Gifted: Obey Me

by Paige Cuccaro

  I wanted to call my power, to give him the push he seemed to need. But I didn’t. My voice was small, filled with hope and longing, but not an ounce psychic power. “Alex…join me.”

  As though I’d given him permission to breathe, he crushed my mouth with his, kissing me deep and long, flooding me with his venom. He broke the kiss, his hips rocking a steady rhythm in and out of me. His beard-rough cheek slid along mine, he found my ear, kissed and nipped then lowered his mouth to my neck.

  His breath washed over my flesh with his whispered words, igniting a riot of tingles. “Sweet Sophie,” he said and then he bit me.

  Molten heat poured through my veins. Alex’s penis grew hard inside me, stroking deeper, faster, filling me utterly again and again. Every molecule of my body hummed with life, tingled with the draw of sensation quickly pooling at the center of my sex. Muscles pulsed around him, milked his marble-hard sex for every last stroke. I held my breath, willing the fast swell of pleasure to rise higher and higher inside me until I couldn’t breathe for it. Until I couldn’t hold back.

  My release spilled over me in a hot wave of pleasure, swamping my mind, warming down my neck, my chest, relaxing muscles in my belly and legs, fluttering through my sex drawing Alex along with me a moment later. His pace turned frantic, his mouth’s grip on my neck tightening, the erotic suction there sending another roaring release through my body. He drove himself deep and hard inside me, faster and faster until we both slipped over the edge our bodies hugging and pulsing in and around the other, stretching the exquisite sensation as long as we could.

  I felt him lick the wound he’d made. My breath caught with the erotic jolt it sent zapping through my muscles. He slipped to my side and drew me into his embrace.

  “Mmm…I want to do that again.” My breaths were still short and shallow, but the sweet hum of my orgasm made me smile. A thought occurred to me. “Oh shoot. Does that make me an addict?”

  He cuddled me close. “Let’s hope.”

  Chapter Seven

  Waking up with a vampire isn’t as creepy as you might think. Turns out he’s a pretty decent cook. Which is good, because I am sooo not. We didn’t say a word about murder, or time capsules, or rings, but my mind was all over it the whole morning. By the time I left for work and Alex left to check on his club, I was itching to check sources. I was sure his ring wasn’t in that time capsule, it couldn’t be.

  There was no other way to explain how his mark got on the necks of four murdered women. Unless he’d put it there himself when he killed them. I couldn’t accept that.

  Micky, my editor, left me alone most of the day while I checked internet records and made phone calls. He thought I was working on a story. And technically I was. Except the information I was searching for wouldn’t be part of the finished copy. Yeah, I like truth in journalism as much as the next girl, but claiming the murders were connected to two feuding vampires… Not ready to cash in my ticket to crazy town just yet, thank you.

  According to records I found, the Edmunstons, a highly influential family at the time, did donate their family heirloom, a ring, to be placed in the time capsule. I found mention of a Mr. A. Edmunston who served on the planning and zoning board as well as owning the local butcher shop. Was that how he got his blood back then? Too weird to think about. But after about 1950 or so there was no further mention of Alex or the Edmunston name.

  While I was snooping around the city hall records, I checked for any mention of an Octavius Perrotte and turned up…nada. Maybe Alex was right. Pittsburgh wasn’t exactly a small town back in the thirties, but if Octavius was there, wouldn’t there be some record of him? Alex hadn’t avoided notice, but then again, he wasn’t trying.

  I had one more place to check. Even though the Tribune was in existence in some form or other since the 1800s, it didn’t start covering metro Pittsburgh until about 1992, so checking our archives was pointless. But the Post-Gazette’s been around since the late 1700s. Most of their archives are on microfilm at the library. So I spent the better part of the day in a tiny dark room staring at a monitor watching a black and white blur whirl by. And then…pay dirt.

  “Alex,” I said when he picked up. “I found something I think you’re gonna need to see to believe.” I was staring right at it and I still had trouble believing. “Meet me at the cathedral after you close up. Say around three a.m.?”

  He agreed and we hung up. I clicked print and rummaged around in my backpack purse for my mirror. I checked my neck.

  “Shoot.” The mark was still there, right where he’d bitten me last night, just like the one on the murdered girls. The thought sent a shiver down my spine. I traced my fingers over the spot, my skin tingling, the venom stirring just below the surface. It didn’t look any lighter than it had this morning, and after a day hunched over computer screens and trapping phones between my ear and shoulder, the makeup I’d used to cover it had all but worn off.

  Thanks to the makeup, Alex hadn’t noticed his symbol tattooed on my neck, and I didn’t want him to. I’m not sure why. Maybe I was afraid if he saw the mark, he wouldn’t want to indulge in a repeat of last night. Of course, with the mark as dark as it was, it probably wasn’t a good idea anyway. Crap. I really didn’t want to become a vampire. I’m not the child-of-darkness type and black seriously washes out my skin tone.

  There were still eleven hours before I had to meet Alex. With any luck that’s all the time my body would need to completely dilute the vamp venom swimming through system. It could happen.

  “That’s not possible.”

  I looked from the picture I’d printed out to Alex and realized he was looking at something else. He was looking at my neck. On reflex my hand went to cover his mark, like a teenager hiding a hickey from her parents.

  “It’s fine,” I said. “It’ll probably be gone by morning.”

  “It shouldn’t be there at all.” He moved my hand away and rubbed his thumb over the spot. “One feeding doesn’t leave enough venom behind to raise a mark. It’s Octavius. You must’ve ingested more than we realized. It’s more his symbol than mine. The line closing the ‘X’ is barely there.”

  My hand found the spot again, nerves jittering my muscles. “How bad is it? Am I…?”

  His gaze swung from my neck to my eyes. He took a moment before he puzzled out my expression and a bright smile blossomed across his lips. “No. You’re not a vampire. Not yet. But the mark is darker than I’d like. You need a few days to absorb the venom before your body’s blood is back to a safe level.”

  He dropped his hand, his smile faltering. He looked away then back, his expression turning sullen. “I’m sorry. I should’ve paid closer attention. I should’ve known you had too much venom in your system before we…”

  “Oh, no. Don’t start apologizing for last night. It was, uh, worth it. Trust me.” Even knowing the risk, the sex last night was so good I was half-ready to go again right there in the moonlit shadow of the Cathedral of Learning. Uh-oh. Maybe I was addicted. But to the venom or the man? I wasn’t sure.

  A smile flickered at the corners of his mouth again, though it didn’t have the push of emotion anymore. He gave a nod toward the photo I held. “Show me.”

  I handed it to him. “What are the odds? I mean, I was just joking about finding a picture. But that’s him, right?”

  Alex turned and angled the photo under the sidewalk lamppost for a better look. “What is this?”

  “It’s from a story the Gazette did in 1933 about the city having to destroy the steps in front of the Allegheny County Courthouse to widen the street.” I leaned close and pointed around his arm at the picture. “That’s a shot of the workers. That’s him, isn’t it? That’s Octavius.”

  He turned back to me, his blond brows a tight wrinkle over his eyes. “It looks like him. So he was here.”

  “Yeah. You guys probably hung in different circles. I mean, you were a prominent businessman and look at him. He was a common laborer. It’s no wonder you didn’t know h
e was here.”

  “If I was wrong about this, I could be wrong about everything.” His gaze angled up at the towering gothic-style structure of the cathedral. And then he was gone. In a blur of speed Alex raced to the cornerstone of the building. By the time I caught up with him, he’d already begun pounding at the cornerstone with his fist.

  Each punch was like the strike of sledgehammer, muscle shifting, coiling beneath his flesh, releasing power, cracking concrete…and bone. The pops and snaps and crunches were unmistakable. After each punch he stepped back, shook his hand at his side as though shaking off the pain. A few seconds is all the time it took for his bones to heal and then he punched again.

  I looked at the crumbling block he battered and the blood spattering it. More blood trickled down the wall, dotted the ground around Alex’s feet like raindrops. His white shirt was ruined with blood, spray and splatter covering his rolled sleeves, his collar, his chest. The cuts and gouges on his fist healed in seconds but the blood stayed behind, drying and rewetting.

  With each punch Alex grimaced against the sting of it, the mix of pain and anger making his face dark and ugly. His next punch spattered blood on his lips and he licked it away like it was water…and punched again.

  “I’ve got a crowbar in my trunk.” He didn’t even glance my way. “Alex, that can’t be good for your hand. If you’ll stop a minute, I’ll get something for you to use.”

  The next punch had a different sound, hollow, bone against metal. “Don’t bother.” He gave a hard yank to the time capsule. Stone chunks and dust showered the ground. The metal box hit the cement sidewalk with a loud clatter. At three in the morning it sounded like a siren. We were in the middle of a college campus. No matter the time, there was always someone out and about. Lucky for us, the occasional car passing by paid us no mind and if anyone was near on foot, I didn’t see them.

  A hard twist broke the lock and Alex jerked open the lid. I held my breath while he pushed the contents around, searching, not sure if I wanted to be right or wrong. If the ring was there, then Alex was probably a killer. There was no other way to explain his mark on the victims. If the ring was missing, Alex would blame himself for their deaths, figuring the only reason they’d died was to frame him.

  He stood, staring down at the open box, his hands loose at his sides.

  “It’s not there, is it?” I asked.

  Alex shook his head. His gaze drifted up, staring at the towering building. He exhaled deep enough to move his chest, letting his head fall back. After a moment he swung his attention to me. “Call the police. Tell them someone’s vandalized the cathedral. Hopefully they’ll get here before anyone actually steals something.”

  “Why? Wait. Where are you going to be? What about the ring? What do we do now?”

  “Go home, Sophie.” He leaned down and closed the lid, jamming it with a hard push so it’d be difficult for a normal person to open. He shoved it back in its hole.

  “I don’t think so. This is my story. I’m the one who found the photo of Octavius. I’m the one who guessed he was using your ring. He’s a serial killer and I uncovered him. I can’t just walk away from that.”

  Alex turned to me, dark sticky blood drying on his white shirt and arm. “Octavius is a vampire. Will you print that in your story?”

  My thoughts shifted. “No. Of course not. I can leave that part out. Once the police arrest him—”

  “You think humans can stop him?” He held up the bloodied fist he’d used to punch his way through a stone wall, bone and tissue now perfectly healed. “Can stop me?”

  I blinked at that, my brain readjusting to a new set of world rules. “He’d kill them rather than answer a few questions?”

  “If he has to,” Alex said. “He’ll do what he has to, to escape. He’ll run, and they’ll never find him.”

  “Then what? He just gets away with it?”

  “No. This is between me and him. He won’t get away with anything.”

  “Perfect,” I said. “Then I’ll come with you. I’ll help you find the ring. It’s the only way to connect him to the murders. And after you, y’know, take care of him, I wanna interview him. Find out why he did it, revenge, jealousy or insanity.”

  “You’ll stay out of it, and stay safe.” He walked past me, heading off the sidewalk through the damp, dewy grass and into the dark of night. “Go home, Sophie.”

  I’m not stupid. I knew it’d be suicide to confront Octavius without Alex to protect me. But if he was right, once Octavius realized the jig was up, he’d take off and not surface again until I wasn’t even fresh enough for the worms to eat. I needed his confession, or the ring.

  “Hey,” I yelled after Alex, with only the dim glow of his white shirt to track him. “You know why he did it?”

  “I have an idea,” he said, his voice so far off I could hardly hear him.

  “Well, was it revenge, jealousy or insanity?”

  His voice whispered through my mind like warm silk, “Yes.” I gasped from the sudden caress of it. “Now go home, Sophie.”

  Kinda cute the way he thought that was the end it.

  “Right.” I didn’t argue. It’s not like I didn’t know where he was going—Sinners restaurant to confront Octavius. When the coast was clear, I’d go get what I needed, the confession or the ring. Either way it’d make my career.

  Chapter Eight

  “Welcome home, Sophie.”

  Man. TV and movies were good for nothin’. I looked back at the three locks, the wood cross and string of garlic cloves over the door, and the line of consecrated sea salt I’d poured at the bottom. I’d done the same at all my windows. “Doesn’t anything work on you people?”

  “Bad manners from our hostess can be quite deterring.”

  I called my power, the rush of energy sizzled at the back of my neck, hummed through my head. “Really? Great. Get the hell out, Octavius.”

  Nothing happened. He didn’t even blink. He just settled deeper on my couch, his arms stretched across the back, his suit jacket gapping wide and his leg crossed over the other knee at the ankle. He looked so…normal. “Now, now, Sophie, don’t be rude. Not when I’ve come to offer you such a wondrous gift.”

  “If it doesn’t come with a receipt and a return policy, I don’t want it.”

  His broadening smile pinched his cheeks. Good to know I amused him. “Where have you been, Sophie? Not out with my dear friend Alexander, I hope. You spend a great deal of time together for two people who scarcely know each other. That’s what you said, isn’t it? You hardly know him?”

  “What do you want?”

  He picked up the throw cushion beside him, the one that was behind Alex when he sat in that very spot, and pressed it to his face. He brought it away, smiling. “He’s spent a great deal of time here…for someone you hardly know.”

  Fight or flight instinct itched up my spine. It’s not that Octavius was doing anything overtly threatening, but the look in those striking blue eyes, the way he smiled, the smooth psychotic tone of his voice, had my oh-shit reflex on overdrive.

  “He told me about you, him and Elizabeth. I know most of what you told me was bull,” I said, trying to get that I’m-going-to-eat-you look off his face.

  His dark brows jumped high on his forehead in an Oh, yeah? expression. “And you’ve chosen to believe his version rather than mine. Interesting. Why is that? What could’ve persuaded you? Hmmm…perhaps it has something to do with that mark on your neck.”

  My hand went to the spot despite myself. “If you hadn’t spiked my drink…”

  “You know, blood is a lot like virginity. Give it away too easily and the boy will never respect you.”

  “Is that how you did those girls?” I asked, ignoring his taunt, my reporter instincts bubbling to the surface. “Did you trick them into ingesting your venom and then used Alex’s ring to make it look like he did it?”

  He looked at the ring on his middle finger, the design a match to Alex’s mark on my neck, and then
looked at me. “You know about the ring, do you? Of course. Alexander told you. Trying to weasel his way out of his responsibility. Offering up any possible excuse no matter how improbable.”

  Offense overcame common sense. I huffed, stepping deeper into my apartment. “He’s not responsible. You are.”

  “But you couldn’t know that for sure. As far as you knew, he was just trying to get away with murder, using every outlandish story he could think of.”

  I stepped closer poking a finger at my chest. “I’m the one who figured out you’d used his ring. If it weren’t for me, Alex wouldn’t have known you were around back then. He wouldn’t know you were behind any of this now.”

  “Indeed.” Octavius dropped his foot to the floor, leaning his forearms on his knees. He was still smiling, but his expression had darkened somehow, seemed more menacing. “You’ve disrupted a very tidy plan, Sophie. A plan that’s been a century in the making. Bad girl.”

  I swallowed hard, fighting that oh-shit reflex again. “I’m a reporter.” It was like a word puke—panic making my brain back up.

  “I know.”

  “Don’t…don’t you want to tell your side? Why’d you do it? Revenge, jealousy, in…sanity?” I swallowed in the middle of the word. Probably wasn’t a good idea to call the serial killer sitting on my couch insane.

  “Those are my only options? Why don’t I let you decide?” He leaned back again, resuming the relaxed pose, arms out, ankle crossed over his knee. “Like all acts of war and violence committed by man, this is over a woman. Bess and I were happy, and Alex ruined that. She was mine. She was all I had, all I loved, all I lived for, and he took her away.”

  “So…jealousy,” I said, but he didn’t seem to hear. He just kept talking, staring in my direction but not at me, staring at nothing.