Enslaved (3 page)

Too bad the later would prove to be easier said than done.

Chapter 4

Vince left the spot he had been sitting in after two hours of brooding. Despite the fact that he wanted to return to his "normal" self he still needed to see her. He was like a crack addict, and
Viktoria
was the drug that h
e needed to survive the night.

He could tell she was asleep judging by the sound of her slow, even breathing. Quietly, he eased the door open, shocked to see that
Viktoria's
chamber was so dark, darker than any other servant's room. He shook his head, closing the door behind him. He needed to understand that she was like no other servant girl, she was different, unique,
she
was
Viktoria
Cabot. Silently, he moved to the bed where her body laid curled up just like it always, and watched her while she slumbered.

Vince squatted by her bed, brushing away the strand of paper-white hair that had fallen into her face and eyed this beautiful human who didn't deserve to be treated the way she was. But it was her life now,
she wasn't leaving the Hotel.

It was against the Vampire Code. If a human finds out about The Secret than they either needed to be killed on the spot or condemned to a life as a human slave. Vince couldn't kill this angel, so he did the next best thing, he kept her alive,
even
though he knew that she would be better off dead.

Sighing quietly, he gently caressed her cheek, his touch lighter than a whisper. Her eyelids fluttered for a moment before her delicate hand reached up and grasped his, unconsciously drawing it to her waist, her fingers lacing with his.

Vince couldn't help his suddenly rapid breathing, or the way that his face burned as
Viktoria
unknowlingly
drew him to her. He could not stop himself as slipped onto her bed, meeting her gaze when her eyes fluttered open once more.

"
Vincey
?"
She whispered dreamily as if they were back in that bland bedroom, her cuddled under his arm, quizzing him about what had him saddened.

"Yeah, I'm here,
Viktoria
. Sleep now," he said quietly, rubbing her cheek with his thumb until her eyelids fell over her blue eyes and she was still again.

Vince brushed his lips against her parted ones before slipping out of her grasp and exiting the room, dazed and longing for the past like never before. Wordlessly, he trailed hazily to his room and fell onto his bed, unaware of the eyes that had been watching him from the shadows.

* * *

Jon knew it! He knew it, he was now positive that Master Vince was attached to that human. Why else would he enter her room while she slept? He knew his brother well enough to know his routine, and going to a servant's room was not a part of it.

Jon welcomed the broad smile on his face, he would've cackled with joy if his windpipe wasn't in the process of mending itself. Sighing, he skulked back into his room, a spasm of pain slitting through his throat as another part of his windpipe stitched together. He let out a low growl that sounded like a distorted gurgle of agony.

Slipping up the stairs to the third floor where all the other vampires were staying at the moment, Jon went to his own chambers to think. Once there he sat down on his bed and smirked to himself. The Guardians of Death didn't allow vampire-human relationships. If they did than the world would be littered with hybrids. They allowed vampires to be entertained by humans, to keep them as house pets, but as mates? That was illegal unless the vampire in the relationship changed the human before the Guardians found out.

But how could Jon get rid of his unwanted brother permanently? He had tried dozens times since he had been adopted, but Vince had always been the smarter of the two. Jon was cunning, but Vince could easily outwit him in his sleep. Look at the Hotel!

It was illegal to have more than twenty vampires in one area and Vince housed sixty-two – all at once, keeping them at bay, breaking up fights, feeding them. And the most impressive part was
,
Vince charmed all the Guardians when they did the routine check-up on him.

Vince didn't act like a twenty-year-old vampire,
no,
he acted like a hundred-and-fifty year old Wise One. And in order to get Vince removed permanently Jon would have to act like Vince – at whatever the cost.

Jon sighed and fell back against his sheets. He wasn't just mad at his step-brother for not allowing him to feed, no, he was aggravated because Vince had stolen his spot in their parents' eyes. Before Vince was adopted, Jon had been the apple of their eyes. Now...now he was just a piece of trash compared to Vince. But how could he make that all change?

The Gathering! He thought happily. This year their parents were to be the hosts of the Vampire Gathering, when vampires from all over met at this Hotel with the Guardians in order to discus issues in the vampire society.

If Jon could catch Vince in the heat of his affections towards the girl, then Vince's world would be smashed into oblivion. Jon had a month to get everything in order while his brother tried to organize the Hotel for the meeting. It was perfect.

Unthinkingly, Jon began to laugh – and in the process, choked, coughed, and then gagged. Stupid windpipe, he thought, and went off to look for a servant girl

Chapter
5

As the sun rose high into the sky over the Rocky Mountains, and so did Tori, from her bed, that is. She knew that it was sunrise, and didn't want to awaken, but she had to in order to prepare the vampires' meals; it was her day to prepare breakfast. They, too worked on a human's schedule, but the only reason they did so was because when humans
awoke they were “
more tasty
.”

But at night, the vampires were more powerful,
more thirsty
. The only time the vampires actually did sleep was during twilight, when it was neither day nor night, the time when they were neither weak nor strong.

Tori went through her routines, brushing her teeth, doing her make-up, brushing her hair and pinning it up in an exotic way that she only dared to wear, for it made her more...attractive if she did. But the other vampires knew she was Vince's property, so they looked and taunted, but never touched. She slipped into her "uniform" and heels before heading for the kitchen.

Maria greeted her at the stove, handing her a carton of blood and raw stakes. "You just need to heat those up," she pointed to the
meat,"and
set up the drinks."

Tori nodded, dumping the bowl of steaks into a frying pan, flipping them around until, while the outer layer was a cooked pinkish-brown complexion, the inside was rare, and sopping wet with animal blood. She then put them on plates and headed for the dinning room with its fifty yard long table, crafted chairs, crimson walls and blacked out windows.

Servants, comprised of both men and woman were bustling about, setting up the plates, the napkins, the silver wear,
the
works.

Vampires began pouring in, their stride saying they were alert and hungry, but their crimson eyes telling you differently. They took their seats in their usual places and conversed, argued, hissed, and screamed at each other.
But once Master Vince and Master Jon waltzed into the room the animal-like behavior eased – slightly.

Tori was bending over the table, placing three stakes on one male vampire's plate when she felt a pinch on her bottom. She jumped and nearly dumped the food onto the immaculate white table cloth.

She turned around sharply while Vince let out a low, warning growl to....Jon had pinched her rump? Shocked, she slowly backed away from the handsome blond vampire as Vince switched his blazing gaze towards his brother. Jon was smirking slyly at Vince, while Vince...well the head vampire just looked enraged.

Tori shook
herself
mentally and moved along, placing steaks onto plates then filling up glasses halfway with day-old blood. They would be getting fresher drinks when they were finished with their meals.

Following routine, Tori made her way back to the kitchen, looking over her shoulder subtly at Vince who met her gaze with no emotion. Something was wrong, she knew it. It was in the way Vince's jaw muscle twitched, the way his eyes went from hungry to cold and reserved. They reminded her of the day that...

Tori leaned against the kitchen counter and thought back to when one of the boys in the foster home would pick on her, she recalled the fraction of a moment when Vince would change from a quiet ten-year-old boy into, well, something nearly as dangerous as what he was now.

The bell every vampire carried around was chimed and, in a single-file line, the servants strode out of the kitchen and to their designated vampire, the one that liked that servant's blood the most, except today, all hell broke loose with three words.

"I want her," Jon murmured, crossing his arms over his chest and smirking at Vince when Tori had moved to his side, Vince moving a protective arm around Tori's shoulder.

"Why a change in taste, brother?"
Vince inquired in that chillingly steely tone, his arm sliding to her waist and tightening ever so s
lightly

"I don't know, I guess it's one of those days. Do you have a problem with this...change in taste?" There was a challenging air to Jon's smooth voice- Tori didn't like where this was going. Vince glared at his brother for a prolonged moment while everyone else in the room held their breath. Vince slid his scarlet gaze over to Tori.

"What do you think,
Viktoria
?" He asked quietly.

Tori felt all the eyes in the room slice towards her, she knew every vampire's eyebrow was raised with intrigue and she knew that she wasn't going to get out of this easily. When a vampire challenges another of its kind in a territorial demur, than it was bound to end with one of the two's head being ripped from that vampire's shoulders. But everyone in the dinning room knew that this wasn't a usual confrontation, a vampire didn't usually ask the craved item what they thought!

Panicked and hiding it well, Tori bowed her head so her hair hung around her face like a curtain. She answered quietly and politely, "It does not matter to me, Master."

Visibly clenching his teeth, Vince ground out, "Let this blood-trade only last for this meal, brother,
she
is mine." He made it very clear that Tori was not to be shared as she made her way over to the blond one and Maria, Jon's usual choice, glided nervously towards Vince.

"Begin feeding," Vince ordered.

Tori was cautious as she sat on Jon's lap and stared into his fiendishly smiling crimson eyes, he was up to something, she could tell....she promised herself right then that she would find out what he was planning, even if it killed her.

So, brushing her hair away from her throat, ignoring Vince's eyes that bore holes into her neck, she bared her jugular. Tori expected the usual sharp jab of pain and then the bliss of being fed from....but she wasn't prepared for what was going to happen next.

Chapter 6

The pain was so intense that Tori knew right away that Jon was purposely creating her
agony,
she had tried the best she could to keep in the shriek of torture that achingly clawed its way up her throat. Every time she swallowed back the cry, Jon would push harder...and finally, it was too much.

The scream bounced off the walls, causing everyone but Jon to
stop sucking at their servant.

"No! No, stop, please!" Tori whispered, gasping as she repeated and repeated those simple words. She shrieked again, her body going numb, pins and needles racing up her arms, legs, neck, and face.