Helaine
I couldn’t help feeling nervous as I stood at the top of the steps leading down into his basement apartment.
We had been friends for some time—maybe acquaintances was a better term—but the point is that we’d known each other for a while now, at least through moving in similar circles.
He should have been my type. I had always had a problem with the pretentious wannabe rockstar types, but there was always something about him that put me ill at ease, and if I was honest, neither this street nor the hour was helping.
His apartment sat below the corner of Cardinal and South Main, and the street signs stood ominously above me like a guillotine.
Cardinal was a lovely little street, with its artist alley, street food, and live music . . . if you weren’t privy to the area’s reputation, and ignored the missing persons posters.
Speaking of music, I could already hear the haunting melody emanating from the bottom of the stairs. If I could say nothing else for him, he was an excellent guitarist, and he knew that I thought that.
I couldn’t help wondering if he knew that I was standing up here at the top of his steps, or if he was only warming up because he knew I’d be here sooner rather than later—or at least, this was the time we’d scheduled.
See, the thing about him is that however uncomfortable he had made me, I had the opposite effect on him.
It had been no secret since the day we met that he had his eyes set on me, but I had always had a very convenient reason, or excuse really, to avoid being left alone with him.
It’s not that he ever pushed, or that I felt I needed a reason not to hang out with him—I had never in my life been the kind of woman who couldn’t look at a man and tell him no, but there was something about him that made me feel like I couldn’t trust myself.
I could feel it in my bones that the second he and I were alone together, I would lose all sense of self control. I couldn’t place why, but there was something about him that made the idea all too enticing, which screamed of red flags to me.
Especially given my history.
Even now, my entire body was screaming at me to run, to turn around and go home—or anywhere else, really.
But I didn’t really have a better option.
Earlier this week, my landlord had told me that my rent was going up by a whole two hundred dollars—that was an insane amount, especially for an already broke college student. Not only could I not afford that, but I most certainly couldn’t afford to look for somewhere else to live while paying nearly every goddamn cent I made to the leech who owned my apartment.
That’s where he came in.
He happened to be hanging out with us when I complained about my situation to our mutual friends, and for some god unknown reason I had allowed him to hold me back from the others when we all tried to go our separate ways.
As it happened, he was a lot more well off financially than he looked, and he could make my problem disappear . . . for a price.
Quid pro quo, he’d called it.
He’d make sure my rent got paid, so long as I kept him happy one night a month.
I should have slapped him, and I knew it, but something about the sincerity in the mahogany brown of his eyes, and the tension in my chest, compelled me to say yes.
After all, if it wasn’t for the bad gut feeling I’d had about him, I would have wound up in his bed years ago . . . and I did need to find some way to pay my rent, fast.
At the very least, I knew that taking him up on his offer would buy me some time to make other living arrangements—it’s not like I’d have to whore myself out to him forever.
And it would sate my burning curiosity.
Church bells tolled as I descended the stairs, harmonizing strangely nicely with the guitar music that I was sure came from his apartment—especially when it stopped the second I knocked on the door.
I’d never seen a door that strange—it was heavy concrete, painted with all sorts of gruesome imagery of blood, bones, and gore. Black feathers and bits of what I imagined were chicken bones were matted into the paint—I wondered if he had done the artwork himself, or if the differing art styles pointed to this being a community work. It wouldn’t surprise me on Cardinal Street.
I had become so invested in his door that I practically jumped out of my skin when he answered it.
“Hello Helaine.” His smile was calm, but there was a sharpness to his eyes that I couldn’t leave unnoticed. “You’re a little early.”
“I-I didn’t want to walk here in the dark,” I confessed, a bit sheepishly, more embarrassed over having been caught off guard than anything. “I mean, come on Evan, you live here, you ought to know how dangerous this place gets.”
“I do.” His eyes lingered on me a little longer than I thought was necessary, but I supposed that he was paying for that privilege . . . and paying quite a bit at that. “Would you like to come inside?”
No.
“Yeah, that’d be great.” Suddenly, I was very aware of the chill in the air that always came with nightfall around here.
It would be winter soon, and I wasn’t looking forward to the walk, but at least winter was a little safer since fewer people wanted to be out at all.
At least, with this arrangement, I’d have a roof over my head this winter.
Evan’s apartment was . . . interesting.
It looked like the gutted remains of an old tattoo parlor, and knowing the area, it probably was. I hated to admit that that was pretty cool.
I didn’t know why I was trying to find some reason to pick apart his place—other than the lack of natural light, I really loved the layout, and the art he kept on display, but I supposed I was looking for something shitty to justify the weird vibe I got from him.
I didn’t want to be one of those girls who was just rude to a guy for no reason based on vibes . . . but I had to admit, it was starting to look that way.
Though, he was about to pay me for sex, so that might speak to his character a little.
Not that I was in any position to judge.
A particular piece grabbed my attention. On one of the walls was a stylistic floor to ceiling mural of a man painted in crimson, his hands shackled to the ceiling, and the striking white silhouette of a woman’s hands snaking around his torso.
“Would you like to sit?” He asked, gesturing to a plush red couch that looked about fifty years out of date.
“Thank you.” At least I remembered my manners as I ripped my eyes away from the painting.
He followed my gaze and smiled, that same strange predatory glint in his eyes. “Oh, you hadn’t seen any of my art, have you?”
I shook my head. “Nope. I figured you were an artist since we move in similar circles, but I didn’t know what kind.”
I felt awkward, sinking into the overstuffed couch all by myself while he stood there looking at me like I was fresh meat.
Actually, thinking about it, I wasn’t entirely convinced that he wasn’t a serial killer as I looked around at his paintings and murals, both finished and not.
It made me very glad that we had a whole lot of mutual friends who would make a fuss if I went missing. I hoped that was enough to keep him from trying to kill me.
“I actually work in . . . a variety of mediums.” He grinned, and I knew I was going to die there—kidding, I hoped. “Painting is just one of the many ways an artist can express himself.”
“Did you do the uh . . . paintings on the door?” I asked, thinking of the black feathers and bits of bone matted against the concrete.
He laughed a little too long, and pushed his soft ash brown hair out of his face, smiling a little too wide at me. “Oh, no, no. That’s the work of several neighborhood artists, I believe.”
“Why would they do that?” I asked, fidgeting on the cushions, trying to find a stable way to sit. “It looks a little . . . ”
“Grotesque?” He leaned in closer to me, before laughing again. “They’re artists, Helaine—who knows why artists do any of the things we do.”
“That’s a fair point.” I shrugged. I couldn’t exactly judge him there.
HelaineHonestly, if I didn’t already have a weird feeling about Evan, I would have thought that this apartment was the coolest place ever.I mean, his coffee table was a fucking coffin for fuck’s sake.He was looking at me again, and I shifted uncomfortably on the couch, wishing he’d either sit down so we didn’t feel so . . . unmatched, or that he’d just take his clothes off so we could get started already.But, he seemed starved for a little conversation.In all the years we’d hung around the same circles, he’d never really talked about himself. I realized for the first time that I didn’t really know a damn thing about him.Maybe he was just . . . lonely and awkward.The thought made me feel a little bad for the way I’d blatantly avoided him over the years.“You’re staring at me,” he observed—and that’s what he was doing, observing me with the corners of his mouth upturned slightly with amusement.“Oh, sorry.” I quickly looked away, and he laughed at me.“No, no you’re allowed to lo
HelaineOnce I was on my feet, his hand moved smoothly to the small of my back as he guided me around the room, pointing out all kinds of things I had mistaken for decor, but were apparently very much a part of his sex life.“I hope you’re not overwhelmed,” he mused, slipping his fingers somewhat obscenely through a puddle of hot wax that had formed beneath one of his many candles, and I watched transfixed as the wax hardened against his skin.“A little,” I confessed, and he eyed me with something akin to concern. “But not in a bad way, I’ve just never . . . ”“Never been tied up, at someone else’s mercy, while they drip hot wax onto your skin?” He grinned devilishly, most certainly aware of the way my heart raced as he spoke.The way he said the word mercy . . . on his tongue, it sounded like something between prayer and pornography.“I can’t say that I have,” I answered honestly. “I never had a partner that I—”“That you trusted enough?” He finished for me, and I nodded. “Helaine .
HelaineI bit my lip as I stood, savoring the odd metallic taste of him that still lingered as I watched him fiddle with the old record player—it looked antique, but kept in great condition.He seemed almost frozen when the music started to play, and my heart ached. “We can listen to something else,” I offered.I didn’t know how close he’d been with the band—he couldn’t have been much older than me, so they would have already gone missing well before he was born, but it really seemed to affect him nonetheless.“No,” he sighed, running his hands through his hair as he took a moment to catch his breath, before turning back to face me. “No, I need to hear it.”Before I could say anything else, he closed the distance between us, and pulled me close so he could kiss me again, weaving a hand into my hair.I clung to him, trying to keep up, damn near breathless by the time he finally let me go.I wanted more.“I want you to strip,” he breathed against my lips, still holding my head in his ha
HelaineHe held my jaw in his hand as he pulled me into a deep and hungry kiss that made me whine as he pulled away.His husky laughter resonated through my ears, and I could tell by the tension in his voice that he was every bit as turned on as I was in this moment.He stalked out of my line of sight, and I was left staring down at the coffin. From my vantage point, I could see all of the gorgeous details carved into the black stained wood—hundreds if not thousands of small skulls and bats were hidden among the intricate brambles of roses.Evan had said he worked in many different mediums, and I wondered if he’d carved it himself.My line of thinking was cut off by the sudden
HelaineI let out a pathetic little whimper when I felt the sting of the first cut, but I also heard the sharp rasp to his breath. It was like he was struggling to control himself, and however much the blade stung, it was worth it to hear him so thoroughly wrecked.I didn’t hold back my cries as he continued to slice my skin in what felt as though he was probably cutting intricate patterns into my flesh, and it seemed to spur him on.I had gone dumb with pleasure—more than anything physical, I was getting off on the fact that he had made me his canvas.I let out a loud wail when I came, my pussy clenching helplessly around nothing, and soon after I was startled by the metallic clatter of the knife hitting
Helaine“I don’t know, I think the villain’s motivations were a little passé.”“Passé? Come on, it was a vampire flick from the 80s. What motivation does he need beyond ‘Mmm lemme at that blood’?”“Helaine, you’re into gothic lit, right? Help me out here.”“Hmm, what?” I startled, looking dazed as my friends waited for an answer. “Sorry, I was . . . I was focused on the movie.”Lie.It was a total, complete, bald faced lie.Ever since my friends and I pooled our money together for a projector, movie night in the abandoned underpass had been my absolute favorite thing to do, especially in October, where we met once a week for a horror movie on Saturday as opposed to once a month like the rest of the year.It helped to make up for the fact that outdoor movie nights tended to be a no-go through most of winter.By all accounts, I should have been absolutely engrossed in this cheesy old vampire movie, but it was hard to focus when Evan spent the entire time sitting across the underpass sta
Helaine“Evan,” I whimpered against his lips, but he only kissed me again, holding me tight against him.His teeth scraped across my bottom lip, and I could feel his fangs, darkly sensual as he bit me ever so gently, careful not to draw blood.Not yet.Once the blood was flowing, it would become an exercise of restraint for Evan, and we both knew that wouldn’t be wise in public. Some how, that lurking danger only made it all the sweeter.I loved it. My whole body—my whole being cried out for more.But I couldn’t shake the lingering fear that someone would see us, as out in the open as we were.What would my friends think?Del and Roman didn’t seem too fazed by the way Evan put his arm around me back under the bridge, but there’s a pretty big difference between some harmless flirting and the naked truth that he’s paying me for sex.More than sex, he was an undead creature paying to drink my blood.I wanted to relax and enjoy the emotional foreplay of the long walk back to his apartment
HelaineWhipping around to look behind me, my lips parted in surprise at the large wheel, padded with gorgeously detailed leather.My fingers ran over the intricate patterns embossed into it, skulls and roses similar to the details on Evan’s coffin rendered in detail that must have taken years to achieve on a scale this large. Deep in concentration, my tongue slid along the seam of my lips in appreciation.“Do you like it?” His hands trailed up my hips, his touch feather-light, as he pressed himself against me, telling me that he’s been just as eager for this day to come as I have. “I didn’t build the wheel, but the leatherwork is all mine.”“You made this?” Craning my neck to look back at him, I couldn’t hide how impressed I was. “It must have taken—”“Years, yeah.” He chuckled, his breath tickling the back of my neck. “Time isn’t an issue for me.”The chill of his hand grazing my skin as his fingers carded into the back of my hair made me gasp. He turned my head toward the center of
HelaineWind whipped my face as Valek flew through the air, but I could hardly feel it.I hardly even remembered being taken from my childhood home. Everything after my body had erupted with that dark blast of energy felt unreal, like everything around me melted away in the inferno of the pain that racked my body.But in whatever conscious part of my mind that still struggled to hold on, I knew that Evan was still at my father’s house, left so far behind that there was no way he’d ever find me.What would he do? What would Frank do?Valek had frozen Evan and cast him off as easily as if she were flicking away an ant that had crawled onto her deathly pale skin. The only thin assurance I had that he was even alive was that in some strange way, I could feel him.Maybe it was like Lilith said—his damned soul was bound to me. I would feel it if he’d been killed.I hoped.There was precious little I could feel in this moment other than the searing torture my body was enduring.But he had to
Evan“Helaine . . . ” I could hardly hear my own voice in this moment, like my head was in a fish bowl, and my mouth had gone impossibly dry. I pawed weakly at Helaine, trying to pull her toward the door. “We need to leave. Now.”My whole body felt like there was ice in my veins when I saw her—Valek, the Mistress of Blood, with her cold, black eyes fixed squarely on the woman I loved.“Helaine,” I urged.She yanked her arm out of my grip, looking back at me with desperate eyes, still clouded with inky black tears as she protested, “I can’t let her kill my dad!”“He tried to kill you!” I pleaded, reaching for her again, but it was useless.Evan after all he’d put her through, Helaine still saw the man as her father. She was like a scared little girl right now, and I couldn’t blame her.She wasn’t the only one who felt small—helpless.It was impossible not to feel that way when an ancient horror beyond mortal comprehension made herself known.Frank Fairgrieve made a pathetic effort to p
HelaineFrank’s brow furrowed as he openly stared at me, the shotgun clattering to the gravel below as it fell from his hand. No doubt, I was the last person he expected to see rolling up to his house tonight.“Helaine . . . ” His voice was barely above a whisper as his head shook slowly, side to side, like he knew this wasn’t just a social call.Like he knew all his lies would catch up to him eventually.Evan followed, climbing out of the driver’s seat and eyeing my father dangerously over the el camino’s hood.“Who’s he?” Dad asked, his eyes narrowed suspiciously as he gestured toward Evan.“Never mind who I am,” Evan spat without an ounce of hesitation, his eyes never leaving my dad as though if he stared hard enough his gaze would pierce through him. “Your business is with her, not me.”In some cases, I supposed that Evan’s gaze could do just that to a person’s mind, but he wasn’t using his ability now. He wouldn’t meddle like that when he knew how badly I needed this.“I think yo
HelaineEvan’s hand was on my thigh as the el camino rolled through the woodland road, the headlights illuminating the eyes of a fat raccoon as it crossed in front of us.“We’re close,” I told him, taking his hand and squeezing it tight as we drove further down this lonely road.Just on the other side of these trees would be my hometown of Primrose New York. Even though I came home every year for the holidays, I never looked forward to coming back.“It’s alright,” Evan offered from the driver’s seat, keeping one hand on the steering wheel. One thing that was comforting about riding with a vampire was that he really didn’t even need the headlights, so he was worlds safer driving at night than the average man. “We’ll get the answers you need, and we can leave whenever you want.”That was one of the things I loved most about this man. He always gave me a choice, even when I felt as though my life was spiraling completely out of control.Even though we’d come this far, even after everythi
HelaineEvan’s eyes lingered on me as I pulled his old shirt over my head. The material was thicker than I was used to, but that made sense considering it was a man’s shirt from the eighties, not the flimsy tissue that passed for fabric nowadays.The jeans were a little tight on my hips, but at least they were clean and dry, instead of spattered with someone else’s blood.But . . . there was more than just old clothes in the back of the el camino, and I had the distinct impression that he didn’t want to look at it when he had me pick our clothes.I wasn’t the only one with a past, and that was never a secret. But the more my mind lingered on what I saw in the truck-bed the more I wondered exactly what happened, and why he didn’t want to talk about it.“You look good in my clothes.” He hooked a finger through one of the belt loops on my borrowed jeans and used it to pull me close so he could press a kiss to my freshly washed hair. “I’ll have to let you raid my closet when we get back t
EvanHelaine clung to me with tears streaming down her face and I was suddenly very aware of the blood drying on my hand as I smoothed down her hair.We were a mess, inside and out.No one took their first kill well. Taking another human life wasn’t supposed to be easy, but there were more layers of it for her.Through that one brutal action, it was like the darkness in her was roused from sleep. I saw it in her eyes, and there was no way I could pretend that I didn’t.“It’s going to be alright,” I murmured into her hair, but the words felt hollow even as I said them.How could I even begin to define “alright” for her right now?Whatever happened, whatever path she chose, I knew that I’d follow her. I’d take a thousand lives if it meant getting to twine mine with hers. It wasn’t as though spilling blood was new to me.Lilith called me Helaine’s champion, and she wasn’t wrong.But that wasn’t what Helaine needed to hear right now and as she clung to me, trembling as sobs wracking her s
Helaine“I’ll handle it,” he whispered in my ear, as he slid out of me, stuffing his still-hard cock back into his jeans. “Let me do the talking.”My stomach felt like it had tied itself in knots, remembering the last time those words came out of his mouth.Of course, that wasn’t fair of me.He was in a vulnerable place that night. He’d just been shown evidence that after all these years of nothingness and hunger, he was getting his soul back. I couldn’t begrudge his need for answers.Not when we were currently sticking our necks out to hunt down my dad for any information he had about me.Evan could never have imagined that summoning Lilith would have caused the trouble it did. As far as Evan knew before I took that photo of him, I was perfectly human.And it wasn’t as though living in ignorance would have changed the terrible truth that I was literal the spawn of satan.At least I found out while there still might be time to do something about it.The way he strode toward the absolu
HelaineThe man let out a gurgle as I pulled the rope more tightly around his neck, and I didn’t let go until his body fell completely limp. His face hit the floor hard with a terrible thwack as his nose broke against the ground.My breathing was labored as I stood over him, amidst the carnage. I almost couldn’t believe what I was seeing, what I’d just done.But he would have killed Evan if he had the chance, and I couldn’t let that happen. He was the only one I had who could ever understand what I was going through, and I . . . I cared for him.Deeply.My hands trembled and my head ached as the world seemed to spin around me.I killed a man today. I took a life. A soul.“Helaine, you should’ve stayed in the room,” Evan scolded me, but I could see the gratitude in his eyes as he approached, holding me in his arms. “They wouldn’t have even hesitated to kill you.”“Which is why we killed them,” I retorted, clinging to Evan as I stared down at the still-warm corpse of the man I strangled
EvanThe look of pure concern in her eyes stabbed into me like a knife to the chest. The wound closed as I dragged my thumb across my hand, but she had already seen.The damage had been done.“I never meant for you to see me like this.” I gazed at her with pleading eyes, quietly begging her to understand.Before now, she’d seen me as a domineering presence—always careful, and always in control, but by the very nature of the vampiric curse, there was an inherent weakness.One that made me look and feel truly pathetic.“What—what’s happening?” She asked with a furrowed brow as she extended a gentle hand to touch me, only for me to flinch away. “Evan?”“I should have known this would happen, sleeping away from my coffin.” Shaking my head, I moved as far away from her as I could in the bath, water sloshing around us. “But I haven’t needed nearly as much blood since I met you, so I thought I’d manage until you recovered enough.”“Your coffin? What does that have to do with—”“Sleeping in a