Someone stumbled into her as she was writing, making her bend backwards trying to catch herself from falling. As she righted herself, my eyes zeroed in on a scar that revealed itself right above her pelvic bone at the seam of her pants. A scar that triggered something violently in my memory.
My eyes rolled into the back of my head and my mind was filled with a vision.
I was being held down by three unknown men; their faces shrouded in darkness. One had a small branding iron in his hand and was slowly lowering it down towards me. I felt the sear of the hot metal on my skin, ripping a cry of agony from my throat.
I yelled for the men to let me go, but all they did was laugh at me and call me a pathetic human. I looked down and saw what they had done. SIN105 was burned into my flesh like I was nothing more than cattle in a slaughterhouse. I cried and cried, wishing I could just die from the pain.
“Claudia! Claudia, babe! Open your eyes!” I heard a voice yelling at me. I could barely make out what they were saying, though. It was like my head was shoved under water.
My cheek stung as something was slammed across my face. My eyes shot open and I gasped in pain. I felt wetness down my cheeks and the taste of blood coated my tongue.
“Oh, thank fuck! What the hell was that?” Lucy exclaimed with relief.
I was laying on the floor, staring up into her face as she knelt next to me. Sawyer, Randi and a few other clubbers were standing around me. I groaned as she helped me sit up, my head pounding like a bunch of tiny hammers were tinkering away at my brain. I lifted my hand and wiped at my face, only to see blood on my fingers. It had happened again. My memories were coming back, and they were literally causing me physical harm. Why the hell would Abraham do something to me that would cause this to happen should I start remembering?
“Are you okay?” Randi asked softly. “Sorry about the slap. Lucy was freaking out and I didn’t know what else to do to wake you up.”
I took her and Sawyer’s extended hands and lifted myself up. The waitress who had that scar came over and handed me a wet rag. I averted my eyes from her, hoping that by not looking at her I wouldn’t trigger another memory. I knew it wasn’t her face that had done it. It was her scar. A scar that I now knew I’d had burned into my flesh. Only, I didn’t have it anymore. Old scars healed when a human was turned into a vampire.
“I’m fine. But, I think I need to get home. I need to talk to Abraham.” More like I need to yell at Abraham.
“I called him. He’s on his way,” Lucy said as she grabbed the rag from my hand and began wiping my face. “What happened, Claude? I was so scared. Your eyes rolled into your head, you collapsed and then started seizing. I was trying to wake you, but you just kept vibrating and blood began to pour from your eyes and nose. I was having a heart attack.” Tears sprang to her eyes as she helped me clean up.
I grabbed her shoulders and hugged her to me tightly. “I know. I know, I’m sorry. I don’t know how to explain it just yet. After I talk with Brahm, I’ll be able to give you more answers.”
“God. I hope whatever it is, it never happens again. I don’t think I know what to do if something happened to you.”
I released her and gave her a sassy grin. “You can’t get rid of me that easy. Who the hell would throw glitter at you at your wedding?”
Her tears stopped, and she leered at me. “Don’t you dare.”
I laughed and kissed her cheek. “I make no promises. I am sorry your night has been ruined,” I added guiltily.
She waved me off. “Are you kidding me? This was the best, even with what happened. I’m never forgetting Randi trying to stick money all the way down that poor dancer’s speedo.”
“Unfortunately, neither am I,” Sawyer added. “Can we not let the human on stage again?”
We all laughed at Sawyer’s worried expression.
Chapter Seven
Diego
I was in so much shit. So, so much shit.
The second Claudia had barged into my apartment half naked and drunk, I completely forgot how to put on my tough guy act. She was a hell of a lot more beautiful than I remembered, and the fact that she could legitimately die if I pushed for answers had me pausing.
I knew I had said to myself that one life wasn’t worth hundreds of others. In some deep place in my mind I think I still believed that. But the sight of Claudia so vulnerable and bleeding as the memories hit her, was enough to make me forget that train of thought. It was enough that I didn’t want to be the asshole STF agent I usually was, even for just a moment. I wanted to comfort her. Save her from having to go through what she was.
I hadn’t connected with anyone in a long time. The last time I had it almost broke me into so many pieces, you could use them for sand in an hourglass. I refused to put myself through that again and hardened my heart. I dove into my work and convinced myself it was enough. It was for a while; until she walked through my door.
Even drunk, she was probably one of the most endearing women I’d ever met. I did a good job of pretending she hadn’t amused me or turned me on. However, internally I was enraptured by her. The faces she made. The way she smelled. The way she looked in that lingerie. It was enough to bring even the most dominant of men to his knees, begging at her feet to be touched. And God, her touch. Her hand on my chest when she stumbled almost had me stumbling. Almost.
How Abraham had gone so long without making that woman his, was beyond my comprehension.
A pounding at my front door brought me out of my reverie. I put my cigarette between my lips and shrugged on a shirt. When I opened the door, I was surprised to see Abraham standing there with a livid expression.
“What have you done?” He immediately shouted at me then forced his way into my apartment.
I stumbled backwards from his forced entry and pulled my cigarette away. “Really? What the hell is up with people just showing up at my place? I should really just start giving out keys at this rate.” It probably wasn’t a good idea to taunt him. I knew why he was here. Claudia had told him.
“You mean like Claudia? Did you really think I wouldn’t find out that she was here? What did you tell her?” He shouted in my face. His eyes held nothing but loathing as he stared me down.
“Whoa! Cool it!” I held my hands up in surrender. I wasn’t looking for a fight with an Ancient. “I only told her what she deserved to know,” I replied calmly. I put out my cigarette and went to sit back down in my chair. If he was going to yell at me, I might as well get comfortable.
“That was not for you to decide! She could die if she remembers the things I have blocked! Do you not understand that?” He roared.
I did understand. I saw how just one small memory could affect her. And as badly as I wanted answers, I couldn’t find it in me to pressure her for them. I didn’t want anything bad to happen to her. Even if it meant taking longer to solve this case. That revelation surprised me.
“I got it, ese. I saw what happened when a memory slipped through. I knew what it was the second it happened, and I stopped prying. I may be an asshole, but I won’t be responsible for hurting someone intentionally,” I explained. I conveniently left out the part that I specifically didn’t want to hurt her. Not just because the way she made me feel, but because it felt physically impossible to wish any ill will on her.
Fucking women…
“Even though your earlier statement at my club was that you didn’t care about my progeny and would get the answers whether I liked it or not? I highly doubt your tune could change that easily,” Abraham scoffed with condescension.
I turned my head away from him, not wanting to admit why my reasoning had changed. But he saw it anyways.
“Ah. I see. She came to you and you fell under the same spell as I have.” His tone was smug and had me whipping my head back in his direction.
“I’m not under her spell. I just don’t want to hurt her. She’s…” I couldn’t find the words to finish the lie.
“Special,” he finished for me. �
�Claudia is special. She always has been and always will be. You can deny it all you want, but you know as well as I do that any denial would be a lie. You feel what I felt when I first laid eyes on that woman. She’s hellacious and can be annoying on her best days, but she is like no other. What she went through would have broken any man or woman, supernatural or not. Those blocks are some of the most intricate I ever designed and could never replicate again if I tried. Unfortunately…” his angry tone finally softened a fraction. “-it’s not only your fault the flood gates have opened.”
I scrunched my eyebrows in confusion. “What do you mean?”
He sighed and collapsed onto my couch, then ran his hands through his hair. “I have done something that I promised myself I wouldn’t do to protect her from this. I was the first blow to the block. You only revealed that the block was there.”
“What did you do?” My curiosity was piqued.
“Let me tell you something first,” he started, turning to me with a serious expression. “She and I were more once. I fell for that girl the second I caught sight of her. I was the one who had stolen her away into the ring. I was one of the ones running it with an associate of mine. I took her away from the hell hole her parents had shoved her away in, then somehow managed to make her love me. I never touched her or fed from her like I wanted to until she allowed it of me. Unfortunately, my associate grew angry that my attention to the business was beginning to wane. That I was spending all my time with this one human girl. He was jealous.”
Well fuck. That was all I could think. This wasn’t good.
“He took her one night. He smuggled her away from the compound we were running it out of and disappeared into the night. I searched for her for many nights. I was mad with worry for her and on the edge of going mad from the loss of her. He made sure to cover his tracks and make it next to impossible to find her. I did find them eventually, though. It took killing many of his followers to do so, but I managed. Unfortunately, I was too late.” He put his face into his hands then breathed in and out deeply.
I stood and went to the kitchen, grabbing us some beers and nudging his hands with one. He looked like he needed it. He lifted his face and took the bottle from my hand. Quickly, he pried off the cap and took a long drink.
“What happened next?” I prodded.
“Something I wish I could have prevented. Something that still haunts me like no other memory in my long existence,” he hesitated. A shuddering breath escaped him. “She had tried to hang herself. I barely caught her by the arms before she threw herself from the building. Her body had been beaten, bitten, raped, and branded. She was a shell of the girl I knew. So… I did the only thing I could think to do. She was close to death even before she tried to break her neck. Changing her was my only option. So, I did. I changed her, then immediately put a block up in her mind. I wanted to make sure that she would never remember the horrors that happened to her. I still don’t know the full details; only what I could get out of my associates men before killing them. He had escaped, so I couldn’t very well kill him. And that was it. She awakened as the girl I remembered, and life continued on.”
I threw back my beer, needing to drink every last drop to get the imagery from my mind. No fucking wonder he didn’t want me messing with her memories. Now, I felt like the biggest piece of shit.
“I tell you this, because I need you to understand. I jumpstarted the process to bringing her memories back, because I lost control and touched her. Not my usual affections, but more. I needed to feel her. She is a woman you cannot feel just once, then never again. It is my fault this has happened. I just wanted someone else to blame so the guilt wouldn’t eat me alive.”
I nodded in understanding. I got it now. I understood why he reacted the way he had so violently. If she had been mine, I would’ve done the same. But now knowing this story, I was even more determined to put an end to the ring I was dealing with. I knew without a doubt that these same things were happening to these girls. Then I realized something about what he said.
“Branded?” I asked him.
He looked at me in confusion for a second, then his eyes widened with understanding. “Yes. Letters and a number. That was my associate’s demented way of keeping track of the merchandise. I never approved of it.”
I leapt from my chair and ran over to my filing cabinet. I shuffled through the files until I came across the one with all the pictures of the victims from my crime scene. I pulled the file out and opened it, grabbing the pictures of the brands and spreading them across the table in front of Abraham.
“Like these?” I asked him.
His eyes widened in horror. “Yes! These are from your case?”
I nodded. “Every single body we found had the letters SIN and three numbers branded into their skin. They were also drained of blood, pumped with drugs, and left out in the open for anyone to find. Do you know what those letters mean?”
“Yes, I do. This is his brand. SIN. Sexual Identification Number. He marked Claudia with one, but it disappeared when she turned.”
“What is his name? He has to be the one running this.”
Abraham nodded. “Yes. I believe he is. I’m going to enjoy finding him and killing him like I intended to all those years ago,” he looked up at me with pure loathing flashing across his face. “His name is Rogue.”
Finally. A break in my case. I wanted to shout with excitement at finally having something to go off of. I was about to ask Abraham more, when his cell went off.
He looked down at the caller ID and smiled before answering. “Claudia, love. I need to speak with you and explain—” he stopped talking and his brows drew together. “What? What happened?” he paused for a moment, then suddenly jumped from his chair. “I’ll be right there! Do not let her out of your sight, Lucy!” He hung up and growled.
My heart rate kicked up. Why was Lucy calling from Claudia’s phone? “What’s wrong?”
“Claudia seized and began to bleed from her eyes and nose. The memories are coming back full force. I need to go get her.” He quickly dropped his beer bottle and began to walk out.
“Wait. I’m coming, too. I want to make sure she’s okay.” I shoved on my jacket and grabbed my shoes.
Thankfully, he didn’t argue and just nodded.
I prayed silently as we drove that Claudia would be okay. She had to be okay.
I’d only just found her…
To Be Continued in…
Flesh and Delirium: Under the Skin Serial Part Six
Other Books by K.B. Ladnier
Make Me a Wish: The Conduit Trilogy Book One (co-author)
Blood: Under the Skin Book One
The More the Merrier: A Naughty Nights Novella (Snow and Seduction Anthology)
Polarity of Us: A Northern Lights Novel
About K.B. Ladnier
K.B. Ladnier is from a small city in Southern Mississippi. She has one daughter and three cats who she claims are stealing her soul in only tiny doses, so she won't notice. She is a cyborg and spends most of her time hiding from her tiny human, so she doesn't have to share her snacks as she reads her favorite books. She hates the beach, yet lives only ten minutes away from it, and daydreams of mountains and snow. She is married to a hot nerd and loves him dearly even though he hordes cookies and occasionally hides her prosthetic leg from her, so he can get a quick escape when she’s mad. She plans to write as long as people continue loving what she does, otherwise she's going to say screw it and do her second dream of owning a coffee shop. Though, she may still do both.
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