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Niko’s learned, from experience, that the aftermath is usually messy. Physically, mentally. The clean up is an unpleasant sort of tedious; once the hot spike of adrenaline fades he’s left with nothing but cold and painful reality. The bandages wrapped around his waist to keep his guts from falling out are seeping red, and it’s another few weeks of hiding the newly torn-open scar with T-shirts and tank tops. It irritates him more than the wound itself does.
He compartmentalizes. He thinks, all according to plan . He turns over that moment in his mind, when he saw the werewolf’s aura darken from red to crimson, when lust overtook anger at the forefront of his brain. The wolf had been right, he had been using his power for mindfuckery, but it was so much less than what he’d been accused of. Just a nudge, to throw the wolf’s turmoil of emotions off balance.
The result had been predictable, if not exactly enjoyable. The werewolf had stopped clawing him open and started shoving his dick down his throat instead. He’d thrown this round with the endgame in mind—at least, that’s what Niko tells himself. He prods at the gash across his stomach and winces when the pain hits.
“Nikky?” Lucia’s voice, husky and sweet, breaks in through the haze. He opens his eyes and looks at her from where he lies on the couch. His ghoul gazes back at him, curious and fond, joint in hand with smoke drifting past her lips.
“What is it, Lulu?” he says, watching intently as she undoes the clasp of her choker and bares the long line of her throat.
“I said, I met someone. I think you’d like him.” She twines the soft leather around her finger and Niko grabs her by the shoulders, pulls her down to sink his teeth into her neck almost viciously.
He knows she likes the pain. He likes how it makes her breath hitch, her eyes flutter shut. Lucia sighs on top of him, hips rolling as she grinds slow against his thigh. Sex does nothing for him, but he doesn’t push her off like he does when Kaspar gets handsy, lets her take her pleasure as he takes his.
Her legs are spread, straddling his waist. He settles one pale hand on her thigh, kneading the flesh, creeping it inward and up to tease her through her panties before he pushes the fabric aside and presses two fingers inside her. She purrs at the intrusion, her cunt squeezing down, slick and warm around him. He snaps his fingers into a curl and feels her moan deep in her throat, so he does it again, and again, until she’s squirming on top of him, riding his hand. Sex does nothing for him, but he’s not immune to feeling people fall apart at his fingertips.
Through it all, he drinks. Her blood is sweet, red, pulsing with lust and life. She’s a mix of impulses, always chasing that high, her taste unsoured by guilt or regret. And then it hits him: that giddiness flaring so bright and sharp he has to be high, knows it because this sort of happiness is altogether foreign to him. He lets the drugs in her bloodstream wear away the edges of leftover tension, and he breathes in the scent of weed and some delicate floral perfume as he drinks in her life.
He gets a mix of little flirtations, of Lucia playing her part as the party girl. The taste of sweet liquors on his lips, a hand on his—her—waist. Human sweat and the deep pounding of the bass rattling through her chest, a sea of fists raised up to the start of a familiar song. Some of the faces she sees are familiar to him as well, victims she’d cajoled into joining him upstairs, each of them picked for whatever small thing Lucia found to her liking. They were invariably to his taste as well. She really had a knack for these things.
There are many of these moments in Lucia’s memories; he’s used to discarding them. And then, the scene changes. A dive bar, and— a familiar face. His wound throbs.
Lucia, lost in ecstasy, doesn’t notice when her master breaks away. He licks the blood from his teeth and pulls his fingers out of her, frozen and fixated on the memory of a stranger seated at a bar.
***
Three days earlier
His prey had escaped him.
Liam sits at the bar, nursing his beer. No sense in drinking it quickly, or he’d have to get another, and continue sitting in this dive bar like an invitation.
He could approach someone, but he hasn’t seen anyone he likes the looks of so far. He wants something rough and quick, isn’t even looking for a room for the night, he just wants, needs , something to work off that unfulfilled thrill of energy. He’d had plans for that leech, and being denied set him on edge.
A scent drifts across to him, and he quickly turns to see—
Not him. Not his prey. This was a woman, with shockingly-blue hair and warm brown skin and gothy makeup. She’s saying something, some banal opening line about not having seen him around before, but her voice is low and throaty and he appreciates the way her dress clings to her body, so he turns to fully give her his attention.
“Just visiting town. Seeing the sights.” He throws a half smile at her, knowing his wolfish charm wasn’t something a human could resist.
“The sights,” she echoes, looking around pointedly at the dingy little bar, and he doesn’t move his gaze from her as he takes another drink of beer.
“Looks pretty good from where I’m sitting.”
She laughs with enough warmth to sound genuine, takes the seat next to him, and flags down the bartender. He can tell it’s not her first drink, and not her first time looking for company like this. She introduces herself as Lucia, and he gives her the name on his fake ID— Liam . He’s not that interested in the conversation, but her voice sounds good and she’s making a lot of his one word answers. She smells good too, perfume and powder and sweat and the lingering something he can’t quite place that turned his head in the first place.
“You’re interesting, you know,” she tells him, smile on her lips. “There’s something special about you.”
She might have said that line to anyone. If only she knew. “Yeah? What’s so special about me?” He’s expecting some bullshit. She’s pretty enough that he’d entertain it.
“Got a look to you. Something a little, more . Like there’s more life to you or something.“ She shrugs, and he watches her minidress strap slip further down her shoulder. “You’ve got someone on your mind, huh?”
Just vague enough to be accurate. “That my horoscope for the day?” he growls, with a smile to take the sting out of the words.
She laughs again, not offended. “Hard to believe in that stuff, isn’t it? I’m right though, aren’t I?”
He just grunts and nods, not inclined to let some barfly psychoanalyze him, no matter how cute.
“I’m good at getting it right.” She smiles, surveying him in an odd way. The next thing she says throws him off guard. “You know, I know a guy who’d be interested in meeting you.”
“Hmm.” Going off script. Had he mistaken her intentions? “Your boyfriend?”
“Not really. Kind of, but don’t worry, he doesn’t get jealous.” She grins, impish, and leans over to push her empty glass over to the bartender. “You’ll like him too, I think.”
“Mm. Good,” he says, distracted by the view down the front of her dress. “Was hoping I’d get you all to myself tonight.”
Her smile widens. She holds out a hand, and he tosses back the rest of his beer, no longer needing the prop. Pays for her drink too, because he can be a gentleman sometimes. She’s on him as soon as they’re out the door, pressing her body right up against his, and he wraps a possessive arm around her waist, nearly hauling her off her feet as he starts across the mostly empty parking lot.
She presses against him as they walk, breasts soft against his arm, stumbling a little in the dark and in stilettos. He’s only drunk off lust, and he wastes no time when they reach his car at the back of the lot. He meets her searching mouth with his own, pressing her back against the metal as he digs his keys out of his pockets.
When he finally manages to wrench the door of the backseat open, he almost tosses her inside before crawling in himself. It’s cramped but the thought of finding some motel doesn’t even cross his mind. She’s wet and open for him already, he can smell it. He slides his hand under her skirt to finger her slick cunt, spreading her folds and rubbing his thumb over her clit. She gasps, protesting with a laugh when he hooks a claw into her panties and rips the scrap of lace right off of her.
He’s a little more careful with her dress, pushing it over her thighs and kissing each bit of skin as it’s revealed, up over her belly, her breasts. He thinks about sinking his teeth into her flesh the way he’s sinking his fingers into her cunt, imagines leaving her body bloody and bare and torn up. It isn’t that he has any animosity towards her but there’s something about her scent that makes his movements rougher as his cock hardens, his claws drag reddening lines across her skin.
She doesn’t object to this treatment, instead occupied with blindly reaching between his legs. It’s a relief when she finds the zipper, freeing his erection from where it strains against the denim. She moans in appreciation, fingers not quite able to encircle his cock, and he thrusts against her grasp, grinning against her neck as she leads him to her entrance. He grinds down against her cleft, feeling her wetness on his length, feeling his hunger sharpen.
When he slides into her, it’s almost too tight, but he doesn’t relent, doesn’t stop his advance to let her get used to the stretch until he’s buried fully inside her. She’s all slick heat and softness, giving sweet little gasps and breathy moans below him, legs wrapped tight around his waist. He pauses to enjoy the feeling, take in her wide-blown pupils and open, gasping mouth. It’s been a while since he’s had a woman.
After that, there’s nothing slow or sweet about it. Neither of them have the patience. When he starts thrusting, she cants her hips to meet him, movements sinuous and urgent, and he growls into her mouth. He can feel lithe muscles shifting under her skin as she moves, hear the obscene wet noises each time he sinks into her. He locks his hands around her waist, so delicate he can almost encircle it fully, and thrusts in harder, deeper, as she urges him on with a heel in his back.
They rut against each other, Lucia moaning, head thrown back at the sensation of being stretched and filled. He feels her clench around him, muscles seizing and sucking at his cock as she comes with a cry and he follows her into climax, groaning something—a name, perhaps—at the first pulse and driving in deeper to finish. When he pulls out, she’s limp against the back seat, thighs splayed open and shining wetly in the dim light. He wants to go again, wants to drag her outside, press her against a wall and fuck her from behind this time, but he stops to give her a moment to rest, breathing hard against her skin, slick with sweat.
And then, with a shock, he realizes what’s so familiar about her scent. He remembers that combination of candy sweetness marred by just a hint of blood red rot, and his blood runs hot with a different sort of lust.
“So, your boyfriend, huh?”
***
Lucia has left; he’d ordered her out. She’d pouted but obeyed quick enough.
Now Niko’s alone and sprawled back over the couch, fingers clenched against the upholstery. Of all the people in Los Angeles for her to run into. That fucking werewolf. Liam—what a stupidly mundane, human name for something so monstrous.
He’d clung on to every word of their conversation, searching for any small crack he could work his way into, any small flaw he could exploit, but he hadn’t accounted for, well, the escalation. He can feel the werewolf on top of him, weighing him down, and panic seizes him. Their mouths mesh together in another sloppy kiss, and he grimaces and imagines, with some viciousness, biting the intruding tongue off, drinking up the blood. He has no idea how Lucia’s enjoying this but she is, gasping exultations into his mouth and sucking on his tongue.
The bastard moves down to his— her —neck, pressing kisses to her throat, and Niko shudders at the feeling of those teeth grazing her skin. When Liam’s cock—goddamnit, he hates that it’s now familiar to him—slides up against her cunt he feels like there’s something in his throat, something he can’t swallow down, and it stops him breathing. Lucia has no such reservations, and lets the wolf in.
Niko nearly chokes. Liam is heavy inside him and over him, unnatural heat radiating off his body. It’s all the worse that it doesn’t feel bad , the press of his cock and the fullness nothing like the blinding pain from that first night they’d met. Liam’s movements are still rough, aggressive, but Lucia likes it, and right now, his body does too. He can do nothing but take it, ride out the memory.
“Fuck,” he mutters into the silence of the room, and tries to ignore the wolf pounding into him hot and hard, the clawed hands pinning his own above his head, the warmth of forced pleasure pooling low in his gut. It belongs to Lucia, not him, but he doesn’t feel like a voyeur, he just feels like her . He can feel, with uncomfortable clarity, the cock pressing against his insides, making him ache deep within. Worse, he can hear that growling voice telling him what a good girl he is, how tight and wet his cunt is. It’s maddening. Niko groans, overwhelmed and overstimulated by sensations on parts of his body he doesn’t even possess.
“Fuck!” His voice raises in anger. His twisting about has made the gash in his stomach bleed, and Lucia’s memories meld with his own of Liam’s knife sunk into him, slowly dragging through his flesh, and why was that turning him on . He’s panting like he’s being fucked for real, he feels sick, he’s listening to Liam make feral, hungry noises against his neck. If it had been him in that car instead of Lucia, he had no doubt the wolf would have bitten down and torn out his throat. He almost wants that, would prefer that, to the sickening intimacy that Liam is fucking into him with. This was all sorts of wrong, at once too much and not enough, and he doesn’t know which feelings belong to him and which to Lucia at this point.
He doesn’t bother unzipping his pants, just presses fingers to his wound, scrabbling at the bandages. Red blooms on the white gauze as he shoves them aside, fingering the edge of the gash, though not pushing in the way the wolf had. He didn’t think he’d be in love with pain, but his breath comes harder at the sting of reopening wounds, and when he remembers the way Liam had shoved his cock inside, ripping him open and fucking his guts, using him like a fucking fleshlight , he has to bite back a groan. Fuck , he thinks furiously, what a goddamn stupid kink .
When Liam finally comes, he can feel it, feel himself— Lucia clenching around him. At least the bastard wore a condom, but he hates how good the cock pulsing inside him feels anyway and hates the part of him that wished he hadn’t. Lucia gives a satisfied little moan. Niko only snarls in uncharacteristic rage and punches the couch ineffectually. It was fucking good, and that pissed him off the most. At least his corpse of a body hadn’t let him come, which, frustrating as the unfulfilled ache was, he didn’t think he could live down right now.
He licks his own blood from his fingers before he stains his coat and runs a hand over his head, chest heaving. In his mind, the memory continues like a first-person movie, but the sensations on the comedown are less intense and all-consuming. Lucia’s tugging her dress back down, exchanging words, goodbyes, exiting the car with a satisfied wobble in her step. There’s a metallic taste in his mouth from where he’d bitten his tongue imagining it was Liam’s and a ringing in his ears.
He gets his breathing under control. When he’s regained his composure, he calls Lucia back into the room. She’s unaffected by the earlier dismissal, not in the least concerned that she’d done something wrong. Being the favorite had its privileges.
“Everything okay, Nikky?”
“Fine. It’s fine.”
She blinks her pretty blue eyes at him, too far gone into ghouldom to detect any trace of a lie in his words, and he softens his voice. Whatever had happened between him and Liam, she didn’t deserve to get caught in, but now she is, and he could use that.
“That guy you said I’d be interested in,” he begins, and she brightens.
“Oh? I know you’d be into him,” she purrs, and Niko has to laugh, biting back the edge of hysteria. That’s one way to put it.
“Bring him here. I want to meet him.”
Lucia smiles, all sweetness, and he bares his fangs at her in return at the prospect of paying the wolf back for this humiliation.