Rocked by a Vampire: Billionaire, Rock Stars, Vampires (Immortal Hearts of San Francisco Book 3)

by Susan Griscom

“Oh. Should I leave?”

  Try it and I’ll tackle you to the ground, my mind threatened. There was no way she was escaping me today.

  “Nah, I was just sitting here, going over some songs for tomorrow night.”

  She smiled. “Should we get started, then?”

  “You’re eager today.” I smiled.

  She shrugged those beautiful shoulders, and I wanted to skim my fingers over them, down her arm. I blinked and brought my focus back to the ivory keys. “Okay. I want to do this one again.”

  “We’ve already perfected that one,” she said.

  “I know. And that’s why I want to do it again.”

  She rolled her eyes and shrugged her shoulders again. “Okay.”

  I clicked the record button on the computer. I’d set it up to record through the audio decks, synchronizing with the master machine so I could extract the sounds in layers later if I wanted to. Just to hear her voice and nothing else.

  She sang like she’d been born to sing this song.

  When I played the last note, I hit the stop button and turned to her. “You do know that you are amazing, right? You owned that song.”

  “Yeah. I sort of like doing this with you. Singing, I mean.” She blushed when I glanced her way and gave her a raised eyebrow. Her eyes drifted to her fingers twisting in her lap. Giving me the impression there was something hidden, something she wasn’t saying.

  “You know it perfectly. Will you please sing it with me tomorrow night?”

  “Lane. I told you I don’t want to do that. Why can’t you leave it alone?”

  “Because, honey, you are too good to keep secret. I’ll admit, I feel a bit selfish being the only one in the world to hear you sing.”

  My eyes traveled to her lips. The tip of her tongue darted out, wetting the plump pinkness. Everything about her today was pink. Her denim shorts, the skimpy tank top designed with a scatter of pink daisies, the pink silk jacket with the black collar. She even wore a pink band around her wrist. And she smelled like pink roses.

  Did she bathe in pink bubbles? My cock twitched, and my balls ached at the thought of her naked in a tub as pink foam surrounded her breasts, caressing.

  I suddenly wanted to be the bubbles, fondling her soft flesh, licking and sucking the darker pink nipples. My tongue slipped between my lips at the prospect.

  “Lane.” My name floated from her lips with a melodic rhythm, and I visualized how she might say it with my cock buried deep inside of her.

  “Lane!” I startled at the abrupt touch of her hand around my wrist as she latched on to it just before my fingers found their way to her left thigh, ready to slip down the inner side and feel the sweet, creamy nectar I imagined flowing between them.

  I glanced up at her. “I’m sorry.” I stood and walked away, turning my back to her. Positioning my stiff cock so it didn’t tent my loose-fitting shorts.

  I felt her hand on my shoulder. I turned to her and stared into her inviting eyes.

  “Why?” she asked.

  I shook my head.

  “I know you want me. Why do you always stop yourself?”

  “I…you…” I stuttered, sounding like the imbecilic fool I knew she must think me. “You’re the one who stopped me.”

  “I did. This time. But only because I didn’t want another rejection after you’d succeeded in making me hot for you again. I couldn’t handle it if you abruptly stopped.”

  “You make me crazy,” I admitted.

  “I make you crazy? You’ve humiliated me. You shoved me away after arousing every nerve ending in my body. You accused me of witchcraft, and then told me you couldn’t be with me. Then you spent time with me, showing me how to sing. Acting as if you actually enjoy my company. You’re confusing as hell. ”

  “I do enjoy you.” I enjoyed everything about her. I didn’t know if I could make love to her without the visions. And I couldn’t handle the visions. They berated me, trounced on my soul.

  “Then what is the problem?”

  Dare I tell her?

  “I see things,” I blurted. I knew it sounded stupid as hell.

  “You see things?” Her eyes narrowed. The beautiful green becoming dark. “What sorts of things?”

  Could I tell her? Would she think me a coward? A weakling unable to defend himself against the monsters that took up residence in my head for so many years? The same monsters I’d never been able to deny in the reality of my sordid past? She stood, waiting for me to speak. I averted my eyes from hers and turned my face to the other side of the room, then began with the most recent. The one I thought maybe she would understand.

  “I see Jewels’ monstrous face and her lips compelling me to stroke myself and to fuck her.”

  She gasped, as I thought she would. But then she did something so unexpected it choked me. Saliva accumulated on my tongue, and my throat filled with a sob I didn’t want to let out. Because then…then she would surely think me weak. She placed her hand on my arm and stepped closer to me. “Jewels can’t hurt you anymore.”

  Now, there she was wrong. The other monsters I knew were long dead, and yet still they tormented me. But Jewels? She was very much alive.

  “She’s shackled in a steel box and resting inside a volcano. She cannot get to you.”

  Having Jewels control me that way, compelling me to stroke myself, was the second most horribly degrading experience I’d ever felt. I wasn’t a virgin, it would be stupid to think such a thing, considering how fucking old I was. Fuck, Cian and I’d had more women than I could even remember, but I wasn’t going into any of that with Vanessa. But why did that time with Jewels affect me the way it had? “To be controlled by her,” I continued, “the things I knew she could make me do... I’m no angel, believe me. I’ve had no problem compelling women, or men for that matter.” Her eyes flickered for a moment with confusion. “Though I’ve never made them do anything horrible to themselves or anyone else, and never compelled them against their will. You know for a fact that we can’t compel someone unless they are willing, and that is why we can’t compel witches; mainly because you sense what we are and know how to overpower it. What Jewels did to Cian and me was completely against our will. I didn’t want to stand there and jerk off the way she ordered me to.” Vanessa’s eyes widened as I realized she didn’t know the circumstances of what had happened that day, but I continued. “I didn’t want to pump my cock into her. We tried to resist her, and we fought it, but she overpowered us.”

  Vanessa shook her head. “I didn’t know. No one told me that happened.”

  “For good reason. Do you think I wanted you to know?” She didn’t answer.

  “I didn’t. Why I’m telling you now is beyond my comprehension. It doesn’t really matter that Jewels can’t get out because she’s in here”—I pointed to my head—“already.”

  I ran my hands through my hair, pulling it straight back away from my face, locking eyes with her again.

  “Lane.” Her voice was nothing more than a soft whisper. I loved the way she said my name, and it almost brought me away from my disgusting memories.

  “But regardless of Jewels, there are other demons in my head. Sinister thoughts I thought I’d gotten rid of long ago until Jewels found us last autumn and brought them back to the surface. Things I don’t think I can talk about.”

  “Lane, you must know that I want you. You must feel me melt in your arms every time they surround me. Touch me. I’ve never been able to allow someone to touch me that way.”

  My eyes shot to hers. Able to allow? “What do you mean?”

  “I’ve never wanted anyone to touch me that way. The way I want you to now.” She stepped toward me. “I wasn’t completely honest with you last week.”

  “About which part?”

  “The bullying part. It was more than just bullying.”

  Chapter Twenty

  Vanessa

  I’d never talked about what had happened that night. Not even to Mags. I’d only told her about the aud
ition prank. I never even told my mother. No one. But for some unknown reason, I wanted to tell Lane. His confession to me about Jewels had taken courage. I wanted him to tell me the rest of why he’d stopped making love to me. There was most definitely something wrong with Lane. Something deeply rooted and drilled into him. We both needed to make some confessions, and maybe because we were both damaged, it was better to make them to each other.

  “Lane, I told you about Kyle and Lizzy and their stupid prank, but I never told you about what happened a couple of weeks later.

  “A few days after the audition, everything at school seemed to return to normal. No one laughed at me anymore—which they’d continued to do for a few days after the audition. No one bothered me. I was back to being the wallflower I’d been. I wasn’t popular. In fact, I was hardly ever noticed. Other girls never asked me to join them at their lunch tables. I went about my own business, and people left me alone until Kyle approached me in the lunchroom one day and apologized for laughing at me and going along with the joke, claiming that it was all Lizzy’s idea because she’d been jealous. Just as you said.”

  We were back to sitting down at the chairs like before, and Lane had poured us both a glass of scotch. I took it and gulped it down.

  “Kyle told me that he’d broken up with Lizzy because of what she’d done to me. I had no reason to not believe him, and he’d been very charming with his apology. I accepted it and then he asked me to be his date at one of the year-end school parties one of the other popular jocks was hosting. At first, I said no. But then he pressed and pleaded, assuring me that Lizzy wouldn’t be there and that he wanted to make it all up to me. He told me I was pretty and that he liked me. I gave in and agreed to be his date. For that entire week, I was excited about going. I even wore the new dress I’d purchased for when my mom and I had planned to go out to dinner to celebrate another year of school. We did that at the end of every school year.

  “Kyle hadn’t lied about Lizzy not being at the party. In fact, there were no girls there when we arrived. Only three guys. Kyle assured me that we were early and that more people would be coming, so I didn’t think too much about it until the lights went dim and one of the boys backed me up against the wall and started to kiss me. I shoved him away, but he continued to hold me. He licked my chin, and when I gasped, he stuck his tongue inside my mouth, his slobber making my face all wet. His hands roamed over my body, and I fought to get away from him. I searched around the dark room for Kyle, thinking he’d come to my rescue any moment. But then I saw him standing with the other guys, laughing, goading the one violating me on with cheers. Then Kyle came over and pulled the guy off me. I cried and flung my arms around him, so glad that he’d finally come to save me, only he turned me around and tugged my arms behind me. He held me while one of the others slapped me hard across the face. Tears sprang to my eyes and I begged them to stop. They laughed and ripped my clothes—tore the top of my new dress. Touched my breasts, then slapped me again.

  “They forced kisses on me and then one of them stuck my arm with a needle, injecting me with something. But before he could get the entire contents of the needle into me, he abruptly stopped and pulled it out as someone standing by the front door shouted, “What the hell are you guys doing?”

  “They all backed off. Said they were doing nothing to me. The new guy, I think he was someone’s older brother, told them all to get out. I jumped up to run when he caught my arm. He asked me if I was okay, but I didn’t stop to answer. I just ran. I ran all the way home, which was about three miles. I felt the effects of whatever was in the needle start to take hold right before I reached my house. My mom and dad had gone out for the evening so I was able to sneak in and hide the dress and get myself to bed. I don’t know what the drug was, but I do remember having some very bazaar dreams, and I woke up very dazed and foggy.”

  I glanced at Lane’s hands fisted so tightly his knuckles had turned a lighter shade of white than his already pale skin.

  “If the older brother hadn’t come home, they would have raped me. All of them.”

  Lane jumped out of his chair, almost spilling his drink, but that didn’t matter because the glass went flying out of his grasp and across the room before any of the liquid had a chance to leave it. The glass shattered against the wall; whiskey splattered then dripped down over the baseboards to the floor. He stood in front of me. Anger raged behind his eyes, and I wished I hadn’t told him. I wished I’d kept it all to myself like I’d always planned.

  Was he angry at me? For being weak and unable to defend myself against four men?

  “I fought,” I whispered. “They held me down. Your anger isn’t helping. It’s in the past. There is nothing anyone can do about it. I shouldn’t have told you. The last thing I wanted was for you to blame me.”

  “Blame you? Why the fuck would I blame you?”

  I shook my head. “I don’t know.” I didn’t know. I’d never told anyone. I thought maybe I was to blame for even getting myself in that situation. Or that I’d led them on in some way I hadn’t realized, and then made them angry enough to strike me. That it was all my fault for being there and believing Kyle. “After I’d gone through the ceremony and received the gifts passed down to me, I became a stronger-minded person. I didn’t have any problem dealing with what had happened unless some kind of trigger set off the memories. The thought of singing on stage with you does exactly that because it all started with me trying out for the school play and singing the wrong song. I know I’ll freeze up there, and everyone will laugh.” I’m just not confident enough.

  Then Lane surprised me by kneeling down in front of me and skimming the back of his knuckles down the side of my cheek. “I’m so sorry,” he said. “I’m so very sorry. I will kill those assholes if I ever meet them.” I knew how much he hated killing humans, but I believed him. It was a good thing he didn’t know them. I would never tell him. Except I wondered how well Lane’s memory was, since I’d given him Kyle’s last name when I’d told him about the prank.

  “Please. I didn’t tell you to get revenge. You have to promise me you won’t seek him or the others out.”

  He stood and turned away from me. Looked at the floor, shook his head. “I promise. I won’t kill them. But I won’t promise not to put the fear of death in them.”

  “After that night, I withdrew. It had always been difficult to talk to people, but that episode made it worse. After the ritual that granted me my powers, I gained all the confidence I needed to move on with my life. But being with a man, allowing him to touch me, has been difficult still.”

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Lane

  “Until you,” Vanessa whispered, and my eyes shot to hers. “Except, now you probably don’t want me.”

  “I do want you! I want you so fucking bad. I’ve always wanted you. You’re all I think about!” I shouted. “Don’t you think for a minute that I believe you are the one at fault.”

  “Then take me. Take me here, right now. Help me wipe out the past and show me how a man can make a woman feel...something besides disgust. Because when you kiss me and touch me, I don’t think about those four creeps that tortured me and tried to take me against my will. I only think of you. Can’t you see that?”

  “I do.” He paused and rubbed the heel of his hand against his forehead. “But I can’t.”

  “When you say you can’t, are you saying that you’re impotent?”

  “Goddammit, woman! You’ve felt the hardness of my cock rubbing against you. I have no problem in that area. I just can’t deal with the fucking visions that come into my head every time I get a hard-on.”

  “I’ve just bared my soul to you, Lane. Tell me about the other demons in your head.” She was on her feet now. She tilted my chin up with her finger. “Please, tell me.”

  I walked away from her, grabbed another tumbler from the credenza, poured a generous three fingers of whiskey, and drank it down. I turned to her. Her beauty urging me on.

  “
I’m not a saint. Not by far. Quite the opposite. Tenfold. Cian and I’ve had our share of women. Even shared many. I’m not telling you this to make you jealous or anything like that.” She shook her head, understanding. “In fact, that’s how we met Jewels that night she turned us into vampires on the boat. She wanted to party, and we were willing. I’d always used sex to overcome the damage that had been done to me. Or maybe I’d become more promiscuous to prove I was a man. But after that night here at the mansion in the room with Cian, Jewels—”

  I wiped my mouth with the back of my hand. “She stole something from me that night. She took away every wall I’d built up to protect myself, leaving me naked and afraid. Definitely not manly.”

  I watched Vanessa. Her eyes remained on mine. She swallowed, and I watched as the saliva slid down her throat. The throat that beckoned me to kiss it and lick it on a daily basis.

  “When I was a child,” I began, but paused and changed gears a bit. “The horror of this story is no worse than yours, but different. Cian and I were always together. We did everything together…except when our father took me to the old, grey barn. Our father was a wealthy man, a man of prestige, respected and admired by many people around the village. Most were afraid of him, especially me. Large properties were common back then, and the estates would span over many acres, too many to know what was happening down at the old, grey barn.”

  I kept my focus on the flowers in the carpet, wishing I had a window to look out instead, but it was still daylight, and the blasted blinds were still down and locked.

  “I was nine years old the first time. Cian was the first son, the one my father loved and doted on. I was the second son, the one he hated and tormented whenever things didn’t go the way he wanted. In my father’s eyes, being the second son in a family was like being a noxious pile of feces left by a mongrel dog on the side of the road. To him, second sons had no value in the world. They didn’t inherit anything, so they didn’t deserve any respect. That was something he’d ingrained into my mind since the day I was born, six and a half fucking minutes after Cian. Don’t get me wrong. I love my brother and never would have wanted him to endure any of the shit I had to.