“I have Aiden’s money.”
I look into Penn’s eyes, then lower my gaze to the fat envelope in his hand. With a nod, I take it from him, then attempt to close the door again, but he pushes it open.
“Um. She’s doing a lot better,” he offers nervously. “Doc says she’s healing up pretty fast.”
“Thanks,” I say with a nod, attempting to close the door again. But Penn’s persistent in his visit and he uses his foot to prop the door open.
“Are you okay? I mean, I haven’t heard from you in days and when we went our separate ways the other night you looked absolutely fucked.”
“I watched my best friend get beat to a goddamn pulp, so you’ll have to excuse me if I wasn’t as friendly as you hoped,” I reply through grit teeth. “Now, if you don’t mind, I really want to be alone.”
Penn looks like he’s been slapped in the face, yet I don’t find it in myself to care at the moment.
“Yeah. Sorry. I’ll uh … I’ll go then,” he says quietly, turning away from me and walking back toward the elevator.
Great. Now I feel like shit twice over.
“Wait. Penn? Do you want to help me with something?” I ask, leaning out of the door. My piece is due soon and I can’t put off finishing it any longer, but I know I can’t do it without help.
“You sure I’m not intruding?” he asks curiously, taking a step back in my direction.
“Positive. Come on, I need your help.”
Penn grins widely as he enters my home and I’d be lying if I said I didn’t give a shit about what his reaction will be to my work.
“What do you need help with?” he asks.
I walk back to my room and toss Aiden’s payout onto my dresser. When I turn around, I damn near walk right into Penn, who’s smiling at me wickedly.
“Not that,” I mumble nervously.
“Oh.”
His face drops and a small smile creases my lips. He looks so damn disappointed right now that I kind of feel bad.
“Maybe after?”
“Cool,” he says happily. “So, what do you need help with?”
He crosses his long arms over his chest and I take a deep breath. I’ve never been apprehensive about what I choose to do for a living, and I wouldn’t be surprised if Aiden’s already slipped during a conversation, but I just don’t know how he’ll handle actually seeing my work in progress.
“I need to finish my project. I have to take it to the owner tomorrow night,” I explain.
“I’m not very artsy, but I’ll do what I can,” he replies enthusiastically.
God, I hope he can keep a fucking secret.
“Alright, let’s go,” I say with a nod, motioning for him to follow me back into the hallway. I press the button for the elevator doors to open and once we step inside, Penn sighs heavily.
“What’s the matter?” I ask him curiously. He sighs again, tilts his head to the side, and as the elevator begins to crawl to the third floor, he grabs me around my waist and shoves me back against the wall.
“Whoa, there,” I say with a quiet chuckle, holding my hands up. “I surrender.”
Penn smiles, leans forward and brushes his lips gently against mine but he doesn’t kiss me.
“Just giving you something to think about for later,” he says softly. “Is it working?”
That should be a give-in at this point. I’m sure he can feel my hard dick pressed against his body, but Penn seems to be the kind of person that needs verbal confirmation.
“Obviously,” I reply, moving his hand to my dick. Penn lowers his eyes down to the prize in his hand and bites his lower lip. “But not right now,” I say as soon as the elevator doors open. “Now, we have work to do.”
Penn grunts, a sulking expression on his face as he follows me to the workshop door. I don’t open it right away, though, because I need to prepare him for what he’s about to see.
“Do you remember when you asked me what kind of art I do, and I told you that I work with textures?” I ask him, shuffling my feet nervously. Penn nods and waits for me to continue. “I’m very proud of the work I do and if this isn’t something you can handle then tell me as soon as I show you the piece and we can part ways right then and there. I won’t force you to help me with something you may not be able to handle, but I also expect that you’d be able to keep my little secret.”
He grins mischievously and tilts his head to the side. “Took you long enough to find that chick. I’m pretty sure I’m good with secrets.”
My eyes soften as I return his smile with an even stare. I don’t have it in me to admonish him for thinking that this is anything like the Little Julie situation. What’s inside is alive and going through a transition that no one other than Aiden has seen. It may be harder on him than he may understand, but if he’s willing to help me, he needs to be able to keep the secret.
I run a hand over my face before I relent and turn back toward the door, unlocking it and pushing it open.
“Welcome to hell,” I say over my shoulder as I lead the way into the room.
Chapter Twenty-One
Penn is looking at it like it’s the most beautiful thing he’s ever seen. His eyes are wide with child-like innocence and his mouth is slightly open as he walks around the table, taking in every stitch, every new modification, and the possibility of what it’s going to become.
“What do you need me to do?” he finally asks after he’s taken it in. He places his hands on either side of its head as it watches him with curious eyes. Penn is looking down at it, runs a hand over the side of its face, then turns his attention back to me, eager for instruction.
A little too eager for my liking.
But I’m still grateful for the extra pair of hands.
“First, you need to put on some gloves. You’ll find them on that table over there,” I say nodding to a long, wooden table full of tools and devices that sits alongside the back wall.
Penn quickly goes over and locates the pair I mentioned, slipping them on, as he walks back toward us. I’m smiling down at it and its looking up at me with a kind smile dancing in its eyes.
“Do you … uh, do you love that thing?” Penn asks me curiously.
“I love all of them,” I reply softly, looking up at him again. “Someone has to.”
He gives me an amused look before he shrugs, “So what are we doing?”
“We’re finishing it,” I say, moving away from the piece and walking toward the table. There’s a rather large rucksack sitting in the middle with the final parts that will make this everything the owner required it to be, and while it will hurt it for the most part, I’m hoping that with Penn’s help, we can move quickly.
I pick up the heavy bag and go back to the metal table.
“Fuck, can you grab that power drill for me? There should be two, actually,” I say to Penn as I drop the bag onto the floor and begin to unpack it.
He nods and moves quickly, returning with the necessary tools we’ll need to get these fucking things screwed into place.
“I wish I had something to give you that would dull the pain, but nothing will help this time. We’ll move fast, though. I promise,” I say to it softly as I place the handmade, metal hooves onto the table.
“How do I do this?” he asks, patiently holding out one of the drills toward me.
“You have to slide it on—rest it on the ankle bone, then use one of the bolts to get it into place. That’s where the drills come in,” I say to him quietly as I fidget with my own drill. I press the button and it comes to life, briefly causing the pet to let out a frantic moan.
“I know, believe me, I know. But we all have to feel real pain at some point in our lives to become the beautiful things we’re destined to be,” I tell it as I move down toward the end of the table and slip the other hoof on.
Penn looks at me and waits. It honestly surprises me that he hasn’t asked anymore questions or even backed out of doing this. Maybe he knows that I need him as much as it does,
or maybe he just has no regard for human life.
Either way, he’s a godsend right now.
“Aiden’s gonna be so pissed at me,” I say to no one in particular with a soft chuckle.
“Why?” Penn asks.
“Because she was supposed to help me finish this,” I explain, shaking my head woefully. “Alright. On three. Ready?”
“Yeah.”
“One.” It whimpers, and I try not to make eye contact with it. “Two.” We both power our drills on and line up the bolts with its ankle bones. “Three.”
“That was fucking amazing,” Penn exclaims with a huge smile on his face. We’ve finished securing the hooves now and I’ve been cradling its head, trying to help with the pain and show it that even though it’s a completely transformed into a pet now, that I hope it can forgive me.
“Can you give us a minute?” I ask him irritably. Its tears have almost subsided, but I know the pain will last much longer because I chose to not sedate it this time.
Penn looks stung. Like I reached over and slapped him, but he has to understand that gloating in front of a pet is something I don’t do, nor will I tolerate.
“Sorry. I’ll clean up the mess,” he offers quietly.
I nod at him as he begins to put the drills away, the bag slung over his shoulder on his way back to the table.
He leaves the room once he’s done and I can hear the echo of his footsteps as he jogs down the stairs.
“He’s new at this, but I think he did a good job, don’t you?” I ask it softly. It closes its eyes tightly, tears streaming down the side of its face, and manages a small nod.
“It’ll go away soon—the pain doesn’t last forever. I’ll help you take your first steps before I turn you over and if you don’t like your new owner after some time, you can come back to me.”
Penn returns a few moments later with a hand towel and a bottle of antiseptic. Without a word, he quickly goes to work washing the outside of the hooves and getting as much into the cuff as he can, careful to do his best not to hurt it.
My heart fills a little more for him because of how gently he’s caring for it in his own way. I think he understands now that even though its not quite human anymore, it deserves to be treated with a modicum of respect. It needs to be loved just like anything else in this world—and it deserves it more than most.
When he’s done, he leaves the room again, and I follow not far behind him. Of course, I’ve kissed my finished product gently on the forehead as I always do in parting after I’ve worked on it and tell it that tomorrow, I’ll deliver it where it belongs.
By the time I make it back down to the second floor, Penn is walking back down the hallway from the bathroom and gives me a nervous look.
“Sorry if I pissed you off up there. I really was only trying to help, and I didn’t think being proud of what we did would make you mad,” he explains with a sheepish grin.
“Why were you so comfortable doing that? And getting rid of Julie?” I finally ask, giving him an inquisitive stare. At this point, I don’t think secrets between us should be a thing and I’m hoping he agrees.
Time will tell.
“Huh? Oh,” he begins with a laugh. “Did you ever hear about those places that you can go where you can pay like x amount of dollars and shoot someone in the head or some shit? Well, last year, me and a bunch of my buddies went overseas and found one. It’s not so bad after you pull the trigger—it’s more of a rush than anything else, know what I mean?”
I stare at him, unblinking, shocked by his revelation and doing my best not to show it.
“Not really,” I finally manage to say.
“Well, you’ve killed too, even if it was by accident, that chick? She didn’t fall down the stairs, I bet,” he says, the grin widening on his face.
My face turns red and he nods knowingly. “It’s okay. If I was going to narc on you, I already would have done it.”
“Right,” I reply evenly.
I sigh and look away from him. My mind wanders back to Aiden and how she’s holding up, but something tells me that even if I ask Penn, he won’t tell me.
“Hey, so. Didn’t you promise me something?” he asks, taking a few steps forward and sliding his arms around my waist.
I chuckle and drape mine around his shoulders, peering into his eyes and wondering if maybe this is something more than just randomly fucking.
“Can I ask you something?” I ask with a smile.
“She’s fine. I called the doctor before I came over,” he replies, leaning forward.
I pull my head back and shake my head. “It’s not about Aiden, but thanks for the update.”
“Then what is it?”
“Before Aiden told you that I had a thing for you, did you know?”
Penn’s lips curve into a dangerous grin as he raises his eyes back to mine. “Maybe. But like I said, I’ve never been with a guy before and my friends aren’t exactly the understanding type, so I always knew that I would have to act like you weren’t there even though you were.”
“Oh.”
That makes sense. Rich, little bastards that fly around the world shooting people in the head for fun can’t handle one of their own having a same sex relationship.
I guess it’s just fucking after all.
“Fuck them,” he says dismissively. “They’re usually so coked out, they wouldn’t know a good thing if it hit them in the face with a brick—but I do. And while I may have to keep this from them, I … I want what you promised me. I need it really. You’re like a fucking drug that I hadn’t tried yet, Gray and from the first taste, I’ve become hooked on you.”
“And what happens when you decide you need rehab? What then?” I ask him quietly.
“There’s no cure for you. And if there is? I don’t fucking want it,” he breathes, stepping forward and pressing his soft lips against mine.
I close my eyes and lose myself in his kiss. I didn’t realize how desperately I need him until I felt him pressed against me again and I’ll do everything I can to never have to let go of him.
Chapter Twenty-Two
His moans bring an animal out of me that I never knew existed. I’m gripping his hips tightly and fucking him as gently as I can even though I want nothing more than to destroy him. His ass is as tight as I thought it would be and the sound of flesh against flesh—the scent of sweat and desire is fucking maddening.
Penn reaches back and grabs one of my wrists tightly. His nails digging into my flesh make me smile and I fuck him just a little harder to let him know it.
“More,” he gasps, through grit teeth. I oblige, lean down against him, and bring one of my feet up onto the bed and thrust into him further than I had been before.
Just when I can tell that he can’t take anymore, I pull out of him and begin to tug on my cock. I need to cum right now and I don’t want to do it inside of him. Not just yet—he hasn’t earned that.
My breathing becomes labored as Penn lays on the bed in front of me, trying to regain his composure. His body glistens in the moonlight and I can see the smile on his face. I lick my lips and keep rubbing my dick until I shoot my load over his perfect ass.
“Fuck,” I moan loudly.
“You should have let me do that for you,” he chuckles softly.
“I’m not done with you just yet,” I tell him, pulling him up and laying down on the bed. “Climb on and show me what you’ve got.”
Penn grins as he moves on top of me, holding my dick in his hand and gently easing it back into himself.
“Holy shit,” he breathes, his eyes closing tightly, before he places them on my shoulders. He leans down, mouth open against mine, and I lick his lips. The feeling of his tight hole gripping my cock is an amazing sensation and I honestly hope that he’s enjoying this as much as he seems to be.
He moves slowly at first, raising and lowering himself on my cock. I know he needs to get used to the feeling, so I don’t rush him. If anything, the pace he’s moving at right
now is almost enough to make me cum again, but I grit my teeth and hold onto to it.
“Oh fuck,” he whispers, his forehead against mine as begins to move faster. I grin and push him back so that he’s forced to take as much of my dick as he can, and he leans back as he begins to bounce up and down.
His eyes are closed tightly as he moves faster and harder. I keep one hand firmly on his hip and use the other to being to pull on his cock. I want him to cum with me inside of him, because in a way, that makes him mine.
Penn lets out a loud moan as I keep tugging on his dick and I’m ready for it. I know he’s going to cum and I want him to. I want him to do it for me so fucking desperately.
“Come on; you know you want to,” I say, tugging a little harder. He grunts, and I know that I’m hurting him a bit, but I don’t care. I need this right now and it’s the only thing that will keep me fucking sane until I can see Aiden again.
“Oh shit!”
Penn finally cums, and I can’t help but laugh when he settles back against my bent legs. I tug on his dick a couple of more times to make sure I’ve gotten it all then glance down at my stomach.
“Really?” I tease him.
“Sorry,” he says with a laugh as he climbs off of me and lays next to me. I roll my eyes and shake my head.
I let out a content sigh and glance at him, licking his cum off of my hand when he looks at me. Penn grins and reaches down for my still hard dick and gives it a gentle tug.
I close my eyes and take a deep breath as he rests his head against my shoulder and keeps moving his hand up and down my shaft. It won’t take much to make me cum right now because I’ve been holding another load since blowing the other one on him and he knows it.
He snakes his tongue out toward my nipple and flicks it against it gently enough to make my body shudder as he keeps jerking me off.
I turn my face toward his, my lips in his hair and my breathing becoming labored again.
Penn moves his hand faster.
I open my mouth and begin to gasp against his hair.
Death Blooms Page 10
