Sips of Blood (30 page)

She pulled her mouth away from his.

"What the hell are you doing?"

David's soft voice hushed her.

"I want to pleasure you the way no one else
has. Let me cater to your needs this time."

Her body relaxed, and David kneaded the flesh
on her arms. He moved down to delicately caress the sides of her
breasts, kissing each nipple and using his tongue to cause the
nipple to swell. Liliana rested her head back on the mattress and
allowed him to massage her thoroughly. He fingered each hidden
crevice and inflamed the nerves running through her white skin. Her
body drew up to his hands, wanting more and loving the control he
had taken. Her moans drove away all thoughts of her uncle's actions
and settled her spirit into lustful self-indulgence.

He used the belts from their jeans to secure
her ankles to the foot of the bed and placed one of the down
pillows under her buttocks. She watched him stand back to admire
her pose.

"You're beautiful, Liliana. Almost too
delicate-looking, with the paleness of your skin and the sharp
curve of your bones. Hell, I bet you don't save yourself just for
me. Men must flatter and seduce you all the time. What's it feel
like with the other men? Can they fuck for as long and hard as I
do?"

He shook his head and walked over to the
closet. She saw him turn back to her in surprise.

"There's no clothes in here. A couple of
hangers and some fresh towels. Oh wait, there's a hair brush on the
floor and a riding switch?"

"I used to ride," she answered.

"Baby, I'm going to ride you now."

He walked back over to the bed, carrying all
the items that had been in the closet.

"My bedroom's better equipped, but I know how
to improvise."

The air around Liliana quivered and thinned.
A sweaty chill rumbled through her body.

"Don't, please, David."

He leaned over her.

"Don't you trust me, baby?"

"Liliana."

"Go with the fantasy," he whispered back to
her. "I'm going to find out who gave my little slut that ring on
her finger."

"My uncle gave it to me today at the
cemetery."

"Your uncle didn't give you shit."

"David, I don't like this game."

She studied David's moves. He had changed.
His shoulders hunched, his palms sweated, his breaths increased,
his whole body moved like a predator. Even the smell of him had
altered from a sexy musk to a raging sweat.

"David, I can't play out this fantasy."

"You'll do what I tell you and you'll tell me
what I want to know. First, who gave you that damn ring? Didn't you
think I'd notice? I could feel the touch of metal when you caressed
my cock. I know you never wore a ring before. Why now do you wear
that one?"

"Please, my uncle gave me the ring. Believe
me."

"Why should I fuckin' believe you?"

His voice sounded raspy and tormented.

He twisted a bath towel in his hands while he
spoke. "You're going to tell me all sorts of secrets about the men
you lay. How about women? You go for them too?" David swung the
towel hard across her abdomen.

Choking with rage, Liliana tried to hold
herself in check, tried to think of a way to convince him that she
didn't want to partake in this kind of fantasy. The towel stung her
abdomen again. She had stopped hearing his words. His face barked
out questions, and she repressed the violence building inside
her.

"I'm going to cut that damn finger off if you
don't tell me everything I want to know."

His voice sounded in her head again, but
somehow at a distance. The sound couldn't be part of David. The
harshness and accusations had to be coming from someone else. A
stranger, a demon who had stolen his body.

After several more blows, he clutched her
hips in his hands and ate her out, causing her to writhe and almost
snap free of the bonds, bonds that couldn't hold her except as she
allowed them.

David dropped the towel on the floor. Liliana
relaxed until she spied him reaching for the switch that lay by her
right foot.

"Please, David. This is upsetting me." She
attempted to keep her voice level. Hysteria would only drive him
and herself harder. "I want to make love to you, David, but I don't
want to be hurt, and I don't want to hurt you. Please."

David smiled.

"Look at you. How could you possibly hurt
me?" He played the switch across his left palm. "Only way you could
is by refusing to play the scene out with me. And on that you don't
have much of a choice, baby."

"Liliana." If she kept repeating her own
name, perhaps he would become bored and realize the game was no fun
unless she cooperated.

"Baby, don't upset me. I'm on a roll now.
Haven't been here in a long time, and it feels good." He hit the
foot of the bed with the switch. The smack echoed in the room.

"Please, I beg you. Stop."

"Hey, now, that's better, more in keeping
with the mood I'm trying to set."

His swift movement appeared to her as slow
motion, with only the sting of the switch on her upper right thigh
drawing her back into reality.

"What, no scream? You'll be yelling
eventually, begging me to back off."

This time the switch made contact with her
left thigh.

"Stuart." Her voice softly spoke the single
word.

"Shit! Who the hell is this Stuart?" The
switch came down hard on her thighs.

David looked like Stuart, but didn't have the
softness, the gentleness, the caring of the dead man.
Yes,
she said to herself,
Stuart is dead and will never come back to
me.

The switch kept stinging her thighs.

The man in the room with her was a cruel
simulacrum of the one she loved. This man knew none of the loving,
soft words or actions that had made Liliana give up drinking warm
human blood. She looked at David and saw perspiration forming on
his forehead. The muscles of his striking arm were tense; he did
not hold back on her punishment. And yet a numbness had spread
through her body. He took a deep breath and struck her again and
again. Her thighs burned. A spot of blood appeared on the switch.
Blood, and still he struck.

"Bitch, I'll show you what I think of women
who fuck around on me."

David reversed the switch and drove the
handle into her vagina. Excruciating pain lit her body. Her wrist
sprang forward, breaking the bonds, allowing her to spring at
David, wrapping her hands around his throat and dragging him down
onto the mattress.

"What the fuck..."

The belts around her ankles snapped free from
the foot of the bed, giving her enough leverage to set herself on
top of David. Her powerful legs held David in place while he
sputtered and fought. Her hands held him fast, and she bit into his
neck, drawing blood from his carotid.

"It was only a game. Only a game," were the
last words she heard him speak.

Chapter 54

The mourners hurried back to their cars; only
the immediate family lingered by the grave. The priest attempted to
give comfort, but quickly realized the mother would not be calmed
by words of an afterlife. The father shook the priest's hand, and
Sade thought he saw an exchange of money. Matilda whimpered, and
the priest slowly paced out of the cemetery.

"Why?" seemed to be the only word Matilda
knew. "Why? Why?" Matilda spied Sade leaning against a mausoleum.
Sade lowered his head to avoid eye contact, but the silly woman
came to him.

"You've been so generous, Mr. Sade. The
coffin, even the plot... I don't know how to repay such..." A sob
in her throat prevented Matilda from completing the sentence. "I'm
so sorry, Mr. Sade, that I..."

"Toutes mes condoléances.
It is you,
madam, who suffers the greatest loss. A child starting to blossom
into a woman, suddenly taken in the dead of night."

"They still do not know what killed her. The
doctors, the autopsy, but all they say is she died from a loss of
blood. She was menstruating. Their guess is that she hemorrhaged
and didn't tell anyone. She had faded bruises on her body. They
think she was into self-mutilation."

"I think that boyfriend of hers, Joey, beat
her up a few times," said the father.

"Why wouldn't she tell me, Mr. Sade?" the
mother pleaded.

"Because she was a frightened child,
madam."

Matilda shook her head. Her husband guided
her away from Sade and toward the cemetery gates. Sade followed
them beyond the gates and watched as they pulled away in the
chauffeured limousine he had rented for the family. The darkened
windows hid Matilda's tearful face.

A Latin hymn sparked a memory, and he began
singing the hymn as he walked back into the cemetery.

"Miserere mei, Deus, secundum magnam
misericordiam tuam:

Et secundum multitudinem miserationum
tuarum, dele iniquitatem meam.

Amplius lava me ab iniquitate mea.

Et a peccato meo munda me.

Quoniam iniquitatem meam ego cognosco,

Et peccatum meum contra me est semper."

Magically two workmen had gathered at the
grave site, ready to bury the coffin six feet deep.

"Messieurs,"
Sade called.

The workmen seemed startled and slunk to the
side, embarrassed that they hadn't waited longer to make sure all
the mourners were gone.

"Messieurs,
it will not be necessary
to bury the coffin."

The men looked at each other. One man, short,
thin, with a moustache and a nervous twitch of his upper lip,
started to speak, but his partner touched his shoulder and the man
fell silent.

"Messieurs,
if I allow you to bury my
maiden, you will just be making work for me."

The taller of the grave diggers spoke, "Sir,
are you a member of the immediate family?"

"I am now."

The taller man shuffled his boot-covered feet
and sighed.

"Listen, man, we got a job to do here. If
you're not the father or brother of the deceased, we have to ask
you to leave so that we can finish our job."

"Ah,
monsieur,
but your job is
fini.
You may leave. Now!" Sade's voice rose in a stern
demanding tone, causing the taller of the two men to stand taller
still.

"Why do we get the nut jobs?" the shorter man
said out loud, but seemingly to himself.

"We don't want any problems here, mister.
Just get into your car and spin away."

"Des problèmes!
It is not I who insist
on burying a coffin that doesn't need to be buried." Sade walked to
the coffin and laid a hand on the rich wood. "Leave me,
messieurs.
Go home to your families." Sade bowed his
head.

"Rob here isn't going anywhere," said the
tall man thumbing toward the shorter man.

"Uh?" Rob looked up at his partner.

"You stay here while I go get the
police."

"Me?"

"Messieurs,
you do not understand.
This is a matter of saving your own lives."

"Hell, he's threatening us, Rob."

"I'll get the police," said Rob. He took a
single step backward, and his partner grabbed the gray work shirt
Rob was wearing.

"There's two of us, in our prime. This guy's
up in age. What are you, in your fifties, sixties? You don't want
to threaten us with anything."

"Maybe he just wants some time alone with the
coffin, Ed."

"Did you see how arrogant this guy has been
with us?" Ed turned back to Sade. "Yeah, I wanta go home, Mister.
That's why we're going to bury this box now, not later."

"I will fill in the hole
pour
vous."

Rob nudged his partner off to the side. They
mumbled for two long minutes and then they both looked at Sade.

"We're sorry about your loss, but we have a
job to do. Ed and I will go off to get some coffee, then come back
in about twenty minutes. Okay?"

"It is up to you,
monsieurs,
for she
will not be here."

"Shit, man, we try to give the guy a break,
and now he's talking about stealing the body," said Ed.

"Sounds better than doing bodily harm to us."
Rob shrugged.

"Listen, we have a responsibility to see to
it that the box is safely buried."

Sade sighed. "But she will need the...
coffin," Sade corrected.

"That's right. You're getting it now.
Whoever's in that box will need it for eternity."

"Well, at least for the ride over to Europe,
monsieur."

"We can't have nobody stealing bodies we're
responsible for. We'd lose our jobs."

"Yeah," added Rob. "If you want to dig her up
later when we're not around, we don't care. We just want to
complete our job."

Sade lifted his hand off the coffin and
tapped his index finger on his lips. They could serve a purpose. He
had expected to present her with smaller prey, but...

Sade spun around toward the grave diggers and
rushed at them with both arms outstretched.

"Holy shit!"

Sade couldn't tell which of them had spoken,
but he did see both men take on a stance to down him before he
grabbed each by the neck and tumbled both to the ground. He kicked
one in the head and rapped the other man's head against a
tombstone.

Sade checked their pulses. Neither man was
dead, simply unconscious. He needed them alive and warm.

Sade flung the flowers onto the ground and
drew up the lid of the coffin in a swift heave that broke the seal.
Cecelia's head lay quiet and still on a lace and satin pillow. Her
hair, spun in ringlets, lay spread out like a halo. Sade had
suggested that the parents not allow her to be marked in any
further way and recommended a sealed coffin with immediate burial.
The family had agreed; otherwise, he would have been pulling out
stitches, barbed wire, and all sorts of paraphernalia used this
modern day to preserve the beauty of the dead for the short
duration of a wake.