Love in Troubled Times

by Gayle Riley

  “Rhea, that is a beautiful way to think of things,” he told me, looking at me in the eyes. I loved how his green eyes danced in the dim light when he looked at me. “It won’t be like that, though. It’s not so simple. He’ll keep you under lock and key and under his seductive spell. Escaping may not be so easy.”

  “I don’t care what you say. I believe in my strength and love and in yours. I’m coming with you willingly, and I will endure whatever I have to in order to be around you. Nothing can be as bad as struggling every single day to put food in my fridge and pay for a place to live.” It was the truth.

  Maurice nodded, succumbing to my will, though I could tell he still wasn’t convinced. I would just have to show him how strong I could be.

  Chapter 7

  ***Rhea***

  I stood before Lawrence, the leader of the vampire clan that Maurice was bound to, and I had conflicting feelings. In his human life, Lawrence had probably been a good looking man. His leather jacket exposed his perfect abs, and he had short-cropped, black hair. His eyes were a light brown, and his lashes were long and desirable. But his face looked sickly and evil. His brows stayed in a permanent state of anger, and he had black circles under his eyes like he did not sleep. He did not look like a man I wanted to give my body to, but as he circled around me, surveying me, I couldn’t help but feel something else growing in my core. This was the influence, the glamour, that Maurice had spoken of. He was going to make me want his body regardless of what I actually wanted.

  “I can see why you like her, Maurice,” he hissed in a voice that reminded me of a cartoon lizard. “She is exceptionally beautiful for a human and quite unique. She does not seem to fear either of us.”

  I didn’t like the way he was speaking as if I was not there, but as soon as I opened my mouth to say something about it, Lawrence reached out to caress my face. I instantly felt as if I had had too much to drink. It was the feeling of a drunk woman in a club, willing to dance with whoever crossed her path. I looked upon Lawrence with new eyes; eyes of lust. Though, I found looking at Maurice had a similar effect, if not even stronger. I didn’t think Lawrence was removing my entire will, only bending it.

  “Aren’t you going to turn her first?” Maurice asked on my behalf as I was led into Laurence’s arms by an invisible force.

  “I am so bored with my wives, Maurice. I want something fresh, something unique. I want to taste her as a human first. Then, I will turn her.” I idly noticed that Maurice looked furious at the words Lawrence was saying, but all I could do was look at Lawrence and want to worship his body as I began to remove his clothing. I took his leather jacket off and then his leather pants, revealing a cold and pale body with a rock hard member just for me.

  Laurence leaned down and growled into my ear before grabbing a bit of my hair and breathing in my scent. His arm went around me, and I quickly melted into his strength. I knew somehow that this was going to be nothing like any experience I’d ever had with a man before.

  I looked over my shoulder at Maurice as he stood there watching us. I beckoned him with my eyes, knowing being a part of this was the only way he would be with me right now.

  He looked as if he was having a mental debate, and then he came over to us, helping Lawrence as he began to strip me of my clothes. They fell to the floor like pieces of paper, and soon both vampires had their hands snaking all over my body.

  Maurice was behind me, kissing up and down my shoulders as he slid his fingertips across my spine. I knew the moment his clothes came off as well as I felt his long, hard member against my skin. I gasped at the sensation and knew how badly I wanted him that way. I remembered how he had bitten me and drank my blood before, and I wanted him to do it again.

  But it was Lawrence that bared his fangs first, looking deadly and fearsome as he looked me over with his predatory stare. For a moment, I felt a fear in my heart that he would kill me, but as he sank his teeth just below my collarbone, I stopped caring. I moaned out loud at the mix of pain and pleasure my body felt, plunged into a dark world of ecstasy where there was no more pain or worries, only my two vampires as they lapped their tongues against me and fed on my life’s essence like it was chocolate.

  Lawrence began to massage my breasts before kissing and sucking down toward them, nipping at the left one once he descended. Maurice rubbed his long shaft up against the outside of my center, making me wet and throbbing, desiring him to plunge himself inside.

  The two eventually lay me down on my side in a tangle of velvet. Lawrence devoured me like a predator would the first prey of the spring as Maurice worked his way inside of me, penetrating me deeper than any human man ever had.

  I could not contain my moans of pleasure as I rocked back and forth up against them both as Lawrence’s hard member also found me, spreading my legs from the front as he rubbed up against my clit before working his way down.

  Maurice was prepping me for an experience like no other, slamming into me so that my flesh would spread and give way to another member; Lawrence’s cock snaking its way into me. Somewhere in my mind I knew that this would be pain for me when the spell wore off. I was a mere human being sexed by two thick, juicy vampires, but for now, all I cared about what how they both found my G-spot, sliding in and out of me with ease as I began to quiver in their arms. It was a new high I had never experienced as I pulsed again and again, the two of them continuing to milk pleasure out of me even after my body had exhausted itself.

  I didn’t know how long I had been there as I lay there in the dark between two men; one I had become subject to and the other that I loved with every fiber of my being. But I could feel the spell slowly wearing off, and I tried to hold back the tears when the glamour fully lifted. Maurice cradled me as I shook as if he knew exactly what I was feeling; the immense guilt over what I was putting him through by becoming Lawrence’s bride as well as the physical pain that was rocking my body like nothing else.

  After some time, the two of us were taken to a room unknown to me and locked inside. Maurice was bound, but I was left alone and given a robe to cover myself with. I supposed they hadn’t bothered to tie me up because I would be of no threat. I could not hope to stand up against a vampire while I was still human.

  I curled up into a ball on the floor and hugged myself close, beginning to sob. What had I done and how was I going to get us out of this?

  But as I lay there, my distress turned to anger. In anger, I knew there was power. I was going to figure this out for me and for Maurice, even if it meant killing Lawrence.

  Chapter 8

  ***Maurice***

  Every time I saw Lawrence, I felt a pull like no other. Because I had been a vampire so long, I knew what was going on. He was making me a slave to him sexually just like he was to her. He was making my body respond to the both of them, when they were in the same room, and it was the most sick and twisted thing I had known a clan leader to do. I had once thought of Lawrence as mild in comparison to some of the vampires I had come across in my more than one hundred years, but now I knew there was something dark and broken inside of him.

  Vampires were not good with time. So, the only way I could determine how long we might have been subject to his games was by the number of times he had forced us into a mind-blowing and confusing threesome. It had been enough times that even my strong and perfect body was getting exhausted and extremely hungry. I needed to get out and feed if I was going to continue, but I had qualms about the idea of leaving Rhea alone there to do that. I had no guarantee that she would survive if I left or if I would ever be allowed to be with her again if I asked to go hunt.

  The situation was more hopeless than even I expected, and I often watched helplessly as Rhea cried herself to sleep. My only hope for her now was that Lawrence would tire of playing with his food and actually turn her so she wouldn’t be in so much pain anymore. Vampires could easily let go of human feelings of both physical and mental pain. It was the best thing for her right now.

  I looke
d over at her now and wanted to pull her into my arms. At some point, they had realized I was weakening and no longer tied me up, so it was something I was capable of, but if Lawrence came in there to find the woman I loved which he coveted in my arms, I wasn’t sure how he would react.

  “Why do you not touch me anymore unless he makes you?” she whimpered with her back turned to me. She had the voice of someone who had cried so long that everything in them had just dried up. “Are you disgusted by me because I have been with the both of you now?” I couldn’t bare the bitterness in her tone or the thought that she believed I no longer felt anything for her. It was the exact opposite. As awful as the situation was, I lived for those moments when I was allowed to have my hands on her beautiful, womanly body, when I was allowed to be intoxicated by her scent. Those times were the only thing keeping me going. How did she not know that?

  I decided it was worth the risk, and I crawled my way to her, enveloping her in my arms. My red hair fell against the skin on her chest as she sighed with all the emotion she must have been holding in for me this whole time. She was the bravest human I had ever met, which at the moment, was worth so much more than her beauty and the fact that she was utterly unique. “I love you. You keep me feeling like my heart is beating in my chest even though that has not happened naturally in over one hundred years, Rhea. I would do anything to keep you with me, and that is exactly what I am doing. I know that you fight so hard and have no control over what he makes you feel and do. I feel your love for me in every touch and ever sigh you save just for my movements within you.”

  I kissed down her back greedily, never wanting to be made to stop. If this was possibly the final moment I would get to do this before she was ripped away from me or me from her, I was going to make it count. “I love you,” I said over and over each time I kissed a new precious piece of skin on her body.

  “Maurice,” she said quietly after some time, stopping me in my tracks.

  “Yes, my love?”

  “We can’t keep doing this,” she told me flatly. I knew she was right, but I was powerless to think of a way to get out. We were both bound by his glamour and me especially by the blood pact of the clan. I could not just walk out even if I had the strength to. “We have to do something about this.”

  “Other than die, I don’t know what we could do,” I admitted to her with deep sadness.

  “Only one of us has to die,” she told me, turning around with a new fire burning behind her grey eyes. I could tell by the way she looked that she did not mean a permanent death. She wanted me to turn her, though I didn’t know what strength I had in me to do that at the moment.

  “I am weak. I do not know if that would even work, or if I could continue to survive much longer after that. Besides, how could that get us out of here?” I had no idea what was in that mind of hers.

  “If you turn me and not him, I will not be part of the clan, he cannot order me around.” In theory, she was right, but usually, new vampires did not have their own will to resist being glamoured by an older vampire until they were at least a couple of decades. The blood lust and new senses were too strong for a young vampire.

  “You are right, but he might still be able to glamour you because you would be brand new.”

  “It’s our only way,” she told me with a new determination in her body. Rhea had transformed from a shaking, crying and broken woman to someone who was ready to fight. She was right, it was all we had. “I will kill him. If I succeed, you will go and feed and no longer be weak.”

  I nodded, not wanting to say the things that were scratching at my throat. Goodbyes weren’t something we needed right now. We needed hope. So, we exchanged blood right there on the floor in each other’s arms, and I held her as the light went from her grey eyes so that she could reawake as one of the undead.

  I was stunned as I watched her transform, becoming even more beautiful as she became one of us. I had never known such beauty from anything other than a painting of a goddess. She would be the ultimate predator, luring unsuspecting men of all races to their death with just a toss of her golden hair. Somehow, I knew to look on her now would center me, even under the influence of Lawrence’s sick seduction. She was my muse and my savior.

  Chapter 9

  ***Rhea***

  I looked in the mirror that stood in the room where Maurice and I were being kept, looking over myself in awe. Every flaw that my body had was gone. All my pain was gone. My hair was strong and vibrant, and I had two fangs that I could make protrude form my mouth at any time. I was perfect and incredibly strong. I could feel it with every fiber of my being. I was going to be able to kill Lawrence.

  I was about to turn around and tell Maurice this; tell him that I knew now I could do it, but that was when I heard the footsteps. I couldn’t believe I could hear a vampire coming.

  I got back in my little corner, trying to still appear pitiful and disheveled, though I didn’t know how well I would play that part. Maurice had gone back to his spot as well, looking weaker than ever. I could only hope I would pull off the plot in time to save my love because immortal life meant nothing without him there.

  Lawrence burst into the room, and I could tell by the scent that he had already been drinking from another human. He was drunk with blood. So, why he wanted me at that moment I had no clue. What I did know is that he was trying to push his influence on me, but it flowed around and over me as if I had an invisible barrier around me. Still, for this to work I had to pretend that it was still working.

  I stood up and came over to him, immediately disrobing. I knew that he would see that my bruises and scratches, even the bite marks were gone. But maybe he was blood drunk enough to overlook it just long enough for me to get the opening I needed.

  He began snaking his hands all over my body like always before lazily looking over to Maurice. “You are too weak to pleasure her tonight,” he barked, looking over Maurice like he was a bug he wanted to squash. I tried to ignore it and comply, but I felt anger well up in me like nothing I felt when I was a human. Emotions were so heightened, and I didn’t know how long I could wait before I struck. But I needed to have the right moment in order to make sure I succeeded. There was no room for errors here.

  Lawrence leaned down with his fangs out, ready to take more blood from me. I began kissing his collar bone and gripping his member, stroking it until I knew he would succumb to me more easily. I silently let my fangs extend, getting the feel for them before I spread my mouth wide and grabbed onto his head, forcing him still as I bit into his neck. I pulled flesh with my teeth, ripping him apart piece by piece. I didn’t want to leave any of him to heal. I ravaged his body until there was nothing left but splatter and his head. I closed my eyes and savored the flavor of his blood. It was the best thing that had ever assailed my tongue.

  I went straight to Maurice and began kissing him, giving him the blood that drenched my mouth and then letting him take some from my wrist. I needed him to make it for just a little while longer.

  I picked him up and bore some of his weight on me as we left the room. I had him lead me to where I would find the rest of the clan. We came out into a common room of sorts where dozens of vampires were feeding and joking around. But the moment I walked in there with their leader’s head, the room went dead silent.

  “I have killed your leader,” I seethed, holding his head high so they could all see the truth. “You will all either pledge your blood to me and the husband I will take, or you need to leave now.”

  Chapter 10

  ***Rhea***

  I looked over at the man I was about to join with my blood forever and felt a warmth of gratefulness come over me. We had gone all out, buying me a black lace wedding dress and him a tux with a red vest to match his hair. He had tied it back away from his beautiful face, and here we were, standing before the clan that had stayed behind to pledge their allegiance to me, ready to say our vows.

  Getting married as a vampire was different in one aspect from
getting married as a human. There was no ‘til death do us part. All we had stretched in front of us was forever.

  The crowd cheered as we were pronounced husband and wife, and instead of a kiss, we each partook of each other’s life blood. When we drank from one another, it felt like we were sharing each other’s souls; something I was certain we still had even as the undead.

  “I love you,” I told him with a smile, my fangs still bared.

  “I love you even more, until the ends of the Earth and back,” he whispered into my ear, kissing just below the lobe. I felt my body respond with a burning desire. I still had not gotten to have him all to myself, and I couldn’t wait to retire to our room and make love until we got bored of it, which I was certain would be never.

  Maurice led me through the crowd and into our chambers, and I called for two of my clan members to bolt and guard the doors. Everyone had their orders and assignments, and one of those was to leave us be until we were through with each other. I didn’t know when that would be, but I knew I would have fun finding out.

  I approached Maurice with a sinister grin, turning around and moving my hair out of the way so that he could reach the zipper at my back. He grasped the zipper with perfect precision and began sliding it down as slowly as possible. I knew it had to be painful to be so controlled with his movements. He could easily get this whole thing off of me in less than a second if he wanted to. But he was doing this on purpose.

  His fingernails tickled at my skin all the way down, and I giggled happily until I was finally able to hop out of the confining dress.

  Underneath I had worn a blood red corset just for him, and he made me turn in circles so he could admire it, licking his lips at my delicious appearance.