Box Set: The Fearless 1-3

by Terry Maggert

  I agreed, and then Risa picked up the explanation. “Elizabeth creates her daughters by saving them.” When she saw Kevin’s dubious look, she went on. “She intervenes when these women need her the most. Dire circumstances attract Elizabeth like a fly to carrion. She finds victims of some of the most calamitous violations imaginable and steps in at the most opportune moment, seemingly saving them from death, enslavement, or worse. They are naturally only too happy to give themselves over to her, body and soul, and from that connection, that moment of communing, she begins to shape them, twist them, and forge a broken, terrified victim into something that is predatory, evil, and—here is the part that will challenge what you know—virtually immortal. It is a side effect

  of . . . sharing in Elizabeth’s bounty, so to speak.”

  “But it doesn’t translate perfectly. In fact, there is an example of a failed transformation very close to Delphine—Joseph,” I said.

  Kevin looked shocked at the notion that some creature could pass on immortality. “And this Joseph, what is happening to him? What constitutes a failure in the transmission of life everlasting?”

  Risa chimed in, “We don’t know in every case, but we have an idea based on what we’ve learned from other failures to transmit, as you say. Joseph is dying, but he isn’t doing it in a manner that you would recognize. He is changing, transforming, slowly but surely, and he will most likely resemble the creature you would call a ghoul within a year or so, I would think. He already has the distinct smell of corruption around him, and I can’t imagine that he will hang on for long once he begins to demonstrate more unusual appetites. It reflects poorly on Delphine, who, for all her faults, takes a perverse sense in being mannerly.”

  Wally added, “She isn’t so bad when you compare her to the others.”

  That was true, and I nodded emphatically in agreement. “Ghouls are a problem for the immortals, and believe me, Kevin, there are far more immortals out there than you would care to know about. They permeate certain places, occupations, moving on the periphery, for the most part, and they don’t like ghouls because above all else, they’re messy and visible. They’re bad for business, they stink, and they go on killing sprees fairly often, which are really hard to cover up, even with their human collaborators.”

  Kevin grimaced. “Collaborators. That’s a word that almost never brings good news with it. How does this change get passed on to us? Is it something supernatural or viral? Disease? What do you know about it?”

  “What if it’s all of that and more?” Risa asked. Kevin stopped chewing over the implications of that, so she went on. “The truth is, we’re not sure, but it seems likely that there is a virus passed by intimate contact, or even constant, close contact. But that doesn’t fill in all the holes because there isn’t anything like this in our history, so what if it’s a combination of two things—a virus that is supernatural in origin and has been around for all of our history, and the effects? Look at it this way, every single person who comes in contact with an immortal ends up dead, changed, or wounded.”

  “Except you,” Kevin said evenly. “What’s stopping you from this descent?” He took us all in with his question, the skepticism about our nature peeking from behind his controlled expression.

  I stalled for a second and then said, “We don’t know. All we know is that we three have never really experienced fear, and our lives, we suspect, may have been directed from afar by Elizabeth or something like her in order to bring us together so that we can do what we’re really good at.” I shrugged. It wasn’t my best explanation, but it was honest, and it would have to do for now.

  Kevin smiled slyly and asked us, “Have you considered the opposite?”

  “Which is?” Risa demanded, curious.

  Kevin’s smile widened. “You assume that you were brought together, as you describe it, by someone who is evil. What if your life here is the product of a design drawn by a being of supreme good instead?”

  27

  The Archangel Enoch

  “Dr. Mpemba, this arrived for you.” A mousey student worker placed the heavy box on the professor’s desk as he dismissed her with a wave. He inspected the parcel and saw the description as air mail, originating in Ireland according to the label. Ahead of schedule, as always. I am an excellent customer, and it is good of her to show me proper respect. His eyes glittered with greed and something more primal as he closed his office door, locked it, and sat for a gravid moment, savoring the innocuous nature of the brown box. It was a Friday, which meant that he would not have to wait to use his newest acquisition as the club would be crowded with veterans and newcomers and the undecided who had not yet sampled his unique brand of experimentation and discovery.

  Enoch Mpemba had arrived in South Florida two decades earlier, leaving the killing grounds and hierarchical bloodbaths of his native Liberia behind without a second thought. A naturally industrious student, he had quickly demonstrated superior math skills as well as an uncompromising need to explore the relationships between religion, economics, and all of internecine warfare that those forces could cause. Less than a decade later, he possessed degrees in all three fields, earning his doctorate in economics with surprising ease, a discipline that would prove a boon to someone who had a rare combination of intellect, will, and the depravity to use all of his gifts for purposes known only to him. A handsome man with the deep brown, even coloring of his ancestors, Enoch had striking cheekbones and eyes of impenetrable depth that women found compelling, and later commanding. He quickly realized upon becoming a professor that women were, for him, a wholly renewable resource, limited only by his finances, which were meager even for someone of his title. Enoch changed all of that in one single evening, when he discreetly taped a young student doing unspeakable acts in his living room, her flawless, youthful body on display as he defiled her in every possible way, even finishing his performance with a hard slap to her mouth, felling her, and laughing at her shock. He had not even disguised the act of turning off the camera that had filmed the entire sporting affair, and two weeks later, he had arranged to see her at a local coffee shop. He cheerfully informed her that he would be showing the footage of her enthusiastic participation to her xenophobic parents, who he had discovered, showered her with regular checks as their only, precious child finished what was, in his eyes, a meaningless degree in nursing. During the encounter, each salacious wiggle of her youthful hips were punctuated with animalistic groans that were at odds with her solidly demure exterior, a fact that he valued in the amount of $500 per month, until she left school. After that Enoch had serenely informed her she could be assured that he would destroy the digital film. He was, after all, an honorable man, he had asserted, watching the uncontrollable sobs jerk his victim’s shoulders up and down like a piston. The memory of her submission was as erotic as any of her orifices had been during their play, and he had pleasured himself often at the recollection of her tears. Until the next victim, and the next. Eventually, the professor who had lived in a small apartment had purchased a townhome on a lake in a gated community. Still, his appetite for the flesh had not dimmed, so he began to expand his search. Finally, emboldened by his exploits, Enoch forayed into the fringes of society, where he found that the sexual appetites of others could be safely expressed, even augmented within the subculture known simply as The Lifestyle.

  What an inadequate word, he mused, thinking of the blossoming that he had witnessed within his own libido. Moving quickly within the accepted participants of the clubs and private parties, Enoch began to find simple promiscuity lacking, even with married women whose husbands watched, craven, impotent in the face of his sexuality, but still titillated by their very weakness. It was a feeling that grafted to his needs at once, and he began an immediate exploration of that new and welcome addition to his encounters. The final piece of his sexual puzzle arrived in the form of a dominatrix visiting from Ireland, or Denmark—he was never truly certain, but he did recognize the moment she began to unpack her beau
tifully constructed leather goods, all custom-made, purpose-built, and designed to inflict shame and heighten his orgasms in ways he had not dreamed possible. After an evening of enthusiastic debauchery with her, he confirmed two salient facts that would shape his actions from that moment forth. He had not one ounce of submission within his body and spirit, and the surest means to physical pleasure of the highest order, for Enoch, was to visit shame and degradation upon others until even their safe words could not grant them respite from his lust.

  So before him sat a package, unopened for the moment, with a new device of his own design, crafted by the Irish or Danish scrivener who was virtually enslaved to the woman who had taught him that pain and pleasure are fruit of the same tree. A careful knife cut along the edge of the parcel, feeling the contents shift ever so slightly, and he spilled the paper-wrapped item onto his desk. He then discarded the box onto the floor with the same disdain that he showed his special students, and swallowing once in anticipation, feathered the heavy paper apart.

  Flawless. It was art of a largely unseen quality in this discipline, and he turned the codpiece over gently, almost as if handling a new lamb, admiring the sullen gleam of the wine-colored leather, the metal thread holding everything perfectly with nary a scratch on the heavy hide. But it was the ring of custom-crafted studs surrounding the open crotch that shone like nightshade, each dense, bronze stud forged separately and then freed from burrs with hand tooling. There were twenty-nine in all, a symbolic number mocking the amount of years he waited until he began to feed his true, inner passion. He had no doubt that with each thrust, the metallic punishment of the codpiece would result in a unique calling card, cicatrices of the initials GM branding the recipient as just another conquest in the memory of a man who was slowly but surely, edging ever closer to the abandonment of what little conscience he had left. He felt an awakening in his groin, and the pressure against his linen pants quickly grew nearly intolerable as his hand moved to his lap to reassure his cock that soon, they would begin their night’s work. “Oh, they will have to wait their turn when I wield this. Yes, all of the soft ones will give me a turn.” He spoke quietly, his words clotted with arrogance and lust.

  “I see your newest addition has arrived. Mind if I give you my professional opinion?” She asked him this with the familiarity of an old friend, and he was startled, but only for an instant. Enoch leapt back in his chair, drawing himself up with operatic intent as he began to open his mouth and berate the woman who dared interrupt him in his office. That speech was truncated as one of her gloved hands snatched the codpiece from his desk and the other struck him on the temple, a deafening blow that made his vision flash white as he sagged to the floor, slipping from his chair without resistance.

  “Now, Enoch. I asked you nicely, and yet you’ve proven to be quite boorish. Those are hardly the manners one would expect from a doctor, are they?” The invasive woman somehow made the honorific an insult, leaving him awash with anger, disgust, and an inability to act. I’ve been cuckolded in my own space. Who is this creature? Looking up from the floor, he saw a stunning woman in her thirties, dripping with confidence and wealth. Her brown eyes were flecked with gold, and she had her dark hair pulled away from a face that Enoch was certain could make men capitulate to her every wish. She extended a regal hand to him, waving for him to accept it and rise, but as he reached for her, she kicked him once, hard, in the testicles, crushing the wind from him in a shocked gasp. He doubled sideways, white hot pain gripping him from balls to brain, and through it all, he heard her calmly speak to him as one would address a naughty dog.

  “Gather your things, Doctor. Your erstwhile careers are henceforth concluded, and I have need of you. If, that is, you prove your worth to me. Have you been to New Orleans?” Her voice was conversational, friendly, and utterly without haste. For the first time, Enoch knew true fear, and he also intuited that this was an emotion wielded easily by this woman. Struggling to a sitting position, she knelt daintily, looking at the leatherwork that had dominated his thoughts so soundly she had slipped into his office unseen. Or had she?

  “May I arise, Miss—?” he began in his most diplomatic tone given his excruciating discomfort.

  “Elizabeth. You may address me as Elizabeth, if we’re being familiar. I will inform you when we are not being familiar. You would do well to pay attention to my tone. So much can be gleaned from inflection, don’t you think?” She smiled wickedly at him.

  “Yes, Elizabeth.” He recovered some shred of confidence quickly and made as if to stand. Her hand lashed down and out, striking him soundly in the mouth, and he fell again, but this time he had the sense to remain still.

  Seeing his intentions to stay on the floor, she turned to the door and tossed the codpiece at him, striking him in the face. “Bring that. I will have need of it later, on the plane. You training will begin immediately.” She paused for a thoughtful moment. “You may want to consider some stretching exercises, Enoch. I intend to shed light on your innermost secrets.” She laughed a musical, repugnant noise from a beast that is in complete control of an underling. It was a sound that Enoch knew very well indeed, but from the other side.

  Enoch stood, shivering. He did not think that she was referring to his past, and his body began to anticipate a most unwelcome night.

  28

  Florida

  I sat in the familiar surroundings of the Butterfly, with patrons all around me enjoying their lunch as much as I was or more, because of the special today, Ko Ka Mu, a cinnamon pork thigh with Mirin whiskey, anise, and other mysterious elements. Upon sitting down, Boon informed me that I had ordered the very last serving available. It was just after noon, and I counted myself among the lucky when Boon set the fragrant plate, steaming with aromatic wonder, before me.

  “What did hubby do to this pork?” I asked around a mouthful so tender it surrendered with a whisper.

  She laughed musically and waved her finger at me in mock reprimand before bustling away with the signature tinkling of her many gold bangles. No matter how many times I’ve watched Boon in her element, I’m amazed at her grace and lack of hesitation. She’s always so certain about what to do next in a place that she and Panit have forged from their remarkable complementary talents. I was wool-gathering when Suma slid into the chair opposite me, holding a small plate of orange wedges stuffed with translucent little shrimp. She resembled Boon so closely that they might have been twins instead of just sisters, but her ebony hair was just a bit shorter, ending at the tops of her shoulders. She wrinkled her nose in dismay when I failed to instantly reach out for one of the little prizes she offered, but I relented and her sunny smile broke wide, making her impossibly beautiful in that moment.

  “I thought I might bribe you into letting me join up for lunch.” Suma’s voice was devilish.

  I laughed and bowed from the waist while seated. “Love to have lunch with you. I didn’t know you were here this weekend?” Suma is an emergency room physician in Orlando but spends a great deal of time with her family, which includes me and my partners. Since she also saved my life when Elizabeth nearly sent me to the nether a year earlier, I felt not only a debt of gratitude, but genuine affection for her. She was wryly funny, smart, and the only real temptation among all the women in the world that I’ve ever known since I paired off into my unusual but lasting relationship with Wally and Risa.

  “Spur-of-the-moment trip. I had a three-day weekend, and the girls and I are taking the boat out.”

  “Wait, what? I didn’t know you were going fishing.” This was news to me.

  “Oh, we’re not fishing,” she began in a soothing tone, one I knew indicated that I was about to be cut out of something fun. “Risa texted me and asked if I wanted to go with her and Wally to the Las Olas Art Festival. She promised it would involve boat drinks, lots of people watching, and good food, so—here I am.”

  I grumbled something about ungrateful lovers and ownership of the boat, but she cheerily popped another stuffed o
range in my mouth and patted my hand in a conciliatory manner that made it clear there was no room for me on my own vessel. It was damned near impossible to argue with someone who had given you the gift of life after an attack by a demon, and she was milking it for all it was worth.

  “I guess I can hang out with Gyro, or see if Kevin wants to play ball.”

  “The stud priest?” Suma asked, leering just a tiny bit at my surprise. “What, don’t you think I know about the newest member of the ‘holy shit, immortal beasties are all around!’ club? We discussed it online the other night while you were making pizza. You are such a dutiful lad!” She laughed again, and I found it incredibly endearing, especially considering the fact that it was delivered with a mild insult, but then, Suma had that effect on me, and many people, I suspected.

  “Yes,” I began, with great dignity, “he is, as you say, a handsome man, and I am pleased to have the friendship of someone who takes my athletic pursuits seriously.” I finished with a sniff and comported myself with what I hoped was a touch of menace. It didn’t work, judging by Suma’s widening smirk.

  “You mean we should all give proper respect to your intense hour of basketball followed by beer, chicken wings, and a nap? Yes, I can see how you must feel shortchanged at our disregard for your hardcore training regimen.” She concluded by sticking out her tongue at me, a trait she doubtless had acquired from Wally, who was permanently eleven years old. Mentally anyway.

  I finished the pork, to my chagrin, because it had been that good, and motioned that we should walk out together. “Hit the dock with me for some sun? The beast would love to see you.” Gyro completely lost his mind when Suma visited, making me question his value as security from anyone who took the time to learn the perfect spot on his chest for scratching.