The Silver Cage Page 3

  Erin kissed him, forcing him uncomfortably backwards. Her lips were cool and dry. She whispered, ‘I could tell you wanted me from the way you were looking at me on the doorstep. Did you know your reputation precedes you?’

  ‘My what?’

  She laughed, brief and sinister. ‘You know the main reason a person becomes a werewolf hunter, Mr Tabernacle? The reason they start – about ninety per cent of the time?’

  Blake nodded, his face still in her grip. ‘Friend or relative killed.’

  ‘That’s right. But that’s not the case with you, is it?’

  ‘No,’ Blake said plainly.

  ‘So why else would someone become a werewolf hunter? What drives that other ten per cent? You know what they say – bunch of fucking sniffers. Turns them on. Why else would they do it? No money in it. No reward but the creatures themselves.’ She kissed him again, a long kiss that made him want her and hate her for it. ‘Is that why you do it? You a sniffer? Or do you just like the power kick?’

  ‘The power kick?’ Blake said a little weakly, as Erin stroked his face.

  ‘Oh yes, Mr Tabernacle. The power. Or the lack of guilt. That’s the thing about lycans, isn’t it? They’re not human, but they look like humans most of the time. Their status gives you licence to indulge all sorts of delinquencies. For a certain kind of person, that can be a very attractive proposition.’ She was holding Blake’s face tight.

  ‘Are you saying I’m some kind of pervert?’

  ‘Why are you here? If not to indulge appetites you can’t sate any other way?’

  Blake looked up at her and inhaled hard and slowly through his nose. Then he reached up into the inside pocket of his dirty lab coat and pulled out a packet of tobacco and a little packet of cigarette papers. In the tiny gap between their bodies he slowly began to roll a small thin cigarette. As he worked he said, ‘So, you’re a widow now?’

  ‘What? What has that to do with anything?’

  ‘Vampires, wasn’t it? Darius Cole. Seduced your daughter and killed your husband. Terrible business. The talk of last summer amongst the paranormals. They say Cole was after revenge, that you tortured him and killed his true love in front of him. Unconventional stuff. Got some nasty appetites yourself there, Dr Cobalt.’ Blake took a match from behind his ear, struck it on the fruit machine behind him and lit the cigarette.

  ‘Why do you ask? You want to try me?’ Erin’s face was still set, firm and hard, but Blake saw something else – something right in her eyes.

  ‘Me? I’ll try anything.’

  He took one slow drag before Erin back-handed the cigarette out of his mouth. It skittered away and lay smouldering on the floor. Blake wasn’t worried. There was no way the hard industrial carpet tiles in the auditorium would ignite.

  Erin looked at him. ‘You run this place now, do you, Mr Tabernacle?’

  ‘Uh, yeah. Actually Tobias left it all to me. This place is mine.’

  ‘Not quite, Mr Tabernacle. He bought it with our money. Cobalt funded this project. A little experiment of ours.’ Her eyes narrowed. ‘But we’re thinking of calling in our loan. Which means that you – as his successor – owe us. Seven million pounds.’

  ‘I . . . Seven mill – Oh.’

  ‘So are you going to pay back what you owe us? Or do we need to take possession of your assets?’ She waved her arms around her. ‘We can take everything, Mr Tabernacle. If we want to.’

  Blake opened his mouth, but Erin silenced him with one long finger.

  Blake spoke around her finger. ‘You know I can’t afford . . . Well, what then? What do you want?’

  ‘You, the Fox girl, the unstable lyc. Your whole operation under our control. I don’t know what you were thinking, taking over as director, but you had no right. Our deal was with Malcolm Tobias. We’ll be watching you, don’t run. Get me that unstable lyc. And get ready for a change of location, or when we come back we’ll be closing this place down and you’ll be under arrest for killing your employer.’ She leant in and kissed him one more time.

  As Erin stroked Blake’s narrow thigh in the back of the Merc, he couldn’t help thinking that he really could have handled this situation better. Not telling her about Alfie being unstable – that would have been good move number one.

  They hadn’t fucked when she had kissed him before. She had just bent him backwards over the fruit machine and forced his mouth open with one gloved-hand tight on his chin. He’d liked it, got hard. He liked a woman who could make him frightened – not much frightened him any more. But Erin dangled seven million pounds’ worth of debt, his livelihood and a potential murder charge. Now that was a powerful woman. That got him harder than anything had for a long time.

  She’d kissed him hard and pulled away, leaving him gasping and wanting, and said, ‘One way or another, this can wait until I come back.’

  So, in the back of the Merc, Blake knew that she was going to screw him – one way or another. And, as he was still handcuffed, he knew he wasn’t going to get any say in the matter. She unfastened his flies and climbed on top of him. Pushing him back into the deeply upholstered seats as she mounted herself on his cock. Before she could kiss him, her phone rang.

  Erin moved slowly on Blake’s dick, rocking herself idly, but in ways that made it very hard for him to follow the conversation she was having. Until he heard her say, ‘Yes, Miss Pepper, yes, I see what you’re saying.’

  ‘Pepper?’ Blake said.

  ‘Excuse me,’ Erin said into the phone then put her neat manicured hand flat over the mouth piece. ‘I’m sorry, Tabernacle, is there a problem?’ She wasn’t moving on his dick any more. She was frozen and cool.

  Blake said, ‘Pepper? Are you talking to Pepper? My Pepper? One of our werewolf hunters? I thought she was in hospital?’

  ‘Oh she was. We went to see her. Transferred her to the medical facilities at Cobalt. Much more conducive. She’s a bright girl, very well trained. But she wants a desk job. She going to work with us.’

  ‘That little fucking turncoat,’ Blake muttered.

  Erin took her hand off the phone mouthpiece and reached out. She put her hand around the bottom part of Blake’s face again and squeezed. She covered his mouth and then let her hand slide a little higher so she could pinch his nose closed with her thumb and forefinger.

  Blake couldn’t breathe. He fought Erin and the cuffs. He was still inside her as he squirmed. Fuck, she was strong. He was easily as frightened as he was turned on.

  Erin whispered, ‘Turncoat? But aren’t you and I on the same side, Tabernacle?’ She moved her hand and freed his nose but not his mouth.

  Blake inhaled, hard and jerky. ‘What?’

  Erin Cobalt spoke into her phone again, ‘Have you located Miss Fox yet, Miss Pepper. I believe her contribution to future operations could be vital.’

  Blake strained hard and could just about hear Pepper’s tiny tinny voice. ‘Not yet, ma’am. Sources and seers seem to agree that she has taken out the Silver Crown, which would explain the detectable changes in lycan activity too. But there’s no sign of her. Sources say the Silver Crown had a preference for underground hideouts. Caverns, tunnels, caves, when they were away from their London base, but over and above that . . .’

  ‘OK, Miss Pepper. We might need to bring in a witch on that one. Put me through to the director of finance. That’ll cost us a little.’

  Blake looked out of the tinted window of the Merc. They were heading out of Oxford towards the M40, whizzing towards London. Tunnels. There were loads of tunnels under Oxford. Blake thought of the signal from Iris’s chip that had led him to a shopping street in the middle of Oxford. She was still there. Right there. Underground. Fuck.

  Erin was still on the phone, looking distracted. His cock was still inside her, just about. He wasn’t hard now that she wasn’t massaging him to distraction. If he was going to get out of this car – going to jump – he had to do it as they slowed for the last roundabout on the ring road, anything else would be fatal.<
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  Blake tilted his head back a little into the sumptuous leather upholstery behind him. He braced himself a little, then headbutted Erin right in the face.

  5

  IN PERFECT GOTHIC dungeon style, the heavy wooden door creaked and scraped on the floor as it opened. When she walked through it a second later, Alfie felt his breath catch, just as it did every time. She was so beautiful. Not human beauty. In human terms she was very ordinary. Her hair was short and greyish-brownish – so like the colour of his pelt when he changed. Her features were neutral. Her body was average and simply put together.

  But when Alfie looked at her he didn’t see the human. He saw the animal. He saw a beautiful wolf. A female. A mother. The wolf sire that rejected him. The human parents that were too busy setting the world to rights. All better now she was here. He felt like he had come home at last.

  The Divine smiled at him as she crossed the room and unlocked the cage door. Alfie felt the hairs on his skin stand on end. She was coming into the cage. She was going to touch him. She had been telling him for days that she might. That soon she would. And now, now . . .

  Yes, yes.

  She walked towards him. He didn’t dare move. When she was near enough, she took a handful of his hair and pulled him to her. He lurched from a sitting position on to his hands and knees and crawled the short distance to kneel before her. He wrapped his big arms around her legs.

  She wore a long grey dress, a shroud of cobwebs. Unearthly. He’d barely noticed it before. Her clothes were nothing to him – part of her irrelevant humanity. He noticed it only now as the dusty fabric got in his face. He started pushing her skirt up, scrambling for her skin.

  The Divine cooed as Alfie pushed her skirts right up out of the way and nuzzled his face between her legs. Instantly addicted to the scent of her. A craving that hit him and floored him like a punch in the guts. Blind need. He pushed his tongue into her and looked up, craving the response, the pleasure of her pleasure. He saw her head tip back and her lips part as she exhaled. She threw out one arm and grabbed hold of the bars of the cage on one side. ‘Alfred,’ she said. Her voice was musical, magical. ‘Alfie.’

  Alfie held both her thighs – one in each big hand. He felt like his heart would explode with love and longing. The feel of her, the taste of her, the Divine. It was also melancholic, the feeling of being this close to her, like it could never be enough. He could climb up inside her body and he still wouldn’t feel close enough to her.

  And, as he disappeared into his work, he heard her say ‘Leon,’ but he didn’t look up. He drew his tongue back and forth along the seam of her.

  He was slightly aware of Leon, who had been awake since the door to the cellar opened, getting to his feet. Alfie barely registered him – just a vague image of his long blond hair falling on his bare shoulders – until he felt Leon’s hands cover his own on the Divine’s hard narrow thighs as he used his tongue on her too, echoing Alfie’s movements.

  Alfie could feel the reverb from what Leon was doing to her – long strokes, rimming her and twisting deeper – in his own mouth as he worked. Alfie took it easy and slow, wanting this to be forever. He wanted to stay in this place for the rest of his life. He was already overwhelmed and despairing at the thought of her orgasm.

  After a few more long strokes, up, down, Alfie met Leon, right under the Divine. The scent of the Divine on Leon’s face was too much. Alfie pressed between the Divine’s legs and kissed Leon hard. His tongue swooping and diving into Leon’s open wanting mouth. The taste of his sire, of the sire on his cub’s lips was overwhelming. He moaned out loud.

  The Divine growled and reached down, pulling Alfie away from Leon by the hair. She forced him back, still on his knees, his back arching over. She bent at the waist, leaving Leon kneeling behind her, slightly dumbstruck, his reddish lips moist and kiss-swollen.

  ‘You attend only to me, Alfred. Your cub is nothing to you in the presence of the Divine.’

  ‘Yes, yes . . .’ Alfie was stammering, his heart beating so hard it seemed painful. ‘I’m sorry. I don’t know why I –’

  ‘It really is simple, Alfred,’ the Divine said slowly, ‘you must let the power flow the correct way. You attend to me, your cub attends to you. Let me make it clearer.’ The Divine turned to Leon, kneeling on the floor of the cage. ‘You, wolf, pleasure your sire.’

  Leon met the Divine’s eyes with one silent moment of sullen resentment. He looked at Alfie.

  The Divine smiled. ‘You tell him,’ she whispered. ‘My power over him is still through you until the next full moon.’

  Alfie looked up at her.

  She exhaled hard and then slapped Alfie’s face. ‘Tell him.’

  Alfie looked at Leon. ‘Pleasure me,’ he said dryly, the phrase making him cringe.

  And then Leon – with no choice in the matter – shuffled forwards on his knees, as the Divine stepped out from between their bodies so he could press his face right into Alfie’s crotch.

  As Leon drew Alfie’s cock hard and tight into his mouth, the Divine walked around his arched body. She positioned herself behind Alfie’s head, making him tip it right back to look at her.

  ‘In a moment, wolf, I’m going to show you exactly the way the dynamic flows. But first –’ she reached up and grabbed a generous handful of Alfie’s hair, twisting it in her fist until he gasped, bucking into Leon’s mouth ‘– I’m going to explain why you’re getting confused. The power between you and me should be utterly pure. You’re a Beast cub. You’re the longest-living Beast cub alive. The Silver Crown, the circle of Ancient Beasts, has been destroyed. You have ascended. You are an Ancient Beast now. The Ancient Beast. You are cub and sire. Wolf and man. And you are mine. There is nothing in the line between you and me. And yet, you still find some shred of resistance. Why?’ The Divine jerked Alfie’s head so he hissed with pain as her fingers ripped in his hair.

  He didn’t answer.

  ‘Why?’ the Divine said with a harder jerk.

  ‘Iris,’ Alfie muttered as Leon let his tongue slide the entire length of Alfie’s rock-hard cock and the wrench of pain in his scalp made him see stars.

  ‘Iris,’ said the Divine. ‘Yes. It’s disgusting. A wolf lying with a human woman is one thing – but letting her have power over you, letting her interfere with the lines of your thrall. I can smell the taint of it all over you, sapping your true power. She’s linked to you still, werewolf, making you weak.’ The Divine backhanded Alfie casually across the face. ‘Dirty and weak, not lying with a human woman, not mating with a human woman, loving a human woman. You couldn’t be a proper wolf, just like you couldn’t be a proper man. Look at you, werewolf, blessed as you are with the body of a god, the face of a cherub, a powerful master of a wolf inside you and yet you wasted all that power seducing human women to your bed, trying to fuck that bitch out of your mind. Once you became unstable, you spent your last years searching the world for chains and collars just so you could fuck, drag more human women into your filthy pit of desire, driven by your basest needs. Never a thought for a higher purpose.

  ‘My higher purpose.

  ‘No wolf should live this long, Alfie. You’re special. You’re meant for great things. Or you should be. As soon as I saw you I knew you were the one.’ She straddled his face and put one hand behind her and around his throat. ‘Now, wolf. Beast cub,’ she said, her voice sounding muffled to Alfie as her thighs closed around his head, ‘feel the power flowing as it should.’

  Alfie let his mouth open underneath the Divine as Leon continued to tease his cock. It felt good. It felt perfect. The Divine was right; he could feel the power flowing between them. He twisted his tongue against the Divine’s clit and felt her thighs tighten. Her feathery grey skirt had half fallen down over his face. There was no world except her slick cunt in his mouth, on his face, her hands still woven in his hair, holding it painfully taut, and the grey curtain of her skirts around him.

  He used his tongue. Just his tongue.

&nb
sp; With other women, he would have used his hands too, his nose, his stubbled skin. Iris always dissolved when he pushed the tip of his prickled chin into her pussy.

  With other women, he’d have worked to hold them on their rising edge for as long as he could. Made them sob, beg him to let them come as his will o’ the wisp tongue danced around their orgasm.

  But not with the Divine. She was different entirely. He worked his tongue perfectly for her, brought her right to the point and then circled her clit closely in the perfect motion to tip her over.

  When she came, the Divine moaned, but softly, leaning back against the barred wall behind her and tugging on his hair.

  A second later she stepped away, regaining her composure instantly as her skirts slipped down her legs to brush the dirty straw-strewn floor of the cage.

  Leon’s mouth was still around Alfie’s cock and, with nothing else to distract him, Alfie suddenly felt the sensations overwhelm him. He thrust hard down Leon’s throat. The Divine walked around behind Leon and put one bare foot up on his back, bending down, watching, almost like she was inspecting.

  Alfie moaned. He was still in the same position. Kneeling, leaning back, his arms supporting him. Arms that should have been wobbling by now, ready to give. But they weren’t. Alfie kept thrusting. Leon’s mouth felt so good. Tight, warm, wet. Alfie was two thrusts away from orgasm. Then one. Then . . .

  Nothing. His hips bucked into empty air. His cock was cold where Leon had taken his wet mouth away. He moaned out in frustration. Opening his eyes, he saw that the Divine had lifted Leon bodily away by his long blond hair.

  Alfie looked at her. He was panting, his nipples tight and hard. His cock was desperate for the one final caress that would drive him over the edge.

  She looked back at him and smiled. ‘No, werewolf. The first thing you need to learn about your power is to stop wasting it.’

  From the pocket of her dress she pulled a pair of silver manacles – connected by a short chain. Alfie, dumb with thrall, barely moved as she cuffed his hands behind him, feeding the chain between the cage bars.