Don't... 04 Backlash (5 page)

“I’m gonna fuck
this shit up,” he said softly. “I’m gonna fuck it up, fuck him up,
fuck you up, then you’ll—they, they’ll drag my ass back and drug me
up to my bollocks again. Stupid, so fucking goddamn psycho-bastard
stupid.”

“Easy.” Gray
shifted slightly, searching for something from one of the drawers.
He found it after only a minute, and as he held out a Polaroid
photo, he made sure he lifted Jack’s hand with his. There were
times when Jack wouldn’t think twice about “going casual” with this
photo, then there were these moments, where he’d stare down, eyes
ghosting, taken back to—

“Listen to me,”
Gray said quietly, his other arm pulling the coolness of Jack’s
body against his. “There’s no rules to say you can’t fuck up. It’s
going to happen on all sides.” Gray nuzzled gently at his shoulder.
“So we talk, we listen, we fuck up, we...” Gray slipped the photo
in Jack’s hand, then rested his under Jack’s, keeping Jack’s grip
steady on the photo. “We learn to let go as best we can.”

Jack sucked in
a breath, then let the photo fall, go casual, and an instant ease
of tension came in his shoulders. The photo landed out of alignment
with Jack’s and Jan’s neat rows of cologne, all out of place and
sequence to them. It should have driven Jack wilder or sent him
screaming into the darkness to hide from Vince’s psychological
reconditioning, to stop him doing this and taking comfort in the
most simplistic of routines. But this was his way to cope, his OCD
comfort zone, his way to control the chaos.

He just needed
reminding sometimes.

Gray kissed at
his shoulder again. A moment later, Jack eased around, his arms
slipping around Gray’s waist as he came in close. Gray shifted his
head as Jack nudged there, not to claim or play, just... stay.

“His pace,”
Gray said quietly, kissing at Jack’s exposed cheek. “Yours. But
time, you both still need—”

“Hey, things,”
breathed Jan. “It’s okay.” He stood over by the door, arms wrapped
around himself as he leaned against the doorframe. Jack saw him at
the same time and a kiss feathered Gray’s lips. In the next breath,
Jack eased his way over to Jan and slipped both arms around his
neck to tug Jan in close.

“I get too
mouthy again over going normal, you call time out, okay?” he
muttered, adding a big sigh. Jan pulled back a touch, frowning, but
Jack tugged him back in. “Time out I can hear, Richards. Time out
gets through to my fucked-up thoughts, but you need to state it
clear, okay? And don’t be afraid to tell my ass no.”

The worry on
Jan’s face eased a touch. He kissed Jack back, then looked over
Jack’s shoulder. Gray flicked a look at the photo, how Jack had
needed to drop it casually on the unit, and Jan nodded slightly,
understanding the silent call on another absence from Jack, then it
was lost as Jack took his hand and led him back to the bedroom. Jan
got back in bed, and Gray didn’t offer much protest seeing Jack
slip in between the covers next to him, still wearing his suit
trousers. Jack had stopped doing naked too, his reason branded hard
into his side.

This was the
second absence in two weeks. Jack was struggling with the change
over from the psych unit to being back here and losing his own
terraced house. But that had been taken into account, one of the
reasons why Gray was grateful Jack had decided not to go back to
work straight away and only visit the new apartment Jan had
arranged for Jack. But at least Martin had stayed away.

With how Jan
looked as Jack settled, something in Jan’s eyes seemed grateful of
that too. Life needed to stay calm for them both. For all of them
now.

One Month
Ago

All but two of
the men filtered out of the smokers’ lounge with a mix of cigarette
smoke and the more refined blend of the King of Denmark cigar
lapping at the leavers’ heels.

Kes sat there
waiting for life to call quiet, ignoring the other man and how he
sat low and deep in a leather recliner. Peter Sallows carried out
business by his pseudonym, the Funder, but Kes had never cared for
how easy it was for a rich man to call the shots simply by putting
his hand in his pocket. No class.

Not with whom
Sallows waited for.

Kes took a deep
breath in and held the fading cigar scent, allowing the residual to
bore hard into his organs. He hadn’t smoked in years, so this was
his way of... managing the habit, no matter what social status he
inhaled. Flawed effort, he knew that, but he might as well at least
look as though he breathed next to the suit-wearing pack. No one
had questioned his attire: jeans, T-shirt, scuffed trainers, and a
messy green padded jacket that didn’t distract from the week-old
stubble, but then few would look in his direction for too long. A
different skin colour had that way with some people. Most would
settle for looking behind his back, checking to see if he carried a
rucksack, or if there were signs he might have abandoned one close
by.

The same
couldn’t be said for the late teenage boy who was guided into the
lounge at that moment. A blindfold kept his view of the world dark,
and although jeans and a plain white T-shirt touched his slender
frame, top brand names were visible on both. The young man wore no
shoes, no socks, and from underneath the blindfold, wiring found
its way into the hidden MP3 player no doubt sitting in his pocket.
Blinded and deaf to the world, he still shifted his slim hips to
the hard beat of the music, adding a lip sync here and there as he
was guided over to Sallows.

Money bought
the best around here and, as encouragement, made the teen kneel
between Sallows’s thighs; it also bought silence and a hunger as
hands and mouth blindly sought to smooth the wrinkles from an older
cock.

Still the music
seemed to play, but now the rhythm down the man’s shaft danced the
late teen’s worries away.

Kes looked
away. Sallows had become too comfortable with his company, but then
money assumed it could buy silence from the best. Tapping his
fingers on the polished wood of the mahogany conference table, Kes
drew one leg casually across the other and eased back into the
comfort of red leather, ignoring the sights from the other end of
the lounge.

Today hadn’t
been a good day, the touch on the back of the teen’s head that
demanded a hard blowjob merely mimicking the aggravated heartbeat.
Impatient unease and that inability to control temper also matched
the rest of the high-paid clientele that had left the lounge. The
need to speed up action lately had irritated Kes certainly, but
other than that, he’d let the mode of conference get their say with
barely any interruption on his part, other than a nod when lips
moved in his direction.

Throughout the
questioning, three movies played out on as many flat screen TVs to
his left, each movie a favourite of Sallows’s; each one remembered
for its script even though no sound choked the lounge. Kes hadn’t
wanted them flicked off as men young enough to be his son filed
out. He preferred the silent company of the images to the
disappearance of money.

The black and
white scenes took him back to a time when life had been less
complicated. Boring even. Yet the silence of these particular
movies almost, almost had life injected with a certain colour to
slip life back into gear.

Sallows seemed
as transfixed on them. The teenager was forced up to his feet, slim
ass exposed, as he was pushed facedown over the conference table.
Something was pulled from a drawer, lube... a condom... then the
boy winced as a thick cock forced its way between his thighs. All
the time Sallows kept his intent on the three TV screens.

A black
Mercedes had pulled to a stop on one screen, paused far back from
the wrought iron gates that led up to an archaic manor. Kes knew
the property homed other Mercedes-Benz, one even parked by the
entranceway now, giving the two guards on duty there quick access
to any trouble that might crop up. He knew more Mercedes would be
along the perimeter at this time. At least five others came and
went regularly, taking the long drive up to the stately confines.
And it was noted how security had been relaxed a little around the
perimeter.

So this Merc,
oh this black beauty, it was different, bringing its own...
esoteric provocation.

Mercedes-Benz
always carried a certain class and threat wherever it graced
tarmac, but this was the new S-Class coupe, a beautifully crafted
sleek and stylish silhouette that slept peacefully enough on the
road. The owner certainly had a fine eye for individuality, despite
the required conformity that came with his... Masters’ Circle. Yet
even though no smoke touched the interior, the taste of class was
there, this one so subtle as it turned slow anticipation circles on
the tongue, yet offering a bitter pulse in the aftertaste that
would stir the finest of pole dancers to move and twist in the
simmering desert heat. And the history of this man’s involvement in
the Masters’ Circle over the past decade-plus said he’d made many a
body shift and sweat in the darkness.

Pain and
thrill. Youth and the offer of darker teachings. Certainly with a
lot more class than bending a teenager over a conference table and
grinding his way into him. Kes ignored Sallows, how a line of sweat
dropped down the side of his face as he fucked, giving the young
man’s ass a visible grief of its own as it hit his ass cheek. He
would have felt sorry for the youth and stopped it, only the boy
writhed and twisted, finding his own pleasure and pushing back into
the thickness of a cock, all in time with some unheard music that
he still sang to. Sallows looked close, the flab in his belly
pounding into the youth almost as much as his cock.

Kes preferred
the offer coming from the screens. The invitation to make a move
was there: a watch from the woods on his side; a long look back
into the woods from Gray Raoul, even though the S-class coupe
itself looked like it slept idly there in the dark.

It was becoming
routine. Usually Raoul would pull alongside the security office and
time would be spent talking. Nothing was ever heard, no
conversation given away, but Kes liked it that way: being allowed
to fill in the blanks with how the security team stayed on edge,
bodies never relaxing around this man. Raoul’s MI5 ranking and
Master Circle rights came on easy intel, but there was something
deeper with him. His long glance into the woods was illustrated by
the select few in this life. Despite that offer of controlled
aggression, Raoul kept formality on surveillance, especially with
everything he held close beyond those iron gates.

“Then you can’t
be too careful these days. No telling who is out there. Watching.”
That came from Sallows. He’d cleaned himself up, shirt now tucked
back in, boy being led out of the room with barely the come given
time to dry as it was spilled onto his ass cheeks. Kes could only
guess at the latter, but it was something Sallows enjoyed doing
with his “boys”. Only the blush on Sallows’s face as he came over
spoke his workout, which made him look like he’d run a mile where
slimmer men would go on for another two and still come away with
less sweat.

“Kes. You never
answered my question in the meeting. What are your plans now?”

Kes wanted to
ignore Sallows as movement came on the second flat screen TV. A
young man was dragged into the centre of an ordinary looking
bedroom. It played on a repeat loop, and this particular recording
had made the conference lounge fall silent earlier, or at least
stopped the mouths from moving, sips at bourbon given deep intakes
to wash away the butchery that came next.

Chained down
with a collar around the throat, the bound man and all his
nakedness and snarls of anger were lost as someone came in carrying
a branding iron. A moment later smoke curled into the air in its
wake, then gained more ferocity as the burning letter of the V
pressed down on the bound man’s toned and very slender hip,
then—

“Mercedes,
Mercedes fucking Benz,” Kes mouthed for the tortured soul, even
letting a repeat follow as the branding iron went in for a second
attack, burning the kind of skin that should never carry any man’s
mark. The young man’s cries stayed as silent as Raoul’s on the
screen next to him, leaving Kes to fill in the quiet grief with a
brief close of eye. The pulse that now came from the main speakers
could be felt in his own chest, carrying how sound assaulted the
conference lounge, and his hand went to his chest to feel the cries
pound against his ribcage.

Another tap
came at his shoulder, but Kes denied Sallows as the third screen
crept into his view.

A locked office
door blocked the decor of the interior, but a name branded itself
into the brass plaque.

Mr Jan
Richards.

Ah.
Richards.

Modest came to
mind with the name and inside of the office, although no cameras
had yet found their way into the latter. Surveillance was too tight
around this man, albeit a little too much, far too late. Kes knew
the schematics without use of technological intervention. The
office itself had a medium-sized rectangular office desk, black
leather office chair, and a few file cabinets for client details,
showing a slight distrust, or careful aptitude to take into
consideration blackouts and lost files. Richards had worked there
since he was eighteen, falling in love with one Rob Kershaw, an
older male co-worker, even as wedding bells had taken the older man
down the aisle with a woman on his arm, then how... death had taken
him and his toddler much later. Strange business, most stranger
lives. Not any of the men onscreen holding innocence. Yet now,
everything there in Richards’ office remained devoid of life, much
like Richards’ life now, and offering every echo of past silent
movies.