by Kaia Bennett
I would win!
The muscles of my fatigued thighs strained against the dry tug of the sand, but I loved this. My favorite part had always been the second my feet touched wet sand. The slap of my soles against the soaked shoreline, the way my toes sank and my struggle to gain footing as the waves rolled in. I slipped completely into the water, melting into the waves and pushed away from shore. Into the abyss, I swam for all I was worth.
“Evie!”
I sank underneath the waves. This wasn’t my element, but I could pretend. I could pretend that I belonged here like Nora. Just another ripple in the water coming undone, losing control.
That’s it, little witch. Come to me.
My arms ached, my thighs burned, and my calves strained down to my arches.
Come to me.
“Evie, stop!”
I swam faster. Farther. I ached and my limbs dragged like a stone rolling uphill. I hit the wall of exhaustion but still struggled on. I wanted to be beyond exhausted. I wanted to be beyond the fight, past the point of no return. Then farther still. I needed to be stronger. I had to get beyond the horizon, where the light didn’t touch, to win.
“Evie! Stop!”
My heart stuttered in my chest. Nora had gotten so far ahead of me, like she’d always been in the water, waiting for me to catch up. She waved her arms like windshield wipers on high, as if to say no, don’t come any closer. Her frantic warning sent a chill of dread down my spine.
Ah. I’m dreaming.
The real memory of my time with Nora on the beach bled into the lucid dream, but still I didn’t wake.
I stopped and turned, treading water.
From the shore, Nora waved her arms in frantic arcs now, summoning me back. She managed to be in two places at once, only this version of Nora wore the dress she’d drowned in all those years ago.
“Get out of the water! He’s behind you, get out, get out, get out!”
I’ll make you hurt so good….
Up, I floated. Then down. And, as I rose and fell I lost proximity to the shore, pulled into the heart of the ocean.
Up.
Down.
Another wavelength lost.
Every wave pulled me away from the safety of the shore, like an arm wrapped possessively around my waist. Like a strong chest against my back and powerful hips molded to my ass. Not a kid anymore, I felt my feminine curves caressing a man’s powerful body. A strong hand tugged my neck back. I stared up into Jesse’s black eyes. The curtain of his black hair bracketed us in another world. The veins in his forearm looked like rivers and blood flowed from the wound in his wrist into an ocean of red.
Bronze fingers pried my mouth open and slid over the dulled edges of my teeth. I tasted the salt of his fingers, the slick tang of my pussy, the sweet intoxication of his blood. No ocean could wash away the taste of him, of us combined.
Nora seemed so far away now, calling out with an inaudible voice. Only Jesse’s smile existed now. Only his tongue stroking mine felt real.
I opened my mouth wider for him. Naked with need, I flexed my tongue to taste him.
Water invaded my throat and I coughed and sputtered. Drowning. Nora had been right. I should have swum for shore and gotten out of the water when I had the chance. But the liquid flooding my throat tasted tangy and spicy, and sat hot as a shot of Fireball in my belly. I tried not to, but couldn’t help swallowing some. Then some more.
Let me in.
The water sat heavy in my gut, stone after stone of evil, coating my insides and dragging me under. Nora’s voice disappeared making way for Jesse’s dominion over my mind.
Let me all the way in…. That’s a good. Little. Witch….
I woke, choking on the ghost of Jesse’s blood running down my throat, a sheen of sweat cooling on my skin. I felt the urge to vomit, but swallowed the flood of acid. The price I paid when vampire blood had been used for business instead of pleasure.
Up until that night, I’d slept like the dead. I woke every few hours to find myself packed into yet another stolen car with music roaring through every speaker.
We drove straight through Alabama and Mississippi. I woke in time to see the “Welcome to Louisiana: Bienvenue en Louisiane” sign as we were ushered into the notorious marshy world of Patois, Mardi Gras, and voodoo. When I crossed that line, I closed my eyes and breathed a deep gust of air, swirling with energy.
If I’d believed in ghosts, I’d have sworn they welcomed me. But we weren’t headed to New Orleans. We were passing through Louisiana, only stopping in Tallulah for a night’s rest because Liam had a bad reaction to the medicine.
Exhaustion claimed each vampire, and all around me, predators slept.
All but one.
I startled beside Jesse but the fear response made me lay still. Vaughn sat cross-legged on the bed opposite me. He stared, with an intent so fierce, I knew he’d been watching me while I slept.
“Did baby have a bad dream?” he asked. His voice hit the quiet darkness with soft clarity. He didn’t whisper and yet, his question carried with the intimacy of one, right in my ear.
I didn’t answer. He could see the after effects and I doubted my voice would work anyway.
“You should enjoy your day of rest, witch. Next time we stop, you’ll be all healed up. You won’t get much rest then.”
I could see his sinister white grin.
I could see pain.
I couldn’t stay in the room another second. I got up, naked as the day I’d been born and stumbled in the dark toward the bathroom to pee and get my bearings.
My vision seemed weaker than the day before, the blood in my system working deep in my tissue to repair me. No broken bones though, not anymore. I took a second to marvel at how I’d actually managed to walk when I’d felt my leg twisted at an impossible angle on the road.
“Here, let me give you a hand.”
I spun around and opened my mouth to scream in terror. Vaughn choked my voice with a hand around my throat and used the other to close the door quietly behind him.
“You know who else is having bad dreams, Evie?”
Vaughn squeezed tighter and I panicked. I extended my neck to full length and cut off more oxygen instead of tucking my chin like I’d learned in self-defense classes.
“Liam. Liam’s having bad dreams.” I clawed at his wrist, slapped the naked skin of his chest. “Liam’s sweating and moaning in his sleep. You know why?"
My legs gave out and my vision trembled.
“Because he’s sick, you stupid cunt.”
Please!
My voice came out as a desperate croak.
“We’ve been on the road for years, and until you came along, we were just fine. Jesse would have smelled that rotting corpse full of V-Sep a mile off and Liam never would have taken a bite. But he was babysitting you all day instead of being with his brothers where he belongs.”
My knees hit the tile I stared up at Vaughn’s fury, his pitiless black eyes.
“What did you do to him? You cast some sort of spell? Is that why he can’t let you fucking die?”
I wrapped my hand around Vaughn’s wrist. As unconsciousness beckoned I lashed out and shared my pain with him.
He felt his own stranglehold, his throat turning a violent shade of white while his face turned red with trapped blood.
Stubborn fuck.
He wouldn’t release his hold. He tightened his fingers around my throat even though his own breathing suffered for the squeeze.
Jesse!
The room shook around me, vibrating with my silent scream. My vision went black.
Air hit my lungs so hard I coughed hysterically. Over my wheezing inhalations, I heard growls and the crash of furniture, the thump of heavy things hitting reinforced walls.
I collapsed onto the cool tiles, my throat scorched and my eyes watering. Dots of light danced in my vision.
I heard a crash and shattering sound. Before I’d made sense of my destination, I began crawling toward t
he door.
“Look at him, Jesse! The medicine fucks you up, but what if he’s sick?”
“I’m fine,” Liam said. Liam coughed and the sound made me shudder.
A week had passed, and I hadn’t heard any of these vampires so much as sneeze, let alone unleash a wet, wheezing cough.
Silence. My skin stuck to the tile as I righted myself and leaned against the cabinet under the sink.
“You’ve been so far up that witch’s ass you haven’t been paying attention—”
Vaughn’s voice died on a strangled breath. A thud sounded.
“Who the fuck do you think you’re talking to? You think you’re in charge now, is that it? Are you leader of this crew, or am I?”
An inhuman roar rang out and shook me to my marrow. I slammed my eyes shut like a child with real monsters waiting under her bed. The sound of flesh collapsing under flesh made me huddle in on myself.
“Mom, Dad, stop fighting.” Liam’s laughter had no heart. He coughed again and took a deep breath just as Jesse punched Vaughn again. Had to have been Jesse hitting Vaughn. I heard a sickening crack and a groan of submission.
“C’mon, Vaughn. Put me in my place since you’re in charge!”
Vaughn laughed and then groaned. “It’s not me who’s put you in your place, Jesse. A pretty face and some tight witch pussy did that days ago. We always used to hunt together. Always! If you’d been there, you’d have sniffed out that rotting corpse a mile off and Liam would be fine. And if Liam dies, it’ll be your fault—and hers!”
“I’m not gonna die, dude,” Liam said. “Just takes a bit for the medicine to work. Right, Jesse?”
Silence. A silence so long and so thick I could’ve swam the length of the truth Jesse couldn’t speak.
“Jesse? I’m gonna be okay, right?”
I opened my eyes after a long moment and saw Jesse staring down at me.
He hated me and wanted me, and I saw in his gaze something akin to torment. Guilt, even.
Vaughn was right.
“Are you going to kill me now?”
I looked down at my body, the bruises where broken bones had been, the scratches that only hours before had been open wounds. An itch under my skin, so deep I couldn’t reach, signaled mending tissue and organs. Mysterious things stretched and moved inside me, cheating death.
Vaughn and Liam were bonded to Jesse by nature, by bloodlust and cruelty, by loyalty and time.
But Jesse and I were bonded by blood, by visions and whispers in the dark recesses of our shared minds. He could give me to his brothers in murder. He could cause me pain and drain me dry, but underneath every cruelty, the truth hissed like a snake that coiled around us both.
He didn’t want to kill me. Maybe he couldn’t kill me for some reason I hadn’t yet uncovered.
Maybe he wanted to break me and make me suffer first. But he’d long since decided he wanted me alive and he had no idea what to do now. The longer I stayed around, the more complications I posed.
But he wanted me alive.
He turned his gaze back to the room I feared to enter and he barked to Vaughn, “Go get something to eat. Get one for each of us and be back here within the hour.”
“You want me to go hunting like this?”
Curiosity clawed my insides. How bad did Vaughn look after his beating for his vanity to give him pause? I stayed still because Jesse’s hard stare had honed in on me again.
“Get up, get dressed, and do as I say. Or don’t come back.”
Vaughn dressed and left to hunt. I flinched and averted my gaze when I saw the pulpy mess Vaughn’s face had become under Jesse’s beating. The door slammed and I labored to my feet.
“Are you going to kill me now?” I asked again.
He grabbed me by the neck and stared at me, long and hard.
“When a pet is bad you don’t put her down.” Jesse smirked. “You punish her. And I know how to punish you, Evie.”
18
The sun had set hours before when the door opened so room service could cart out the first body. The second body followed close behind.
I heard the pelt of rain and inhaled damp earth when the pair in hazmat suits opened the door. The aroma of freedom mingled with the sticky-sweet scent of blood. So much blood that I wondered how much money these motels spent on burning and buying bed sheets and cleaning floors. So many screams echoed from the walls that, long after the voices died, I heard them ringing in my ears.
Jesse snapped the back of his hand across my face, spinning me around so hard the floor jettisoned up to meet my prone body. I stared at a broken lamp and a dimple in the wall of our trashed room while my mouth filled with blood. The fire raced across my scalp when Jesse dragged me up to knees by my hair and back to the edge of the bed. The spray of blood hit my face and the smell of sliced flesh assaulted my senses.
“I told you to watch. It’s rude to ignore Vaughn when he’s doing such fine work.”
In my mind, the world shuddered with screams, bathed in red, while Vaughn’s victim struggled to block out the pain in a corner of her subconscious.
Jesse said something else but I couldn’t hear him over the woman’s earth-shattering scream. Vaughn straddled her hips, her naked back vulnerable under the precision of his hunting knife.
Liam nursed a runaway like a milkshake. The boy had flawless mahogany skin. Gorgeous eyes closed tight on tears. He hardly winced now when Liam sank his fangs deep into his bruised neck.
“He tastes sweet. Kinda like the witch.” Liam gave Jesse a broad red grin and wiped sweat from his brow. Liam hadn’t moved from his spot against the headboard, and yet, the weaker vampire looked like he’d spent all night exerting himself the way Vaughn had. I wondered if the medicine was to blame or if he really had gotten sick. “You want some of this?” Liam tilted his prey forward. The boy folded in on himself, passed out from blood loss.
Jesse ran his fingers through my hair. “Nah, man, he’s all yours. Have fun breaking him in if you wanna keep him. That’s the hard part.”
The girl on the bed sobbed as Vaughn pressed his faced to her back and licked up the mess he’d made.
I stared at her through the tears in my eyes as she shivered in shock. Her broken gaze met mine. I wondered if Vaughn would heal her so he could break her again, or if he’d finally let her die. The girl seemed to be fading, until she blinked and I knew she’d be too strong to dwindle this time. Her arms hung limply over the edge of the bed. I watched the light glint off a thin silver wrist cuff. Embedded within the silver were amber, cat-eye gemstones. When I couldn’t bear to look at her tortured features, at her pretty freckled face streaked with tears, or red hair, tangled with clumps of blood, I stared at the bracelet.
I’d watched the same torment happen to the last girl. The way she pled silently for death like I had days before, only to have Vaughn and Jesse heal her and start again. Every time Vaughn licked his knife clean and started from the beginning, I felt a piece of them die.
I looked up at Jesse, standing above me like a god of death. Naked and covered in blood from his hair down to his feet, he looked as if he’d been smeared in red finger paint.
He hadn’t touched me yet, not really. I thought he’d grown disgusted with me at first, or bored, but then I noticed the tremor when his fingers ran through my hair. I noticed how he kept me close even when he fed to gluttonous proportions.
Everything he did and said seemed to say, you’re mine to punish and I’m going to break you.
And yet, a voice kept whispering in my mind, my diseased and fast-numbing mind.
He doesn’t want a victim. He has plenty of those. He wants a challenge. He wants me and he doesn’t want the others to know how much.
“Don’t let him hurt her anymore.” Vaughn’s latest design evoked a shriek that drowned out my voice. He’d carved Slut into the girl’s pale skin the first time. Now he carved his name. Her howls and attempts to get away earned her another broken finger.
“You’re fu
cking up my work. You know how hard it is to carve in script?” Vaughn mumbled.
The girl didn’t know, or if she did she couldn’t say so, because she’d begun choking on her own spit and tears.
Jesse licked his lips. “What was that, Evie?”
Of course he heard me. Of course, he heard everything, even the sound of my heart breaking.
The last girl, with dark hair and olive skin, sat silent in the corner, weeping without making a sound.
Funny, to see the same expression on the final victim’s face when she looked at me. This young woman looked nothing like the one under Vaughn’s knife, but the final victim could have been a mirror image of the first dead girl. The girl whose jacket I still wore as armor against the growing chill. She’d asked the same silent question.
Are you with us or with them?
How could I explain with just a look, that we were both prisoners here? How could I explain that I wanted to be with them, but I hadn’t been given a choice?
I stared into Jesse’s cold gaze. He could’ve been a god of war, a god of punishment. He’d have been no less imposing had he sprouted black wings and called himself a fallen angel. No less imposing and no less beautiful.
“Put her out of her misery. Please. This isn’t what you want. You don’t want me afraid and broken. You want me strong.”
Fresh puncture wounds sliced my soul open. For a moment I wondered if red ashes would flow from my veins. My insides felt like scorched earth. And yet, the link between Jesse and I continued to feed me, as my blood fed him. His desires became my own. He’d prepared me for this moment.
“Show me what I really want.”
That’s what this had always been about. He wanted all of me. He wanted the highest high, the top of the ride, and the vicious drop to the bottom. And I would give him that high, finally. I’d become strong enough to be his equal instead of merely his prisoner.
Hear me, witch. I’ll fuck you yet. I’ll have you making so much blood, I’ll be able to stick my dick in your veins. Baby, I’m making so many nasty plans for you.
I shivered under the slithering stares of Liam and Vaughn as I rose to my feet and touched him. Jesse’s cock began to rise in my hand, blood-red and eager, while Vaughn finished his name with a surgical flourish.
