The Bite of Silence

Chapter Two

Nothing could have proven Nikos’s point better. Guessing vampire was certainly not the same as being trapped in a limo with an aroused one.

Before I could even squeak my dismay he swung me onto his lap and wrapped me in arms of steel. I’m a nice curvy size six but sitting on his tree-trunk thighs, looking up into his flaming eyes, I really got sexual dimorphism. Slamming it home, his mouth slanting over mine covered real estate from Boise to Philly.

His lips landed moving, muscular ripples as strong and potent as the rest of him. They laved me like pounding surf, crashed through my flimsy barriers with hot desire.

I’d barely gotten used to overwhelmingly big Nikos kissing me when the whole fang thing hit. Smooth, long canines pressed like warm ivory against my lips. His tongue worked between them, teasing. Tongue, lips and fang together drove me a little nuts. I poked the tip of my tongue out for just a taste.

Rumbling his approval, he sipped at it. He caressed it between his own lips, silk and velvet and an intoxicating male taste. His tongue flicked the tip of mine in return, his so big it swiped half my mouth. He licked me again, maybe to tease my lips open, but his size made it more of a demand. I surrendered, lips parting on a breathless moan.

An instant later self-preservation kicked in. Vampire, fangs, trapped with a very big, aroused male. I closed up.

Too late. He swept into my mouth like a conquering warrior. His tongue was a flaming sword, stabbing deep, plumbing every dark mystery I had, licking me with light and blazing heat. I groaned.

Klaus had been a good kisser. A pointillist, every daub of tongue and swish of lips placed precisely so.

Nikos was a modern master, throwing aggressive splashes of bright color across aching, empty canvas. I wriggled at the size and feel of him, the taste of him, potent and smooth as aged whiskey or absinthe.

He pulled me tighter to contain my wiggles and captured me completely. His arms wrapped me from head to hips, one hand cupping my head. The other cupped my breast.

I have Tafel breasts, round heavy globes that overflow men’s hands. They fitted perfectly in Nikos’s.

My nipple slotted between his fingers. He pinched it erect. Need sparked. Any fear drowned in the wash of desire. He kissed sweeter than a dream, and his hand on my breast was oh-so-tutored, pinching and fondling.

He shifted me, pillowing my head on the enormous deltoid of his shoulder. Then he kissed me harder, deeper, pushing me into his own muscled strength. It left his hand free to plunge down my jeans directly onto my nub.

He petted my clit in welcome. At my gasp his tongue plunged deeper, began to drive into me. He kissed with the rhythm of sex, but he wiggled his finger on my clit lightly, almost teasingly. I rocked my hips, asking for more. Asking for the same fire as his kiss.

His hand withdrew. I whimpered until I heard a pop and a rasp, and my pants loosened. When he dove back in, his thick finger went straight into my aching body. His thumb grabbed my clit, his finger thrust deep inside, and he pinched.

My eyes shot open. Sweet Monet, yes. I arched into his chest. Licked his lips eagerly. “That feels amaz-”

He cut me off by laying claim to my mouth. He kissed me fiercely, his fingers pinching breast and pussy in rhythm. I rubbed myself against his crisp shirt, grabbed his shorn head and gave myself over to the wonder of it.

And he demanded more. His finger plunged harder. His tongue thrust deeper, opened me so far my jaw ached. It stabbed everywhere, lighting passion, demanding surrender. No part of my mouth went unclaimed by his hot, virile possession, inside or out. As his tongue thrust, his sleek fangs rode my throbbing lips.

I tried to kiss him back, brushing mouth and fang indiscriminately in my zeal. He groaned, and his fangs grew longer. It reminded me I had only guessed.

I lifted my chin. “Bite me. I want to know.”

His eyes were closed, lashes a jet fringe against his hewn cheeks. “Not yet.” His lids lifted, revealing dilated pits of red fire. He pinched my nipple, slowly, deliciously.

“Not yet?” I shuddered, wriggled on his finger thrust inside my body. He seized me more firmly, driving a second finger deep, and shook my entire vulva until I writhed.

When he let up I opened my eyes and panted. “What do you mean, not yet?”

He smiled, desire burning in his eyes. It was frightening, it was heady. “This.”

He tossed me onto the seat next to him and yanked my jeans to my knees. I tried to scramble up but he knelt in the seat well, restrained me with an arm dropped across my torso, and spun me toward the seat back. A hand pressed my face into the seat, another clasped my knees and held them down. I couldn’t see what he-

Breath seared my labia. A flaming tongue thrust me open. I jerked hard against him. He contained me easily. “You wanted shocking. Take it.”

He started to lap at me, great swipes of tongue that went deep into my body. I writhed against the invasion, embarrassed at how swollen and open I already was. It was only a start. He rode me with his tongue until I was mewling.

His fangs nicked my lips and inner thighs as he worked me. Each tiny prick scored me with pleasure. I could only imagine how thrilling his actual bite would be. “Nikos-bite me. Now. Please.”

“Not yet.” His rumbling purr buzzed against my wet, licked-open flesh.

I writhed violently but his great strength reduced it to mere ripples. “Then when?”

“Soon.” He thrust one finger inside and licked delicately at the hood of my clit.

I shrieked. As he plunged that thick finger rhythmically into me, I began to pant. I’d wanted shocking, sure, but he could have given me shocking simply by biting me. Instead a male of vast experience was doing his damnedest to make sex thrilling for me. That went beyond shocking to electrifying.

He thrust a second finger deep. I curled into the seat at the intensity of it. He beat into me with two fingers, licked ardently at my nub.

I gasped. “Nikos, it’s too much.” My hips beat back, at least as much as he let them. His fingers sank deeper with every thrust, until I wanted to cry, until I wanted to scream. “Bite me. Please, I’m begging you.”

“Mmm. Nice. But not yet.” He began to suck at me and I moaned and pleaded and railed against him until I wept. He ignored it all, sucking and licking and thrusting with the same forceful, demanding rhythm.

Until I groaned to my very soul. “I…I’m coming…”

“Ah.” His deep voice was filled with satisfaction. “Now I bite.”

He grabbed my knees and head and held me firmly. Sharp needles of sheer pleasure drove hard into my swollen labia. My body wrenched in his strong grip, driving the pleasure to the bone. Tight spirals released, radiated out like rain washing from my heart to my outermost skin.

The orgasm was shockingly sweet. Thrilling, but more. Maybe because this was Nikos, the guy I’d been just a little nuts about since the first moment I’d seen him. With Nikos I got shocking and I got thrilling. But I also got a deep sense of rightness.

Not just “yeah baby” or “hat-sah”, but finally.

“Oh my.” Little fireworks were still going off behind my closed eyes. It must have been some time later because my jeans were back up and the limo was stopped.

Nikos helped me up. His fangs had retracted and his eyes cooled. But now I knew, rather than guessed. And it did make a difference.

Now I wanted him more.

Nikos pointed at the door. “Your cousin’s.”

I frowned. “I didn’t tell you where he lived. I didn’t even say his name.”

He almost smiled. The slight softening made his face so lickable it was probably illegal in Alaska. But he hardened almost immediately to Mr. Deadly Serious. “Don’t tell Aylmer about us.”

Us. It hit me low in the belly, started the motor all over again. “You and me?”

“Vampires.”

Oh. The motor coughed and died. “Yeah, I know. The whole my-best-friend-not-telling-me clued me in that you guys are underground. Care to say why?”

A muscle in his hewn jaw jumped. “Humans outnumber us.”

“So? You’re superstrong. Doesn’t that kinda level the playing field?”

“Not when the odds are four thousand to one.”

“Um, yeah. Okay, I’ll keep your secret. Aylmer won’t know a thing.”

“Good.” Nikos hit the intercom. “Ready.”

“Wait! I have questions. How did you know about Aylmer? What-”

“Business,” he said, reaching past me to open the door. A rush of cold air revealed a black-uniformed Kato. Behind him was a six-story brownstone. Nikos nudged me out, not giving me time to fully understand the implications of any of it, sex or fangs or this unseemly knowledge. One thing filtered through, the most inane. “My luggage?”

“My man will deliver it.” Nikos pushed me into the opening. “Go.”

Wisps of smoke rose from his exposed hands. I sucked in a breath. “Is that because of the sun?”

“Go.” Nikos’s voice rang in my head, weird and hollow. It shoved harder than his hands. Not enough to make me, but enough that when his chauffeur grabbed me under the arms and pulled, I popped out.

Before I could clamber back in, the door shut and the lock clicked. Smoke trailed around the edges. I stared, slightly horrified.

Having a vampire for a boyfriend might be a little more difficult than I thought. I turned and made my way up the brownstone’s stairs.

My mother was an African diplomat, my father a famous surgeon. When they settled down to have children they chose my father’s hometown of Meiers Corners, a small city west of Chicago where the beer flowed freely and the school uniform was lederhosen and clogs. Not really, but only because we all kept voting Principal Gustav down.

Anyway, my parents were internationally recognized people. My brother’s a lieutenant colonel in the Marines, my sister’s a neurosurgeon. I studied art and photography at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago but when I graduated there weren’t that many jobs for a newbie freelancer. My parents were dead by then and I had to earn a living.

So I drifted back to Meiers Corners where I ended up a glorified secretary for a small-town mayor, the underachiever of the family.

My cousin Aylmer made up for that.

Aylmer Tafel lived in an attic and thrived on conspiracy theories. Attic lofts are all the rage now but Aylmer ’s garret was more like a rat’s nest. And nuts? He made Bruno Braun, who runs the survivalist shop Armageddon Three in Meiers Corners, look like a savvy entrepreneur.

Sherlock Holmes said art in the blood takes strange forms. I think it’s more a matter of degree, like homeopathy. Art is the insanity gene, the only moderator being how much. I had maybe fifty percent. Aylmer was hovering at eighty-nine. But he was mostly self-sufficient and he wasn’t dangerous.

I pressed the lobby doorbell labeled 7B-Tafel. After a few minutes I pressed it again. I hadn’t called Aylmer with my arrival time but he never left his rooms. He was antisocial to the point that he didn’t even leave to earn a living-he had his work delivered and picked up by express. In fact, the only way I got an invitation was because he owed me big time for getting him an in at a company called Bujný a Zvuk Magie. Don’t ask me to pronounce it.

Actually, I more invited myself. Aylmer refused at first. But it took a lot for me to get him the job as the American rep for the high-powered Czech company, not your usual dream-job but look who it was for. I had to collect tons of personal favors, tug strings until my fingers were bloody. I thought the least Aylmer could do was put me up for a few nights.

Still getting no answer, I double-flathanded half a dozen doorbells. Thankfully someone buzzed me in.

There were two doors on the attic level. One side smelled musty, like stale cigarettes. A pockmarked metal 7A hung on scratched wood. The other door had no number but it reeked of rotting pizza layered with the stench of seriously stinky guy. I pinched my nose and knocked. “Cousin Aylmer? It’s Twyla.”

A flicker at the peephole presaged the shht of a bolt, three clicking locks and a brrrt of chain. Aylmer popped out, stick in one hand, clunky meter in the other. He was nineteen-fifties très chic in coveralls and tinfoil hat. He shot me furtive glances through blue-tinted lab goggles. “Don’t come any closer. Hands up.”

I dutifully raised my hands while he waved the stick in front of me. He checked the meter and broke out-well, not smiling. Aylmer never really smiled, not since the night at Grandma Tafel’s cabin in northern Wisconsin when he sleepwalked, came back smelling of skunk and said it was an alien abduction. “Twyla. It is you.”

“Good to see you too, Aylmer.” I followed him into his apartment.

He set his ancient equipment on a document box, one of several littering the room. “It’s Van Helsing now.”

“Abraham? Or do you just go by Van?” I hugged him, awkward with his body odor kicking me in the septum but I made the effort because he was family. He felt light under my fingers, unwell. I held him away from me. He wasn’t looking so good, either. Peaked and scrawny, like he hadn’t been eating. “Why don’t we go to the kitchen? I’ll make some tea, see if there’s any food for an early dinner.” Last I looked at a clock, it was near four.

I didn’t know where the kitchen was but the place wasn’t that big. I’d have to run into it sooner or later. Besides, there was only one path through the boxes, strewn clothes, and “equipment”.

In the kitchen Aylmer fished an old tin box from deep within a cabinet. It jangled as he opened it, revealing a snake pit of keys. He stirred a finger into the mess, finally extracting a key ring heavy as a jailer’s. “Here. So you can get in tonight after the New Year’s thing. Although why you’d want to be in the middle of that mass idiocy…don’t wake me, okay? And make sure you relock everything after you’re in. Don’t forget the chain. And get all the bolts. You’re staying only one night, right?”

“One night?” I dropped the keys into my bag, wincing when something went crack. “Come on, Ayl…I mean Van. I had to call in some major favors to get you clearance. Whatever they do, Bujný a Zvuk Magie is a big international player.” I found a kettle but had to wait for the rusty tap to run clear, so I set it down to hunt tea. “That’s worth at least four nights.”

He sat at the table and took off his foil hat. “I said thank you.” His face was petulant. “Two.”

“Three nights and we’re even. What was that job for, anyway? Times Square came up in the conversations several times.”

His face closed down. “Twyla, I want to tell you. But I can’t.”

I smiled. Him and his conspiracies. “Because then you’d have to kill me?”

“No.” He practically snarled it. “Because you wouldn’t believe me. Nobody believes me when I tell them my theories.” He wore a two-year-old’s frustrated pout.

I found a tea canister I recognized as Aunt Myrtle’s, probably from when Aylmer moved out five years ago (at the age of thirty-seven). “You don’t have to tell me then, Ayl-Van.”

“But I want to tell somebody. It’s brilliant. I’m a genius.” He glanced furtively around, then ran out of the room. I was at the tap, filling the kettle when he returned with an ominous-looking metal suitcase which he hefted onto the table with a grunt. But when he opened it, it was filled with nothing more sinister than toggles and flashing lights. Still, he was very earnest as he flipped a couple switches, then a couple more. With another furtive recon of the room he motioned me closer. I put my head next to his.

Even that close I barely heard his whispered, “Vampires are real.”

No duh. I just had sex with one in a limo on the way from the airport.

But v-guys were supposed to be this big secret, so I only said, “I see.” After all, Aylmer was just guessing. He couldn’t know. I set the kettle on the stove, turned on the gas. Flames licked bits of burned food, making them flame like charcoal.

“You don’t believe me?”

I was careful to keep my face neutral. “Sure I do, Van. Although I was wondering how you figured it out. If you-if we have any proof.”

“We don’t yet. But we will. I knew I could count on you, Twyla.”

“Sure.” I busied myself washing out mugs (desiccated spider bodies don’t steep well) wondering how he’d guessed. Just because he was right for once didn’t mean he was any less crazy. “Count on me how?”

“I came up with a plan. A brilliant plan. See, vampires are natural predators. Appeal to their predatory instincts and they’ll come out of the woodwork. We get it on film, instant proof.”

“I don’t follow.”

He snorted. “And they say you’re the smart one. C’mon, Twyla. What’s a vampire’s prey? People. And what city has the most people?”

“ New York.” I saw where this might be headed, and didn’t like it.

“Exactly. And what’s the biggest outdoor event?”

I really didn’t like where this was going. “The Super Bowl?”

“At night, dork.”

And wrong city, but that wasn’t my point. “Vampires aren’t only awake at night-”

“Who’s the expert here?” He eyed me suspiciously. “I don’t think you’re taking this seriously enough.”

He really meant I wasn’t taking him seriously enough. I set a mug of chamomile in front of him, dunked the bag to stir the smell. The action and scent were reminiscent of Grandma Tafel, which I hoped would calm him. “Seriously, then. Times Square on New Year’s Eve. So what?”

“Normally the vampires try to blend. Even though it’s illegal to carry liquor in, people are already so drunk or just high with excitement that they don’t notice a thing, and the vampires get away with it.”

“Wait. Are you saying vampires are killing people at the New Year’s celebration? Wouldn’t we see the bodies the next day?”

“Vampires can drink from humans without killing them, silly. And they generally don’t drink in public, but New Year’s Eve is the exception.” Aylmer picked up his tea, waved the mug over the suitcase. Flipped a switch and did it again, peering closely at the blinking lights. Whatever they whispered to him, he apparently felt safe enough to finally drink. “So here’s my brilliant plan. We hypnotize the vamps to remove their inhibitions. They fang up in full view and people start screaming. Running. The running further fires the lurking predator and whammo! Tons of damning footage. Maybe even a few corpses if we’re lucky.”

I fell into my chair. “You’re going to remove whatever inhibitor keeps vampires from killing people? That’s no better than being a murderer yourself!”

He pouted. “It’s their fault for not believing me. Once I have proof, everyone will believe me. They’ll have to.” His eyes narrowed on me. “I don’t know why I tell you things. I don’t know why I tell anyone!” He kicked back his chair and marched out. Came back, banged his briefcase shut, took it and stomped back out.

I heard the slam of the bedroom door, sat for a moment processing. Vampires gone berserk, humans dying in droves. It was crazy. Aylmer couldn’t possibly do what he’d threatened. I held my mug but didn’t drink.

At some point the sun set and I got up to turn on the lights. Yes, it was crazy, but if there was even a possibility Aylmer could deliver on his threat, it was too horrendous to ignore. I needed more information.

I pulled out my cell phone and hit the speed dial for my friend Nixie Emerson.