not have been there. "You know I love a little rough foreplay, true."
Infuriating male. My fangs caught at my lip, trapping the smile that threatened to curve up with a bubble of laughter. Fists slowly unclenched, shaking out the ache of the punch, my gaze hot with amusement and a spark of wicked desire. "Foreplay's gotta be rougher than that..."
Spark morphing to a blaze that lit through my entire body, I'd stood, scorched by the heat, his warrior form so damn close, near fused to every...slightly breathless...line of mine, his breath hot against my neck as words tickled my ear. A warning. A promise. A double edged sword I didnt mind the bite of. "This isn't finished..."
I was all sorts of aroused, a hand supporting me on one broad shoulder as I rose on my toes to reach his ear, the whisper on my lips part seduction, part threat. "It will never be finished warrior..."
Triumph played on the curve of my smirk as he leant back in surprise, those diamond eyes bemused, black leather playing over the spot I'd struck and with a roguish grin, a silent incline of his head, Vishous simply walked out, splitting the crowds like Moses and the goddamn red sea and vanishing from my radar. My breath was a shaky exhale that preceded the shotting of a drink that burned the fury of the Green Fairy down my throat. Shit. Fuck. He put me on edge and drew me to him like a moth to a fucking inferno. He excited something in me that had only ever been cold blooded. I was absently playing a nail around the rim of my glass when a gnat flew by.
"You know you wont be able to satisfy him..."A female, my own kind, whoring after Brothers like it was the end of the fucking world, slammed down another shot of Absinthe to the table and stalked off in the direction the warrior had gone...probably to offer to ice where I'd hit him...Fucking Caith. Always up in my grille, the female had issues that lay in the slutdom realm and I couldnt save her from her own stupidity. She irritated and angered me. And she didnt do anything to help herself with any of the Brothers. My eyes tracked her retreating, exaggerated hip sway with a narrow emerald growl. Something irked me at the thought of her anywhere near him, and homicidal tendencies rose up in a crest that threatened to break on the surface of my confused emotions. Downing the swirling green liquid with a purring hiss, my only thought as I barged my way from the clusterfuck of people occupying Zerosum: Was it really just the blood making me feel this way?
***
What. A. Fucking. Night. I slumped onto the bed with all the grace of a truck hitting the mattress. He drove me crazy! A maddening, all consuming, very fucking real desire left in the wake of stimulating provocation and a buzz of inhibition lowering alcohol. Absinthe, it seemed, caused my body to act like a dam of lust around a certain warrior, the flesh between my thighs drenched with the aroused honey of a molten emotion. Fuckfuckfuckfuck...the one thing I couldn't control unleashed only in the presence of the object of my...fuck...I didn't even know what he was to me.
All I knew was that I WANTED him. Full blown, aching, highly irritated and beyond turned on, I tried focusing on the bruised knuckles on my hand. Hitting him had only pumped us both up, the edge of violence fuel on a fire that needed none.
"You're an idiot Tory. And he knows where you fucking live. Bra-fucking-vo. No running, he's in your blood. What the fuck were you think...ing..." My self chastisation trailed off to silence, a looming broad silhouette parked on my balcony and thrumming an energy I would only ever associate with him. Stealing shadows to caress my blood with the potent intoxication of his presence, he simply stood, made no move to gain entry, waiting for an invitation...no, my mind whispered in the husky purr of my body's desire...a surrender. Stop it, female. Snap the fuck out of it!!! 'Cause talking to yourself is sane...always unhinged, always on the edge of something with him, violence, insanity, ecstasy...
Standing, a lithe rise of taut curves framed by the falling cascade of midnight silk, fluttering to my ass in a sweep of ebony, I willed the doors to open, brow quirked above vivid emerald eyes as I uttered six words that would set the course of my life on an irreversible path....
"You here to kill me, warrior?"
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