Page 1 of Dark & Darker Still (Vane and Roc: Origin)

One

Alice

Vane Maddred, unofficial prince of the Umbrage, is fucking me like he wants to bruise me.

I’m sure he does.

I clutch at him like he’s an oak plank in a churning sea.

We never fuck like we like each other.

Our movements are frenzied, a little punishing.

I think we find ourselves like this most nights because we remind each other of things we hate about ourselves.

He hates that he desires anything, and I hate that I desire one thing I can’t have. The fact that that one thing is his uncle is something neither of us will ever speak about.

The floor below us, music thumps against the walls of the Joker’s Den.

Sweat coats our skin.

It’s the heart of summer and it’s always worse in the city where the nearby factories permeate the air with heat and the smell of burning oil.

It’s after midnight. I’m drunk but not drunk enough to like myself.

I’m pressed against the wall, my boot braced on the arm of the nearest wingback chair.

Vane is a near carbon copy of his uncle. He towers over me by half a foot, his shoulders broad and muscular. His eyes are violet and bright, his hair dark and unkempt.

But where his uncle is a cliff edge crumbling beneath me, Vane is solid ground, even if it is unforgiving.

“Trying to fuck crown princes now, are you?” Vane asks.

“Yes,” I tell him because I know it’ll piss him off and I know he’ll take it out on me and I just want to feel something, even if it’s a punishment.

He growls into me, fucks me harder, his left arm hooked beneath my thigh, spreading me open. His right hand is buried in my hair, fingers like claws, yanking my head back to expose my neck for him.

The hour is here. He and I don’t need his clock to know he will be drinking my blood.

Because Vane Maddred is a jabberwocky and jabberwockies need to drink to keep the monster at bay.

His god is time, the tick-tock of his pocket watch his prayer.

But sometimes I think blood is his salvation.

“And were you planning to tell me?” he asks.

“I’m telling you now.”

His mouth hovers over my throat.

The “fucker” in question is the Crowned Prince of Darkland, His Royal Highness Evren Lorne. The official prince.

We hate him.

Maybe more than we hate each other.

But crowned princes do not make good enemies.

“I’m going to kill him,” Vane says and presses his mouth to the rapid thump of my heart in my throat.

“No, you’re not.” His teeth graze my flesh, and I hiss out.

I’m pent up. Ready to sail. He hasn’t given me this much attention in days. Did I bait him by flirting with the Crowned Prince? Yes. Do I regret it? Abso-fucking-lutely not.

Vane is possessive of his toys, and I am his favorite one, even if he likes to break me again and again.

He licks his way up the sensitive line of my throat, and I shiver beneath him.

Maybe I don’t hate him.

Maybe he’s just enough like his uncle that it quiets that incessant gnawing in my gut.

All of the Maddred men are dark and dangerous and monstrous.

And dark, monstrous things like to be in the company of other dark, monstrous things.

I think that’s why we’re terrified of losing each other, why we cling to one another, not with love, but the opposite: obsession.

Friction builds between us.

I’m hot and warm and cold all over and when Vane’s teeth tickle my neck, I jolt away from him.

“Hold still,” he says, yanks my head back, and sinks his teeth into me.

The first hot gush of blood surges out of the puncture wounds.

My veins fill with honey.

Getting bitten by a jabberwocky feels like your bones melt into stars.

I exhale.

To my ears, it sounds like a breath that lasts a lifetime.

I sink down the wall.

Vane adjusts his weight so he can catch me.

Our frenzied fucking slows and the slow drag of his cock is the most sublime feeling in the world.

I’m a puddle, no shape, no weight. I exist only to contain him.

My flesh is sticky in the summer heat, but it’s too late to pull off my shirt.

I couldn’t move if I wanted to.

Vane drinks from my neck, fills me up and I sway in his arms.

I can feel him growing harder, throbbing against my inner walls. He’s described drinking as sexually charged, but if I’m to believe him, I’m the only one he drinks and fucks.

“It’s messy,” he’s said. “And I don’t like the clean-up.”

Because I know Vane well, I knew he wasn’t talking about the bloody mess. He was talking about the feelings, the emotional charge, the wake of women he’s left trailing after him.

There are a thousand or more on Darkland who would kill to be where I am. A thousand more who would kill me to take my place.

Sometimes, knowing I get all of him, the monster and the man, is more pleasure than an orgasm.

All three of us, Roc, Vane and I, we fuck who we want, but somehow, we always find ourselves here, fucking each other.

“I hate you,” I whisper into his ear. But the words come out sounding desperate. Like a wish that will never come true.

He drives in deeper, deeper, harder, harder, as if he cannot get enough of me.

When I first left Wonderland and found myself in Darkland, I thought I would never find a place to set down roots. I’d just lost my family home, and worse, been driven from my world.

But it was with the Madd brothers that I found something new and yet deeply familiar.

And now I want to build something with them, by their side.

Vane drinks from my veins, grunts into me, muscle dimpling in his back, his arms tensing up as he comes.

There is nothing I love more than a Madd brother coming inside of me. As if I’m marked by them, claimed by them.

As if to say, she is mine and she belongs here.

When Vane pulls away, my lifeblood drips from his mouth.

His eyes are glowing yellow in the semi-darkness of our apartment.

“I hate you too,” he says and then he throws me into the chair, kicks my legs open, and sinks his mouth to my center.

I arch against the chair, hand hooked over the back, bracing myself.

I’m already soaked, but the blood makes it messier, wet and slippery, and I’m driven to the edge in a flash.

“Fuck,” I breathe out. “Fucking hell.”

I run my fingers back through his dark hair and grip tightly, driving his mouth into my pussy.

He groans, the sound humming against my clit.

I’m over the edge in an instant, bucking against his mouth.

He hooks his hands around my legs, holding me in place as he eats my pleasure, every last fucking drop.

My breath stutters up my throat as I twitch through the last of the orgasm.

Vane stands up and drags the back of his hand over his mouth.

Blood smears across his face.

His hair is a mess, several strands sticking straight up from my assault.

He’s so fucking hot it makes my molars ache.

I want to trap him in amber, never let him go.

“Stop fucking baiting me,” he says.

We’ve arrived at the place we both knew we were headed.

“Why? When you make it so easy.”

He leans forward, caging me in the chair.

His strong hand comes up, grabbing me by the throat, squeezing.

“Do as I say, Alice. You won’t like me when I’m mad.” He plants a chaste kiss on the corner of my mouth, leaving a sticky mess of blood, spit, cum, and my juices.

Then he lets me go, buttons up his pants, and heads down the stairs.

I sink back and squeeze the arms of the chair until my nails ache.