The Last Vampire 3

by R. A. Steffan

  “Not to worry, luv,” he said easily. “It’s clear you can control it. You’ll just need more practice to separate the mechanism of that control from the emotion surrounding it.”

  “Hmph. Sounds like almost as much fun as letting you repeatedly kick my ass while trying to teach me self-defense,” I managed.

  “Oh, I expect we can make it marginally more enjoyable than that,” he promised in low tones, his hand never moving from its reassuring place over my heart.

  Above us, fireworks painted the sky in a red, white, and blue grand finale.

  SIX

  THE NEXT SEVERAL days fell into a sort of pattern, though it wasn’t one I ever expected to experience in my life. No… rather than dragging myself out of bed to go work a waitressing shift and put in my volunteer hours, I was now splitting my time between cleaning up the ruin of my house, having increasingly kinky sex with a vampire while lounging around a gazillionaire’s penthouse suite, and training to become Buffy the Freakin’ Faerie Slayer.

  It was safe to say I was making forward progress in three of those four arenas. For now, though, Buffy appeared to be safe from any meaningful competition on my end.

  Rans hadn’t let up in his obsession to teach me to control the flow of animus I drew from him, and that was his excuse for the extent to which the two of us had been getting our freak on during the past few days. I hadn’t been warned ahead of time, but today was apparently finals day for my unofficial ‘Animus Control 101’ course.

  All of which explained why I was currently drooling into Rans’ pubic hair, trying to get him all the way down my throat while simultaneously rubbing two fingers over his prostate in a steady rhythm. And, yeah, okay—it might not have been the most dignified position to be in. But, damn. It had taken me less than twenty-four hours to become the prostate gland’s number-one fangirl.

  “Really?” I’d asked yesterday, not exactly repulsed by the idea—just… unsure.

  But Rans only smirked, one eyebrow arched in challenge. “I did mention that vampires don’t harbor microbes, yes? If squeamishness is the issue, I can assure you that those pipes haven’t been used for their intended purpose in centuries, Zorah.” His lips twitched. “And for the record, you can thank me later.”

  In actuality, I’d had to wait until much later to thank him. At his insistence, I’d been making no attempt to stop myself siphoning sexual energy from him, and the goddamned inconsiderate bastard passed out on me after climaxing six times over the course of forty-five minutes.

  I spent a panicked few seconds convinced I’d just killed the last surviving vampire with sex, thereby committing unintentional murder-suicide via the life bond. Fortunately, it then occurred to me to grab a knife from the kitchen and slash it across my palm, prying his mouth open to let some of my blood drip onto his tongue. I cursed him up one side and down the other until he eventually came around with a groan.

  “You could have warned me!” I’d yelled, shoving him in the shoulder and leaving a smear of blood on his pale skin.

  He just blinked up at me with unfocused blue eyes. “Blimey, luv. Sorry about that. Are you sure that was your first time? Seven hundred years, and I’m fairly certain that was a new record.”

  Caught between relief and fury, I’d made an incoherent noise of frustration and stormed out of the room, leaving him to sleep it off. That was the moment I realized that I was practically buzzing with stolen energy. My palm tingled, and when I looked down at it, I found the ugly cut scabbed over as though the injury had happened days before, rather than minutes.

  I was overcome with the need to move… to do something. I ended up running five miles on the treadmill, and when that wasn’t enough, I swam another two miles in the swim spa. In both cases, I knocked more than thirty percent off my previous best speed, yet the exertion had barely taken the edge off. In the end, I liberated a bottle of something dusty and expensive-looking from Guthrie’s wine rack and drank until I no longer felt like I had live voltage running through my veins instead of blood.

  Rans stumbled into the living room some considerable amount of time later to find me passive-aggressively engaged in a Twilight movie marathon—mostly as a way to distract myself from my burning urge to alphabetize Guthrie’s sock drawers by color in a fit of raging, animus-driven OCD.

  “The second film was always my favorite,” he’d said, and then utterly failed to deflect the couch cushion I hurled at his head.

  I was still pissed at him, but the incident had driven home a few different points. Firstly, I had no friggin’ clue what my real power capacity was. Secondly, Rans hadn’t been wrong about the kind of advantage my succubus abilities could potentially be in a fight with a more powerful opponent—there was little question that if I’d sparred with him in our present states, the outcome would be considerably different than it had been up until now. And thirdly, the prostate gland was actually pretty fucking awesome, in a ‘with great power comes great responsibility’ kind of way.

  Although I seriously hoped that any supernatural ass-kicking I might one day need to employ could be managed without sticking my fingers up a stranger’s butt. I would still need to work the details out when it came to those sorts of logistics, I supposed.

  All of which brought us back to the reason I was currently deep-throating my vampire lover while simultaneously doing my best impression of a perverted general practitioner giving a digital rectal exam.

  Rans had wanted me glutted on sexual energy before trying this experiment—hence yesterday’s little misadventure. With his hand tangled in my curls and his low murmurs of encouragement as he guided me up and down his length, there was no question I was getting off on this. But I wasn’t supposed to touch a drop of his animus today, no matter how tempting it felt as it brushed at the edges of my awareness, promising a fresh feast if I would only let my guard down.

  His hand tightened, tugging at my scalp in a way that he knew damned well I loved. I hummed around him; a moment later, he groaned and spilled his release down my throat. The grip he had on my hair ensured that I took everything he had to give me. And… okay, there was a lot. That was another thing about prostate stimulation, apparently.

  By the time he was finished, I was shaking—and not only with the need to come. Even with the practice I’d been getting over the last few days, blocking the flow of his energy into me still went against every instinct I possessed. A needy little whining noise escaped the back of my throat as he eased me off his cock, and I slid my fingers out of his body at the same time.

  “Bloody hell,” he said, drawing out the first word. “Well done, pet—on several fronts. Now come up here so I can return the favor… but no cheating and feeding from me, or I’ll stop and toss you in a cold shower as punishment.”

  “Fucker,” I muttered, a bit hoarsely.

  He chuckled. “I had something else in mind for tonight, actually.”

  A heartbeat later, I was on my back on the bed, legs spread. Rans dove between them and promptly made me forget all of my irritation with him over the course of the next two hours.

  * * *

  “I still don’t understand what you’re getting at with this little project of yours,” I said, much later that night.

  My head was pillowed on his chest; one arm and one leg thrown across his body in a way that I tried to tell myself did not scream possessiveness. Because in addition to the sheer difficulty involved in not allowing myself to feed from Rans’ animus while we had sex, I now had something new to worry about.

  Namely, without the paper-thin excuse of feeding from him to use as a shield, I was finding it more difficult than ever not to want things I couldn’t have. Over and over, I chanted the words silently—he was helping out a clueless and starving succubus hybrid because he was a good guy, undead or no. In return, I was helping him turn off his brain by giving him mind-blowing orgasms and sucking his life energy out through his dick.

  That was all.

  I mean, yeah—he was technically
stuck with me now, after he’d bound our souls together in a fit of temporary insanity compounded by a healthy dose of centuries-old martyr complex. But that was all there was to it. At some point, he was going to come to his senses and tell me to stop freeloading. Hell, maybe that was exactly what he was doing right now—training me to get my demon kicks from someone other than him.

  And who could blame him?

  “The animus control, you mean?” he asked in response to my question. “Oh, I just had an idea the other day, is all.”

  I waited, and when no further elucidation came my way, I pressed further. “And would you like to share your idea with the rest of the class?”

  The shoulder beneath my cheek lifted in a small shrug. “I was considering your options for feeding that don’t involve direct sexual contact with strangers.”

  Bingo. I craned to look up at him. “Strangers? I hope you’re not planning on throwing me at any of my exes.”

  A blue glow kindled in the depths of his eyes, and his brow furrowed in a scowl. “Don’t make me laugh. Those idiotic sods never deserved you in the first place.”

  I tamped down the little flutter of hopefulness that tried to rise in my chest. Stop it, Zorah. Seriously, get a grip and try living in the real world for a change.

  “What, then?” I asked.

  “Even in this puritanical excuse for a country, there are still a few avenues for the legal expression of sexuality,” he said, his tone musing.

  A frown furrowed my brow as I pondered what I knew of legal sex-related stuff. My jaw dropped in outrage, and I pushed upright so I could glare down at him. “You want me to become a stripper!” I accused.

  But he only let out a huff of laughter and tugged me back down to his chest. “Not what I was considering,” he assured me. “Though in a pinch I suppose it could work—you certainly have both the looks and the flexibility for it.”

  That was… probably a compliment, so I restrained myself from smacking him.

  “What, then?” I repeated, this time through gritted teeth.

  “Private fetish club,” he said without hesitation. “Most major cities have them, and it’s about that safest place you can be while still being surrounded by a crowd of randy people lusting after you.”

  My mouth opened, but nothing came out. I closed it, blinked a couple of times, and tried again. “What, like in Eyes Wide Shut or something? That’s a real thing?”

  He smirked. “It’s a real thing. Though usually without the associated murder and mayhem.”

  Huh. For the life of me, I couldn’t picture stuffy old St. Louis as the venue for a bunch of rich people wearing capes and Mardi Gras masks while using naked slaves as furniture.

  Shriners parades? Sure.

  Elk Lodges? Absolutely.

  Whips and leather bondage gear? Well… I supposed the occasional downtown showings of The Rocky Horror Picture Show still managed to pull a respectable turnout. Presumably, that meant someone, somewhere was doing a decent business in corsets and fishnet stockings.

  “Forget about the existence of faeries or demons,” I said. “Apparently there’s a whole ‘nother world hiding right under my nose that I knew nothing about.”

  “Several, probably,” Rans agreed in a dry tone. “Anyway, I did a little poking around, and the local organization is called St. Louis Silk and Leather—SL2 for short. They have a good reputation—no walk-ins at private events. Getting accepted requires sponsorship by a current member in good standing, and the Code of Conduct provides adequate protection for everyone who comes to play.”

  I was still having difficulty wrapping my mind around this concept. “Okay… couple of things, here. Firstly, I’m having trouble picturing leather-clad kinksters hammering out membership agreements and legal codes of conduct for a sex club. Secondly, if membership requires a sponsor, how would we even get in? And please don’t say Guthrie’s a member, because as much as I like the guy, that’s a mental image I don’t really need.”

  “If Guthrie’s a member, I’m unaware of it,” Rans said with tempered amusement. “But who needs a sponsor when you’ve got these?”

  His eyes burned briefly with inner light, and I felt the press of his will against mine. As a demon crossbreed, I had some defense against the power of his vampiric gaze, but most humans didn’t. If he told someone they were sponsoring us, then I guessed we’d have a sponsor after all.

  “That’s cheating, but all right,” I allowed.

  He flashed a dangerous smile. “If you’re not cheating, you’re not trying. Isn’t that the saying? And as to your other question, it’s the only way to get around the outdated morality laws in most parts of the U.S.”

  “Morality laws?” I echoed. “What, like the no alcohol sales on Sunday thing?”

  “More like the no charging money for sex thing, in this case.” He quirked an eyebrow. “Although fetish clubs rarely allow alcohol, either. Not only does it increase the chances of someone deciding to act like a twat; it also brings down more governmental oversight than your average BDSM practitioner wants to deal with.”

  I shook my head in amazement. “So instead, they make it a nice, legal members’ only club—”

  “And once the annual membership fees are paid, it’s arguably none of the government’s business what they get up to behind closed doors at their private events—especially since no money is changing hands at the venue.”

  “Wow,” I said, intrigued despite myself. Then I remembered that the entire thrust of this conversation was about teaching me to feed from other people, and my heart sank. “So, you want to take me to one of these events so I can learn to siphon energy off of random people who happen to be horny and nearby. And I’m guessing you wanted me to learn not to siphon from you first, so my body wouldn’t just take the easiest option whenever you’re around.”

  He shrugged. “More or less. I suspect that my being around you when you’re dolled up in fetish gear and not wanting to shag you would be something of a tall order.”

  And, damn it, if he would just stop saying ambiguous shit like that…

  “I’m never certain if you’re trying to come on to me, or if you’re the most shameless man-slut I’ve ever met,” I muttered.

  He gave me an odd look. “If you haven’t figured it out by now, luv, I’m not quite sure what to tell you.”

  I chewed the inside of my cheek. I could ask. I could come right out and demand he tell me why he was doing all this. I could have my answer in thirty seconds or less.

  I wavered on the cusp of dragging it out of him, once and for all. Then, I imagined that cultured voice telling me how I was a sweet girl, but surely I could understand that there could never be anything serious between us… and I wussed out. Like always.

  I’d heard every imaginable variation of that speech, and it still hurt each and every time.

  “If we’re doing this, I want to be the Domme,” I blurted instead.

  He stared at me for a beat. I’d managed to surprise him.

  “Do you, now?” he asked, almost managing to hide his amusement. “Any other little tidbits about your predilections that you’d care to share with me?”

  I colored. “No.” When he was silent, watching me expectantly, I finally said, “Look, trashy BDSM romance novels are a starving sex demon’s best friends, all right? What can I say? I’m well-read.”

  He raised his hands in mock surrender. “Not judging. At least, not unless your entire knowledge of the lifestyle is based on Fifty Shades.”

  “I couldn’t even get through the first book,” I assured him. “Though if we’re seriously going to do this, you’d better clue me in on the differences between fantasy and reality when it comes to sex clubs. And maybe get me a copy of that Code of Conduct document, just to be safe.”

  “Happy to,” he said. Then, a slow smile spread over his features. A dangerous one. “First things first, though. Tomorrow, you and I are going shopping.”

  SEVEN

  SURPRISE, SURPRISE
—WHEN a sexually adventurous vampire drags you out for shopping after outlining a plan to take St. Louis’ kink scene by storm, you don’t come home with a bag full of new t-shirts and white cotton underwear. In fact, there wasn’t a stitch of white to be found anywhere in our purchases. Or a stitch of cotton, for that matter.

  I stood in the entryway of a grand old mansion in the richest part of the Chesterfield area, trying not to let my self-consciousness show as I shifted from one stiletto-heeled foot to the other. Already, both Rans and I were drawing interested glances from the other people waiting to have their I.D. checked so they could enter the members’ only club.

  Not that I could really blame them. Rans’ darkly beautiful features and lean grace drew attention wherever he went. And that was when he wasn’t wearing tight leather pants, black boots, his long black leather coat… and nothing else except a spiked dog collar buckled around his throat. Well, almost nothing else. His chest was bare, but I’d watched with queasy fascination earlier as he’d pierced his own nipples with nary a flinch and slid a pair of pale metal rings through the holes.

  “Tell me those aren’t real silver,” I’d said, unable to look away from the little hoops.

  He’d only snorted. “Anything else, and my flesh would push it out within moments.”

  “But... doesn’t that hurt?”

  After all, he’d told me not long after we met that vampires were sensitive to silver, the same way that Fae were sensitive to iron.

  “Oh, most definitely,” he’d replied, eyeing me with amusement. “It hurts in all the best ways, luv. What—have you forgotten where we’re going?”

  So apparently, Rans wasn’t averse to putting the ‘M’ in S&M on occasion. Which, okay, I probably should have guessed.