Page 14 of Skin Trade

“Stop it.”

The sound of laughter enveloped her, but she was sure it came from inside her—inside her head. She slammed her mental shutters down and thrust him out.

It’s because he gets in your head, she thought to herself. Vampires could do that. Not all of them, just some. Like an odd power they got when they crossed over. Some were good at it, some weren’t. Creven never really got into her head, but then maybe he’d never tried. He’d be more in the head of a ten-year-old, teasing her with vicious thoughts of what he was going to do when they were alone—play out his sick fantasies.

She didn’t take the lift back to her floor. She didn’t take it at all. If she went up there, to her room … he’d be a pulse in the room next to hers. He’d be this thing her mind would focus on, yet he was still watching her, and she could still feel the warm stroke of his gaze on her. Damn him. She’d not turn around to look, but she did. For all the fight and will she tried to put into her body, she gave into that desperate need.

She looked.

As she reached a door, a big double door, whose destination she didn’t know, she turned, enough.

Bright eyes, dark hair, bare chest. She sucked in her gasp before it could escape her, and he’d hear it and give her that fucking grin … that all knowing grin.

The door led to the club, well part of it. Like a pocket of sex and blood. It smelt like it too. It smelt a little like Creven’s when he had his blood parties, or after them. All the girls splayed out on the floor, bodies taken any way the vampires wanted, blood drunk to the very brink of the lives of the blood slaves.

It made Payton rock on the clifftop of her memories—a victim to them, ready to take the leap but not quite sure if she was done with the world yet. This must have been the private area, where the booths were, and where vampires paid high coin for that private session with a donor. Donor … the very word was a mockery. It came with the image of voluntary giving, of free will and the right to choose. A lie.

She’d never chosen to give blood to Creven or one of his friends. She’d never chosen to give anything else to them either. It was simply demanded, and she did it.

Each booth was a confined space. Not so confined that no one could see, but enough privacy for those parties dining in here. The first one had chains attached to a bar in the middle of the table, and handcuffs hanging open at the side. They were heavy to her touch, cold, harsh … ruthless binds wielded by ruthless creatures.

“No different.” Not really. He was no different to Creven or to the men who went there. Just treating every human like they were there just for the blood. “No different at all.”

“I may take offence to that remark,” Seth said, making Payton’s heart leap with the surprise. She dropped the chain with a clink against the table and moved away.

“Why? Because it’s true?”

A tilt of that beautiful head and she had to fight to grasp onto the thought … to the reminder of what he was and what they did. “Well that would depend on what you were thinking.”

“I wasn’t thinking anything.”

“Come now, Payton. Everyone is thinking something. Minds are such noisy things. Even if you were only thinking how amazing I am and how thankful you were I saved your life that you were going to--”

“To do nothing,” she cut in.

He eased around her, walking like an animal circling its prey. “We’ll see,” he said, making her shudder.

She snapped one of the cuffs shut, pushing the arch into the clasp and making the hole so small nothing would fit inside. She wished she could lock them up, but no doubt Seth had the keys. “We’ll see nothing,” she said, as she went to toss the locked cuff onto the table, but Seth caught it.

He was fast, so damn fast. He grabbed the cuff from her before it had even left her hand and the movement of it, meant she was pressed against him. “I could just take you,” he said, a deep not quite whisper going along her neck. “You forget already that it is my name on your papers.”

She tensed against him, his hard chest, his muscled body, but she’d not bow to that. Not with those words. There was no room for shame now. No room for any of the things she’d have to do. “If that’s what you want,” she said, forcing ice into her words.

Her skin broke into goosebumps when he reached and ran his hand along her hair, pushing it off her back. She’d not be able to stop him if that’s what he wanted, but she could close her mind. She could lock herself away inside herself the way she’d done so many times before.

Part of her quivered with it. Not with fear, or excitement. She’d read Seth wrong. He really was like all the rest. Greedy, cruel, and thinking he could take whatever he wanted.

He slid his hand down, brushing down her side with his knuckles until he reached the edge of her t-shirt. Then his hand was under the fabric, and she sucked in her stomach at the feel of him touching her skin and fought against the sensations her body wanted to betray her with.

“I can hear your heart racing.”

“It always races when I am mad.”

“You’re mad?”

A pause. It was not her place to talk to him the way she did. He’d reminded her. Yes. His name was on her papers, and with that meant she was supposed to show him respect.

“You’re mad with me?” he asked, pushing for an answer.

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