Page 41 of Bottoms Up
I added up everything he wanted to do, including the price for Heather to fly him out and back, the cost of the room, and payment to feed from the Master Vampire of Vegas’ flock. He’d also have to purchase tickets for his security to get into the shows with him, though Marco would reimburse him. I asked Marco how that would work at the brothel, and he said it would be fine for them to wait outside.
Most of Julian’s money was moved straight to savings, so I put three thousand more than I figured he’d need into his checking account, and emailed him approval for everything he’d requested, with instructions not to go over the amount available. He was responsible for making all arrangements, including security. Marco pays for protection, since Julian only needs it because of his job, but he’d still have to make the arrangements.
* * * *
Julian
Silver was giving me too many new abilities, or responsibilities, orwhatever. More decisions to make, more chances to fuck up. My opinions mattered now, which sounded good on paper, but less so when I had to choose flooring samples.
I had to redecorate my suite from scratch. Furniture, wall color, rugs, artwork. I walked through showrooms surrounded by endless options. How could I possibly choose? It waslike trying to build a personality out of catalog pages. My surroundings had never been my choice before. I’d never developed a style. Never considered the possibility of doing so.
When I saw a sample room I liked, with sturdy furniture big enough for my frame, I chose it. All of it. Rugs, tables, sofa, chairs, pictures for the walls. I only needed to choose a wall color similar to what the furniture store had used, and hardwood flooring I thought would work.
The trip to Vegas was worse. Stressful as hell. Technically, I wasn’t alone — security was with me — but they followed my lead instead of giving it. I made the schedule, and if I wanted to change something, I just… could. No one stopped me. It was terrifying.
And then picking up the guitar —fuck. Silver had said it wasn’t so much the cost, but the fact he’d had to wait so long for it to be ready. I’d looked this guy up online, though, and discovered the cost was pretty astronomical. I carried it like it was a newborn child, terrified I’d drop it or do something wrong.
All the crushing micromanagement that had been so soul-encompassing back in the beginning was gone. No more cock cage, no more daily whippings, no more collar, no more waiting for permission to leave my hidey-hole. If I’m honest, I’d say I miss being told what to do — the safety of knowing what’s expected, but I understand that free people have to make decisions about pretty much everything. They have to figure their own lives out.
Silver is still my Master, but also adviser, confidante, and as much my friend as possible, under the circumstances. Not lover, though. She orders me to pleasure her orally, but she doesn’t allow me to fuck her. Ineverhave permission to come when I service her, but I’m allowed to ask for permission to masturbate when my work isn’t behind, and she most often lets me. She makes me do it in front of her, but she allows it.
We aren’t lovers right now, but I know we will be again, so it’s okay. I still get to spend time with her nearly every day — except when she sends me off on assignments.
What I didn’t expect, two weeks shy of the nine months this was supposed to take, was that when Marco took me to Memphis for a routine session of the Senatus, he’d have strangers plunk me into a silver-laced jail cell, and my final testing would begin.
Not to mention, I’d fed when rising the previous day, and there hadn’t been time to stop and feed on this day, so I was hungry to start with.
The test I’d taken while Silver was gone, before the new contract had changed everything, had proven I could be around humans. There were situations designed to trick me into showing myself, so I had to allow myself to be hurt rather than run faster-than-human, or defend myself against thugs only as much as a human my size could, careful not to do somethingimpossible. There was a test to make sure I had control and wouldn’t drink humans down if we were stuck in an elevator, and some social situations to navigate so I didn’t give myself away. Three days and part of a fourth, and it was hard, but I’d managed it, and Marco had someone sit with me for two days to help me prepare for it.
But this one, they just shoved me into a room with no explanation. I wasn’t given time to mentally prepare, or to talk to anyone about how best to survive the ordeal.
Silver flecks laced the floor, the ceiling, every wall — burning every cell in my body. No escape.
I have no idea how long I was there before a terrified man was tossed in, his scent lighting up every inch of my hunger. Fucking Fae, of course. Sweet and decadent. A drug I couldn’t have.
Aos Sí, the most populous race in Faerie, are like crack cocaine to vampires — high-octane and magic-laced, bright asthe sun on the back of your tongue. It took every ounce of my being to keep my fangs from dropping.
I gritted my teeth and told him, “I need you to get against the wall, please. I have to stay in the center of the room, and I need to be as far from you as possible. Please,please, I’m begging you, stay behind me and as far away as possible.”
They didn’t stop with him.
One by one, shifters were sent in, giving me a chance to fully experience each one’s special flavor, their terror, their racing pulse.
Before it was over, three men and two women, all either half-fae or full-shifter, were crammed into the tiny cell with me.
I couldn’t avoid touching them. Their body heat pressed against me constantly, their pulses throbbed like bass lines under their skin. I stopped breathing to try to keep from smelling them, but it barely helped. Their scents coated my sinuses, soaked into the walls. I could taste them just by opening my mouth.
The shifters were sent in with their hands bound behind their backs, except the last, who was in a severe hog-tie when someone opened the door and settled him just inside.
He was a werewolf, andfuck, did he smell good. Earthy and hot and wild. Blood thick with power and dominance. Even bound, he looked at me with an arrogance that made me want to tear him open and drink straight from the source.
I believe those five were sent in over a twenty-four-hour period. They all pissed themselves at some point, and I assume they were given enemas beforehand, to keep them from shitting in the small cell, since none did.
They came in staggered across that night, and then the next evening and night. The first three were taken out when the sun took me, but sent back in when I rose the next day, with anotherbeing shoved in about an hour later, and the final one an hour or so later.
When they werefinallyall taken out, I thought my ordeal was over. But then the sun took me.
And when I rose, I was alone. No voices, no movement. Just silver-lined silence. The sun took me again. And again.
