Cake (13 page)

While we had been out, a transformation had occurred in the concrete bunker, formerly known as my prison. I found the thought really funny;
while we were out.
It was just so peculiar, making it sound as if I’d just come back from a date with my kidnapper. I started laughing and couldn’t stop. Both Marcus and Claudius, who were in the process of taking off their coats and shoes, stopped to look at me, and then they looked at each other as if asking what they should do. The perplexed look on both their faces made me laugh even more.

Soft rugs and cushions had been added to the room, and piles of pillows tossed casually onto the large bed. I still couldn’t believe that all the time I had spent searching for a way out of this hellhole, it turned out the one place I avoided like the plague had been my means of escape.

When we’d left for the nightclub, I’d watched as Marcus touched part of the wall behind the bed and stared as the huge thing rumbled off to the left, exposing beneath it stairs which led down to lower floors. Following him down, we’d ended up twisting and turning in corridors before exiting out into a parking garage and making our way towards a limo. Marcus had kept a firm grip on my arm that he hadn’t released until we’d gotten into the back of the car. Then, when we’d ended up at that gay bar, he’d waited until we were well inside the club before he’d let me go, knowing the rest of the bar would keep me in check.

And now we were back where I hated to be and yet wanted to be at the same time. It was ironic, weird, bizarre, unreal…a real-life horror story.

I tore the bronze shirt off that Marcus had made me wear and threw it on the floor. I felt filthy; from the killing, from the alley, and from all those groping hands. I undid my pants and shimmed them down a little over my hips.

“
Sex!” Marcus seemed alarmed at what I was doing. Why? He’s the one who’s kept me bare-assed naked for a year. He’s seen everything I have to offer, and so has tall, dark, and handsome over there.

I shook my head, not wanting confrontation. “I need a shower now. I can still feel those hands on me.”

“
You need to take those boots and pants off first.”

“
Not quick enough,” I said shuddering and just took off to the bathroom as fast as my feet could carry me. I got there a lot quicker than I expected. I guess being dead makes you speedy. Turning the shower on, I was about to step in when a hand came around my throat, and I was yanked back hard against Marcus’s button-down shirt.

“
You are not listening to me. I thought I had gotten your attention in the past year.”

“
If I don’t get clean now, I don’t think I ever will,” I gasped at him, struggling. The knife flashing before my eyes caught my attention real quick, and I tried to back up through him. “If you want to fuck me, you can. Your friend can too if that makes you happy. Just don’t kill me.”

“
Sit.” Marcus stepped away, and I just dropped where I was. “Give me your leg.”

He cupped my extended foot and setting the knife-blade against the tongue of the boot, he slit the laces open with one sweep. Yanking on the heel, he quickly freed my foot and dropping the boot behind him, he motioned for the other one. Just as quickly, he cut the lacings and pulled that boot off too.

“
Strip.”

I wiggled out of the leathers and sat huddled naked on the warm tiled floor, my chin on my knees, and my arms wrapped around my shins.

“
I am well off, Sex, but I am not made of money. I cannot replace everything on a whim. Now, go ahead and shower.” Marcus showed what he wanted me to do by pointing the knife first at me and then at the shower.

Given his permission, I got under the hot jet of water as fast as I could. He had actually terrified me when he pulled that knife and held it before my eyes, and his voice had held that hard edge that I remembered from the beginning of my capture. I guess you could call it his Master’s voice. When he used that voice, you did what he said when he said it, because if you didn’t, you got pain, lots and lots of pain. I gave a resigned sigh. I was still the plaything of a vampire. I might have fangs now, but I was still just his plaything.

Even after standing in the shower for five minutes, I could still feel the touch of their hands on my body. Who the fuck reaches between some stranger’s legs from behind?

“
Everybody wanted you, my little Sex.”

Holy crap. Marcus had stripped off and joined me in the shower. Shampoo was being worked into my hair.

“
You smell like stale smoke. Actually, I smell like smoke too. Will you wash my hair, my Little One?”

I bit my inner lip to keep from shouting out a refusal and tasted blood from the small self-inflicted cut. I almost fanged my bottom lip again as my teeth extended, and I wrenched my jaws open at the last second. I really didn’t need a repeat of dual suck-face in the corner pocket by the gruesome twosome.

Grabbing the shampoo bottle out of Marcus’s hand, I realized he was too damn tall for me to really get at his hair. He gallantly knelt on one knee when he realized my predicament and then, just as gallantly, forced me to sit on the other, smiling sweetly at me. I wanted to rub the shampoo in his face, but I knew where I’d end up if I did that, so I just reached up and started rubbing his scalp. He got a hard-on real quick. Oh. Dear. God.

I stood up. “I need to do the back.” I had hoped to make my escape around the side, but his arm threw up a block, so I had to step closer and reach over him, and as I did, the bastard suckled on my left nipple.

A tingling sensation tore through my body, and I dropped the bottle, stupidly watching as three dollars’ worth of shampoo disappeared down the drain. A screech or a moan, or a combination of the two, ripped past my fangs, and I could feel my skin erupt into what felt like hundreds of little flames. The crystal vision that I’d had before came back with a vengeance, and I could smell Marcus clearly again. He was my sweet apple orchard, crisp and clean, cold but always with a hint of warmth beneath the surface, a touch of decay and death.

I grabbed the back of his hair and jerked his head backwards. His eyes were the same sexy chocolate brown that he’d had while grunting over me the past year, but this time they were widened in surprise as I stole a kiss from his parted lips. My fangs were too far extended though, and I cut him. I licked at the blood. He tasted good, and it seemed to stoke whatever fire was burning inside me.

Marcus used two hands and shoved me hard against the tiled wall, pushing me away from him. I winced as the back of my head cracked one of the pretty brown tiles. That pissed me off, and before he could struggle fully to his feet, I kicked him hard. He flew back, hitting the shower door and fell out onto the mat. I followed right after him. It seemed I was quicker and a hell of a lot stronger than I used to be, because I was able to grab up the knife he had threatened me with, get it to his throat with one hand, and start to fondle his cock with the other. He tensed for a moment, and then he lay on his back, those brown eyes of his staring up at me with an unreadable expression.

“
You are so pretty, Marcus,” I said, my fingers working him to fuller hardness. “Even when you were raping me at the beginning, I was thinking to myself, he’s so gorgeous, why does he have to kidnap someone for sex? I probably would have gone home with you willingly that night if you’d asked, ‘cause, damn, nobody looks like you.”

I stroked him hard and fast, looking into his eyes and waiting for that red, what did they call it, Flame? If what I was feeling now was anything close to what Marcus felt when he would need to fuck me all night long, then I’m surprised he even took the time to take off his clothes. I pumped faster, and his hips jumped up to my hand, once, twice, and…bingo.

“
My Pretty,” I cooed at him as Marcus covered my molesting hand with his offering, laying there shuddering as I continued to stroke him past his orgasm. His eyes rolled back into his head as I licked his chin, my fangs nicking the flesh there. Blood began to trail slowly down his throat towards his Adam’s apple, the scent of orchard apples getting stronger as his red elixir was exposed to the air. I inhaled deeply, allowing him to fill my senses before I leaned over and flicked my tongue along the red trail.

Delicious.

I could hear his heart, its beat pumping. I could actually see the carotid artery expand and contract. My fangs dropped to their full extension. I needed to eat an apple.

“
That is a muscle you know. If you overwork it with your hand like that, he will not be of any use to you.”

I looked back over my shoulder to the entrance of the bathroom, hearing a deep growl echo in the confines of the room. Wait, that growling was coming from me. I was warning the black-haired vampire to back off from my kill.

“
I do not think you need that knife anymore, Sex. You have proved your equality, at least to me,” Claudius said, still standing in the doorway. “Sex, does your own member require attention?”

Some time between the shower and my attack on Marcus, I had gotten as hard as a rock. I watched Claudius warily, one hand on the knife at Marcus’s throat, the other still warm and sticky with his cum. Bringing that hand to my lips, I began licking his leavings up, just as I had been taught. The crystal vision seemed to fade with each cleaned digit.

All clean.

One second the black-haired vampire was standing at the doorway, the next, he was a blur. Claudius tackled me, and my face skidded along the bathroom floor. We ended up some way from Marcus, with Claudius lying across my neck, weighing my head against the flooring with his body.

“
Do not move. You will get hurt. Marcus? Marcus!”

Marcus groaned and shifted on the tiles. “I am fine, just a little light-headed from that orgasm.”

“
Why did you not call for me?”

“
I could not. Sex had a vocal and physical binding on me.”

“
But he is only two hours old. He cannot even control his fangs yet. I have never heard of such a thing.”

The rush of energy that had taken me over was gone. My vision was back to normal, and Claudius was grinding my nose into the tiled floor. “Can you get off my head? You’re crushing me!” I growled.

“
Hush, no one is talking to you right now, Sex, and I do not think that you want our attention at this moment.” To emphasis his point, Claudius pressed a little harder on my head. I relaxed and stayed still.

Marcus’s voice was a little shaky, but it seemed to be getting stronger by the second. “I think it is because of his eyes.”

“
Okay, what the fuck is wrong with my eyes? Someone please tell me. What’s going on with me?” Ignoring the advice Claudius had issued regarding being still and silent I tried to struggle free, but all I managed to do was just rub my cheek painfully on the grout lines of the floor tiles.

I felt Claudius shift as he let out a big sigh. “Take your shower, Marcus. I will talk to him.”

“
He is my fledging; it is my duty.”

“
You are
my
fledging. Obey me, Marcus.”

Marcus got up and headed back into the shower, while Claudius made himself more comfortable on my head, the floor tile grinding harder into my face. I didn’t say anything as he still hadn’t eased up from his first smack down. My teeth bit into my cheek, leaving me to suck on my own bloody saliva. I thought about what I’d just heard. Claudius
made
Marcus? Damn it. What did that make him to me then?

Owww, Uncle. Uncle. Uncle. Uncle.

I shifted again and he grabbed at one of my wrists, yanking it hard up behind my back. Oh…tears ran down my face from the pain, though Claudius ignored them as he began speaking to me.

“
The Blood are an old and ancient race. They greeted Man when they finally emerged in their present form. And just like today, anything that is different is deemed evil and is destroyed with a vengeance the Blood has never encountered before.”

I calmed as he talked, and the pressure on my shoulder and wrist lessened.

“
From that time, the Blood scattered and broke into different areas and aspects of the world. Thirteen races, only one of which is vampire, developed in isolation from each other over the millennia. Within our Blood Nation, there is a hierarchy originally based on lineage for the upper classes, but they are few and far between now, and truthfully, our status is determined on Flame, or Vampiric Eye.”