The Darker Side of Love (A Dark Erotica Boxed Set)

by Tara Crescent

  “You’ve got work to do.” His voice held some disbelief.

  “Yes.” She wasn’t backing down.

  “Fine.”

  Those were the last words they spoke until their fast and awkward goodbye as they exited the plane. Once off the jetway, Ben quickly outpaced her until he was out of her sight. She’d seen him briefly as she walked to catch a cab, entering the passenger door of a sporty car.

  Ben was beyond tired. When Sarah had picked him up, she’d asked point blank where things stood between them. He’d tried to sway her from having the conversation in the car, and that they’d be at his house in twenty minutes, but she wouldn’t relent. He told her that it was over, ready to reiterate some of the struggles they’d already discussed, but Sarah had cut him off, unwilling to discuss it any more.

  He was momentarily confused when she got off at her exit, until she said that he needed to get his stuff out of her house. Ben inwardly laughed at that because she’d always complained he didn’t keep enough of his things there to begin with. When they left her place, he’d retrieved two pairs of boxer shorts, a book, and a toothbrush. At his place it was a different story. She emptied out a dresser drawer, a few items from his closet, and two drawers from the bathroom. From the kitchen she took back her cast iron skillet and French press coffee maker. He helped her load two large boxes into the trunk of her car.

  “Sarah. I know in time you’re going to know this was for the best.”

  She just looked back at him coldly.

  “And I hope in time you’ll realize how good I was to you… how much I put up with for you.”

  Ben had no response to that. He already knew it was true.

  In bed that night, Frick and Frack curled into him, Ben had never felt so alone in his life. He’d enjoyed sleeping next to Margaret’s warm, strong body - but she’d made it clear that she wanted no part of him after their time together.

  What the fuck?

  Had he misread what was going on between them? Had that really just been a fling?

  Ben felt like an ass for thinking he could have it all, which over the weekend Margaret had become for him. She was funny, intelligent, thoughtful, sexy, and dirty as hell - but maybe after Jonathan she just didn’t do relationships anymore - at least not with him.

  He looks thin.

  It had been three months since the conference in Boston, and Ben looked to have lost at least fifteen pounds. Other than their monthly meetings, they rarely saw each other anymore. His input during the meetings was sparse, and he generally would exit the room without a word to anybody. If their eyes did meet, he’d give her a nod before moving on, seemingly disinterested in any conversation with her.

  Margaret knew she’d been the one to create the dynamic between them, and regretted it more than she could admit. He’d called her a few times their first few weeks home. If she did answer, she would quickly find reasons not to talk. When he’d confronted her in her office, she told him to back off - that she preferred to keep professional relationships professional. He’d looked at her incredulously, shook his head and walked out the door. After that - not a word.

  She spent the next few weeks trying to simplify - everything. Backing off from buying a house, Margaret elected to renew her lease on her apartment. Instead of the dog she’d hoped to get, she purchased an aquarium. Lastly, she decided to shelve her kinks - for good.

  What had they brought her?

  You know what they brought you - terror in New York - a twisted relationship in Austin - and an incredible man in Portland who can’t stand the sight of you.

  Margaret decided to leave her thrill seeking out of the bedroom and had doubled up on her outdoor fun. On the advice of another doctor, she decided to try online dating. Just dating - for now she was happy to satisfy herself with her toys.

  The dates were nice, and she even went on a few second and third ones - but as soon as they’d want to kiss her - Margaret would feel herself backing off. She was meeting up with one guy that she did like though, after work. She’d met Brian at the bouldering gym, rather than online, and she’d found him attractive and funny. After a few daytime dates that had ended in hugs or quick pecks, she’d actually found herself desiring more from him. Ready to replace her plastic cock with a real one, Margaret resolved to push things further with him.

  He won’t touch you like Ben - he won’t know what you need.

  Margaret couldn’t wait to get out of the meeting, as if in doing so all thoughts of Ben would cease. She knew better than that - their time in Boston played through her head almost every night that she lay alone in bed. Perhaps inviting Brian in will change that.

  The meeting had finally ended, and Margaret expected Ben to bid his hasty exit as always. Instead though, he’d swiveled around in his chair and suddenly locked eyes with her. There was no look away this time - no nod - he wouldn’t let go. His expression was unreadable, but his eyes had fire in them.

  Margaret suddenly felt transparent, as if he’d been listening to her thoughts the entire meeting. Suddenly self-conscious, it was her turn to break the gaze. Flustered, she exited the room as quickly as she could, but swore she felt his eyes burning into her.

  Ben watched as Margaret left the room. He’d hoped to talk to her - to apologize for months of not only unprofessional behavior, but just plain immaturity. When she’d told him to leave her alone - that she just wanted to have a ‘professional’ relationship with him, Ben had been pissed. Within a few days of being home from Boston, he’d felt with absolute clarity that they belonged together, and just knew if she would talk to him, she’d see it too.

  But she wouldn’t talk to you, and when she finally did, she’d said no.

  After that, Ben became an ass. He had nothing to say to her, and so he didn’t.

  He immersed himself in long-distance biking, riding most evenings and weekends while he trained for Cycle Oregon. Dating didn’t interest him - in fact, not much did for a while. But as the weeks turned into months, Ben realized he needed to move on, and the best place to start was at the source. But when he’d turn to say something, their eyes had caught and he was suddenly speechless. She looked - sad - and then she’d left.

  Ben resolved to go to her office in the morning and talk to her, but until then, he had two more surgeries on the schedule and an evening ride planned.

  As he rode up to his house around nine in the evening, a car he didn’t know was parked in his driveway - the passenger motionless. Dismounting his bicycle, Ben walked over to the driver side window and was more than surprised to see Margaret sitting there. She looked relieved to see him though.

  “I’m glad you’re home. I hope this is okay.”

  “Of course… I was hoping to talk to you.”

  Ben was pleased she was there. Very pleased.

  They went through his side door where he hung up his bike, then entered the kitchen to his two famished acting cats.

  “Don’t let them fool you. They got fed just before I left for my ride.”

  “They’re adorable.”

  “Frick and Frack - the worst guard cats ever.”

  The small talk was nice, but Ben really wanted to talk to her, just not in his bike clothes.

  “Help yourself to anything - beer in the fridge, wine and booze in the living room. I’m just going to change out of these sweaty clothes.”

  Shit. I really stink. A quick shower is needed here.

  Ben did just that. Dressing in baggy shorts and a tee-shirt he found her on the living room couch drinking a glass of red wine. He poured himself one too and sat in the chair across from her.

  “Margaret, I owe you a huge apology. I’ve been a total ass to you these past months. When you didn’t want to date me you kinda’ blew my ego out of the water - and you know us surgeons and our egos.”

  She started to open her mouth to say something, but he interrupted her.

  “Let me finish, please. Regardless of my battered ego, I should never have been as rude as have, a
nd for that I…”

  “Ben… BEN!” She interrupted him this time.

  “You’re not the one who should be apologizing. It’s me who should apologize to you. I fucked up. I know that now. I freaked out the last day in Boston, and then convinced myself it was too risky to be involved with you.”

  “I would never hurt you…” He paused after he heard what she was saying, then added, “I have hurt you.”

  He looked suddenly worried.

  “Was it something that happened between us in Boston? Did I push you too far?”

  Margaret looked incredulous.

  “What? No!”

  “Then why are you here, Margaret?”

  She was silent for a moment, then spoke.

  “I had a date tonight - a fourth date.”

  Ben couldn’t help but recoil. Why was she telling him this?

  “He came home with me. I thought I wanted him.”

  Ben couldn’t stand hearing any of this, but was curious as hell where she was going with it.

  “I… I didn’t feel a thing. We were kissing on the couch. He was touching me and I couldn’t feel him. Not on my skin - not in my heart.”

  She looked at him, her expression imploring.

  “Not like with you, Ben.”

  He couldn’t stand it anymore. She was too far away and had been since the moment he’d seen her across the surgery table from him almost one year ago. He stood and went over to the couch and pulled her up. Setting her wine on the table, Ben folded her into his arms.

  “I can’t just date you, Margaret - not at this point. I won’t have just pieces of you.”

  Margaret’s eyes shone as she smiled up at him.

  “I’m all yours, Ben. I think I always have been.”

  Ben wondered if he was going soft - all he wanted in that moment was to take her to his bedroom and make love to her.

  But for tomorrow… he had other ideas.

  About Justine Hollander

  Justine was a die-hard east-coaster, until the Pacific Northwest called to her and she never looked back. Erotic literature, from the classics to the lesser known, have interested and excited her over the years, eventually inspiring her to put pen to paper. She hopes her stories both entice and encourage future authors to do the same.

  You can contact Justine at jhollander@justinehollandererotica.com, or visit her burgeoning website and Facebook pages at www.JustineHollanderErotica.com or www.facebook.com/justinehollandererotica

  Wide Open

  by

  Alice Schermer

  Text copyright © 2015 Alice Schermer

  All Rights Reserved

  The first time they met, she was nineteen and he was covered in someone else’s blood.

  It was the first night of what would become the coldest winter the country had seen in years. Usually, Rose wouldn’t be out in the weather. Her guardian, Mrs. Cross, had things to say about girls who ventured past the door after dark, “Not while you work for me, you don’t!” being one of them. However, Mrs. Cross had worse things to say about untidiness, and had determined that somebody needed to do something about the dirty windows before the sun went down.

  Rose had drawn straws with young Millie and lost, which was why she found herself atop a ladder, with a filthy rag in hand and her teeth chattering like a jammed engine trying to start. The last stubborn rays of light had gone while she worked. Night had spread over the streets like a sudden rainfall, and if it weren’t for the few gas lamps spread around the block, she would have had to work in complete darkness.

  She attacked the layer of coal-dust with feverish speed, hoping to stop the cold from settling in her bones. Mrs. Cross had come outside minutes ago to tell her she wasn’t allowed back in until every last window was clean, and she had very nearly cried once she realized that she would never finish in time for dinner.

  Of all the times for that to happen, too! Millie had bought two whole pigeons from a pair of slum-dwellers that morning — a rare treat for a household that had almost forgotten what meat tasted like — and made stew with them. Rose knew it would all be gone before she sat down at the table. Mrs. Cross never took pity on late arrivals, and Millie was mercenary about hoarding leftovers. She’d have to content herself with bread, and some broth if she were lucky.

  Rose had just started on the kitchen windows, and as the blackness that covered them was swallowed by the rag, the pot on the stove came into view. Delicate tendrils of steam curled up from under the lid, spreading like an opening fist and fogging the glass. Looking at it was pure torture.

  She licked her lips. Would she get away with it if she went inside and told Mrs. Cross that she was done? It was beginning to drizzle, so it felt unlikely that the woman would come out and check. She could simply get up early the next day and finish the job before the others woke.

  But no. As tempting a plan as it seemed, the risk wasn’t worth the reward. Rose was painfully aware of how irreplaceable she wasn’t. If she were caught lying, she’d be thrown out before she had the time to apologize, and Mrs. Cross would simply go down to the orphanage to get another girl. Besides, living at the bakery wasn’t as bad as all that. She had her own bed, she didn’t have to go hungry too often, and Millie was good company even if all that she wanted to talk about was men. It wasn’t a life worth throwing away over some slices of dead bird.

  Sighing, Rose clambered down the ladder, placed it under her arm and walked towards the thin alleyway that separated the bakery from the next house. The windows at the back were the last she had to do, and if she finished them quickly she would still miss dinner, but at least she wouldn’t freeze to death.

  The first thing to tell her that something was wrong was the sound. She began to hear it as she entered the alley, and if she were the sort of person who listened to her instincts more, she would have stopped and turned around then. However, her curiosity had always been her fatal flaw — or at least that was what Mrs. Cross snapped at her every time she asked a question. She kept walking, and tried to decide what she was hearing sounded like. She settled on ‘like the noise of flesh being stabbed’, and gave herself a pat on the back for being so poetic.

  Then the end of the alley came into view, and Rose realized that the reason why it sounded like the noise of flesh being stabbed was because it was the noise of flesh being stabbed.

  She halted. Her arms went stiff at the sides of her body, letting the ladder fall down with a clatter. Her mind both tried to comprehend what she was seeing and refused to acknowledge it.

  She had heard about the murders. Everyone had heard about the murders. They were all that people talked about nowadays. Mrs. Cross had made a valiant attempt to keep her wards ignorant, and had forbidden that the subject be discussed under her roof. However, Millie, who was much more of a gossip than Rose was, had weaseled out bits and pieces of the story from people who came in, and delighted in sharing them.

  The current body count was twenty four, and it was the same man doing them all in. The killer had made it obvious not because of the sort of victims he picked, but because of his methods. All of the dead had had their faces cut off, rendering them disfigured beyond recognition, and all of them had been found lacking eyes.

  Rose had heard the grizzly descriptions, but had never been able to picture them in full. Now she stared, as if bewitched, at the face splattered on the cobbles. Blood pooled around it, and the mangled lips were slightly parted, while the empty pouch that should contain a nose had sagged down like a sad, empty balloon. It had been a man. Been being the operative word.

  She didn’t scream or attempt to flee. She couldn’t seem to find her voice or feet.

  The killer at the other end of the alley kneeled and bent over what she presumed to be the rest of his victim. Her sharp intake of breath and the noise of the ladder hitting the ground had alerted him to her presence and caused him to look up, but he seemed otherwise unbothered.

  He also made no move to escape. He’d only need to take two steps
to his right to disappear behind the bakery and enter the maze of streets that crisscrossed from there onwards. However, he seemed intent on finishing his work first. The gloomy light from the gas lamp around the corner didn’t stretch so far that Rose could make out the details of what he was doing, but the wet, squelching sounds were telling enough.

  After a while, the killer picked up the flask at his side. A moment and a pulling motion later, he held it up so that it would catch the light, nodded with satisfaction at the unseeing globes inside, and pocketed it. Rose felt like vomiting. Unfortunately, she still didn’t seem to feel like doing anything remotely practical.

  When the killer finally deigned to take a step, it was forward, towards her.

  Again she tried to convince her legs to move, to scream at herself and make those screams go past her lips, but neither worked. It started to dawn on her that such an occurrence couldn’t be natural. She had heard about being paralyzed by fear, but this was too ridiculous by anyone’s standards. There had to be some other force at work, some magic, some devilry.

  Which meant that the thing standing in front of her couldn’t be of this world.

  “Good evening,” the demon said. He had a pleasant, cultured way of speaking that was entirely at odds with the fact that he was, well, a demon. Although even Rose had to admit that he didn’t look much like the demons that she was used to seeing. The devil statues at her church had horns, and tails and so on, and pointed ears and impossible mustaches. This one looked just like a man. She doubted she would have glanced at him twice if they had met anywhere else. “I’m terribly sorry for this. I wasn’t counting on being interrupted, what with the weather and it being this late.”

  Rose found herself nodding. Her mind had filled with a pink fog that made even the most outlandish statement sound eminently reasonable.

  “When I take a life, I usually make a point of explaining why I do what I do.” The demon closed in on her at a relaxed, unhurried pace. If she hadn’t been so frightfully aware that whatever was happening lay far beyond her control, Rose would have felt angry with herself for not running. “It seems only fair. So although I’m sure you can’t help but wonder, in your heart of hearts, about what’s happening here and who I am . . . it’s truly best if you never know.”