Give. The most he’d ever given someone was when he told people they could try to give him good reasons not to kill them. But he always killed them anyway. Or, he’d given out punishment. That was part and parcel of having slaves, of course.
“You look confused. Come.” She took his hand and led him back to the tiny camp. She unzipped her tent with one hand as the colors of an Arizona sunset began filling the sky.
She was right. He was confused. Give. What was it she expected him to give? She had initiated the contact, why did she then say no? He really and truly did not understand at all.
“Come inside with me. It will be getting cold soon, and our fire died while we were out walking.”
He recalled something she had said that morning, about having to leave to go to work, and wondered why she was still here. He had to get on his hands and knees to fit his six-foot-four frame into the confines of the tent, and she followed him in, turning to zip the entrance shut behind them.
Then she sat atop her sleeping bag and motioned for him to do the same. “When I say you have to give as well,” she began, “it’s because…well, it just feels like all you want to do is take me.”
He didn’t see the problem with this, but kept his mouth shut.
“Tao,” she said so softly he barely heard it. “I want you. I don’t know why, I just do.”
“I want you,” he repeated, only this time actually meant the words to be more than an echo of hers.
She gave a small laugh. “For some reason it sounds like you’re leaving off ‘and I will have you.’”
He opened his mouth, and then shut it again. How well she knew him in only a day…how could that be? He didn’t know what to say. He didn’t know what to do. He was at a loss for what his next step should be. Except maybe it should be away.
This was no good. It couldn’t be. It shouldn’t be.
“You’re getting ready to bolt. Why, Tao? Why are you so afraid of me?”
That hit him where it hurt. At first he felt indignant, followed by enraged, followed by frightened, lost, confused, alone and hurt in rapid succession. Nearly all were feelings he was unfamiliar with and the whirlwind left him breathless as he watched her in the waning light.
“Let’s just lay down,” she suggested. “I have to be up early. I still have to go to work in the morning.”
He nodded, feeling the pressure she’d placed on him ease a little. She quickly unzipped the sleeping bag and removed her coat and boots. Then she looked up at where he was still seated at the bottom of the bag and smiled. “Usually I sleep naked.”
His pulse throbbed at his throat. He looked from her eyes, to her mouth. Her mouth, to her chin. Down her neck to the brown tee shirt she wore. Down further to the curve that beckoned from her chest. Vasan Naran, a man who had killed more men than all serial killers in history combined, wanted to touch them so badly. He knew they would be soft and supple. His hands began to ache.
Jane placed her fingers at the bottom of her shirt. “I’m not really modest,” she said, blushing. Pulling it halfway up, so that only her abdomen was exposed, she reached across and took his hands, guiding them to her waist. “Steady me.”
He felt the smooth skin of her body under his hands and became so dizzy he had to close his eyes. He heard the swish of her shirt being removed. When she told him to look, he did. That gnawing ache, the one he’d been feeling these last many weeks, the one that no meal could satisfy, returned with a vengeance to his body now.
“I will give myself to you,” she offered, placing her hands over where his still encircled her waist, “if you will give yourself to me.”
That was what had been the beginning of the end. It didn’t matter if he just took what he wanted. It was when someone willingly gave to him and he equally willingly gave back. This split-second decision, one he would have known better than to make under completely different circumstances, was to seal his fate…and that of this innocent called Jane.
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
The urgency was there, like before, only somehow slower and not so consuming. Like an empty vessel he felt her fill him, pouring shining liquid into the empty hollow he’d become, bringing cracks of light into the darkest recesses of parts of him he was convinced were long-dead.
Her mouth, her tongue, the feel of her body as she leaned into him. He realized after several minutes that she was trying to push him back, and so he let himself fall to a sitting position, sticking his legs straight out in front of himself. In wonder, he watched as she grabbed the bottom of his tee shirt and pulled it up and over his head. He grasped the fabric and tossed it aside, watching her look at him.
Her breasts waited beneath the see-through lace of her bra. Oh, how he ached with need, with desire. Her hands darted out to feel the defined ridges of his abdomen, to move upward over his pectorals, stopping to tweak his dark brown nipples. He shivered, and it wasn’t because he was cold.
He was learning to feel. Like a blind man or a babe fresh from its mother’s womb. The sense of touch…he had never known what it was like to have someone adore you with touch, to worship you with touch. He had worshiped Tin-Tin’s mother this way, but she had not reciprocated. The fact was she had never loved him; she had only been using him for her own greedy purposes.
This was, after all, ironic since that had always been his M.O.
But this woman, she was unlike any he had encountered. Everywhere her fingertips roamed turned into melted flesh. Everywhere her mouth touched his body became white-hot fire. He watched her consume him inch by inch and silently begged for her to take him all, to leave nothing behind.
“Tell me,” she said, and he realized she was nose-to-nose with him. “Tell me what it is you are thinking right this very moment.”
He was surprised by how easily he said it. “Take me. All of me.” Was that him? Was he begging?
“You are giving yourself to me,” she whispered, leaning down so their noses touched. “Yes.” She kissed him softly, chastely, upon the lips. “Yes,” she breathed, nuzzling her way down his neck. She reached behind her body and undid the clasps of her bra, letting the straps fall along her arms.
He reached up, hesitant, unsure. This was new territory. This was not a conquest or a possession. This was…different. She nodded and his hands found both straps over her biceps. Gently he pulled them down along her arms, freeing her to his eyes. The bra was gone and forgotten.
She shifted and laid herself on top of the sleeping bag. As her pale brown nipples hit the air they hardened, the skin around them puckering. “Come, Tao,” she said softly, opening her arms to him.
This woman of the golden hair and whom he knew absolutely nothing about and yet felt as if he’d always known was inviting him to take her. No…not take her…to give to her. To give himself.
The last time he’d given himself…no! He blocked that from his mind. No! He would not think of her. He would think only of this one before him. “Jane,” he said, his voice emerging as a deep rumbling bass. He leaned over her, towered over her as he straddled her legs with his own.
Leaning down, he realized the ache was beginning to disappear. He kissed her. His groin burned. He licked along her jaw, up her cheek to her ear. He moaned in harmony with her. His mouth moved down as his hands stroked her hair, the color and oddly the same smell as fresh, rich honey.
Such sweetness he had never known. The small sounds she made. The sighs, the mews, the gasps. And all in response to him. He didn’t feel the same this time. He was somehow being gentle, but he wasn’t sure how or why or what was guiding his ministrations. And then, as his mouth moved to her belly button, then to the waistband of her jeans, she arched into him and he knew.
He was following her lead. He was responding to her. He was doing what she wanted and needed and desired, rather than what he wanted and needed and desired. And yet somehow, even though he wasn’t thinking at all about what he wanted, he was getting it.
The concept was novel. It was something he ha
d not considered. That by giving someone else what they needed, you yourself would receive the same. How had he missed this? How in life had this concept, which seemed so very simple and yet still so very complex to him, been missed?
Her jeans were removed, as were his. There was almost nothing left separating them. Her breasts, he returned to those again and again. Not only because he could not get enough of their softness, but because of how she reacted. It was as though each time he kissed or licked or touched them, her reactions were tiny gifts. Gifts that kept piling higher and higher and higher until he could almost stand no more.
Mindful of the fact that he dwarfed her considerably, he laid atop her just enough that she would feel his body the length of hers, but not enough to crush her. She smiled, looking into his eyes, her body responding to his proximity. She rose up to kiss him, and then settled back. He lowered his lips to hers, kissed her thoroughly, and then pulled back.
It was choreographed. A dance was all he could liken it to. But much more beautiful and satisfying than the dances his slaves did. They were ridiculous, in all honesty. And in that moment, looking into eyes he wasn’t even sure the color of in the near darkness, he vowed to release every slave as soon as he returned to his palace. All of them. Fuck them and their forced worship of him. He now understood how fake their ‘love’ for him was.
Because this woman he held was worshipping him. Only she actually felt it.
He couldn’t help the movement of his hips, grinding into hers. A moan was heard and he wasn’t certain if it was her or him or both of them. He caressed her, eagerly waiting for her signals that what he was doing was right. Her hands moved everywhere, he felt like such a giant against them, towering over her. He didn’t want to overpower her, he wanted to…do…to…to what? What was this he wanted?
The lovers. He recalled the card from the tarot deck his mother had used during his early childhood. Lover. He wanted a lover. To…make love. He rose to his knees and saw her body shiver. Pulling her to a sitting position, he then reversed so he was seated and she was in his lap, her legs around his waist.
“I want to watch you. I want to see you.” And he did. He knew how to bring a woman to ecstasy. His father’s friends had made him learn how to do it for their amusement. And over time using his slaves as experimental toys, he had figured out every intimate and intricate detail of womanhood. But he hadn’t ever cared whether they enjoyed it. He’d only cared that he was the one making them lose that control over themselves.
This time, he cared.
Cared. Did he? He did? He cared…what?
The shock of the thought numbed him at first, and then he felt a tingling sensation at the very tip of his head. As it swept down into his face, and then his neck, and began dissipating throughout his body, his eyes squeezed shut and then flew open. He looked at her eyes and knew instantly they were hazel. Nearly gold around the pupils and a dark green to the whites of them, they sparkled under her long lashes.
He looked at her mouth and knew she wanted to taste his. He obliged.
He smoothed her mussed hair down along her head, feeling its silkiness in between his fingers and once again was overcome with the scent of honey.
He pulled away, cupped her breasts and held them almost reverently, for he realized what women were given these for. They were not to be used for torture, for punishment, for maiming. These were the givers of life and demanded reverence, not abuse.
He wrapped his arms around her body, enveloping her, surrounding her, owning her but not as property. No, not this time. This time because she desired it. He felt humbled and empowered all at once as her arms wrapped around his back. He felt scared and overjoyed. He felt need and fulfillment. He felt as though his chest would burst.
She pulled back, forcing him to let her go, and her hands moved down to his tight black boxer briefs. Deftly she slid the opening apart, and his organ sprang forth, a sigh of relief escaping his lips. Then she raised herself just enough to place her opening above it, sliding her panties out of the way as she moved.
And before he knew it, she had taken him completely, crying out into the still night air. Again, he couldn’t be sure if it had only been her voice, for it felt as though he, too, had made the sounds.
She moved. Wet. Hot. Mad. Fever. The tingling, the rush, the satiation. He’d had sex more times than any man alive, most likely. He’d been having sex for forty years now. But that’s all it had been.
This? This was more.
She moved faster. He moaned into her mouth, kissing her, holding her, rocking her, feeling her. Just plain feeling.
And when their climax came, he knew for certain his voice had cried out just as loudly as hers.
He rested his forehead against hers, ragged, rasping breaths rendering him unable to speak.
“Tao,” she whispered, kissing him softly.
This time he didn’t flinch.
They didn’t both fit into her sleeping bag, so they had unzipped it completely and laid it flat on the ground, and then used her wool blanket to cover their nakedness. He had been too overwhelmed by the experience, and had fallen asleep quickly; unaware that Jane spent the next few hours just watching him at rest.
But by 3 a.m. she too had succumbed to their exertions and was nestled against his body, her back to his front, enfolded in his arms. Safe. Secure. Content.
That’s when something startled him awake. He listened but heard nothing and wondered what it had been. But in his sleepy haze he didn’t really care. She was there, gathered into his embrace. Not an ounce of worry wrinkled her brow; not a bit of concern disturbed her dreams. He smiled – it was a real smile – and closed his eyes.
He heard it again, and this time he knew exactly what it was.
“No,” he breathed, raising his head.
A low moan escalated, becoming louder, increasingly louder, morphing into a higher pitch, changing, becoming more urgent. He was on his feet by the time it reached a shriek that could split your head right down the middle. He scrambled away from Jane, ignoring her mumbled protests, and had the tent unzipped in mere seconds. Crawling out on hands and feet, he rose to his full height.
Where before there had been no campfire, flames now burned high into the sky. Where each and every star had once been visible in the clear sky, there was now an acrid fog that smelled of sulphur.
“No,” he said desperately.
The flames turned from yellow to red, from red to green, from green to purple, and then darker and darker until they were very nearly black. The legions sang her arrival, howling and screaming and screeching until he covered his ears with his hands, the pit of his stomach dropping out. He suddenly felt sick.
Louder and louder. They sang and sang, paving the way for her to arrive in this strange place, for she had found him. She had found him because she knew. She knew because she felt it. And he knew he was going to die.
“Tao!”
Jane. He pivoted to face her. She had managed to pull one leg of her jeans on but stopped as soon as she saw the black-purple fire raging before them.
“What’s happening?” she cried, wiggling out of the jeans and racing to his arms.
“You must not…I told you not…” his voice failed him as a wail cut through the night sky. They both covered their ears. “It is my fault,” he said, but she could not hear his words. “This is my doing.” He pushed her away, holding his arm out to keep her at bay.
Sparks flew and in the blink of an eye she appeared, gray and deformed, ugly and evil, and slammed into his body with such force it sent him sprawling into the tent, knocking it to the ground. He could hear Jane scream and knew he had to fight this…he had to fight Jal’gonnoth.
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
“You have betrayed me,” came a voice that was a thousand tongues time a thousand. Shrill and guttural with the same effect as fingernails scraping a chalkboard. “You have betrayed me and you will pay!”
He struggled to get to his feet, but she controlled
every limb.
“First you, and then her!”
That made him take notice. For reasons he could not begin to explain, he knew he had to protect Jane. With every ounce of strength he could muster, he fought against the control. He had not given her permission this time, he had not offered himself willingly as always in the past he had done.
“No!” he said, but his voice could barely be heard in the din.
“Tao!” her sob cut through him like a knife. “What’s happening? Tao!”
He could feel her hands. No, no, no, she couldn’t touch him! “Get away!” he bellowed, and thankfully felt her retreat. He used Jal’gonnoth’s moment of distraction at the unfamiliar flesh to arch his back, leap to his feet and stand. His eyes blazed the color of silver, skin rippling and moving like something alive moved just beneath it.
He knew he had to weaken her. He had to rid himself of her. If not, she would have her way and Jane would die. He looked across at her, at the golden honey hair swirling around her head in the wind created by creatures that whirled around them. Jal’gonnoth’s children cried and moaned and sang to their mother, their demon princess.
Jane’s eyes were wide, disbelieving. She looked directly at him. He stepped closer, maintaining as much control over his violently shaking body as he could. “Cut me,” he ordered, using his finger to draw an invisible line from his right pec diagonally to his belly button. “Cut me!”
“What? No, I—Tao, I can’t! I can’t hurt you!”
His mouth opened and Jal’gonnoth’s screeching voice emerged. “Fooool!” she cried. “He is mine!”
“Cut me!” This time it was Vasan’s voice again.
Jane ran for her knapsack, which had been knocked back four feet from the tent. She opened the front pouch and produced a large red jackknife. Vasan had turned to face her, but as little as she knew about what was happening, it was plain to see he was losing the battle.
“Cut—” His voice was low, and a mixture between the demon’s and his own. “Meeeeeee.”
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