Terrorscape (31 page)

She woke late in the afternoon and was startled to
feel a heavy depression in the mattress beside her.
One of his denim-clad legs was bent at the knee and
he had his sketchpad propped up against his thigh.
His hair was mussed. Charcoal stained his hands, and
his face where he had touched his lower lip in silent
contemplation as he was doing now.

Val sat up, leaning over to see what he was
drawing. A rose, she saw. Dead, the petals worn
ragged with age and thin as parchment. His shading
was exquisite, and she half-wanted to reach out and
touch the edges to reassure herself it wasn't real.

He glanced at her, then let the sketchbook fall
open to another page. It was her—in bed, asleep. Her
first thought was that he had done it this morning, as
she slumbered, but then she looked at the date at the
bottom,
and
noticed
several
other
details
that
contested this. Shorter hair, a bruise long since faded.

“I drew that on the first night you came to me.”

The tiger lily, tangled in her hair. Crumpled basil
leaves trapped beneath the cage of her fingers on the
sheets. Rose petals and star-shaped jasmine.

He had employed the use of water colors to
highlight the vibrancy of the flowers. Her lips were
tinted a coral pink, as well as the tips of her breasts.
Everything else, he had left in black and white.

Images from freshman year, partially forgotten,
flooded back in horrific detail. Naked flesh, draped in
furs and silks and beads. Sexuality so overt that it
seemed almost bestial. She said, “That's sick.”

“What is art, if not an excuse to be adventurous?”

A lobotomy of the senses
, she thought.
Perceptions
culled and cut and displayed in cross-sections in a futile
attempt to portray the gestalt.

A cage wrought from artistic license—and lead.

 

▪▫▪▫▪▫▪

Mary had filed for a roommate transfer. Her
family would soon be coming for her things. The
three sisters, most likely. Angel, Cherry, and Flo.

How long ago that dinner seemed. There had still
been hope then. Distant, but gleaming. But not now.
Hope was dead now, buried with the other casualties
of this cruel and terrible game.

Everything we touch, we destroy
.

“That's not art.”
“Oh no?”

“No!” She lunged for the sketchbook, then, filled
with the irrepressible urge to shred the pages like a
child tearing the wings from a butterfly.

She
understood
the
reason
for
Mary's
withdrawal, but that did nothing to ease the slight.
Understanding did not provide solace or make
the pain go away; in many ways, understanding was
just
more
salt
in
the
emotional
wound.
Understanding inspired empathy, which led to guilt,
as well as suffering.
She looked up at Gavin, supine, unconcerned,
contented,
and
thought
that
perhaps
there
was
something to being a sociopath. If you didn't have a
heart, it couldn't be broken.
He returned her gaze, brazenly. “What is art?”

“Not that.” Jerking her head at his sketchbook.
“That's filth.”

“I disagree. One need only look at you,” he said,
“to see that you, my dear, are my greatest work. Your
body is my canvas, your mind my palette.”
“I'm not your
work
.”

“Oh, but you are. I created you. I made you into
what you are now—it's stunning.
You
are stunning.”
He pushed her back, leaning over her. “Such a
fascinating
blend
of
emotions.
I
repulse
you.
I
captivate you. And your very being captures the
essence of that struggle so beautifully. Yes, you are a
work of art.”

“When does it
end
?”

His smile was thin and knife-sharp. “When I
grow bored.” He paused and added deliberately, “Or
when you fall out of love with me. Neither seems very
likely to happen anytime soon, though, hmm?”

“I hate you.”
He laughed.
“No. I mean it. I hate you.”
He pushed her hand aside.

“Hatred is about possession. It is all-consuming,
cruel, and vainglorious. When love is allowed to
fester, it becomes twisted and corrupt; it settles deep
in the heart—” he drew the fabric back from her
shoulders “—and metastasizes, sending its dark roots
through the body to raze all that stands in its way.
Love is chaste and pure. Love is banal. No, hatred has
infinitely more possibilities.”

His mouth moved down the line of skin now
bared from neck to navel, and Val sucked in a breath,
her arms over her head, grasping, searching, reaching
desperately for something only just out of reach.

“This is how I kill you—capture—possession—
enjoying your beauty even as you begin to die inside
so very slowly.” His hands, at her hips, kneaded the
flesh. “And when you cease to amuse me—when your
leaves begin to wilt and your colors begin to fade—I
may very well decide to prune you, the way one
might deadhead a drooping rose.”

“You mean, you'll kill me.”

 

“Val.” Her skirt was sliding up her thighs. “Each
time you lie with me, I make you die a little death.”

She arched, bringing him up by the chin to kiss
him. He obliged her.
Just another game
. One game in a
long line of many, to be played in accordance with his
capricious whims.
He will be the death of me
.

“
La petite mort
.”
He smiled against her mouth. “If you insist.”

He will be the death of me. Unless—unless I am the
death of him
. Her fingers slipped beneath the pillow,
and he lowered his mouth to her breast. Val gasped,
fingers closing and convulsing around the smooth
plastic. When he shifted his weight, pausing to draw
breath, she said, urgently, “Gavin—”

He lifted his head, and she saw his pale eyes open
wide as she plunged the knife into his throat, into the
curled edges of the scar she had left over a year ago.

The
effect
was
instantaneous,
dramatic.
A
fountain of scarlet, crimson ribbons. Spatters of liquid
warmth at her face and breast. Each attempt to draw
breath resulted in a gargling sound and frothy
bubbles of blood. His hand at his neck, slipping,
smearing red down his bare chest like war paint.

She expected fear. Fear was more instinctual than
emotive; she had thought the prevailing fear of death
would override the scrambling cipher he possessed in
lieu of empathy.

Nothing.

The sketchbook had fallen back open to the rose
he had sketched only minutes before. The petals were
now dappled with and smeared by streaks and
spatters of blood.

Hatred. Slavish devotion
.
Art.
Or madness.

She could taste the blood in his mouth, see the
light fading from his eyes as she kissed him for the
last time. His body convulsed. She felt cold metal
between her ribs. He had managed to grasp the knife
with the hand not holding onto her throat.

I will destroy us both
.

 

He died, and as he fell, carved a gash that
pointed, arrow like, to her belly.

 

She waited until his lips were cold.

 

Then she got dressed and picked up the phone.

 

The end.

 

Forward

This erotic short story takes place in the same
world as my Horrorscape trilogy. Some people were
curious about Gavin's father, who is not really
mentioned in great detail in the storyline, and his
mother, who largely remains an enigma.

(I like enigmas! They don't require explanations!
Yes, I am lazy. I
am
a writer, after all. Just kidding—
but not really.)

There actually is a reason for that vagueness,
though, and if I ever get around to writing my spinoff standalone about Gavin's mum and dad, you will
see why. But just in case I don't—
THIS
.

I wrote this short for a small, private writingthemed group I was involved with for a while. It has
since disbanded but the friends I made through it
have not. There were several “hazing” rituals, and
one of them was an erotica writing challenge. Ex(xx)members of this group may well recognize this story
and giggle that they were the first to read my—well—
first
public
attempt at writing erotica.

Or, as they call it, porn.
Or, as I call it, my shamefest.

I hope you enjoy it. I'll be over in the corner. You
know. Cringing in embarrassment.

 

J'adoube

The scent of roses hung heavy in the air, though
no blossoms were to be seen in the dark loft. His
apartment loomed over the streets of Palma like some
large bird of prey, appropriately giving him a bird's
eye view of the neighborhood. Spain's major port city
was beautiful by night, the way the oceans reflected
the moon and the stars, but Anna Mecozzi could not
see them from Damían Álvarez's window. It mattered
not. Neither of them cared for such things.

His mouth was on her throat the moment the
door was closed. She felt his teeth close around the
diamond necklace she wore around her neck. Then he
kissed her mouth, and the sharp facets and metal
clasps cut almost as cruelly into her mouth as his
teeth. His hands found her ass and squeezed her
through the thin silk of her evening gown. “No
underwear,” he growled. “Bad girl.”

She bared her teeth at him. “You have no idea.”

That made him grin, and it was no less feral than
her own smile. “Why don't you show me, then?”
Anna grabbed him by his tie and shoved him
back against the wall of his foyer. He tried to kiss her
and she pulled her head back haughtily, giving him a
saucy smile as she ground her hips against the bulge
straining to break free from his pants. He tore at her
gown,
snapping
the
shoulder
strap
that
had
previously been fastened with a rather elegant swath
of silk shaped to look like a flower.
“Bastard,” she said, bucking against his hips with
enough force to make him gasp. “This was my
debutante gown. My fiance bought this for me in
Paris
.” Each word was punctuated by a jerk that had
him moaning lower and lower in his throat. “I'm
going to
kill
you.”

He laughed huskily, though his black eyes were
smoldering with lust. “Really?”

“Knife in your throat,” she hissed. “I'll drink your
Dago
blood like wine while I'm resting my feet on a
rug made from your worthless Spanish hide.”

“Before or after you fuck me?”
“During.”
“Good. I love foreplay.”

Damían tackled her and the two of them fell on
the floor. She scratched at him, hard enough to get
fuzz from his suit jacket beneath her nails. He yanked
her gown down to her waist. She ripped his shirt
open, causing buttons to scatter over his hardwood
floors. They went rolling into the living room, and she
slammed him into a table, causing a vase to shatter.

Anna ended up on top. She straddled his waist
and kissed him, unknotting the tie from around his
neck and sliding the silk over the tanned skin of his
throat before tossing it aside. He tilted his head back
and she ghosted the path the silk had taken, trailing
kisses down his muscular torso.

He had an incredible body. The first time she'd
seen
him,
he'd
been
in
a
tux.
His
frame
was
deceptively
lean,
and
she'd
heard
he
was
a
grandmaster, so Anna had automatically assumed he
was one of those bookish intellectuals her parents
were forever trying to marry her off with. But they
had never suggested
Damían Álvarez. Quite the
opposite, in fact.

This had aroused her curiosity…and other things.

Oh, but she soon found out why. Because at her
engagement party in Milan, he'd approached her,
danced with her, sweeping her across the floor with
the lightness of a summer zephyr, and as he bent in a
courtly fashion to kiss her hand at the end, he'd
murmured, “I have a proposition.”

“Oh?” she had said sweetly, pulling her hand out
of his.

“I bet you'll be in my bed before the end of the
night.”
She had tilted her head. “That's preposterous.”
“That's what they said about my using the Grob
opening during the tournament in Moscow. But I won
anyway. And I'll win you.”
And he'd been half-right. They hadn't done it in
his bed. They hadn't made it much farther than the
door before he tore her clothes off. So that was at least
two dresses the son of a bitch had destroyed so far.
She bit one of his nipples and heard him hiss.

Few men were capable of giving her what she
wanted. Damían Álvarez was the sole exception. He
was almost as fucked-up as she was. Perhaps more so.
Their chemistry was explosive and caustic, poisonous
to anyone else but themselves. He was perfectly
willing
to
try
anything
she
suggested:
except
submission. On that, Damían did not bend. He was
ever the master, never the slave.

Or so he thought.

She leered at him, with gray eyes as cold and
calm as a frozen lake, before moving lower, tugging
lightly at the hairs that trailed from his navel with her
teeth. She heard him inhale sharply as she prodded
him with her tongue through his pants and felt him
jerk against her mouth.

“Hypocrite,” she said.

 

“Whore,” he replied.

She clicked her tongue at him and yanked sharply
at his fly with her teeth. The button popped open, and
she yanked down the zipper hard enough to make
him arch his back and say, “Fuck.” He was already
hard, had been for quite a while, and she admired
him for a few seconds, just teasing him with her
breath. Then she let her tongue play over the
gleaming tip, savoring the salty, musky animal scent
of him, before taking him all the way into her mouth.
She let her teeth scrape against his shaft, just enough
to cause some mild discomfort, and felt him shudder.

Anna pulled back a little, and stroked his balls
while she kissed and licked the last few inches. She
loved the feel of him, iron sheathed in silk, with
tissue-thin skin covered in veins. As dark as he was,
his skin was almost as pale as hers here, except at the
tip, where it darkened to a deep rose.