Sin Eater (22 page)

Shit
, was the only thought Iola had.

Claudia had jumped as Iola’s door was ripped open behind her, but when she’d seen Damien standing behind Iola, she’d felt an odd … disappointment. Because Iola looked radiant, gorgeous, and totally flushed like she’d been … well, getting worked over good by a talented lover. Like the one standing behind her.

Like the one Claudia had just had the pleasure of enjoying the night before. But
he
didn’t look guilty, he looked happy to see her, too.

“Hi, guys. What’s … what’s up?”

“I heard Damien out here waiting for you, so I invited him in for tea. But I’m glad you’re home.” Iola sounded like she really meant it, so Claudia assumed maybe her imagination was getting the edge on her.

Damien stepped around Iola and crossed the hall to her, taking her hand. “I heard you had a rough night.”

Seeing her hand in his giant paw made her want to start crying, but she didn’t, she just nodded.

“I was going to ask if I could stay here tonight. That’s why I was waiting. But if you’re upset, I think it’s better if I go.”

She gripped his hand in both of hers when it seemed like he was going to pull away. “No, please. Please stay here. I need … I need someone to stay here tonight.”

Claudia was dimly aware that Iola was closing her door, not wanting to intrude on them. But she kept her eyes locked on Damien’s face.

He just nodded. “If you want me here, honestly, I will stay.”

“I do. Please, come in.”

He followed her through the door, turning on the lights for them. “Do you want to talk about it?” He asked in a very gentle way.

“No. Yes. I have no idea.”

Damien took her in his arms, pressing her to his chest. “If you need to sleep, we’ll sleep. If you want to talk, I’ll listen.”

“They were lying in wait for her in her own damn house,” Claudia bit out each word. “Whoever it was, they raped her and strangled her and just left her there, bleeding. Oh God, you wouldn’t believe what they did to her.”

His arms tightened around her. “Let’s go to bed. I think you’re exhausted.”

“I am.” He let go of her, turned off the living room light and led her by the hand to her bedroom. Once there he turned on the bedside lamp, and began to undress her.

Claudia didn’t fight any part of the process. She watched him carefully put her clothes on the armchair in the corner, go to her dresser and pull out a huge T-shirt, pull it on over her head, then pulled back the bedcovers and steered her to the bedside.

As she settled in between cool sheets and found her comfortable spot on the pillow, he stripped down to his boxer shorts and climbed in next to her. Even in the surreal state she was in mentally, she appreciated the view of his back as he sat on the side of the bed and then turned to shove his legs
into the pile of blankets. Her body was aware of him immediately, like a space heater set on “tropics.”

As he pulled her against him, she couldn’t believe she was turned on. After what she’d seen, what she’d already gone though, here she was, hoping she hadn’t sapped out so much that he was basically castrated by her
girliness
.

She pressed her lips to the warm strength of his chest, waited, then placed another kiss higher up. He shifted around, rolling on to one side to look down at her.

“Claudia, surely you’re tired. And upset.”

“Anger has a way of numbing me out totally. Can you just … take away the numbness?”

He captured one hand, turning the palm inwards and kissing it. She closed her eyes, surprised to find that the palm of her hand was an erogenous zone.

“Stop me when you want,” he said. That was fast becoming one of her favourite phrases. Then he came in for a kiss that had her heart pounding and her legs opening for him in no time at all.

When he’d stripped them of their clothing, he’d begun to stoke her fire with his hand while keeping his mouth on hers. She matched the movement with her hips, then all but pushed him on top of her. When he continued to touch her, she parted her lips from his to say, “No, now. Just … do it. I’m ready.”

God bless him, he always did as he was told. With him on top, she was totally trapped in the cage of his body, and when he entered her she felt completely full, not against her will just … out of her element again. Claudia was starting to think that was what she liked about Damien.

While his movements were aggressive and passionate, his attention to the rest of her body was sentimental and non-intimidating. His kisses were slightly more languid, lazy but completely engaged. His dry, hot hands caressed her skin like it was breakable.  In those hands Claudia felt softer than she thought possible.

Her orgasm was a
gentle one which took a bit longer to pass, definitely no less pleasurable, but she’d been well aware of its approach and she’d buried her hands in his hair, pulling his face down to her shoulder so she could muffle a cry into the slick skin of his neck. His skin was salty with sweat, and as the shudders were fading she found … she was now crying.

He froze immediately, pulling free of her body and easing on to his side, a hand on
her cheek. “Claudia … look at me. It’s okay.”

“I’m sorry,” she sputtered, aware now she was shaking as well.

“Don’t apologize. You saw something … traumatic.”

“I’m here, and she’s not,” Claudia sobbed nonsensically. “I get to be here with someone who touches me like this and … the last person to have his hands on her was a complete monster.”

She was held against his chest as she cried loudly. He didn’t say a word, just silently comforted her and stroked her back until she fell asleep.

Charlie awoke to the sound of a cart being pushed down the hotel hallway. But he only realized what the noise was when he first remembered
where
he was.

The sheets were so clean, his underwear was brand new, and he couldn’t remember how he’d gotten to a hotel. The last thing he remembered was ending up in jail.

He was here. The new guy had brought him here. He’d had a nice meal just last night.
Remember?

He rubbed his face, then pulled his hands away and inspected his arms. They were marked with deep gashes from someone’s fingernails. That woman had fought hard.

As Charlie’s memories came back again, with the buffer zone of a good night’s sleep, he wanted to weep. Or throw up. What made him get so hateful? Why did he have to do all those horrific, monstrous things? That woman’s wide pale eyes … she’d been so terrified of him. And whoever else she was seeing in the room. Had she …
could
she see the Master like that other man had? He hated that he had to think of that voice as
Master,
but he didn’t have any other name for him.

He got out of bed and headed for the washroom. The wet towels he’d used the night before were still on the ground. He felt bad, picked them up and put them on the hanger. There’d been a lot of blood to wash off of him. Blood
every
where.

Charlie had been so vicious to that woman. Well, another, darker part of Charlie had done it. Not the here-and-now Charlie. Once the Master got hold of him, there was nothing too depraved or disgusting for him. All to please the Master.

Charlie had felt the disgust of that other man. He’d felt it even as his body had been doing awful things and he wanted to stop, that man had been horrified by him. Charlie should have been ashamed but … again, the darker side had hold of him then.

Charlie frowned. Now that the shock was thinning out, he had to wonder who he was
. Charlie had never seen him around before. And why could the new guy see the Master but Charlie couldn’t? Was that fair? Charlie had been with the Master for months now. He was disliking the new guy … then he remembered the fact that he’d … he’d actually finished in that woman, hadn’t he?

When Charlie turned the shower head on, he became aware of his penis in his shorts, it was stiff and the
fabric of his underwear was chafing like crazy. He’d never woken up with an erection … or had he? He only got them when he was … hurting someone, or scaring someone until they screamed. He took off his boxers and stared down at himself, surprised. And when he touched it … he groaned out loud. Oh, that was good. He moved back and forth a couple times. It felt like it used to … it felt normal. Charlie got in the shower, and as he continued to stroke himself he remembered the other parts of last night.

The Master had made the new guy give Charlie an orgasm. Not like
that
… not by touching at all. The Master said after that the man had
thought
it for him. But the best part had come after that. When the man put his hand on his head. Just remembering, Charlie could feel that warmth again, like he was being washed of what he had just done, it was taken from him.

Charlie felt he’d been forgiven. The man took it all away and forgave him for what he did.
That
… that had felt better than the orgasm.

Again, like the night before, Charlie felt … almost normal. And here he was, touching himself in the shower, just like many other men were likely doing that morning, too. And when the orgasm came Charlie even made a little sound of pleasure. He couldn’t be sure he’d ever made that noise before. It felt fantastic.

As he washed his hands of the fluid that came out of him, Charlie felt a laugh bubble up. He was forgiven, if he dropped dead today he would … he’d go to heaven.

Again, normal. Nothing to feel bad for. Even after remembering what he’d done he felt saved.

Then Charlie covered his eyes as he wept.
Thank you Master,
he was thinking, or maybe even saying out loud.
Thank you
.

He dressed as usual for work, whistling as he knotted his tie, thinking to himself that he looked pretty damn good for once. He felt … well, he felt
great
.

God help anyone that fucked with him today.

As he got on the elevator to go downstairs, he recognized a woman he’d seen in this very spot a few weeks before. He’d thought at the time she was gorgeous. Hadn’t even bothered trying to talk to her.

Now as the doors slid shut he knew she was looking at him, even though she was behind him. She thought he had nice shoulders, nice clothes, nice hair, and a great ass.

He smiled at the elevator door. This mind-reading thing could be awfully handy. He turned back to her slowly, saying in a friendly tone, “Supposed to be nice out there today.”

He’d caught her looking at his backside and she blushed, stammering out, “Oh, uh, yeah. That’s what they said on the radio this morning.”

“Which station do you listen to?”

“KLCD.”

“What’s your name, by the way?”

“Tabitha, but everyone calls me Tammy.” Of course they did. She was bleached-blonde, injected lips, tan darker than the Williams sisters. Part of the attraction to this kind of woman would have been finding out what parts of her were factory installed and which were after-market.

“Nice to meet you, Tammy.”

“It’s …” she lost her breath as he sent her a picture. With his mind. He was imagining her against the wall, legs wrapped around his hips, skirt up around her waist as he pounded
into her, her nails scoring his back as she screamed nonsensical words. She blinked and her head dipped forward, and he could feel her temperature increase. And he could swear he could smell her arousal.

“Tammy, I’m off work tonight at about nine. I’m in 8-D. You should … you should come by. It’ll be fun.” He didn’t let the image go; he kept it going, flowing right into her cerebral cortex. Poor Tammy was having trouble staying upright. She wasn’t even trying to figure out what was happening to her anymore.

“I’ll be there,” she pretty much moaned.

“Good.” He took a step towards her just as the doors opened behind him. She met him breasts first, panting wantonly. “And today, I want you to keep listening to KLCD. I’m on all day. I do the news.”

“You do?” Her pupils were huge, he could tell now that they were close.

“That’s right. You might know the name. Jasper McKay.”

Voro watched Claudia get up and leave the bed, headed for the washroom. Morning sunlight was coming around the black-out blinds, and he could make out every luscious inch of her olive-toned skin. She walked slowly, probably knowing he was watching, but not embarrassed to be seen.

She was really starting to impress him. He rolled on to his back again, feeling incredibly relaxed considering she’d woken up ready for more of him, and for the last hour he’d been ridden better and more completely than any other time in his recent memory. She was fucking away pain, he could tell that, of course. But what would he do? Complain?

Then he felt the tingle of despair. While she’d slept she’d had nightmares of what she’d seen, and he’d been unable to avoid
sharing it with her. The living room, the blood, the body … his Portia. Broken beyond comprehension.

His chest ached again, right at its centre. He pushed away his chain until the pendant fell under his arm, and he rubbed the dip in his sternum, frowning in concern. He knew she’d suffered plenty. He could still almost feel and taste it. Something very evil had done all that to her. Something that he had to ease out of someone.

God, he didn’t want to do it, but now he had to. Or maybe he could just … hell no, he couldn’t do
that
. He couldn’t find the guy that did it and kill him
without
freeing that demon, could he?

Voro wanted to. He wanted to rid this place of that particular person
and
what had moved them to such brutality. For Portia.

That would not go over well with the Boss, though.

Whatever. The Boss was out to get him, too. May as well stick it to The Man before he fired your ass.

He yawned loudly, his jaw cracking, but he kept a hand to the centre of his chest.

“Heartburn?” Claudia guessed, climbing in beside him. He hadn’t even noticed she’d entered the room. That thought had him worried, but as she pressed up along his side and put her head to his chest he forgot about how he’d started to let his guard down around women now. Ironic, wasn’t it? A woman was being sent to trap him, and here he was, all warm and fuzzy with one.

“No, not heartburn. Exhaustion.”

She laughed, and her chest tickled his side.

“That’s too bad. I apologize.”

“Mmmm. No need. Any time.” He tilted his head so he could see some of her face. “You were much more … quiet. Just now. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t need you screaming from a mountaintop or anything.”

Claudia laughed again, and her nipples against his skin were driving him mad, not that he would have moved if the bed had been on fire. “Ummm … the other night we were a little loud. Iola heard us and we … we kept her up. She said.”

Voro smiled, letting himself chuckle. “Oh no. No wonder she couldn’t look me in the eye last night.”

“Yeah, about that. What were you two talking about while you were waiting for me?”

“We talked about you, actually. She told me she’d tear me limb from limb if I did wrong by you. And then I told her about how you liked to be on top most, and that you preferred a counter-clockwise twist on the left nipple but a clockwise twist on the right - ”

She gave him a jab to the ribs, and he made a sound like she’d actually hurt him. “I’ll show you a nipple twist,” she growled, straddling him and pushing his shoulders
into the mattress.

He was smiling up at her as she seemed to pause, her mind going elsewhere. She was thinking about Iola. How she was pretty sure that after him she wouldn’t want any other men, she’d be strictly women, but could she even be with Iola?

Voro’s cock stirred. He couldn’t help it. The thought of this gorgeous women so much as kissing the sweet Iola made him want to fuck anything with a hole. He made a low growl in the back of his throat, and she looked down at him, surprised.

He didn’t want her to stop that train of thought. He rolled her on to her back, mounting her again, to which she responded with a hot, heavy lip-lock. She was wishing she
could be him, just once, to see what it would be like to please Iola like this. Because Iola was straight, Iola wanted men.

Voro’s brain was firing like a rat bastard. He could do that. He could totally manipulate Claudia’s brain. He could cross wire her
into his brain, so she would feel what
he
was feeling. And if he imagined she was Iola …it was pretty damn close to the real thing.

Should
he even do that?

Yeah, because doing the right
thing at this stage of the game was going to win him brownie points with anyone.

Essum had Voro’s
frustro
in sight as she boarded the subway, oblivious to him, even though he’d been following her for two blocks. But then, he had some blockers up. Most humans wouldn’t see him, even if they stepped right through him. There was one crazy homeless man that had run from him screaming, but … well, people were used to seeing that from time to time. No one noticed.

But a
frustro
wasn’t entirely normal. He had to be careful around her.

She stood holding an overhead rail, reading a folded newspaper. She was oblivious to everyone around her, come to think of it. She barely noticed when, during a sudden
surge of movement, the man standing behind her overreacted to the train’s momentum shift and basically threw himself against her, totally getting a handful of her butt. He apologized in a way that indicated he knew he was wrong and she just smiled, looking back to her paper. But he was glowing like a frigging Jack O’Lantern.

Essum just shook his head, saddened that that little physical assault had actually been enough to make a guy’s day. Was no one aware of what they could accomplish if they had
real
power?

He was twitchy. Impatient, but that was nothing new. He needed Jasper to get up to speed quick. He didn’t want to give Voro any more time to figure out the holes in
Essum’s
laqeous
or
trap
explanation. He’d left a few things out, of course. As much as he and Voro might have been friends at one time … it was a
very
long time ago.

He wish he’d known as much as Voro knew back when he’d met Daphne. He would have done things so differently … like head for the hills on the fastest horse he could acquire. But that’s easy to say now, when the object of his insane infatuation was long dead, even her delicate bones likely faded to dust.