“Have you got your map?” Jane pulled the folded piece of paper out of her pocket, squinted at it under the light of her headlamp.
“Yeah.”
“Okay, so this hallway is all bedrooms, but the door at the end leads to a bathroom, and then a staircase. Do you see it?”
Scott grunted in agreement.
“I’ll keep going and take those stairs down. You go back and meet me on the second floor. There’s a kitchen right there.”
“This is such a waste of time. I’m going to walk right through Rocky’s shot, and we’re going to have to film this whole thing again.”
“Scott-”
“Yes, fine, I’ll see you at the kitchen.”
Jane heard his footsteps and a soft string of cursing followed Scott into the distance.
She turned back to look down the dark hallway. There was nothing to be afraid of, nothing. People had lived here, and people had suffered here, but that was sad and infuriating, not scary.
“Basilica,” Jane whispered, “Compluvium.”
When she lifted her head, the light illuminated the door at the end of the hall. There would be a bathroom on the other side, and then stairs leading down to where Scott would be waiting for her. She just had to put one foot in front of the other, and this would be over. It was a poorly built building on a bad foundation, but it was no more dangerous than any of the other buildings she had explored on this ridiculous show.
“Modillion.” Jane took a step, and then another. It was nothing, it was easy.
“Jane.”
She didn’t ask who said her name, because nothing did, she was alone and nothing was there to speak to her.
“Jane.”
She heard nothing, because there was nothing to hear. She didn’t look toward the rooms at her sides, where unfortunate people had spent the better part of their lives. She focused on the door at the end of the hall, the bathroom, the staircase, the end of the episode, the hotel room, the sunrise. She could see it all so clearly, as if it were happening right now. She just had to keep walking.
There was a soft creak behind her, and Jane froze. Silence.
Then another creak, as something took a step.
But that was not true, she was alone, and there was no blood on her hands. Jane kept walking, and if it sounded like footsteps were following her, it was the building, a trick of the mind, architecture, balconet, spandrel. She kept walking, because she was not afraid, and soon the door was in her grasp and the knob turned and she was in-
Another long hallway of bedrooms.
“That’s not right,” Jane said aloud, speaking without realizing it. She pulled out her map. There should be a bathroom where she was standing, and then a staircase. “No, that’s-”
There was another creak behind her, something in the shadows patiently waiting for her next move. She would not turn around to see it.
There would be a bathroom and staircase at the end of this hallway, Jane told herself, and started walking. She did not quicken her step, and she did not look away from the door at the end of the hallway. The hotel room, the sunrise, Elijah Leer. His pale eyes. His collar bones. Sweat at the small of his back. Curls at the nape of his neck.
“Jane.”
The door was unlocked, and Jane opened it to reveal another hallway of bedrooms. She was off the map, or the map was wrong, or she had gotten lost somehow. Or she had always been lost. Something was tapping against the wall to her left, the slow sharp tap of long fingernails against wood or a room key against a door frame. Her headlamp lit a narrow path down the center of the hallway, but on either side the shadows closed in like jagged teeth. Brass gleamed at the other end, a doorknob catching the light. Another door, then. Maybe- maybe a bathroom. Maybe a staircase.
Jane took a step toward salvation, and her headlamp went out.
She ran then, not hearing the thump of steps behind her, not listening to the hoarse whisper of her name, again and again until it turned into her pulse. She hit a hard surface that left splinters in her palms, and then there was a doorknob in her hand and she was through the door and falling, falling, knee banged, elbow smashed, and she screamed then, she had to scream, it was as necessary as breathing.
She hit the ground and didn’t move. Stairs, she thought weakly, she had found the stairs. She could feel her jeans growing sticky and hot on her left thigh, a prickling pain that was about to get a lot worse. She pushed herself into a sitting position, eyes searching for any source of light, anything other than the swimming, endless black.
“Jane, Jane-”
There was light then, a painful brilliance, and for a moment Jane could see nothing but lightning. Then her eyes adjusted. And she could see nothing but the blood all over her hands.
****
When Jane was fourteen, her sixteen year old brother Brian stabbed himself in the chest. Three times, with a kitchen knife. He had gotten quiet and anti-social lately, but their parents assumed it was normal teenage stuff. Jane had come home from school to find Brian standing in the kitchen, talking to himself, blood blossoming like roses across his white t-shirt. She had screamed and Brian had started screaming too, crying, “I’m so sorry, I had to, I’m sorry-”
She couldn’t remember ever calling 9-1-1, but she must have because at some point she was on her phone, a voice in her ear telling her to check his throat for obstruction, to try to stop the bleeding. She had held her crumpled up jacket to her brother’s chest, weeping, while he told her that he was a bomb that would destroy the world if he wasn’t stopped. When the ambulance got there, Jane’s hands were slick with blood, and her face too, where she had wiped away the tears.
Brian had not punctured his heart, though he was committed for two months to the acute psychiatry unit of St. Paul’s. He was eventually released, and diagnosed, and had a pretty uneventful life from there on in- went to school, started teaching, got engaged. He used to speak to kids with mental illnesses about it, but now he mostly kept it under wraps, afraid of what the parents of his students might think if they found out he was bi-polar. The point was, he got better. He managed, anyway, and he was a good brother, and Jane loved him. And when she looked at him, sometimes she felt the inside of his throat, gagging around her fingers. And when she looked at him, sometimes she saw blood in the creases of her hands, painting stripes across her cheekbones.
****
“Jane, it’s okay-”
“There’s blood, there’s blood on me-”
“It’s okay, you just scraped your leg. It’s okay. Jane, look at me.”
Jane kept wiping her hands on her jeans, but it was still there, it was still there. Something was digging into her shoulder, and it took a moment for her to realize it was Elijah’s hand.
He was there. Kneeling on the ground, right in front of her.
“How did you get here?” she whispered. In the glow of the flashlight, his pale eyes were so clear. She realized that, besides one impulsive hug, they had never been this close before - knees pressed together, noses almost touching.
“I heard your voice.” He didn’t move away. Her gaze darted from his eyes to his mouth, and that was enough to break the spell; Elijah took a sharp breath and stood. He offered her a hand up and she took it, wincing at the soreness in her left leg.
“You’re lucky you didn’t break your neck on those stairs. Where the hell is Scott? Did he leave you?” Elijah looked furious, before Jane shook her head.
“We were separated. A door locked behind me. We were going to meet on the second floor, but my map is wrong.” She peered into the darkness behind Elijah, vaguely making out a short hallway flanked by closed doors. “Where’s Lisa?”
“We had serious camera trouble. Two faulty batteries in a row, I don’t know what the problem was. She went back to the van, and I was supposed to wait for her, but then I heard you and-” He shrugged, glancing away. “I wanted to make sure you were okay.”
Jane resisted the urge to put her arms around him like she di
d once, hundreds of years ago.
“Can you walk?”
Jane took a step and nodded. Her skin pulled hot and tight across whatever she had done to her leg, but it would take more than that to keep her in Greenhaven.
“Okay. Lean on me if you need to.” He gave her shoulder a squeeze, and she felt his warmth linger over her skin long after he dropped his hand. “I don’t really know which of these doors I came through. I just- kind of- ran. Anyway. Your headlamp not working?”
Jane had forgotten about it. While Elijah tried a few doors, Jane took the lamp off, tried to figure out what was wrong. It seemed fine, though it was difficult to tell without any real light source. She wrapped the straps around her wrist, carrying it with her.
“All these doors are locked,” Elijah murmured to himself. “Which can’t be right because I came through one.”
Jane must have banged her head when she fell, because that swimming sensation was back, a slight tilting of the ground with each step she took toward him.
“I think it was this one. I swear it was this one, but-”
Jane stood behind him while he twisted the doorknob, the scent of him dark yet sweet, like ashes and lilacs.
“Can you hold my flashlight?” He passed it back to her, and she pointed the dull beam at the door while he kept trying. “This is-”
The door opened.
“At last,” Elijah said, stepping through. Jane followed, only to immediately regret it. The flashlight revealed a large linen closet, walls lined with shelves of sheets and towels. There was barely enough room for the two of them, and Elijah cursed, turning around and running into her. She had been following too close, and he stumbled as their bodies met, knocking her up against the door.
The first thing she noticed was that the door had closed somehow behind her. The second was that Elijah was pressed against her, and she could smell his breath, and against her hip she could- she could feel-
“I’m sorry,” Elijah pulled away.
Jane could not speak. There was a buzzing in her ears, growing louder, like electricity. She took a step forward. She could see Elijah’s collarbone where his shirt hung open. He had been hard for her. She had made him hard.
She dropped the flashlight, and it rolled into the corner, casting only a dim glow through the room. She had hit her head, she must have, because that was the only explanation for the heat rolling through her, the emptiness she suddenly felt in her hands and between her legs. She reached out, hand hovering in the air, before finding Elijah’s stomach and resting there.
“Jane, what are you-”
His stomach was hard beneath his button-up shirt, and she could feel the muscles tensing as his breathing quickened. She slid her hand lower, watching as if transfixed. That hand could not belong to her. The button on his jeans felt almost scalding to the touch, burning her fingertips.
“Jane.”
“Elijah Leer,” she whispered, and it was easy to undo the button, so much easier than she thought it would be. It was easy to slide the zipper down, easy to part the folds of cotton and find him, hard and heavy in her hand.
“Oh God.” Elijah was biting his lips. “Don’t do that, don’t-”
His cock was softer than she had imagined, and wetter. The head was slick, and she ran her thumb through it, bringing it to her mouth to taste. He gasped at this, hips jerking even as he pulled himself away from her.
“Jane.” He blocked her hands as she tried to reach for him again. “We can’t. We have to find-”
She dropped to her knees then, and she didn’t feel the pain in her leg, she felt nothing but her mouth opening, tongue licking across her lips.
“Let me,” she begged, feeling three years of desire wrap itself around her throat. She was going to choke if she couldn’t have him. “Please, please-”
“Jane.” Elijah’s voice was broken as she touched him again, pushing his pants and underwear off his hips to catch on his knees. He had backed up against one of the shelves, and she followed him there, biting his hipbones, licking across his stomach. There was a trail of coarse hair leading from his bellybutton to his cock, and she followed it with her mouth, tasting sweat and salt. She wanted him in her mouth, but she wanted to taste him first, so she licked him from root to tip, licked the tops of his thighs, wanted all of him, everything. At last he moaned and took his cock in his hand, offering it to her.
“Okay.” He tilted his head back, eyes closed. “Oh god, please.”
In the darkness, she had no shame. She sucked him in as far as she could, gagging slightly when he hit the back of her throat. She pulled off to gasp for air, then swallowed him down again. He was almost entirely silent, only a choked off “yes” escaping his lips as she suckled gently at the tip. His hand came to rest in her hair and it felt like it belonged there. He had started to move his hips, just a slight thrust, never enough to choke her. She could do this forever, she thought. They could stay in this closet and she could suck him and touch him and she would never get tired of it, never. She traced her hands up between his thighs, and then down between her own, undoing the button on her pants. If she didn’t touch herself she’d die, and when she finally got her hand beneath her underwear she found herself dripping, fingers sliding easily inside.
“Christ, what are you- stop, stop.” Elijah’s fingers tightened just slightly in her hair, and Jane let him slide free, looked up at him with parted lips.
“Why-”
“I have to fuck you,” Elijah said, and his skin faintly glowed in the darkness. His hands were trembling and his mouth was open and in that moment Jane would have said yes to anything he asked. “Can I- will you let me?”
Jane was already standing, sliding her pants over her hips and stepping out of her black underwear.
“Oh God.” Elijah pulled his shirt over his head and she could see the muscles on his chest, the freckles on his arms and shoulders. She had to kiss him then, had to, and it wasn’t her first kiss, but when his tongue licked into her mouth it felt like the first time. She bit his bottom lip and he moaned around her tongue, and her hands were in his hair, pulling, pulling him closer. She could feel his cock pressed against her stomach, and she suddenly wanted it inside her more than the taste of his mouth, more than the sting of his tongue. She pulled away, pushing him down until he sat on the floor, legs stretched out and back resting against the door. She put her hands on his shoulders and straddled him, letting the tip of his cock brush against her, not daring to do more.
“I’m a virgin,” she gasped, because oh God she was, and it didn’t matter, she wouldn’t stop.
“Jane, oh Jesus.” Elijah’s hands tightened on her hips, but he couldn’t tear his eyes away from the place their bodies almost joined. “I don’t- wait- I don’t have anything-”
“It doesn’t matter.” The only thing that mattered in the world was the trembling of her thighs and his heartbeat pounding beneath her fingers. “I need- I need you inside me before I-” She was speaking almost mindlessly now, words spilling off her tongue because her cunt was wet and tightening; she could feel her inner-muscles fluttering and she had barely touched herself, what was happening- “I’m going to come, I’m going to come-”
“Oh- Jesus Christ!” Elijah thrust inside her, mouth going slack and eyes closing. “Oh my God, you’re- you’re so-”
It didn’t hurt, it didn’t hurt at all. Jane had heard horror stories about tearing and blood, but she just felt full, full and wet. He was huge inside her, made her arch her back and open her mouth with the stretch of it, but it didn’t hurt.
“Did I- are you okay? Is it okay?” Elijah’s voice was shaking, vowels drawn out as he struggled to breathe.
Jane could only nod at him, attempt a small rocking motion that moved him just slightly inside her.
“Yes,” Elijah murmured as she moved again. “God, yes.”
He lifted her hips up before pulling her back down onto his cock, and when she liked that, he did it again and again. Each movemen
t seemed about to wring her orgasm from her, leaving her gasping with shock. Her hips shifted frantically, chasing a pleasure she had never known before, so far removed from those fleeting private moments in her bedroom. She was going to come on his cock, it was going to be huge and overwhelming and unbearable, and she was close, she was so close-
“I want to come inside you,” Elijah said, leaning up to bite sharply at her throat. “Can I? Let me come inside you.”
“Yes, yes, yes-” Jane begged, and she could feel him then, hot and liquid in her cunt just as she hit her peak, screamed as she was blinded with pleasure, pleasure and light because her head lamp had come on, white light illuminating the room, and their bodies and his eyes, his eyes, his green eyes-
Which were not light at all. Which were dark. Wholly dark.
Jane screamed then, wracked with pleasure, blind with fear. She screamed because of blood and sex and panic, but most of all because she could not stop.
Whatever it was between her legs screamed too.
****
Scott was found wandering the grounds sometime that evening. They found Jane, half dressed, weeping and bleeding in the main hall, after she had grabbed her clothes and ran blindly away from whatever had been in that closet. Madeline had discovered Elijah in similar shape an hour earlier, stumbling around the library. He and Jane had matching bite marks on their throats, and would not look or speak to each other.
They never found Rocky, or his camera operator.
It was Jane’s last episode on the show. It was the last episode of “Restless Spirits” full stop. She had not spoken with any of them for five months, since that last day at Greenhaven. Madeline was apparently being kept busy with a lawsuit from Rocky’s parents, and every now and then Jane would find an email from E_Leer in her inbox. She always deleted them. She could not read his words and hear his voice and feel someone else’s tongue in her mouth.
Hundreds of miles away from the place where they had turned the cameras on, safe in her small and well-lit apartment, Jane’s hands shook. She could not remember the last time she had her period. Her hands did not have blood on them, but she washed them anyway.
Bloody Sexy Anthology Page 5
