Vampire Heart Read online

  Much, he said in my head, and I slapped him even harder as punishment.

  “Did I say you could get into my head?” I shouted.

  Of course, that was how we stayed in tune with each other, how we felt what each other felt, and how we knew if we were taking our little games too far.

  “I’m sorry, master,” he said.

  His ass looked like a peach, rough, shiny, and definitely to be bruised, so I decided to continue his punishment in a more pleasurable way.

  “I hear you say sorry a lot, but I don’t think you mean it,” I said, pulling the zipper of my trousers down and pushing Caleb off me. “You need to shut up, and I’ve got just the right thing to make that happen.”

  Caleb had pulled my dick out of my boxers before I’d even finished my sentence, and he’d swallowed it whole. My breath caught. My heartbeat quickened. And the heat in my stomach spread to the rest of my body.

  “That’s it. Suck it, boy. Suck it till you choke,” I ordered him.

  This was so much better than training. Why did we have to spoil all the fun with spellcasting and bleeding and stupid crystals when we could be spending our time like this? This was my favorite part of the day. Because every day, one way or the other, we always ended up fucking or sucking.

  And, if I was being perfectly honest, the grungy warehouse, with all its rough surfaces, the misuse from years of squatting, the dirt and dust, made our sex even hotter. Like we were playing out a porn fantasy every day of our lives.

  Not that I had anything against our beds. On the contrary, the best sex we’d had was in our homes. But there was a certain kind of… aliveness to having sex in public places or in an abandoned, dirty-old house.

  Caleb gagged and tears streamed down his face before he released my cock, took some air, and then got back down to business.

  I bent over him and tickled his hole with my fingers, inserting them strategically one by one until all four fingers were stretching his sphincter, and he moaned with my dick in his mouth, giving me vibrations that made me lose my shit.

  Before I could control myself, my whole body spasmed, and he swallowed every drop of me.

  My muscles burned from being spent, and I had to catch my breath as Caleb licked every part of my length.

  Moments later, he stood over me with his own cock erect in front of my face and pressed his hips down to me so I had no option but to take his sweet cock into my mouth.

  He pushed himself all the way down until my nose touched his pubes and pounded into me. This was his revenge. I’d shown him who was boss, made him obey me, and now he was getting back at me, in the best way possible.

  I gagged and coughed, but he didn’t let me go. My left hand was still playing with his hole, but with my right one I patted his arm three times, as well as saying stop in his head, and he immediately pulled away from me.

  “Are you okay?” he asked me, the passion in his face replaced with worry in a split second.

  I coughed and cleared my throat before I sat back in the chair.

  “I’m fine. Now come for me, baby,” I told him, and he looked for approval again before we returned to our previous position with his dick in my mouth and him fucking it.

  “I’m close,” he panted.

  I slipped my fingers back into his hole, practically my entire fist, and pushed into it until he broke down in me and I swallowed his seed.

  He collapsed over me and we panted together, breathing together, our hearts beating to the same rhythm. This was how it was going to be now whether we liked it or not.

  “We need to get back to work,” Caleb mumbled on my neck.

  Planting a kiss on it, he sat on me and looked into my eyes.

  “Only if you promise to take it easy on me.”

  He sighed.

  “I promise. But there’s something you need to know.”.

  Finally, he was ready to share whatever was bothering him. I knew it wouldn’t take him long, but it bothered me that he couldn’t do it earlier.

  “Christian’s body is missing,” he said, and without even realizing the full extent of his words, I wished he hadn’t said anything.

  “He…he’s alive?”

  How could it be? That motherfucker should be dead. His body should be rotting for all eternity.

  “We don’t know. Ash told me yesterday. That’s why I’m worried the vampire attack from yesterday isn’t just a random incident.”

  Who knew what Christian was capable of? If he was alive, I wouldn’t have been surprised if he’d found a way to control me again. And this time he would stop at nothing to see me suffer. I was sure of it.

  “See, I told you they’d be—oh,” someone said behind us, and Caleb rushed off me and made himself decent again.

  “Sorry,” he said.

  I zipped my trousers and stood up to find Hew and Winston looking away from us.

  “Hey, guys,” I said. “We’re dressed now.”

  They both turned to us hesitantly, and when they saw that I was telling the truth, came closer.

  “Do we have to like knock before we come in?” Winston asked.

  “Or can we just agree you put a sock at the gate if you’re in here…canoodling?” Hew offered.

  Caleb rolled his eyes.

  “As if you’re any better. Fuck off,” he said.

  “What he said,” I agreed.

  “You’ve never walked in on us naked,” Hew said.

  “Yeah, that’s because he puts some extra disturbance magic around the place when you’re fucking,” I said and pointed at Winston.

  Not only was my brother able to cast spells with ease, but his power was of some use too. With his psychogeography, he could make any location have certain physical, emotional, or spiritual reactions on people, so he’d used it extensively to put wards around the warehouse so we didn’t attract attention coming and going from it and to get the squatters that had been loitering to fuck off. I didn’t even know the extent of his power, and he was still growing stronger. Unlike me.

  “What are you doing here anyway?” I asked.

  Winston raised an eyebrow and crossed his arms.

  “I’ve got a session with the guys in a few,” he said.

  “Oh,” I said.

  I was proud of my little brother and how far he’d come. He’d taken in all the witch hunters that had survived and made sure they kept fit so that they could offer their services to the witch and Nightcrawler community. He had made such a big change in his life since he’d discovered his witch powers and after the Tower Bridge incident, people seemed to have put his past as a witch hunter to the pits of their collective memory.

  “Have you told him yet?” Caleb asked.

  I threw a glance at him and shook my head.

  “Tell me what?” Winston asked.

  Caleb patted my arm.

  “You need to let him know,” he said and took Hew’s hand, leaving me alone with my brother.

  “Wh—what’s going on, big brother?” he asked.

  I didn’t know where to start. Did I tell him what happened to me last night or did I break the news about Christian? Should I tell him our father knew about us or that Mrs. Weatherby had been keeping watch on us our entire lives? Where should I begin?

  “So?” he insisted when I didn’t reply after a few seconds.

  It was clear my mind wasn’t going to sort itself out, so I just blurted out everything. I took it from the top, leaving practice with Caleb, the vampire attack that almost killed me. Mrs. Weatherby saving me. Telling me about Dad. Repeating some things word for word and skimming through others, the details of things I’d forgotten.

  Lastly, I told him about Christian. About his missing body and what that might mean. Only, I didn’t know what it meant, other than that it couldn’t possibly be good.

  “Fuck me sideways to Sunday,” he said once I’d finished.

  I grimaced.

  “Ew, I’d rather not. Little brother,” I said.

  He just stare
d at me emptily.

  “I remember her. Our nanny. I don’t remember her name—it’s definitely not Mrs. Weatherby—but I remembered her when Hew gave me back my memories. She was sweet. But our dad knew about us and never came for us?” he said.

  My body ached everywhere, whether from the mental workout Caleb had put me through or the stress of all the news, I didn’t know. I dropped back into the armchair and Winston stayed standing.

  “He never came back from his mission. He’s probably dead. That’s why he never came back,” I muttered under my breath.

  Did it matter? Would it have made a difference in our lives if he had come back for us? Would he have been able to save us? Would he have been able to save Mom?

  “What do you want to do about it?” he asked.

  I shrugged.

  “I wish I knew. Find out what happened to him maybe?”

  “What is that going to achieve?” Winston grimaced.

  Why was he being like this? I had just told him our tormentor was probably running loose around London, scheming against us, that our father hadn’t actually abandoned us, but had had a happy relationship with our mom, and there was a slight chance he was out there, and he was being so negative.

  “It’s not his fault we were cursed, you know,” I told him.

  “Well, maybe not. But if he’d been there for us, Mom wouldn’t have gone to Christian. He could have stopped her,”

  “You don’t know what happened back then.”

  “And you do?”

  “I don’t, but I want to find out,” I said, keeping my composure. Getting angry at him wouldn’t achieve anything.

  Winston turned his head to look at the empty space. I wanted to reach out to him and grab his hand, shake him, hug him, anything to help him feel better, more at peace with the news. But we weren’t there yet. We would be, eventually, but for now, all I could do was be there for him.

  “Where the hell is everyone? They’re fucking late,” he spat and avoided looking back at me.

  “Don’t write him off before you know the truth. For years, Christian and Mom had us thinking he’d abandoned us. Now we find out it might be a lie. Don’t we finally deserve the truth?” I asked.

  He raised his shoulders, his chest inflating, and held his breath for seconds, hours in my head, before he let it all out.

  “Fine. What do we do? Where do we start?”

  If only I knew. But I knew someone who probably did.

  Mother Red.

  I told Winston what I was thinking, and he finally turned to me.

  “She might know him or of him, or at the very least point us in the right direction,” I explained.

  “You,” he said and reached for my shoulder, “do that. I’ll catch up with you after practice. If those assholes decide to turn up.”

  With a pat and a look that was guiltier than a blushing virgin, he walked out of the warehouse in search of the people that used to be witch hunters.

  Despite his attitude, I was proud of him and all he had achieved. He had taken it upon himself to protect, train, educate, and re-purpose all of our old, surviving colleagues and use them to do some good in the witch and Nightcrawler community. None of it could ever make up for the witches we’d killed, but anything was better than nothing.

  “How did he take it?” Caleb asked from behind me, wrapping his arms around me and resting his hands on my chest.

  Where had he even come from? Had I been too lost inside my head again to notice time passing?

  “He’s fine with the Christian thing. But he’s not sure why I want to look for Wilder.”

  “Maybe there’s something that happened in the past which he now remembers and it’s making him reluctant. Or maybe you’re not the same people. I understand why. If I had any clue where my parents were or who they were, I’d drop everything to go look for them.”

  I turned around and placed my lips on his.

  “I love you, Caleb Carlyle. Have I told you that today?” I meant it too. With everything I had.

  He shook his head, pouting, and I playfully grabbed him by the throat and inserted my tongue in his mouth.

  “You’re such a tease,” I told him once I’d managed to pull away from him.

  “It’s in my blood. I can’t help it,” he said and jumped up on my hips. I grabbed his ass with both hands and held him onto me for dear life.

  “Do you think we have time before the blades arrive?” he asked.

  I rolled my eyes and huffed. “Don’t call them that. They’re not blades anymore.”

  “Whatever.” He chuckled.

  “They’re late. So maybe a quickie?”

  Instead of an answer, Caleb dove in for another kiss while I lowered him down to the armchair.

  “They do need a new name though,” he mumbled as I unzipped his trousers.

  Yes, they did. They needed a new name, Winston needed to pull his head out of his ass, and I needed to find what happened to our dad. And we all needed to figure out what the hell was going on with Christian.

  But for now, being in Caleb’s arms, that could wait.

  Four

  Caleb

  “I don’t understand why none of them showed up.” Winston sighed as we walked down the street, only a block away from the Crow.

  “Maybe they’re planning your surprise birthday party,” I said without much thought behind my words, but it made him wince and pause for a moment.

  We all stood around Winston and waited for him to catch on.

  “My birthday isn’t for another five months,” he finally said and Hew laughed, leaning in for a kiss. “Caleb, I love you and everything, but you’re an ass.”

  “Hey!” Wade protested.

  “What? He is,” Winston said.

  “I know that. Don’t tell my mate that you love him. You got your own to do that shit with,” Wade said and elbowed his brother in the ribs.

  Hands on hips and my head cocked to the side, I stared at Wade. “You’re going to pay for that later.”

  Hew opened his arms wide and gestured for all of us to get a move on, and so we did.

  The winter sky had gone all dark on us despite the early time, so it felt later than it actually was, which only served to put me into a bigger mood for booze. The rest certainly agreed, because Hew got beer—he usually drank wine—and Winston got us two rounds of shots of the vile stuff. You know. Tequila.

  We sat at the front on a table surrounded by soft seating and magical candles. The bar was still rather empty, but it would fill. It usually did as the night went on. Most Nightcrawlers lived vivaciously by the moonlight, whether they were sensitive to the sun or not.

  “Any progress with your spell casting?” Winston asked, taking a sip of his beer.

  “Next question,” was all Wade said.

  Winston’s eyes opened wide before grimacing.

  “Dude, what’s blocking you? You’ve been at it for a month. You should be an expert by now. It’s not that hard,” he said, and I couldn’t help the huff of air that escaped me.

  “Thanks for that,” I told him.

  Wade’s shoulders sagged, and I knew he’d take that as a hit, which would only make tomorrow’s practice even harder.

  “Maybe I’m just not meant to be casting spells,” he said under his breath.

  Hew’s hand rested on Winston’s shoulder before his mate said anything further.

  “Don’t listen to him, Wade. Everyone has different strengths. You’ll get there. You’ve got a great teacher,” Hew said.

  Wade reached out for my hand and gave it a squeeze.

  “I know. He’s great.”

  I just need to get my game on so I can protect you from those vampires. And myself, I heard him say in my head, and I felt the knot in his stomach.

  You don’t need to worry about me, I told him.

  Yeah, just need to worry about me, he replied.

  I turned to him, ready to tell him to shut up, to reassure him he’d be okay, but I didn’t get
a chance.

  “You guys, stop doing that. It’s creepy,” Winston said.

  Wade apologized and pulled his hand away from mine. It shouldn’t have made me feel like shit, but it did. I understood where Winston was coming from, but when we touched, things made sense. We could make sense of each other’s mess inside our heads. When we touched, that was truly when we became one.

  “I’m going to get us another round. Same again?” Winston asked, and he walked to the bar.

  Hew scooted closer to both of us and looked at Wade.

  “Don’t mind him. He can’t help what he blurts sometimes,” he said.

  Wade nodded in understanding but didn’t say anything. Nothing Hew, or I, or even Winston said could fix how he felt. How did you convince someone they’re not a failure when everything is pointing them to that direction? How did you tell someone that it’s okay to fail at something and still be good within yourself?

  Usually, in situations like that, going into someone’s head and reflecting their emotions could help gain some perspective. But in this instance, I couldn’t bring myself to do it. What if it made things worse? What if it weakened him?

  “How are things at the council?” Hew turned to me.

  It took me a moment to clear my head. The high council was the last thing on my mind right now. It shouldn’t have been, but I couldn’t help it.

  “Things are coming along slo—” I didn’t manage to finish my sentence. Because a group of guys crowded over us, making the light dimmer where we were sitting.

  We all turned our heads to look at the intrusion in our privacy and found the familiar face of Nolan, the alpha wolf that had helped us out at Tower Bridge.

  He was surrounded by his pack and none of them looked happy to see us. Had something happened? Had Winston done something to offend them? Or had we simply taken their spot at the bar and they weren’t too happy about it? Wolves were territorial as shit. I wouldn’t have blamed them if they were pissed with us.

  “Nolan!” I exclaimed and tried to avoid looking him straight in the eye, out of respect, but it was impossible if I was meant to have a normal conversation with him. That was the tricky part with wolves.