Servant of the Undead

by Isabelle Drake

  “Hello Hayden.” Mattie was perched on the back of the couch, her feet, still in her boots, had made a wet patch on the floral cushion. Behind her, a slice of the Boston skyline glimmered, the lights blinking, a reminder of the normal world. The beige walls were accented with artistic black and white photographs of Boston’s historic districts. Mattie’s leather jacket was on the floor, beside the heaped pile of Guy’s clothes. There was no sign of the male winner. Used and thrown away, no doubt.

  “Hello Hayden.” Mattie said again. Louder the second time as she leaned forward, put her palms on the inside of her thighs and spread her legs. “I have something you want and another thing you need.”

  The lighting in the room was too dim for him to see into the darkness under her skirt. He didn’t need to, though. His body was already responding to her unspoken request and he moved toward her, everything else in his mind fading. Without thought, he reached for his belt and pulled it free from the buckle. The metallic jangle caught Belmont’s attention, his pale face shifting quickly.

  “We’ve been waiting for you, Hayden.” The man came out the shadows, crossed the room, and stood beside the pile of his clothes.

  Hayden let go of his belt, dropped his hands to his sides.

  “I insisted we wait.” She slid one hand further up her leg, working it up slowly, dragging it across her skin until it was far up enough to cup her pussy. “Guy’s been impatient but you know me, I found ways to settle him down. Let him have some fun with our guest.”

  Hayden glanced at the mug on the counter.

  She smirked. “He loved the tea almost as much as Rachelle.”

  Belmont didn’t even have the decency too look uncomfortable, and Hayden wasn’t about to ask for details.

  “Stop looking like a sulky asshole. That loser loved it. Ten minutes ago, I put him in an Uber and sent him back to BC.” She glanced at the floor. “Thanks to Guy, he’ll have a few bruises and some scratches. He’ll wake up tomorrow wishing he could remember what the hell happened to him.” Pointing to the counter, she asked, “You want some? There’s enough.”

  Hayden went to the counter and poured the remainder of the tea into the mug then crossed the room, held it out for Guy.

  The man accepted it, wrapping both hands around the mug and lifting it so quickly some splashed over the edge. He drank the contents, set the mug down, then licked the sheen of liquid from the tops of his fingers. He slid his hand into his boxers. “Can I take them off now, Mattie?”

  Mattie didn’t look at him when she replied. “No. And you aren’t ever going to take them off. Not for me, anyway.” She stood on the couch, pivoted, then bent forward. “You can watch Hayden fuck me.” She glanced over her shoulder, the fresh green in her eyes cutting through the dim light as she flipped up her skirt to expose the solid curves of her bare ass. Her thighs flexed, the muscles fluid beneath her white skin. She smacked her cheeks then dropped her skirt. “What are you waiting for?”

  Hayden finished unbuckling his belt then unzipped his pants.

  “This is supposed to be about me, my night. Why don’t I get a turn?”

  Hayden kicked Belmont in the ribs. “Shut the fuck up.”

  “What about what I want?” The man recoiled. His gaze shifted from Mattie’s bare ass to Hayden’s hard dick, now fully exposed. “This isn’t fair.”

  Fair? No, none of this was fair. What did it matter anyway? Hayden sure as hell didn’t. Mattie still needed him and as long as she needed him he had some power over her. He planned to use it.

  Mattie had turned to face the window, and her reflection filled the window. The iridescent glow of her emerald gaze mixed in with the lights of the skyline, but the gleam didn’t blend. He lifted her skirt and grabbed the waistband of her skirt. Then, he jerked her toward him and positioned himself behind her so he could push the tip of his cock between her ass cheeks. She wanted him to thrust in immediately, but he’d learned over the past few days that making her wait gave him a measure of satisfaction. The illusion that he had a choice about whether or not to fuck her.

  He’d grown accustomed to the subtle iciness of her skin. Even the inner recess between her ass cheeks was cool. She arched her back, and he moved in, finding the tight opening of her pussy. Below, from his spot on the floor, Guy’s breath grew loud and uneven. Hayden tried to ignore the noises as he thrust in but soon he felt the man’s fingers wrap around his leg.

  He lifted his leg, struck out and connected with Belmont’s side without breaking rhythm.

  Mattie laughed and bucked against him. “That’s right Hayden, give Guy a show, make sure he sees what’s he’s not getting.” She looked back over her shoulder to the man on the floor and sneered. “What he’s never going to get.”

  The man whimpered.

  Hayden’s pumped harder, deeper, rougher. Willing his mind to go blank, telling himself not to enjoy her tight cunt squeezing his cock, he held on to the waistband of her skirt and pounded in. The lights of the city shifted in his gaze, the darkness of night swirled. He jerked his hips, squeezed his thighs together, made himself stiff. His orgasm came on suddenly, sharp as a dog bite, and ended just as quickly, leaving him feel bitten and ashamed. Again. Within seconds, Mattie was yanking her skirt from his hands. She leapt from the couch.

  “Are you still waiting for a thank you?” She gestured toward Belmont. “Hayden? Stop looking at me that way or I’m going to ask you to jack him off.”

  Hayden looked up from zipping his pants. “Ask me?”

  She reached down and grabbed the collar of Guy’s vest heaped on the floor. “Up. Get off.”

  He rolled to his hands and knees then backed his palms to his feet to stand. He looked at Hayden with tea-glazed eyes. “You can do it if you want, you know.”

  “What?”

  Guy had shoved his boxers down, taken his dick out, and had it resting in his open palm. “Jack me off.”

  Hayden averted his gaze as he hooked his belt.

  Mattie tossed the jacket down. “Where is the thumb drive?”

  “I didn’t get all I wanted.” Half-heartedly, he started stroking his half-limp dick, his glazed eyes unfocused and his jaw loose.

  “Thanks to that stupid contest, you got more than you deserved you twisted pervert.” She wrapped her hands around his throat and shook him until he let go of his cock. “This is all a game to you, some kind of joke.”

  He grabbed at her fingers, trying to pry them from his throat. “I—you—”

  “Where is the thumb drive?” She shook him harder and lifted him from his feet. “Listen up mother fucker. This isn’t a game and I don’t care one shit about you.”

  Finally, they were going to get what they’d come after.

  Lifting him higher, she lowered her voice to an intimidating whisper. “You’re going to give me that thumb drive—and the notes—right now.”

  Hayden tensed. The thumb drive, the notes, they had to be there somewhere. They had to actually exist.

  The man hit the floor with a hard thud after she let go. “But—”

  Her open-handed smack made his head snap to the side. Rubbing his face, he crawled across the room and pointed to a closed door. “Back of the toilet. Floating in a Ziploc.”

  “Fucking unoriginal place to hide shit.”

  Less than a minute later, she reemerged from the room, a piece of plastic sticking out from her leather pocket and a tattered brown journal in her hand. Weathered edges of paper stuck out from the journal. She stood at the end of the hallway, flipping through the papers. “This it? All of it?”

  Belmont nodded.

  She loitered a few seconds longer, the threat in her stare silencing any of Belmont’s additional complaint.

  Then she was gone, the slam of the hotel her last comment.

  Chapter Eleven

  “Are you still waiting for a thank you?”

  “That backstabbing bitch.” Belmont whined, still rubbing his face. “We had a deal.”

  The door to t
he adjoining bedroom was stood open, Hayden slipped through it. The bed was made, a closed backpack on top of the grey-striped cover. Both nightstands were clear. He cut across the room, into the bathroom. A row of brown prescription bottles lined the counter, a razor and bar of soap sat in the sink. Even knowing he would find nothing, he lifted the back off the toilet. Empty. When he turned to put the cover back on, he slipped. As his foot went out from under him, an empty plastic ice bag floated into the air. He reached for the shower curtain, grabbed a handful of the fabric, tore the curtain from the rings and landed in the tub.

  He wasn’t alone there. A body, wrapped in burlap, was beneath him. Only the head was visible. Grey skin, frosted eyes stared upward. Hayden scrambled, realized there was another body beneath the one he’d landed on. That one was also wrapped in burlap, secured with twine, the head exposed, with frosted eyes and cracked lips.

  By the time Hayden was out of the tub, Belmont stood in the doorway, his soft arms crossed over his sunken chest. The man was pouting.

  “Those are mine.”

  The stolen dormants. Icy. Cold. Both alive and dead. “How did you get them?”

  Why did he need to know? Mattie would want to know. Matthew would really want to know. He didn’t really give a shit, but he was already considering the bargaining possibilities the bodies represented.

  Belmont grabbed the curtain, he hands shaking as he covered the bodies. “Why should I tell you anything? You didn’t help me. You don’t care about us.” Gently, he realigned the heads with the bodies then tucked the curtain around the bound limbs. “These special ones are mine.” He looked at Hayden, his face soft. “Do you know what to do? How can I make them want me?”

  The man lowered himself to the toilet and sat, then reached out to pet the stringy hair of the one on top. “Mine. My special ones.”

  Hayden put his hand on Belmont’s crotch, moved it around until he found the man’s soft cock. The pinstriped fabric was moist, disgusting, but he squeezed the man’s shaft, gently trying to massage some life into it. Then asked, “Is there more tea?”

  * * *

  It was after two in the morning by the time Hayden had the second dormant secured in his own apartment bathtub. Eight sacks of ice from the 7-Eleven were packed along the sides, six more were crammed into his freezer. Unlike Belmont, he didn’t want to see their ashen faces, and stare into their steely eyes, so he’d yanked the burlap until it extended over the heads. Then he’d pulled the shower curtain closed and went to sit at the foot of his bed.

  And wait.

  It had started to snow again, the small flakes whipping past the window panes. A couple times he picked up his phone, thought about Rachelle. He couldn’t blame her for not messaging back. After this last round was done, he’d go to her place. Explain? Probably not. Relieve his guilt? Maybe.

  Around 4:00, the tapping on his window broke through his daze. She moved her fingertips across over the glass with a rhythmic, circular pattern, her face, blurred by the frosted glass, moved beyond. Icy clusters clung to her tangled hair, the weak light from the street made shadows on her neck. He stayed on the bed, waiting, staring into her green eyes.

  She dug through the ice on the ledge, pried her fingertips beneath the bottom of the window and lifted. Gliding foot first through the window, carrying with her the whisper of cold from the night, she crept in. The chill, the night, it came in with her. And her scent, it came and reached him too. His jaw clenched, blood ran hot, skin tingled with the desire to give her what she’d come for. But only that.

  She stepped toward him, her boots making a soft thump on the wood floors until she stopped in front of him. The snow melted, left two shimmering trails that widened and ran into the corners of his room. A new tear had opened up on the stocking on her left thigh. He slipped his index finger into the hole, tugged, watched the hole widen and the fishnets cut into her skin. With a quick yank, he made the hole even bigger.

  Her leather jacket hit the floor after she rolled her shoulders back. “You’re changing Hayden.”

  He thought of the bodies in his bathroom. “Are you?”

  A snicker, then, “No.”

  “Do you want to?”

  “No.” She grabbed one of his ears and twisted, forcing him to lift his face to her. “Not in the way you mean. Understand?”

  “What if you could?”

  “You’re not being very subtle.” She touched his chin. “If you want to know what’s on the thumb drive, just ask.”

  “What about that journal?” He slid his palm under one of the binds. “Did you look through it?”

  She grabbed his ear and twisted it, sending spikes of pain up and down the side of his face. He understood her methods now, so didn’t back off. He pulled his fingers from beneath the bindings and cupped her breast, then covered the nipple with his mouth. The point stiffened, and he sucked on it, flicking it with the tip of his tongue. The pain from his ear eased as she released some, but not all, of the pressure. Slowly, he pulled the peak further into his mouth, continued the caress. A bit more of the pressure of his face eased. He reached up, took her hand from his ear, lifted his mouth from the breast and slid her fingers between his lips. A few seconds passed, the two of them acting like lovers, until she grabbed him under the arms and threw him backwards, across the bed.

  “You aren’t the first one to try that.” She straddled him, grabbed at the waistband of the sweats he’d put on when he’d first gotten home. “I’m not going to start caring about you, or fall for you, or some lame shit like that.”

  Beyond her silhouette, the snow flickered by the window, spots of white cutting through the night. The night, the snow, ice, it would always be a reminder of her. “Matthew? Did he try that?”

  She yanked down his sweats, freeing his dick. He reached up, grabbed her shoulders and wrestled her over, pinned her leg with one knee. “Is that why you hate him?”

  Staring up at him with her green eyes, she reached up, grabbed one of the bindings pulled it up, over her head. Shifting, she reached for another section and did the same, then continued the motion until the one long piece was on the floor. He’d not seen her without the red binding, and free from it she looked softer. Almost a woman. To think of her that way would be a mistake.

  No more mistakes.

  After lifting his knee, he said, “Tell me.”

  Rolling her shoulders in, her curled up and reached for his cock. “Pay attention to what matters.”

  He leaned back on his heels, keeping his dick in her hand, she rolled up toward him and slid her calves behind her. With light stokes, she skimmed her fingertips up and down the shaft. The chill of her touch sent shivers up his spine, hardening his cock. He closed his eyes, dropped his head back and let her possess him. For a moment he let the dark images fade, fought to find his humanity, what was left of it.

  What she hadn’t taken from him.

  If he was more honest, some of it he had given away. There, on the bed, in the moonlight, with her hand stirring his blood, it would be easy to tell himself he hadn’t had a choice, but that would be a lie.

  He lifted his head, took her hand and began kissing her knuckles. Gently, he worked his way down, skimming over each one. “Lie back,” he said, releasing her hands.

  She did as he asked, settling back onto the pillows, her face turned upward, her emerald eyes vibrant. “Stop screwing around and do it, Hayden.”

  He lifted her skirt, exposing her bare pussy, then watched her spread her legs. “It can be more than fucking.”

  “No. It can’t.”

  Her words cut through the illusion in his mind, but he rejected them and the truth they held. “You mean you don’t want it to be.”

  She sat up, grabbed his ass, and pulled his hips toward her. The tip of his cock bumped her wet opening. He braced himself, held his body stiff enough that she wasn’t yet able to force him inside her. “You can get anyone to do this,” he said. “You don’t need me.”

  “But I want
you, Hayden.” She dug her fingers into his ass, pulled his butt cheeks apart. “I like the way you fuck me.” Her fingernails cut into his skin as she squeezed harder. “You like it too.”

  The muscles in his legs started to shake. “We had a deal, the informa—”

  “Is mine,” she replied, grinding the words out between her teeth.

  “We had a deal,” he said again as he began losing the battle to keep his cock from her icy cunt. Using the grip on his ass, she lowered his body, forced him in. “No. I don’t like it. Don’t want this.” His cock was fully inside, being squeezed by her slick, cool pussy. “Or you, like this.”

  “What do you want Hayden?” She loosened her hold, let him pull away, but kept her grip firm. “What you had with your sweet girlfriend, Rachelle?”

  “At least that was honest, consensual. No one was getting used.”

  She squeezed, pulling him down on top of her until their hips ground together. The sensation was too much to ignore, and he found himself moving against her. “I never took advantage of—”

  “There you go again, being small minded.” She spread her thighs, angled her ass upward.

  “What about Matthew?” Hayden continued moving, now gliding in and out of her on his own, his resentment turning into that new dark energy. How long until that became permanent? Something he couldn’t get rid of or control? Since when did he just give up, give in? He slowed, opened his eyes to look at Mattie. “He used you, didn’t he? Used you the way he used Rachelle. And me.”

  Her words spilled out in a tense rush. “Stop talking about him.”

  He clamped his jaw shut and drove in, pistoning faster, letting himself feel each thrust. The past week ran through his mind, a blur of images and sensations. None good. “Did he hurt your feelings? Are you pissed because he doesn’t want to use you anymore?”

  She froze, her entire body stilled as she grabbed at him. He fought her, but this time wrapping one arm under her, trying to fuck her instead of resisting. She pried his arm out, then lifted him, breaking their contact. With one long sweep, she threw him into the air. His elbow smacked the wall, then be tumbled to the floor. She rolled onto her side, stretching as she used one hand to prop herself up. “You really have no idea what’s going on Hayden. I tried to help you, get what I needed and keep you out of it, but you’re so fucking smart.”