Existence

by Mel Teshco

I backed away from the toxic scents that were dangerous even to inhale. “We need to get out of here.”

  But when I turned and headed for the stairs, Alexander clasped my arm. “Wait.” I stilled at his hoarse order. “The music’s stopped.” He tightened his hand. “Turn the flashlight off.”

  Chapter Seven

  I flicked off the light to complete and utter blackness. Alexander was right. Music no longer throbbed through the floorboards, but the faint cadence of voices became clearer as my hearing attuned.

  It was Rory’s voice that came through loudest. He sounded belligerent and more than a bit pissed off. “I don’t care who invited you inside. You can’t just come in here searching for my guests.”

  “Can’t I?”

  I shivered at the voice I already knew all too well. The vampire’s tone was smooth and modulated, with undertones of power. “I’m looking for a dark-haired, slender woman and a tall, well-built man.” His voice changed, almost smoky with persuasion. “You will tell me where I can find them.”

  The floorboard overhead squeaked a little as they walked closer to the hallway trapdoor. “I saw them only fifteen minutes ago.” Rory’s voice had also changed. He sounded passive, his last bit of resistance worn thin. “But I think he might have left with the female. Probably went back home to that dump where they live.”

  I held my breath, too scared to move for fear the vampire would pinpoint us.

  “Where they live?” the vampire asked in a mild voice, though the threat of violence simmered.

  When Rory blurted out where he thought we resided, the vampire drawled, “I know the place. You’re certain that’s where they’ve gone?”

  “Not really,” Rory admitted. “I was enjoying Amelia’s strip show.”

  Silence reigned for perhaps a minute, and I sensed the vampire deepening his brainwashing of Rory, and probably anyone else in the room.

  “If you see either of them again, you will bring them to me when the sun is down.”

  As the vampire told them his address, I went hot then cold, giddiness assailing me and my belly cramping hard. I bit into my lip to stop from crying out, sweat beading on my brow at the effort. If he took us back to his nest, we’d never leave again. The leech would chain us to the walls if he had to.

  The floorboards creaked again, a tread that moved toward the front door. Alexander put his arm around me, balancing me while my whole world slowly spun on its axis.

  “Sorry for troubling you.” The vampire’s voice pierced the air like an arrow, smooth and well-modulated. “Enjoy the rest of your night.”

  The door slammed shut and I sagged against Alexander as he turned me in his arms and said in my ear, “Let’s stay here until morning. We’ll sleep behind the stairs…the toxic fumes shouldn’t be anywhere near as strong there.”

  I nodded. I didn’t have any better ideas. I was too numb to do anything more than wait in the blackness as he fumbled around making up our temporary bed. I heard his soft footfall before he clasped my hand in his and he led me to the blankets.

  “This is never going to end,” I whispered bleakly as I shrugged off my backpack and lay on the blanket he’d folded to better protect us from the hard concrete.

  The music throbbed back into life in the house as Alexander lay beside me. I turned to him, needing the comfort of his arms around me. Needing the man who not only understood my fears, but had lived through more than I imagined any human should.

  A jagged pain through my belly pushed the breath from my throat in a wheeze. “The hunger pains are coming back,” I said through gritted teeth.

  He drew me to him. “Fight through them, distract yourself with other thoughts.”

  I sucked in a shaky breath that filled my lungs with dark-spiced male. I touched his face with my hands and pressed my lips to his. Awareness danced through my nerve endings. I wanted more than his arms around me. I wanted all of him. “I need you to be my distraction,” I whispered hoarsely.

  I didn’t have to see Maya to know she wanted me. Not only because she’d kissed me with quiet desperation, but because her breaths had quickly become shallow pants and the fear seeping through her pores quickly intermingled with lust.

  My dick swelled, the dread in my belly receding as physical need overpowered all else. I captured her mouth this time, and I leaned into the kiss, swallowing her moans and drinking in her breath.

  We only broke apart as I climbed over her and pulled her shirt up her arms and over her head. Then I kissed her throat, lingering on her pulse point before circling my tongue around the twin nicks from where the vampire had drunk.

  She shuddered and gasped before arching closer. I had no doubt her sensitized skin had been made even more so by the memory I’d triggered, and which I refused to skirt around. I wanted our lovemaking to override the terror of the vampire drinking from her vein. Wanted her to forget about the nightmare inside the nest.

  I wanted her to focus on nothing but us. And if lovemaking was the only way to do that, I was more than happy to oblige. More than happy to lose myself in her too.

  I kissed my way down the length of her throat, light butterfly kisses that moved to her breasts and the lacy cream bra my memory recalled with precise detail. When I’d seen her in the bedroom wearing nothing but the bra and panties I’d selected, she’d looked even sexier than I’d ever imagined.

  I’d wanted to go all Neanderthal on her and throw her on the bed, tear off her underwear and fuck her until she screamed out my name. It’d taken every ounce of my considerable willpower to turn and walk away.

  There’d be no walking away now. And although I’d imagined our first time together would have me ogling every detail of her body, it pleased me to touch every inch of her, to taste her and hear her little gasps.

  I sucked her breast through the material of her bra. She arched her back and her nipple pebbled to attention, before I gave her other breast the same treatment. My dick swelled at her mewls of ecstasy, then jerked at the touch of her hand between my thighs.

  My balls tightened, the pressure intense. Fuck. Perhaps it was the intensity of the moment, with danger still thick all around us. Or perhaps it was the attraction I’d felt for this woman from the moment she was brought into the nest. Not that I wanted to second guess myself now. What we had was powerful and real and I wasn’t going to fight it even one second longer.

  I froze when Maya moved her palm up and down the thick wedge in my jeans, triggering every cell in my shaft into pulsating life. A deep, throaty growl inched up my throat, and I slid my own hand down her silky soft skin to stop between her thighs.

  Her breath hitched even before I pushed my hand inside her lacy panties and spread her pussy open. She was already wet, her musky scent filling my nostrils and making my mouth water. Even the crisp triangle of curls down there caused my dick to throb all the harder.

  I wished I could see her pussy, even as I knew my other senses had taken over and intensified the experience. I slid a finger into her tightness and swirled my thumb around her clit. Her gasp hit the central nerve to my dick, tightening my balls and swelling my shaft until the crotch of my borrowed jeans felt as if it was choking me.

  My groan was part torture, part thrilling need, and I dragged her panties down with more haste than skill, tossing them aside and pushing her thighs apart so I could sample her delectable pussy.

  I licked her from the bottom of her slit to the top, before focusing on the little fleshy clit already swollen with anticipation. Her fragrant scent filled my nostrils, and my breath quickened, my desire kicking up to a whole new level of need.

  In the forty-six years of living in the nest, sex had been the one thing that’d kept me sane. But not one of those women had triggered anything other than lust. I’d pleasured them in the same way I’d once pleasured my wife, a skilled performance without the involvement of my heart.

  I stilled between Maya’s thighs. I’d never really loved a woman before, not even Clara. Not the way she’d wanted.
I’d thought I’d loved her, but mostly I’d stayed with her out of habit. Despite Clara’s insecurities, we’d both been comfortable in our relationship. It was a pity it’d lacked the chemistry I had with Maya.

  I inhaled her sexy scent. Being with Maya was like being awakened for the very first time. She’d taken off my blinkers and made me see the truth, made me realize the true extent of my loneliness even before I’d been taken to the nest.

  Warmth flooded through me and settled in my chest. I wanted to please Maya like I’d never pleased another woman before. I wanted to pour my heart and soul into her along with my seed.

  I licked and sucked her little bundle of nerves, then rhythmically drilled into her with my tongue. Her writhing body stilled, then jerked, her mewls morphing into a raspy groan.

  I lapped at her until my tongue was coated in her essence and she had nothing left to give. Warmth radiated through me as I crawled up her beautiful body and kissed her again so that she tasted herself on my tongue. I unclasped her bra strap and pulled it from her shoulders. I might not have been able to see her, but I wanted her bared breasts against my chest. I wanted to imprint her every crevice against my body and into my mind.

  “You have…too many…clothes on too,” she whimpered.

  She helped me strip off my shirt, and we broke into fits of giggles and half-strangled moans when my jeans snagged on my dick and refused to be dragged off my legs.

  Kicking free of the denim and boxer briefs, Maya reached up and pulled me to her mouth. Our kiss was as fierce as our bodies rubbing together, her legs wrapping around my hips even as I fisted my dick to center it at her core. I pushed my tongue deep into her mouth and plunged even deeper into her tightness.

  She hissed with pain. I froze and my voice cracked with tension and disbelief. “You’re a virgin?”

  “Not anymore.” Her voice was about as taut as her body.

  Shame swelled inside. “Shit, if I’d known I would have been more gentle—”

  She reached up and kissed away my reservations, her lips an insistent brush over mine before she pulled back and said, “No more talking. I need you to make me forget…everything.”

  I cupped her jaw, loving her smooth velvety skin, her silken hair that’d come free of its ponytail. But most of all I felt honored I was her first and only lover. “It will be my pleasure,” I said hoarsely.

  It took every ounce of my willpower to move in and out of her with slow and careful strokes. But my resistance melted away faster than icecaps in the Sahara when she grasped my hips and urged me on. Faster. Harder. Until the slap of my balls hitting her flesh and our grunts and groans echoed in the damp, dark room like a primal sonata.

  Her breath caught, and I knew she’d been caught unawares by the orgasm that caused her body to stiffen and her inner muscles to clutch at my cock. I didn’t even try to hold back. I groaned loud and long as my seed shot inside her in pulsating jets that drained me dry. I folded over her, limp as a wrung-out cloth yet buzzing with joy.

  I kissed her one more time, savoring the slow return to earth and the taste of her tongue and breath that lingered with the musky pussy essence that I’d shared earlier.

  She splayed her hands and outlined my face, and I wished I could see her stare when she said in an awed voice, “Wow.”

  I grinned smugly. The darkness allowed me that freedom at least. “I hope your first time was as good as you imagined?”

  “Better,” she breathed. “Much, much better.”

  Satisfaction careened through me and took away all my weariness, at least for a little while. “You don’t know how glad I am to hear it.”

  I could almost sense her smile even before she said. “I can only hope round two will be as pleasing.” Her sated and relaxed body suddenly stiffened beneath me. “My God, we didn’t use protection.”

  “There’s no chance of impregnating you. Not with even the minutest vampire blood in our veins.” I’d learned that much, at least, when I’d been in the nest and fucking women as if it was my right. Of course, I’d told myself I was doing my so-called playthings a favor. They were desperate for sex thanks to the vampire’s blood exchange.

  “Really?” she breathed, her relief patently obvious.

  I ignored the strange tightening in my chest and added, “We’re also immune to any mortal disease.”

  Her whole body relaxed, and I chose that moment to disconnect and lie beside her, tugging her around to face me so we could share breath and intermittent kisses.

  She sighed. “If we were to die tonight, tomorrow night, next month…or whenever in the future. At least I understand now why some women throw their whole lives away to be with the one man who makes them feel this good in bed.”

  “Well, you’re not dying anytime soon,” I said with a certainty that defied the weariness settling into my bones. “Not on my watch.”

  I nuzzled her neck, inhaling her scent of lavender and musk deep into my lungs. Would I ever get enough of this woman? We might carry the perfect blend of blood for vampires, but we shared more than just that.

  I’d never been a spiritual man, but I was drawn to Maya with a soul-deep connection that’d roused me from the very start. Like she’d poured icy cold water over my sleepy senses and braced me for the future I could have. And now my heart beat again with something other than the formality of existing.

  “Then it looks like we’ve got each other’s backs,” she said sleepily, not even trying to suppress a yawn.

  I smiled against her neck, wanting only to press myself even closer to her curves and her warmth. “It’s been a hell of a day. Get some sleep. We’ll need our wits about us in the morning.”

  “Night,” she murmured.

  “Goodnight, Maya.”

  “‘Night, Alexander…and my name’s Charley.”

  I might not have been able to see her right then, but I knew without a doubt she didn’t look like a Charley. She looked more like a Lara Croft ready to take on the world. “Night, Charley,” I said to her soft little snores.

  My smile widened. “You could call me Jake, except I’m not that man anymore.”

  Chapter Eight

  I woke with Alexander wrapped around me, keeping my back warm, while goosebumps peppered my front from the damp cold. Even worse was the oppressive darkness that revealed no hint of night or day outside.

  Yet somehow I felt safe with my lover’s arms around me. Not just any lover. Alexander made my last boyfriend—if Jeremy could even be called that—look like a young punk with fluff between his ears and the self-discipline of a gnat. Jeremy wouldn’t have lasted five minutes in the nest. Alexander had endured forty-six years of hell on Earth.

  Cold fingers of fear stilled my breath, before I inhaled jaggedly and blinked into the bleak gloom. Now we just had to stay alive and free from the vampire.

  I strained my ears for any sound upstairs. The music had probably been long silenced. Now nothing stirred and I reached for the flashlight and flicked it on, sensing Alexander wake even before I turned the light his way.

  Though I was glad to hear no movement upstairs, I worried it was too quiet. Like maybe someone or something was waiting for us the moment we left the cellar and entered the house. If the vampire didn’t get to us first, the humans would either kill us for seeing their drug lab, or take us to the vampire who’d compelled them to do so.

  Alexander sat, looking instantly alert and awake. “Good morning, Charley.”

  “Morning,” I said in return, somehow warm inside by him using my real name.

  “We should go.”

  I nodded, unwilling to ask his real name in return. “Yes.” While we still can.

  We could lie in the dark and plan our next move for hours, but it wouldn’t make any difference. We had no way of knowing what we might face, if anything, and the longer we waited, the more likely we’d be caught. With any luck the partygoers would all be sleeping off their night of debauchery.

  We dressed quickly before hauling our bac
kpacks off the ground and heading up the steps. I tied my hair into a ponytail as Alexander carefully lifted the hatch. I sucked in the stale beer and cigarette scent that was somehow fresh in comparison to the drug-laden, unventilated air we’d been breathing, before I blinked against the weak morning light while trying to see or hear anything at all.

  A raspy snore in the lounge room indicated at least one person was sleeping off their chosen poison. I followed Alexander out of the cellar before he carefully shut the hatch then held my hand as we moved with stealth through the house and toward the front door.

  Daryl lay sprawled on the sofa, his snores increasing in volume. Evidently, he’d been too drunk to make it to his own bed.

  “Going somewhere?”

  I looked at Alexander, his expression revealing nothing more than mild irritation. He turned to face Rory. “Actually, yes. We’re leaving.”

  Rory stepped closer, along with three of his dazed-looking mates. “Not without my permission you’re not.” He lifted his hands, his stare glassy but his intent all too dangerous. “We invited you into our home, showed the utmost hospitality and generosity, and now you’re both leaving without even a thank you or a goodbye?”

  Alexander arched an eyebrow and repeated drily, “Thank you and goodbye.”

  Daryl’s snores cut off. He woke and stretched. When he saw his brother and mates held us up, he immediately pushed off the couch and stepped behind us. Alexander and I half turned to keep both brothers in our sight.

  The younger brother looked more bleary-eyed than everyone else put together, yet it was obvious he wasn’t under any compulsion. He’d probably slept through the brainwashing. He was obviously hungover and apparently mystified by the tension. He put out his palms, signaling us to stay put. “What the fuck is going on?”

  Rory barely noticed his brother. “We can’t let these people go.”

  Daryl shot us a frown. “Why the fuck not?” His mouth dropped open and his body stiffened. “Holy shit. They saw our lab, didn’t they?”