MY SWEET VILLAINTINE Read online

  My Sweet Villaintine

  A collection of deliciously dark villains

  Lili St. Germain

  Skye Warren

  Shari Slade

  T.M. Frazier

  Callie Hart

  Contents

  FOREWORD

  WARNING: BEYOND HERE LIES DARKNESS

  MY SWEET VILLAINTINE

  ORCHARD

  RITE AND RITUAL

  LITTLE SORROW

  HIS POSSESSION

  LOVE IS BLIND

  THANK YOU

  FOREWORD

  Get cozy with a villain this Valentine's Day.

  FLOWERS OPTIONAL.

  To celebrate this Valentine's Day, five of the most twisted minds in dark romance decided to get together and let their demons run wild...

  Each author has brought something unique to the table - or should we say, someONE. A terrifying villain. A broken antihero. A sexy bad boy.

  Why isn't this available to purchase on retailers like Amazon or iBooks?

  Simple - because we knew we wanted to break ALL the rules. We wanted to bring you the darkest, most fucked-up pieces of our characters. Think dubious consent. Think bondage. Think violent delights. Think “this book is banned” within about an hour.

  We didn’t want to get banned, yo.

  But we DID want to swim in the dark depths of our souls. And you know - for such a dark place, the water is surprisingly warm.

  Ready to dip a toe in?

  Right this way…

  WARNING: BEYOND HERE LIES DARKNESS

  This is not for the faint-hearted.

  * * *

  Proceed at your own risk.

  * * *

  Be prepared to have your heart shattered and your e-reader melting by the time you reach the end of this exclusive dark romance collection.

  ORCHARD

  BY SKYE WARREN

  The girl notices me when I walk in the door, heralded by the sad chime of a cracked bell. The stiffness of her spine betrays her. I don’t think she recognizes me. If she did she’d slip out the back door, Mary Janes slapping the pavement as she ran home. But she recognizes power.

  I take a seat in the corner, sinking onto a vinyl bench with the stuffing peeking out of the seams. The Italian shoes I’m wearing could buy out the mortgage on this godforsaken diner, but no one else wants it. The same way a farmer can look at a dry plot of land, I see possibility.

  And the ripest fruit is the girl, her cheeks pink from exertion, wisps of blond hair curling over her temple. Every man in this place watches her as she bustles and sweats to earn every two-dollar tip. It’s the closest they come to making her stroke their cocks, having her fetch watered-down coffee, again and again.

  She breezes over, mug and pot in hand, pouring before I’ve ordered. “What can I get you?”

  I nod toward the glass platter on the counter. “What kind of pie?”

  “Peach.”

  Of course. “I’ll have that.”

  She manages a brief smile, not quite meeting my eyes, before bustling back to get me a slice.

  Yes, I can see why this derelict diner stays open in the war zone that is west Tanglewood. If I only had ten dollars in my pocket, I wouldn’t buy a blow job from the whore on the corner. I’d make this girl scurry back and forth, back and forth.

  I have much more than ten dollars to my name.

  And she will do a lot more to earn it.

  She returns with a slice on a white ceramic plate and a fork. It’s obscene, the way the fruit has slid from the cuts, the glisten of sweet syrup. The way strips of flesh-colored crust drape over the filling.

  “What’s your name?”

  She hesitates only a moment. “Penny.”

  Her full name is Penelope Margaret Hartford. Such a dignified name for a baby born addicted to drugs from her bitch of a mother, her father in prison before she drew her first ragged breath. “How long have you been working here, Penny?”

  She hesitates a little longer this time. Eventually she’ll give me everything—her body, her sanity. But I want to see how far I can push first.

  “Two years.”

  Two years would have made her fifteen years old. I’ve owned Mel’s Diner since before that, but I never came here. Never saw her. And that’s a damn shame. How sweet would it have been to see her cheeks rounded with youth, her knees knobby?

  Fifteen would have made her underage for what I have planned. That’s also a damn shame. I prefer to break every rule that exists, prefer anarchy to order. I would have fucked her peachy little cunt when she was underage. Illegal. Naturally, I’ll still do it. A little more coercion, a little more twisted desire, will make her just as delicious.

  I tip my head toward the cup of coffee, exactly where she left it before. “I prefer two creams. Three sugars.”

  She pauses, uncertain whether to shove the small container of watery creams and old sugar toward me. That’s what a busy diner waitress would do for a normal customer, but I’m far from normal.

  In fact, I don’t prefer this weak excuse for coffee at all, but I want to see her dither. I want to see her weigh whatever tip this rich stranger might give against the gas bill at home, weigh her natural desire to obey against the sexual undertone of my request.

  After a moment, she reaches for the ceramic container. Slender fingers dig out two tiny cups of cream. Three paper packets of sugar. Her hands are shaking as she pours them into the mug.

  White nondairy creamer swirls into the center, embraced by the black. Sugar sinks to the bottom.

  I make no move to hold the spoon, to stir them into the coffee. There’s a surface kind of strength that men seek—always controlling with their hands, their bodies. Even their words. God, the sweet pressure around my cock as she obeys me without a single sound, as she rushes to please me without my even issuing a command. It’s inherent between us, my authority, her obeisance. She can feel it, even if she doesn’t understand it.

  She picks up the spoon and stirs until the coffee becomes a warm brown, swirling around silver.

  “Is that—” She catches herself, wondering why she’s doing this for me, most likely. Wondering what hold I have over her. “Is that everything?”

  Not even close. “What time do you get off?”

  How many times has someone asked her this? If a man is young and handsome, it means he’s asking her on a date. I’m betting plenty have tried. I’m not young. At least twenty-five years her senior. And I’m definitely not handsome. The last escort I fucked said I look like the devil himself. She had my fingerprints bruised on her neck, so that might have influenced her opinion.

  A small shake of her head, almost as if she’s gathering herself. “That’s not really—”

  “Appropriate? I’m rarely appropriate.”

  “I’ll come back and check on you in a little bit.”

  “I’d rather you sit down with me.”

  She takes a step back. “Please stop.”

  What a good girl, protecting herself. Too bad it won’t help.

  I watch as she ducks into the kitchen. Checking on a meal, or hiding from me? When she emerges, she avoids my side of the diner completely, delivering food and handing out checks without making eye contact. Such a little press into her boundaries, such a lovely display of vulnerability. There’s so much more for us to explore.

  I drop a hundred-dollar bill on the table, leaving the coffee and the pie untouched. She’ll think about me for the rest of her shift. For the rest of the week. She’ll look over her shoulder for me.

  I’m a farmer in this concrete land, money my tool, fear a steady fall of rain.

  And very soon, I’ll pick the sweetest peach for myself.

  * * *

 
; Darkness coats the city like sweet dew, nourishing and slick. It’s my favorite time to walk the streets, when no one recognizes me. Unless I want them to.

  I’m six steps behind little Penny, cloaked in shadow. She knows someone follows her, but she doesn’t know who. Does my face come to mind—silver eyes and black hair? Does she know which wolf stalks her? On the west side of Tanglewood, it could be a nameless rapist. Not Jonathan Scott, the amoral businessman who owns most of this cracked concrete.

  My footsteps echo off the bricks on either side.

  She speeds up, her shoes slapping the wet pavement. Her shoulders hunch down, instinctively making her smaller. She’s already so petite, body thin and undernourished. Except for her tits and ass, a red flag to bulls like me. Her body can’t help but be fertile. She can’t help but attract me.

  Poor Penny. She can’t help being so fun to break.

  Around the corner toward her house, she spurs into a run. My steps lengthen to their usual stride, but I don’t chase after her. Not quickly. Not when she’s running straight into the trap I’ve set. The entire tenement is a maze made for small people, powerless people.

  Her door is shut, the lock turned.

  I knock. There’s a key in my pocket the property manager gave me. I’d rather be let inside. The devil wants an invitation.

  The door opens a crack, yanked short by a brass chain. A wide, fearful brown eye takes me in. “You.”

  “Me,” I say agreeably. “May I come inside?”

  “Who are you?”

  The man who’s going to strip you down, layer by layer. Until I get to your beating heart. “The owner of this building.”

  Her eyes narrow. “You’re not the super.”

  “He works for me.”

  “How do I know I can trust you?”

  My cock twitches at being challenged, even this small amount. My reputation is so absolute, my power so replete that I rarely find this—especially from a girl so small.

  “You definitely can’t trust me. Run and tell your daddy that Jonathan Scott is here.”

  She shuts the door and turns the deadbolt with a squeak. I hear soft voices through the thin walls but not what they’re saying. I can imagine it well enough. Jonathan Scott? Are you serious? Open the fucking door. Let him in before he kicks it in.

  I would never do something so crass. I became powerful so that I could direct people instead of the other way around. The door opens about sixty seconds later.

  A breathless Penny swings open the door. “Come in.”

  An older man hobbles inside, leaning on both the wall and a single crutch. His leg is wrapped in denim, a poor man’s cast. Someone who can’t afford health care. “Mr. Scott,” he says, cheeks ruddy, eyes bright with pain and fear. “What can we do for you?”

  “Please sit down, George. Don’t strain yourself on my account.”

  He hesitates, clearly preferring to stand even as his balance wavers. No one wants to sit down around an animal baring its teeth. Penny helps him to a lumpy plaid armchair. Such a good daughter.

  I do him the favor of sitting across from him, on an old corduroy sofa. It’s a courtesy I can extend since I’ll have my cock in his daughter tonight. “I understand my son has been to visit you.”

  Fear glistens over the man’s eyes. He glances at his broken leg. “I told him we’d get it. I swear.”

  I shake my head, disappointed. “Don’t lie to me. There’s no way for you to get ten thousand dollars. Little Penny could serve a hundred pies a day, and you’d never be able to pay.”

  “Stop it,” Penny says, brown eyes flashing. “Leave him alone.”

  Like biting into a peach, the slight crisp, the hint of tartness beneath the sweetness. Heat courses through my body, rare for someone so jaded, so fucking experienced. Almost an old man, really.

  “I could,” I say idly. “Leave him alone, I mean. If you want me to.”

  A hard swallow. “What do you mean?”

  “Ten thousand dollars.” I pull out an envelope thick with hundred dollar bills. Just like the one I left her on the Formica table in the diner. I cock my head, studying her. “Would you like this, Penny?”

  George looks concerned. “No, leave her out of this. She didn’t have nothing to do with it.”

  “You’ll have to give the money to Damon yourself. Do you think you could manage that? Or would you gamble again, hoping to turn it into twenty or thirty thousand?”

  “I’ll make sure he gets it,” Penny says with a worried glance at her daddy.

  “You won’t.”

  She doesn’t want to ask. She has no choice. “Why not?”

  “You’ll be with me.”

  “No!” George says, struggling to heave himself up. An involuntary sound of pain fills the cramped apartment as he leans too much on his leg. “You can’t do this.”

  He knows it’s already done. He should have known that when I showed up at the door. Maybe he did. Maybe he sent his little girl to the door knowing it would be the last time.

  “It’s up to you,” I say, smiling at her.

  An impossible choice. A dirty old man with a taste for sweetness. Her lips firm. “You’re a monster.”

  Fuck, I almost come in my pants. “That’s right,” I murmur. “Fight me.”

  “How dare you do this?”

  “Offer you money? Well, sure, call the cops. Tell them how horrible I am for paying your daddy’s debts.”

  “Aren’t the police in your pockets?”

  “Or you can take your chances with Damon Scott. He has quite a reputation.” I glance at George’s leg. “I suppose you’re already familiar with it. What did he promise to take next?”

  A furtive glance at his daughter is the only answer I need. Damon is my son, after all.

  “Tick tock,” I say softly. “Would you like the money?”

  She looks to her daddy in that trusting, hopeful way a child does. Of course, her father has no comfort to offer. He can’t even meet her eyes. That’s the way Damon looked at me once. I didn’t comfort him either.

  “I’ll do it,” she says between clenched teeth.

  I stand and leave the room without another word. The money remains on the cheap cushion where I left it. Her footsteps chase me down the hallway.

  “Wait.” She’s breathless. “I’m coming.”

  I beat her down the uneven stairs and into the night. Only on the street do I let her catch up. “I don’t wait for you, little girl. That’s not how this works.”

  She bites her lip, clearly holding back some retort. The fire in her burns, where for too many years I felt numb. “Okay. I’ll be good. I swear.”

  “Do you really think Daddy is going to use the money to pay off the debt?”

  Large brown eyes look up at the building behind me. That’s the true monster, its bones rotting wood, its skin crumbling concrete. Glassy eyes stare out, unblinking as it eats people up. There’s no way her father will give the money to Damon. He’ll gamble it away, ending up in more debt. It’s a sickness.

  The glimmer of hope in her eyes is a stroke to my cock.

  “He knows what I’m giving up.”

  “Do you?”

  Her eyes narrow, fierce with righteous anger. “You want to have sex with me.”

  “Wrong.”

  Even she knows that will be worse. Suspicion. Fear she tries to hide. “What, then?”

  “I want to break you down into parts—into hope and despair. Into love and fear. I want to consume your humanity, feast on you, until there’s nothing left but a small, jagged core at the center.”

  She should be afraid, and she is. More than that, she’s defiant.

  I knew I chose the best piece.

  “Why?”

  I laugh softly. “Do you ever think about how mechanical sex is? Men so desperate for something warm and wet to fuck. A purely physical sensation. We might as well be automatons.”

  “Not you,” she says with a hint of bitterness.

  It would
be better if I only wanted to rape her. She knows that much.

  “I learned to block out physical sensations as a child.” I believe in honesty, in exposure. Secrets are weakness. “Pain. Sex. Hunger. They only touch our bodies. Not our minds.”

  She looks horrified. “What happened to you?”

  I hold out my hand. “Come along.”

  It may as well be a snake, my fingers its fangs. “You’re insane.”

  “No, little peach. I’m the only sane one in a world full of rabid animals.” I have endless patience as I leave my hand outstretched. Mercy is important. Mercy to a girl who’ll be broken soon enough.

  She trembles as she puts her palm against mine.

  I squeeze in comfort. I’m not a heartless man.

  We take a long walk through the back alleys of the west side. Five blocks south and two west. The sign for the Midtown Asylum has long since crumbled, leaving only a large, plantation-style building. If the west side of Tanglewood is my orchard, then this building is the barrel of bruised fruit. It will be mashed and strained. Still useful for its indelible flavor, but no longer bearing the same colors.

  On either side, there are houses falling down. I could repair them. Or maybe rent them as they are, to people desperate enough for a leaky roof. But I prefer the privacy. There’s no one else on this street.

  I have mansions and compounds scattered across Tanglewood, shows of wealth and of strength. They’re fine for me to visit, to use like a simple man fucks a slick cunt. Temporary relief.

  This is the only place I ever feel human.

  I hear her indrawn breath before the lock has turned.

  Pictures spread over the floor. The insides of senators’ houses. The interiors of city hall. Windows into our twisted little world. I haven’t hidden any of them from her—like I said, I believe in honesty.

  “The desk,” I tell her, hanging my coat on a hook.