As dawn grew near, Xhex wrapped up her first night back in her old boots. The pace of the hours had been good, the Ping-Pong nature of dealing with a fuckload of people in an enclosed space with alcohol in the mix making the time pass fast enough. It was also good to be Alex Hess, head of security, once again - her own female, even if the name she used among the humans was fake.
And it was frickin' fantastic not having the Brotherhood breathing down her back.
What was not so hot was the fact that everything felt flat, like life had been bulldozed in preparation for the paving trucks to come.
She'd never heard of females doing the bonding thing. But as usual, that didn't mean she wasn't an outlier. And bottom line, without John by her side, everything seemed to be just a big, resounding meh.
A quick check of her watch told her there was one hour left of true darkness. Man, she wished she'd come in on her bike so she could can the headlight and roll through the shadows at ridiculous speeds. The Ducati was locked up tight in her garage, however.
She wondered if there was a rule against shellans riding.
Probably not... As long as she was sidesaddle, dressed in armor plating, and had a helmet made of reinforced, skid-resistant Kevlar, they'd probably let her go a few circles around the fountain in front of the house.
Vroom-vroom. Fucking wheeeeeeee.
Leaving her office, she locked the thing up with her mind so she didn't have to worry about keys -
"Hey, Trez," she said as her boss emerged from the ladies' locker room. "I was just coming to look for you."
The Shadow was tucking his crisp white shirt into his black slacks, and looking a little more relaxed than usual. A second later, one of the working girls came out from behind the door with a glow on her like she'd been hand-polished.
Which was probably not far from the truth.
At least her clueless expression told Xhex that Trez was keeping things on the DL. But still... you shouldn't feed where you worked. Complications could arise.
"I'll see you tomorrow night," the woman said with a loopy smile. "I'm late. Meeting friends."
After the girl went out the back, Xhex looked at Trez. "You should use other sources."
"It's convenient and I'm careful."
"Not safe. Besides, you could scramble her mind."
"I never use the same one twice." Trez put an arm around her. "But enough about me. You off?"
"Yeah."
Together, they ambled down to the door the woman had used. God... it was old times all over again, as if nothing had happened since the last time they'd closed up together. And yet Lash had happened. John had happened. The mating had -
"I'm not going to insult you by offering to escort you home," Trez murmured.
"So you like your legs right where they are, huh."
"Yup. They fill out my pants just fine." He did open the door for her, the cold air rushing in like it was trying to get away from itself. "What do you want me to tell him if he hits me up."
"That I'm fine."
"Good thing lying isn't a problem for me." When she went to argue, the Shadow just rolled his eyes. "Don't waste your breath or my time. Go home and get some sleep. Maybe things will be better tomorrow."
By manner of reply, she gave him a quick hug, and stepped into the darkness.
Instead of dematerializing north, she wandered along Trade Street. Everyone was in closing mode: the clubs were spitting out their last few patrons - who looked about as attractive as masticated gum; the tat shop was clicking off its neon sign; the Tex-Mex restaurant had already battened down its hatches.
Shit grew seedier as she kept going, everything getting gloomier and grungier until she arrived at the blocks-long stretch of abandoned buildings. With the downturn in the economy, businesses were drying up like roadkill, and lessees were fewer and farther between -
Xhex stopped. Sniffed the air. Looked to the left.
The unmistakable scent of male vampire wafted over from a deserted walk-up.
BBFO, or Before Brotherhood Freak-out, she would have pursued it - gone in, checked to see if any of them needed help, found out what the Brothers were doing.
Now she just kept going, walking onward with her head held high. They didn't want her help - no, that probably wasn't accurate. They'd seemed fine with her until John had had issues. It was more like they no longer felt comfortable with her -
Up ahead about two blocks, a massive figure stepped out into her path.
She halted. Took a deep breath. Felt a prickling in her eyes.
On the breeze drifting down to her, John's unmistakable bonding scent was a dark spice that wiped out the stink of the city and the wretched sting of her unhappiness.
She started walking toward him. Fast. Faster...
Now she was running.
He met her halfway, falling into a jog as soon as he saw her pick up the pace, and they slammed into each other.
Hard to know whose mouth found whose, or whose arms were cinched tighter, or who was the desperate one.
But then, in this they were equals.
Breaking the kiss, she groaned, "My cabin."
The second after he nodded, she was out of there and so was he... and they re-formed outside her place.
No waiting to go inside.
He fucked her standing up, against her door, in the cold.
It was all so fast and frantic, her ripping her leathers down until she got one leg free, him breaking the buttons on his fly. Then she was spread wide and locked on his hips and he was buried to the base in her core.
He pounded into her so hard that her head banged on the door like she was trying to break into her own house. And then he bit her on the side of the neck - but not to feed, to hold her in place. He felt so much bigger inside of her, stretching her to the point where he strained her capacity. She needed that. At this moment, on this night, she needed him raw and unchained and a little painful.
Hell, yeah, she did - and that was exactly what she got.
When he came, his hips locked against hers, his erection kicking up a storm deep within her, spurring her own orgasm.
And then they were in the cabin. On the floor. Her legs cranked apart, his mouth on her sex.
With his hands clamped on her thighs, and his still-erect cock sticking out of his open fly, he went down on her with a furious tongue, lashing at her, penetrating her, taking what he'd just had.
The pleasure was unbearable, a kind of agony that had her throwing back her head and contorting on the floor, her palms squeaking on the linoleum as she struggled unsuccessfully to keep herself from riding backward -
The orgasm plowed through her so violently that as she shouted his name, bright lights flickered across her vision. And he didn't relent in the slightest. As the onslaught continued, she was pretty sure that at some point he bit her on the inner leg, at that juncture where the thick vein went down to feed the lower half of her. But there was too much sucking, too much releasing, too much... everything to know or care.
When John finally stopped and lifted his head, they were in the far corner, nearly into the living room. Oh, what a picture. Her mate's face was flushed, his mouth glossy and puffy, his fangs so long he couldn't close his jaw - and she was likewise wrung out, her breathing ragged, her sex throbbing with its own heartbeat.
He was still erect.
Too bad she barely had the energy to blink - because he deserved one heck of a payback....
Except he seemed to know exactly what she was thinking. Rising up between her open legs, he gripped himself and began to stroke.
With a moan, she arched and rolled her hips. "Come all over me," she said through gritted teeth.
John worked himself, his palm locked around his thick shaft, a clicking sound rising up as he pumped. His massive thighs split wide as he shoved his knees farther apart for balance, the muscles in his forearm standing out in harsh relief as he went harder and faster. And then he was barking something in a soundless way, his body going rigid as hot jets splashed all over her sex.
Just the thought of herself wet and messy was almost enough to make her come again. But the sight of him making it happen? Sent her right over the edge once more...
"She's going to need an extra two hundred if she does him."
Xcor stood off to the side during negotiations with the whores, making certain that he was in the shadows - especially now that Throe had reached the tricky part of his being accommodated. No reason for the reminder of what he looked like to drive the price even higher.
Only two of the three girls had shown up at this abandoned house down on Trade Street, but apparently number three was on her way - although courtesy of her being late, she had been handed the short straw: him.
Her friends were taking care of her, though - unless, of course, they intended to take a cut of the increase. After all, good whores, like good soldiers, tended to look out for themselves.
Abruptly, Zypher stepped into the woman who was doing the talking, clearly prepared to use his physical assets to conserve financial ones. As the vampire trailed a fingertip along the girl's collarbone, she appeared to fall into a trance.
It was not mind games on Zypher's part. Females of both races couldn't help themselves around him.
The vampire dipped toward her ear and spoke softly. Then he licked up her throat. Behind him, Throe was as he always was, silent, watchful, patient. Waiting his turn.
Ever the gentlemale.
"Okay," the woman said breathlessly. "Just fifty more - "
At that moment, the door opened wide.
Xcor and his soldiers put hands into their coats, finding their weapons, prepared to kill. But it was just the prostitute who was late.
"Hey, girl, heeeeeeeeeey," she said to her friends.
Standing in the doorway with a floppy jacket pulled over her whore clothes, and the bad sense of balance of a drunk, she was obviously on something, her face suffused with the blissed-out expression of the newly drugged.
Good. She'd be easier to deal with.
Zypher clapped his hands. "Shall we get down to business."
A giggle came from the one next to him. "I love your accent."
"Then you can have me."
"Wait, me, too!" A giggle from someone else. "I love it, too!"
"You're going to take care of my fellow soldier - my friend. Who is going to pay you all now."
Throe stepped forward with the cash, and as he doled it out into waiting palms, the whores seemed more focused on the two males as opposed to the money.
A professional role reversal that Xcor was willing to bet didn't happen very often.
And then the pairing off occurred, with Throe and Zypher drawing their prey into separate corners, whilst he was left with the whore who was fuzzy.
"So are we going to do this?" she said with a practiced smile. Indeed, the fact that her eyes were softened by drugs made the expression almost real.
"Come to me."
He held his hand out of the darkness.
"Oh, I like it." She sidled over, exaggerating the shift of her hips. "You sound like... I don't know what."
When she put her palm against his, he pulled her to him - except then she jerked back.
"Oh - er... um... okay."
Turning her face to the side, she rubbed her nose, and then pinched it as if she couldn't stand the smell of him. Logical. It took more than a rinse with water to get lesser blood off someone. Naturally, Throe and Zypher had taken a moment to flash home and get cleaned up. He, however, had stayed to fight.
Dandies. Both of them. On the other hand, their women were not already looking for an escape.
"It's okay, though," she said with resignation. "But no kissing."
"I was unaware I had suggested such a thing."
"Just so we're clear."
As moans began to rise up, Xcor stared down at the human. Her hair was loose around her shoulders, looking stringy and pulled-through. Her makeup was heavy and smudged at the lip line and in the corner of one eye. Her perfume was sweat and -
Xcor frowned, as he caught an unwelcomed scent.
"Now, listen," she said, "don't give me that look. It's my policy and you can - "
He let her ramble on as he reached out and lifted one side of the blond tangle, exposing her throat.... Nothing but smooth skin. And on the other side...
Ah, yes. There they were. Two puncture marks right on her jugular.
She had already been used tonight by one of his kind. And that explained the fogginess and the musk his nose was picking up on.
Xcor laid the hair back where it had been. Then he stepped away.
"I can't believe you're being so pissy," she mouthed off. "Just because I won't kiss you - I'm not giving the money back, you know. A deal's a deal."
Someone was having an orgasm, the sounds of pleasure so rich and lush that the symphony transformed, for however briefly, the abandoned walk-up into a proper boudoir.
"But of course you may keep the cash," he murmured.
"You know what, fuck you, you can have it back." She threw the wad at him. "You smell like a sewer and you're ugly as sin."
Whilst the bills bounced off his chest, he inclined his head briefly. "As you wish."
"Fuck you."
The alacrity with which she changed from bliss to bitch suggested this kind of mood swing was not uncommon to her. One more reason to keep things professional between oneself and the female sex -
As he bent down to pick up the money, she drew back her foot and tried to kick him in the head.
Not smart. With all his warrior training and years of combat experience, his body defended itself without his conscious mind giving any commands: The whore was caught by the ankle, yanked off balance, and slammed into the floor. And before he was aware of even moving, he had her spun onto her belly and had taken that fragile neck of hers in the thick crook of his arm.
Whereupon he was prepared to break it.
No more aggression from her. Now she whimpered and begged.
He immediately relented, jumping free of her, then helping her shuffle back against the wall. She was hyperventilating, her chest pumping up and down so hard she was liable to rupture her false breasts against the cups of her brassiere.
As he loomed over her, he thought of how the Bloodletter would have handled the situation. That male wouldn't have let her get past the no-kissing proposition - he would have taken what he wanted on his terms, and to hell with how much it might have hurt her. Or whether it killed her.
"Look at me," Xcor commanded.
When those wide, shell-shocked eyes lifted to his, he erased her memory of being here, putting her in a trance. Instantly her respiration calmed, her body resuming its loose, relaxed composure, her frantic, jerky hands stilling.
Gathering up the money, he put it in her lap. She deserved it for whatever bruises she was going to have in the morning.
Then with a groan, Xcor sank down and arranged himself against the wall next to her, stretching his legs out and crossing them at the ankles. He had to go pick up his satchel of goodies and his scythe at the skyscraper, but at the moment, he was too exhausted to move.
No feeding for him tonight, however. Even with the hypnosis.
If he took the vein of the woman next to him, he was liable to kill her: He was viciously hungry, and he didn't know how heavily she had been tapped. For all he knew, her loopiness was low blood pressure.
Across the way, he watched his soldiers fucking, and he had to admit the rhythms of the bodies were erotic. Under different circumstances, he imagined Zypher would have merged the two pairings into one large tangle of arms and legs, breasts and hands, cocks and slick slits. Not here, though. The room was filthy, not secure and cold.
Easing his head back against the wall, Xcor closed his eyes and kept listening.
If he fell asleep, and his soldiers questioned whether he had fed, he would just use the other vampire's aftermath to explain away their concern.
And there would be time to sink his teeth into another source later.
In truth, he hated feeding. Unlike the Bloodletter, he got no thrill from forcing himself upon women and females - and God knew, none of them had ever come willingly unto him.
He supposed he owed his life to prostitutes.
As someone else started to orgasm again, this time one of his soldiers - Throe, if he had to guess - he imagined himself with a different face, a handsome face, a comely face that summoned females rather than sent them screaming.
Mayhap he should be removing his own spine.
But that was the beauty of inner thoughts. No one had to know your weaknesses.
And once you'd finished dwelling on them, you could toss them into the mental trash bin they belonged in.