by Ace Gray
I couldn’t help but squeal.
His answering smile was so broad, I swear I almost saw his dimple hollow out.
Carefully he lay me back. I expected his lips to come back to mine but he slowly rolled up the hem of my shirt instead. He bent down and kissed below my belly button, conveniently working on the button of my jeans, but not pulling them down. My hands found their way into his hair, only for him to take them out oh-so-gently and press them to the blanket beneath me.
“Don’t move,” he dragged his lips up along my stomach then reached for the paper bag beside us.
He straddled me and started evaluating my pale skin in the ever-darkening light. Only this wasn’t his usual hungry devour. It was the same look I gave a piece of metal before scraping away at its layers or chiseling into stone. Cole was studying a canvas.
From the bag, he pulled out three containers. I propped myself up on my elbows to study him right back. Two of the containers were round with saucer-sized lids, and the third a regular to-go box. He pulled off one of the big lids and reached three fingers in. Thick blue was globed on his fingers as he spread it on the plastic. He repeated it with a yellowy gold from the other round container, then he started mixing colors.
Dark blue swirled into yellow as he mixed, his brow furrowed just the slightest bit. Deep sea green melded in between and the more blue he added, the more it looked like the depth of color staring back at me.
My heart started racing.
He set it down for a moment and popped open the last container. Red velvet cake. With beautiful creamy white icing. He scooped the white off the cake and slathered it onto his makeshift painter’s palette. Then he reached back for the cake and let a piece crumble into his hand. He dangled the bit above my lips. I snatched it and hummed as I ate the delectable dessert.
With a single finger, he collected more frosting. This time he rubbed it around my lips then dove in to take them. His manly salt mixed with cream cheese sweet had to be what Heaven tasted like.
My hands moved of their own accord, back up and across his face. Then his shoulders and down. Down far enough to clench at his t-shirt.
“Stop,” he breathed. “Let me show you the stars.” It was a pained plea.
Oh God.
How did I tell him I could already see them?
Obediently, I let my hands fall from him and back to the blanket.
“Show me,” I whispered my challenge.
He nodded curtly, focusing back in on the artwork at hand. Blue and white, then yellow and white swirled together on his circular palette making brilliant colors, particularly for frosting.
And then he started painting.
The frosting was cold on my skin. Thank God. Because Cole touching me as a painter was going to torch my very marrow. It was somehow more intimate than any of our other moments. My skin blistered beneath his touch but rather than wonder whether I’d fold, whether I’d let him have me, I simply wondered what the crimson of my skin would do to his painting.
His eyes pinched into their familiar contemplative stare as I shivered. Touch after touch swirled on my skin. I felt thicker spots, a tiny bit of extra weight against my skin, and thinner ones that threatened to crack.
Yes, he was relishing my skin but it was different than lust. He was studying my dips and curves, the shadow and light as it crossed my body. I was a piece of cherished art he wanted to bring to life.
Finally, he sat back and his eyes rolled across my painted stomach and arms. He added small touch ups here and there, then rubbed his chin leaving a beautiful deep blue smattered across his skin. I couldn’t help but laugh.
I sat up with every intention of licking it off but he stopped me.
“Wait. Look.” He pointed toward my stomach and I couldn’t help but obey.
Tears pooled in the corner of my eyes.
Beautiful swirls coated my stomach down to the lace of my underwear and over onto my bare forearms. Like the ceiling, it was textured and seemed to glitter in the ambient city lights. His talent made me see both the magic of the stars and him. The depths of him and of his soul. He was guided by light in the midst of a swallowing dark. He was guided by me.
Part of me wanted to keep it forever. Part of me couldn’t keep my hands off him for another moment.
I lunged at him, my lips finding his. Blue started to smear across my skin and his shirt. This time he didn’t stop me. The night sky was all the beautiful dark things between us. The sugar was sticky, the color was going brown and dirty, but it was still the symbol of us. The beauty in the madness. The sugar in the salt.
I straddled him, my hands at his cheeks pulling him closer to my lips, pulling him to be devoured completely. Because that’s what I would do. He’d live in me. We’d find north together. I didn’t care what it took to get there, only that I knew now we would. We’d stumble. We’d turn brown. But he was my universe. Every planet. Every star. Every single swirling breath that connected them all.
My body was doing what it could to consume him when a phone rang from his back pocket. His hands were too busy crossing my body, still dragging blue and gold where they went, to answer. The ringing just punctuated the all-consuming and bone-devouring need, barely interrupting how completely my soul needed to feel his.
On and on and on it went, until I finally broke away. “Answer it, if only to shut it the fuck up.” I bit his lips and pressed my chest harder against him.
Reluctantly he pulled it from his jeans and the whole night sky shifted.
Dark clouds consumed the moon and the glitter of the painted stars above dimmed. Shadow had come to live on the rooftop, with the full intention of flinging us from the edge.
“It’s Mickey,” Cole barely breathed. “And he has a job for me.”
14.
Cole
If I wasn’t hell-bent on murdering Mickey and watching his life bleed through my fingertips before, interrupting this moment made me picture an unapologetic string of end trails. Vivid images of the way he’d struggle against my grip, the way his neck would spin with my massive blows, and the way his blood would seep out, black as night, danced behind my eyes.
And Elle—perfect, priceless, painted up Elle—was mine in front of me. I could tell her every fiber was back in my possession. I wanted to be lost in her, in the ever-narrowing space between us. She’d stolen my breath many times, my heart what felt like ages ago, but tonight, she’d taken my soul and claimed it as hers.
But that was the reason that I had to push her beautiful frosted body from my thighs.
“Ladylove,” I breathed, barely able to form the words.
“You have to go,” she said simply. “Don’t go,” she added in the same breath.
“For you,” I whispered, “for us.”
“I know. I just want a few more hours lost to the galaxy of you.”
I laughed lightly against her lips. “And see here I was, thinking about a timeline closer to forever.”
“Well, when you put it that way…” Her smile colored her words as her lips found their way back to mine.
She was going to eat me alive and all I could think is what a way to go until my phone rang again.
“Motherfucker,” I swore low against her lips.
“You better not be fucking any mothers.” She laughed as she slid off me but then her face fell. “Or…or…Oh God.”
She shrunk, looking the tiny broken bird she sometimes seemed. The horror and the question were written plain on her face.
“Not if I can help it.” I swallowed and said a silent prayer. “But you…” I cleared my throat. “Us. That may have to happen again.”
A smile warred with her thinned, firm lips. “Tonight?” I couldn’t tell if it was good or bad anxiousness in her voice.
“No. Sin of a different color tonight.” I crawled forward and kissed her forehead, soaking in the last taste of innocence I’d have for a little while.
“Can I go with you?” she asked timidly. “I just can’t leav
e you yet.”
My insides twisted. The obvious answer was not only no, but fuck no. But my heart said I don’t just need you to live, I need you nearby to breathe.
“Ladylove, I don’t know…” I rubbed the back of my neck, smearing frosting around.
“Never mind,” she whispered as her hand grazed down my arm. “I just…” she stumbled over her words. “I just got you back.”
And there went my heart, exploding and scattering to the wind.
All I could do was pull her into my body. There was a squish and slide of paint between us as our bodies seemed to meld together.
“I should get going.” I pulled back and nipped her lip.
She nodded, a sadness hollowing out and shadowing her face. I craved to light her back up.
“We’ve got a long drive.” My crooked smile tried to pull on my cheek. It couldn’t stop when she caught my meaning, spreading like the honey she poured through my veins.
She was aimlessly stroking on the globs of frosting still wet enough to wield while streetlights illuminated the car in pulses. The effect was hypnotic. Or maybe it was just her. I couldn’t be sure, except that magic sprung from her seat, spelling me completely, as I pulled over.
For just a moment, I didn’t pay attention to the house beside us, the single light pouring out onto the street from the living room or the TV show idly flashing in the background. I shoved aside the notion that someone’s life was about to alter completely, if it continued at all. For one more moment, it was just us, a couple swimming in stars together.
I wordlessly pushed her fingers out of the way, then shoved her shirt up, tucking it into the band of her bra. She watched me intently but didn’t stop me. I reached for my phone, and taking advantage of the warm pillar of light I’d pulled into, snapped a few pictures.
First was a close up of the artwork. Of course, she’d somehow made it beautiful again. It was her. Magnificent, illuminating, her. Consequence be damned, I was savoring this moment forever.
Or until the curtains ruffled in the living room beside us then the lights flashed out.
“Shit,” I swore as I swiftly reached under the seat for my gun then wheeled out of the car. “Stay put, Elle.”
I took off running for the back door, sure that’s where the man inside was going. With just a few powerful strides, I hurdled the hip height chain link fence. I bolted down the broken concrete trail, pausing only to kick the toy fire truck out of the way. I rounded to the back door at the same time the rickety tin door sprang open. My arm was out and around the man’s neck before he even saw me careening at him. He fell back, flattened to the concrete steps with a bone-crunching thud and a girlish screech.
“Hi there.” I leaned over him, letting my mangled smile shine in the faded streetlamp light. “I’m guessing we don’t need an introduction.”
“What does Mickey want? Why did he send you?” His voice was a shaky, timid thing that really did make my insides twist.
The only thing that brought my hand to his collar to drag him inside was the blonde happily ever after sitting in the passenger seat out front.
Though if she saw this, saw me mercilessly question this innocent man about her mother, about the ledger, about things I knew the answer to, would happily ever after even be an option? I shook my head as I pulled his scrambling body back into the house. I couldn’t let myself think ten steps ahead. I could only focus on one step, one moment, one movement at a time.
“What did Simone Laroux tell you about the ledger?” I snarled as I threw him into a dining room chair that creaked and protested as it jarred on the floor.
“Nothing,” he wailed. “Absolutely nothing.”
“Not what I heard.” I pulled my gun front and center to polish it as I glanced over from under my eyelashes.
“Well I don’t know who’s telling you what, but they’re wrong. Dead fucking wrong.”
“When did she steal it?” I barreled through his posturing.
“I told you,” he shouted. “I don’t know anything!”
The moment he erupted, I did too. I lunged for him, latching onto his throat and using my momentum to slam both him and the chair back flat to the floor. It bounced a little as he crashed into the cheap brown tinted pattern coating the linoleum.
“She had you mail a little leather-bound book.” I spat out the words and his eyes went wide. “Mickey knows because I told him. And you wanna know how I know?” I knelt down, pinning his arms and torso to the floor with all the strength I’d built over the past few months. “Because FedEx doesn’t need this kind of persuasion.” The memory of a wailing driver twisted my insides but I simply shoved the barrel of my gun against his temple. “Should you decide you don’t need it either, I’d highly recommend talking. And now.” I pressed harder as an exclamation point.
“I can’t talk. I can’t let her down,” he sniveled beneath me.
“Simone’s dead. She’s already as low as she can go.” My heart twanged in my chest when I said such harsh things about Elle’s mom.
I’d never met her but I knew the goodness and beauty she radiated. I could see it in the outline of each of Elle’s precious breaths.
“I’m not talking about Simone,” he bellowed.
There was only one other her in this scenario and she made my stomach bottom out. The man I was sent to torture, to kill if needed, was just trying to do the same thing as me. For a moment, without knowing anything about him, about his life, his history—and sure as hell not about his future—I felt connected to him.
My gun fell away before I consciously made the decision.
“Start talking.” I didn’t move. I barely breathed. “Now.” I closed my eyes and blew out a deep breath.
“Are you going to kill me?” His voice trembled, vibrating his chest against my thighs.
“That depends entirely on what you have to say.”
“I’m not telling you shit.” He all but spat the words. I couldn’t help but arch my brow as I looked down at him.
“You wanna rethink that?” I effortlessly pressed the gun to the bottom of his chin.
“Cole?” A timid voice asked from the darkness to my left.
“Ladylove, what are you doing?” I snarled as I peered up to find her outline appear from the deep shadows.
“There are cops outside.” Her voice dropped again, a barely there whisper as if they might hear.
“What did you do?” I turned back to the man beneath me.
“What did I do? What did you do?” His eyes ghosted up to Elle and traced her form as if he couldn’t believe the vision in front of him.
“Did you call the cops? Is that coming in here for us? For her?”
“No, I didn’t call the cops. I certainly wouldn’t do that to her. Do you even know who that is?” A different type of panic registered in his voice.
“Yes, I know who she is.” I couldn’t help but melt a little as I answered.
“Then you know exactly where I sent the ledger.” He looked me dead in the eyes. “And you know exactly why I did it.”
As if his words were a key to unlock a riddle, the memory filtered through my mind. The tiny chapel, the crunch of the gravel beneath my shoes, the way the candle flames flickered in an indiscernible breeze. Elle had looked so small where she sat between Jimmy and her mom’s killer. A killer that was now pinned to the wooden chair slats digging into his back and cool steel into his chin.
The moment I’d felt pity for him dissolved into black.
“You think that could ever make amends?” I stuttered out, rage choking off my words.
“What are you talking about?” Elle’s voice tried to boom and failed. “Cole, what’s he talking about?” I wanted to see her, but fury and rage were blinding me.
“My hands were tied,” he scrambled. “I couldn’t say no to Mickey. He won’t let you and you know it. It was the only play I had left.”
“There’s always a choice,” I snarled.
“Not all of us are his
prized pets. Not all of us can fuck our way out of things. Some of us just have to be soldiers. Some of us just have to kill or be killed.”
Mickey had called Horse his soldier before he’d dragged him to The Butcher. He’d demanded loyalty. But still Horse had resisted. He’d fought for what mattered and he fought fucking hard.
Elle dropped to her knees, begging one of us to explain. The tone of her voice told me she already knew. I looked at her with my softest smile, hoping it would somehow reassure her since I couldn’t. Looking at her pleading face, her giant doe eyes shimmering even in the shadow, I realized my love, my everything, had fought too. She’d defied Mickey every way she knew how. Including love me. As stupid as it was of her to fall, she didn’t just drop, she flung herself into me. Into us.
And now I was going to fight for them, too. Not for Mickey. Not ever again. If it wasn’t in service of those two, either it or I could go to hell.
An ice crept through my veins as brutal as death itself. The world always seemed so much simpler when a killing calm coated my insides. Nothing was painted in shades of gray, it wasn’t even in black and white. Red. The most brutal, vivid, dark crimson. The cloak of death. And damn did I wear it well.
Every muscle in my body relaxed as I turned away from my Ladylove and laid eyes on the scum in front of me. He wasn’t defending Elle, he was a rat on a sinking ship desperate to save himself.
“I’ve got news for you. I’m not a prized pet, and I’m not fucking my way out. I’m fighting. And for what matters, goddamnit.” My voice was every bit as cold as what coursed through my veins.
“Cole, please. Please tell me what’s happening.” Elle had stood and rested her hand on my shoulder when she asked. It didn’t startle me, nor did it fizzle and fade the red. Rather it was encouragement to right the wrongs leveled against those delicate birdlike hands the only way I knew how.
“You’re everything that matters to me, Ladylove. Everything.” The word was a feral growl. “I thought I was being smart before. I thought I’d just accept my fate and deflect anything I could from disrupting yours. But not anymore.”