by V. L. Brock
Drawing his eyes from the road ahead, he flashed me a look, a look that indicated how peeved he was getting. “Kady,” he shot back sternly, before peeking back on the road.
I don’t know why, by the vexation that punctured through his tone had my contemplations scattered on the wind, shuddering in a corner. I knew that if I voiced my concerns and told him how he was making me feel, it would lead into an argument. And that was something that I wasn’t in my right mind for.
So I decided to keep my mouth shut, and forced a smile. “Nothing, I’m just nervous.”
He smiled warmly, his eyes twinkling as the light bounced from the windshield when he quickly peeked at me. “You’re with me, Kady, baby. There’s nothing to be nervous about.”
The first thing I noticed when Liam turned right at the next set of lights, and my first thought, were two entirely different things. The first thing I noticed was a quaint little white church in the center of a squared enclave, its bell-tower soaring high with a clock beneath, and my jaw slacked. The surrounding buildings were a mixture of diners, barber shops, patisseries, a small movie theater and a few apartment buildings with bay-windows.
It was small, and I intuited that it was an area where everyone knew everyone, and therefore everyone must have known each other’s business and private affairs.
My first thought when I saw the area was, ‘when the bell-tower sounds at 6:00 p.m., do the residents lose their own mind and become possessed?’ I know I shouldn’t have, but the sphere in my gut lurched and told me that this place––although a nice, quiet town––was like a bloody ghost town.
“Welcome to Bricksdale, baby.”
I took a moment to gaze out of the window and watch the establishments pass by, as he drove slowly around to the left side of the square, and pulled up outside a white building. I hung me head, focusing on my knitted fingers that rested in my lap.
“Kady…”
I wanted to sit in stillness and just concentrate on the way my fingers were locking, the length of my nails, and assess the state of my cuticles. Maybe get lost in what was left of my own thoughts. I already felt alone, he was making me feel it. But, after a few hushed moments, I reluctantly pulled my head up to look at his face. With his hair slicked back, his block jaw, familiar contented eyes, and an enormous grin on his clean-shaven face, he looked too…happy, too eager to throw me into the sea without my raft.
“We moved from Dorchester, to here?” I muttered, my voice was broken, utterly shattered. I loved Dorchester, I remember being happy there. I remember the neighbors, my way around, and yes, even though I felt ashamed that I was a stripper, I loved being around the corner from Liv, Benny and the other workload at Red Velvet.
“To Bricksdale, Kady, you can say the name. It’s your home…our home.” My blood ran cold as I watched his mouth curl and eyes deepen into a bottomless chasm of persistence and silent urging. That expression, I never want to see again, he looked manic. “Get out of the car; I want to show you something.”
He opened his door and unfolded himself from the leather seat. With a weighty sigh, I did as instructed.
Liam’s arm coiled around my waist, pulling me into the side of his body as we stood on the sidewalk, staring at the white building with an overly-large window, displaying an array of cakes.
“Ent-icing,” I read the golden script on a pink background, overhead the window. “Ent-icing is a cake shop?” I look up at the tall man whose arm I was under with a skeptical arch of my brow.
I felt his shoulders bounce as he sniggered. “Ent-icing is a cake makers and decorator, wedding cakes, birthday cakes, you name it. This is your business, Kady.”
The world crumbled around me until I was left hanging on the precipice, and at that moment, I really wished I could have jumped into the lava below my feet and be done with everything. The new information was too much to absorb, and I didn’t feel I was strong enough to even experience these pieces of a new life, let alone recognize them. I didn’t want to learn anything new about the person that I had become, because it was too painful and exasperating as I forced my mind to remember something.
But it didn’t. My memories were a lost dream, a dream that was bobbing on the sea and too far out of my reach to grasp onto and force a recollection.
I turned my body to face him directly. “Liam, I’m a dancer, not a businesswoman, or a cake decorator for that matter. My God, I can’t even fry a fucking egg.” He laughed, and for an ephemeral moment, all I wanted was to pull out the ice-shard in my heart and stab him in the eye. “Liam, why do you think this is funny? This isn’t funny…” I frowned; my voice couldn’t have been any smaller or deflated.
He wiped his finger under his eye to dry a straying tear. “Oh, come on, baby, you have to laugh, that comment with the egg was funny.”
I shook my head sheepishly. “Not for me, Liam. It’s far from funny to me. I don’t understand why you couldn’t have talked to me about the things that have changed, before setting me down in front of them.”
His laughter ceased, his face became apologetic. He framed my face with his large hands and searched my eyes. “I’m sorry, Kady,” he whispered. “I thought if I showed you the changes, rather than talked about them, that they may trigger a memory, or something.”
“The only thing it’s triggering Liam is my confusion and anger. You’re hurting me. I’m feeling scared. I don’t want to resent you, and feel bitter towards you because of the way you’re trying to help. But Liam, please…doing it this way,”––I gestured to the shop along my right––“isn’t helping me.”
With a nod of his head, his mouth came down to settle over me. Taking me in his arms, he held me against the stretch of his body, and we stood there for seconds? Minutes? I have no idea, but when he pulled away, the fist of negative feelings, which I directed towards him over the last few days with his uncommunicative ways, had dissipated, and understanding, and gratitude took its place.
“So, where’s this house then?” I questioned while he studied the road ahead.
“It’s on the second right, a nice white one. The only white one on the street actually.”
“A white house? You’re going to tell me it has a picket-fence next,” I teased.
Risking a glance, he pulled his eyes from the road and wiggled his eyebrows at me with a conceited, yet roguish air.
“No, you got to be kidding me, Liam. Really…a picket-fence?”
He sniggered, “No, Kady, baby, no picket-fence.”
Thank God. I threw my head back against the cold rest. I hated those things. I pushed myself into the black leather seat, rolled my head over the rest to gaze out of the window, and watched as we ascended the tree-lined street.
Within moments, we pulled into an uphill driveway next to a white, detached, old fashioned property. It had bay windows on both the upper and lower floors, and a circle window for the attic.
“Here we are, home sweet home.” He put the car into park and shut off the ignition.
“This is our house?” I probed dubiously, my eyes practically bulging out of their sockets. It was beautiful. Although, I wasn’t overly enthusiastic about the attic window, ever since I was a kid I hated attics.
Shifting in his seat, the leather cracked and he grinned with self-satisfaction. “Did I, or did I not tell you that I would make sure you had everything you wanted, and that you never need to worry about anything, because I would handle it?”
As those words fell from his lips, I felt blessed, I felt hopeful, because they were words that I could remember him saying to me.
I was steered hand in hand to the front of the building. There were six steps we had to climb before we were level with the front door. As I set my foot on the bottom step, I was startled by an earsplitting voice calling, “Coo-ee.” The ‘coo’ was a lengthy note, whereas the ‘ee’ was short. I’m positive it could have shattered a glass flute.
I turned to be greeted with a stubby, middle-aged woman with a mass of dyed, red hai
r that looked like a football helmet rushing towards us. She scooped me into her arms, her hefty chest pressing against me as I stood stock-still waiting for her embrace to slacken.
“Kady, I’m so glad that you’re back.” She released me from her grip, to which I was grateful. Her hand parked on the tops of my arms. “We have all been worried about you at the cake and coffee club. Mr. Quinn has been praying for you––well, we all have––”
“Umm…” I scowled, and glanced at Liam with a confused expression.
“Mrs. Steinbeck,” Liam interjected. “Thank you so much for your kind words. But Kady needs her rest.”
“Oh, of course, Mr. DeLaney––I’m so sorry, Kady. I have a cake cooling in my kitchen; I’ll pop it around later as a welcome home sweet.” She shifted her hand to my shoulder and grinned. “My cakes will never taste as good as your ones, Kady, but it’s the thought that counts,” she tossed her head back on an eerie cackle which prompted my eyes to widen in shock horror. Fuck, was this woman high?
“That it does, Mrs. Steinbeck, and thank you for your kindness,” Liam retorted, while steering me up the steps, and away from the nosey neighbor.
“If there is anything at all we can do for you both, you know where I am. My door is always open.”
Liam tersely gushed, “Thank you, Mrs. Steinbeck,” before shutting the front door behind us. “God, that woman never shuts up.”
I stood in the hallway, flanked by two entrance ways, one to my left, one to my right. Motionless, I peeked up the dark wooden staircase directly before me with a wooden balustrade, the top steps curving around the left corner.
Liam’s breath tickled the nape of my neck, and the warmth of his body through his shirt, pasted onto my back. “Do you want the grand tour?” he asked in a husky tone. I swore I could feel the vibrations traveling from his throat to meet me.
He was already rounding my stagnant body as I turned to face him. Standing on the threshold of the right entrance, he offered an encouraging smile, and I took hold of his hand as he offered to me.
“It’s a simple layout. You follow the rooms around, and you end up at the left entrance in the hallway. This is the living room obviously.”
The room bolstered a Grecian theme, with white and cream tones, white and gold veined marble, glass and chandeliers. An overstuffed white and gold-trimmed couch rested in the bay of the window to my left, a pillar-style lamp perched on a small table behind the left arm, and a hefty white marble coffee table with magnificent carved legs and a glass surface sat in the center of two overstuffed sofas. A fifty inch flat screen hung above the large, carved fireplace in the heart of the wall directly ahead.
“It’s very…white,” I breathed as I completed my perusal and followed Liam through the end archway to the dining area.
“Get used to it, it’s like this throughout. Don’t blame me, you’re the one who decorated, Kady, baby,” he chuckled.
The dining area and kitchen was integrated, and it was huge. Passing the lengthy glass surfaced dining-table that sits six, a crystal chandelier hanging perfectly in the center, I stepped into the kitchen.
“This is your room of preference,” he smiled, arms outspread as he performed a little twirl behind the white and oak-topped kitchen island.
I began my subtle perusal. “Room of preference?” I grimaced, my eyes falling back on Liam who stood behind the island, his hands set on the wooden top. “What do you mean?”
The island was the focal point of the room, a state of the art range along the back wall. Cooking equipment hung from hooks while gadgets were placed in its own designated area. It was both magnificent, and very intimidating. I was hesitant to move or touch anything, in fear I would move it out of place and never remember where it belonged. The amount of counters, worktops, units and cupboards were already confusing the Hell out of me. I knew it was going to take me a decade to find my way around.
He freed the surface of his hands and raised them in the air with flair. “Your improvisations, your creations, they all happen here.” He dropped back onto the island, his shoulders practically touching his ears as he bore his weight through his arms. “You spend hours every now and then in here. I don’t know how you can stand the heat at times.”
Liam was right; the entire house was identical to the living room with whites, gold, marbles and glass, apart from his home office, which was dark wood and burnish red. Bookcases upon bookcases spanned along the left wall, while a bay window was situated behind the desk.
I headed straight to the master suite after my grand tour. Liam pushed several times on the word home, but it wasn’t my home. And it wouldn’t be my home until something sparked. For now, it was a house.
Time didn’t exist as I parked myself in the middle of the largest, most stupendous bed I had even seen. Ivory satin covers and a golden throw decorated the pillar-styled four-poster bed. It didn’t have a canopy, which to me, made it even more striking.
I sighed as I stared at a photograph on my bedside, one I had no recollection of ever being taken. Liam and I were on a beach, he was wearing only a pair of knee-length shorts, displaying a Chinese tattoo on his left pectoral, an eagle on his left forearm, and a spider’s web on his neck. I was in shorts with an oversized black sweater draping over my shoulder, my blond hair whipping around my face. He was carrying me on his back and we were smiling like lunatics. I wondered what beach we were at; I wondered who took the photo.
The doorbell rang loud and clear, causing my heart to lurch into my throat, and drew a close to my musings. Uncrossing my legs, I shimmed off the queen-sized bed, trudged down the cream and gold hallway with mirrors and pictures adorning the walls, and down the stairs.
Liam was already at the door, embracing the woman and mumbling something in her hair.
Although her arm remained on his forearm, the brunette pulled away from my boyfriend. With golden eyes, she observed me as I descended the finally two hardwood steps. “Oh, my God, there’s my, Kady. How are you feeling, chick?”
I smiled at the endearment.
Chick.
********
The music from outside pierced through the backstage door as I was adding my last coat of mascara. Checking out my reflection in the mirror surrounded by golden lit bulbs, I battered my eyelashes and smacked my red coated lips together.
“Oh, my God,” Through the corner of my eye, I spotted a brunette sporting nothing but a gold shimmering thong and matching heels, flouncing through the door. “I have no idea who that guy is, but you need to check him the fuck out when you go on, chick.” She stopped behind me and helped me adjust my midnight-black glossy wig.
“You couldn’t sound any more excited if you tried, Liv,” I giggled. “What side?”
“Left, and trust me––” reflections still remaining eye contact, she bent down over the arch of my neck, totally uncaring that her tits were pressed against my shoulder. “He doesn’t look cheap. I think I might do a little digging for his number when I’ve finished.”
I sniggered and shook my head. Liv was an amazing friend, she was so spirited, so brazen. She had everything that guys wanted: the tits, the figure, and the confidence. Liv could have anyone at her feet, both men and women alike.
“Raven,” Benny summoned me, the backstage door held open as he rested his back against it. “You’re on, move that ass girl.”
I pushed myself from the stool, while adjusting my tits in my red sequined bra to maximize my cleavage. “Sure thing, Benny,” I purred, strolling my ass past my boss in nothing but a thong, bra and transparent stripper shoes.
I waited behind the curtain for my set to begin. All my regulars knew when I was up, not solely by the fact that Liv was always on before me, but because the music for my sets were basically the same: a sensual, chill-out, ambient style tune.
The soft Japanese female voice of the group, Cibo Matto sounded over the system. I took a deep breath, holding the air prisoner in my lungs as I psyched myself up before stepping through
the Red Velvet curtains. I stepped onto the stage as the first beat resonated, and was instantly bathed in crimson light.
A sensual glow from the bulbs decorated and framed the walkway. I blanked everything out, allowing the music to wash over me, to consume me as I prowled seductively down the platform. Like every other night, I became one with the beat as I swayed my hips, caressed my near naked body with sensual strokes, and met the pole at the end of the way. Performing my usual one circuit warm up, I wrapped my hand around the steel before slowly grinding my pelvis, rolling my stomach and with the cold metal between my thighs I sunk to the bottom of its length.
I hadn’t even glanced at the man Liv was gushing about backstage, yet I felt his eyes on me, boring a hole into me as I slithered my way back up the bar and into position, tossing my fake tresses back with a flip of my head. I circled my hips again, rolled my tautened stomach, cupped my breasts and bit my lip coyly when my hands slid down the golden flesh of my stomach, and wantonly concealed my pussy, before pressing my back against my pole and dropped down into a crouch.
Usually, I would have stayed zoned out, never really taking any notice of the people watching me, but that man who was sitting along the left of the walkway had my full attention. I wasn’t dancing for the other twenty-odd men in front of me, I was dancing for him, and he made it very fucking clear that he was enjoying what he was seeing, and that alone spurred me.
He was sitting back in his seat, loosening his tie and releasing the collar button of his shirt. The fingers of his left hand grazed over his lips, and his eyes didn’t stray from my body, my movements. I gazed at him as I raised my leg, wrapped it around the dowel and spun it again. I saw him fight a swallow and his lips parted as he gasped.
Sinking to my knees, I crept my way further down the stage, my spine dipping with every movement forward, flaunting the arch of my back. I stopped in front of him; his right leg was outstretched as he dropped further into the seat. I held his gaze––even in the crimson light, I could see he had amazing eyes, and a magnificent jawline. He carried himself well. That was obvious.
