Her Mind Games: A Dark and Erotic Paranormal Romance Read online

Witch!

  “Yes, Crystal, a witch in the truest sense—like you. Just like—Oh, Oh, Oh—just like you. You and I—mmmmmm—are birds of a feather, my dear. Birds—oh, dear gods. Oh, yes, faster, faster, Jackson. Fuck me faster!”

  She was high on the drug of sex. Absolutely psychotic. Rabid, not thinking, mad.

  I wondered how someone could be equally so good and also so terribly, terribly bad.

  Jackson’s pelvis slapped against her ass.

  I turned and fought with the door—

  “Yes—dear fuck—yes, oh yes.”

  —but it wouldn’t come loose. I slammed the bottoms of my fists against it repeatedly.

  “Watch me, Crystal. Just watch. You’ll want him. You’ll want him like I want him. You’ll...”

  I felt her thoughts worming into my skull, sending the feel of him inside her, into my mind. She was using our channel, a channel I kept open for her all the time. “Stop it,” I cried. “Get out of my head!”

  I never felt his cock inside her, never felt a thing. She tried, and pushed, and tried.

  But I resisted her.

  “Oh, dear lords, fuck yes. DAMNIT, CRYSTAL, WATCH!”

  I tried to unbolt the door with my mind but I was still stunned by the shock and my powers were in disarray. She was more powerful than me in this instant. Who am I kidding—she is more powerful, period. I’ve seen what she can do. She was holding the bolt in place with her mind. She was Mr. Hyde now. A vicious, vile Mr. Hyde.

  I felt myself wanting to weep but fought back the tears.

  Witches.

  “I loved you,” I said to her, putting the full meaning of friendship-love into the statement. “I love you, Shira. How can you keep doing this to me?”

  The sounds of sex were an orchestra behind me.

  She kept me trapped there, begging me to watch, but not forcing the idea into my head.

  “Oh, yes. Oh, mothergods yes, Jackson. Put that cock in me nice and hard—oh that was deep.”

  I crumpled to the floor, hands only hitting limply against the door now.

  I want you, her thoughts said to me. I want you more than life, you child, you little girl.

  “Why are you being so cruel?” I cried out. “You’ve gone mad.”

  “CHILD,” she sputtered. “CHILD! Oh—mmmm—fuck. Nothing but a—oh—child. I gave you everything. And all I wanted in return was a little satisfaction.”

  “You’re a demon,” I said, believing it.

  She laughed in between poundings. “Oh, I’m no bloody demon. Bring a demon here and I’ll fuck him like a succubus and take his power from him. Let him put his—Oh, FUCK that’s good. Let him put his filthy seed in me and I’ll—”

  “Stop it, Shira. Come to your senses.”

  It was here that the full brunt of her evil and madness came to me.

  When she screamed her next words, it sounded like the shriek of death, the sound of a million banshees in the sky: “YOU COME TO YOUR SENSES...CHILD!”

  Child.

  The word angered me.

  “I am no child,” I told her slowly. “And you know it. You...know...I’m more powerful than you.”

  I felt the hatred building inside me. I felt...the power. Witches. And I am one of them.

  “How dare you?” Shira said. “How...dare—OH, FUCK YES.”

  I turned slowly. I would face her and look her in the eyes. I was done playing victim. She was either on my side or not. She might want to be sucked in by a demon and lose her sense of will and power.

  But I didn’t want to.

  And if I had to do it alone, I damn well would.

  Sitting with my back against the door now, taking no pleasure in her sweating grimaces of pleasure, I said, “You heard me. I’m more powerful than you. And you know it.”

  I’m a witch now, I said to myself. And I’m acting like one. Is this what I am to become? Am I destined to this life of betrayal and manipulation?

  “Prove it,” she said.

  My fists clenched up.

  When you’re angry, you act macho. You say things you regret. You think you can take on an army alone.

  I made this mistake now.

  I was in a moment of rage.

  I spoke out of place.

  And in retrospect, it was probably a foolish thing to do.

  Or was it?

  “Take me,” I said. “Try and take me. You and your....slaves. You say you won’t force yourself on me, but I believe you can’t, even if you wanted to.” I was being mean and petty.

  Shira began to grin.

  And then the truth of what I had just said started to hit me. I’ve just given her...permission.

  My hands went cold with sudden fear.

  “I sense the fear in you,” she crooned. “A delicious, lovely fear. Jackson, stop!”

  Jackson pulled himself out from behind her. His shaft was massive. He fell to a nearby chair in exhaustion.

  “You have given me permission,” she said, sneering. “So the promise no longer binds us.”

  As a final attempt to appeal to her good judgment, to the friendship I thought we had, I said, “You would do this to me?”

  With that constant grin on her face, she reached out for the nightstand and grabbed a cigarette. Lit it up.

  She said, “Yes.”

  -18-

  The door unbolted magically behind me.

  And six masculine hands grabbed my waist and legs and arms and dragged me to the parlor.

  “Jackson, come!” Shira said.

  I didn’t fight them. This wasn’t about them. The men would do what the most powerful witch commanded them to do.

  Only the most powerful survive.

  And if I’m not the most powerful witch?

  It was too late to back down.

  There was no friendship between us anymore. Only a battle to the top of the food chain. I understood this like some unspoken natural law. This is the way it must be done.

  It came to me suddenly that all this time, Shira had maneuvered herself to the level of top witch. She had no coven, but the other witches feared her. It was her unofficial position.

  And now it will be mine.

  I sensed all these things innately, as I had sensed my coming to LA, the scene with Loquacious Robert as I had discovered my powers to put a thought into his mind. Just as I had understood that, I understood this as well: There was no way around this next action. I had indeed made the right decision.

  It doesn’t mean I wasn’t scared.

  I was terrified.

  There was an upright steel frame in the parlor where the glass table had been. It had cuffs on each corner. I understood immediately what they planned to do to me.

  I didn’t fight it. I knew this wasn’t a struggle of bodies, it was a struggle of minds. Her mind games. She controls them. Ronald and Jamie and the unlicensed Doctor Nolan Talwart cuffed me to the frame so that I was spread-eagled in standing position. Jackson clapped a bar between my legs to boot. I still had my clothes on, a shortish dress and a green blouse.

  The four men stood there like Egyptian soldiers, all of them naked, all of them powerful and dominating. All of them erect.

  I wanted to scream.

  This is really happening. Oh dear motherfucker this is really happening.

  My stomach went into itself. I fought to hold my bladder under control. But I wouldn’t humiliate myself.

  Shira stood like a she-devil in front of them all. She had shut down the channel between us, and I couldn’t put any thoughts into her mind. She had locked me out. She had locked the entire world out, including her own sanity.

  I kept eye contact with her, not willing to show any fear.

  Her eyes had small bags under them, showing signs of tiredness.

  And then she began to smile. I didn’t know why...until I felt the flogger snap painfully against my thigh.

  I screamed.

  Oh, dear fuck this is really happening.

  Jackson held a red flogger
in his hand. All these things were appearing by magic, just as the men had appeared at the door by magic. She’s using everything she has against me, all her power. “Am I that important to you?” I asked her.

  “More,” she snarled.

  “The other women, they’ve done this to you,” I said.

  “Does it matter? The seed needs to be within us for the effects of others to take root. You know this lesson, Crystal. Why blame them?”

  Jackson switched me again, on the same spot on my thigh, and it sent a burn through my very soul.

  No, I cried in my mind. No!

  “Yes,” she said quietly. And then, as if it were the sound of an orgasm itself, “Oh, yes.”

  She lunged for me.

  And so did the men, all four of them. Their strength was brutal, utterly brutal. Before I knew it my clothes were ripped off of me, only parts of my blouse still dangling off my left arm and my red panties hung low at my right ankle. Nolan kneaded my breast—No—painfully while Jamie’s lips started moving down toward my other breast.

  It’s happening. She’s winning. They’re about to—

  “No!” I cried, now desperate, now afraid, now understanding that my strength was nothing compared to hers and that I was wrong and I was a fool and how did I get myself into this position and I fucking hate witches and what we are and what we do.

  “No!” I cried out. “No!”

  No one listened. Shira went to her knees, admiring my pussy, putting thoughts into my head of what she planned on doing with me; what she intended the others to do with me.

  She would make it painful.

  She would make it hurt.

  And I was going to regret ever having challenged her.

  Ronald was to be first.

  With her mind, she put him front and center of me. He was too large down there. Too large. It would hurt, I knew it. And he would be rough and callous during it—because she was telling him to be so.

  The other men had moved aside, all watching, waiting now. Ronald put his hands on my waist—I won’t look away. I’ll face them to the end—and bent his knees slightly, pushing his too-big cock forward toward my center.

  I...screamed.

  Climb the ten-foot wall, climb the wall, climb the wall, climb the FUCKING wall!

  He was almost inside me, almost touching my not-aroused labia.

  Shira laughed like a hag.

  The men started cheering, clapping hands, urging him on like the mindless zombies they were.

  No. No. No. No. NO!

  I dug deep. Dived into the Well of Knowledge and swam down into the darkness, the depths, the murk, the fear, the cold and hateful bottom of all strength and power and witchcraft and occult knowledge that has been gone for centuries and millennia and I hunted endlessly in my mind, ransacking, wading through the rough gunk and junk and mess and screams and wars of past failures, all of it taking decades in my mind when only milliseconds had passed in this dungeon of Shira’s home—

  I howled: “NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! STOP! STOOOOOOOOOOOP!”

  And then I found it, way, way, way down below, at the bottom of the bottomless Well.

  The answer.

  The...power.

  And it was larger than anything I had ever felt before.

  It surged into me like the smell of ozone before a rainstorm, my eyes glowing and my skin burning hot with fire.

  I found...how to be a goddess.

  -19-

  Thunder...cracked.

  The earthquake began.

  Shira’s window-walls smashed inwards. Lightning exploded on a tree outside. I looked down at my crotch. All motion had stopped. Ronald’s massive cock was dangled less than an inch below my center, pre-come dripping upwards and out of his tiny hole.

  He paused, seemed suddenly confused.

  When I howled, the chandelier in the next room...dropped. “STOOOOOOOOOOOOP!” CRASH!

  A wall in the parlor cracked.

  Shira dropped to her knees, sudden contrition on her face. Her hands went to her cheeks. It’s dawning on her, the madness that took over her is leaving...

  “I was possessed!” she said fearfully. “Oh dear sweet Crystal, forgive me, I was possessed!”

  When I roared, I felt like I owned the power of all the devils of the underworld combined. “GET OUT!” I screamed. An explosion from the next room—another window. Brandy bottles smashed. A wine bottle rose up and burst just above her head, covering her in red Merlot, spraying small droplets on my skin as well.

  The shackles on my wrists and ankles split open.

  Ronald moved away.

  Jackson moved away.

  Jamie moved away.

  Nolan moved away.

  Shira laid herself flat on the ground, arms outstretched toward me. “Oh, gods—Crystal, forgive me. Forgive me!”

  Another shattering snap of lightning burst outside. Wind gusted in from the shattered wall-to-ceiling window and howled in celebration under the eaves. I am a goddess.

  I stepped over her arms while she begged for forgiveness.

  Ronald kneeled, and the others followed suit.

  I left them there, ran upstairs. I must get out of here. The earthquake had ceased, but the storm flashed viciously now. I went to Shira’s bathroom and wiped the wine off my body. I took a pair of jeans and a shirt from her, a sweater.

  Slowly the truth started to hit me.

  The megalomania of the moment began to recede.

  And I began to shiver.

  Oh, my fuck, what just happened?

  The insanity of it struck me like a hard blow.

  I was suddenly afraid, feeling weak, trembling.

  I ran down the stairs as fast as I could, not knowing what to find.

  Shira and the boys’ subservience was long forgotten. She was now in a rabid frenzy, sucking off Ronald like he was an oxygen tank. Jackson was behind her, Jamie below her. Nolan was behind Jackson, all of them thrusting in their relevant directions. The sounds were violent and hungry. Rain kept splashing in from the outside, but no one seemed to care. In between sucks, Shira said, “Oh, yeah, oh, yeah, oh, mmmm.”

  I’d had enough.

  Me and Shira were over.

  -20-

  I was disillusioned. Not because of what had happened, I had won after all. And I had known I would win. I had known it from the moment of first-rage as I’d sat with my back to Shira’s bedroom door and said the words, Take me.

  I was disillusioned because of my friend.

  Are human friendships like this as well? Do humans also backstab and betray and break your heart like witches do?

  My time in LA was over. I was packing my bag and getting ready to leave. I called Vera and asked her to say goodbye to Sexy Gina and Model Richelle for me. I wasn’t in the mood for long goodbyes.

  Shira had shut down the mental channel between me and her, or maybe it had simply disintegrated. The channel had been kept open by our mutual desire to talk to each other. I didn’t want to talk to her, and she clearly didn’t want to talk to me.

  Would I forgive her? Sure. Someday. We’re witches, after all. This is simply how we are.

  I fought the understanding of it, but had I not used her as she had used me?

  These were more moral questions I still didn’t have time to answer. Would I ever answer the accumulation of them as I discovered my true nature? I needed to get to Marfa and talk to Roxy. And then I needed to get to West Rocks and...fuck my boyfriend.

  Yeah, that’s all I wanted to do. I wanted to make love to the man, the hunter, who had stolen my heart, who had given me the advice and support to push through all of this. Who had suggested I come to LA.

  No lessons worth learning are easy. And the upshot of all this crap was that I had found the power to be a veritable goddess when put in a tight spot. The memory of the power I had felt was already fading, it had been such a surreal rush, but the concept of it remained—that narcotic surge of unrelenting strength through my blood. How far cou
ld I take it? I didn’t need to know right now. The Well was bottomless, and I’d reached further down than anyone had before.

  I would reach further still. In my heart, I knew this.

  I remembered how weak I had been five months before when I had first arrived in LA. I remembered how afraid and coy and shattered I had been after that small event of Jack destroying my inner world.

  Small, that’s what I called it now. Back then it had been the destruction of life as I had known it.

  I was nothing now compared to who I had been.

  Did I even need a hunter for protection now? Perhaps not. But Luke was not merely a hunter. My reason for wanting his presence had nothing to do with killing demons.

  I wanted him because I loved him.

  Was Jack still in Marfa? Would I visit him while I was there? Would I try kill him? Or would I simply plumb Roxy’s knowledge and see if she remembered anything about once being a witch and so bring her with me?

  Jack was only one demon.

  There were more, many more to be fought.

  The man called Jack could wait.

  I was on my way to the bus stop when a soft knocking appeared in the channel of my mind, the channel between me and Shira.

  But it wasn’t Shira knocking. I could feel it. I could feel its presence pushing insistently for me to open the door. Another witch.

  Something nagged at me about the sound, the tap-tap-tap of its incessant patter.

  Tap-tap-tap.

  I could have turned it off. I had the power to do so now.

  But I didn’t. Because on the other side of the tapping...is an entity...that I recognize...

  Little child. Little child. Little child. Little child.

  I stopped walking. I had nothing to fear in opening the channel. After last night, I was ready to face the god of war himself.

  Little child. Little child. Little child.

  I opened it.

  Just when you think things cannot get any worse, the universe shows you it can.

  What I saw now was not what I had expected.

  It was worse.

  Talya was on the channel. Her mind sent thoughts to me in a stream: We have her, she said in the susurrus sounds of the wind. We have her...and she’s lovely-lovely-lovely-lovely. We have her, little child. We have her like you had her last night. Come. Come. Come to us. Come to us. Come—to ussssss. We have Shira-Shira-Shira-Shira. And we are going to...hurrrrrrrrt her. Hurrrrrrrrrt her. Hurrrrrrrrrt her.