by Mara Black
What a sickeningly noble individual.
I went to find some clothes.
Autumn stirred awake while I dug through my bureau drawers. Blinking sleepily, she yawned, then a slow smile spread across her face.
"Come back to bed," she murmured.
Never once in my life had a woman said that to me. I'd always wanted to hear it, and now, fucking Joshua was ruining it. As much as I enjoyed toying with him, I had to draw the line somewhere.
No sex while he was in the house.
"Can't," I told her, stepping into my underwear. "Got a visitor."
She frowned, sitting up. "Who?"
"Only visitor we ever have." I made a face. "What dress do you want? I'll fetch it for you."
"Wait - how do you know he's here?" She stared at me. "Did you..."
"I let him in," I said, simply.
"Naked?"
I shrugged.
"Oh, for..." sighing, she stood up. "Pick whichever one you want. Lunatic."
I went and looked through her dresses while she washed up. It took me a while to decide between something unbearably sexy - to rub it in his face - and something demure, so he wouldn't see any more of her than was strictly necessary. I settled on something in-between, making sure to bring a bra and panties as well, from the back of the bottom drawer. Completely untouched.
She was pulling up her hair when I came back. Unable to stifle the urge, I walked up to her, sliding my arms around her waist and kissing the back of her neck.
It felt so good to be like this. To act normal. To pretend.
"I thought we had to see our visitor," she murmured, feeling the nudge of my half-hard cock against her ass.
"We do," I sighed. "As much as I'd love to fuck you, and keep him waiting...you don't know how to be quiet. And nobody gets to hear those sounds you make." I nibbled at her ear. "Nobody except me."
"Nobody else could make me make those sounds." She giggled. "Come on. I promise I'll be quiet as a mouse."
I groaned, my erection pulsing fully to life. "That's very tempting, Autumn. But no."
"You can be quiet," she purred, spinning around to smile at me. Her eyes shone with wicked promises. "Can't you?"
"Very quiet," I mouthed, as her fingers tugged at my zipper. "But..."
"Please." She breathed against my neck, her hand sliding into my open fly. "I want to taste you, Master."
My throat was too dry to answer.
Closing her hand around me, she squeezed gently, then stroked. "Don't you want to? Knowing he's waiting for you? And he'll know something's happening?"
God damn it, she was going to kill me.
"Fuck yes," I hissed.
She dropped to her knees, mouth and tongue swirling and sucking and caressing. I stifled a groan, rocking towards her. As always, the door was open just a few inches. He wouldn't, but he could. There was a chance he could walk in on us. See how beautiful she looked with my cock in her mouth.
I'd have to kill him. But oh, what a sweet few moments that would be.
The heat of her mouth, the urgency and wrongness of it, while at the same time, it was so tame, so fucking tame, compared to what I wanted to do to her - was too much. I gripped her hair, not bothering to hold back. My hips jerked faster, and I wasn't so sure the sound of the generator would be enough to drown out the little sounds she was making.
"Shhhh." I tugged on the roots of her hair.
My orgasm rushed to life, and I rode it as silently as I could, gritting my teeth as I filled her sweet little mouth. She accepted me, as always. Everything. The bitterness and the things I tried to hide.
My eyes were closed. I opened them slowly, to see her standing on shaky legs. She swallowed delicately, grasping my carefully-knotted tie and pulling me against her. I smiled.
"Thank you," she whispered.
My head was swimming as I pulled myself together, waiting for my hard-on to subside as she quickly dressed and smoothed her hair.
"I'll meet you downstairs?" She cocked her head.
I nodded my permission, and watched her glide out into the hallway like a woman who hadn't just sucked my cock.
"Joshua," I heard her say. "It's so nice to see you again."
I couldn't distinguish the words in his response, but I hoped he knew.
"So glad you could join us," said Joshua, dryly, as I appeared on the stairs.
I went straight for the liquor cabinet. "The pleasure's all mine."
Autumn rolled her eyes.
"Well, the good news is, we've got everything we need for a successful siege." Joshua's fingers were tented together as he waxed rhapsodical. "It took long enough, but I've got three hundred strong. That's more than enough to take on Stoker. They'll all be well-armed, too. It's just a matter of timing."
"I don't really know what you expect me to say," I told him. "Congratulations?"
Joshua sighed. "Say you'll help. You're still a legend to them, Tate. You can get them to act rashly - nobody else can strike at the emotional underbelly of an organization like that."
"I'm a traitor to them," I insisted. "I don't know why you seem to think otherwise."
He leaned forward, earnestly. "You should've heard the way they talked about, Tate. Of course they don't trust you - that's not the point. But they think Holland pushed you too far. They think you took your revenge on him, not them. They're still in awe of what you accomplished there. You have influence, whether you like it or not."
"I don't know what you mean by that." I took a sip of my whiskey. "There's nothing I can do to help you."
"There is, Tate." Joshua's eyes glinted. "All this time, they've been waiting for their prodigal son to come home. You just have to convince them you have, and they'll be putty in your hands."
I shook my head. "I won't go back there," I said. "Never again. That was a promise I made to myself."
"It's a promise you'll have to break," said Joshua. "Don't you want to see them crumble?"
Beside me, Autumn was perfectly silent. What did she think of all this? I didn't really have to ask. I already knew. She wanted me to be a force for good in this world, as if that could help. As if it undid any of my past sins.
Joshua wasn't giving up. "Why do you think they sent you Autumn as a gift?"
I grunted noncommittally. "Holland told them to."
"Mr. Charles doesn't give a shit about respecting the dead," Joshua countered. "And he's not superstitious. He had his own reasons for doing it. He thought he could break you. Send you spiraling back to your old ways."
It was too close to the truth. I winced, sitting back in my chair.
"Let him believe it worked," Joshua said. "Let them see you the way they remember you. Be the Viper. It won't be difficult to convince them - it's what they want to see."
Autumn cleared her throat. I stared at her.
She took a deep breath before speaking. "I think I have an idea."
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
The Sacred Law of Hospitality
Tate
"Are you ready?"
My eyes locked with hers. I was searching for any sign of doubt, hesitation - fear. All of them were present, but they were overwhelmed with something else.
Lust. But not the kind I was used to seeing on her face.
"I'm ready," she rasped, her pulse fluttering with excitement. The Viper glowed with appreciation, seeing a kindred spirit in the flash of her eyes.
I flexed my fingers, experimentally. It had been a long time since I'd felt him inhabiting my flesh, without taking over and crushing nearly every human instinct I had left. Now we moved as one, unified at last in the desire to destroy something ugly.
Her thumb brushed hesitantly at the band of leather buckled tightly around her throat.
"Is it uncomfortable?" I asked, while the Viper rolled his eyes. "I can loosen it."
"A little. But it should be. This has to be convincing." The tips of her fingers ghosted across the collar again, getting to know the feel of it.
She was eyeing me skeptically.
"You'd be used to it, by now," I explained. "The leather would have loosened. Especially if you never took it off, even in the bath."
A smile played on her lips. She wanted this. For real.
Once again, the Viper and I could agree on something.
It was a good plan, the one she came up with. As good as any. She finally admitted that she read something like it in a book - of course she fucking did. But it didn't make me any less impressed.
Joshua liked it too, but that hardly mattered.
The only question was, would the Seven Devils fall for it? They would come with armed bodyguards, of course. That, we knew. The trick would be to make sure that the bodyguards stayed close by. That shouldn't be too difficult. The Devils would still be cautious, suspicious, no matter how overjoyed they would be to hear from me. No matter how much they'd want to believe what I was saying.
Her hand rested on the little sketch laid on my end-table, slightly smudged from use, painstakingly labeled in her delicate writing. "We should run through everything one more time," she said. "Just to check."
I picked up the map and she followed me around the house as I checked and double-checked everything she'd marked. Blood pounded in my head as I remembered why she'd been able to draw this so quickly, how frightened and despairing she'd once been because of me.
That's over.
No, the Viper smirked. It's not.
I hated how close his voice was now, not in my ear, in my head. More so than usual. He shifted under my skin. But if I was going to survive this, I needed him.
The design of the house made it easy. Like many old buildings, it had minimal windows, to cut down on drafts. I'd had them replaced with double-pane glass long ago, but never bothered to have any more installed. Never saw the point. Now, I was glad. Bars on the windows probably would have made them unduly suspicious, even if I had a thousand good excuses to be paranoid.
There was at least one door between the main part of the house, and any exit points. The only exception, of course, was the front door. But that would be taken care of.
"I keep having the feeling I'm forgetting something," I said, absently, rattling my bedroom door one more time. At first it had been a challenge, figuring out how to effectively block something from the outside. But Autumn had helped me rig a latch that would fall when the doors closed, sending a massive plank of wood into two brackets on either side of the doorway. I heard the comforting thunk and knew I just had to trust it.
The brackets were attached to the thick, heavy wood with railroad ties. There was no chance of it budging. Not in a short amount of time, anyway. Still, I frowned at it.
"Come on," she said, grinning, backing all the way across the hall and taking a stance like a fullback about to charge. "Let's test it out."
Shaking my head, but not bothering to argue, I joined her.
We crashed into the door together, and it didn't so much as groan.
"Again," said Autumn.
She whirled her body at the last second before she connected, every time, letting the meaty part of her back take the lion's share of the punishment. Smart girl. It would have been hard to carry out our plan with a dislocated shoulder.
"Satisfied?" I grunted, after the fourth or fifth time.
Her eyes shone. "Not even close. But we should probably move on."
I could see the lingering doubt, the worries, but I'd reassured her as many times as I could. Our biggest advantage was their paranoia. They would be armed, all of them, but the ammunition would be limited. Enough for targeted kills only - not a massacre. Holland was always very insistent about that, and from Joshua's research it seemed they still held with the tradition.
"Quality, not quantity, my boy," he'd said to me many times. "I'd rather have a few expert marksmen with a single clip than an army of monkeys with enough ammunition to last a lifetime. If my enemy turned one of my own guns on me, I'd rather it be empty."
Enough bullets for us, but not enough to penetrate six inches of heavy oak. Even if they were full metal jackets, it would take more rounds than any one of the men carried on them. More time than we'd give them. And if I knew Stoker, they'd be carrying hollow-point only. Bullets meant to maim, to kill, to mangle flesh, to stop inside the body and mushroom out instead of passing right through. It would take twice as many to do half the damage to one of the doors.
As the appointed time drew close, we hovered by the door, waiting.
Everything had been set in motion.
The knock came just on time, and I went to answer it, just the way Holland had taught me to walk. Shoulders back, confident, smooth like flowing water. Leave no room for doubt in your speech or actions.
Be a knife. Sharp. Deadly.
It was about to begin.
I pulled the door open, slowly. I let the Viper take over my eyes.
Mr. Charles had aged terribly since the last time I saw him. Hair coming out in tufts, he looked like someone's decrepit grandfather, not the head of a multi-billion-dollar slave trade.
"Come in," I said to him, in a measured tone.
"Goodness gracious." His eyes darted around the room. "What a lovely home you keep here."
He made a gesture to the men behind him, and two armed bodyguards stomped their way in first. They scouted the room, then turned and gestured towards Mr. Charles.
All seven of the Devils came then, filtering in, one after the other. Some I recognized, but others were new to me. The youngest of the bunch eyed me suspiciously. He might be a problem. I made a mental note.
As I'd expected, half of the bodyguards came in with them, and the other half lingered outside by the cars. Everything was going according to plan.
"Gentlemen," I said, when they'd all gathered in the hall. "You remember Autumn."
Her eyes lifted, slowly. The blankness on her face chilled my blood.
This was almost real.
This was almost what you wanted.
But I knew that wasn't true. Not even the Viper wanted this, this smiling, lobotomized version of Autumn. But knowing how close she came to this reality was more than I could stomach.
"Hello," she said, softly. "Can I offer any of you a drink?"
Thankfully, my role called for more attention to be paid to my guests than my slave. I sat down and watched her out of the corner of my eye, hoping it would pass as idle concern that she was doing everything correctly.
She served the drinks silently, bowing her head slightly to each of the men.
"Do you think she remembers me?" Mr. Charles looked at me with a twist of a smile.
"Why don't you ask her?" I suggested, easily, taking a sip of my whiskey.
Mr. Charles snapped his fingers, and Autumn went to him quickly, with fluid motions. Without a moment's hesitation, she kneeled at his feet and turned her face up to his expectantly.
"You may speak, child," he said, with a chilling smile. "Do you remember me?"
"Yes, sir," Autumn trilled. "We met a long time ago."
This answer seemed to satisfy him. "You can go. Thank you."
She stood up, bowing as she went.
"This is good," one of the men said, lifting his martini. "You've done a remarkable job with her, Tate. I have to say - when we sent you someone so green, I had my doubts."
"I didn't," said Mr. Charles. "Our Tate is a natural born dominant. Through and through. And the girl...well, she's obviously born to kneel."
Hearing him say those words, true as they might be, although he'd never know how - it made my stomach roil. I had to calm down, to keep playing the role I had to play ton
ight.
"She gave me some trouble, at first," I said. The Viper speaking through my mouth, his words in my voice. "But I knew I couldn't just send her away. It's very rude to return a gift."
"Oh, don't play it so close to the chest." Mr. Charles' smile was indulgent now, as he pillowed his glass of whiskey on his waistcoat. "We all know you have a soft spot for these girls. And I have to agree - I think it's a shame to see such beauty wasted. I don't quite have the same cruel streak as Mr. Holland, sad to say."
"He was just trying to run a business," I said, coolly. "Sometimes, there are necessarily casualties."
"I believe that's war you're thinking of, my boy," Mr. Charles chuckled. "Not business."
I half-shrugged. "What's the difference?"
Mr. Charles guffawed. "Sense of humor still intact, I see. I can't tell you what a relief it is to see you doing so well, Tate. A lot of us..." His eyes flickered. "Well, we were afraid, after what happened, maybe Holland really had broken you. Just not the way he planned."
"I'm not psychotic," I said. "I just wanted some blood in return for the gallons of mine that he spilled."
"And you got it." Mr. Charles raised his glass in a sarcastic toast. "But a man like you shouldn't be lonely. I was hoping you two would take to each other." His eyes glinted in Autumn's direction. "She's so beautiful. Have you taken her virtue yet? I know how you like to toy with your prey."
"Of course," I said, roughly, with a dismissive gesture. "I tortured her with the possibility as long as I could, but once she stopped being afraid of it, there was no point in holding back."
"Hmm." The glint in his eyes was taking on a quality that made my cold blood start to boil. I took a deep breath, voluntarily letting the Viper suppress my humanity. Inside, I panicked, but the voice in my head grew fainter and fainter.
I had never done this. Not purposefully. I had never worn the mask of the Viper unless it came over me instinctively, and part of me was afraid I'd never be able to come back.
But I knew that wasn't true. I was still here. I just had to be quiet.
Later on, I'd get the blood I lusted for.
"Tell me," Mr. Charles said, slowly, his voice lowering a little. "How sweet was it?"
