Dog Days of Summer (Damned of the 2/19th Book Four) - Finished

Matron Tuath Dé Aine's Touch

I-5 Freeway Southbound

Seattle, Washington, USA

8 August, 1986

1045 Hours

The car was an older model, a 1963 Chevy Nova II, and it smelled of pear blossoms for the most part, the stench of hot urine was there from the front seat. I could smell the faint tinge of rotting blood. The smell was coming from the woman next me as she sat in the back seat holding my hand, caressing the inside of my forearm with her long little fingers, her fingernails tracing the network of veins beneath the skin. Her fingertips left burning, stinging trails in my skin, and I could feel it in my veins.

My internal clock was off, some of my brain functions shut off by Matron Aine's touch and the lizard was extremely drowsy, barely able to get up and check his monitors. He shook his head, and the monitors showing my pulse, respiration, blood pressure, blood-oxygen saturation, and all the other vital statistics lit up, flashing a warning to the lizard that I had been poisoned.

"You saw what he did to the Ruari's sons, Matron Aine." I heard the man's voice from the front seat, an older man's voice that I didn't recognize. I was tempted to look up, see who it was, but the lizard was more awake than I was and kept me from looking up with a hiss of warning. "He doesn't even look like his pictures any more. I thought you guys said you called him Little Annie, he doesn't look so little to me."

"He's not." Aine said softly, her other hand stroking the inside of my thigh. "He is no longer Aodan or Anthony or even Little Orphan Annie like he was teased into being." She sighed. "He has a different name now, one I have not compelled from him, one written in blood and more." Her voice was slightly curious at the end and full of dark mirth. When I was a child her tone would have frightened me. "That name would give me power over him in ways none of you would understand." She shivered again, a sexual thing that made my groin ache more. "Were I not bound by agreement, I would compel it from him and own him utterly."

Now I was made of twisted steel and sex appeal, but Aine's enslaved killers.

"Just let some of the boys beat it out of him." Another male voice said. "He damn near killed my boys." Uncle Ruari McSrainhe, then, father of Carl, Niall, and Douglas. He had always been a scumbag, and my Father Tiernan hated the other man with a passion. Rather than joining the family business of the military and war, he had chosen to suck up to the Matrons of the family as their lapdog and bully  boy.

Matron Aine chuckled, a musical sound that made my nerves sing and the erection I was sporting ache even more. "I would warn against that. He is stilled and quieted right now but violence may awaken him." Her hand slid further up my leg and I saw her lick her lips with her too long tongue. "You family's Matrons should be wary, this is not the boy they knew. Something has changed him."

"He is nothing but a boy." Another voice came. Aunt Regan, her voice full of scorn. The family's Matrons had long memories, but it looked like Aunt Regan had forgotten what I had done rather quickly.

Matron Aine McCullen, one of the Sitting Matrons of the McCullen family, chuckled wickedly. "You say that now, Matron Regina Charter-McDaurn, but a mere half hour ago you sat on the floor of a bathroom with your panties soaked in urine and terror robbing you of your womanhood."  She chuckled again, taking pleasure in her insult to the other woman that Aunt Regina dared not take offense to. Her tiny hand cupped my crotch and squeezed gently. "You deny this one is different even as your breast aches with pain and you burn with remembered humiliation and fear."

"Remember your place, Matron Aine, you are McCullen, this is McDaurn family business." Aunt Regan snarled from the from the front seat. "I don't care why you agreed to come along, but as far as I care you can just get out of the car right now."