Only Trick

by Jewel E. Ann

  He kisses the top of my head. “You seemed plenty warm last night. In fact, I think you were sweating.”

  I giggle, kissing my way down his chest under the covers. “I was just giving you your Darby fix.”

  He lifts the covers, tilting his chin to look down at me. “And what are you doing now?” That voice is an acoustic vibrator; it makes every conversation foreplay for me.

  I inch my way down, kissing below his navel then licking along the tip of his erection. His hips jerk up. I grin. “Now I’m getting my Trick fix.”

  He moans as I take him into my mouth. His hands fist my hair and the covers fall back over my head, leaving me in a darkness of pleasure. This has never been my thing … until Trick. Everything about him is officially my thing.

  Everything about him leaves me in the most incredible sensory overload. I’m so drunk on him. He moans and tugs at my hair, driving me insane with need. Trick unleashes some untamed part of myself … I could fucking devour him.

  “Darby … stop …”

  Not happening.

  I feel the conflict in his grip on my hair. He starts to pull me away, but his hips pulse toward me, begging for more.

  “Fuck … Darby … I-I’m … serious …”

  I ghost my hand over his hip and slide it under his ass, digging my fingers into his tight muscles. For just a few minutes I want to control his body the way he does mine. I want to feel him lose his mind, helpless to my touch.

  “Shit … Darby!” His body goes rigid as I swallow every last drop of his salty essence.

  My trip back up his body is just as leisurely as it was going down. Best. Trick. Fix. Ever!

  He flips the cover off my head and the smile on his face … no words, just no … words.

  “Good morning, Mr. Roth.” I grin, running my tongue in a seductive circle over my lips.

  He shakes his head. “I think it’s time for me to return the favor.”

  Rubbing my lips together, I feel the warm tingle of rosiness spread along my cheeks. “Um, yeah about that…” my nose wrinkles “…I sort of took care of that too…” I dig my teeth into my lip and shrug “…you know, since I had a free hand.”

  “Jesus, Darby!” Trick squirms under me. I feel him start to come back to life. “Do you have any idea what the thought of you touching yourself with my cock in your mouth does to me?”

  I kiss the corner of his mouth then sit up, wrapping the sheet around me. “I have an idea.”

  “Where are you going?” I’ve never heard Trick sound anything but raw and masculine, but I detect a hint of a whine in his voice.

  I laugh. “Eggs and jellied toast. I’m hungry.”

  He tugs at my sheet. “But you just ate.”

  Twisting my body, I free myself from his grip. “Yes, I had my morning dose of zinc, calcium, potassium, fructose, and protein, but it wasn’t very filling.”

  “There’s more where that came from.”

  I snort. “I’m sure there is.” Standing, I hustle into my closet and pull on a pair of pink plaid flannel lounge pants and a sweatshirt.

  He slips into his jeans and tugs his shirt over his head. “I don’t think the average woman knows the nutritional composition of semen.”

  Wrapping my arms around him, I slip my cold hands into his back pockets. He brushes my hair away from my face as I gaze up at him. “I’ve never been that good at average.”

  He kisses me, then brushes his nose against mine. “Thank God for that.”

  *

  “So what’s my BFF have planned for us today?” I flip my hair up, shutting off my hair dryer.

  Trick leans against the vanity, arms crossed over his bare chest. A few rivulets of water still cling to his messy post-shower hair. “You know I don’t respond to your text talk.”

  I reach up on my toes and kiss the corner of his jaw. “You sure did in the shower. Every time I OMG’d, you gave me more hashtag wowza!” I bat my eyelashes at him. “Emoji winking face. Emoji face blowing a kiss.”

  I think he growls, but it’s so subtle I can’t say for sure. The scowl … that I can’t miss. “If your oral skills weren’t so refined, we’d no longer be friends.”

  Shoving my dryer in the bottom drawer, I laugh. “Yes, we would be.” I hop up on my vanity next to him. “So, Mr. Artistic God to the Stars, what’s my face need today?”

  Trick stands, turning toward me. I don’t know if the day will ever come that I don’t feel a twinge of nerves under his expert, scrutinizing gaze. He feathers the back of his hand across my cheek bone, then brushes his thumb along my bottom lip. “You’re with me today. Your face doesn’t need anything.” He slides his hand behind my neck and presses his lips below my ear.

  “It doesn’t have to be a lot. Maybe some mascara or lip gloss?”

  He straightens shaking his head, then turns, sauntering out of the bathroom. “I only hide your perfection from other people. Come.”

  I’m beginning to lose track of how many times he says something that feels like a defibrillator to my static heart. Trick doesn’t claim to be a gentleman, and truthfully he’s not, but when it comes to sweeping me off my feet he has the biggest fucking broom I’ve ever seen.

  “Where are we going?” I brush past him to my closet as he slips on his shirt.

  “My place. I want to show you something.”

  “If it’s your arsenal of weapons, I don’t want to see it, but Nana might.”

  He leans into my closet doorway, resting his hands on either side. “I don’t have an arsenal. I have a gun … or two.”

  I glance up at him while tugging on my boots.

  “Your nana’s into weaponry?”

  “I don’t know if she has a machete or a grenade belt, but she has a handgun in her nightstand.”

  Trick’s eyes crinkle in the corners as a smirk plays across his face.

  I duck under his arm and grab my phone off the nightstand. “That’s only half of it. She and her friend, Mary, go to the shooting range every Monday.”

  “That’s … awesome.” He turns.

  “Awesome?” I shake my head, heading toward the stairs. “I don’t think senior citizens with arthritic hands, glaucoma, dementia, and a slew of other issues should be packing.”

  “They probably offer an AARP discount at the shooting range.”

  “I also don’t think you should be allowed to have a handicap parking permit and a gun permit.” I pull on my jacket.

  “Now that’s not true and you know it. In fact, it’s just the opposite; people with disabilities can feel vulnerable and they definitely need a way to protect themselves.”

  “Brilliant. Before long I’ll be writing prescriptions for handguns.”

  “Well, if it bothers you, maybe you should write your senator about it.”

  I give Trick the stink eye before he walks past me to the back door. He slips on his socks and black boots that are sitting by his suitcase. “You’re driving. I took a cab here from the airport.”

  My heart swells at the thought of him coming to my place straight from the airport. If he weren’t still here, I’d blow up his phone with chat acronyms and Emojis.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Several photographers greet us with flashes and coy smiles while I back my car out the garage.

  “What the hell?” Trick jerks his head away from their intrusive lenses just inches from my windows.

  “Countdown to the polls. The campaigns are making their official shift from throwing sand at the playground to digging their opponent’s grave.”

  “Why take our picture? What are we?”

  I give Trick a sidelong glance. “Dirt.”

  “Am I going to be an issue?”

  I chuckle. “God, I hope so.”

  “Why would you say that?” There’s an iciness to his words. “Are you using me to rebel? Slumming with the homeless guy?”

  He’s taking the defensive like he did shortly after we met. I was ten percent angry and ninety percent turned on th
en, but now it flat out pisses me off that he would think that about me. I get he has trust issues, but I’d hoped by now they wouldn’t be with me.

  “Thanks for the trust, but no, I’m not using you to rebel.” I sigh. “Rachel visited me the other day and basically told me to stop seeing you. She fears you have too many ‘skeletons’ in your closet that could destroy my father’s chance for re-election.”

  Trick’s eyes stay focused on the road ahead.

  “She also thinks you’re going to crush my heart and that you’re incapable of loving me.” I expect a response. I need a response, but he’s still a statue—no response, no emotion.

  “So if you define rebelling as giving my father and his wife the proverbial finger by not allowing them to decide who I choose to love, then maybe I am a rebel. But if the issue here is you not trusting me, then maybe Rachel’s right. Maybe you’re going to crush my heart.”

  Still nothing.

  My heart knows him, of that much I am certain—my head, not so much. Trick would never hurt me on purpose, but broken is broken. This heart of mine won’t care how it happened; the pain will feel the same.

  His door opens as I push my newly programmed button. I put my car in park but I don’t shut off the engine.

  I will not be Darby the Doormat!

  He reaches over, shutting off the car. I stare at him, waiting, because he’s going to have to give me a good reason to open my door. I fight the urge to melt into his hand as he caresses his palm against my cheek.

  “I’d never forgive myself if I crushed your heart.” Releasing a slow breath, he closes his eyes for a moment. “I’m sorry for what I said. You might be the only person I completely trust … including myself.”

  My lips pull into a sad smile as I cover his hand with mine and lean into his touch. “That’s what BFFs are for.”

  That earns me a lip twitch, but I know he’s fighting the full-on smile.

  “Come.” He gets out and so do I—because I want to, not because he told me.

  He pushes the button to lower the door and then flips several other switches. I’d suspected this garage or warehouse space expanded farther than what I’ve ever been able to see with the limited lighting from the one set of fluorescents or the natural light from the large door. What I didn’t expect was the massive amount of stuff.

  “What is all this? Is it yours?” There’s more than just the one covered automobile, four to be exact. At a quick glance I see three more motorcycles, a set of jet skis, stacks of boxes, and at the very back there are more covered objects that look like his artwork that had been upstairs.

  “This…” he points to the partially covered black Audi SUV “…is Grady’s. But the rest is supposedly mine.” He shoves his hands into his pockets and watches me as I take slow steps deeper into the maze of everything.

  “It’s from your missing past?”

  “Yes.”

  “Where was it?” I lift the edge of another car cover. It’s a lime green Lamborghini.

  “A warehouse in Queens, much like this one.”

  “Your place?”

  “Yes. I don’t remember living there, but it was the address on my license and the building was purchased in my name and completely paid for just like everything in it … everything here.”

  “Did you have a roommate?” I flip open the lid to a box. It’s filled with gaming equipment.

  “Not that I know of. Word on the street was that I lived alone.”

  “Were you a dealer?”

  “I don’t think so, yet it’s the only logical explanation. Nobody I talked to knew me as a dealer, just an addict.”

  I knock on the top of a safe that’s had the lock busted on it. “What was in here?”

  “Money.”

  “How much?”

  “Enough.”

  “Where is it now?”

  “I donated most of it to an outreach program for the homeless.”

  I nod. “So why keep everything else? Why transfer it to a similar warehouse here in Chicago?”

  “I couldn’t stay in New York for a number of reasons, but Grady and Tamsen thought recreating my living environment, including all of my stuff, might help bring back my memory. The upstairs is almost identical as well, same furniture, lighting, even the appliances are identical.”

  “Why couldn’t you stay in New York?” I peek in another large box. It’s filled with framed artwork. No one I recognize; they’re all numbered prints.

  “Grady needed me in Chicago, but also it wasn’t safe for me to stay. I was at a disadvantage; there were too many people who knew me, but I didn’t know them. I didn’t know who I could trust, and apparently I didn’t hang with the crowd that was welcoming me with open arms ready to fill in the blanks of my past.”

  Taking my time, peeking in a few more boxes here and there, I worm my way to the far end. Trick follows me, keeping a consistent distance between us. It’s as if he’s giving me space … space to look through everything … space to process everything.

  The mix of belongings is odd. I’m not sure I can see Trick having purchased all this stuff with drug money. Something tells me these things were gifts. I want to ask him if he’s sure his parents were his real parents, but that’s a subject I don’t think I can broach. It’s just that everything around me feels familiar, not the stuff itself, more the feeling of it all. I grew up with people giving me stuff; for wealthy people it’s easier to give money than it is time. My father showered me with gifts, but never his attention. Even Nana did it on a rare occasion.

  Was someone giving Trick one thing because they couldn’t give him another?

  I stop where there feels like an invisible line. Everything before here is randomly scattered around. What I assume to be Trick’s artwork is organized and carefully draped. I think I have his unspoken permission to continue, but this feels personal. Before I was browsing at things like I would at an auction, but touching what’s in front of me would feel like snooping, an invasion of his privacy.

  I look back at him. He leans against a steel support beam, hands crossed over his chest. “Go ahead.” He nods.

  My gaze falters for a moment before meeting his again. “Will you show me?”

  Pushing off the beam, he moves without hesitation, like he knows exactly what he wants to show me first. As he pulls away the sheet, my heart surges upward, strangling my throat. I can’t breathe. It’s a photograph of a homeless couple slouched against each other sleeping. They’re dressed in tattered layers, sitting on flattened cardboard boxes against a brick building backdrop. Their hands are gloved but their fingers are intertwined. It’s heartbreaking and heartwarming at the same time.

  “My parents.”

  I nod, biting my lips together while taking in a shaky breath. “You took this picture?”

  Trick shakes his head. “I drew it.”

  What?

  Squinting, I step closer, leaning so my face is within inches of it. The shadows, the exactness of detail, every wrinkle, every eyelash, skin peeling from their dry lips … my God it’s not possible. The realism is indescribable. I was brought to my knees in awe when I thought it was a photograph, but this … “Trick, where did you learn to do this?”

  “I don’t know, I mean … I didn’t. I’ve never been able to explain it other than my hands are good at recreating what my eyes have seen.” He removes another sheet, and another, and another until I feel dizzy. My head cannot make sense of this. They’re all people or parts of their body. Hands holding a book, toes curling in grass, lips sipping from a drinking fountain. Unbelievable! The water from the fountain looks so real I swear it would feel wet if I touched it.

  “Has it ever occurred to you that maybe your money came from selling your art?”

  He chuckles. “Maybe when I’ve been dead for a century.”

  “I’m serious, Trick. These could easily go for thousands of dollars—conservatively.”

  “So you think during the five missing years of my life, at lea
st some of which I was strung out on drugs, I was selling my sketches, which can take up to two hundred hours to complete one, for…” he gestures to everything else in the room “…hundreds of thousands of dollars?”

  I shrug. “Maybe you have a rich uncle … maybe you won the lottery. How much money was in your checking account after the accident?”

  “Less than two hundred dollars.” He nods toward the safe. “Apparently I paid for things in cash.”

  “So aside from the pastor, you didn’t question friends, neighbors … anyone?”

  “Just like here, I didn’t have neighbors to question. The only friends I can remember are from high school but they were long gone by then, and according to my bills, I owned a cell phone but it was never found. I’m sure the numbers under a contact list would have been helpful. Grady had a friend check into my phone records, but most of the calls were to private numbers. Probably drug dealers. I don’t know.” He sighs, running his hands through his hair. “It’s all so fucked-up.”

  “Do you want to know?”

  His brow tenses. “What do you mean?”

  “I mean, you had all that cash. Why didn’t you hire a private investigator to dig into your past, fill in the blanks?”

  He shrugs. “Once Grady and Tamsen got me through rehab, they convinced me to leave that part of my life behind. I don’t know, like my memory loss was a blessing of sorts. It’s not that they didn’t want my memory to come back. Obviously they went to a lot of work to make this place a reminder of my past. They just want it to be all or nothing. They want me to remember it … not figure it out.”

  “Is that what you want? Do you believe it’s a blessing that you don’t remember?”

  He scratches his neck, eyes fixed in contemplation. “I think it’s a blessing that I’m clean and sober because I’m not sure I would be had I not lost my memory. But feeling like something or someone from those missing five years could come back to haunt me is the part that feels more like a curse.

  “What could haunt you?”

  Trick takes slow steps toward me; a wrinkling of worry distorts his handsome face. “Anything that could take you away from me.” With a whisper touch he glides his fingers along my cheeks and down my neck.