The Key (Sanguinem Emere) (16 page)

“Oh, Eva?” He frowns sorrowfully. The blonde angel’s curls hanging limply around his face now, like his head has trailed through oil, shining oddly in this counterfeit light. An unusual copper colours the tips of his hair, but only on one side of his face. “You see,” He continues, “I think I have to tell him, you know that,” He chuckles in his strange, slithering way, making my skin creep.

His smile is far too broad, too ostentatious, like he has what he requires to achieve his deepest desires, right under his thumb. Deftly, he reaches to me and places a hand on my abdomen, too far down for comfort. To my intense humiliation, elements of my flesh begin to stir as his eyes drink me in.

I shuffle back from him in horrified vertigo. The scream, the knowledge that something… Something occurs down here, the realisation that I may have to choose between Dimitri and my sense of self.

And now this.

“You can’t touch me,” I whisper at him, “Dimitri protects me.”

My tone isn’t near intimidating enough, I realise as his hand brushes the side of his face that, until quite recently, was still swollen from Dimitri’s displeasure. The smile that only briefly wavered from his countenance returns with a vengeance as his eyes shine and a strange pensive expressions casts itself over his face.

“Hmm. But he may be disinclined to continue that ruling if he learns of this,” His fingers reach for me again as he places them roughly against my lips, pulling them apart, grazing over my teeth now clenched together. “Shall we discuss it with him and bet over the outcome?”

I stay quiet. The vibrations of anger in me have turned to an amalgamation of fear and disgust.

“Look, I’m only trying to help you, Eva,” His eyes tell me I can trust him, but I’m starting to suspect otherwise, “Let’s see if we can work something out?”

“A show, then. tomorrow night before the Master arrives,” I look up at him as uncertainty coils in my gut. “Prove your love of him to me then. If you can convince me that you want to be here, I won’t say a word.”

“What?”

His voice lowers in a coaxing coil, wrapping around my chest, dragging the breath from me, “Display what is beneath these,” His fingers trifle at my gown, “And I will refrain from mentioning this little infringement to Dimitri, hmm?”

I step back from him, once more torn between horror and disgust.

“Oh please,” He fakes shock, “I won’t lay a finger on you. A simple show will suffice.”

I would be well within my rights to refuse. I have not felt this victimised since the seventh grade when one of my neighbours’ boys tried to force me at water-gun-point to kiss him. Come to think of it, I have never felt this victimised. And, I suspect, the feel of his eyes roving over my naked skin, exposed like a slaughtered lamb, will somehow be worse than the sensation of his fingers. But the bastard has me cornered. Dimitri will be livid when he finds out what I have done. What can I do? Tell him? I can’t afford to lose him. I just can’t. I would rather…

I nod.

“Good girl,” He whispers, the sound rolling up to me like a gentle hiss, as he leans into my frame and places a tender kiss on my cheek.

He reeks of stale tobacco and cologne, but my wrist is still so warm where he held it.

THURSDAY 21 November 2008… 18:32

Sleep evaded me last night like the soft, tantalizing strains of an ice cream van, billowing its song down a warm, sun-stripped street, refracting its location into a million shards. I would feel it creeping up on me, feel my body sliding tenderly into that place where everything is weightless, nothing holds import, and then his face would shatter through my subconscious, driving me back to wakefulness.

Levi.

The image of him leering at me, his smell clogging my senses, his fingers flexing towards me and then retreating like a scolded mutt made me cringe with a subtle combination of loathing and intrigue. It still does.

But when I think that I am beginning to feel a heat in my pelvis for tonight, when I feel anything other than disgust and hatred, self-loathing eats at my nerves and I dig my face into the cool silk of the pillow beneath my head. And more than the threat of being held hostage tonight by my own curiosity, more than the threat of feeling victimised, more than the thought that he has me cornered and there is nothing I can do about it, my mind reaches for thoughts of Dimitri and I hate myself for thinking of anyone other than him. I hate myself when I remember Levi’s fingers touching me like an old woman kneading dough. I hate that, of all the men I can be feeling even the vaguest intrigue over (besides my Dimitri), it is Levi that has garnered my attention.

And it is a strange attention I feel for him. I detest the man. I especially hate his condescending tone, his cruelly slanted eyes, the way his mouth seems almost too wide when he smiles, like a crazy cat, the way he slithers like a python. Mostly I hate the way my body reacts to all of this.

The way it did for Dimitri at Delilah’s party.

I bury my face in the cushions again. Cushions that Dimitri had placed on this bed. Cushions that were chosen specifically for this room, the room that he has given me to sleep in. In his home. That he has opened for me at his own behest, his own cost. And what have I done to earn my Master’s kindliness? His compassion and care? I have failed at his task, dug into his life, disobeyed his direct instructions, and near-fantasised about his employee, if that’s the appropriate word.

The pillows are not enough to hide my pain. I can’t seem to run from my own thoughts.

It is now 18:32. Dimitri will be in in an hour. I haven’t slept all day. Levi will be waiting for his showing. If I do not acquiesce he will tell Dimitri what I did.

And I can’t have that.

Delilah tried to get me to come out today. I feigned my own discomfort. I claimed I was still feeling unwell when she came to check on me again later. It was true, in my defence. I felt awful. Partly from self-disgust, partly due to my lack of sleep and the bump still on my head. A strange hunger also sung through me as the day progressed, but the thought of food made me feel sick. Quite literally. This time it was not a lie. I couldn’t pin-point exactly what was bothering me, but the hunger was definitely there. Even as I lie here now, it still is.

Somehow it makes me think of Dimitri. And Levi. And my body burns again. In part due to my shame.

The article for Dimitri is only half complete. It reads like static on a television. There is no life to it. And it bothers me. My cursor blinked over the selected script this afternoon and my finger tingled as I held it threateningly over the DEL button. I should have just erased it. But it is an acceptable starting point, I suppose. I’ll hang onto it for now. Still no word from
Bordeaux
.

My skin itches with the extent of how much I do not deserve the faith he has put in me.

Well, there is nothing for it. I got myself into this mess. Particularly the bit involving Levi. But I’ll be damned if I’ll allow myself, or him, to ruin this thing with Dimitri.

A soft rapping on the door breaks my reverie and for a moment my conviction abandons me as a wave of surprised nausea shudders through my body, starting in my fingertips and settling in my heart.

“Come in,” I call out, steeling myself for what I know is coming through my door.

And there he is. Levi’s bony fingers wrap around the doorframe as he slinks inside, his bangs almost disguising his licentious grin as an apologetic smile. Almost, but not quite.

“Ready?”

I should have known he would traipse right over formalities. His opinion of me is not nearly great enough to give me the opportunity for a bit of small talk to ease my suffering.

“Now?” I have already stood from the bed. My fingers have already deftly laid out my clothes for the evening, seemingly without my acknowledgement or behest. As though they do their own bidding. I can feel the oddly anticipatory shudders run through me as his mouth opens again, the smile slipping like sand through water. “Well, get on with it. We haven’t got all night.” His voice is unkind. But what did I expect? Consideration?

To my horror, my body responds to his aggression, his loathed impatience.

I nod and stand, dropping my bath robe without ceremony. I was prepared for this. Extricating myself from my clothing as swiftly as possible seemed like the path of least shame to me. But now that I stand naked before his roving eyes I feel exactly that. Bare to the criticism and misogyny in his face.

He speaks again in a slightly hoarse voice, but his face bears the expression of a man anticipating a slower lure, “How clinical of you, Eva.”

His venomous eyes narrow as he looks at me intently, and I can just tell from the way he inclines his head. I won’t like what’s coming. And I am utterly at his mercy here if I want to keep Dimitri.

“Hmmm, how can we remedy the situation, then?” His voice is softly insistent, with a hint of honey lacing the edges, promising things that tug at my thighs, unhinging my lust and loathing.

I shake my head uncertainly. But he inclines his head with flushed cheeks, his expression suddenly severe and his lips glistening with damp desire, “Touch yourself.”

My eyes flutter rapidly, as the flush of heated resentment warms my face. He did not just ask me to do this.

I stare at him, bemused, as the smile snakes its way back over his lips, reaching his eyes in a curious glint. I think he’s just curious to see if I’ll actually do it, more than anything else.

Well, I don’t back down that easily. I pull the robe back up to my shoulders, negating any hope he may have been harbouring that I would fall for his threat-laced command, and a rush of relief surges through me as I realise how cold my skin was. My nipples burn rough and hard against the sudden touch of the silk.

He has noticed too, it would seem, as the look of appreciation alters to one of mockery. “If that’s the way you want to play, fine. I’ll just go down and have a private word with your master, shall I?”

I know he’s baiting me even as his fingers extend to open the door, not even caring to glance back at me. He wants me to stop him and he knows I will. The sweet memory of Dimitri placing a gentle kiss on my head, caring for me when I was injured - these things crank my voice to life.

“Stop,” I croak, a lump of shame clogging my throat. But he hears me and turns with that aggravating, knowing grin on his features. “You’re not as tough as you pretend to be, Eva,” He jibes at me as he sits in the chair alongside my bed.

I turn from him, unable to look at his critical face as he gazes over my imperfect form, unable to face him and the fact that he altered our deal. I should call him on it, but I can’t lose Dimitri.

The gown pools around my feet again as I bare my back to his roving eyes.

“Lie on the bed.”

I obey, swallowed up by my misery. I stiffly manoeuvre backwards on to the bed, bending my knees up to protect my abdomen, forgetting for a moment that this only exposes other parts of me. Even as I try to avoid looking at him, my eyes glance in his direction to find him studying me with unsmiling glances, a crimson blush highlighting his cheeks. When he sees me looking, he locks his eyes with mine, pulling me in, forcing me to keep eye contact and face him. Face his violation. My shame.

The bed beside me creaks like a death toll as he leans over my body, his golden curls framing a halo around his face. He is careful not to touch me. A step too far for Dimitri, the patient master.

“Now,” He begins, his tongue slipping from between his lips to moisten them. He has no need to finish the command as my fingers find their destination and I am offered no resistance, the scent of me drifting up to us both. A smell I’ve always found poignant, a combination of nourishment and hunger. The essence of incense and perfumes, unbottled and sheer. A scent of warmth and want. It reminds me vaguely of Bram.

And Dimitri.

I arch my back and squeeze my eyes shut.

Dimitri’s face superimposes over the shine of Levi behind my eyes. I can smell his breath above me, a sick complex of sweet irises and stale cigarettes, as his lips part and his eyelids slip down to half-mast. Yet his hands have still not strayed, they remain firmly on the bed, elevating him above him, throwing his dominance over my dancing body. It only makes me writhe more fervently.

The fire stirs in my belly and spreads slowly out like a fan, crawling through my hips, tickling down my thighs, traipsing up my spine. It burns like an inferno one moment, near too intense to cling to, but fickle as any lover it swirls to tender warmth, teasing me into submission.

It is said that pornography is only that if the subject’s eyes look directly at the viewer. And mine do not leave his as my breath hoarsens. The sight of him staring at me, all amusement dead in his expression, his hair moving ever closer to my neck, and then my fingers slipping over that mound of sensitivity, makes me cry out.

A small sound, the clearing of a throat, makes me look up into the consternated face of my psychiatrist. He’s taken to fidgeting with his notes and scribbling feverishly.