Master: Crimson Read online

  “Help me,” Gabriel suddenly pleaded. His voice was so low that even the vampire’s sharp ears barely hear it. Raiden gaped as his victim’s shocked eyes rolled open, tears gathering at their corners.

  “Shhhh, it’s okay. Just close your eyes,” Raiden whispered, smoothing down strands of Gabriel’s hair with surprising tenderness. You’re not human, Rai, so don’t pretend to be. You’re a thing.

  “Don’t—don‘t kill me.”

  Gabriel’s eyes fell shut once again as he slipped out of consciousness. Raiden’s heart practically wrenched free from his chest as he read those lips. He just couldn’t stomach the notion of throwing the actor’s body in the dumpster like a piece of trash. Why did he have to beg like that? Now I can‘t do it. Barely aware of his own actions, Raiden numbly removed his gloves and brought his wrist to his mouth, indenting the flesh with finely pointed incisors. Hesitating for the final time, he watched in horrified fascination as a tear slid slowly down Gabriel’s cheek, magnifying the pores, leaving a wet trail in its wake. Before it had the chance to fall, he was force-feeding Gabriel some of his own blood.

  * * * *

  Gabriel screamed wetly, jolted out of his stupor by the agony of transformation. Startled, Raiden quickly scanned the surrounding area for any witnesses, breathing a sigh of relief when he found none. In an effort to calm the hysterical man, he leaned over and pulled him into a close embrace, awkwardly pressing his chest against Gabriel’s. Equal parts fascinated and horrified, the vampire looked up. Too weak to struggle, Gabriel merely laid against the car seat, moaning quietly as countless shudders wracked his body. Raiden’s blood dripped down his chin, wetting his entire front. Only the whites of his eyes were visible as his neck snapped back and forth, chin sporadically crashing into the top of Raiden‘s head. The vampire ignored the stinging collisions, and held him closer.

  After a few agonizing minutes, the spasms subsided. Swallowing hard, Raiden tilted Gabriel’s head to the side, ignoring his groans of agony. Pain was something that used to remind Raiden of his mortality. Now it was just one more sensation he had taken for granted while still alive. He envied Gabriel even as his life slipped away. Sometimes, the vampire thought he would give anything just to have the fear of death return. He wanted once again to grasp the uncertainty of living in his palm, map it out with the rough pads of his calloused fingers, and still wonder. Gabriel’s weakening heart was beating so close to his strengthening own. Without a doubt, Raiden knew that he would never forget the sound. He allowed himself a brief moment of regret as the transformation reached completion.

  The actor’s eyes finally closed as his heartbeats slowed to a temporary stop. It would only be a matter of time before he awoke. Raiden quickly detached himself from him and started the car. He drove the 350-Z recklessly down the highway, willing his newest victim to remain unconscious until they were safely inside the house. Glancing at Gabriel’s lifeless form, he cursed himself for having ever set eyes on the man. Why do I always get the shit-end of the stick? Raiden thought that maybe he was just born doomed.

  Chapter 3

  The Turning

  The taste of creation pleases me.

  I lick my fingers clean and briefly wonder

  If you would do the same.

  He still tasted Gabriel’s blood. The flavor seeped through the responsive flesh of his tongue, thoroughly soaking it. The persistent fluid lingered in the crevices between his teeth. With a twinge of reluctant guilt, Raiden licked the roof of his mouth; then, he expertly circled each bloodied tooth with his tongue, shuddering with stolen pleasure. Fucking delicious. Pausing a moment to savor the last remnants of his exquisite meal, Raiden glanced over at Gabriel’s fast asleep figure. He tastes even better than he smells. Shuddering, he looked down at his crotch. The taste of blood was a potent aphrodisiac.

  “Mmm,” Raiden grunted softly before he could stop himself. Acting on impulse, he shifted on the couch to get a better view of his victim, who lay inches from his reach. Gabriel’s eyelids suddenly fluttered open, only to close again in a matter of seconds. SHIT. His heart thudded fitfully in his chest, the beats resonating deeply in the hollows of his ears. He’s not supposed to wake up yet! It took me at least two hours. The last ounce of blood forced its way down Raiden’s throat. Muffling a groan, the vampire crossed his legs and pushed the tip of his elbow into the head of his erection. He grimaced in a combination of sexual frustration and outright pain. There was definitely a downside to all this heightened sensation his supernatural status afforded him. Savagely, Raiden wished he could have found the balls to snap Gabriel’s neck. It would have been so much better that way.

  * * * *

  Shapes shifted behind Gabriel’s eyes, a veritable kaleidoscope of lurid patterns and images. There were sounds, too—wet and harsh, sticking to the insides of his ears like leeches. Still, he didn’t want to wake up. Though the dreamlike state he currently occupied frightened him beyond reason, he sensed that a far more terrifying reality awaited him. The thought of waking up to face whatever card fate had dealt him was shit-in-your-pants scary. He clung to the remnants of unconsciousness as his mind struggled to process its most recent memories. The limo, I was in the limo. And Joe…he tried to warn me. His bodyguard’s voice echoed eerily in the chambers of his mind.

  “Boss, you sure you want me to let you out here? The alley’s kinda dangerous at night.”

  He didn‘t want to remember this. Bad things happened. Though Gabriel resisted the memory‘s progress, it simply refused to quit. Against his will, he heard his own laughing voice respond.

  “I’ll be fine, thanks. I’d rather take my chances in the alley than get mobbed by a bunch of fangirls at the front door.”

  “At least let me come with you, boss. Wouldn’t want you to get raped or anything.”

  The sturdy black man raised an eyebrow, running a hand over his bald head as if expecting to feel instant hair growth. Gabriel chuckled.

  “You’re such a pervert, Joe.”

  “I thought that’s why you hired me.”

  Gabriel smiled and winked flirtatiously. “I never said it was a bad thing. But really—I don‘t need you to accompany me. I’ll have better luck achieving my goal if I meet with Raiden one-on-one. It’ll be less intimidating for him that way.”

  Joe burst into laughter. “You’re a piece of work, you know that, boss? I swear you get cockier by the day.”

  “Yes, I believe my manhood has indeed expanded exponentially of late,” Gabriel quipped, smoothing his jacket pointedly over the front of his pants. Joe let out a strangled laugh and shook his head.

  “But I do have a valid point in flying solo tonight,” Gabriel continued. “I know for a fact that Raiden doesn’t feel comfortable in the presence of total strangers.”

  “And how do you know that?”

  “He revealed it in a recent interview,” Gabriel replied with a grin, reaching for the door handle.

  His bodyguard scoffed and placed a firm hand on the actor’s shoulder, hindering his exit. “Didn’t anyone ever tell you not to believe everything you hear?”

  “Didn’t anyone ever tell you not to question me?” Gabriel countered, his eyes narrowing dangerously. Joe took the hint, quickly ascertaining that perhaps he had crossed a line.

  “I’ll tell the driver to stay until you’ve gone inside.”

  Joe’s tone of voice was soft, but clouds of unease gathered in his honest brown eyes. Gabriel ignored the jingle of anxiety jangling in his gut and opened the door. Stepping out, he peered inside the limo one last time.

  “No, don’t bother. The limo’s attracting enough attention just idling here. I think I can make to the back door.”

  The bodyguard opened his mouth as if to reply, but then quickly shut it when he saw the determined spark in the actor’s eyes. Satisfied with Joe’s compliance, Gabriel adjusted his sunglasses and prepared to close the door.

  “I’ll call your cell when I’m ready to go. Then I’ll buy you a drink to cele
brate my success.”

  “You seem pretty confident he’s going to say yes,” Joe marveled. Smirking, Gabriel jokingly tapped the middle of Joe’s forehead.

  “Joe, think about it—has anyone ever been able to refuse me?”

  With a parting wink, he shut the door and promptly erased Joe’s worried expression from his mind. The limo screeched down the street, burning rubber all the way. Snorting in amusement, the celebrity moved confidently towards back entrance of Gohatto. About thirty feet from the door, he realized that he was being followed.

  Gabriel moaned. His subconscious reminded him what part of the memory came next. He tried one last time to block the recollection’s reemergence. For a few moments, he seemed to have succeeded. Everything stopped. The noises, the images, the sensations…his brain underwent a total mental black-out. This is what it’s like to die. He felt not a single defining emotion except relief. Embracing the darkness, he surrendered himself to its stillness and waited for his body to release him. Please, just let me go. I don’t want to stay. I just want to close my eyes and—

  “Shhhh, it‘s okay. Just close your eyes.”

  The darkness gave way to light. Ghastly, searing light. Light that blinded Gabriel with its garish fluorescence, light that penetrated his inner vision so deeply, all he could see was the afterimage of red.

  “Just close your eyes.”

  The crimson hue was all around him now, filling him to the brim, stifling him with its insistence, mocking him with its promise of life after death. Sights and sounds rushed by him on a high-powered stream of consciousness. Raiden. The last piece of the puzzle fit neatly into place. He remembered. Just…

  “Just close your eyes.”

  That voice…he knew that voice only too well. Those canines, glittering, sharpening, dripping trails of his own blood onto dry patches of skin…he couldn‘t even draw enough breath to scream. So tight, his lungs were so tight, and the car‘s insides were so hot, so hot and close; the smell, the death-smell, it was oozing from his pores, and he couldn’t stop it. Then Gabriel was begging for his life, begging with his last breath as the miasma of decay rushed inside his nostrils like a line of cocaine. He sagged helplessly against the seat, a victim of its toxicity. Briefly, the blackness enshrouded him. Then a sound—wet, slow, and ragged, brought him stumbling back to the surface of consciousness. As his eyes refused to budge from their tightly shut position, his other senses worked in overdrive to compensate for his lack of sight.

  Following close on the heels of the ripping noise was a smell—something like pennies and ammonia mixed together. That scent—thick, greasy, noxious—came closer. Gabriel realized the source of the odor was the body next to him. Blinded by panic, he clamped his mouth shut, nearly severing the tip of his tongue between his teeth. A scream bubbled inside his throat, but it burst harmlessly before it had the chance to escape. Something steaming and rank landed on his cheek; he felt the warmth of a limb, possibly an arm, against his jaw. He tried to move, only to discover that he could not even coax his hand to form a fist.

  In a last desperate attempt, he tried to force the arm away with his mind, but still it came closer. He choked on tears as his penis threatened to shoot projectile piss into his luxurious leather pants. Scalding, slippery skin branded his lips upon contact and he parted them in surprise. A trail of metallic saliva coursed down his chin, molding the fiery flesh to his mouth in the process. Then, he was drowning in blood. A powerful hand held his heavy head firmly in place as the proffered fluid rushed down his throat. Gagging, he attempted to vomit, but his muscles took on a life of their own and convulsively coerced him to swallow.

  Though one side of his brain screamed in protest, the other side convinced him that maybe if he drank more, he would somehow manage to stay alive. Acting on pure survival instinct, he relaxed his throat to receive the steady stream of blood trickling down its incline. The figure above him muttered meaningless encouragement in his ear as Gabriel blindly sucked the scarlet liquid.

  “That’s it…don’t stop, Gabriel. Let it fill you up.”

  At last managing to open his eyes, Gabriel broke into chills when he saw the speaker was hungrily watching him feed. There, in the confines of the car, in heat of the dark, Raiden met his shocked stare. Gabriel tried to tear his mouth away from the wrist from which he willingly drank. Before he could manage, however, an almost electric vibration assaulted his mouth and throat. The sensation invoked a desperate, unforeseen desire within him and he didn’t want it to stop. His teeth instinctively slammed further into the soft flesh. Eagerly, he gulped down the fresh blood that pooled into his mouth. Raiden threw his head back with an agonized cry as the suction on his wrist increased, pulling Gabriel’s hair in the process. An army of goosebumps attacked his entire upper body at the pleasurable pressure inflicted upon his scalp.

  Everything seemed to simultaneously move closer and go farther away; then, he noticed Raiden was prying his wounded wrist out of reach. The tang of blood dulled as the appendage withdrew; a frown wrinkled Gabriel‘s expressive forehead. Shocked, he realized that the taste was something he had begun to crave. All thoughts of reason vanished and he grabbed hold of Raiden’s arm with sudden strength, baring his teeth and BITING, tearing the wound deeper. There was only base feeling, only brutal force, only blood flooding him with torturous bliss, wakening his senses in ways he never dreamed possible—and he wanted more. Suddenly, he climaxed in his pants, teeth sinking deeper and deeper into Raiden’s wrist.

  “Gabriel, STOP! You’re taking too much, oh, God, oh FUCK…”

  With a shudder, Raiden wrenched his wrist free and retreated to the opposite side of the car. Growling, Gabriel reached for his shirt to pull him closer, but something broke his hypnotized state, stilling his motions. Molten warmth was oozing down his neck; the pain he had forgotten to feel had returned full-throttle. Trembling, he stuck a finger to the side of his neck. For a moment, he was confused. Where he should have felt smooth flesh, there were instead two tattered indentations. He experimentally poked a finger into one of the holes. With a gasp, he withdrew his finger and held it up to his face. In the dim lighting, the digit was covered to the second knuckle in purplish-black slime. Gabriel sniffed it, fear in his heart.

  “Don’t worry, it will heal soon enough.”

  Raiden’s words held no comfort for him. Feeling his sanity faltering, Gabriel brought the dreaded finger to his mouth and administered a tiny lick to it. Blood. His blood. Blood dripping steady drops down his neck. Blood staining his shirt. Blood coating the top of his tongue. Blood all over him. Before he had the chance to process this information, a sound momentarily diverted his attention. Slowly, so slowly he could hear the tendons in his neck creaking like rusty hinges, Gabriel turned his numb gaze toward the noise.

  Raiden was utterly absorbed in the task at hand—so absorbed, in fact, that he didn’t even notice the purring sounds originating from the depths of his throat. He was too busy licking the wound in his wrist as a cat laps up milk, the other hand grasping the fabric of his shirt as if he wanted to tear it off. Gabriel couldn’t look away. Even as his gorge gurgled and struggled to rise, even as his head seemed to shrink like a deflated balloon, even as his neck nearly melted away from his the rest of his body, he couldn’t force his eyes to break free of their frozen gaze. The most excruciating ache he had ever known split his vision in two, but Gabriel still couldn’t move.

  In fact, he was so paralyzed by pain; he didn’t even feel the wetness further soaking his pants as his bladder silently emptied. Raiden opened his mouth wider, perhaps to allow his tongue more access to the wound, and then Gabriel saw them again. Those razor-sharp, dripping fangs stilled the breath in his lungs. The vampire happened to flick his eyes upward to meet Gabriel’s. When Raiden saw the expression on his victim’s face, he almost snickered.

  Gabriel wasn’t even aware he was screaming until the sound had already left him.

  Escaping from the nightmare in the only way he could, the
newborn vampire opened his eyes.

  * * * *

  Raiden watched the actor’s eyes slowly focus and bit his lip. He had absolutely no idea what to do or say. Gee, Gabriel, I’m sorry about the mix-up, but I accidentally mistook you for a non-acquaintance, started to feed on you, and then recognized you too late to save your life. So I kinda had no choice other than to turn you into a blood junkie like me. Can we still be friends?

  Raiden didn’t quite think that explanation was going to fly. Gabriel looked more alert now, but he was still blinking in that owlish, sleepy way that suggested his brain was still relatively clogged with sleep. The older vampire decided to stay silent until he was spoken to directly. Though he told himself this was the wise way of handling things, his conscience knew better.

  What I mean to say, Gabriel, is that I’m a total coward and a lazy fool. I would have killed you, but I was probably too high on your blood to think of a clever place to stash your corpse.

  Raiden twisted his lips to the side and tried not to laugh. On some level, he felt genuinely awful for thinking such thoughts, but on another, he really didn’t give a flying fuck. After all, humanity was only a passing notion to him, something he liked to try on for size and model in the dressing room but never really felt compelled to buy. Or at least that’s what you tell yourself.

  “What the fuck did you do to me?”

  Raiden yelped in surprise as the raspy voice bulldozed through the brick wall of his thoughts. Gabriel was still lying down, but the stiffness in his body coupled with the awareness in his face indicated he was now fully awake. It was a full ten seconds before the older vampire’s heart started beating again.

  “Goddamnit, Gabriel! You startled the hell out of me!”

  “Answer my question.”

  Gabriel sat up, his blue eyes fixed on Raiden’s brown ones with deadly purpose. Raiden swallowed. He hadn’t quite anticipated their talk to start off like this. Already, he felt that the fledgling vampire had somehow stolen the upper hand.