by Ashley Black
In fact, the whole street, I realized, had been cleared. A desert backdrop was being swiftly erected beyond the cross. I almost believed I was not at the outskirts of the main city, but rather, deep in the belly of the desert itself.
“Wow!” I breathed. “What are you up to Mr. Cellrager?”
Thorn laughed happily. He sounded care-free, proud, elated. My mind near snapped from the whiplash he delivered it. He wrapped his huge arm around me, as he guided me toward the black crazy cross of mayhem sticking out of the sand, and calmly explained the music video concept to me.
I felt a pang, wishing my agent were here to enjoy what sounded like a sensory feast!
It was for a song off the new LP called Black Hole Heart and Thorn was going to have me undress him to the torso, push him on the ground and I was to whip his back.
Like he was some kind of demented Jesus Christ.
Then he would be attached to the cross.
And I was to take an ax to it … well, my stunt double would, and feed from his bleeding wrists and ankles, and finally rip out his heart – with a hole, and force him to eat it.
Beautiful.
Fuck that! Aaron couldn’t miss this craziness. I had been too cautious before telling him to stay away. As long as he didn’t get in speaking range of Thorn, all should be all right. I pulled out my phone quickly and texted him.
'Get your ass back here, you won’t want to miss this crazy vid shoot!'
“And the song is about?” I asked Thorn's scowl at my having the audacity to text message someone in the middle of his excited reveal of his sinister fucked up art.
“The revulsion of not really being there,” he answered in dark, low somber tones, his beautiful face dripping with pain.
I wanted to kiss it all away.
Before I knew what I was doing. I was doing exactly that.
Shit. How did this happen to me? Unraveled. A sensual grind of surrender.
Every time.
This impossible man!
My mouth fell all over his face in a siege of kisses.
I kissed the cold smoothness of his forehead, kissed the fragrant shining dark shock of hair that had fallen into it, his eyelids, and long thick eyelashes. I kissed his cheeks, reverently, sucking and caressing his high cheek bones in that dramatic, sexy, angular face, and then his wide open mouth.
His tongue slipped inside and fucked my mouth with such force I moaned, and humiliatingly fell against him.
“You called me out here to watch you suck face with the devil?”
Aaron’s outraged voice made my heart crack open and spill out. All.The.Shame.
Thorn ignored my friend, drew me against him fiercely, rested his chin on the top of my head, and sighed. I watched our shadows flickering before me on the 'man-made' desert floor for the video shoot, his crouched threateningly over mine, flattening it.
I could not see my shadow any more.
Thornton Darko's had swallowed it whole.
Like it had never been.
Ever existed.
Except, inside of HIM.
I shivered.
I couldn’t tell if it was because of the shadow thing or because he had stepped back and allowed some harried sweaty crew members to adorn him in that black long coat. The coat I would rip off him later for the scene where I whipped him.
“Before we start, I want a few shots of you Thorn on the cross in your full get up,” his quality control dude Sammy, said.
“Whoa … check you out Mrs. Cellrager.”
“I think not!” Thorn reproached angrily. “Don’t even joke about that Sammy.”
The tall man shrugged and pushed the infamous mask into Thorn’s chest. “Come on, let’s get your ass tied up to the cross.”
As Thorn was led away to be affixed to that demented black cross, my gaze was torn from the sight of his ridiculous huge tall form striding away from me to a black dread locked dude leaning all over an impressive blinking electronic display. He wore big bad ass black headphones and his fingers were flashing all over the place. A DJ, the song that kissed my ears … Black Hole Heart.
Sweet Jesus! It was pulse smashingly beautiful and chaotic.
I loved it.
Thorn’s voice parted my legs and tried to enter me, I slammed my thighs shut in alarm.
“That shit is good,” Aaron breathed sounding disappointed. He then began madly taking photos of Thorn hanging from the cross.
“Get in one of them,” he encouraged.
Overhearing him, Sammy waved me over, “come on Elena, bride of Cellrager, make him look beautiful will you.”
I laughed
Thorn growled, his eyes flashing menacingly behind the mask.
Sammy shrugged, unconcerned.
“Where do you want me to stand?” I asked cheekily. Because Thorn could not stop me, I slid my hand along the inside of his left thigh, and lightly tickled his balls. I did the same thing up along the inside of his right thigh. Then detour! I found my fingers walking outward, following the span of his arousal, rocking out there in his glorious black pants … at half mast.
“Stop that!”
He didn’t sound amused, as he grunted, pulling his hips sharply to the side. His dark green eyes slit with anger.
Why was he being such a cranky pants?
Oh. Rules. Really? I had only forgotten all of them.
Besides, it was only fair I should have rules for him.
Why did every single rule exert his control over me?
That seemed unfair.
We needed to address this imbalance sometime.
Never.
Because you are running away from him tonight and you are going to be reunited with Brett.
“All right, if you could kneel on this red satin.” Sammy spread out a huge swath of it upon the sand and motioned.
I knelt.
“Place one hand on his thigh and look up at him adoringly,” he directed.
I reached and then Thorn’s voice may well have slapped me in the face. “No! I don’t want her touching me! She is to kneel and and stare up at me only.”
“What the fuck is wrong with you man?” His quality control tech dude huffed out a sigh, and shook his head. His gaze slid sympathetically to me, and then lifted. His mouth fell wide open. Shaking all over, he clasped his hands behind his head. His hazel eyes widening in shock at something behind me.
“Elena!” a familiar, beautiful, heart smashing voice called to me.
Brett!
Sixteen
“Brett!” I barely got the words out of my mouth in desperate reply, before I was lifted by a grim faced military looking dude, not Brett, and hustled out of there.
I looked over his thick, bobbing shoulder to see a swarm of military testosterone. They were closing in around the King of Testosterone himself, Thornton Darko. Thorn, who was whipping his insane physicality into a frenzy, as he tried to free himself from the black cross.
Aaron was screaming shrilly somewhere to the right of me, but it was more in delight than shock. A rather handsome finely cut military dude was carrying him towards the sleek black jeep I was now standing in front of.
“Where is Brett?” I asked.
Mr. Grim face duly pointed.
The sight of my man! Alive. And about to kick ass.
Oh.
Just.
Wow.
He wore grey ripped cargo pants, a white filthy with paint torn singlet, I smiled faintly at that, and his beautiful long wavy dark golden blonde hair had been shaven off, it was so incredibly short, just bristles on his skull. Holy shit! The military swarm parted either side to allow him access to Thorn.
Something was dangling from my man’s finger tips.
I squinted.
It looked like some kind of mask.
What the fuck was Brett up to?
“Secure his head,” he ordered a few of the dudes standing closest to Thorn.
They nodded and duly head locked him.
“Remove
his mask.”
Through the proceedings I had not heard a word out of Thorn. Not even so much as a snarl.
But his eyes.
His eyes though looked large and terrified. They were popping from the eye holes of his Cellrager mask.
A strange look for him.
The mask was roughly torn from his head.
“Look at you now,” Brett snarled. “Put in your place. You deserve to die on that cross like the demented messiah you are fucker.”
“Oooooh,” Aaron whispered loudly. “Brett sounds so hot when he’s being bad.”
I elbowed him. I was worried. Fuck. He wasn’t actually going to kill him was he?
No.
Please.
I wasn’t ready.
To lose Thornton Darko.
And then Brett’s next words made my soul shrivel up and freeze inside.
“I know all your dirty little secrets Mr. Darko. You tried to kill me. I have the fucking proof. Even your warlock piece of shit ass can’t magic its way out of that! You will never see Elena again.”
“We’ll see.”
I had never heard that tone in Thorn’s voice before.
So, irretrievably sinister, almost … callous.
It cut me up.
“You come near her. You die.” Brett roared in his face. “I did my research, perhaps you should have done the same on me before you got your prick anywhere near my piece of ass.”
Sweet Jesus!
Clearly it was a day of the men in my life acting out.
Piece of ass.
Brett had never referred to me as such before.
I decided I liked it.
But what the actual flipping hell? What did he mean by these secrets and killing him? Thorn had me convinced he hadn’t had a hand in that awful incident in the art studio explosion.
“I know what you do to women like her!” Brett ranted. “You stupid, sick, twisted fuck.”
Thorn only laughed in his face.
Brett flipped out. He gripped Thorn roughly by the hair and pulled his head down, and then wrestled awkwardly with a mask. Brett succeeded in pulling it over Thorn’s anger flushed face.
Then he stood back, hands on hips, breathing hard.
It was a clown mask.
It was hilariously grotesque.
Green frizzy hair spewing out of the top of it.
Buck teeth, and black lips stretched in a wide slash of a grin.
A huge bulbous red nose.
Its face was startling off grey white and full of bumps, blemishes and pimples.
A horror show.
Aaron and I exchanged wide eyes glances, and then I rolled my eyes when he held up his phone and started getting footage and pictures.
“Much better.” Brett broke into harsh laugher. He snapped his fingers at Sammy, staring at Thorn aghast. “Give me your phone.”
With a shaking hand, Thorn’s quality technician handed it over.
Brett stood beside Thorn and took a selfie.
He showed it to Thorn.
There was no reaction from him.
Other military folk had also taken pictures of the two of them together.
“Remember … Mr. Cellrager you are a demonic little freak who could have just as easily ended up in the circus.”
Thorn snarled behind the mask.
“So go join it. You were born to be an ass clown.”
Oh Sweet Jesus, Brett was killing me.
“Let’s move on out!” He ordered.
The swarm fell away from Thorn at once. He remained there on that black cross with that stupid clown mask on.
Oh shit he was going to kill Brett. I was terrified.
A crazy mayhem of activity exploded around me, I was hurriedly pushed into a vehicle and Brett sprinted toward it and tumbled in after me. There was a beautiful moment, where our hands rose in unison to lay along the side of each others faces and we stared into each others smiling eyes.
His entire body just looked like it had very bad sun burn, not almost burned to death by a lying homocidal maniac. And … his hair. The lush golden dark blonde wavy length of it I had so enjoyed running my fingers through had been shorn clean off his head. There was dark blonde bristle there instead.
“Are you ….still mine?” his lips shivered over the question as his brown eyes slid to my dress.
“Yes. Yes she is,” Aaron answered for me. “Stupid video shoot. Thornton Darko has a thing for white dresses apparently.” His eyes went wide as he looked at something past my shoulder. “Um…. The fuck? He’s coming at us. We better get out of here now!”
I blinked, as Brett gently struggled around me to take a closer peek out the window. I pressed close to his side as our jeep pulled away.
I will never ever forget the sight as long as I keep breathing
Which probably wouldn’t be very long with a man like Thornton Darko wronged and irretrievably pissed off at you.
Thorn coming after us.
The black cross strapped to his back.
He was moving incredibly fast for a man bearing the weight of that thing.
He seemed to be gaining momentum.
The clown mask was gone. Just his devastatingly beautiful, but viciously, hateful face.
I flinched at his rage.
It slammed repeatedly into my heart.
Irritated, I found my fingers winding around the raven necklace protectively and stroking it.
And then before Thorn was a distant memory in the review mirror, I saw him.
Him from the bar. The leader of the cult. The strange, creepy man who terrified Thorn. Standing there, smiling smugly, as he watched Thorn’s desperate surge toward us.
Every instinct inside told me to warn Thorn of this.
When I blinked, he was gone, and so was Thornton Darko.
Seventeen
“I bled for days.”
I watched, spellbound, heart cracking and popping like fireworks in celebration at the exquisite revelation that was my Brett alive.
I was curled up with a pillow hugged to my chest, naked on the crappy hard dry cotton sheets of the motel room bed, we had stopped in, in a non-descript town just outside of Mexico. Most of Brett’s military entourage had kept going, but a few of his buddies stayed behind. They were on sentry duty. Some were outside (and inside of Aarons’ room) I frowned in annoyance, I sure hoped as hell Aaron wasn’t cheating on the delicious and adorable male model beau of his, Daniel.
Brett sighed as he removed his filthy white singlet and tossed it to the ground. I cried out at the strange raised red welts on his body. He shot a rueful smile at me over his shoulder.
“Yep I bled so long, after they cut me up all over my body and filled the wounds with the new serum they had been testing.”
“Mostly,” Brett puffed, as he hopped out of the cargo pants. He kept a pair of charcoal grey boxer shorts on and slid onto the bed beside me. “They’ve all healed.”
“This serum,” I began, frowning.
“Purely experimental for severe burns. They also used some kinda spray on skin technology.”
Brett ran a hand nervously over his shorn head.
I decided I actually liked it that way, despite the first sight of him sans all that beautiful hair had been truly shocking to me.
“Side effects?” I bit my lip, peeking at him through my lashes, not quite able to meet his gaze that fell all over my face like sunlight.
So fucking beautiful.
My Brett.
I had only just learned of this other side of him before the explosion in the art studio. A hero, a soldier who had fought, killed and tried to protect his country in the special forces in Afghanistan.
What he must have been through.
I could never hope to understand.
And yet his beautiful soul did not seem tarnished and fucked over as a result.
Such a talented artist. He created such rich, bold, and delicious art.
I loved him so much.
Lo
st, and now found.
“None that I know of,” he eventually answered my concern. “Except for this sunburn look of mine, and this,” he gripped my hand and pressed it to his skin.
It was so incredibly warm, almost hot to the touch.
“The sunburn look, well, they reassured me it is not forever and will fade, but the temperature of my skin, they’re not sure about.”
“You look and feel delicious,” I smiled at him.
He laughed. “Like a ham steak.”
I was always wildly inappropriate with him and loved nothing more than provoking a reaction. I couldn’t resist tucking my finger inside the band of his boxers and pulling them from his taut muscular lean waist. I peeked down at his dick.
“And what about the bundle of awesome down there, is the whole package hot?”
Brett’s hand closed over my finger and guided it deeper inside his boxers. “That is a very good question. Do tell?” he invited, with a playful wink.
I stroked my finger gently, reverently over his soft lulling cock and felt him stiffen a little in attention.
“Definitely hot. So incredibly hot,” I licked my lips.
Brett looked vaguely irritated when his hips flicked forward a little. I trailed my fingers along his balls, stroking over them, rubbing lovingly. They were also, incredibly warm, the heat of these succulent yummy things, blasted through the pads of my fingers.
“Great balls of fire!” I declared.
Brett’s shoulders shook in laughter.
I then refocused my attention on his cock, and ran my finger from the blistering hot base along the length of him to the tip of the head. I paused and smiled up at his sultry, heavy lidded gaze shining down on me.
“I wonder how hot he would feel inside of me.”
Brett shook his head, regret lashing his beautiful flushed face. “Such a god damned tease woman. You will find out soon enough, but I need to show you something first.”
And to my pout. “It’s important Elena. “
He decisively yanked up his boxer shorts. His tall, lean muscular body moved away from me to fetch a lap top that was blinking on the crooked desk against the window.
