by Elena Lawson
I was a mass of senses. Of touch and smell and pain and pleasure and strain and pressure as his thrusts became harder and quicker, him close to finding his own release, too.
Fuck, I couldn’t hold on any longer, I couldn’t contain it. It was like trying to stop a bullet midair. Impossible.
Blake’s fangs slid free of my skin and he growled, “Now, baby.”
I shattered in a million tiny pieces as the force of the orgasm hit me like a fucking hurricane, swirling and wet and hot as hell. My body clenched around Blake as he found his own release, cumming into me with a broken moan of his own.
“Oh, good, you’re awake.”
I sat bolt upright at the sudden sound of a voice ringing against stone. It took me a moment to come out of the fevered dream, still breathing hard with an ache between my thighs. A profound sadness settled over me like a leaden weight when reality set it. Blake wasn’t here. None of the guys were. I was all alone.
The woman from before bustled into the stone chamber, a white towel and what looked to be a dark purple bathrobe folded in her arms.
“Up you get, girl. The master will be wanting to see you before the night is through.”
Still nighttime, then? So, I hadn’t been asleep long. I wondered how in the world she could tell what time it was. I didn’t see a watch on her wrist, and other than the low glow of embers in the hearth, there wasn’t a lick of natural light to be seen.
Trying to get my bearings with a shake of my head and a deep breath, I slunk from the bed, testing my broken foot softly against the cool floor. Nope. Wouldn’t be walking on that until I could set it. I cursed under my breath. Why couldn’t it have been a dislocated shoulder, or a broken arm? I’d managed to re-set those before without much issue.
But a foot? I’d never broken it before, and I knew enough about bones to know that there were too many in my foot for me to be able to set it properly without some help. I would try, but I shivered to think of how many times I’d have to break and re-set it before I got it right enough to walk on.
The woman didn’t seem to care at all that I could barely walk, she vanished into the shadow of the corridor, leaving me grunting, clutching the wall for support as I hopped to follow her as quickly as I could.
We wove a long path through the labyrinthine underground dwelling. I thought it must be some sort of cave. The walls were rough stone, and there didn’t seem to be any form of electricity. Flaming torches lined the walkways every so often, but not nearly close together enough to be able to see everything.
The spaces between the torches were pitch black and, in those spaces, I had only the steady footfalls of the woman in front of me to direct me. I felt more than one opening in the stone—almost fucking fell into one of them—on the way to this so-called devil’s spring. The network of tunnels seemed endless, and much as I tried to memorize the route we were taking, I lost the pattern after the eleventh turn.
This was going to take longer than I thought. I ground my teeth, checking to make sure the butter knife I’d tucked into the waistband of my skirt was still there. It was. I patted it, reminding myself that I didn’t need a sharp object as a weapon. I’d taken down a vampire with a spoon. A butter knife would prove a much better defense.
Though, judging by the tepid silence within the suffocated stone walls, I was beginning to think we were the only people down here.
The scent of sulfur was the first sign we were drawing nearer to the spring. And within a few seconds more I could faintly hear the trickle of water over stone and the echoing shhhh of a small waterfall somewhere underground.
“Here we are,” The woman proclaimed as the tunnel opened into a wide dark chamber filled with steam that tickled at the back of my throat with the strong tang of minerals. It was hot inside the room, and I squinted to be able to see better by the light of the single, low-burning torch set into the wall next to the entrance.
I could make out the surface of the water in the cave—looking like no more than an undulating floor of shadows carved into the hard rock. The steam made it difficult to decipher where the rock ended, and the water began.
There was something else here, too. A prickle along the back of my neck alerted me to the fact we weren’t alone. I shivered even though I was warmer than I’d been since I’d awoken in this hellish place. I knew that feeling.
Azrael’s particular brand of vampire was easy to decipher. The atmospheric weight of his presence was so great it settled like a weight on my chest—crushing me.
“Well, I’ll leave you to it,” the woman said as she bent to set the towel and bathrobe down on a hewn stone bench a few feet away from the entrance. “Back to get you in a bit. Don’t try to go anywhere by yourself, girl. This place has swallowed up more than its fair share of wandering souls with its intricate pathways. Would hate to see you fall prey to it, too.”
I barely heard her, I was staring out into the black water, searching for him.
“Did you hear me?”
“Hmm?” I said, snapping back to myself.
The woman threw her hands up and turned away to leave. “Just stay put until I come back.”
“That won’t be necessary.”
His voice floated out from the dark recesses of the cave—and from the distance, I had to guess the spring was a lot larger and went a lot further into the dark than I originally thought.
“Oh! Master Azrael. I’m so sorry. I didn’t know you were bathing, sir,” the woman’s hand curled around my upper arm and began dragging me back the way we’d come. “I’ll bring the girl back later, sir. So sorry for disturb—”
“Leave her, Estelle. I can smell her stench from here.”
I bristled, cheeks inflaming with an emotion that burned hotter than embarrassment. The only reason I stank was because he’d fucking kidnapped me and left me in a bed covered in blood and sweat.
“But, sir?”
“I’ll escort her back to her chamber once she’s finished.”
I still couldn’t see him in the darkness at the other end of the cavern, and my jaw twitched, and stomach soured at the thought of being left alone with him again. At the thought of bathing with the monster who—
I shut down the thought, clamping my jaw tightly as I began to erect that white wall of stone in my mind again. I had no idea if it was helping, but it was worth a shot.
“Yes, sir, as you say. I’ll be going then.”
She released me and I saw a flicker of something like worry in her glassy gaze before she straightened her spine and released me, disappearing into the shadows, back the way we’d come.
I couldn’t help how my heart raced as the echo of her footfalls faded into nothing as she drew further and further away—leaving me with the devil in the spring.
Azrael didn’t speak, and I still couldn’t see him. After a few minutes, I began to wonder if he was still there at all? If it weren’t for the creeping feeling still making gooseflesh rise along my arms and back of my neck, I’d have assumed he’d left. The only sounds were the trickling of droplets over stone and the gentle shhh of a small flow of water somewhere off to my right.
“Are you just going to stand there?”
That same fury I’d felt before bubbled up again. It was impossibly difficult to contain it. I’d never really had to before.
In the game of cat and mouse I’d played with vampire kind for the last several years—I’d always been the cat.
“And now you’re the mouse. How very…ironic,” his voice slithered over me, and I thought it sounded closer than it had a moment before.
I gulped, cheeks aflame. “Stay out of my head.”
He didn’t answer right away, and when he did, I wasn’t sure I heard him right. But it sounded like, “As you wish.”
I edged closer to the rim of the pool, keeping my weight on my good foot while I swept the broken one forward to feel where the rock ended and the water began beneath the rising gray steam. Finally, after several feet of hobbling, my toes touched
hot water and I shuddered at how incredible it felt.
I swallowed hard as I swept my gaze one last time over the spring. He would be able to see me plainly because of the flickering torchlight at my back—whereas as I couldn’t see him because he was sticking to the shadows further back.
Dick.
I thought I heard a chuckle, but I couldn’t be sure it wasn’t just the burbling of water rising from somewhere deep below the surface.
Fuck this. I needed a goddamned bath.
Strengthening my resolve, I tore off my shirt.
My bra fell next, and then my skirt. I was careful to pull it down by the hem, holding the dull knife in the waistband with my thumb. As I scooted to the edge of the water, I turned to lower myself down, still in my panties, and when I thought my body was in position to conceal the maneuver, I released the skirt, taking the knife with me as I sank lower into the spring.
The heat swirled around me, seeping into my pores. It felt somehow heavier than normal water. And instead of just wetting me and warming, it seemed to sort of caress me. As though it were laced with the most luxurious of essential oils. I shivered as the chill fled my skin, and the warmth began to soak into deeper layers. Softening muscle and soothing aches I didn’t even know were there.
I gripped the dull knife hard between my thighs as I tipped my head back and dipped my long hair in the water, running my fingers through it to loosen the tangles and soak out the blood and dirt.
The water came up to my chest, just above my breasts, but they bobbed in the water, floating a bit so my nipples were only just covered.
Though I wasn’t one for modesty, even I had to admit, bathing in the same pool as the monster who kidnapped me was hideously uncomfortable. The disquieting feeling all the more strong because this time I knew I wasn’t stronger than my foe. I didn’t have a chance if he decided to attack.
But Azrael didn’t make a sound and I couldn’t see him through the dark haze. It made it easier to assume he was far away and would stay there until I was finished.
Removing the knife from between my legs, I limped against the slick stone floor beneath the water, feeling a source of more heat over to my left where the trickling sound was coming from. Eager to be even warmer than I was, I followed the trail of heat and the trickling noise, feeling some of the aching in my foot ease with each step. I wondered offhandedly if the water held some kind of healing properties.
A witch could have spelled it. Or enchanted it. Or whatever it was witches did. I didn’t have enough experience with them to know how their magic worked.
As I drew nearer the source of the sound and the heat, I could see that I was coming up on a rock face, and when I reached out to touch it, I could feel scalding water running over a worn crevasse down into the spring. I recoiled back, shocked at how hot it was. It had to be boiling. It felt like fucking lava.
Devil’s Spring, indeed.
“Quite hot, isn’t it?”
My mouth parted and my eyes widen as I whirled around, blindly striking out with the butter knife. I heard a muffled grunt and an iron grip came around my wrist, holding my hand—still holding the blade—high above my head. The silver tip dripped crimson.
I grinned.
Azrael’s mis-matched eyes glinted in the whisper of torchlight—making them look black in the dark, with fire in the place where his pupils should have been. My chest heaved as I drew in breath after breath, waiting with my fist clenched and stance wide for his retaliation. He tilted his head to one side, studying me.
His gaze went lower, touching the curve of my jawline. My throat and the wild pulse it contained.
Lower still. Until he was looking at the jagged scar across my neck.
My traitorous lower lip trembled as the memory of how it was made came back in a rush of pain-filled emotions. I tried to stifle it, but there it was, clear as though it’d only just happened because here he was. The monster who did it.
I’d been so small. So innocent back then.
I was fourteen again. Screaming my sorrow over my mother’s prone body, my knees and hands coated in a thick layer of her blood as I sobbed uncontrollably into her chest. My body wracking with the force of my anguish. I screamed and I screamed. My chest felt as though it would burst from the sheer agony washing over me in crashing waves that made it difficult to breathe.
My small hands curled into her wool sweater.
My tears dropping like broken promises onto her cheeks.
She would never hold me again.
Her eyes wouldn’t ever open.
And all the while he stood there looking down at her with something like reverence in his gaze. Like he was proud of his handiwork. He was admiring his art.
Pain-fueled hatred burned brightly behind my breastbone and adrenaline snaked through my veins like acid, burning hotter and brighter than anything I’d ever felt before.
I attacked him. My strangled sobs became an ear-splitting battle-cry as I descended upon him, hands clawed, and teeth bared. It was useless, of course.
I was a child. I had no weapon. No fighting experience save for some basic self-defense training I’d learned from Mom. I lost before I even stood up.
The vampire swung his hand in a wide arc, stopping me from even reaching him. His razor-sharp nails sliced into me as though they were a fucking buzz saw.
All I remembered before I fell to my knees was the warmth of oozing blood as it ran between my breasts and filled the cups of my bra. I could remember it being difficult to breathe. And I remembered how he’d smiled when I fell, too. His pearly white fangs gleaming under the glow of the streetlamps before he vanished in the blink of an eye and the darkness began to creep in.
I didn’t realize tears were welling in my eyes until Azrael released my hand and I let it fall limply back to the water, dropping the useless piece of cutlery to sink to the bottom. I felt just as helpless in that moment as I did then.
When I looked up into the face of the monster again, I found a deep sadness etched into his eyes and the hard line of his jaw. A faraway look in his gaze.
Was he remembering what he did to us?
Was he fucking reveling in it?
I wanted him dead. I didn’t care anymore if he heard my thoughts. Let him know it. I wanted to rip his motherfucking head off and I would find a way to do it.
His eyes flashed with a dangerous glint as our gazes met. A challenge?
“I will kill you for what you did to her,” I told him, knowing he’d been listening. He’d seen his ‘art’ replay in my memories. “I promise you that.”
The tiniest of smiles twitched at the corner of his thick lips and my stomach pooled with dread. “You can try.”
My chest ached as his unspoken admission and a quiet understanding began to settle over my bones.
“But my brother won’t be killed so easily, my sweet Rose.”
“Your…what?”
“The vampire you wish to kill. You think I am him, and I won’t fault you for the mistake. It’s a common one,” Azrael said with a heavy sigh and moved back from me, though his steady gaze never left me.
“What are you talking about?”
The vampire began to vanish into the mist, and I moved forward, wincing as my broken foot hit against a rock beneath the water. I chased after him, snaking my hand out to grab hold of his arm without thinking.
He froze as my hand connected with his warm skin beneath the water, and I remembered where we were.
That beneath the black surface of the water he was naked. And I was damn near close to it with only my thin panties to cover me. I let him go as though burned by his touch, my body reeling from the oppressive weight of his vampiric energy.
Azrael rolled his shoulders back and I noticed for the first time how ripped he was. With broad shoulders and arms that looked to be close to the size of my thighs.
Stop it, Rose.
“His name is Raphael. We were born under the same moon.”
Was he trying to tell
me he had a twin?
Yeah. Right. Like I would be believing that. I scoffed. He just wanted me to cooperate. He would say whatever he needed to get what he wanted from me. His kind had no honor.
No code.
Besides his whole theory about my bloodline reeked of bullshit. It was impossible for vampires to walk in sunlight, no matter what this fucking lunatic thought. He had me going with that one. I would do anything to give my guys back that one small thing. To make their new immortal lives that much easier. But I’d had time to think while I’d been all alone in that cell he called a room. And the more I thought about it, the more insane it sounded.
What he proposed to do simply wasn’t possible. Which left me stuck in this cave belowground with a murdering psychopath who was basically trying to sell me on the theory that he had the cure to vampirism.
If I didn’t know any better, I would have to start thinking I was the crazy one for believing him at all.
A muscle in his jaw twitched.
“I don’t believe you.”
“Should I care?
Grinding my teeth to keep my taloned fingers from striking out, I managed to keep myself in check at the barely concealed taunt in his tone. “I want to see them,” I spat, unable to keep the venom from my voice as I backed away, keeping a good three feet of space between us. “The guys I was with when you captured me—I want to see they are unharmed before I’ll do anything to help you.”
The vampire exhaled as though exasperated. Bored with my insistent requests.
The smug prick.
“I’ll fight,” I added, practically hissing. “I’ll make it a nightmare for you to do—well, to do whatever the hell it is you want me to do.”
I thought I saw him flinch at the threat and a glimmer of hope made me even more brazen. “But,” I said, annunciating the word. “If you just give me this one reque—”
In the blink of an eye Azrael was right in front of me, his eyes boring into mine. His body beneath the water brushing against my nipples. What I thought was his cock brushed against my navel. But the feel of his flesh on mine wasn’t the worst part.