The Red Door (The Door Series Book 1)

by Massey, J. L.

  Copyright © 2014 by J.L. Massey

  Interior Designer: Jovana Shirley, Unforeseen Editing, www.unforeseenediting.com

  This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you are reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to author and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

  Warning: This is a work of fiction. It is by no means true. Any names, characters, places, and incidents came from this author’s twisted imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to real events, people, or places is purely coincidental. If you don’t like books with sex trafficking or abuse, this is not the book for you. If you don’t like books with ménage or male on male interaction, this is not the book for you. If you don’t like sexy men who want to take control, again-not the book for you.

  Preface

  One

  Two

  Three

  Four

  Five

  Six

  Seven

  Eight

  Nine

  Ten

  Eleven

  Twelve

  Thirteen

  Fourteen

  Fifteen

  Sixteen

  Seventeen

  Eighteen

  Nineteen

  Twenty

  Twenty-One

  Twenty-Two

  Twenty-Three

  Twenty-Four

  Twenty-Five

  Twenty-Six

  Twenty-Seven

  Twenty-Eight

  Twenty-Nine

  Thirty

  Thirty-One

  Thirty-Two

  Thirty-Three

  Epilogue

  Acknowledgments

  2010

  I looked up as the fire burned. I hated how effortless it was to kill them. They were both so sure of their standing in the community that neither thought they could be touched, and I was able to walk right in and give them both a lethal dose of GHB while they slept. I messed with the wires of an outlet outside their bedroom door and started the fire to cover my tracks. Child’s play.

  I stayed back until it had burned enough to draw a crowd for me to blend into. The fire was hot even from a distance, and the heat was growing on me. The reds and oranges were entrancing. I looked around and watched everyone closely. I had seen a couple of people I knew and shook hands, asking worrisome questions, but I still stood back waiting. When I heard Aurora Hammonds’ anguished cry, I had to fight off my smile and keep from turning to her. I walked toward the burning house, staying a few steps in front of her, listening to her screaming. When I stopped a single step from the taped off area, I made sure my face was schooled and caught her as she tried to run by me. She fought and cried, and I turned her into my body, feeling her warmth and holding her tight.

  It was easy, again, playing the good guy. Being a pillar in the community, no one thought I was doing anything but trying to help. But holding my prize in my arms was not easy. I was hard and wanted nothing more than to bend her over and fuck her while she watched her life burn away. To teach her that life was nothing but a speck of sand in an hourglass, and I controlled how much escaped. I leaned down and pressed my lips to her neck breathing her in, taking what I could.

  “Soon, Angel, I’ll make you forget all about it.”

  “Why?” She jerked up and started looking around. I glanced over and saw her friend coming and several others moving in closer. I looked again and knew the one person who was supposed to be here wasn’t. That pissed me off. His job was the one thing that was guaranteed to be easy, and it looked like it wasn’t going to be. I looked back into her red frightened eyes and squeezed her sides.

  “Their time was up.”

  2014

  Aurora

  I looked in the mirror at the girl staring back. She was too skinny and pale. Her hair was long, dull, and in desperate need of a cut.

  Cut, not a trim, because it was past that need two years ago.

  Cut and styled as well as some highlights.

  The golden luster on the strawberry blond it used to be was long gone, leaving a darker shade with an oily residue no matter how clean. I looked down and saw the loose jeans and old t-shirt I was wearing. Jeans that were in style four years ago, but because of the weight I had lost, they barely hung on my hips. The t-shirt was one I received freshmen year when enrolled into the University of Arkansas as part of a welcoming gift for freshmen. It was a small but stretched thin from too much wear. It was white with a red razorback, though now the hog was pink and the white was more beige. I needed some new clothes. I looked back up at my face, a face that would be appealing if I smiled. I had a cute pert nose with tiny freckles across it, full lips, and purple eyes. Very much like the fairytale princess I was named after, Aurora Rose, pretty but lonely. I had been lonely for so long. I shook my head and looked away from the mirror.

  “Isolation will do that.”

  I walked over to the bed and saw my diploma lying there. I thought about how it was ironic that I now had my bachelor’s degree in psychology but couldn’t even hold a conversation with someone long enough to make a friend. I was now licensed to help people with their problems and encourage them to face their demons but had yet to go back and face my own. I looked back toward the mirror, at the stranger reflecting back at me, and decided it was time. Time to face my past, confront my demons, and rekindle the friendships I had so hastily discarded.

  First thing on my list was to take better care of myself. I transferred a large amount of money out of savings into my checking, even though I hated that money. I felt like if I used it, I was agreeing to be paid for my parents dying. Profiting off of it. I knew I was wrong, and it was money from the life and house insurance settlements my parents had agreed to and signed off on so I could take care of myself, but it still felt wrong. Like a payoff. I had mostly avoided it; every dollar spent was a reminder that the two most important people in my life were gone. Until now, I had only accessed the account to pay for school, which cost a chunk because I took the maximum number of hours plus winter and summer classes. I had tutored students and worked in the college library, animal shelters, and soup kitchen to earn spending money while also keeping me busy.

  I called a spa I had overheard some girls talking about and managed to get an appointment an hour later. Five hours later I reemerged, trading the dull stranger in the mirror for a shiny new one. My hair was up to my shoulders and had massive highlights making me look totally blond, I had been waxed in places I’m not sure the light should ever touch, and had a mani and a pedi, a facial, a massage, and gained a new attitude. I also realized that half the crap people went to a psychologist for could be solved at a spa.

  I stopped by a car dealership and traded in the dependable Honda that my parents had bought me. Unfortunately, my dream car had to be special ordered, but I would have it in three days. I hit the mall over by the college and spent more than I ever have on clothes. I even bought a couple of pairs of shoes, which was the last thing I needed, because I had a shoe problem. Let’s say that what little time I left for myself over the last four years was spent on certain internet sites with fabulous shoes. They were my weakness. Well, that and underwear.

  When I moved in with my Aunt Lucy, my mom’s sister, after my parents’ death, I learned to erect a wall to keep people out. Like me, she missed them, but where I worked nonstop, she pretended they never existed and removed any trace of them from her life. We avoided each other
as much as possible, because we reminded the other of my mom. It helped that I had my own living space at the back of the house.

  I had to accept the time I had with them was long gone, but there were others who I turned my back on who were still here. I would use the pain that seeing them again would bring to remind myself that if I died, their memories did too. I needed to go back to Rockwall, Texas and to those who helped me when I fell too far apart to help myself.

  Four days later, I was in my Cadillac CTS-V Coup driving the five-hour trip from Little Rock to Rockwall. It was badass with a 556 HP V8 and could go from zero to sixty in four seconds flat thanks to a cold air intake and a Bama tuning chip. Of course I didn’t know this personally; I only knew the car was sweet, and I would look sweet in it. Even as impressive as it was, I saw it for what it truly was to me, another coat of armor to go with the hair, nails, clothes, and everything else.

  Time passed quickly, and I was noticing the scenery changing, but thankfully I didn’t hit heavy traffic. I checked into a hotel then drove out to my neighborhood. I knew I needed to see what had become of where I used to live.

  I parked across from where my house once stood. Someone had leveled it. Instead of the two story brick house with the dark brown shutters I grew up in, there was a small white cottage house. But I could not see it. I couldn’t see the white picket fence or the blue shutters. I could only see what happened that night.

  It was a month before I had graduated from high school. I was out with Becca and late getting home for curfew. This was fine with my parents as long as it was around curfew, and I was with Becca and not out on a date. Tonight was no different; I was thirty minutes late. Our friend Mark had begged us to go to a party. He had been gone all summer, then winter break, and spring break. Since he was in college, he didn’t get to see us at school anymore, either. We missed him and couldn’t wait to meet up. We stayed for a few hours, but his girlfriend kept him busy after the first initial hello. We left when the party wound down, and we got bored of waiting.

  When we arrived at my street, the road was blocked. I remembered seeing a red haze covering everything. Without realizing, I jumped out of Becca’s car and walked toward my home, seeing it burning but not registering that it was my home. I had focused on how the flames changed colors and hopped and skipped as they licked up the side of my house. I passed the police cars and kept going. That was when it hit me. It was late and my parents trusted me enough to go to bed without waiting up. They would have been asleep. I looked around and couldn’t see them. Turning to the fireman, I grabbed him and asked over and over where they were. I turned and ran toward my home before being pulled back and turned into a chest while I cried.

  I felt the tears rolling down my face as the white grandmotherly house came back into view. No matter how cute, I hated it. I didn’t want to see the remains from that night, but I also didn’t want my “home” so easily replaced. Then again, it had been four years, and the people who lived in this neighborhood probably didn’t like the reminder every day either. They couldn’t run from reality like I had done. I sat and stared at it for a long time, reminding myself to breathe and trying to see past the last memories to the good ones. It took a while to work through the red haze, but they started coming. I never knew that by blocking out their deaths and how they died, I also blocked off so much of the joy and happiness that came from them. The love they gave me and how I was taught to give.

  My hands were shaking when I started the car. I knew where I had to go. I turned my car around to go to Becca’s house. Rebecca Young. She had been my best friend since kindergarten when she had put gum in my hair and I had dumped glue all over her new jeans while the teacher was out of the room. We were both sent to the principal’s office. When asked what happened, I said, “You don’t think it looks pretty in my hair?” Becca simply said she was starting a new style with her jeans. They sent us home with our parents, but the bond was there, and we became inseparable.

  Becca was beautiful. She had caramel brown hair and golden brown eyes. She was fun and always up for an adventure. She had twin brothers, Jackson and Jasper, who were three years younger than us. Her mom, Michele Young, taught at the elementary school and her dad, David Young, built anything from houses to tables, dressers, and cabinets. Although she probably didn’t live there anymore, I could see her mom and give her the thanks she should have received four years ago. I knew I would not have survived if she hadn’t been there. She forced me to eat and go to school and shower, even if she couldn’t get me to interact with any of them.

  As I pulled into their drive, I was relieved when it looked the same. Michele answered the door, and I didn’t get out more than her name before I broke down crying. Until today, I had not allowed myself to cry after that first week four years ago, so when Mrs. Young hugged me and I cried, I really cried. I let it all out, from what I had done in the last four years to why. She was the type of motherly woman you couldn’t help but trust with all your secrets and knew you would get only advice without scorn. She called Becca, who still lived in town and was an ER nurse at the hospital, and told her that I had finally come home.

  Home.

  With that one word I felt a foreign warmth inside me spread, comforting and covering me, letting me know I had made the right decision.

  Over the next week, I had a couple of job interviews and looked at more than a few houses. I was glad that I took the extra courses in college to make sure my license would reciprocate to Texas. I guess somewhere deep inside I always knew I would be coming back here. I hung out with Becca every chance I could. We took turns sharing everything that had happened over the past four years. Of course, this was one-sided since I had nothing to tell. But she told me all about her ups and downs, her wild college nights, and how she almost got married, but it proved to be a disaster in the making.

  “Seriously the only thing good from our relationship was I got to go to his club. It was The Red Door.”

  The Red Door. The first time I ever heard of it, I was eleven years old. I was eavesdropping on my mother, Brenda Hammond, and Aunt Lucy.

  At the time, The Red Door sounded like a carnival. Area after area of entertainment, games, and rides. And to hear them, the cost to play wasn’t that high. I was so excited. I counted my money and planned my outfit.

  A few nights later, Adam and Holly James came over for dinner. They were good friends with my parents and came over so often I thought of them more like family than friends. Adam had a younger brother who was often with them. His name was Alex.

  AKA the bad James’ boy.

  AKA the guy every girl fell for.

  AKA my future husband.

  I don’t remember when I decided that, but always having him around and watching me play, I never thought of him as a family member like I did Adam, only a cute older guy who would always be there. Plus, he always called me Angel. I liked having a nickname that only he called me.

  I had been waiting for the perfect moment to ask to go. When it came, I plunged forth, leaving my dad speechless. To my dismay my mother replied softly, in the graceful way that only she could, that I would have to wait until I became an adult.

  That night, I started adding everything I heard about The Red Door to my journal I had on Alex. Becca, being my best friend, agreed to listen for anything on it, too.

  I kept up with both for years. Alex had joined the Marines after coming over to my house when I was eleven. I held onto the hope he would come back, writing down every detail I overheard about his short military career in my journal. But a year passed and then another. The fixation I had dwindled, the excitement I had felt hearing his name lost its importance. I hated the fact that I was naïve enough to think that someone like him, an idol to girls, would look at a girl who was a stick figure with weird eyes. I quit thinking of him, and I also quit thinking about the club. I packed away my journal, not wanting to see the dream man and life I had planned out or the club that promised to be so much fun.

&n
bsp; But hearing the club’s name now and knowing what it was did things. It woke up feelings that I had buried so long ago.

  “Oh. My. God. No way!” By this age, we both knew it wasn’t a carnival but a BDSM Club. We had found out early our senior year of high school. Knowing we would one day go, we did lots of research.

  “Yes way!” Becca smiled. “It was awesome. It’s like a big sexy costume party. At least when I went it was because everyone wore a costume.”

  “Costume? And what were you dressed up as?” I felt a smile coming up, knowing what the answer would be.

  “Alice, of course! It was kickass. It was a white corset with blue lace around the edges and black buttons and black bow and ended right above my belly button. The skirt was blue with white and black tulle. Thigh highs with black bows and black high-heeled Mary Jane’s.” I laughed as soon as I knew I was right. Alice in Wonderland.

  “Of course. So, did you participate in any of the “rides”?” I did my fingers in quotation marks, knowing she understood I was asking if she had sex with anyone besides her ex, Trevor, while there.

  “It isn’t only about sex, Ari. Even with all the research we found about these types of clubs and relationships, I still wasn’t prepared for the effect it had on me. When you go inside, you have to have an open mind. There are all types of relationships, and it’s up-front and personal. If you don’t want to see two guys going at it, a girl going down on another girl, or punishments being handed out, then you don’t need to go there, because you will see it as well as all other types of sex. But it is more than sex. It is the relationship the Masters have with their subs. It was beautiful to watch and very eye-opening. I do believe I am submissive, but that Trevor is most definitely not the Master for me.”

  “Wow, Becca. With the way you’re talking, your voice changes into awe. You sound entranced.”

  “I guess in a way I am.”

  “How did you find out Trevor wasn’t the Master for you? I mean, how does one go about finding that? Or that you are submissive?”