Into the Darkness (6 page)

I parked in the space designated for my apartment
, waited for the monstrous man to unfold from the confines of my car, and beeped the alarm on. I turned toward home, so tired I could barely stand, needing sugar to cure the adrenaline crash and possible shock I was enduring.

“
Wait, one thing.”

I turned back. “What now?”

He surprised me with his proximity. Before I could blink, his hand was on my head.

I
awoke with a groggy head sometime in the mid-morning. I lay on top of the covers in my bed, wearing a black hoodie and dirty, spotted jeans. My left shoe was covered in a vile smelling brown sludge, as was my comforter under my foot.

I labored to sit up,
moving a hand up to my fuzzy head. I felt like I’d been drinking.

I thought back to the night before.
Then blinked in confusion. I couldn’t remember. Not last night, and not even the majority of yesterday. It was like huge pieces of my memory were wiped clean.

Sighing, struggling to remember what day it was,
I stared at my calendar, and then checked my clock. Red numbers read 7:35.

Why couldn’t I remember yesterday? Did Jared drug me for kicks or something?

A memory fluttered at the edge of consciousness. I grasped at it, catching nothing but stale air. My eyes glanced over my room, finding my purse on the ground by the door.

I never put my purse on the ground. I always put it on a chair or counter top to keep the bottom clean. I’m anal like that.

After a few moments of staring at it like a hog looking at a wristwatch, I lay back down and closed my eyes. I would skip first period.

Chapter Six

“Hey, whaddya doing?” Charles stepped forward with Jonas toward the apartment complex, reaching a hand out to stop his brother-at-arms. “We’re just supposed to watch and make sure he doesn’t go wandering around. We’re not supposed to go in.”

“The Boss doesn’t care about this weasel. He only cares about the girl. Let’s have some fun.”

“Okay, but, the girl likes this guy, so the Boss wants this guy safe.”

“He’ll be plenty safe. I’ll take him to Third Three. He’ll be fine.
Time of his life.” Jonas waited beside the door until a human, so unobservant it might as well have been blind, unlocked the apartment complex door and went through, completely missing their presence. Jonas stepped forward in a smooth, quick glide, catching the door before it clicked into its bed.

“This just isn’t a good idea,” Charles whined, following.

Jonas often pushed the envelope. His tastes generally bent toward pain, liking when his victims screamed and begged for their life. It wasn’t a perversion, per se, since being a hunter was in their genetic makeup, but it wasn’t exactly normal, either. The majority of their species leaned more toward wanton pleasure any way they could get it, with any one they could get it, pushed higher and harder with another willing participant. Oh sure, there were the dominance games, which could be fun, but all-in-all everyone was in it for a good time.

It was why Charles was supposed to keep an eye on Jonas
—make sure he didn’t do anything stupid. Terrible idea, obviously. Jonas was one of the best they had, brutal without mercy and extremely effective. Charles was an up-and-comer with a lot of potential.

Which meant he’d get his ass kicked if he got in Jonas’s way.

They made it silently up two flights of stairs and down the hall without anyone noticing. As Jonas waited outside the human’s door, he snickered. “It’s almost too easy. These humans don’t notice nothing.”

“That’s because they
don’t want to know what goes bump in the night when they’re safely behind their alarms and locks. That girl human does, though. She peeks right into the shadows and picks us out, remember? What’s with that? It creeps me out. We’re supposed to be the dominant species…”

“Shut up, I can hear him
coming. I don’t want him to scream before I can Dose him. That’ll just get messy.”

Jonas knocked quietly. They heard three footsteps before the door swung open, a chubby male with a shock of orange hair holding a candy bar staring at them with round eyes. “Hello?”

“Who are you?” Jonas asked in a low voice, stepping into the small apartment. Charles followed quickly, scanning the corridor to make sure they weren’t seen.

“Whu—” T
he male’s face went slack.

“That worked fast,” Charles noticed
, eyes dipping to this fellow’s stiffening dick. “He’s dim-witted, then? Is that why he succumbed so fast?”

Jonas stepped around the human male and walked to the back of the apartment in quick, smooth strides. “Some just have
less defense against it. Doesn’t have much to do with their I.Q. Some of the dumb ones can really give you problems.”

“Oh.” Charles stepped away from the kid’s groping hands. “No thanks, bro, you’re not my type. Sorry. We didn’t know anyone else was home.”

Jonas stepped out from the bedroom at the back of a frumpy apartment. “He’s not in his room.”

“Human male,” Charles spoke to the kid,
and then danced away from outstretched arms, “where’s your friend?”

“Roommate
!” Jonas yelled, stepping beside the male.

The kid turned to Jonas with huge eyes, his hands falling to his side. He started to tremble.

“Now, Jonas, bro, this isn’t the time for screaming,” Charles lectured. “You know what the Boss said; we’re supposed to keep a low profile tonight.”

“You nag.” Jonas tugged down his zipper, letting his pheromones change back to lustful coaxing. “Suck it in, Carrot Top, I ain’t got all day.”

The door handle of the front door jiggled just as Charles was about to complain again. The knob turned, revealing the tall, thin Jared they’d met a couple days ago. He was okay-looking for a human male, with a great suction in the kisser. Given a choice, though, Charles would much rather have a lady. Which was why he thought this was more or less a wasted trip. If they were going to bend the rules, he’d much rather head on down to the human girl’s house. That Sasha got him in all the right ways. She was a riot, too. Pretty cool for one of her kind.

“Ah, Jared
. Just in time.” Jonas slid his dick into Carrot Top’s mouth.

“What the—
?” Jared froze, stunned.

“Howdy partner, good to see ya again. Let’s go ahead and invite you inside, huh?” Charles ushered him in, hitting him with a good Dose of pheromones to loosen him up. Human males had the propensity to scream with their first experiences with other men. They really needed to relax and just let the good times happen.

Which was exactly what Charles was helping him do with the Dose.

“What’s happening?” Jared stared down at his roommate, currently taking Jonas’s dick in hungry, deep gulps.

Charles sighed, impatiently staring at Jonas. “C’mon, bro. Hurry this along. I’m getting a weird feeling we’re going to get caught.”

“The Boss is on the other side of the city. He’s dealing with a turf breach. We’re good. I’m… almost…” Jonas flexed, his hips jutting out.

Charles noticed two slim hands reaching for his crotch. He slapped them away and stepped toward the door. “I’m not in the mood, kid. Jonas, handle this guy, would ya?”

Jonas let out a low moan, coating Carrot Top in something that was irritating to get off. It was another reason Charles preferred the ladies—cleanup was much easier
when you were on the receiving end.

Breathless for a moment but not inactive, Jonas stepped for
ward and slipped a bag over Jared’s head. Before Charles could protest, Jonas had the kid’s hands bound behind his back and over a shoulder.

As they walked out the door, Charles asked, “Aren’t you going to mind wipe Carrot Top? I don’t think he’s gay. This will severely fuck with his head.”

“Human males should be more open. This’ll help him.”

All Charles could do was
shake his head. He had a really bad feeling about all this.

Chapter Seven

“Damn it!” I sat forward in the still room, silence wrapping me in a thick blanket. A moment of contemplation had me catapulting out of my bed and into some sweats. It was just after ten at night and I knew Jared would still be up.

“Think they can just keep sucking my brain out of my head, do they?” I jerked my hood over my head. “Well, joke’s on them—just like school, it doesn’t stick!”

I slipped into my tennis shoes and snatched my handbag. “I am going to give them a piece of my mind! Just as soon as I make sure Jared isn’t in some weird orgy!”

Just like the last time I spent a whole day with no recollection as to what happened the night before, I awoke remembering everything. Only this time, the recall was faster. It was as if my brain remembered the path out, and took it just as soon as my consciousness got out of the way.

I hesitated at the door for a brief second…then shrugged and grabbed my rape whistle off the table by the door. You just never knew.

I really needed to get a proper weapon…

Fifteen minutes later and I was knocking on Jared’s apartment door. It opened with a swirl of desperation, his red-headed roommate looking out at me, butt-ass naked.

“Uh…” I cleared my throat and stepped backward. “What, uh…what’s going on, Billy? You, uh…you’re naked…”

“I sucked a man’s dick!”

I’d been doing a lot of confused blinking in the last couple of days, and this was no exception. “That’s something. Is, uh, is Jared here?”

“Did you hear me? Why the fuck did I suck a man’s dick, Sasha? Am I gay?” Billy’s eyes were wild and unfocused. His cock was standing on end.

Suddenly I knew exactly what happened—two guys that liked to prey on straight boys had happened—and it wasn’t very nice to leave his memories intact. Poor Billy was scared out of his head, having known he liked girls his whole life and suddenly unsure; but unlike a drunken night of experimentation, he had been blind-sided. Unfortunately, I didn’t know how to talk him down, nor did I want to get any closer. Billy’s eyes were starting to lose their focus, sliding down my body in unmasked lust.

“I need to screw you,” he said immediately.

I took another step back. “Is Jared in there?”

“Nah, he got kidnapped. C’mon pretty pussy cat, I wanna pet you.”

“You need to stay in your house until this wears off, Billy. You’re dangerous.”

“I’m a thrill ride. Wanna ticket?”

Ugh!
I turned and ran down the hall, looking back before I hit the stairs to make sure Billy turned back into his house. Miracle of miracles, thankfully he did.

“Kidnapped?” I asked myself, knowing full well it was Charles and that other, scary guy.

Outside his apartment complex I slowed to a walk, thinking. How would I know where they took him? Because I had to get him back—that was a given. I could go back to that alleyway where those guys tended to pop up, but having been accosted by a homeless man, and met by crazy monsters that could spit out other, more colorful monsters, I wasn’t in a hurry to go alone.

I sank into the driver’s seat of my Firebird. Those guys must live somewhere. They may not be human, apparently, but everything needed a place to reside. So the question then became
: Where did they live?

Probably on the bad side of town, since the Boss referred to
it as his territory.

Suddenly
, in full action, I started my car and stepped on the gas. Some guy dove out of the way, groceries flying.

“Sorry!” I yelled out the window, berating myself for not looking first.

Speeding to my general destination, I couldn’t help but feel a hard pang of guilt. In the back of my head I knew, just
knew
, this had to do with my secret box. I’d finally found the things I’d been catching glimpses of my entire life (they were real!), and while a huge part of me was relieved I wasn’t crazy, Jared was somewhere right now probably thinking he was. My life had officially started to corrode him.

It was only a matter of time.

Slowing as I neared the old crash site from a couple of nights ago, I noticed the fresh scar on the tree. I kept driving, letting out the other contents of my secret box and grasping a really helpful little tool. I’d always thought of it as women’s intuition, just a lot more potent than other people’s. I could find a diamond earring on a soccer field after everyone else had looked all day and given up. I had feelings about pop quizzes. I could guess someone’s intentions a second before they acted on them. It wasn’t failsafe, and it didn’t always work, but when it did, miracles happened.

I needed a miracle right now.

In a weird kind of daze, I let my inner voice guide me, my arms dropping to the right on the steering wheel, then the left, taking turns until I slowed in the nicer part of town. Low and behold, looming up on the left, huge and brooding, was a freaking mansion! A fortress, more like, dominating the neighborhood with size and well… weirdness. It had gothic-looking spires and busts, three visible stories, and took up half a block. Oh yeah, and gargoyles huddled along the sweeping roof, snarling out at the street.

How had people not petitioned? How had I not heard of a relic from Ghostbusters? Where was the key master? All good questions
for yet another time; I had found the right place.

“Homey,” I muttered, taking in the dark brown paint with black trim.

A woman, moving as if made from silk, made her way down the sidewalk and turned onto the path to the front door. She was tall and lithe, beauty showcased in a shimmery, see-through gown.

“Yeah, this is the right place, all right.”

When had I taken up talking to myself?

I slipped out of my car silently and bush hopped until I was crouching next to the porch, watching the quiet street in the darkness. I had to assume that the other houses were owned by normal people, and normal people didn’t gallivant outside at midnight. That just left me with the non-normal people
who were definitely living, or at least residing, in this house.

I glanced at the door, shifting within my bush. I really didn’t want to go in and face the crazy. I hadn’t forgotten how large those guys had been, or Goddamn strong Charles was. I poked the guy in the eyeball and he just reached out to palm my breast, completely unconcerned! Who was I fooling? What help would I be trying to break Jared out of here?

I should call the cops. That’s what I should do. Report a kidnapping.

Except, these non-humans could apparently bend people to their will sexually. I had to imagine that crossed over into just influencing people,
period. These people could also somehow hide gothic castles within the city limits. Something told me cops would be ineffective. Plus, I’d been hiding my secrets for so long, I knew better than to stick my neck out. 

So
, hero it is. Ugh.

Steeling
my courage, I tiptoed out of the bush and scurried up the steps, pausing at the door. All was quiet. Fingers tingling, I turned the ornate handle and opened the door a crack, braced with flight in mind.

Silence.

The breath slowly exited my lungs.
Here we go.

I
peeped my head in, eyes scanning furiously for occupants.

My noisy inhale was not in the plans.

It was like I had just stepped into a rich person’s house in the early nineteen hundreds. The colors were lush wood and browns with pinky-purple velvet chairs and a marble fireplace. Large rugs adorned the floor and sweeping drapes styled the windows. It was an outer room, made for company and pleasant chatting, and completely clean—no mess, no dishes, and no clutter. If it wasn’t for the muted glow from electric lamps, I would’ve thought I jumped back in time.

Keeping to the sides, I edged my way deep into the room toward the back where there was a nondescript door almost blending into the wall. This was where my inner sense directed me, whispering that Jared lay deep in the heart of this place. He would be in a room with a lot of people, mindlessly held prisoner, entertaining a great many people as they, in turn, entertained him.

My stomach twisted, strengthening my resolve.

I scampered across the
spacious room and paused again, turning the handle slowly. Well-oiled hinges, thank God. Another old-timey room waited beyond, but this one was decorated like a study of some kind. A huge rack of books—the term bookcase was too small for this masterpiece—dominated the back wall. A couch and a few chairs were positioned near the middle of the room with a large, mahogany desk sitting against the other wall.

Empty.
Still lucky.

I once again
scurried through, trying to make absolutely no noise. At the other door, I paused to listen, my palm on the handle. It was here I heard murmuring through the heavy wood door.
Crap!

I bounced around like a spider, trying to figure out where to go. The voices got louder—
they’re coming this way!

My eyes dusted t
he sizable space, lingering on the desk. A few quick steps had me swiping a vicious-looking letter opener. It wasn’t a gun, but it was much more effective than a whistle.

Except they had huge swords.

I stuffed the pointy object in my pocket anyway—hopefully that didn’t come back to bite me if I fell—and thought about running toward the other door. Except they’d just follow me. Then where would I go, back to that bush? Counter-productive.

I closed my eyes, feeling that intuition pointing toward the wall behind the desk. I was there a second later, poking and prodding the thing, dancing like a child that had to pee, trying to figure out if it opened or my secret box was screwing with me.

“I don’t know why Jonas bothered to bring that little critter. He isn’t much fun. He hardly knows what he’s doing,” a woman whined as the door opened a crack.

Oh holy crap
!

I dove beneath the desk, bumping the chair out of the way, and tried to control my panting.

Two pairs of feet entered the room, a person with spikey red heels and black fishnet stockings, and a man with shiny black shoes and slacks. I could only see up to about their knees.

“It is always wise to either compliment, or ignore, items that Jonas finds interesting. He is not a male to trifle with.” The man was headed through the room, the woman on the far side from me.

Please don’t need to write a letter at this desk…

“I know. Pity. I had high hopes. He usually has better taste.”

I grimaced as the man chuckled. “I’m sure you can give him
a couple pointers when you get him alone.”

“He’s not the one I want to get alone…”

The heels stepped in front of the shiny shoes so their toes were almost touching. I heard a wet kiss, then the guy was shifting on his feet—he marginally spread his legs.

Seriously?
Did these people ever
do anything else besides have sex?

“Well, darling, I must leave you. We can finish this another time. I have a million things to do for the Boss and you know how I hate to keep him waiting.”

“Let’s be quick.”

The feet danced, one red heel stepping to the side of the man’s legs, one flying skyward and disappearing.

The sounds of kissing resumed, the feet starting to rock.

“One quick one before I leave, then,” the man murmured.

I nearly groaned in frustration.

The other heel disappeared
as shimmery red fabric pooled onto the floor. The shiny black shoes took a few quick steps away from me, two clothed butts landing on the couch in my line of sight. Fingers wearing red polish to match the shoes scrabbled at the man’s zipper, peeling his pants away to the side eagerly. I squeezed my eyes shut again, wanting to hum in order to drown out the moans and heavy breathing.

“Lick me, Rupert,” the woman purred.

Oh come on—you don’t need foreplay!

I peeked an eye open in gross fascination, seeing a man’s hand rub down the woman’s thigh and across her panty-covered sex. His fingers rubbed up and down the middle, scratching at her clit, making her moan and gyrate her hips up to him.

“I hope you aren’t too partial to these tights,” he said in a low, husky voice. With two hands
, he ripped the tights parting in her crease. His fingers snaked under the edge of the red panties—the woman knew how to match her accessories—and stripped the material away. He bent to her glistening sex immediately, licking up the center with a greedy tongue.

“Oh Rupert,
yes!”
she sighed, pushing her hips into his face.

I couldn’t look away. They had so much passion and fire, desperate for each other. It was strangely arousing watching it happen.

So great, now I could add peeping Tom to my list of accolades.

“Mmmmm,” the man moaned, climbing up her body. He grabbed his sizable erection at the base and threaded it into her.