Chapter 20 - Crave for You

Chapter 20 - Crave for You

Cord grabbed a nearby chair and steadied himself as his muscles undulated painfully under his skin. Despite burying them deeply inside his mind, visions of his transformation into a dark one and his rampage in the past started appearing along with the seizures.

It started off as a single memory of when he was once human. He was sleeping soundly, in the realm of dreams when midnight hit the clock. In his thirtieth birthday the curse would begin, that was what the witch, Eloise, said and indeed, it happened.

First, Cord’s mesmerizing bluish-green eyes had changed into obsidian. He groaned, clawing his naked chest as he felt his insides tearing him up apart. His skin, already a pale complexion, turned even paler, all manner of color drained from its pigments.

Second, his human heart stopped beating. He could feel the fibers shrinking, tightening until it lay dead like a stone.

In intense pain, Cord tossed himself out of the bed, falling onto the floor with a loud thud. He gritted his teeth and this time, with his now-sharp nails, clawed the floor sending splinters of wood onto his face. Not one drop of blood emerged from his cheeks. His skin was unscathed. It had drastically toughened.

Third, his gums pulled and ached and then his enamels vibrated. His canines elongated thereafter, top and bottom, until it pricked his lips. Blood leaked out of the wounded spot. Some streamed down his chin while others went inside his mouth. It became Cord’s first taste of blood and it was burning his throat.

He growled loudly as he could as if it would make any difference. His hands, from digging the wood floor, reached up to strangle himself. He bucked and tossed his head back all the while his fingers squeezed his neck. He was going to kill himself. Death was the only way to be freed from the curse, but unfortunately, the transformation wouldn’t let him. It was already too late....

Back in Amanda’s room, the seizures continued. His weakening knees couldn’t support him any longer, so he fell down on all fours on the marbled floor. He wheezed and gritted his teeth, trying as much as he could to ride out the pain without losing his self-control.

“Shit,” he muttered as he heard the faint heartbeat of Amanda and her step-father indicating their arrival in their residence.

He squeezed his eyes shut and focused on tuning out the seizures, but instead, he was met with another round of flashbacks of his past....

The clock hit one minute past twelve. An eerie silence filled the room as Cord recollected himself. His breathing, from being labored earlier, now steadied, but he couldn’t feel the rush of air into his lungs. He couldn’t feel his heart too yet it was so heavy inside his chest. His whole body felt warm still, just like how it was when he was still human, but his sensations had heightened. Everything had heightened: his hearing, touch, taste, smell, except his sight.

Just as the curse dictated, he had lost his eyesight.

How many times had he regretted not killing himself, Cord had lost count. His thirtieth birthday was supposed to be cause for celebration, now it had turned into a day of damnation, not only for him but for all those people who were present at the time of the casting.

In the next few days, he refused to seek out blood to nourish his body, hoping that by starving himself, he’d lose his immortality and die. However, it wasn’t meant to be. The curse was just too strong.

Until it came to the point that he could no longer bear it, he left the confines of the Vitalis Castle and wandered aimlessly into the estate’s forest. He tried hunting animals first, sucking their blood dry until the animals were nothing but dried carcasses.

It wasn’t enough unfortunately.

Cord needed more. He wanted more.

And that was when his rampage started. He had his second taste of human blood from a passing coach carrying a teenage daughter of an aristocrat. She was frail and vulnerable. She didn’t put up much of a fight when Cord sank his fangs into her flesh. She was drained in the end.

The third victim was the coach’s driver: a lanky man in his forties. He crashed the coach first before running for dear life. He hadn’t got away that far into the forest. Cord was quick to catch him despite his blindness.

The ensuing victims came rapidly like clockwork. Cord disregarded the pile of bodies in his wake. He wasn’t even concerned that this had caught the attention of the local townspeople. Jerome, his vampire butler, was the one dutifully following him and cleaning up the clues.

It was in the Town of Luttina in the border of Belgium and Netherlands when he met his first family of witches. They mostly studied plants for potions instead of practicing magic. He drained them of blood one by one, sparing no mercy. This was the start of his revenge.

The youngest member of the family, a twelve year-old girl, had Cord reveling as suck per suck of her crimson life, he could feel his energy bursting. It turned out she was gifted with the ability to extract the energy of the surroundings and make it her own. As an incentive, he took this ability and claimed it as his own.

After his encounter with the family, Cord had his target set on the witches and urged his fellow vampires to do the same. Ultimately, he had waged war on the very kind that placed him on a curse and this lasted for over hundreds of years.

Many witches were killed, stolen of their abilities and drained of their life essences and blood. Cord continued his rampage until he encountered Arriana in a tavern located in Alaska. He didn’t know they were half-related then. Not like that would cause him to give her mercy. She fought well, but not enough. Cord overpowered her easily.

After she was sucked dry, he claimed a precious part of her existence, and it was the dark shadows she commanded.

He used this to kill more, claim more, and drink more. He took advantage of his newfound abilities to act his revenge on every witch on every country he visited until one day he found himself in Estonia and met a little girl of five-years-old in the Marquess of Tallinn’s high-profile gathering.

This girl had the most striking eyes. It was the first time ever Cord wished he could see again just to behold the color. Jerome, while standing behind him, said it was a beautiful brown-violet; perfect for a girl of high status in society.

As the party went older, Cord couldn’t keep his eyes off of the girl. She was so full of life, so full of love and sweetness while her mother cradled her in her arms.

Her cheerfulness made him remember of his life as a human. Made him second guess himself and the life he chose.

He had truly become a monster and for that, he felt disgusted. Felt disgusted of the many blood that had gone through his system. Felt disgusted of the people he had turned to corpses without hesitation.

And that feeling of disgust, of boredom and loathing of himself ultimately led him to a self-imposed fasting....

‘Amanda,’ Cord remembered the name of that five-year-old girl who had unknowingly changed the direction of his corrupted life. She was his ray of sunshine; his ray of hope. Truly, the world was small for this girl turned out to be the very same woman he had fallen in love with….

With the memory of Amanda’s little self in his mind, Cord had successfully broken the seizure’s painful hold on him. The undulation of his muscles gradually stopped. The chattering of his teeth lessened. His body’s normal processes returned.

He stood up and recollected himself, acting as if nothing had happened. He moved to Amanda’s balcony connected to her bedroom. In there at least, he would not be bombarded by the room’s aroma. He’d be able to clear his mind while he wait for her arrival.

And yes indeed, some time later, Amanda waltzed inside her room. Expecting Cord to be waiting for her there, a big smile crossed her lips when she saw him stand in the balcony. His back was broad and poised and vulnerable to whatever she could do and her mind instantly ordered she embrace him.

Gleefully, she agreed without hesitation, but then she remembered his ridiculous no-kissing, no-touching, and no-sex rule.

‘To hell with it,’ she thought in her mind as she quietly moved closer and snaked her arms around his waist.

“You do realize you might be seen from here by my father or the house staff right?” she asked, whispering the words close to his ear.

Cord glanced past his shoulder and smirked. “I know but I don’t care.”

Amanda pressed her cheek against his shoulder and chuckled. “Well, I do. It is important we give my father a good first impression.”

“Hmmm, yet here you are, showing yourself ‘with’ me and even embracing me,” Cord retorted. His fingernails dented the wrought iron balustrade as he stiffened himself. Such was his suffering. If Amanda couldn’t carry through with what they had agreed with the rules, he would have to harden himself even more.

“Well, I don’t care too,” Amanda replied. “If it means I get to touch you like this.”

Cord released a heavy breath. “Amanda.” His tone was thick with warning.

“Give this moment to me, please,” she stated, closing her eyes to bask on the feel of his warmth. “You don’t know how much I want to make love to you in my bed, Cord, yet because of your stupid rules, I’ll have to satisfy myself with just embracing you.”

He released a long-contained sigh in response and in the end, didn’t budge.

For what seemed like forever, they stayed like that. Cord relished on the feeling that she was close to him, while Amanda, though not fully satisfied, had taken advantage of this moment he had given.

She was well aware he meant every word he said and she respected it. She wouldn’t even dare try to seduce him even though she ached for him with all her being.

“Father wants to meet you at lunch tomorrow,” she broke the silence and looked up at him. From his profile, she saw nothing that would give away what he thought of their impending meeting. “I also told him about my plan to live with you. He took the news rather well just as I knew he would, but I think he still has doubts about it.”

“That’s expected of a father, Amanda,” Cord remarked. “But if you’d permit me to be selfish, I’d say it wouldn’t matter. Whether he likes it or not, you’re still going to live with me forever.”

Amanda chuckled slightly in response. “You really have a unique way of stating the facts, Master Vitalis.”

Under normal circumstances, Cord would have already faced her, seized her in an embrace and devoured her mouth. But, unfortunately, he chose to remain on his little safe spot against the balustrade.

“I heard your conversation this morning with your father,” he said, choosing to look at the beginning sunset over the horizon. “When are you going to tell me about Matteo?”

Amanda’s brows twisted in confusion. “Why, what of him, Cord?” She stepped forward and leaned against the balustrade with her arms crossed.

Cord glanced at her briefly before returning to look at the sunset again.

“You hadn’t told me he already returned in New Zealand too, and he is to become the next owner of your family business.”

“Ohhh...” Amanda routed her eyes on the garden below. It was of no surprise he knew. He basically used his excellent hearing while hiding earlier during lunch.

“Yes, father chose him,” she nodded. “He’ll actually go to the office tomorrow and officially sign the papers.”

“And you’ll go too?”

Amanda noticed the subtle jealous tone in his voice. She stared at him, hiding nothing that would amplify that emotion.

“Cord, I need to go. I have to support my father at least through this.”

He didn’t reply. He just continued that faraway look on his face that Amanda wanted erased.

“If you want, you can come with me. We will have lunch with my father anyway and after that, we can go to the office together. You don’t need to hide yourself anymore.”

“As much as I don’t want to see that man’s face,” Cord started, “for you, I will do it.”

Amanda’s heart swelled upon hearing it. She couldn’t keep herself from reaching out to him then. She placed a gentle, but lingering kiss on his cheek, her way of saying thank you, but it had soon became a battle on Cord’s side.

He took a deep breath to calm his nerves, but her scent, her heartbeat only beating for him, her voice, and her soft lips pressed up against his cheek that he oh so wanted to cover with his own—they were a deadly concoction, it had muddled his senses and he had literally come undone.

‘Probably one kiss wouldn’t hurt, right?’ his mind reasoned and with that, he moved to face her, grabbed her hair, and returned her kiss, but this time on her lips.

Amanda gladly opened up to this surprising progress.

The touch of Cord’s lips was shy at first, almost reverent. Amanda could feel him suppressing his passion. She moved a little, testing the sweet outline of his bottom lip with her tongue. Maybe this would get him all fired up.

It did.

He groaned and in just one second, he explored her mouth deeper, casting all his restraints aside.

Tossing her worry that her step-father might see, she hopped onto his waist and wrapped her legs around him.

Cord was quick to balance their weights. It wasn’t hard.

If he could teleport them together with his shadows, he would have done so in that very moment, but he couldn’t, so he opted on walking as fast as he could towards her bed whilst still locking lips with her.

Once there, he dropped her on the mattress and joined her seconds later.

“Cord, yes…” Amanda whispered as he lapped her neck, trailing his wet tongue down her throat, “more.”

Her hands moved to undress him starting by removing his coat. He reciprocated by pulling her blouse off of her.

Her generous breasts came into view covered with her black brassiere. He groaned in satisfaction. His hands cupped her full, placed his face against her cleavage and licked her skin.

Amanda moaned and arched her back. Her hands moved to thread her fingers along his thick mass of hair, delighting how he had made a buffet out of her chest.

Cord unclasped her brassiere from the back. The two globes spilled, her hard nipples begging to be tasted.

And he did, covering his mouth with one of the pinks. He encircled his tongue around it first, slowly, surely, then sucked her full like there was no tomorrow.

Drunk with ecstasy, Amanda wrapped her legs again around his waist. She grinded against him, putting pressure on her mound as it hit with his hardness.

“Cord, please, I want you,” she cried, one hand snaking down to capture his shaft.

He tensed.

Her hands felt good. It felt really, really good, but….

“Damn it, Amanda,” he grunted, realizing his mistake that instant. He wanted her more than she’ll ever know. The desire to make love to her in that moment, inside her bedroom, on her bed was agonizing, yet he couldn’t continue. Not now when too much was at stake.

With great difficulty, he pushed himself away and stood up, huffing; his eyes aflame showing the turmoil inside.

Amanda fell speechless.

“I’m sorry, but I can’t,” he stated, pain roped in his voice.

Then, he disappeared; his shadows bringing him far, far away where he could cool the burning of his body.

Back to Amanda, a little bit of sadness and disappointment overtook her. She sighed deeply, putting her panting to rest and straightening out whatever heightened sensations she had.

With Cord’s disappearance, she could no longer feel the warmth inside the room. She pulled out her blanket on top a layer of pillows and wrapped it around herself.

A coarse grunt escaped her lips just as her head hit the mattress. Salty water filled her eyes. She quickly wiped them away with the back of her hand. It, however, continued to stream down her temple as she stared blankly into the ceiling.

“Oh God, Cord…I crave for you.”