When Tobias Thorn sees a hooded figure abducting a young girl, he doesn’t think twice before racing to the girl’s rescue. Only he isn’t quite quick enough...because the next thing Tobias knows he’s waking up in a cavernous room, his hands and wrists bound to an equally cavernous bed, with his chances of escape looking pretty damn slim.
But Tobias is not a man to take things lying down. He’s going to find his way back home no matter what it takes! But then he meets his abductor and realizes things aren’t quite that simple. Tobias has entered a world unlike anything he has ever known before. If he wants his freedom, there is only one way he is going to get it, by making a bargain with the Beast...
Bargain With the Beast
A Twisted Erotic Fairy Tale
by
April Andrews
M/M, ANAL SEX, ANAL PLAY,
FORCED SEDUCTION, AND BONDAGE
Twisted E Publishing, Inc.
www.twistedepublishing.com
A TWISTED E PUBLISHING BOOK
Bargain With the Beast
A Twisted Erotic Fairy Tale
Copyright © 2014 by April Andrews
Edited by Marie Medina
First E-book Publication: October 2014, SMASHWORDS EDITION
Cover design by K Designs
All cover art and logo copyright © 2014, Twisted Erotica Publishing.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED: This literary work may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, including electronic or photographic reproduction, in whole or in part, without express written permission.
All characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead is strictly coincidental.
DEDICATION
I have always loved the idea of living on top of a hill, in a creepy old building, with no access but for the one hundred crumbling steps below. Imagine sweeping balustrades, gargoyles a-perch the roof, flagstone floors and leaded windows. Imagine too how the wind would sound so high up, or how beautiful the sunshine would be...
When I started writing Bargain with the Beast, and knowing where Tobias was going to end up, it made perfect sense for him to live in that imaginary building of mine. So, thanks go to English Heritage who helped stoke my muse, and for finding the perfect place for Tobias to live.
Bargain With the Beast
Chapter One
Tobias Thorn was feeling pretty damn good. No, more than that, he was feeling pretty damn great. As he made his way up the hundred or so granite steps that led to his cliff-top apartment, he drew in deep lungfuls of cold, salty air and felt his ab-muscles contract.
That sensation still surprised him.
A year ago he hadn’t actually had any ab-muscles, or at least they were so far buried under layers of fat that he couldn’t feel them. But now—he grinned to himself as he raced up the last few steps—now he had all sorts of ab-muscles going on, not to mention pecs, and lats, and other muscle groups he hadn’t even known existed.
He paused as he reached the top of the steps, not to take a deep, no several, deep breaths, which was what he would have had to have done in the past, but just to admire the view. It had been that which had pretty much sold the apartment to him on the very first viewing. The entire town was laid out below him. It sat in a valley, looking almost like it had been scooped out by a giant’s hand. The land was met by a body of water, which was fed by the Atlantic, and had some of the highest tidal surges in the world. The waves were ferocious, loved by surfers and body boarders alike. Tobias loved them too, though he’d only started surfing recently. Before that he’d liked to just watch them. There was something mesmerizing about the way the waves beat against the cliffs, the way that, bit by bit, they were carving away at the land.
On the day that he had viewed the apartment, he had looked down at those fierce waves and known that this was where he wanted to live—with the wind whipping around his body, the scent of salt in the air. Had he considered the fact that buying his apartment meant that there was nowhere to park his ride except the lot below? Or that he’d be up and down the stairs day after day after day?
No.
He didn’t regret it though, because those stairs—and he looked down on them now—had been the turning point in his life-long effort to get in shape. It was only being confronted with his lack of fitness every single day that had made him take a good, hard look at his lifestyle, and the changes that Tobias had managed to make had changed so much more in his life.
He thought about those changes, and their consequences, as he turned away from the view and towards his apartment. It was one of twenty-three in the building that sat, alone, on the top of this cliff, and Tobias was of a mind that if the view hadn’t been enough of a reason to convince him to buy, the building itself was.
Despite the fact that he’d researched it when the sale was going through, Tobias still didn’t know which period the building dated from or who had thought to build it up here, separate for the rest of town. It was almost part castle, part colonial, part Greek revival, with a smattering of marine homage thrown in. On one end of his apartment, in the room he had made his bedroom, he had a glorious arched window, which reminded him strongly of a church, and yet on the other, in his home gym, was a round, tinted porthole which made him feel like he was out to sea. Tobias loved it. At thirty-four years of age, he couldn’t ever imagine living anywhere else.
He smiled at that thought as he jogged across the cobbled ground and to the huge, oak front door. The frame around the door was decorated with a series of drawings, and so far as Tobias could tell they were part of the original structure. He’d once spent a half hour looking at them all, at the howling wolves and the fierce bears, but it was too cold for that today. Already, now he was on the cliff to proper, he could feel the bite of the wind on the back of his neck.
Quickly, he pulled his keys from his pocket and let himself in. The change from howling wind to complete silence was as startling as always. The building seemed to be built from the same sandstone and granite that the cliffs were made of, and it was a wonderful noise reductor. Once inside, and especially in his apartment, Tobias felt like he was sealed in, able to watch and enjoy the elements from the warmth of his bed.
He placed his keys back in his pocket, rubbed his hands together to warm them up then checked the mail slot for his apartment. There was a small pile of letters, and Tobias scooped them up into his hand. Briefly, he looked through them, but there was nothing pressing. He had nothing pressing to worry about at all in his life right now beyond what he might eat for dinner, and whether to watch the television show that he’d recorded.
He nodded at that thought and turned towards the sweeping staircase that would take him to his apartment on the second floor...then paused.
Another guy was making his way down the stairs, and when Tobias realized who it was he felt his heart sink. He looked left, then right then left again, but there was nowhere he could make a hasty retreat to. Instead, he pasted a smile on his face and clenched his fist around the pile of mail.
“Tobias!”
His neighbor Paul, who lived four doors down, came to a halt at the bottom of the stairs. He brought with him a strong stench of whatever aftershave he was wearing, not to mention whatever the stuff was he had covered his hair in. Tobias suspected it was some sort of molding gel, though it could just as easily have been baby oil.
“Oh, hey, Paul.”
Paul responded to Tobias’ greeting by, as he so often did these days, invading his personal space. As he did so, Tobias couldn’t help but think about how quickly Paul’s reactions to him had changed. On the day Tobias had moved in, Paul had given him nothing much beyond a cursory nod and a polite greeting. But over t
he last months, as his body became more defined, as his entire shape changed, Paul had changed too, and it wasn’t just him. Guys that wouldn’t have given Tobias a second look a year ago were all over him now. After spending pretty much his entire adult life struggling to get even a date, Tobias now had his pick of as many as he liked.
And it was weird...but he didn’t like it.
Though part of him understood why the guys at work, and the guys at the gym, were now interested, the other part of Tobias couldn’t get past the fact that he was still the exact same person now as he had been a year ago. If they’d asked him out before he hit the gym, they’d have got the same conversation, the same interests, the same everything...all except the body.
Which made Tobias wonder if the body was all they wanted.
And if so, what was the point?
Those thoughts raced around his mind as he took a step back from Paul and tried to work out how soon he could get away from the other man. Paul negated Tobias’ effort to put some distance between them by placing his hand on Tobias’ arm.
“Haven’t seen you around in a while?” he said.
Tobias shifted. “Well, I’ve been busy, you know work, and the gym, and stuff.”
Paul grinned and squeezed Tobias’ arm. “You never told me which gym worked such miracles on you.”
“No,” Tobias said. “I didn’t.”
He meant that to be a way of ending the conversation, of making his feelings clear to Paul, but the other man clearly did not pick up on it.
“Or,” Paul said, and then his voice lowered, “when we’d be setting up our date.” He grinned. “I’m still trying to pin you down.”
Tobias pulled his arm away from Paul on the pretext of crossing his arms. As he did so he wished he could just tell the other man to fuck off, but Tobias had so little experience of dealing with male attention that he didn’t quite know how to do it. So instead he shrugged. “Like I said, I’ve been busy.”
“Well let me know,” Paul said. “You have my number.” He paused and let out a chuckle. “And you know where I live.”
“Yeah,” Tobias said. “I do.”
Paul grinned and headed out the door. The moment he was gone Tobias rested his head against the mailbox. Why couldn’t he just tell Paul he wasn’t interested? Why couldn’t he just tell all of them he wasn’t interested? Tobias wished he knew the answer, wished that along with all of his new muscles he’d somehow grown more of a backbone, maybe even learned how to deflect the attention he was getting.
Because it was the wrong kind of attention.
Tobias didn’t want a quick fuck or a fling...he wanted something more than that, and yet, what were the chances of that happening?
“Idiot,” he muttered. “Idiot.”
He lifted his head and let out a sigh. That TV show was looking more and more appealing with each passing minute, as was the prospect of being by himself, tucked up in his apartment, with just the view of the bay for company.
Tobias nodded to himself, and, mail still in hand, crossed the lobby and jogged up the stairs to the second floor. As he did so, he couldn’t help but shoot an admiring glance at the huge window that overlooked the sweeping staircase. It was made of stained glass, and it was this feature out of all the others in the building, that suggested church-like origins. Of course the pictures on the stained glass would never have graced a church, as they were erotic in the extreme. More than that, they featured men and women in the clutches of a variety of odd animal-type figures. In Tobias’ favorite pane a robed male was being embraced by some sort of wolf creature and he seemed to be quite happy about it, in fact his painted features were pretty damn happy indeed...
Tobias shook his head as he passed the window, wondering for maybe the hundredth time who had created it, and what it meant. Trouble was, his curiosity was never going to be sated, because he’d researched it, and no one seemed to know. Tobias hated not knowing.
Once at the top of the stairs he took a sharp left before heading down the long corridor that ran almost the width of the left side of the building. It branched off into two other, smaller corridors, and one of those led directly to his apartment. The corridor, all of them in the building, had subdued lighting at intervals after each apartment, and was covered in red carpeting. Tobias couldn’t even hear his own footsteps...but he could hear the voices at the very end of the corridor. A moment later, once he branched off into his own, almost private walkway, he saw the people they were coming from.
They stood outside of his apartment, in the shadows of an oval window, just a few yards from his front door.
Two people in all.
Tobias slowed his pace, wondering as he did so, who would be visiting at this time of night. Not to mention how they had managed to get inside. Only residents of the building had a key to the front door.
“Hey there,” he said. “Can I help you?”
They both turned at the sound of his voice. Tobias did not recognize the woman. She was maybe five foot, had startlingly red hair, and was dressed in a floor-length green cloak. Whatever she wore underneath it was black, but Tobias got the impression of lots of flowing material.
The male, because it had to be a man, was something else entirely. If the woman was five foot, then he had to be about six and a half. He wore the hood of his cloak pulled low over his head, almost like a cowl, and Tobias was sure, just from a brief look, that he wouldn’t recognize him either. Paul aside, theirs was a friendly building. Passing your neighbors daily on the steep steps outside naturally led to conversation. Tobias knew everyone in the building, and he was damn sure that these two, whoever they were, were not residents. So, again, how the hell had they gotten inside? And more to the point, what were they doing outside of his apartment?
He looked around, wondering what to do, when the woman stepped forward.
“Help me?”
Tobias paused, wondering if he had heard her right, when, a mere moment later, the man took hold of her arm and pulled her to him. She let out a little shriek and tried to pull away.
“Help me,” she said again, and her eyes—her strange yellow eyes—were pleading.
A swift, sharp kick of adrenaline filled Tobias’ body then. Danger was suddenly in the air, he could taste it. Despite that, he took a step forward, though in truth, he had absolutely no idea what he was going to do.
“What’s going on here?” he said.
“None of your concern.”
Those words came from the male, and his voice sent shivers up Tobias’ spine. He stood still, in the exact same place he had been when Tobias had spotted him, only now he had one hand clasped around the woman’s upper arm.
“It’s my concern when it’s right outside of my apartment,” Tobias said, and then he turned to the woman. “Are you okay?”
“No,” she said. “I’m not. He won’t let me go. He’s trying to make me go back with him.”
Fuck.
Tobias clenched his fist around his pile of mail, his heart racing at speed. What the hell was he supposed to do here? How was he going to handle this situation? For one painful moment he even found himself wishing that Paul were with him. At least between the two of them they’d have some chance of dealing with this man. Only Paul wasn’t with him...Tobias was alone...and he couldn’t just let this woman be manhandled by some hooded brute. His parents might have been dead for some time, but they’d raised Tobias right. He couldn’t simply ignore what was happening.
“You need to let the lady go,” he said slowly. “Right now.”
The male tilted his shadowed head...and then he laughed. The sound filled the space around them and made Tobias shudder. Did he work out at the gym? Yes. Was he toned and muscled? Yes. Could he take this man? Tobias feared the answer to that would be a resounding no. He’d never gotten into a fight in his entire life...and he didn’t much want to start now. And yet, was he going to have a choice?
“Let her go?” the man asked, pretty much confirming Tobias’ though
ts. “The only place she is going is with me.”
“No,” he said, and the adrenaline was pumping so hard it made Tobias feel slightly sick. “She’s not.”
The man straightened up. He looked from the woman to Tobias and then between them again. No one said a word. Tobias could swear the air was actually pulsing with danger...and then the man moved, and he moved so quickly that Tobias could barely take it in.
He planted his feet firm, lifted his fists, tried to draw in a deep breath...but Tobias didn’t have a chance to do a single thing. A scream sounded, something like a bang ringing in Tobias’ ears. He felt his feet leave the ground, and his face seem to rise up to meet it.
Thoughts raced, feelings shot through him, sensation after sensation, all of them jarred and out of place...and the next thing Tobias knew a hand was muffling his mouth...and then blackness descended.
Chapter Two
The moment Tobias awoke he knew that something was wrong. Usually his alarms would wake him, alarms plural, because no matter how hard he worked to keep to his fitness routine, he still loved to sleep as late as possible, he always had. It had been a brutal transition at first, getting up at five in the morning, and in the beginning he’d needed three alarms to rouse him. He was down to two now, but so used was he to reaching out to shut the first of them off, that he panicked the moment he realized it wasn’t going off.
Had he forgot to set them?
Had he overslept?
Would he be have time to go for a run before heading out to work?
He shot up and drew in a deep breath...his thoughts oddly jumbled and out of place...a moment later and everything came back.
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