“No kidding?”
“By the time they get ‘rescued’, they’re more animal than human. They’ve got a totally different nature. Can’t be civilized. So, they get locked away.”
Tate downed the last mouthful of stout, no longer cold. “You think they’re better off living like animals? That Remus and Romulus stuff is a myth, Will. Kids left on their own, even if they can find food, they’ll eventually get sick or hurt. It’s not like the fairy tales.”
“Where d’you think fairy tales start? Someone lost in the woods. Maybe they curl up under a tree and die, or maybe they keep going. The will to survive is powerful. Especially in kids. Powerful enough to bend the fucking universe.”
Tate wondered. Was there a situation here? Abuse or neglect? Was Will telling him to leave well enough alone? Leighaven creaked and popped around them. Pipes juddered as water was called forth. A police siren careened by on the street below. Tate peered blindly across the couch at a shadow he suspected could see just fine. Something about being watched when he couldn’t see unnerved him beyond his tolerance. He reached over to switch on the desk lamp.
Will hissed, his hand flying up to shield his eyes.
Tate held up his bottle. “Want another?”
“Why not.” Will drained the last of his beer and scratched his finger over the pink upholstery of the couch. “This thing.”
“What’s wrong with it?”
“Ugly as hell. I could make you an afghan. How d’you feel about grey?”
“Swell.” Tate took the empties to the kitchen. “What’s with the knitting, anyway? Not many guys are into it.”
Will didn’t fire a smartass round from his retort cannon, but rather, stared at his hands, resting palms up on his legs. “Like how it feels is all. Life is hard. Yarn is always soft. What am I doing here, man? Seriously.”
“Seriously?” Tate pulled a loaf of bread out of the fridge. “I’m going to make sandwiches. You hungry?”
Will’s eyes gleamed in their deep hollows. “Starved.”
“Good. I’ll fix you up.”
“You would offer it just like that.”
“A sandwich?”
“Jesus, Tater, develop some trust issues like a normal person, yeah?”
Tate shrugged. “I’ve got turkey.”
“Cheese?”
“Nope.”
“Course not.”
Tate made the sandwiches. Lettuce, tomato, and mustard. No mayonnaise. Whole grain bread. Between that, the stout, and the turkey, it was Carb Christmas.
“Call it an olive branch.” Tate offered Will a fresh bottle and a sandwich. “I’d like to get right with you. I’m sorry about Cymbria.”
Will rolled his eyes. “Did you rape her?”
Tate nearly coughed out his first bite. “Is that what you think?”
“If I did, you’d be in the dumpster, rolled up in that rug.” Will set his bottle on the coffee table and chomped into his sandwich. “You got nothing to be sorry for. It’s called seduction, Tater. Believe me, you didn’t stand a chance.”
“She told you?”
“Didn’t have to. I know her.”
Tate slouched back on the couch. “I’ve stopped by the office every day, sometimes twice a day, but she hasn’t been around. I think she’s avoiding me.”
Will chuckled. “Someone’s got a crush on Little Sister.”
“Laugh it up,” Tate muttered into his bottle before taking a drink. “Why d’you call each other that? Little Sister. Little Brother.”
“Family joke. She’s smaller, I’m younger—by about ten minutes.”
“Twins?”
“Hatched from the same meatsack, or so says the paperwork. Not that there’s much of it. I suspect the adoption arrangements were shady as fuck, but fat cats have a way of writing their own rules, don’t they? They wanted kids so they went out and bought a pair. Like shoes.”
“You’re not close with your folks?”
“Gave us their name, this mausoleum, and not much else.” A scowl swept over Will’s face. “They’re gone, now. Dusted.”
“Mine too.”
“You miss ‘em?”
“All the time.”
“You’re tight with your brother though.”
“I thought so. But could you walk out on Cymbria like I walked out on Brad?”
Will shook his head. “She’d hunt me down and drag me back. Little Sister’s stronger than she looks.”
“No shit.” Tate said, catching his tongue too late. “That came out wrong.”
Will’s hot hand clamped around the back of Tate’s neck. “Relax, man. Probably seemed weird, me going berserk over you and her. Thing is, Cym’s got impulse control issues. Does things without thinking them through. She’s all I have, Tater. And I protect what’s mine.”
Protect her from what? From unsafe sex with strangers? Was it a pattern? Will did seem more pissed than surprised at the whole thing. Tate made a mental note to get himself tested for everything from the clap to SARS.
“To family.” Tate raised his bottle and Will clanked his against it. A shrill twittering bounced off the walls, floor and ceiling. A moment of silence and the twittering repeated.
“Speaking of our resident succubus.” Will dug in his pocket and pulled out a phone.
Tate hadn’t heard a phone ring in almost two months. And now, to have one shrieking in close proximity? He could confidently say it was the most god-awful sound in the universe.
“Uh huh … upstairs with number nine … yeah, really … you should come up … just get your ass up here … see you in a few.”
Tate shoved Will’s shoulder hard with the heel of his hand. “What’re you doing?”
“Getting you out of your own goddamn way.” Will jammed the phone back in his pocket. The movement dragged the waistband of his jeans down exposing a taut slice of abdomen sweeping like a snowdrift to the crest of his hipbone. “Cym’s a tricky bird, Tater. Never gonna fly into your cage just because you leave the door open. Has to be something in there she can’t say no to.”
“Like what?”
“Like me.”
Tate sucked back the bottom third of his beer and banged the bottle down on the coffee table. “William Leighaven, you are the devil.”
Will flashed an honest-to-god smile that promised only sin. Lots of it.
Cymbria waltzed in without knocking. Tate stared at her outfit. Flip-flops, basketball shorts, and a Hawaiian shirt knotted beneath her breasts, exposing a long arc of midriff. She’d changed the game on him again. This wasn’t tequila. This was Malibu rum, pineapple juice, and coke. Trailer park colada.
Tate wrenched his eyes upward. “Hi.”
She ignored him, homing in on her brother. “This is the last place I expected to find you.”
Will shrugged. “Guess I know when I’m beaten.”
She glanced at Tate and then back to Will. “But you said—”
“Forget what I said.” Will braced one hand on the back of the couch and pressed his eyes shut for a moment. “We both know it’s too late.”
Cymbria’s features melted into something like sadness. Something like grief. She walked up to her brother, held his head in her hands and burrowed her fingers in his hair. “You look awful. You need this.”
Will opened his eyes and stared into hers. “I had some.”
“A scrap here? A crumb there? That’s not enough.”
Tate stepped forward. “Hey, if you want another sandwich, there’s plenty of—”
Will thwacked him with a glare so hateful it seemed to form a dark halo around his head, sharpening the angles of his gaunt face. Minutes ago, they’d been having their first real conversation over Russian stout. Will almost seemed to be enjoying himself. But with Cymbria’s arrival, Little Brother was back to grouch city.
She pressed her cheek to Will’s. “You’re running hot.”
“Why do you think I called you up here? It’s time.”
“Okay then.�
� Cymbria looked over her shoulder at Tate. Her lips parted slightly and her tongue flicked between her teeth like a snake tasting the air. “Miss me?”
Tate took a reflexive step back. “Just wanted to see how you are.”
“Dandy as a dandelion.” She slithered over and dragged her nail over the scab on his forehead, sending threads of fire down his spine. “Does it hurt?”
“This helps.” Tate’s arms reached out of their own accord, finding the hot skin of her waist. Maybe it was the stout, or perhaps it was what he’d come to think of as the Leighaven Effect. Prolonged exposure to the building and its management had a way of heightening the senses while rounding off the edges of reality. Tate didn’t care anymore that something massively odd was afoot. Or that Will was still glaring from the other side of the room as his sister steered Tate onto the couch and straddled his lap.
“Don’t you want some?” Cymbria asked, looking over her shoulder.
Will shook his head. “You first.”
With a smile she turned back to Tate. “Little Brother likes to watch.”
Sweat beaded along his hairline. He was on the wrong side of their language barrier. The smoldering woman-creature in his arms squirmed closer. He forced himself to let go of the need to understand, and when she kissed him, Tate knew he was lost.
Her lips left his, only to yank his shirt off, and then they were back, on his mouth, ears, face, and neck. He unknotted her Hawaiian shirt, pulled it off and threw it away. Her naked skin threw off a blast of nearly unbearable heat, and Tate wanted nothing more than to burn his mouth on her nearly flat chest and stomach. All the way down.
Then another pair of hands glided over Cymbria’s bare shoulders. Tate could only watch as Will grabbed Cymbria’s jaw, wrenched her head around and kissed her hard. Cymbria leaned back into her brother, returning his kiss, even as she rocked her hips against Tate’s hard-on.
“Fuck, you guys are so weird,” Tate groaned, but they didn’t seem to hear him over the ravening noises in their throats.
Will slung his arm across Cymbria’s collarbones, locking her in place as he kissed her deep and deeper. Until it could no longer be called a kiss, and Tate no longer felt aroused but drugged. His limbs grew numb and heavy. His breath came in labored gusts. The conduit of Will and Cymbria’s joined mouths glowed white, even as the dark chasm of their hunger yawned open.
Cymbria flattened her palms against Tate’s chest. It burned like a branding iron. He gasped, raising his weak arms to push her away. She grabbed him around the neck and crushed him to her, toasting his face on her breasts. Under her skin, he felt the rhythmic contraction of muscle. Her whole body acted as a pump, drawing not blood but something even more vital from the living pulp of him, and shotgunning it into Will.
Tate found himself thrown back as Will hauled Cymbria off his lap and pushed her down on the sofa beneath him. Tate rolled to the floor, banging his shoulder on the coffee table. Through bleary eyes, he watched their passionate embrace turn brutal.
Will kept his mouth clamped hard over Cymbria’s as she whimpered and struggled. Her wrists bruised and her skin blanched as she fought, but Will held her down, appearing to grow stronger as she weakened. Finally, her body went limp and her big eyes rolled back before closing. Will broke the kiss. Then he stroked Cymbria’s hair until the last drops of tension drained from her mottled face and she fell solidly unconscious.
Tate couldn’t believe the difference when Will slid off the couch to sit on the floor. The heroin addict pallor was gone, replaced by the pearly glow of health, and his eyes glittered like chipped onyx.
Will turned to him with that devil’s smile. “You’re not looking so hot, Tater tot.”
“Wha …” Tate couldn’t even form the one-word question.
“She wasn’t lying.” Will took a deep contented breath. “What little you got tastes damn fine. I haven’t felt this good in decades.”
Tate tried to lift his head. Might as well have been a mountain. He glanced over at Cymbria’s blue-tinged skin and purple lips. “Is she …”
Will responded with one of his withering looks. “Like I’d shove my only family in the proverbial oven for you?”
“Then why?”
Will grazed his knuckles over the bruise forming on Tate’s shoulder. “Little Sister likes you an awful lot. Would’ve hated herself for killing you, and I can’t have her hurt like that.” Tate’s heart struggled to pound the adrenaline through his body as Will’s face moved in closer. “I like you too, Tater. At least I like the person I think you could be. But I could still drain you dead without losing a speck of sleep over it. So the question becomes—what am I gonna do with you?”
The question sank into the murky grog of Tate’s mind. He tried to move his fingers and found he couldn’t. He attempted to speak, but his voice wouldn’t come. His pulse slowed. His eyes refused to focus. Death wasn’t as unappealing as it ought to have been, and he’d already left so much behind, it would be easy to drift away. In spite of all that, Tate wasn’t ready.
“Good choice,” Will said, sliding on top of him. “Try to relax. This might feel strange. For both of us.”
Strange was one way of putting it. Strangely repellent. Strangely compelling. Will’s mouth tasted like butter and cinnamon, like Cymbria, and his wiry body crushed Tate into the floor. Whatever the mechanism, skin contact seemed to get the job done, but slowly. Kissing—or fucking, for that matter—created a direct pipeline. Typically, the flow went from the prey to predator. Now, Will forced it in the opposite direction, creating violent turbulence. Tate gagged as it gushed into him and tried to pull away but Will bit into his tongue, forcing his mouth wide open.
Luminous energy filled the chambers of Tate’s heart and lit up his blood. Strength flooded back into his limbs and he moaned when his revived erection pushed against Will’s. It made sense now. This was more than their fuel source. It was a narcotic, an aphrodisiac, an elevator, a regenerator. In its clutches, pain, regret, morality, and identity were rendered meaningless. The cries of extinct animals.
Tate ran his hands under Will’s shirt feeling his skin heat to a blaze. Like a shot of ice cold Chopin pouring fire down his throat. The kind of vodka you sip alone, not because you have a problem, but because it’s just that special.
Will broke the seal of their mouths and panted against Tate’s neck, the harsh rasp of worn out machinery. Tate didn’t know what else to do for Will, so he held him.
Until a little girl’s laugh rang out in the hallway.
Pushing Will off, Tate scrambled to his feet, wincing as his teeth scraped his bitten tongue. Will propped himself up and licked away the blood trickling out of his mouth. He looked even worse than he had earlier in the evening. Skull clearly defined under his bleached skin. Cheeks flushed with sickness rather than health. Death boiled over.
The girl’s laugh echoed through the stairwell.
“Those kids, what are they?” Tate asked.
“Dreams,” Will muttered.
“You mean ghosts?”
Will’s glazed eyes sharpened. “No ghosts here. Little Sister and I, we clean our plates.”
Rage simmered in Tate’s rejuvenated veins. “There are no other tenants in this building.”
“Think of it as serial monogamy.”
“Or serial murder.”
Will uttered a weak laugh. “Does a wolf murder a rabbit?”
“Is that what you are? Wolves?”
“Wish I knew. Unfortunately, this ain’t a fairy story. There’s no woodsman coming to the rescue, or an evil witch with a candy house, or a moldy old book with all the answers. Sometimes the breadcrumbs don’t lead anywhere.”
“They led me here.”
“And it’s a good job more people don’t know the way. Otherwise, we’d have a queue out the door. Don’t act like you don’t know.”
Tate knew. Sex was only a word, a crude act that couldn’t begin to describe the pleasure of that metaphysical energy dialysis. B
ut that’s not all it was. He felt something that night with Cymbria. He felt it tonight in the midst of their fucked up three-way, and again, just now, on the floor. He felt cared for. Of course, that was part of their game, wasn’t it? Seduction.
“That’s all I am to you? A meal?”
“Christ, don’t push it.” Will managed to sound dangerous despite his exhaustion.
“You wanna hear something that makes you feel like a special snowflake? Listen to your heart, yeah? The fact that it’s beating right now makes you special. The fact that I’ve never, in over a hundred years, done what I just did for you makes you fucking special.”
Tate stared at his shoes. “She said I was the right one to let in.”
“But not the right time. You’re too thin.”
Tate’s hands covered his stomach. “What?”
“Your soul, dumbass. It’s emaciated. Saw it the second I laid eyes on you. Christ knows how long you’ve been starving yourself of everything good in life.” Will’s bruised eyes softened. “Cym promised me it would work out, that she could fatten you up. I may be a grouchy son-of-a-bitch, but there’s not much I wouldn’t do to make her happy.”
Tate swallowed hard. “Then let me stay.”
Will shook his head. “Go back to your brother and your bar. Watch your disgusting nephews grow up. Do it right this time. Live the life you want. Write that novel. Drink with your friends. Fall in love. Break some hearts. Make a big fat feast of your existence. And when you’re stuffed so full you’re tearing at the seams, then you’ll come home to us. To Leighaven.”
Tate shook his head. “But I can’t leave the two of you, not like this.”
“You can.” Will tensed like a feverish panther. “Or I’ll take back everything I just gave you with interest. I’ll have you in ways you can’t even imagine, and I know a part of you wants it, but timing is everything, Tater.”
Tate shoved his hands in his pockets and his fingers clutched his car keys. All he needed to escape. If only he wanted to.
Will didn’t wait for a final answer. He dragged himself onto the couch where he curled his body around Cymbria’s, kissed her ear, closed his eyes, and joined her in a death-like slumber. Twin corpses. Babes in the woods. But instead of a cadaverous chill, they radiated heat so intense it turned the entire apartment into an oven. If Tate stayed much longer, the Leighavens might literally cook him for dinner.
Year's Best Hardcore Horror Volume 2 Page 21