Page 5 of Grave Throbbing
"It's not for me," she said. "Lucifer." The name had a distinct Irish lilt to it. "When Key said you'd be a hard sell, he wasn't kidding."
Now, Harley was triply confused. Did she mean Lucifer, the prince of hell, or Lucifer, another person? It wasn't a common name among humans, but Harley knew at least three vampires who had changed their names to sound more devilish. And who was Key? Did he dare hope it was a nickname for Ciarán?
Greed shook her head, and her ponytail brushed her cheek. "We now have twenty-four minutes. You coming?" She chuckled, like her question had a double meaning.
Key sounded enough like Ciarán to intrigue him. Before he could ask more questions, Greed sauntered off through the crowd. The humans reflexively shifted away from her, leaving a window of opportunity for Harley to follow. He almost missed it but soon found himself on her heels moving toward the sign for "All Hallows Glory Hole."
At the door beneath the sign, Greed narrowed her eyes at the long line of men waiting along the wall. If Harley didn't know better, he'd think they were waiting for the restroom. The fact that most were vampires overruled that assumption.
"Why do they want to see your storage room?" Harley asked when Greed had shooed them away and shut them both inside the dark room.
"Storage room?"
"Glory hole. It's an informal term for an untidy storage place. My ma called my room a glory hole when I was a child, especially when she showed the house to her guests."
"Key was right," Greed muttered. "You are a fucking crust." She flipped the light switch with one hand and coughed into the other. It sounded much like a laugh with an Irish curse thrown in for good measure. "This room is not for storage, but that's a cute story about your ma. I bet she'd be appalled to learn what it means now."
Harley opened his mouth to argue. He was not a member of the upper class growing up, the "crust," as she so eloquently quipped. His family had been lower middle class at best.
He forgot what he was saying as he took in the garish mixture of black and red befitting a vampire bordello. Peekaboo black lace curtains hung over blood red walls. Brass candelabras full of unlit wax candles melted for ambiance lined the red carpet leading to the display at the back of the room.
Greed motioned toward the main attraction, a set of wooden risers leading to a table running the length of the back wall with "Grave Throbbing" written in red paint so thin it had dripped down the wall like blood. A black-lacquered sedan of a coffin sat atop the table. It was almost as wide as the table and high enough to fit two bodies stacked on top of each other. There was a hole the size of a basketball in the middle of the lid.
Harley frowned. "That won't do for daytime."
"This coffin isn't for sleeping."
Harley would have pegged Greed at least a century old, but the way she rolled her eyes reminded him of the over-exaggerating teenagers on late-night reruns.
"This is a first." She brought her hand to her mouth again, but this time, it was definitely laughter. "I've never had to explain how to use a glory hole before. You get on top of the coffin. You stick your dick in the hole, and the vampire inside will make you feel fantastic."
Harley tried to swallow and almost choked. Others liked this sort of thing? It seemed so impersonal.
"If you like what you feel, I'm going to give you an address for a little diner where you can wait for us until we get off work."
"Could we skip," Harley motioned at the coffin, "and start at the diner?"
Greed shook her head. "Not a chance. He's shy. Needs to taste you first."
Taste. Harley felt a little more at ease. He wouldn't be fucking the person in the coffin. An impersonal blowjob was a little easier to handle, though it looked like the person in the coffin would be cramped and uncomfortable after a few minutes.
"Why are you doing this for him?" Harley asked.
"Key needs a keeper."
There was the nickname again. Key. It could be short for Ciarán. Harley would have a hard time getting the image of the sexy vampire out of his head. If it wasn't him, this was going to be a mindfuck from which Harley might never recover.
He closed his eyes, trying to calm his pounding heart. His cock was on board, straining the tensile strength of his tight Lycra pants. Still, Harley didn't do casual sex, and this seemed about as casual as one could get without a physical description of the person on the other side of the hole.
His cock was only on board when he imagined it was Ciarán. They'd spent one magical night together, and Harley hadn't danced with anyone since.
"You saved our lives once," Greed said. "He thinks he owes you."
The plural made no sense. Harley would remember if he'd met Greed. He had an eidetic memory.
"I can see you're interested," she said to draw him from his reverie. "What are you waiting for? If you're not finished in …" she looked at her watch, "twenty-one minutes and twenty seconds, I will open the door and let everyone watch. You don't strike me as an exhibitionist." She gave him another once-over.
"Stop teasing him, Greed!"
