What Dreams May Come

I've always told myself a good old-fashioned cry is as good for the psyche as grease is to machinery, but after four days of slicking my spirit with that particular lubricant, I wasn't feeling the relief. In fact, I was beginning to worry my face would forget how to make any other expression except ugly cry. Four days. A full day for each year I'd devoted to the bastard who had fooled me into thinking monogamy could be as good for the soul as confession. Of course, I'd believed he thought the practice just as spiritual as I did. Of course, I was the sole devout practitioner. Of course, I was an idiot not to see the signs.

I needed a good exorcism, that was what. Rid myself of the demons of grief and regret. Get the hell out there and just rile things up. Get my party on. Get my drink on. Get my what the hell am I going to do without that bastard blubbering on.

I settled for a mocha swirl latté because who was I kidding? My complexion looked like someone had scoured it with acid. My eyes could barely peer through the swollen sausages that used to be my lids. No way I could find any sort of Jade juju with my face looking like a raw turkey's ass. I'd need at least a week to recover, and all I had was the weekend. Halloween weekend at that. I'd taken three sick days from the vet's clinic where I worked the desk and I knew by the tone of the vet's voice that if I didn't show on Monday, my ass would never get the luxury of imagining such a wondrous thing as a turkey ever again. Like it or not, it was back to the land of the norms who hadn't had their hearts ripped out by a cheating bastard. Or at least, back to the land where those who had, have at least managed to move on.

So coffee and sugar would have to do.

Which is how I met the hot-as-hell Sam.

Which is how I managed for the first time in four days to find a tattered edge of my self-esteem's cloak close enough that I could steal a tentative grip on it.

Which is how I ended up on a rampage of apocalyptic proportions trying to find a costume at four o'clock Saturday afternoon for a party that started at nine.

"This is it? Really?" I said to the rental clerk, a gorgeous mulatto chick at least three years older who obviously never had a man pull on the string of her self-esteem. "This is all you have?"

She quirked a charcoal brow at me over hazel eyes. "Honey," she said, making me want to pinch her sensually thick and wax-balmed lips. "Any sane woman booked their sex kitten costume weeks ago."

"Do I look sane to you?"

Her appraising eye ran my length from hair to heel before she placed her palms on the counter much like a bartender does when he's about to tell a patron he's had too much to drink. I braced myself.

"What you look like is shit," she said.

"Exactly. My bastard of a fiancé dumped my ass for a dozen less beautiful women and I just got asked to a fuckin' costume party by a goddamned gorgeous hunk of a man and I am damned well going to go and find my confidence again at the bottom of a keg of beer or the deep root of said hottie's dick if I have to, even if it means I have to pile on a shit-ton of cover up foundation to look more human."

I sucked in a deep breath, realizing I had no air left in my lungs after the tirade. "And I am NOT going as Miss Muffet's spider."

I shook the thing at her for emphasis.

"You want my advice?" the clerk said. "Put a sheet over your head. It'll solve both your problems."

Five days ago I would have been quite comfortable giving this sassy clerk a piece of my mind, but this was not five days ago. I felt a familiar sting behind my eyelids and had to rip my gaze away from her penetrating one to keep from brimming up. I looked down at the spider costume with its eight furry legs, one of which had obviously been broken at some point, and was now at odd angles to its partners. I imagined myself trying to find some semblance of charisma from within it sufficient to beguile a hot young male. Even as I held onto the thing on the counter, my fingers clenched at the material in a way that made me jerk my eyes from the sight. It was too much. One more blow to my already fragile ego.

"Please," I said. "One woman to another. I need this."

I felt her feathery touch on the top of my hand and swept my gaze to hers. The eyes that met mine could have been hard chunks of mossy asphalt and I was certain she would give my skin a pinch, one last retort before she rushed me from the shop and swung her open sign to closed.

"If it were me," she whispered. "I'd just stick a pin in him. Or a reasonable facsimile." She pulled the spider costume from my grasp and tucked it under the counter. "Failing that, well... You know what they say. If a man hurts you, fuck his best friend."

I spread my arms out. "Seriously? Would you fuck this mess?"

She looked me up and down. "No. But then I like my lovers a little less man drunk."

In the end, she suited me up with something from her own closet, a narrow-stepped level above the shop in an apartment that smelled of spices and a strange sort of smoky fragrance that could have come from candles, but didn't smell like any store-bought fragrance I'd ever encountered.

I tried to ignore the pile of desiccated chicken feet lying out in the open in a basket on her coffee table. I tried to tell myself that the various candles amid the half-dozen – were they real – chicken, beast, and human skulls were really just there as decoration. Stick a pin in him, she'd said, and it was so close to Halloween that I was willing to believe that anything was possible. Even a real, live voodoo priestess working as a lowly clerk in a costume store.

I kept my eye cautiously on her face as she wrapped a bright yellow bandanna around my head and pushed a circle of beads onto my wrist. Maybe if I didn't look around, she wouldn't rethink her impulsive kindness. She pressed a lightweight ball of material into my hands.

"The sarong is easy to tie," she said. "Go heavy on the eye makeup, and wear nothing underneath."

"What man can resist a sexy priestess, right?" It wasn't a test, not really. But even I heard the question in the statement.

"What woman, for that matter?" She grinned, ignoring the undercurrent of suspicion. "The beads are real," she said. "So make sure you get them back to me. Toute suite."

I looked down at my wrist. Beautifully cream-colored ivory. Elephant tusk? I wondered. Even as I fingered one of them, I realized the beads were too brittle to be real ivory: elephant, walrus, or otherwise.

She quirked a black brow, but said nothing as I lifted my gaze to hers. I didn't need to ask to know that meant real authentic bone. I just hoped it wasn't human.

I started to stammer out some sort of thank you that sounded oddly like I needed to get the hell out of there and she took to laughing and slapping her jean clad thighs.

"I wish you could see your face," she said. "Just because I have Haitian blood you're that willing to believe I have some sort of zombie juju power." She pushed on my shoulder. "You spindly spoiled bitches. Gets me every time."

I let her push me to the door and found my way down the stairs to her shop. She called out to me as I got to the bottom.

"Flip the sign before you leave," she said. "Door'll lock behind you."

I nodded stupidly. "I'll get this back to you tomorrow by noon."

She put her hands on those voluptuous hips. "Give it till at least apres midi. Just in case you wake up in hottie's bed. But mind you, don' miss the deadline. Otherwise, dose bones der will bind you to Bacalou." She snorted derisively and waved me away.

I wasted no time flipping the sign and pulling the door closed. I leaned back against the outside of the shop for a moment, willing my heart to stop beating as though it were about to hammer out of my chest. Just Halloween, I told myself. Get a grip.

By the time Sam picked me up at nine, I was suitably arrayed in what I thought was pretty authentic-looking voodoo priestess attire. I'd teased my hair into a tall pile and clipped it in places odd enough that it looked like I'd been whirling in a frenzied trance. The yellow bandanna traced the outline of my hairline and the milky whiteness of my complexion, wan from all of the sobbing, actually worked in my favor, with all the black kohl around my eyes and all. I looked reverently terrifying, but also damned fucking smoking.

Sam the hottie would be under my spell by midnight. Surely, my self-esteem was just a hop, skip and jump past that.

"You look different," he said as I slipped into the passenger side of his car.

I let a fair bit of thigh peek out from beneath the sarong. "Isn't that what Halloween is for?"

He looked preoccupied as the overhead light died to black.

I couldn't help putting a trimmed nail to the corner of my mouth and chewing nervously. "Do you like it?"

"Yeah, sure," he said and turned away. The car roared to life.

The sudden silence started to fray my confidence. "If you don't like it, I can go back and change." Change. Really. And into what? But I had to say something, even if it meant that I was going to ramble on like some sort of possessed idiot. Saying things like: I'll just go put a sheet over my head, go as a ghost, or we can stop at the Walmart and I can grab a kid's mask.

He chuckled. "No," he said, patting me on the knee finally. "I think it works."

"It better," I said. "You wouldn't believe what I had to go through to get it."

His hand slipped up beneath the sarong to cup my inner thigh. Part of me tried to insist that the smart thing to do would be to move into his hand, but the other part: the part that had been flogged quite badly by a litany confession of betrayal just days before wouldn't let me. I felt my muscles tense.

He responded by stroking his hand back down toward my knee and squeezing. "You're modest," he said. "I like that."

"Not exactly modest. More like gun shy."

I caught him stealing a glance sideways at me. "Unlucky in love," I said by way of explanation.

"I guessed that."

"You did?"

"I did. Either a bad breakup or someone had just died. You looked like you'd been crying for days."

I sighed theatrically. "Well, you guessed right. I must have looked pretty pathetic."

"It's what attracted me to you, actually."

"You have some sadistic streak or something?" My nerves hummed, making my skin electric with anxiety.

"Or something." He flashed a grin at me. Hot. Damned hot. I smothered the nerves with a good dose of lustful thoughts that started with his sandy blond head between my legs and ended with several satisfying fingers plunging deep inside me. I was already mid-fantasized orgasm when I realized he was speaking to me.

"What was that?"

"We're here," he said.

I peered out the windshield and then through my window. If we were indeed here, here was someplace I'd never dreamed I'd ever be going to.

"It's huge."

He pushed his door open. "Mistress of the obvious," he said and my brows scuttled down in reflex, feeling stupid. He reached in across his seat to touch my arm. "I was teasing," he said. "It is huge. The guy is some bigwig who only comes to the city once a year."

"Then what does he need such a big house for?" I used the term house pretty loosely, because what was in front of me, lording over the expanse of a parking area big enough to be a football field, with several boxwood hedges and exotic plants, was anything but a house.

"I heard that when he comes, he has big shindigs." He ran his hand behind my neck before easing back at his side and closing the door.

I pushed out my own side, taking his arm when the valet took the keys. "So are you some bigwig too?"

He laughed, showing me a healthy set of teeth but for the one crooked canine. "Hell, no. I'm some other bigwig's lackey. Business, you see."

"Lucky you to be doing this kind of business."

He shrugged. "It has its perks." He reached behind me and ran the flat of his hand almost imperceptibly over the round of my ass. I snuggled in closer to his side, thinking he'd surely realized that the only thing between his flesh and mine was a thin piece of rayon.

"What do you say, Jade, shall we go in?"

If the outside made me goggle, the inside made me want to have three sets of eyes. I couldn't see enough. The costumes on the guests were elaborate enough, with Marie Antoinettes and Cleopatras and any number of pirates, serving wenches, Highlanders, and Angels. And vampires, of course. What was a Halloween party without the token vampires? But whoever owned the place had paid out a princely sum for decorators to come in and dress the place. It looked like some sort of Gothic medieval castle complete with candle sconces and oil lamps and linen fold paneling. I counted three fireplaces alone on the bottom floor and the stairs told me that there were at least two more floors.

The host, if I was right, was a tall, broad-shouldered Viking next to the biggest of the fireplaces. Everyone who came within reach of him deferred to his attentions, introducing themselves briefly, being scanned by that stare, moving on when approved.

"You figured it out, I see." Sam touched my elbow and nodded toward the Viking. "Said bigwig."

With the excuse to look again, I let my gaze travel back to the Norseman, planning full well to roam the breadth of him with my eyes, taking in the shoulder length blond locks, the scruff of beard beneath eyes so cobalt they reminded me, even from this distance, of a long ribbon of pre-dawn sky. I felt almost guilty gulping the image of him down as though it was a feast for a starving appetite, but I reminded myself that I was starving. My eyes were traveling back up his chest and to his face when he caught my eye.

I immediately had visions of him slashing and hacking his way through a Nordic village, plundering and raping as he went. Something inside my chest quivered at the thought of coming up at the end of his sword, his piercing gaze settling on mine as he decided what to do with me. I had to shake off the ripple of pleasure that tremored through me in that instant. He smiled with the left corner of his mouth and for a moment, I felt as though the image was more of a memory, rather than fantasy, even the sounds of battle echoed somewhere behind my ears. He raised his drink at me and swallowed down several gulps, the muscles in his throat working slowly and purposefully, as though he were demonstrating exactly how much control he had over his body.

Even as I was trying to tear my attention away, I felt Sam's arm wrap around my waist and pull me closer. I swayed against him, making my neck muscles turn in his direction. It took a while for my eyes to follow the same command, and they only did so because a petite redhead had commanded the Viking's attention.

"What did you say?" I asked Sam.

"I said, would you like a drink?"

I nodded as though I'd forgotten how to speak. He squeezed me closer and grinned, but although it stretched widely across his cherubic cheeks, I couldn't see any humor in the smile. It was a flash of muscle movement across his face that spoke to nothing more than a sort of social courtesy.

"You look as though you've seen a ghost," he said.

"Oh, is that it?" I couldn't stop my fingers from trailing to my throat. The bones on my wrist clattered, making me feel even more unsettled. I couldn't decide if it was the Viking or the deadpan expression behind the eyes of my date that was sending the chills down my spine; all I knew was I could feel the goose bumps rising against the material of the sarong. I needed a drink. Most definitely. The upset of being dumped had mangled my ability to read signals, and I couldn't be sure if I was interpreting any of them correctly or even if there were signals there for me to read at all.

I imagined the place had a bar, but through the throngs of crowds, I couldn't see enough of the walls to see if there was one set up. I decided it wasn't important when I noticed a tuxedoed gentleman with fingers splayed across the bottom of champagne laden trays. I gripped Sam by the fingers and pulled him closer to a walking tuxedo. I grabbed for the tray with both hands and passed him both glasses, then reached again for two more.

"Here's to finding oblivion in a mansion where the only thing that sucks are the cheesy Draculas." I upended one glass, then the other without waiting for him to partner me. After four days of crying, getting drunk seemed just about right.

I felt his eye on me as I drained the second glass. "What? Aren't you drinking?" I realized he still gripped the stems of his glasses. I swallowed convulsively, nervously, realizing that this wasn't some college keg party. I'd probably embarrassed him. I twirled in place, trying to find some place to divest myself of the two glasses. "It's okay," I blurted. "I'll just..."

I felt his hand on my arm and the current of his touch set my feet into paralyzed shock. At least I could read that signal correctly.

"Don't worry about it," he whispered. He stepped closer, leaning in so that his face buried itself in my neck, his lips against my ear. "You make me fucking hard when you look all vulnerable like that." He eased in closer, pressing his hips against mine. Just feeling that demand made my knees go to water. Or was that the remnants of the anxiety? Might even be the flash of images from the Viking still coursing through my synapses. Maybe it was all of that. Maybe it was knowing I was about to do something so completely out of character, that my brain had decided to send my body warning signals and my muscles were mistaking them for fight or flight. I wondered briefly which one would win.

"Second-floor," he rasped. "There's a balcony that looks out onto the garden."

I didn't dare turn to look into his face. I wanted so badly to be wanted, to fling my self-consciousness into some early grave that I was afraid to see the results of those desires mirrored on his expression. And if I recognized so much as a hair of that want, I knew I wouldn't be able to keep from giving in. I could only nod against his shoulder. The next thing I knew, a white-gloved hand divested me of my burden, and Sam was pressing his wine glasses into my hands.

"Go on," he urged. "I'm driving."

"Right," was all I could get out, and even that had to push its way past a fairly thick clot of sudden lust that made me dizzy. Like the first two glasses, I downed these, but I did so as surreptitiously as I could. I already felt the tingle of inebriation dancing beautifully with the currents of desire. It was going to be okay. Women everywhere did this sort of thing all the time. Just this once, one of those women could be me.

I thought I felt people watching us as we threaded our way through the crowds. I fancied the blond Viking couldn't take his eyes from my bared shoulders. The delicious thought of his eyes roaming my body as I let Sam plunge into me sped my heart rate. He'd be occupied with the redhead, of course, but a gal can dream. In fact, I felt pretty damned magnificent as I threaded my way through the crowds behind Sam. Jade was getting her juju back. That was what. To hell with old what's his name. He didn't deserve one more tear. Let people stare. Let them all stare.

At least one rather seedy looking Dracula reached out for me as I passed. I gave him an icy look and tried to shrug him off. He kept his grip on my arm for several long seconds, meeting my glare with an almost detached eye. He wavered in front of me as though he were standing on the other side of a shower door. I stumbled, cursing the vanity that made me wear two-inch heels to a standup party.

I took a deep breath and forced myself to turn to watch Sam's broad back ripple beneath his suit jacket as he strode ahead of me. For the first time, I wondered why he'd chosen to wear a cheesy cloak over his Wall Street executive costume. Then I realized I truly didn't care what he had on. Tonight was about letting my guard down, about filling the empty space that my cheating fiancé had bored into me. It wasn't just about payback; it was about finding my confidence again.

The second floor room turned out to be the master bedroom suite, obvious from the California King-sized bed. But the opulence of the room, the sheer size of it struck me dumb as he led me straight across to the balcony.

"How did you know this place would be empty?" I couldn't help peeking over my shoulder, worrying that someone would come in. Then I realized, who was I kidding? I knew exactly what we were going to do, and I knew a small thing like being caught would not deter me. Hell, it might even add to the flavor. I felt a pang of uncharacteristic naughtiness streak up my throat. At least I told myself it was anticipation; I would never admit it might be intuition trying to ruin my fun.

The palm of Sam's hand slipped up the back of my neck before we even made it to the French doors that led onto the broad balcony. He pulled me toward him in a kiss that devoured the last of my reticence. I found myself pressing back against him, pushing him outside so that I could close the door behind me. If I paused to take a breath, I wasn't aware of it: my lungs were burning with the need to breathe. I broke away only long enough to pull in a sweet draft of honeysuckled air, tasting the last bit of pollen from late blooming flowers.

"I'm so sorry," he murmured against my neck, his hands cupping my backside, scooping me up onto his hips. "So sorry."

I found myself straddling him for the brief moment it took for him to find the railing. I let my head drop back, savoring the feel of his lips against my throat, the liquid fire of the alcohol blazing through my veins. Maybe at some point I would open my eyes, when I didn't feel so damned guilty about letting go, but for now, with them squeezed shut, I could let this fantasy run its full course, let it take me.

"It's okay," I told him. "I want this too. You're not going too fast."

I let my body mold to his. I waited for the moment when his hand would slip beneath my sarong and find me wet. I braced myself against the railing, my hands on either side of me, straining everything else toward him. His breath moved in hot drafts against my chest, his fingers slipping beneath the bodice and tugging my breasts free of the sarong. My tongue roamed my bottom lip as his circled my nipple; I could taste his pleasure, the electricity of it was snaking its way up my throat and tightening my jaw.

"Fuck," I said without meaning to say anything at all. I couldn't do more than sag against him, grateful that the railing was behind me to keep me from collapsing completely from the pleasure of letting go. Whether it was the bolts of alcohol in such fast succession or the feel of his teeth making my nipples rise and my skin prickle into goose bumps, all I knew was I was fast approaching the point where my dignity would come second to getting good and fucked in a stranger's bedroom balcony. The back of my neck prickled.

Just as I was about to beg for release, his mouth covered mine, sealing my lips against his, his teeth gripping my tongue playfully at first, then in such a fierce demand that my eyes flew open in surprise.

Shock sent a jolt of adrenaline straight up my spine, making me jerk to a rigid stand. Not Sam. Not Sam at all. That greasy, cheesy Dracula had my hips beneath his hands as though they were pinioned in the middle of a vice. In the next instant, I thought that I had surely bitten my tongue. Pain was so intense it shot to the back of my skull, and then there was the sensation that something from the very depths of my solar plexus was being drawn out. Unbidden, tears stung my eyes and my knees began to tremble. I was sobbing into his mouth, trying to scream, thinking dimly that I should be able to ram my knee into his groin. Should have been able to. Except my feet felt rooted to the floor. My hands still gripped the railing as though someone had nailed them there. I was being crucified beneath some ridiculously greasy bastard using a costume party as an excuse to rape someone.

I heard a command to be still. I resisted. The command came again. My stomach swamped with bile, dumping the last of the champagne into my veins. Drunk, yes, drunk with fear.

Even as I registered the terror, it dissipated much like steam does in an over-warm room. Once again, my body sagged, each bit of resistance within my muscle tissues ebbed away. From somewhere within my core, I could feel myself being emptied with each pulse of my heart. Fog enveloped my brain and I had the ridiculous notion that it was made up of my fear, keeping my synapses from piercing through to the nerve endings that could electrify my muscles into action. All I was able to do was stare into the now hooded eyes. There were flecks of gold in them. The most beautiful iridescent gold leaves. I imagined illuminated Bibles not having such purity adorning their margins.

I tasted my own blood; could feel some of my blood dribbling down my chin. Still, I couldn't form any sort of command that would make my muscles move. I couldn't even swallow the flood before he somehow drew it from my mouth, all the while pulling me closer and tighter against him. When he let go, he put a single finger to his lips, shushing me the way a mother would a child. He trembled all over as though he were trying to maintain his composure.

"You taste like the finest Chianti," he murmured. "Like my first taste of it," he said. "Like the first drunken joy of it." His eyes swept my throat, taking me in as though I was his possession. "It's been decades since I tasted your vintage.

"It will be the finest pain." He went on, leaning closer. He licked the corner of my mouth where I felt the cold stickiness of blood. "I promise you. I will give you the most delicious oblivion."

He shuddered and then he buried his face between my breasts, sinking his teeth into the flesh of one and moaning the way a starved man would at the first taste of heady broth.

Shock, I realized. I'd sometimes wondered what it would be like to be assaulted, whether I would scream or fight. I'd always taken myself for a bit of a warrior, and I'd always assumed I'd make any bastard that touched me uninvited would pay so dearly, he'd never rise to the occasion again. I'd never until that moment believed I would be rendered so useless that I wouldn't even protest at some deranged madman played at being Dracula as though it were some sort of sick S&M party. I wanted to feel something--rage especially. What I ended up feeling was sick at my complacency and confusion that I couldn't manage to feel violated.

When he entered me, I had the distinct impression that his member was the only thing keeping me from collapsing. I might have whimpered because the next thing I knew his gaze was on mine again, his fleshy tongue licking blood from his lips.

"Don't go," he whispered. "Not yet."

Don't go. Strange thing for him to say. And it took me a moment for my oxygen-starved brain to process what it must have meant. Don't go. I almost laughed when I realized the meaning, except I couldn't manage more than a groan. I was dying. I had to be. Everything within my line of sight was tunneling down to one small pinprick of light. Sounds came to my ears as though they were struggling to reach me through water. But he was right about one thing: it was a delicious oblivion.

The bastard was giving me the most exquisite orgasm of my existence as he watched my life drain away. And all I could think was that the strength of it was drawing power from my very soul and that when it was over, I'd be gone.

I woke to shadows and a headache so massive my head felt swollen to four times its size. Alive. I was alive, even if I felt like I'd been dead three days.

Something moved in the darkness, and I realized I was lying down. Someone's bed. Not my bed. I barely had the energy to twist my head sideways, let alone lift it off the pillow. A rustle of sound near my feet stole my attention. I strained my eyes in the darkness, trying to make out what was there. A memory tugged at my consciousness, telling me I should be frightened. That something in the darkness wanted to hurt me.

"Do you want to die?"

Did the question have a response? I wasn't sure. In the moment, I wasn't entirely aware what it meant. Confusion swam about me, trying to fish from the depths of my memories a sort of connection that might help me process the response. All I got was an image of the rental store clerk pushing a bracelet of bones onto my wrist. Bacalou, I remembered her saying. If I didn't get her things back, I'd belong to Bacalou.

"Do you want to die?" The demand came again, this time more insistent. A growl from the darkness that commanded an answer. "Answer me."

I tried to shake my head because the rest of the information hadn't dislodged itself from the recesses of my mind. Whatever connection my brain had to my muscles had long been severed. Along with the struggle of trying to find a meaning for the word die, I was now tripping over the question of whether or not a paralyzed person could have control of her head at all.

Strong fingers gripped my ankles and squeezed hard enough that pain managed to find its way through the fog. I heard myself groan and realized that at least such a thing as sound existed, that sounds could come from my throat. I opened my mouth to test the theory--

And realized something was stuffed inside it. Thick and fleshy, I knew it couldn't be material of any sort.

Disgusted with my lack of response the black thing began pacing, swelling to twice its size, turning, pacing back again.

I tried to talk around the stuffing. "Who are --"

Before I could get out the rest of the question, I realized that what I thought I was saying was nothing like what was coming out of my mouth. The hulking shadow disappeared from the room, leaving me not entirely sure it had been there in the first place. My eyelids were so heavy, I couldn't keep them open to save my soul. The tip of my nose itched, and I couldn't seem to find the strength to lift a finger to scratch it. I just lay there, sinking into oblivion and rising again from the depths over and over. Sometimes the hulking shadow returned, asking me the same question, growing frustrated when I couldn't seem to process its meaning. It was just so much easier to sink, so much easier to let the heaviness of my limbs pull me down into the darkness that existed somewhere beneath me. Strange that a bed so soft could make me feel so black.

At one point, I managed enough strength to turn my head to the right. French doors. The liquid red of the rising sun painting the balcony. I knew where I was then. I knew I had been out there. I knew something had buried its teeth beneath my skin while I inhaled honeysuckle and rode the currents of orgasm. I should've screamed. Somehow, I should have found the wherewithal to scream. I didn't need to touch my breasts to know they were sticky with leftover blood, that the stuffing between my cheeks was my own tongue, swollen and tender, butting up against my teeth in a way that made it impossible to sound coherent.

It took me several seconds to realize the piercing sound drilling through my eardrums came from my own throat. No, I couldn't speak; but I could certainly scream.

And I could sob. I wept until oblivion took me again.

The shadow was there again when I woke next. This time, my eyes were better adjusted. I was still exhausted, terrified, confused, but I was also determined.

I waited for him to ask me that question.

"Do you want to die?"

This time, I inhaled through my nose, fueling my muscles with as much oxygen as I could pull in. And then I thrashed on the bed like a landed fish. The bones wrapped around my wrist clattered together. When I had spent all the energy in my body, I lay staring at the ceiling, my lungs burning and my core trembling from the exertion. There was a sound of satisfaction from the end of the bed. I wasn't sure if the interrogator stayed or left. I only knew that when I woke again, it was to sunshine and the feeling that some of the heaviness had lifted.

I shifted on the bed only to realize that my arm was hooked to a length of tube that snaked its way from the crook of my elbow to a glass bottle held high above the bed by a stainless steel frame. An IV, then. Maybe even painkillers. My tongue felt less thick, but it was tender to the touch. I couldn't so much as swallow without it scraping against my back teeth and making me cringe. Maybe not enough painkillers, then.

My benefactor came with the dusk. This time I was aware, the medicine in the IV making me stronger and able to stay awake for longer periods of time.

"Do you know what's happened to you?" he asked from the foot of the bed.

I eyed the Viking warily. Several thoughts flitted through my mind, all equally abhorrent possibilities taken from endless movies and instilled parental fear. I thought I heard him chuckle.

"No," he said. "Nothing like that. In some ways, maybe those things would be better."

He came closer as he noticed my confusion, running his battle-hardened hands along the silk of the duvet. They came to rest on my forearm, a cold and calloused touch that sent a shiver up the back of my spine.

"It's not such a hard trick, reading minds," he said. "Especially yours. Your every thought crosses your face like words on a page."

He tapped the IV bottle, making it chink against his nail. "Full of hemoglobin," he said. "It will help restore your strength but won't heal you."

He sat on the edge of the bed, pushing closer to me, the cobalt blue of his eyes piercing through mine. For a second, I couldn't breathe. I felt again the panic I'd endured on the balcony, instilled by a gold-flecked gaze.

"I'm not going to hurt you," he said. "Would I be helping you if I wanted to hurt you?"

I managed a weak shake of my head, trying to process, trying to force my mind to find light through the fog.

"He liked you," he said, leaning over me. I had the distinct sense of being enveloped. It made my chest squeeze in fear, my heart hammer at my ribcage. I tried to push away, but he splayed his palms across my chest, holding me still. I could feel my heartbeat in his hands as he held me still, drilling me with his eyes.

"Not that rat of a date of yours. He's just a recruiter; his likes don't matter. Ambrogio. He liked you. I know he liked you because he didn't kill you."

His gaze dropped to my mouth for the briefest of moments, then dragged itself back to meet my eyes.

"He wanted all of you. Every last drop."

He swiped at the stream of tears running down my cheek.

"And yet he let you live." His tone was a musing one, pensive. He sat back, assessing my expression, letting something fierce run across his own that made him look even more a plunderer of old.

"He'll return for you. Delaying the gratification will only make fulfillment that much more euphoric for him."

He cocked his head sideways. "You won't survive it. You know that?"

I nodded. I had no idea what he was talking about, but I did know I wouldn't survive. My body started to tremble. Seeing it, he ran his hands down my hair, catching in the tangles I had so carefully created, smoothing the tresses against the pillow, letting his fingers linger in my hair. I wanted to melt against him, sensing something stronger than me, stronger than anything I'd known, within him. Bacalou, my stuttering brain whispered.

"Do you want to die?" he asked again.

I croaked out a no past my swollen tongue, unsure whether he understood it. His response was a slow, languid, almost rapacious smile that chilled me to my toes.

"Good."

He pushed to his feet and nodded to a form that hovered to the side of my vision. The form fiddled with my IV, and a rush, like a wave of hot oil, moved through me, making me think for a second that I had taken to floating. The painful throbbing of my tongue eased away.

I searched for the Viking, wanting to fill my vision with him before my eyes fell closed, thinking ridiculously that I'd be all the more safe with his image in my mind.

He met my gaze with a cocky grin that made me flush beneath the sheets.

"Sleep, my little mambo. Tomorrow night we'll see about sticking a big pin in your recruiter."

My mind registered a second thought, on the heels of those last words that made me think he'd spoken straight to my mind. It couldn't be so, of course, but I was certain I heard him say, "And when Ambrogio comes for you, we will be ready."

I didn't have a clue what ready would entail, but I was grateful to be left to my rest. Visions of teeth and blood and carafes of burgundy wine swam in my head. Just as I was sinking beneath the waves of sleep, a thought jarred me, struggling to the surface. I'd missed the rental clerk's deadline, and if she was being earnest, then I belonged now to Bacalou. A peculiar sensation passed through my solar plexus, sending heat suffusing my core only to dissolve to a fit of chilled shaking.

I'd thought I needed a good exorcism at the beginning of this journey. Rid myself of the demons of grief and regret. What I'd ended up doing was trading one demon for another. The problem was sorting which of these men was the evil Bacalou: the nightmare from the balcony, or this seeming savior.