Chapter 8
For the third time in just as many days Qhuinn found himself laid flat out on his ass, staring at the PT room ceiling. The only difference was that it was Zsadist serving his ass on a silver platter instead of Hollywood. It didn’t take long for the sweat to adhere his naked back to the blue floor mats. A hand filled his line of vision and he took the offer of help. He was yanked off the mat and was faced with canary yellow eyes.
“You did well today, ladies. Now getcha asses in the showers,” Z said.
John, Blay, and Qhuinn all marched it – more like hobbled it – into the locker rooms where the showers were. The hot water didn’t do much for the small aches and pains, but at least he didn’t feel like he was fed through a meat grinder after his tumble with Z.
All three were relatively quiet. They were tired and sore and in no mood to swing verbal punches at one another. It was a chore just to peel off training gear and stand under the spray of the shower. After which he could only manage to throw a pair of sweatpants on.
When they were done, the boys took off for the kitchen to find something to fuel their tired bodies. The Brothers were going to be out the entire night due to an increase of
lessers in the area so their training was getting cut short.
With the extra time, Qhuinn snagged a bottle of Herradura from a seemingly endless stock. When you couldn’t get laid or fight, the only option left to you is C: start hitting the bottle until you’re one sip away from FUBAR.
John had the right idea and was already pouring himself some Jack. Blay, never a heavy drinker, declined and went to his bedroom to return a phone call to his parents.
Qhuinn grabbed a crystal tumbler and was about to retire to his room when he caught something out of the corner of his eye. He turned toward the movement, catching a flash of white outside through the window.
Eve was making her way to the pool with a white squared something in her hand. The spill of her hair was confined to an elastic band though wispy tresses escaped confinement. The scrubs she wore hung from her thin body, the breeze ruffling the green fabric around her like a sickly aura.
She sat on one of the chaise lounges bordering the water facing away from him. It was dimly lit around the patio, just enough so that humans like Rhage’s Mary could see in the dark.
Curiosity dug its sharp hooks in him. Taking his bottle and glass with him, Qhuinn slid out the door and crossed the grassy lawn. Used to treading carefully, he didn’t think anything of his quiet approach.
“What are you doing out here?” he asked when he was next to her chair, his voice loud enough to echo in the quiet night.
She was on her feet in a second, a pen in her white-knuckled grip, aimed to be buried in the center of his chest.
He wasn’t startled by her reaction, but he wasn’t expecting it either. “Easy, it’s just me,” Qhuinn said softly, his hands raised in surrender.
“Oh my god, you scared me!” Eve hissed when she noticed who it was. She took a deep breath though her grip on the pen never lessened.
Qhuinn motioned to her makeshift weapon. “Are you still planning to stab me with that?”
“Oh,” she murmured as if just noticing it. “What the bloody hell are you doing sneaking up on me like that? I should stab you anyway just for that!”
“I wasn’t trying to creep up on you or anything.” He was trying his hardest not to let amusement bleed into his futures. With her angry glare and rigid battle-ready posture, Eve looked like she would make good on her threat.
She placed her free hand over her heart and rubbed as if trying to push away the frantic pulse.
“What are you doing out here by yourself? Are you all right?” he asked, his brows drawing low on his forehead.
She shook her head then shrugged. “Fine. It’s just been a long day.”
He could tell that she was lying to him – she was snippy and sounded exhausted and weary – but it wasn’t like he cared much anyway. He just wanted to know what was up with her slinking in dark corners alone. He didn’t trust her as far as he could spit. She was still a stranger in their space. But they were responsible for her as well as keeping her unharmed.
“Mind if I hang for while?” he asked, surprising himself. This wasn’t what he had planned on doing when he came out here. He was just going to check on her to make sure everything was cool but instead here he was parking his ass in the lounge next to Eve’s when she told him she didn’t mind him joining her.
She opened her mouth to say something only to pause when she got a gander of what was doing on his puss. There was purpling bruises blooming where his face got up close and personal with Zsadist’s fists and elbows. “Your face…you look like you’ve been through a war,” she commented.
“This ain’t nothing. If he really wanted to do some damage, my head would be looking like an eggplant,” he replied with a lopsided grin, his lip still feeling a little swollen.
She eyed him carefully. “You sure you don’t need me to fetch a cold pack or painkillers or something? You look like you could use them.”
Qhuinn was surprised by her offer but declined anyway. “No need. I’ll be brand new in a few hours.” He raised the bottle of Herradura up so she could see. “And this is the only painkiller I need.” He poured himself a double and downed it. It stung a tiny cut on his lip that he didn’t realize was there. He refilled the tumbler before setting the bottle down beside him. “You never did say why
you were out here.”
“Fritz found me a sketching pad,” she said waving the white square in her hand. The pen was tucked safely in the binding. “Now I am in search of things that catch my eye.” Eve curled back up in the chair that was across from Qhuinn’s.
He looked around the grounds and the countenance of the manse not really seeing anything that would make him want to channel his inner Da Vinci. “What exactly would be so eye-catching around this place?”
She shrugged a shoulder. “Lots of things. People, the statues, the gardens, rooms…it’s limitless really.” She looked him up and down, a small smile curling at the corners of her lips. “You can find beauty in just about anything.”
Qhuinn had a feeling her statement was directed at him. “What’s that supposed to mean?” He leaned back against the recliner big enough to serve as a proper bed and crossed his arms waiting for an answer.
“Just that there is always something remarkable in what others think of as ordinary. As an artist, it is my job to examine something on a deeper level and bring out whatever hidden beauty I find so that others can see it as well,” she said.
Okay…maybe she wasn’t talking about him. “Like what?”
“Here…have a look for yourself.” She started flipping through the pad of paper. When she stopped shuffling through pages she tossed it over to him. He caught it with one hand then set his glass beside the bottle. “They are all preliminary sketches really, not finished products. I go into more detail when I paint.”
Qhuinn’s brows drew together as he examined the picture. The statues from the hall stared back at him. He had passed them thousands of times. He never paid much attention because honestly…he really didn’t get the whole art thing. Some of it looked like the creator just slopped some paint on the canvas and called it a day. He had no idea how something like that was supposed to reflect one’s soul or whatever.
But the drawing in his hands wasn’t like that. The statues in the hallway outside their bedrooms looked slightly different, more warm and alive. They weren’t just bland white stone sitting under hot lights. Eve captured every dip, curve, hallow, crack, and shadow. The likeness of the stone was transferred on paper with vivid clarity and detail.
There was a portrait of Wrath on the next page. His face was as harsh as ever, the dark wraparounds lending to hard demeanor of their king. There was no gentleness in this sketch, just one agitated vampire that one often saw when Wrath was in one of his moods. This time the anger was probably directed at the female across from him.
Qhuinn flipped to the next drawing. It was of some girl he had never seen before. She had dark shaggy hair cut short and almond shaped eyes set in a pixie-ish face. She looked like she was ready to cause trouble with a devilish grin and a knowing gleam in her eye.
The following picture was of the pool, the water gently rippling as a dragonfly collected water from the surface. It wasn’t completed but from that little that was there it was still well executed. Qhuinn hadn’t expected to be this amazed by her skill.
“These are really good. The one of Wrath is spot on.”
“Thanks. They’re just rough sketches though. I can’t go into as much detail as I would like to with just a pen,” she explained, trying to downplay her work and his praise.
“Eve, they’re still really good.” He flipped to the last drawing and laughed. It was a little cartoon version of him, John, and Blay. They had their arms thrown around each others’ shoulders and were smiling and laughing in good fun. “What’s this?” He turned the pad around so she could see what he was referring to.
“Doodling. I doodle when I’m lost in my own thoughts.” She looked embarrassed, her cheeks reddening. “I’m rarely aware I’m even doing it half the time.”
Qhuinn handed the tablet back to her and stretched back out on the chair with his legs crossed at the ankles. He snatched the crystal glass back up and started nursing the tequila which for him was stretching it out to three swallows.
The night was calm. A slight breeze ruffled the newly sprouted leaves on the trees. They were greeted by the crisp, fresh scent of late spring and new blooms. Since the weather had been warmer fairly early into the season, the pool was uncovered and lighted. It was even heated, the steam rolling off the top of the water lending to the spook factor of the night. An almost full moon dangled from the heavens peeking at them through billowing dark grey clouds.
When he looked over at her, she was staring at his body, raking her light gaze over every part of him. He was used to females looking at him with heat in their eyes. But it wasn’t anything sexual, which was something he wasn’t accustomed to. It was cool and calculating like she was looking over her taxes instead of a half-naked male body. He squirmed under her detached scrutiny.
She tapped a finger against her chin, the wheels of thought almost visibly spinning in her head.
“What are you looking at?” Qhuinn asked self-consciously, wishing he had a shirt to cover up his naked upper half. He picked up the bottle and poured himself more alcohol so he could wash away some of the shrinking feeling within him.
Eve cocked her head to the side. “Have you ever thought about modeling?”
He coughed, nearly choked on the liquid sliding down his throat. “Excuse me?” He sat up a little straighter and stared at her incredulously.
She shook her head. “I suppose not because it doesn’t seem like anything you’d ever give a second thought to.”
He didn’t know if he should be offended or not. “What do you mean by that?”
“You have a great body, but you don’t seem like the type that would be interested in that sort of thing. We have a lot of nude models that come in to the studio. Maybe you should try it sometime,” she said. “I wouldn’t mind getting my hands on a lump of clay and sculpting you.”
Qhuinn’s lips curved slyly up at her. “If you wanted to see me naked, all you had to do was ask.”
Eve rolled her eyes into her head and made an exasperated noise. “Don’t start that shit again,” she warned.
“And don’t
you start doing
that,” he snapped back.
“And what would
that be?” she retorted.
He cast a sour look in her direction. “Getting all uppity about a little teasing. Is that all you do, snarl and snap at people? I’m just trying to joke around. I thought we were over this.”
She met his gaze head on. “
And you can be friendly without involve your vampire bits in the picture. You act like that is all you have to offer someone.”
He flinched as if she had struck him. “Maybe it is,” he snarled, teeth gritted in anger. He was about to get up when he felt her cold hand on his leg stopping him.
“It’s not. That’s not all you are. Blay and John both see something in you other than a body. You are their best friend. I don’t know much about John, but Blaylock doesn’t seem to be the kind of guy that would put false adoration into someone unworthy. I have even seen your nicer side. You are a decent guy whether you believe it or not. Don’t think that is all you are: an instrument to only be used as a weapon and for sex.” She pulled her hand away from him. “Why would you even think that?”
Qhuinn ran a hand across the back of his head as he turned his face away from hers, not wanting to see the sincerity to be found there. He didn’t want to have this sort of conversation with anyone let alone her…
He didn’t want her to know what he really was, what he had been told all his life.
He was a genetic failure to the race. Never would he be valuable for anything more than combat. His parents were the ones that signed him up for the training program with the brothers. Most likely they hoped that he would be recruited as a soldier and killed by
lessers in the line of duty. They wouldn’t have to worry about him sullying the family bloodline any longer.
Qhuinn so didn’t want to dip into that well. He had to shut her down the fastest way he knew how. “Why did you try to kill yourself?”
She was quiet for a while. He didn’t even know if she was angry with the question because he couldn’t look at her. When she finally spoke, her words weren’t what he expected to hear. She didn’t scream, she didn’t even curse him.
“I
never tried to kill myself,” she finally said in a steady voice.
One thing that Qhuinn hated was being blatantly lied to. He had seen the evidence, even commented on it back at the club the night they met. He cringed remembering how that had turned out. No need for a repeat. He was about to get up and leave for a second time, finished with this conversation.
“No,” Eve continued softly. “This…I didn’t do.” She gave a bitter laugh. “I may hate my life, but I’ve never been one to take the easy way out. This wasn’t self-inflicted, not really.”
Qhuinn made no other attempt to leave. Though he doubted what she told him, he still couldn’t help but question her. People don’t go around slitting other people’s wrists for no reason. “By who then? Because it kind of sounds like you’re lying when you say someone else did it.”
“I answered your question, now you answer mine.”
Forgoing the glass, he took a long swallow of Herradura straight from the bottle but barely felt the burn as it went down. Qhuinn wasn’t one of those males that liked to share about what was doing on the inside. It was never his thing because whining about shit was going to change absolutely nothing. With that little bit of liquid courage, he decided he was the biggest fidiot in the world to answer her. “That’s all females – and even males – seem to want from me. They want for me to fuck them senseless. I’m good at it. And I like having sex. Why not do it?” He was never wanted for anything in his life, not that he was about to tell her that. Nobody had ever wanted him. Not his family, not the
glymera. But after his transition, he had gone from a gawky looking kid to a powerful male with fully functioning equipment. With his new body came new things. He was finally wanted for something. Even if it wasn’t love or even like, someone finally wanted him for once in his miserable existence.
“Because it doesn’t sound like it’s something that gives you any kind of joy to be doing.”
“No, you’re wrong about that. It’s one of the few perks I have and I thoroughly enjoy it.” He could hear the lie coating his words. If Eve could, too, she gave no indication. He loved the screaming and moaning, loved losing himself in someone’s body, loved when they begged him for more… But sometimes he wished for more. Sometimes he wished he could be the type of male to settle down, to find someone to settle down with even for a little while. But he wasn’t that kind of male. He could never see himself with the same mate long term. Being a
hellren wasn’t in his fucked genetic makeup.
“You don’t mind being used like that?” she asked.
“I don’t think anything of it. Besides, I’m using them, too. I get what I want and then I move on to something else. It’s simpler, cleaner that way,” he said.
Eve looked out into the darkness surrounding them while neither one of them spoke for a stretch. There was a slight breeze that ruffled her hair, sending a chunk of white to billow around her head like a tiny specter. They were having a conversation that didn’t include taking digs at one another. Qhuinn was surprised to find that it actually felt nice to just talk to someone even if he wasn’t pouring his whole heart out. He really couldn’t talk to John and especially Blay about this kind of shit. John would probably think he was some sort of nancy. And as for Blay…he was a road best left untraveled.
Eve finally reached her hand up and tucked the unruly lock behind her ear before glancing back at him. Qhuinn wondered if she bleached all the color out of it or if it was natural. “I have a girlfriend a bit like you. Her name is Roz,” she said, breaking the silence. “She is a self-proclaimed nymphomaniac and loves every minute of it. She is hard to get along with if you’re not having sex with her, but she grows on you. We were kind of a whenever-the-mood-strikes thing.”
“That one girl, what’s-her-name, said you, uh…like females. I didn’t know if she was just saying that to get under your skin.”
Eve shrugged a shoulder. “She mostly was. Both of them go out of their way to antagonize me in any way that they can. Megan is the worse. I don’t know why. I’ve never done anything mean to them. I’ve always pretty much ignored them any time I’ve been around them.”
“Did you live with them?” Qhuinn inquired.
“Not for any real length of time,” she said. “While I was in between places to live, I stayed with my mom and her husband for a little bit. And naturally my step-sisters came with the package. I never really settle in one place too long. It’s hard to find a cheap apartment to live that doesn’t get condemned within a month or so of staying there.”
“Don’t you have money though?”
“Ha! I wish. I barely make enough to live on. It’s hard to find work as a free-lance artist, especially in this economy. And the money I get from teaching isn’t all that great either. I was always one step above living in a cardboard box. In fact, I did sleep behind a Dumpster a few nights after I got kicked out of an apartment.” She shuddered. “I never want to experience that again.”
“Couldn’t you have asked your mom for help? And what about your father?”
“There was never a father in the picture. I was a bastard child to a single mother, something not uncommon in my world. And I hate going to her for help. I love her, but we never had any kind of special mother/daughter bonds. Our relationship has been rocky at best and there were times when I truly hated her. I struck out when I was sixteen. I figured I would have a better go at it on the street than I would staying with her. I never once regretted it. Even though I had nothing to my name in the way of possessions – and still don’t – I have a certain freedom that could not have if I would have continued living with her.”
After Qhuinn took another drink, Eve held her hand out and motioned for him to pass the bottle over to her.
“She loves you though,” he said handing Eve the Herradura.
She eyed the bottle and the contents within. “In her own fucked up way she does. I’m still going to miss her.”
“Why would you just leave at sixteen? You were still just a kid. Home life couldn’t be that bad. Every adolescent goes through the whole ‘I hate my parents’ thing.” His hadn’t been the greatest in the world, far from it. And he had stuck it out until his family had denounced him and kicked him out on his ass like he was nothing but yesterday’s trash.
“Dina Malone’s motherly instincts leave a whole lot of something to be desired. Believe me when I say it was bad. At the time, I wasn’t in the right frame of mind either. She ran through men like shit through a goose. We were constantly moving. I’ve never had a stable place to live even as an adult.” She hesitantly took a sip and grimaced as it went down. “How do you drink this shit?”
His lips twitched. “You get used to it. Butch said he knew you from his human life. How do you two know each other?”
“Who lives in the projects their whole life and doesn’t get acquainted with at least one homicide detective?”
Qhuinn wasn’t about to fall for that. “Butch wouldn’t risk his neck for a human that he hardly knows. It would take more than a passing acquaintance for Butch to want to save you.”
She took another drink – this time bigger – before responding. “We lived in the same building for a while. He was my neighbor for a couple years. That’s how we met first anyway. And like I said, you don’t live in the project without seeing a homicide detective so we ran into each other occasionally over the years. Then I ended up living with him for awhile. Actually it was more like he provided me with a roof for the night, a night that ended up lasting a couple years.”
“You two weren’t together…like that, were you?” It didn’t sound like the Butch he knew. He wouldn’t have that kind of inappropriate contact with a minor. But then again, he and the ex-cop weren’t all that tight.
Eve wrinkled her nose up as she handed the bottle back to Qhuinn. “I was in my mid-teens when I lived with him. Do you really think Butch would go after a kid? He wasn’t a pervert. No, Butchy was like a comfortable medium between a father, a big brother, and friend; very protective and the like, but never restricting. He never asked or demanded anything from me. And he has been the only one to really guide me when I needed it the most. I don’t know what I would have done without him actually. I would have most likely ended up gutted in a ditch somewhere if he hadn’t offered his place to me. He might not have been the best of role models but he did save me from myself.”
“That doesn’t explain how you came to live with him.”
“I didn’t have anywhere else to go. In those days, my mother and I couldn’t stand the sight of one another. He picked me up off the street. I didn’t want to get put in the system – which I would have because I was only sixteen. He helped me out. I was able to finish school because of him. And since we are on the topic of Butch and living arrangements, how did he ever come to live with you guys? Last time I checked, he didn’t have fangs and was able to go out in the sunlight whenever he wanted.” she said.
The answer she gave about living with Butch was still a little vague in some areas but he let it slide. “Butch lived here before I did. I wasn’t even with the training program. I don’t know much about it but I do know they adopted him when he was still a human.”
“What program?”
“The brothers scour through males and look for the strongest, those with warrior blood in them. Then train them to fight to protect the vampire race.”
“And let me guess, the mountainous vampires I met went I first saw Wrath, those are the brothers.”
Qhuinn nodded.
“A bunch of nice guys,” she said dryly. “Really nice.”
“They are.”
“To you maybe. I’m on their shit list.”
“With you living here indefinitely, they’ll come around eventually.”
Eve was about to reply, but a new voice cut into the conversation.
“Hey guys.”
Qhuinn and Eve both looked over to see Blay coming toward them with a friendly smile.
“Hey, Blay,” Eve greeted, perking at his arrival.
“What’s up,” Qhuinn said.
“What are you guys doing out here?”
Eve waved her notebook. “Sketching.” She motioned toward the male opposite her. “Qhuinn was keeping me company. What’s up?”
Blay glanced first at her then at Qhuinn and back again with a wrinkle in his brow. “Can I take up a little bit of your time? I have something for you.”
Eve cocked her head to the side, her dark eyebrows drawing down low. “What would that be?”
Blay grinned then, the action brightening his features. “Follow me and find out.” He reached out a hand to help her off the chaise.
Eve accepted his hand and was pulled from her seat with the redheaded male’s help. She looked at back at Qhuinn. “You coming with us?”
“Yeah. Let’s go see what this surprise is.” If he know his best friend like he thought he did this surprise was no doubt going to be something big.
~*~
Mr. Z wiped the bloody knife on a stained rag then tossed both on a table littered with other gleaming tools of torture. As usual, he had gotten nothing out of the vampire but begging and screams. The questioning had lasted hours and hours, working him over with a scalpel until he nearly gutted the son of a bitch.
He stared down at the grizzly scene, admiring his work for a moment. The harsh florescent lighting flashed against the glossy cherry red puddle expanding on the floor. The steady
drip- drip-drip sounded louder than ever now that the screams have stopped.
He just wasted precious time on prolonging the death of this piece of shit. Usually he would revel in his job, soak in the delicious pain he caused his prisoner. It was his only release for the rage that built within him.
But not this time.
His time could have been put to better use finding his whore of a girlfriend and her daughter, erasing them from the world and his thoughts.
While torturing the poor captive, he had contemplated on how he would go about his plan. Eve was most likely with the Brotherhood. There would be no way for him to find her, no way to pick her off the streets.
He was going to have to lure her out somehow. The only way to do that was to dangle something precious enough in front of her. She had doted on the little boy hand and foot when Z had lived with them. Eve had loved her brother more than anything. Family was important to her.
Mr. Z made his mind up. He would find the mother first. She was the ticket to fulfilling his vengeance. Eve would no doubt come running if she knew her mother was in trouble. If the mom went missing, Eve would know it was him that got her if he left the slightest of clues behind. And she would do everything she could to get her mother back.
And while he waited for little Evey to make her move, he would enjoy carving into Dina. She always bore her punishment well, always handled being slapped around when she made him mad. That’s why he respected her. It was hard to find a woman as didn’t snivel and whine after a few love taps. Most would call the cops just because he smacked them for doing stupid shit.
Grabbing two meat hooks attached to chains, he buried them between the corpse’s ribs and dragged the lump of flesh outside. The sun would rise; the body would go up in flames. The evidence would be burned away.
As far as Z was concerned, that was the only thing useful about vampires. The clean-up was easy.
After disposing of the body, he grabbed the green garden hose attached to old metal faucet in the corner. Since the floor was stone and had a drain in the center, all he had to do was spray water on the floor and wash away all the blood splatter.
He imagined it was Eve’s and her mother’s corpses hanging from the chains dangling from the rafters. It was their screams that he heard, their blood he was washing away.