“Is that it?” I whispered, unsure if it was wise to interrupt a feeding vampire. I wouldn’t get between a dog and its bone.
He kissed the bite and lifted his head. Heat filled his meadow-green gaze. A few strands of toffee hair had separated from his always neat hair and flopped over his forehead.
Something hardened beneath me.
“No!” I said, squirming on his lap. No sex during blood compulsion, my ass. That was a definite erection.
“Your turn,” he said. There was a dreamy quality to his voice.
Not breaking our stare, Kyros bit his wrist and pressed the dripping wound against my closed lips. In a burst of speed, he leaned forward on the seat so I was forced backward. His free hand whipped between my shoulder blades to support my arched position.
“Open,” he snapped in annoyance, shaking his wrist against my mouth.
I parted my lips.
Thick soup tasting of rust and salt trickled into my mouth, and I gagged—at the texture more than anything—though I wouldn’t be licking any rusty fences to replicate the taste in a hurry.
A growl ripped from Kyros’s chest, and I tensed, swallowing obediently until he yanked his wrist free.
He licked his wound, and I watched it seal from beneath hooded eyes.
Were we done—?
Fire filled me in a wall of red.
The suddenness drew a gasp from my lips.
Oh my god.
I squirmed on his bulging lap, my shocked gaze flying to his. I clutched his shirt in both hands, moaning slightly.
“This is the after part?” I keened, everything from the waist down clenching.
He ran his hands up my thighs, thumbs close to the apex of my thighs. “Powerful. Exquisite.”
I crept my fingers up his neck and lifted high on my knees to bring our faces level.
“We didn’t want this before,” Kyros reminded me, voice still dreamy.
“Mmm,” I answered, lowering my mouth.
A door crashed open and a male spoke. “Sir.”
Kyros’s hips were grinding into my core from below. When had that started? He didn’t stop in response to the voice, but a terrible snarl filled his chest, spilling over. I didn’t care. I began to rock on his lap, desperately seeking my own release.
“Sir, the dice are about to roll.” A woman interrupted this time.
Kyros’s eyes flashed, and he squeezed his eyes shut. “When?”
“One minute, sir.”
He swore long and hard.
Not as hard as some things.
“Do you need assistance separating from her?” the woman asked.
A bead of sweat trekked down the side of his face.
Clasping my waist, the vampire bodily lifted me, striding to the door. Him. I needed him now. I’d always need him. The world could fall to ruin around us and none of it would matter if he was inside me.
My hands finally found what they were looking for.
Kyros moaned as my fingers brushed the front of his suit pants. His mouth crushed down against mine.
“Thirty seconds, sir.”
“Fuck!” he seethed.
I was passed to another.
Whimpering, I reached for Kyros as Angelica took me in her arms.
“Confine her,” he said, muscles straining with some inner battle. “Post a guard at her door. Female. The human isn’t to leave the tower.”
And then the vampire was gone.
12
Vampires existed. It was my first thought upon waking in a room with no windows. How the fuck did I fall asleep after that?
Did the monsters even call themselves vampires? The term felt inadequate to describe the terror Kyros could induce—like calling a panther a kitten or something. Pop culture had ruined the term.
I rolled onto my back, lost in what I’d gotten myself into. My mind and body didn’t know what to feel first. I’d felt soul-numbing disbelief when my parents were ripped from me and the two building blocks intended to guide me through life were crushed.
I’d felt bone-shaking shock when Clint hurt me for a quick buck.
The disbelief and shock that ripped the rules of the world apart was different altogether. I’d always stood on the world beside everyone else, and it was a given that the rules of the earth I lived on would remain the same. That gravity would keep me grounded. That I would not fly without man-made machines and devices. That without my head, I would die. That I would age. They were rules people rarely spoke about, and yet those unspoken rules created a safety net; an anchor that helped every person on this planet centre themselves.
In the space of a few minutes, my world had been blown to smithereens. I had no sense of up and down. My only tether to earth now was that Kyros let me live.
For now.
He’d mentioned that if I failed this trust trial thing, he’d compel me further, but there was no mention of death. I felt it was implied—due to the fact they drank blood.
My exhale shook its way from my lips. Vampires existed. One killed her boyfriend in front of me. Kyros had guzzled my blood like I was a strawberry mojito. And I—
Oh my god. I drank vampire blood! My hand flew to the bite at the base of my neck. I couldn’t feel any raised bumps, but the area was tender.
Curiosity spurred my despairing ass from the bed.
I shuffled to the edge of the mammoth bed and stood. White spots flooded my vision, what blood I had left filling my legs.
“Whoa,” I rasped, feeling behind before sitting heavily on the mattress. I closed my eyes until the dizziness faded and squinted around the room to get my bearings.
A blaring blue light—the only light in here—caught my attention.
2:00 p.m.
Was I dizzy because I slept, what had to be, nearly twelve hours? Or was it that last night I was drained of a crucial pint or two?
After the events of the last two days, I should feel wrung out. But fear filled me with a crackling, erratic energy that I didn’t know how to process.
Someone knocked at the front door. “Miss Tetley?”
I leaped to my feet again, dizziness forgotten. Okay, maybe I wasn’t as cool and calm as I thought; much more like an on-edge rabbit who could ignore the world as long as she remained in her burrow. Or her prison cell.
I didn’t recognise the woman’s muffled voice. I didn’t have to, really. I was in Kyros Sky and anyone in here was surely above me on the food chain if bright eyes were an indication of their race.
“Yes?” I squeaked in response.
“Are you well?” The woman’s faint voice trickled through heavy wood and across the five metres between me and the door. My prison cell was actually pretty big. The massive bed occupied the corner farthest from the doorway, and two other doors branched off the room and were closed. That’s all I could make out in the alarm clock’s blue glare.
Was I well? A high-pitched squeal left my lips.
“Miss Tetley?”
“Sure. I’m right as rain,” I said, choking on a chuckle. Oh fuck, I’d lost the plot.
“... Very well. Let me know if you need anything.”
Yeah right.
My prison cell had a guard. Which, upon second thought, I’d known. Angelica brought me here and spoke to another female vampire, and Kyros had ordered her to post someone outside the door.
Kyros.
Groaning, I turned for the closest shut door. Hopefully one of the two contained a bathroom. I didn’t want to leave my burrow.
Pushing open the door, I felt along the wall until I found a light switch. Soft light flowed through the space. A bathroom.
Win.
I whistled low. They treated their victims well—a claw bath, double overhead nozzles in the shower, and fluffy white towels.
Sinking onto the toilet, I left the rules of the world dilemma unresolved and moved on to problem two of one million—the blood compulsion.
I had to grab Tommy, her family, and my grandmother and get the fuck out
of Bluff City. Oh man, that might not work. This city couldn’t be the only place with a vampire infestation. Which meant I had to get out of the tower, away from Kyros and Live Right, and alert my loved ones so they were on their guard always.
Or would that put them in more danger? The last thing I wanted was for them to go through the same thing I was going through. Moaning low, I slid from the toilet to the cold, graphite floor of my burrow.
I was going legit insane. Like, living in a tree where pants were optional and tree bark sustained me insane.
Only one cure to insanity existed.
Shave, wash, hydrate.
Peeling myself off the graphite, I swept the bathroom counter for the necessary supplies. In my haste, the objects on there—a hairnet, body milk, shampoo and conditioner, soap, and a tiny comb—went flying to the cold ground. The neatly rolled hand towels followed.
I had soap and moisturiser, but if I couldn’t complete all three parts of my sanity ritual, the whole thing was pointless. Sometimes hotel rooms—which this seemed to be—had little razors. Returning to the bedroom to continue my search, I halted in the doorway. Light streaming from the bathroom illuminated the silver logo of my Elegance pack.
“Mine,” I snarled, leaping on the bag in a frenzy.
I recalled Kyros checking out my homeless story by sending a pleb to check my office. Someone thought to bring it here for me—Angelica, I assumed. Thank Zeus’s left nut all my stuff was in there.
I drew out my sanity pack and cradled it close, scuttling back the way I came.
Turning the shower settings to scalding, I remembered my reason for leaving bed in the first place.
I turned to the mirror to study my neck.
Dark smudges circled the space under my topaz eyes. My eyes ranged from orange-brown on a good day, to muddy brown on a bad day. It was a muddy brown kind of day. My silky butter-blonde curls weren’t looking so silky smooth—the locks plastered against my face and neck.
I swallowed, peeling the tresses back from the right side of my neck.
No marks.
Huh. I don’t know what I’d expected—two small wounds. Maybe a tattoo of Kyros’s face? The spot was tender to touch. No way could I forget the feeling of his fangs slicing into me. I tilted my head to the left and angled toward the light, shivering at the memory of the large vampire exposing my neck last night.
There. Faint yellow bruising. It would be gone in a few days at most. He’d accelerated my healing somehow. Is that what he did with all the licking?
Warmth flushed through me at the thought of what nearly transpired between us after the blood compulsion. The warmth lasted a split second before fury followed in its slipstream, shredding all trace of lust in its path.
That was more like it. I’d known the hatred would come back.
He’d nearly killed me. With fright. And then saved my life only to interrogate and hurt me. Now, his blood was in my body, and my blood in his. That felt more invasive and violating than if we’d had sex. Sex would have been a one-time thing. With him anyway.
This blood compulsion?
... He’d been inside my head, controlling me while drawing my life force into his mouth one greedy guzzle at a time. But for Angelica’s interruption, neither he nor myself could have stopped us from having sex.
I scowled at myself in the mirror. “Hussy.”
Quickly stripping, I stepped into the hot shower. A sigh left my lips as water pounded over my head. Mmm, good pressure. Kyros Sky had one thing going for it. Because it sure wasn’t the owner.
I let go of as much of the last two days as possible. Minutes passed, maybe hours during which I remembered the episode with Clint. It seemed so insignificant now. What Clint did to me had obeyed the rules of the world I’d known. I’d take a run-in with him over Kyros any day.
My breathing slowed.
My shoulders eased.
Only then did I pick up my razor with something akin to reverence.
And began.
Losing myself to the task as I inspected my body for hair. Then I foamed the lemon myrtle blend all over my body. I returned a second and third time, trying to rub Kyros’s fingerprints off my body.
I wouldn’t be rubbing Clint’s away, it seemed. Ugly purple bruises marred the skin of my upper arm, but I hadn’t noticed any bruising on my face from his slap at least.
Remembering the state of my hair, I ducked out of the shower to grab the shampoo and conditioner from the floor.
After two shampoos and two conditions, the heat in the shower had my head swimming. The crackling, erratic fear I’d felt since waking had dissipated somewhat and I was feeling appropriately tired.
Time to face the world again—after hydrating of course.
I wrapped a towel around my body, tucking it in over my breasts, and wrapped a second towel around my head.
Legs shaking, I crossed back to the main room and flopped onto the bed.
Jesus, how much blood did the leech take? I wanted to sleep again.
How did the blood compulsion even work? It was meant to stop me talking about vampires, but how foolproof was it?
Kyros failing occurred to me for the first time.
Vampires exist. I imagined Tommy in front of me as I tried to say the words aloud, only managing an intelligible gurgle. With my finger, I tried to trace the words on my leg as though writing it for her. Nope, couldn’t even budge my hand. I couldn’t think of any other ways to test my constraints, but I could assume the blood compulsion worked. Which was magic.
And impossible.
But it was real.
Shuffling off the bed again, I squeezed as much moisture from my hair and used the tiny comb from the bathroom to work out the knots. Drying my arms and legs, I returned to my pack to don the only clean underwear I had—my black G-banger and lacy bra. Another sign the universe was having a field day with my life. This was a day for underwear that stretched over half my stomach, a hole-ridden tee, no bra, short shorts, and woollen socks.
Pushing aside my longing for all of the above, I picked up my moisturiser. A hazelnut-sized dollop was enough for both legs. I put much more than that on my hands today.
As I worked the scentless blend into my arms and torso, I returned to my attempts to break the blood compulsion even though I was on the fence about telling my loved ones about vampires, leaning toward not. That aside, the bastard had pillaged my mind. Pure self-respect wouldn’t let me accept that without a fight.
Hey, Tom, Twilight is real, but Edward’s hair is better. Nope. The words choked in my throat.
I opened my lips again. Fangs, super speed, mind-control stuff. What do you have?
Spelling the word backward proved futile too. The bastard had me trussed up nice and tight. What a dick.
I squeezed more moisturiser onto my hand and propped my foot on the edge up of the leather bed frame to work it into my smooth legs.
“Let me in.”
I froze, my muscles coiling to run at the voice rumbling through my door.
Three words spoken by him. That’s all it took to undo the careful ministrations of the last hour or two. Fear took me first. Anger close behind. Loathing curled my fingers into claws while terror begged me to hide. In a strange twist, the heart-pounding part was the easiest to manage—I’d already had three days of managing that at Live Right. It made me realise how muted Kyros was until last night. How dull his eyes had appeared in our prior interactions. When he’d dropped his human act, I’d nearly expired on the spot. Literally.
It had to be a power thing. Kyros was definitely in charge around here, so I assumed he was the strongest. At least in his clan. Which meant there were other clans—who he didn’t get along with judging by his accusation that I was a spy. Maybe I could use that to my advantage, but the rebellious thought seemed overly ambitious considering I couldn’t talk about a single thing to do with vampires.
At least my sanity routine had shown me what I needed to do next. I had to get myself to
safety and to protect my loved ones. To do that, I had to keep the vampire leader happy.
Which meant not irritating him.
Which meant I couldn’t show a lick of my anger around him. Anger, I could hide. Fear, not so much.
“Sir, you gave orders that you were not, under any circumstances, to gain entry into Miss Tetley’s room.”
I tensed at his furious answering snarl.
That was all it took for the vampire guarding me to open the door. For the first time, I considered that the guard wasn’t there to keep me in, but to keep Kyros out.
Fuck.
The vampire, dressed only in low-riding black sweatpants, strode in the room. I caught a peek of a white-faced young woman before he slammed the door shut.
He looked straight at me.
Then stilled.
Not like a human—or a crocodile waiting to ambush prey. He went as still as stone, his eyes riveted on my ass.
My eyes widened. “Shit.”
I was still in the leg propped up on the bed while wearing my G-string and bra pose like I was starring in a porn film. I hastily lowered my leg.
Kyros’s eyes went to my breasts as they bounced with the change of position. Really, body? I swung my wet hair to cover my chest, and his chest rumbled.
I couldn’t win.
His eyes went to the area between my thighs only clothed in a scrap of sheer black material. My face didn’t need to present for what he had in mind. Which was probably why he ignored it. Practical.
My heart sputtered in my chest.
Why wasn’t the vampire speaking or moving? What was he planning? I blew out a shaking breath, noticing how perfect his gold-tinged skin was. My fingertips itched to run themselves over the smooth plains of his chest.
He took a step forward, and a gasp left my lips as the wall of fire from last night slammed into me hard enough that my knees folded.
I sank onto the bed, body trembling with the sudden heat.
“Kyros,” I pleaded. “Stay back.”
Last night, I wasn’t able to reason through the cloud of lust whatsoever. Four metres separated us where last night there was none. Whatever this fire was, distance helped to keep my mind clear. He couldn’t come any closer.
Blood Trial: Supernatural Battle (Vampire Towers Book 1) Page 13
