Enslaved (2 page)

She sighed and tried to go back to sleep, but the sounds of a servant girl asking for, “More!” and crying out in pain kept her in the agonizing realm of the living – and the dead. Tori wasn't sure why she kept herself here, alive, why she didn't just kill herself, maybe it was because she wanted to change Master Vince...to get her Vince back.

I need some air, she thought, as she felt as though all of her grief was smothering her.

Getting out of her bed, Tori moved towards her mirror. No other servant was allowed to have one, but Master Vince had bent the rules for her. She wasn't sure why he had as she looked herself over in the seeing glass.

Tori was
regaining some of the color back into her face. She noticed that the two red holes in her neck stood out in stark contrast to her fair hair, sallow flesh, and required slinky, black outfit. Slipping into her – also required – high-heels Tori left the room and headed for the gardens that no other servant dared enter.

They knew better than to go there during the night, for that was Master Vince's favorite resting place.

Tori didn't care that Vince resided there most of his time, she preferred the clean air and sharp chill of the night...it helped her think, reminisce, escape the present.

Down the hall a door closed softly, and upon turning, Tori saw that it was Vince's room a servant had exited, blood streaming down her throat from the two puncture wounds...

Sighing and shaking her head, Tori hurried off, not wanting to be called back to him if he saw her...If he wanted her.

Chapter 2

Tori always knew that she didn't have the best of luck in life, from Vince being adopted and changed, to Vince changing and
 
sucking the life out of her and finally landing on her mixed feelings for Vince. Her life had been no bed of roses.

She sighed and curled up on one of the stone benches out in the garden surrounded by black roses, her little
 
spot was located in the corner of the box-like area, out of view of the main doors on either side of the space. The night sky expanded over her like a dark cape while tall walls wrapped around the space between two parts of the Hotel.

Tori was staring at an onyx rose, pitying how those poor flowers had succumbed to the night's charm, all in efforts for her not to have a flash back into the past. She was so absorbed in trying not to think about Vince that her stupid bad luck decided to kick in. She didn't hear anyone enter the garden or slip up behind her until that smooth, rhythmical voice whispered at her ear.

"
Viktoria
, I told you to get some rest, darling. I do not think hanging around in the gardens is the best place for that." Vince breathed in her ear, his breath tickling the sensitive skin that was already very keen to the fact that he stood a mere foot from her curled-up body.

Slowly, she glanced over her shoulder, her blue eyes meeting scarlet ones, a tell-tale sign that he had just fed.

"I'm sorry, Master Vince." She said quietly, fearful that he would seize her by the shoulders and seduce her once more. Tori began to stand up when Vince's hand touched her shoulder.

She unthinkingly jumped away from his touch and saw the shocking expression of hurt flash across his pale, beautiful face. Tori closed her eyes tight, bracing
herself
for the slap that was sure to come, but it never did.

"I won't put you through anymore torture for the rest of this week,
Viktoria
," he said calmly, stuffing his hands into the pockets of his tailored black slacks.

Tori stared at him in disbelief, eyes roaming his figure to make sure he was fine, unconsciously committing every part of his anatomy to memory.

Vince was tall and lanky, yet had a strong build with broad shoulders, long legs, and muscled arms. He wore a crimson button-down shirt that was left open to reveal the sinuous, smooth planes of his chest and abs. His shoulder-length black hair was worn the way he had always worn it since childhood: slightly shaggy in a stylish way, strands of it falling in his eyes.

His eyes...they used to be a nice shade of green lined with long, dark, sweeping lashes that, before he had changed, would tickle her face whenever he gave her a hug. But now, his optics weren't pools of melted-down emeralds, they were lagoons of smoldering blood rimmed with luscious onyx grass that brushed the skin of her
neck whenever he fed from her.

"Please, Vince,” she muttered informally, “don't fool with my mind. I'm already messed up as it is." She flashed her eyes at him, and she crossed her arms over her chest. She knew that he understood the fact that she was blaming him.

Tori saw the shock run across his face when he caught the look of pure hatred printed clearly on her face from the way she quirked her pink lips to the way her eyes narrowed and
her nose scrunched up slightly.

"
Vik
-
Viktoria
, I'm not fooling you. I'm giving you some time to rest, build up more blood," he stammered, unusually flustered, the rare insight into how young he really
was, how young they both were.

She nodded, the movement sarcastic, as she stood. Her eyes were level with his lips...curvy, sundered lips begging to be kissed. Her own mouth got an odd itch to them as she licked them and looked up at Vince.

"I don't tr
ust you, Vince," she whispered.

"Then why are you still with me in the gardens...alone?" He purred back, his fingers running through her hair, giving her tingles from the root to the tip of
he
snow-white hairs.

Tori stuttered, but managed nothing coherent in response. "
Viktoria
, if I wanted to hurt you I would've already done it," Vince said serenely. "Yet, I haven't, now
have
I?" Tori helplessly shook her head.

"And if I wanted your blood again, I would've taken more earlier, now wouldn't I?" She nodded again, not trying to pull away as he wrapped his arms around her small waist.

"And if I wanted to kiss you, I would do it like this, right...?" His words were cut off as his lips came into contact with Tori's slightly parted ones. She felt his tongue caress her upper lip, felt his hands trail lower than her waist, sensed his disbelief when she kissed him back and slowly pulled away.

"No torture, right?" She sighed, her mouth just underneath his bottom lip as she spoke, head tilted back so she could stare him squarely in the eyes.

"No torture,
Viktoria
," he answered and froze completely when she rose on her tip-toes and kissed his cheek.

"I believe you now," she said quietly and ghosted away, leaving Vince stunned and confused...leaving him wanting more; knowing he couldn't have what he craved the most.

Chapter 3

Vince sat down on the bench
Viktoria
had just left, pleased that her scent could be found all over the carved block of stone. He watched as she walked off, and for the first time in the last year, his eyes weren't examining her rump. They were staring after her, and he was wondering what had just happened. His hand slowly moved to the warm spot on his cheek – the ghost of her lips lingering on his flesh.

He could hardly believe what had just happened, how she had reacted. Most servants would not have just kissed his cheek and walk away. They would not have just wanted the peck on the lips that he had given her. Why couldn't
Viktoria
be as willing as all the other servant girls? With a jolt he realized something that he already knew –
Viktoria
she wasn't like them, she didn't have a low self-esteem or unsatisfied longing
s like the rest of the humans.

He wished she did though. Any other servant would have wanted more than they could get, more than he was willing to give. With another a shock he came to the realization that he was in the same mind-frame as the
the
human girls...He got bits and pieces of
Viktoria's
attention, yet he wanted more. Vince wanted what was not in his reach, the one person he could not reclaim after what he had
– and is – putting her through.

He sighed, asking once again for the hund
redth time this year, why?

Why did he brin
g
Viktoria
back into his life?

Why had he awakened those lost...feelings?

Why?

Why?

Why?

Viktoria's
name was the one thing that made Vince restless, yearning...lustful. But with it inevitably came a torrent of memories, emotions, desires, and nightmares. Within seconds he was engulfed in a memory of the moment that had changed everything.
It had steered the both of them apart, made him a vampire, and her the oblivious human.

"Aren't you excited, Vince?"
Viktoria
asked, happily twirling around in the small room they shared while he sat back on his bed watching her. "We'll have
a family, parents
, maybe even brothers and sisters!”

She stopped spinning and looked at him with eyes as clear as a sunny day, alight with the rays of the sun and the light of joy. “Aren't you happy?" She wondered when he hadn't answered.

Viktoria's
brow furrowed when he looked away, avoiding her sensitive gaze. Vince could tell that
Viktoria
knew something was wrong, and before he could do anything she was climbing onto his bed and cuddling into his side.

"You're not happy,
Vincey
." She said definitively, using the name no one else dared to call him, the name he allowed her only to call him. It sounded right coming from this girl who he had known since birth. "Why?" She asked as his arm wrapped around her, stronger and more muscled tha
n any ten-year-
old's
should be.

"Because,
Viktoria
," he breathed, still looking at the ceiling, anything to make sure he didn't catch a glimpse of those eyes, the eyes that made him melt inside and do anything for her, the eyes that allowed
Viktoria
to wrap him around her little finger.

"Because why? Vince you're not telling me something." She said, sitting up, his arm falling away from her shoulders.

Frustration built up inside of Vince as he, too, sat up and glared harshly at
Viktoria
. "Because,
Viktoria
! You're not coming with me! The adopters only want one of us, they want me!" The moment he saw the hurt on her face, the betrayal and pain in her now stormy blue eyes, he wanted to take it all back, to lie to her just to make her happy. Just so she wouldn't look at him
like she had just killed her best friend, and if he looked at it from her point of view, he had indeed killed her best
friend,
he had taken away the only person who actually knew her.
..who actually cared about her.

But before he could get a word in edgewise she slid off the bed and ran out of the room...and out of his life.

Vince sighed, shaking his head to expel the dark memory that had murdered the old Vince. He re-hardened himself, fording himself to return to the cold, lustful Master Vince, to return to a powerful vampire who had control of all the vampires, controlled the humans, drank their blood, and looked at
Viktoria
like another one of his
whoreish
servants.