Sips of Blood (4 page)

Slowly she picked up the jagged pieces of
china. Lennox. Relatively new and simple. Too simple for her Uncle
Donatien, who preferred the ornate and antique.

She dropped the pieces of china into the
garbage.

"Ma petite!"

"In the kitchen, Uncle Donatien!"

"My precious pet," said Louis as he entered
the room with arms outstretched.

Liliana tolerated the hug and the
un-uncle-like kiss Louis persisted in giving.

He sniffed the air.

"Blood. Sour, bitter blood. Have you been
drinking that horrid filth again?"

"I brought home some blood from work and just
had a cup of it."

"Yech! Did you store that garbage in our
cooler?"

"Yes, I put the left-overs in the
refrigerator. I don't want to argue over it, Uncle."

"Dead blood in our home, among our
vittles."

"Uncle, we're dead."

"Mais non.
Dead is when you putrefy
and disappear into dust. We, child, thrive in the arms of
immortality."

"We can be destroyed."

"Ah, a sin."

"A reality check, Uncle."

"And here I have brought home a gift for you.
Something at least better than that awful stuff you steal from
work. Work!"

"I work to feed myself. I can't manage to get
enough animal blood to satisfy my appetite."

"Of course not, animal blood is thin. It
lacks the richness of warm fresh human blood."

"No, Uncle, I'm not returning to feed on
others like ourselves."

"You compare us to these mortal wimps that
cross our paths?"

Liliana started for the doorway.

"Wait! I've brought you something alive."

"And probably small and cuddly."

"You get pleasure drinking from those horrid
rats?"

Liliana shrugged and faced her uncle. "What
did you bring home?"

"It needs to be cleaned up a bit. I was going
to bathe him before delivering him to you."

"You caught something in the wild?"

"No, it has the...
la chiasse."

"Dysentery! It must be ill. Where is it?"

"Not
malade,
more like ill-tempered.
He's in the animal carrier in my car."

Liliana hurried out to retrieve the animal
and was delighted and left breathless when she opened the
carrier.

While being washed in the bathtub, the rabbit
managed to take more than a nibble from one of Liliana's fingers.
Her cry brought the sound of her uncle's French curses to her ears.
Eventually the rabbit was cleaned and bundled in a natural Egyptian
cotton towel and taken to be reacquainted with Louis.

"He is adorable. There's no way I can take
his life."

"If you don't, I'll throw him live into a
stew pot."

"You wouldn't dare!"

Donatien Alphonse François de Sade rose nobly
from the feather cushion of the couch and walked over to where his
niece stood.

"Please, child, you refuse the charming men I
have brought home for you. At least accept this small token of my
love.

"Your skin was once so soft. Now it is papery
thin, and blotched from the many years of famine." He touched her
cheek and slid the back of his fingers across her lips. "My
favorite little girl."

During these awkward moments Liliana was glad
that she looked wasted to her uncle. She believed it was the only
thing that saved her from his incestuous desire.

"Did you see Grandmother today?"

Her uncle shook is head and stepped closer.
She was sure he would have taken her in his arms, except that the
rabbit let out a loud and smelly fart.

"Mais non!"
Louis quickly backed away.
"I have not seen her in a couple of days, but she is fine. She
always gets her way, why shouldn't she be fine?"

"Grandmother deals in a very dangerous
business."

"Dangerous only for her customers. She is
Maîtresse la Présidente.
The finest dominatrix on the East
Coast of the United States. Now on the West Coast--"

"Please, I worry about her. After all, she is
my grandmother and your mother-in-law. What if someone realizes
what she is? Don't you feel any responsibility? You're the one who
made her a vampire."

"She demanded to be made what she is. As for
me, I had no choice. If I had refused, she would have left me in
the Bastille for the rabble to tear apart.

"Ah, but you, my child, I made out of
love."

Lust, Liliana silently corrected.

"I'm putting François in the hutch in the
backyard with some food, and then I'm going to rest for a
while."

"But it is night."

"I didn't have a chance to rest during the
day. There was a lot of work to do. I had several autopsied bodies
to work on and had to use the six-point injection. It's always more
time- consuming for me when I have to drain the blood into the body
cavity and then use a trocar to drain the chest of blood, making
sure I don't lose any for my personal use."

"If you were not speaking of cadavers, you
would be making me hungry."

"No kind of sensation is keener and more active than
that of pain; its impressions are unmistakable."

The 120 Days of Sodom

by the

Marquis de Sade

Chapter 6

Garrett swooned in the ecstasy of the blood
letting. That
La Maîtresse
deigned to feed from him elevated
the thrill. His own orgasms did not have the power of her
blood-sucking kisses.

Softly he felt her delicate breaths on his
neck, felt the sting of the punctures and the moist exquisite
movement of her lips.

He raised his body up into
La
Maîtresse'
s kiss, and she responded by tightening the clamp on
his right nipple. The dark pink gag muffled his cry. Her long black
fingernails traced a path down to his loin, and he found himself
spreading his legs wider, praying for her touch to caress his
manhood. Her fingernails danced circles around his cock, causing a
pleasurable ache.

Garrett moaned and rubbed his tongue against
the muslin material of the gag. His parched mouth, his neck wet
with blood and spit, and his cock damp from the dribble of urgency
combined to persuade him that the ecstasy must never end. Never
cease to satisfy
Maîtresse la Présidente,
he told himself,
for her pleasure increased his own four-fold.

He was fighting the end, resisting the
inevitable release that he yearned for.

The nylon rope tying his hands behind his
back limited his freedom, reminded him that he must hold back,
allow the pleasure to go on and on. He fought himself and the
rope.

Suddenly the knot on the rope gave way and
his arms swung out from behind his back, laying out
La
Maîtresse
in a bloody, disheveled heap.

Chapter 7

Liliana hurried up the stone steps into her
grandmother's arms.

"You are so pretty today, my little one."

"Grandmother, why are you tying and untying
that rope around the rail?" As Liliana spoke she picked up the book
her grandmother had been reading.
The Ashley Book of Knots.
She looked down on the stone porch floor and saw
The Klutz Book
of Knots
and
The Boy Scout Fieldbook.
"Homework?"

"Thank Heavens we vampires heal quickly."

"Grandmother, are you all right? What
happened?"

"An accident caught me in the jaw, but my
slave paid dearly for the mishap."

"I wish you would give up this brutal way of
obtaining blood."

"There is no way to avoid brutality when we
feed. You, my child, have chosen to limit your hunger to small
animals, but is it any less brutal than what I do? My victims
simply have slightly higher intelligence quotients." She paused.
"Sometimes. However, what about the dead that you feed upon? It is
disgusting and unhealthy, child. Do I proselytize to you about
that?"

"You try, Grandmother."

"Yes, but damn it, it hasn't taken hold. My
business is blooming. You could assist me. No sex. Simply tie up,
beat, and drain a few of my customers. It would allow me more time
for my favorites."

Attempting to change the topic, Liliana asked
about the T-shaped bench at the far end of the porch.

"It's an Eton Bench that your uncle brought
over. He wants to store it in my dungeon. I left it here out on the
porch because I have no idea where it's been nor who has been
enjoying their pleasures on it. Knowing your Uncle Donatien,
probably some cheap strumpets."

Liliana turned away from her grandmother to
smile. Her grandmother was intolerant of most things Uncle Donatien
did.
Perhaps with good reason,
she thought, remembering her
childhood and the stories she had heard about her uncle, the
Marquis de Sade.

A dusty gold Cadillac of 60's vintage pulled
into the driveway. Liliana did not recognize the man behind the
wheel and feared that she had interrupted her grandmother's
workday. A sloppy man in his seventies got out of the car.

"My dear, I didn't expect a visit from you
today," her grandmother called.

"He's here." The man gruffly pronounced.

"Ah, your son. Liliana, this is Keith
Bridgewater,
a close friend."

The man grunted.

"And this is my granddaughter, Liliana.
Keith's son has come to spend some time with his father. And we're
both very excited about it." Marie flashed a smile at the man, who
grudgingly nodded.

"How long is your son going to be staying,
Mr. Bridgewater?" asked Liliana.

"Too long, probably."

"Keith has a wonderful sense of humor. Come
up on the porch and sit for a while."

Slowly he climbed the steps. Reluctant to
look at the women, he studied the ground instead. Once he was on
the porch, his interest seemed piqued.

"What are you doing, studying about
knots?"

"Oh, I wish I could share my interest with
you, Keith." Marie reached out a hand to touch his face and he
backed away.

"I need to take a leak. Mind if I use your
bathroom?" he asked.

"You know where it is,
dear."

He sighed and twisted around, almost knocking
Liliana over, but she quickly got out of the way.

Once he was inside the house, Liliana turned
to her grandmother.

"You must know him well to let him go into
your house alone."

"If I hadn't let him use the bathroom
immediately, I'm sure he would have pulled it out and pissed from
the porch."

"Grandmother, is he a beau?"

"Him! Child, he is in his mid-seventies, and
not terribly well-kept at that."

"A client, then."

"No. Although I do have fun working my wiles
on him. It's so different to be able to torture a man with
kindness. Come in, let's have a little fun."

Liliana opened her mouth to say she couldn't
stay, but her grandmother pulled her into the house.

The entry hall did not reflect her
grandmother's taste. Black-and-white earthenware tiles covered the
floor. Marie believed only in marble. The walls were covered with
tiresome still-lifes, some done by famous artists, but her
grandmother favored portraits of nobility, especially those she had
personally known. To the right side was an American
Revolutionary-era side table. Antique to most, considered
contemporary by her grandmother, and not very well made at
that.

Liliana wondered why her grandmother had
never bothered to redecorate the entry; after all, she had lived
there for the past five years. She knew that for her grandmother
the house was temporary, to be lived in only briefly while Paris
had time to forget the
Madame
with the penchant for
blood.

The salon had been altered. A portrait of
Marie-Antoinette stood above the fireplace mantel. Grandmother had
met the queen only once, but she spoke of her as an old friend. The
furnishings were Louis XVI, from the jewel casket that had been
designed for the
Dauphine
to the writing desk covered with
Sèvres porcelain. When she was fleeing Paris, she could not leave
these objects behind, even though the French police had begun to
take an interest in her activities. Grandmother had delayed her
departure several weeks while she supervised the packing and
removal of her favorite furnishings.

"Sit down, child, while I go fetch Keith a
beer."

"A beer?"

"His favorite: a Schlitz."

"Oh." Liliana sat down on the green velvet
sofa and waited for the show.

Bridgewater came into the room while still
zipping up. When he saw Liliana, he immediately dropped his hands
to his sides and rubbed his thighs.

"Fancy home your grandma has here."

"Yes, she's collected the furniture over many
years."

"I bet. They real or reproductions?"

"Real."

Marie swept into the room holding a can of
Schlitz in one hand and a beer mug in the other. She handed both to
Keith.

"Don't need the mug." He snatched the beer
from her hand.

"I should have known."

"I hope I'm not intruding on your visit, Mr.
Bridgewater," said Liliana.

"Hell, no. Makes no difference to me." He
plopped down in a chair once owned by Charles VI. Liliana noted how
inappropriate he looked.

Marie seated herself next to her
granddaughter.

"Aren't you two going to have beers?"

"Our tastes are a bit more refined,
Keith."

"Nothing like a good beer. My dad loved the
stuff so much, he used to joke about wanting to be fed beer up
until the last, even if it was intravenously."

Marie screwed up her face. "Glad I never ran
into your father."

He charged into the reason for his visit.
"I'd like to bring my son over for a visit. Prove I've got a
friend. He's a little peculiar. Lives in Greenwich Village in the
city." He lowered his voice. "Into leather and piercings, that kind
of thing."