Trueblood 01-The-Consolation-Prize (7 page)

Her lilting voice made his heart sing. Luka opened his mouth and smiled. It didn’t have quite the effect he’d intended.

She fainted.

“Rufus, you don’t know your own strength. There’s no need to hurt her.”

“Look, princess, she could easily call the emergency services, but if she does it will wreck
everything.”

“She needs to work this out for herself.”

“Well, thanks for that, Angel. When did you lift a hoof to do anything?”

“Guys, concentrate on the matter in hand. Our girl has fainted.”

Chloe’s head hurt. Something was in there, trying to batter its way out. Her brain? She groaned.

What happened? Why was she lying on the floor?
Oh yes
. She sat upright.

“Are you all right?” Mr. Freak asked.

Scuttling backwards across the stone slabs like a confused crab, Chloe finally hit the opposite wall with a clunk and came to a reluctant halt.
Oh God. Shit. Fuck. Bugger
. She wanted to get up and run but doubted her legs would hold her. Then common sense tweaked her ear, hard, and she calmed down.

There were no such things as vampires, and in any case, the guy was chained up. If he could have gotten free, he would have. So she was safe and he was an idiot who’d persuaded a dentist to file his teeth.

“You fainted.”

Breathe deep. Exhale
.

“My fault,” he said. “Sorry.”

She forced herself to look at him.

“I speak English. You don’t have to bother with the Russian swear words.”

Her heart juddered in her chest trying to regain an elusive rhythm.

“Christ, you think you’re a vampire too,” she whispered.

He screwed up his face, opened his mouth, and then closed it again. No sign of fangs. Maybe she’d imagined it.

“Vampires don’t exist,” she muttered, as much to herself as to him.

He gave a quiet cough. “How’s your head? That was a spectacular faint.”

Chloe lifted her hand to the back of her head and felt the rounded lump.
Oh, wet
. She looked at her fingers smeared with blood and heard a loud groan from the other side of the room. Forget her injury, he needed help. She pushed herself upright but stayed where she was.

“Please wash the blood off your hand.”

Chloe swilled her fingers under the tap. She took a deep breath before she returned to stand in front of him.

“Not scared of me anymore?” he asked.

“I guess if you could escape, you would have. But then, if you’re playing a game, maybe you don’t want to get free.”

The teeth had to be fake. She couldn’t see them now. She’d obviously stumbled into some weird club for freaky people who liked to pretend they were vampires and licked blood off guys in chains. Helen was a bitch for sending her here. She must have known.
Oh God, maybe she was a
member?

“Were you role-playing and it went too far? Did you forget your safe word?” Chloe asked. “Shall I try and help you remember it?”

“You think this is a game?” he snapped.

“Well, yes.”

He stared straight at her. “I am not here because I want to be. I was injected with…some…drug, kidnapped and brought here against my will. When I do get free, those responsible will very much regret what they’ve done. But if any of them decide they don’t wish to continue and prefer to free me, then I’d be eternally grateful.”

She glared at him. “Don’t take that tone with me. You’re talking as though you think I had something to do with this. I’m trying to help you, Luka.”

His mouth tightened. “You know my name. You
are
with them.”

Chloe rolled her eyes. “No, I’m not. Your clothes are in the wardrobe. I found a business card in your pocket with your name and I heard them call you Luka.”

He continued to stare at her. “Tell the truth.”

“It
is
the truth.”

“What’s your name?”

“Chloe.”

He gave a deep sigh.

She didn’t want to be cross with him.

“Is there anything I can do to stop you bleeding?” Despite her efforts, blood still trickled down his skin, thin red rivulets linking in a grotesque spider’s web. She rubbed the itch on her arm.

“If it’s not a game --” she began. He glared at her and Chloe winced. “Then what are you doing in here? Why are they torturing you?”

“You were watching.” He gave her an accusing stare.

Chloe shifted uncomfortably. “Well --”

“You enjoy watching the infliction of pain? You think the siltrane was fun for me?”

She stepped back as he snarled, even though he couldn’t reach her.

“No. What the hell’s a siltrane? Look, I’m trying to help you. If you want to get free, we need to work together.”

“How did you watch without them seeing?”

Chloe hesitated but if she managed to get him loose, the secret corridors would be his route to freedom.

“This building has passageways hidden in the walls. There happens to be an access point in my room and another in here.”

“And you know this, how?”

She heard the disbelief in his voice and bristled. “I used to live here.”

“What is this place?”

“Washburn Hall. It was my home and now it’s the Sunset Spa.”

He smiled. “What are you doing in a spa for vampires?”

Chloe groaned. He said this wasn’t a game, yet he was still pretending to be vampire like the others. Everyone in the place must be in on it. It made sense now: the treatments through the night, the receptionist aghast she’d turned up in daylight, horrified she wanted to go out in the sun. What a load of weirdos.

“Well?” he asked.

“I won four days here as a consolation prize,” Chloe said. “How about you?”

“I think I’m lined up as one of the treatments.”

Luka had half-changed his mind about Chloe. He saw neither guile nor treachery in those big green eyes, only innocence. She didn’t believe he was a vampire. She didn’t believe in vampires -- period. He winced as she rubbed cream on his cuts.

“They want you as a treatment? What sort of treatment?” She pursed her lips into a shape that made him think about shoving his dick between them.
Christ
.

“They want me to fuck them, act as a stud. I don’t want to.”

She blushed and he felt his cock twitch. Blushing was impossible to fake.

“Why do they want you to do that?” she blurted and then cringed. “Sorry. I mean I’m sure you’re great at it. I mean you’ve got the equip -- um…why do they need to force you?” She gulped.

“God, it’s rape.”

“It would be if they succeeded, but I don’t intend to let them. I won’t let them make me come.”

He wondered why he felt the need to make her understand that.

“Why you?” Chloe asked.

Luka bristled.

“Sorry again. Nothing wrong with you. You’re really…er…” She waved her arms as though she was trying to scoop a word out of mid air.

“Unless you accept I’m a vampire, you’re not going to believe what I tell you.”

“Pretend I do.”

Luka bit back a smile. “My ancestors are descendants of the original vampire family.”

Chloe grinned. “You mean like Lestat and Dracula?”

Luka curled his lip. “Neither of them existed. Both are figments of their creators’ imagination.”

Though he had to admit their creators danced close to the edge of the truth. “You look disappointed.”
And amused
.

“A bit. I always wanted to meet Lestat. Such a sexy guy.”

Luka felt a ripple of something he thought might be hope.

“The women you saw in here want me to get them pregnant.”

“Vampires can’t get pregnant.”

She sounded so sure for someone who moments ago hadn’t believed in vampires, maybe still didn’t, that Luka wanted to roar with laughter. “And how do you know that?”

“I’ve seen the films and I’ve read the books.”

He smiled. “You think if you wear a cross you’ll be safe. If you eat garlic I won’t touch you, and that holy water will burn me?”

“And you can turn into a bat, disappear into thin air, and you’re brilliant in bed.”

Luka chuckled. “One out of those three.”

She blushed again and he wanted to kiss her flushed cheeks, hold her face to his chest, and let it warm his undead heart. The pain of being unable to touch her was becoming greater than that from the chains.

“So what’s the problem?” Chloe asked. “Why can’t you just give them what they want? It’s only sex, right?”

“Because the price for fucking them is my life.”

In theory, every hundred years Luka was allowed to apply to the Council for permission to father a child. Permission was rarely given and those who applied tended to disappear. So sensible Truebloods stayed out of sight, didn’t apply, and only occasionally risked having a child who they then had to keep very quiet.

“I don’t understand,” Chloe said.

“Notwithstanding accidents, vampires live forever. Our progeny would exist forever too, which would make the particular clan I belong to very strong. That was the way it was for a long time.

We were the vampire royal family until action was taken to eliminate us. The Council won’t let us rise again.”

“So you’re in hiding?”

“My clan went underground over two hundred years ago when the Council acquired a new leader.” Luka had once been a prince; now he didn’t even have a family. “A handful of my kind who can make a vampire pregnant are in hiding until the Council leader changes.”

“Except someone’s found you.”

“Yes.”

“Won’t the females be in trouble too, if you get them pregnant?”

Luka had wondered about that. There was something here he wasn’t getting.

“Six months ago, the Council passed a law allowing Truebloods to sire one child in this particular year. Only one or the punishment is death. For the male, not the female. I thought it was just a trick to draw us out. Now I’m not sure. Maybe they want our offspring for some experiment.”

The only trouble with that scenario was that he remained unconvinced that Eve and Krista worked for the Council, and even if they did, they couldn’t each have a child.

“Perhaps someone in the Council decided they wanted a child.”

She was smart as well as cute.

“What are they going to do to you?” Chloe asked in a quiet voice.

Luka sighed. “Keep trying to seduce me by whatever means they can.”

“And if they fail?”

“Probably kill me.”

Chloe gasped. “Is there anyone I can call who can help you? I’m not strong enough to cut you free, but maybe you know someone who could snap these weird chains. Give me a number or tell me where to go.”

Luka stiffened. “Oh, that was clever. To think I almost fell for it. You want me to offer a way to contact another like me? I don’t think so.”

In the unrest that led to the appointment of the current Council, Luka’s clan had been hunted down and slaughtered. His father had ordered the family to split up, scatter around the country, change their names, and have no further communication with each other, not even mind links.

Luka didn’t know where his family was. He’d never tried to contact any of them, yet held on to the hope that he could if he needed to.

Chloe’s shoulders slumped. “You don’t trust me. Okay. I’ll figure out a way to help you on my own. I suppose you don’t want the sandwiches or the chocolate I’ve brought. You only drink blood.”

He heard the sarcasm in her voice and knew that she still didn’t believe him.

Chloe shot him a look of disappointment. “For your information, this is a stupid game. I’ve gone along with what you’ve said, but you must think I’m as crazy as you if you expect me to believe you. I can see what’s happened here. This is one of those role-playing clubs, like the history enactment societies, only instead of pretending to be Roundheads and Cavaliers in the Civil War, you lot are pretending to be vampires. Now things have gotten complicated and you’re in over your head. Why can’t you just admit it? I’ve tried to help you. I’ve spent money trying to help you. Seems some people just don’t want to be helped.”

She backed away, picked up her things, and then turned and pulled the lever to open the wall.

Luka watched as she crawled through. She didn’t say good-bye. He started to tell her to wait and then changed his mind. The hole closed up and he had a feeling he’d just made a bad mistake.

Luka knew they were coming before they entered the room. This time the pair wore white toweling robes with the words “Sunset Spa” embroidered on the front. So Chloe had been telling the truth about that at least. The robes were off before he could blink.

“Why is your body clean?” Eve demanded. “What happened to the blood?”

“I licked it off,” Luka said. “I have a long tongue and I’m very flexible.”

Krista giggled and put her head close to his. “Show me.”

Luka wished his tongue was hard enough to jab her between the eyes and knock her out. He looked up as the door opened again. Simon, the floppy-haired guy from the club walked in and winked. Luka sucked in his cheeks. So the whole thing with the little bastard had been a set up.

“Put on those gloves and then get him on the bed,” Eve ordered. “He’s weak but not powerless.

Be careful.”

But Luka was powerless. His frailty alarmed him. He tried to struggle as the restraints were removed and his legs buckled. In places the chain had to be ripped out of his skin, blood spurted, and he howled. Within moments, he was fastened again, this time with his ankles and wrists secured to each corner of the frame so he lay spread-eagled. Krista pushed a pillow under his head and stood back. Luka’s anxiety level went up another hundred points.

“Get on with it, Simon,” Eve said.

The blond guy turned and glared. “I’m not a performing monkey.”

“Forget we’re here.” Krista flipped her hand in a dismissive gesture.

Simon peeled off his T-shirt and unzipped his jeans. He wore no underpants. His cock was already full and hard. He was a big guy. Luka gulped. The female vamps moved a little closer.

Simon knelt on the end of the bed, ran his hands up Luka’s thighs, and then licked the blood off his fingers one by one. He lowered his mouth towards Luka’s dick.