The Wolf Within (15 page)

He arched an eyebrow, looking amused. Except for his eyes. They stayed blank and empty. “You think you’re in a position to request a favor from me?”

“I think I’ve earned that much. After all, you’ve taken a lot from me already.”

“True.”

I held my breath as he pressed his hands together and stared at me. “All right, make your request. But be aware, I may choose not to grant it. And, if I choose not to do so, there may be consequences for asking.” As if to emphasize his point, the monitor flared back into life with a close-up of Bug’s face, looking old and drawn.

My throat dried. Was this worth the risk? My stomach twisted but it felt like now or never. I gulped. “I understand. This is my request. If I go along with what you want, if I don’t fight you, then whatever happens to me, I want my aunt to go free.”

Something that might have been surprise flickered in those dead eyes. “You would do anything I ask?”

I licked my lips, nodded. “Yes.”

“But you have no guarantee I would keep any agreement we might make.”

“I’m willing to take that chance.”

“Interesting.” He looked back at the monitor. “Humans never cease to surprise me.”

I wondered if he ever remembered that he’d been human once. Then again, given he’d been a psychopath or a sociopath back before he was turned, if the rumors were right, maybe he never had been. “Do we have an agreement?”

“Anything I want?” He smiled broadly, revealing his fangs, reminding me I was making a deal with the devil. “All right, Ms. Keenan, we have a deal. If you see this through to the end, your aunt will be freed.”

“Alive.”

He waved a hand as if that were a given.

“And not turned,” I added.

He frowned then nodded again. “Do not try my patience any further. Free. Alive. Still human. That is all.”

“Then we have an agreement.” I wondered if I was insane to speak the words but it was done. Bug would live. I had to believe in that. It might just help me survive too.

“Good. Take her back to her room. Then to the doctor.” Tate said.

Kyra hauled me to my feet and started hustling me out of the room. As we reached the door, Tate said, “Wait. I forgot something.”

All three of us turned back to him. He stalked across the room, stopping in front of me. He reached down and took my hand then raised it to his lips. His mouth was slightly open as he kissed my skin and I felt the brush of fangs and had to fight not to snatch my hand back.

“I will see you tonight, Ashley,” he said softly as he straightened.

My stomach flipped over and I was glad that Kyra’s hand was still tight around my arm. Otherwise I might just have crumpled to the floor again. What the hell had I gotten myself into?

Chapter Eleven

There’s nothing like an imminent date with a homicidal vampire to focus your mind on impending doom and make a day drag by. Turns out you can’t be terrified all the time. It comes and goes in waves. I alternated wildly between wanting to curl up and wait to die and thinking maybe I could get through it. Which was exhausting on top of the fear.

They left me alone, mostly. I was fed and taken briefly to the lab for more prodding by Smith, this time confined to taking measurements, peeing in a cup and only one more tube of blood. And another ‘vitamin’ injection. I tried to get a better look at the vial he used for the injection but his hand was in the way. Then it was back to my cell. More food only distracted me briefly.

So I had plenty of time to spend thinking I’d go crazy if I had to wait much longer, staring at the walls and trying not to think about what might be happening to Bug and what might be about to happen to me.

Then Kyra arrived with a garment bag and a scowl. She dumped the bag beside me on the bed and ordered me to be ready in half an hour.

Suddenly, the walls seemed fascinating.

Kyra left and I stared at the bag, wondering what exactly might be inside. “No time like the present,” I muttered and undid the zipper.

What lay inside was long, black and made of velvet. I rolled my eyes a little as I drew it out. Talk about your goth maiden’s delight dress.

But I wasn’t going to argue with Tate’s taste. If he wanted me to wear black velvet, I’d wear black velvet. I showered hastily then wriggled into the dress. Its shoulder straps were barely threads and the neckline just skimmed the tops of my breasts, leaving me all too aware my shoulders and neck were horribly bare. I felt like a piece of meat lying on display in a butcher’s window.

Prettily wrapped food.

Where was the chain mail collar when I needed it?

There was lipstick and eye make-up in the bag. I applied both, wincing a little at the bright red color against my bruised face. Red lipstick isn’t really my thing. And it didn’t go with the lovely purple bruising surrounding my right eye.

Apart from combing my hair there was nothing else I could do but wait and try to remember how to breathe each time fear tried to close my throat and crush my chest. Luckily it didn’t take long for Kyra to reappear.

Unfortunately Rio was with her.

His eyes lit up at the sight of me. “You clean up good, Pretty,” he said, prowling around me. “I’m looking forward to the boss being done with you.” His hand skimmed my butt and then snaked round my waist, pressing me back against him.

His erection pushed against me and I fought not to flinch away. I wasn’t going to let them see me freaking out. “What makes you think he’d give me to you?” I said coolly.

He growled softly in my ear, a grumbling, pure animal snarl. “Believe me, Pretty, by the time he’s done with you, you’ll be happy to come to me.”

Hopefully before anyone had time to be done with me, the cavalry would arrive. If they had to kill Rio and everyone else in the place in the process of rescuing Bug and me I wouldn’t be sorry.

“Don’t count on it.” I looked to where Kyra was leaning against the door watching us with a smile playing around her lips. “I don’t want to keep Tate waiting.”

“If you knew what was waiting for you, you wouldn’t be so eager,” Rio said but he let me go. “And remember, Pretty,” he added as I reached the relative safety of the corridor. “I owe you one.” His hand drifted over his stomach and down to the knife at his thigh. I hid my smile of satisfaction. Sure, being a were, he’d healed the damage I’d done but I’d managed to hurt the son of the bitch and, if he came near me again, I’d do my best to do even worse. Somehow.

“You like doing things the hard way, don’t you, Pretty?” Kyra commented as she shepherded me out of the room and into the seemingly never ending corridor. This time we went right at the junction, instead of left toward the lab. “Just remember, tonight, if he offers you an easy way then it would be smart to take it.”

I pretended not to hear her, schooling my face not to reveal the fear blurring my senses. I don’t know why I bothered. She could hear my heart thumping and no doubt could smell my panic as well. But not letting her see it made me feel better.

My small act of bravado lasted until we reached Tate’s room. I stepped over the threshold and stopped dead instinctively.

Everything about the room screamed danger.

Trap.

Flee.

The walls were painted a deep, dangerous red, which made the silver chains decorating one of them gleam starkly in the muted lights. There was a huge bed covered in some black fur against another wall. A rack of whips and various things I couldn’t name hung above it. And in the middle of the room was the most disturbing item at all.

I didn’t even know what you’d call it. A whipping post was the closest thing that came to mind but this was shaped more like a cross with upwards-slanted arms so it didn’t form a true crucifix. It dominated the room, looming like a malevolent black insect.

A man, or maybe a boy—I couldn’t see his face, just pale blond hair and a slender frame—hung from chains attached to the slanted arms, his feet not quite touching the ground. The muscles in his shoulders bulged unnaturally and bruises blossomed like rotten flowers all over his bare arms and legs. His back was a mass of raw bloody welts.

Tate stood behind him licking blood from those wounds. Naked. Blood spattered. A long whip dangling from his left hand. And, I saw as he turned at my indrawn breath, he was aroused. His erection rose long and thick between his legs and I backed up a step automatically. Only to bump against Rio and freeze again.

A dead smile, stained with blood, spread across Tate’s face. It turned me to ice, frozen in place like a mouse who senses a hawk high above ready to plummet, rend, and tear. Not breaking our gaze, Tate ran his forearm across his face, wiping most of the blood away. “Ashley,” he said as if we were standing somewhere perfectly normal instead of a chamber of horrors, “How nice to see you.”

Rio shoved me and I stumbled further into the room, almost tripping on the long skirt of the dress. Every nerve screamed at me to turn and run. Run for my life.

Tate stayed still, watching me intently. Then he reached out slowly and ran his fingers down the man’s back, drawing a pained moan from him. Then he licked his fingers clean of the blood. Slowly. Delicately. Like a cat cleaning its claws. “I thought you might like to see what happens to guests who aren’t cooperative.”

Not really
, I thought wildly. I wanted to close my eyes but I didn’t think Tate would like it.

“Pavel, here—” he reached out and yanked the man’s head back so I could see his face “—tried to escape.” He ran the whip up Pavel’s thigh.

I shuddered and Tate’s smile grew wider.

“He won’t try again. Will you, Pavel?”

“No, Master,” Pavel slurred through bruised looking lips. His eyes—I couldn’t tell what color they were in the dim light—fastened on Tate’s face like a dog watching its owner. Adoring. Mindless. Determined to please.

I shivered with revulsion. Tate had taken his mind. Pavel had probably enjoyed what Tate had done to him and might just willingly step up to the post again if Tate asked him to. He would probably even let Tate beat him to death.

I turned away. Only to be met by Kyra’s and Rio’s vicious grins.

“Not so pretty, is he?” Rio purred.

I wanted to faint. To black it all out.

Help me
, I screamed inside my head.

“I want you to remember Pavel,” Tate said, crossing the room to where a black marble vanity almost the size of a bathtub loomed against the wall. “Because if you disappoint me, your aunt could be the next one I play with.”

He washed his hands and face, and then pulled on a shirt and, I was relieved to see, trousers. “Take him away.”

Kyra and Rio obeyed silently, unlocking Pavel from his chains and dragging him out of the room. His eyes stayed on Tate the entire time, looking hurt.

I remained standing where I was, trying to control the tremors running through me. I wasn’t terribly successful.

“You look scared,” Tate said as he walked toward me.

“I am scared.”

“Don’t worry. I didn’t bring you here to teach you the same sort of lesson.”

I didn’t want to ask him what he had brought me here for. I no longer wanted to know.

“It’s fascinating to me,” Tate said. “What humans will do for love. I can hear your heart beating, do you know that?”

I nodded.

“It’s racing. I can hear how scared you are. And yet you stand there waiting. You don’t run. All because you don’t want me to hurt your aunt. Because of love.” He cocked his head to one side. “It’s really quite stupid of you.”

“You wouldn’t understand.”

“Wouldn’t I? Maybe you’re right. But it makes me wonder.”

I felt my pulse leap and catch. His purring tone did bad things to my nerve endings, grating like steel fingernails down a blackboard. But I stayed silent.

“I wonder exactly what you would do to save her from me.”

“I already said I’d do what you wanted.”

He walked back to the whipping post, eyes still fixed on mine. “Yes, but did you mean it? When faced with reality. With pain. Will you still be willing? Would you step up to the post and let me do to you what I did to Pavel? Without me thralling you?”

I had to swallow several times before I could speak. “Is that what you want?”

His eyes narrowed. “I’m still deciding what I want. But I want to know what you’d do. You interest me, Ashley. Most women would be begging by now.”

“Will begging do me any good?”

“Are you good at it?”

“I don’t know. I don’t usually beg.”

That made him smile again. I preferred the frowns.

“Something to remember. But we were discussing what you’d be willing to do to save your aunt. What would you do, Ashley? If I told you to take off your clothes, if I said lie down on the bed and spread your legs, would you let me fuck you?”

“I think the term you want is rape me.” As horrifying as the image was, I didn’t think Tate had brought me here for sex. Not when he’d made it so clear he didn’t fuck humans.

“Not if you consent.”

“Consent obtained under threat of torture and murder doesn’t count.”

“Brave words.” He picked up the whip from where it had fallen, moved closer. “You’re thinking I don’t sleep with humans, so you’re safe.”

Shit, was he reading my mind? Sometimes I thought Jase could. If Tate could I was really and truly screwed. “I don’t think safe applies in this situation.”

“Smart girl.” He ran the tip of the whip up my arm.

It felt damp and sticky and left a reddish smear. Pavel’s blood. Dizziness swept over me.

“I could just as easily tell you to strip and then let Rio fuck you. I know he’s keen to have some fun. You really shouldn’t have annoyed him.”

The thought of Rio raping me was slightly better than Tate. Somehow I managed to stay standing while Tate stroked the whip over my shoulder.

“Or I could ask Kyra to do the honors. She has all sorts of interesting proclivities. But she breaks her toys so easily.”

The whip brushed my face. It smelled like leather and sweat and something heavier. Blood maybe. I didn’t really know what blood smelled like. I didn’t want to find out. I jerked my head back. “If you wanted me raped, I’d be raped already. Why am I here?”