by Dee Carney
The Ben Gay seeped into her muscles, warming her all over. Then again, she couldn’t be sure if she wasn’t flushed from enjoying the very fine view of Victor.
“I haven’t cooked for someone in a long time, but it can’t be that hard, right? Just like riding a bike... Right?”
Victor kept his back to Lucy. He didn’t want her to notice the way his hands still trembled. On the drive home, he’d pulled over just in time to keep from driving headfirst into a large oak tree about ten feet from the road. He would have survived, but that wasn’t the point. His vulnerability to those werewolves had left him rattled.
The drive had been surreal. He’d never forget looking at the gnarled branches, admiring their strange beauty, as blood had dripped down his face and onto his black shirt. Just as he’d wondered if he’d be able to clean the crimson liquid from the car’s leather, his left eye had shut on its own. Pain had burst from the broken socket as his vampire physiology got to work pulling in bone and tissue back to its original position. He’d cried out, but that sure as hell didn’t stop his body from correcting the damage.
Like someone grinding glass into his flesh.
The car had veered off to the right, rolling through the gravel and dirt off road before he lifted his foot. Somehow he’d managed to cut the engine—he assumed—prior to the torture overwhelming him to the point that he’d passed out.
Eight minutes lost to his body healing. Slumped over the steering wheel, the sun minutes from breaking over the land. Blood and sweat had saturated his shirt, his heart pumping as he’d swallowed down bile and slowly come to awakening.
All because he’d been unable to walk away from the two werewolves without dispatching them first.
They weren’t even guys he recognized from Locke’s crew. These two had stumbled upon him, and he couldn’t say if they’d been out searching or just dumb, blind luck pointed in his general direction.
“You’re going to burn that.”
Pulled back to the kitchen of the little shack he shared with the enticing blood slave, he glanced at the skillet, where the butter indeed bubbled into an ominous brown color. Victor frowned at it, then reached for the eggs. He curled his hand into a fist around the delicate shell when he noticed the slight tremor.
“Sure you don’t want to turn down the heat first?”
He glared at Lucy over his shoulder. “Are you the one doing this or me?” He turned down the heat though. Just in case. “Why don’t you go make yourself useful and practice your take downs?”
“Because I’m luxuriating in not hurting like someone’s been using me for a punching bag for the last week.”
“It hasn’t been a week.”
“It sure as hell feels like it.”
The eggs immediately began to sizzle as they hit the hot pan. The edges curled up, turning as brown as the butter within seconds. The aroma coming from the pan seemed okay, so he figured he couldn’t be doing too bad a job. Besides, this gave him something to do while he figured out the riddle of Lucy. Thick slices of ham went into the pan too, the air coming alive with the rich scent of grease almost immediately.
It was too easy to get used to this domestic scene.
Time slipped by while he stayed here with her, the werewolves on the hunt for him. Sooner or later they’d find him, and he couldn’t be sure he’d make it out by himself. He’d need her help. Did he bring her into his confidence and let her know about the price on Sage’s head, or was she better off not knowing?
“Have you given any more thought to what we’d talked about before I’d left?” he asked. Feeling safe to leave the eggs unattended, he moved to the cutting board and began slicing into a plump tomato. His eye throbbed painfully, but he ignored it. If he drew any attention to its healing progress, Lucy would pounce. The last thing he wanted was her pity.
“Did you feed while you were out?”
He’d gorged himself on the werewolves, draining them both until their hearts had given out. “Yes,” he said with a smile, making a point to show his retracted teeth. “Hunger’s at bay, and I should be good for a few days more.”
“So can I assume that you no longer feel like you have to bite me?”
His heart thudded triple-time, because if given one opportunity—just one—he’d be all over that shit. No question. “No,” he said slowly, “I don’t have to bite you, but I can also say that you aren’t giving off the same aura from last night either. I don’t think the hunger was all me. I stand by my theory that you still might have spice in your system.”
She pointed to the pan, and Victor pretended he didn’t notice. He just so happened to have lifted the lid right as the ham stuck to the iron. He’d meant for it to be that dark brown, almost glossy black color. He turned down the burner heat a little more.
“Spice isn’t supposed to affect humans at all. I didn’t even make the connection to Cindy until I’d started getting sick. I don’t get to interact with other blood slaves too often, so I don’t know how many, if any others at all, have been affected. I assumed that if they were doing it to us two, then others must be given it as well.” Victor turned in time to watch her pop a few grapes in her mouth. “You should probably wash that first. Wait...you did wash the tomato and these, right?”
The bell pepper in his hand looked clean enough, but he figured she probably knew something he didn’t. He rinsed it under the sink and then chopped it, placing ringlets besides the sliced tomatoes. He might have forgotten to run the plump tomatoes and juicy grapes under the water, but they were vegetables and fruit. They came clean. Probably.
“Okay, let’s think this through. You were given spice so that the vampires who drank from you could get a hit without ingesting it directly. You acted like a filter.” He’d never partaken of the illegal substance, knowing its very addictive properties didn’t easily let go of users. “What if it does something like bloom once it’s in your system? I don’t know, maybe it’s active and takes over after it’s been ignited.”
When she didn’t answer, he stopped plating the ham and eggs to look at Lucy. Her face had gone devoid of all color. “Could it be living inside me?”
“I don’t know, doll, but it can’t last forever.” He hoped. “I’m just wondering if it’s possible to maybe activate it when wanted. That would make it more valuable to your masters, I would think.”
“Yeah, but that’s so tech. I don’t know if Sage cares enough about sex to go through all that trouble, you know?”
He deposited the plate of food in front of her. Two fried eggs—brown around the edges—fried ham—dark and crispy in places—green pepper rings and tomato slices. That ought to fill a hole. “Don’t forget how long we live. Not immortals, but long enough that choosing a single thing to focus on as a distraction isn’t unheard of. Technology is a fascinating thing for people who have seen so many changes in the human population. Don’t put anything past someone like Sage, not when he has unlimited money and time stretched out in front of him. Eat.”
Some enigmatic expression flickered across her face, but Lucy reached for the knife and fork he’d already put before her. Her stomach grumbled, and Victor just knew she was about to feast on the best thing she’d had in ages. He kind of liked this being-domestic thing. Maybe he’d do it for her again.
“It’s good, huh?” he asked, a beam of pride almost making him want to puff out his chest. Look at her face! Obviously Lucy was at a loss for words. He’d done good and would definitely cook for her again. She’d earned it.
“Um...did you happen to buy any salt or pepper?”
His smile faltered. “No.” Victor’s brow furrowed. “Don’t you only use that stuff when the food needs something added to make it taste better?”
“Well, that would be one way to look at it.” She shoved around a piece of egg with her fork. “But back to Sage...if he discovered a way to make it last and last, then blood slaves would actually be in danger from the spice.”
“Probably, but our laws don’t cover
you. We’ve got protections in place for the number of humans who can be killed by draining, but those apply to humans in the regular population. You’re a part of the vampire nation, and property. I don’t know if the same provisions apply. I doubt if they do, especially when you serve the people at the top.”
“But...but I’m not a part of that world anymore. I’ve been released from service, so I have to be protected too.”
“Tell that to the vampire who’s draining you because he can’t help himself. If that stuff in your blood gives him uncontrollable cravings, it might not matter. People break the laws all the time. If he doesn’t get caught, who would know to care?”
Lucy didn’t answer, instead keeping her attention on the food she shoveled into her mouth as if in a trance. He wished the first meal he’d cooked for her didn’t happen over this frightening conversation, but they couldn’t avoid the topic that brought them together in the first place.
“So what do you think activates it?” she asked softly once she’d finished almost everything on the plate. A black piece of ham—maybe the egg?—had been pushed to the side of her plate.
“My first guess might have been something you’d eaten or drank, but that doesn’t make much sense. Maybe it’s something simple like an emotion—”
“Or sex. It was probably sex.” She sat up straighter. “That makes the most sense. We were intimate, and that’s something I know I haven’t been in the past month with anyone else.”
“You haven’t even—um, touched yourself in that time?” Damn, damn, damn. Why’d he bring that up, because if there was one thing Lucy could gift him with, Victor wanted more than anything to watch her get herself off. He wanted to study the way she did it so he could do it one better when it was his turn.
A touch of color lit her cheeks, making her impossibly prettier. “After spending a lifetime as a sex object, it’s not a moment of pleasure anymore for me.” Her matter-of-factness made Victor inwardly cringe. The things he hadn’t known about her life. “I don’t do it for release. I’d sooner find release in reading a good book or eating a gooey cinnamon roll than I would in having sex.”
A crack knifed its way through Victor’s soul at those words. While he never expected her to walk away from their encounters feeling like she’d been romanced or wooed in any way, to know that she’d gone into the agreement with the understanding that she wouldn’t find ultimate pleasure wounded him in the worst of ways. He wanted to change and fix that for Lucy. She deserved more than this. “Finish your ham,” he said, turbulent emotions keeping him from thinking straight. “You need the protein to heal those muscles. Ben Gay alone isn’t going to do it.”
Dutifully, she stabbed at the black pieces. “Well,” she said, her voice shaky, “you haven’t finished your training, and I haven’t finished my obligation. One way or the other, we’re going to figure out whether or not sex is the answer, right?”
“Yeah, but if we’re not prepared for another reaction like the one I had earlier, I could hurt you.”
Lucy nodded. “So we get prepared. The first time we weren’t expecting it. Now we know what might happen and can take precautions.”
“It sounds like you’re starting to believe that I’m right and that this is all linked back to sex somehow.”
“No, but it’s a theory, while I don’t have any. I can’t stop thinking about how I felt so much better physically after sex too. I mean, every day for weeks now it’s seemed like I’ve been breathing through fiberglass. All day I swear I could climb a mountain. I think it’s beginning to fade, but I was enjoying it while it lasted. You can’t tell me that all of this combined is coincidence. It’s just too convenient.”
“So how do we go about making sure that you walk away from me without missing a few pints of blood?” The look she shot him was pure mischief. “Whoa. You have an answer, way too easily.”
Her smile continued to broaden. “No, it’s just something I thought of. And it’s convenient.”
Victor’s brow furrowed. “What?”
“Well, how strong are you? I mean, I know that vampires have superior strength, but exactly how strong is that?”
“I don’t know. I could probably lift a car if given the opportunity.”
“So if I tied you up in rope, that wouldn’t be enough to stop you?”
Now, his eyes narrowed. “No...”
“Chains?”
“What is that look?”
“What look?” Lucy blinked at him as if she couldn’t possibly have any idea to what he was referring. As if.
“You want to tie me up in chains.”
“Well...”
“You want to tie me up. In chains would be icing on the cake.”
“Well, maybe...”
Victor laughed. “You’re kinky. A woman with a courtesan’s training, and she likes to tie her men up. I don’t know what I’ve done in a past life to deserve this, but if I could go back in time and high-five myself, I would.”
Lucy leaned back against the chair, crossing her toned legs in the process. With seduction in her eyes, she asked, “So...when can we get started?”
Chapter Fourteen
Lucy stretched, the aftermath of a full day’s sleep still working its way out of her system.
They’d both agreed to get some rest before attempting to recreate the surge of spice in her blood that might incite Victor to bite her. Although his level of eagerness for their proposed experiment reached almost maniacal levels as far as she was concerned, Lucy couldn’t help her apprehension. She almost didn’t want to know if this would work. Despite a reprieve from her illness, the other possible repercussions terrified her.
Trying not to disturb him, she turned in the bed to look at Victor. He’d given her some of the tools with which to go after Sage, given her a sexual intimacy she’d never experienced the likes of before and fed her some of the worst eggs she’d ever had the displeasure of tasting. Seriously, how could anyone ruin eggs like that?
Yet, she found herself more and more enchanted by him with every minute they spent together. He wasn’t polished, but if anything that made her increasingly relaxed around him. All of the training and rigor she’d been put through were superfluous to Victor. He didn’t care if she wore plastic party beads instead of custom-designed undergarments. The table fork, dessert fork, fruit fork and salad fork nuances didn’t exist; there was just a fork. Use it or use her fingers.
“Are you hungry?” he murmured. She should have known he’d be awake. “I can fix you something.”
Her stomach pulsed as if to remind her of the eggs she’d eaten before bed. “Uh, no. Besides, I’m in the mood for something light, like maybe a banana.” Perhaps by lunchtime, she’d find the courage to make more suggestions on how to improve his cooking if he insisted on taking up residence by the stove. “I also don’t think I can tolerate being tossed on my ass on a full stomach.”
“I thought we’d agreed on a more amorous adventure this evening.” His voice dipped wickedly low, full of suggestion and expectation.
“Oh.” She’d just assumed they’d continue as they had. Lessons in the first part of the evening, seduction in the latter. “Whichever you prefer.”
His lips quirked in the semi-smile uniquely Victor. “I’ve got a beautiful woman in my bed, wearing nothing but a clingy shirt, and you have to guess as to whether I’d want to fight or to fuck?”
“I suppose when you put it that way...” She ran her hand over his chest and torso, once again impressed with his physique. Despite her constant exposure to him, she continued to feast her eyes on his form. No straight woman with a pulse could ever tire of a body like Victor’s. “Get the tow chain from your car and then meet me right here.”
“Christ, that shouldn’t turn me on as much as it does,” he muttered before climbing out of the bed.
Lucy went to the bathroom and cleaned up quickly. Victor might not be too picky, but she had her standards. Besides, she was still under contract to him. That meant
he should expect the full services any other client would. Just because she worked with limited resources didn’t mean she got to ignore basic niceties.
She found it convenient to disregard the fact that she treated him differently than any other client she’d ever entertained.
By the time she came back out, he was sitting on the bed, the chain coiled beside him. Her gaze went to the metal, and despite what he’d suggested about her kink level, cold dread went through her at the sight of it. Neither of them knew if this would work, if it would be enough to hold him back. If a rampaging vampire wanted to kill a human, she doubted anything could stop it.
“Stop thinking so much,” he said. “Come here.”
God, she hadn’t even realized she’d stood frozen, as if caught by the chain herself. “What happens—”
“Over. Here.”
Taking a deep breath, she nodded and did as bidden. He watched her so intently that she drew the shirt over her head, dropping it behind her. The soft whisper after it hit the floor seemed to capture his attention before his gaze moved over her again.
Victor visually ate her up, and her body responded to his perusal.
Lucy’s nipples grew tight, her breasts heavy as she made her way closer. Thanks to Victor’s careful instruction of the last few days about paying attention to her body’s cues, she realized her breathing had quickened, her heart rate picking up speed too. Soon she knew she would feel the moisture coating the inside of her thighs, her body in a constant state of arousal around this man.
She went to him and climbed onto his lap, cowgirl style. The blanket partially covered his thick cock, but she didn’t want him tempted to push into her just yet anyway. Instead, Lucy lifted onto her knees, her pussy grazing his groin. He made a rough sound, his hands moving to her hips.
They squeezed when she leaned forward and brushed a kiss across his lips. The contact on her breasts was electric, his chest hair scraping across the sensitive tips, arousing her further. She raked her fingernails over his chest, moving her hand to his mouth. They locked gazes as she slid her index finger between his lips, where Victor suckled on the tip and swirled his tongue over it. The blatantly sexual move made Lucy smile since she knew what she wanted to do next.