by C. A. Rene
I try to scramble forward away from the stranger but that same boot drives into my lower spine, sending me flying face first into the pavement. I roll over onto my back just as a large boot presses down onto my stomach, holding me in place. I look up to the face of an exceptionally large man whose hoodie hides his features.
“Looks like you caught something.”
There are two of them, the second voice is deep, melodic, and doesn’t sound like he’s just smoked a whole pack of cigarettes.
“Let me up.” I push at the tree trunk of a leg.
“Tempest Skeigh Verona.” The second voice floats from above my head. “When I first heard it, I thought it was a unique stripper name, Tempest Skeigh. Then I find out, that is your actual name.”
A hand snares into my hair, then I’m being dragged against the cement, and pulled to my feet. My head comes to the man’s shoulders; I consider myself tall but he’s freakishly tall. Another exceptionally large body is pressing against my back and I freeze in complete terror. I still can’t make out the features of the first man but I know he’s familiar. He looks a lot like one of the four men that were here last night. Deluge.
“Is this part of my choosing?” I ask quietly and the body behind me stills.
“Shouldn’t have asked that.” The man in front of me tsks.
A knife appears in front of my face and I open my mouth in a silent scream. I can’t move, my limbs are locked, and my body is vibrating as potent terror invades all my senses.
The same all black handle and blade slowly comes at my face.
“Something inside me calls to you, Tempest.” That voice washes over me and I almost moan at the captivating sound. “Your blood sings to me, tempting me to spill it, and begging me to taste it.”
The edge of the blade presses against my neck and shockingly I find myself arching it to give him easier access.
“You feel that too, right? How the air around us changes, our souls pushing against our barriers, and trying to break through our skin to taste one another.”
His words and that voice put me into some kind of a trance because I can feel myself languidly pushing back against him.
“Sing me a song, Tempest Skeigh Verona.”
The blade cuts into the flesh of my neck, the sting instantaneous, and I can feel the slow wet trickle of blood beginning to spill down my neck. It’s a surface cut, but deep enough that the blood flows unencumbered.
My head tips back on a sigh and then I feel his lips seal around the wound on my neck. I moan, the sound a little high pitched and long. Very much like a song. The soft tug on the gash sends a wash of sensation over my body and I gasp, reaching my hands up to wrap around the arm he has across my chest.
We’re moving forward but I’m not paying attention until my chest and stomach hit a rough brick wall. I open my eyes and see that I’ve been led into the alleyway between the club and the Liquor store.
I look to the mouth of the alley and see man number one standing with his back to us, guarding us from what, I don’t know. My senses begin to float back to the surface and I can feel the panic welling up inside me.
“No.” I push back against the hard body behind me, “let me go.”
“What’s done is done, you’re mine now to use as I wish.” Fuck, his voice.
“What the fuck does that mean?” I question.
He pushes me back to the wall and my hands fly forward to prevent my face from meeting the unforgiving brick. I curse the decision I made today to wear a long maxi dress and a ridiculously small thong. The skirt is pulled up and over my ass, making me curse. I try to get out from between him and the coarse wall but he causes me to pause when his thumb presses into the cut on my neck. The throb from the wound and then the sound of him sucking my blood off his thumb and into his mouth, has my eyes rolling back in pleasure.
My head falls forward and rests against the brick as his hands rove over my ass.
“You’re perfect,” he says as his fingers pull on my thong. “You’re exactly what I’ve been searching for.”
Then that delicious mouth that acts as an outlet for that amazing voice, reseals around the laceration, his rough tongue brushing over the slice, and his fingers seeking out the wet warmth I know he’ll find between my legs.
He parts my folds and my knees grow weak at his touch. His fingers slip through my arousal and circle around the hardened nub, sending arcs of lightning across my skin. I begin to moan and circle my waist, trying to create a sweet rhythm of friction for the hungry bundle of nerves he’s stroking.
Then his finger pushes up into me and I groan as his knuckles scrape against my walls. I feel my pussy constrict, sucking him in further as he pushes in another, and begins to fuck me with them slowly. I’m growing louder and my pussy is sucking hungrily, the noises almost embarrassing. Almost, because right now I couldn’t care less, I have never felt this way, and the orgasm that’s creeping up on me is shocking.
My stomach tightens, my pussy clamps around his fingers, and my scream gets lodged in my throat as I crest the wave of my orgasm. I'm grinding into his hand when I feel a sharp pain on my right ass cheek. At first, it feels like an annoying scratching but my orgasm overpowers it and I only begin to feel the smarting sting as I come down.
He steps back, his warmth replaced with a chilling breeze, and I hear his quick intake of breath.
"Mine." He growls.
I reach my hand back, wiping along my buttock, and bringing it back to my face. I'm shocked to find it's covered in blood.
Chapter Five
Tempest
“What the fuck?" I gasp as the bright red of my blood coats my palm.
I turn to ask this stranger what he's done when I see him already leaving the alley.
"Hey!" I drop my skirt and chase after him. "What the fuck did you do to me?"
I grab his arm and find myself quickly slammed against the brick with his hand firmly around my throat.
"Don't ever fucking touch me." He snarls, his mouth and the tip of his nose the only things visible under his hood.
"You touched me." I gasp as I try to look under the shade.
"You're mine and I can do as I wish with you. Your body is mine, your breath is mine, and your dark, cold soul is mine." I close my eyes at the sound of his voice, feeling myself become calmer than any drug has given me.
"Raiden." I whisper his name, it must be him.
He has a goatee that curves around his full round lips, the color black with a sprinkling of gray throughout and his nose is slightly wide, one nostril sporting two rings while the other has a single stud. His tongue comes out to wet his bottom lip and I see a small bar through the tip. I want to know how it would feel to have that bar gliding against my pussy and sinking deep inside.
Fuck.
I try to shake off the stupor I keep finding myself in and sort out my thoughts.
"Why did you cut me?"
His hand squeezes tighter around my throat and his plump lips pull back and tighten against his bright white teeth, "You. Are. Mine."
His body crowds in against mine and the coarse brick begins to dig into my back, his mouth so close to mine. I want his kiss and the feel of his breath washing over my face has me wishing we could get closer still.
Then, he breaks away and I whimper at the absence of his touch. He turns his back and walks away from me like he didn't just violate me in the best way. I continue to lean against the wall, catching my breath, and feeling the sting on my ass and neck. I need about four Valium and twelve hours of sleep.
I push off the wall and swiftly walk back to my car, my ass smarting and the blood running down my leg. I'm starting to see why Sky was so fucking scared of these men. As much as I want to sleep, I need to get home and Google Deluge.
Once home, my slow as fuck laptop hums loudly like it's ready to take off and I pour myself a large glass of wine. The pain in my ass has eased but the skin is an ugly red color and inflamed around a long, jagged cut. I cleaned t
he wound and covered it with a bandage because the sight of my broken skin makes me want to fucking lose it.
I pull up Google and type in Deluge. A bunch of articles pop up but it's the first picture that has my full attention. All of them in what looks to be long black robes, the hoods wide and low over their heads, and their mouths on full display. I intuitively know which one is Raiden, the shape of those lips will forever be ingrained in my mind, and I touch my neck on the cut he licked clean.
The others are pretty much normal save for the long, pointed beards and is that a forked tongue?! One of them has a forked tongue! I scroll over the articles and there are a few that stand out from the late nineties.
"Deluge causes a riot in the streets of Chicago."
"They're at it again! Deluge Kills a dove on stage."
"Blood thrown onto the crowd! Deluge being fined."
“Is Deluge really a part of the Illuminati?”
That last one gives me pause and I quickly open the link. There’s a picture of the four of them looking much younger and a lot more out of control, the picture is grainy with how old it is so I can’t really pick out their features. But they’re all topless and muscular like running backs. Two of them have their hands thrown up and their fingers shaped into a triangle.
“Deluge greeted fans backstage tonight after their final concert for the tour. When a fan asked them what the secret to their success was, lead singer Raiden James said, quote, ‘hard work and a lot of blood.’ To which his bandmate Torrent added ‘sweat and tears, too.’ Strange right? Especially when they draw Illuminati symbols from dove’s blood onto the stage during their shows. Then let’s not forget their very own manager Kenny Tonga has been known to associate with many suspected Illuminati members.”
Okay, so these guys sound a bit fucked up, like a lot a bit and my stinging ass can attest to that. My satisfied pussy on the other hand, wants more of the fucking madness. I can't help but be somewhat drawn to the man that tasted my blood and finger fucked me simultaneously.
Next, I Google the Illuminati and skim through a few sites but not really learning much. There’s nothing about selling souls to the devil but there is an in-depth explanation about secret societies and that we may never know exactly what the Illuminati are or what they stand for.
I hit a link to a YouTube video and one of their songs begins to play. It’s heavy metal with the angry sounding electric guitar and the hard crashing of drums, but Raiden’s voice is singing like it’s Sunday choir. He sounds beautiful against the aggressive background noise and his voice is melodic.
I close the laptop and sit back on the couch. I'm intrigued and if I'm being honest with myself, I have always been slightly attracted to the more fucked up things in life. That includes the men I choose, too. Hence why I'm sitting here in this one room apartment and pulling my clothes off every night for a buck. I'm not your average twenty-one-year-old.
For as long as I can remember, everything that surrounded me was different shades of dark and I grew up thinking that was normal. People weren't nice, life was hard, and survival meant you made it another day. Anything more than that was a privilege, which I rarely had.
Maybe if I had a mother that stuck around to raise me, things would’ve been different, I was about six when she left, but I can’t seem to summon her face or hear her voice, and she’s long been forgotten. I have been told many different versions of the same story and they all add up to the same conclusion, she was a cunt who left her young daughter in the hands of an alcoholic father.
I know nothing of her family, where she came from, and where she went. My father was rarely sober and asking about her always resulted in more questions than answers. He resented her for leaving and even more for sticking him with me. Not that he raised me, I was left to the streets most days, and that meant I was stealing food and robbing people’s pockets.
That’s why I’m sitting here, sucking back a bottle of wine, and wincing whenever I shift on my ass, instead of crying at a police station. I don’t trust pigs and I know in most cases they cause a bigger problem instead of solving it.
I know I can handle the likes of Deluge because this shit isn’t new to me and men like Raiden are more familiar than not. Like he said, my soul is cold and dark, and I know there’s no light at the end of the tunnel around here.
I chug down the rest of the bottle and let the glass hit the carpet, watching as it rolls towards a few others. Raiden may think he owns me but he has no idea what owning me entails.
I am looking forward to watching him find out.
Chapter Six
Tempest
“Carl,” I slam my fists against my hips. “Him and his goon jumped me as I was heading to my car.”
“Why were you alone?” His brows crash together in confusion.
“Who the fuck cares?” I throw my hands up. “They fucking jumped me and that crazy motherfucker carved into my skin.”
I tip my head to show him my neck and then turn to lift the skirt I’m wearing, giving him a good view of the long, jagged cut in my ass cheek.
“I wanted you to stay home.” He drops his head into his hands. “Then maybe this could have been avoided.”
“I can’t stay home!” I yell. “I need to work.”
“Now, you’re in his sights, there’s nothing I can do.” He leans back in his chair. “You can leave this place.”
“Leave?” I widen my eyes.
“Yeah, I don’t know that he wouldn’t hunt you down though, I think he’d enjoy that.”
“I’m not leaving because some old asshole Illuminati bitch is trying to scare me.” I turn on my heel and stomp towards his office door.
“Tempest, I wouldn’t say that shit to anyone else if I were you,” he calls to my back. “They are coming tonight for the choosing. Be ready.”
“Fuck them,” I flip him the bird over my shoulder. “And fuck their fucking choosing.”
Tonight's line up consists of me, Queen, Diamond, and Tiny. I think Tiny requested this night hoping Squall would choose her again. She said it was an amazing experience and a lot of money was transferred into her account afterward.
I won’t be hitting the stage tonight, the cut on my ass is ugly and I can only imagine what the girls would be saying about it. Instead, I sit at the bar with Kyle and guzzle back all the free drinks he rolls to me. I can see the interest in his eyes but I can say with one-hundred percent certainty that he stirs absolutely nothing in me.
“Not going on tonight?” He asks me.
“Nope.” I shake my head and down the tequila shot, flicking the lime slice back at him.
“Shame, I like watching you the most.” He grins what he must think is his panty dropping grin.
“I bet.” I wink and suddenly my back is hot as a body steps up to it.
I know who it is, it’s the same energy as last night, and I watch as Kyle scurries off down the bar like the pussy he is.
“You carved into my ass like a fucking thanksgiving turkey, you asshole.” I snarl my back still to him.
“Is that why you're not dancing?”
Fuck me, that voice.
“I’m damaged enough on the inside, I’m not feeling like displaying the now damaged outside.” I cross my arms over my chest.
“Do you want to never dance here again?” His breath hits my neck and I shiver from its warmth.
“Are you going to whisk me away and give me a better life?” I snort.
“No,” he chuckles and the sound goes straight to my clit.
I turn to confront him but once again see his back as he walks towards a table filled with the other band members and their manager. All of them wear hoods, save for the cunt in a suit, and all of them are looking my way. Raiden sits in the booth and leans back, his legs opening wide. His fingers begin to curl the hairs on his chin and my mouth waters when I remember where they were early this morning.
My reaction to him is nothing short of visceral and from the smirks of his bandmates,
they notice it too. The only one not smirking is their manager, he’s looking at me like I’m unworthy, and his brow lifts as if to ask why am I still looking? I flip him the bird and turn back around on my stool. He doesn’t intimidate me but he is dredging up these feelings of not being good enough.
I hop down from my stool and make my way back to the dressing room. I’m inebriated from alcohol but alcohol stopped being enough a long time ago. Now I need something stronger, something more chemical to stop myself from succumbing to everything I’ve failed to deal with.
“I have to do three dances tonight.” Diamond moans from the vanity beside me.
“Sorry girl,” I shrug as I cut my lines into the glass top. “I had an accident and I don’t think men want to see a bloody bandage on stage.”
She looks at me skeptically but I don’t give a fuck. Diamond is a girl who grew up with a lot of money and this is her big rebellion to her pretentious family. She’s pretty enough, but her face always holds that haughty sneer rich people inherit. Her hair is a dirty blonde and her eyes a bright green. She’s average height and her body is still all soft curves, showcasing her lack of work and young age.
“I was asked to come tonight.” She lights a cigarette and I scrunch my face at the smell. I hate cigarettes. “Looks like I might be working at some private party.”
“Were you given a knife?” I ask her.
“What?” She looks from me to the coke on my table.
“Nevermind.”
“Carl asked me to come.” She flips back her hair with a grin on her face.
She’s had a thing for Carl for a while now and I find it amusing when he barely acknowledges her. He’s easily fifteen years older than her but whatever, all girls find themselves crushing on an older man at some point in their lives. I’ve had a few myself.
“Diamond.” Freight calls “You’re up.”
I turn to look at Freight and his jaw is clenched as he purposely ignores me.
“I’m sorry about not waiting for you to walk me last night.” I tell him, I’m not sure how much Carl has told him.