Hex, Love, and Rock & Roll

by Kat Turner

  Perhaps fate wanted him to have some sloppiness in his life, some chaos. Some darkness to throw the order of his well-planned existence into disarray.

  Perhaps to live his most complete self, to write and create and love again, he needed to court disorder, the temptations of the universe’s secrets. Helen symbolized so much, yet at the end of the day was simply a woman he wished to be around. The universe worked its mechanisms in weird ways.

  Desire coursed through him, hot as the singing wind. He could, he really could, toe the edge of some kind of crazy-beautiful abyss. Touch mysteries. Play at the border of magic, live vicariously through Helen, taste taboo along with her sex.

  Wasn’t attraction, chemistry between two people, ultimately witchy?

  Wasn’t he a fucking artist, a songwriter and musician suited to draw inspiration from the swamps of Dionysian murk?

  “Can you get here in the morning? Ticket is on me, of course, and I could pick you up at the airport.”

  “Let me text Lisa and ask if she can sub for a few more days. But yes, I agree that I should be close by for this finale show. Can I text you in a second?”

  Warmth spread through his chest, making its way down to tighten his balls. He glanced back at his bed, a California king dressed in hotel whites and navy pillows. He’d never brought a woman into this brand-new bed, the one he’d bought as a replacement after catching Kris screwing some photographer between their wedding sheets.

  What a perfect opportunity to christen the new bed with Helen, lay out the luscious witch and slide into her body. Take her. Claim her, in all of her power and glory and beguiling enchantment. His cock plumped. Was this what the history books meant when they spoke of men being bewitched? If so, sign his name on the applicable line.

  “Hurry up.” His voice was bestial. He practically growled.

  This horny, alpha-male side of himself came out around Helen. Whether the inner beast turned him on or frightened him or both, he couldn’t say, but goddamn the novelty thrilled. He longed for Helen, body and soul.

  “Or else what?” She popped off her taunt, her dare, without a moment’s hesitation.

  He smirked at the rocky slopes beyond his property. Brian Shepherd could play. He could peacock, strut, release the macho. Albeit a bit in jest, a self-aware experiment, but that didn’t make it any less fun.

  “Or else when you get here I’ll punish you. Tie you to the bed and pleasure you until you scream my name. With a healthy dose of ‘yes, maestro’ mixed in.”

  “Not bad, not bad. You should write that down.”

  “Perhaps I will.” He stood up straighter, thoughts bouncing between Helen in his bed and making music in his home studio.

  He’d fuck her in the studio, if she was game. Bend her over the couch, shag her up against the wall of the sound booth. His skin tingled, excitement spurting through his veins. A groan slipped out before he could stuff it.

  “Are you looking forward to seeing me? Cause I’m willing to bet there’s a drumstick in your pocket.”

  God, she could be so shameless. He loved that about her. She was unrepentant where he was uptight. Helen gave him permission to release reins, to free the stallion and charge. “Nice Mae West reference. Suits you. And what do you think?”

  “Yes. I think yes.”

  “So get your affairs in order and get your sexy self to California.”

  “Yes, maestro.”

  He sucked in a breath and adjusted his fly. “Quit teasing.”

  “Why would I do that? It’s too much fun.”

  He moaned. Yes, she’d reduced him to a nonverbal shaft of male lust, a phallus, a caveman.

  “I’m hanging up.” His head swam, his swollen erection claiming all of the blood.

  “Same. I’ll talk to you soon. See you soon.” Christ, her voice. Rough yet smooth, silk stockings ripped off of spread legs under red lights. The phone clicked. Brian stood there for a second, worked up and dazed. He hissed out a breath and fanned his forehead.

  His phone blooped with notice of a text, the device vibrating in his hand. Helen sent a thumbs up. Pulse bumping, he went online, bought her a ticket, and texted her the flight details.

  Sure, he had an assistant to take care of administrative matters, but this chore fell into the category of something so important he’d do it himself. She texted back with another thumbs up and a red lipstick kiss.

  Gaze on those puckered red lips, Brian walked back into his bedroom and latched the sliding glass doors to the deck. Those lips, those lips. How would her lush pout feel wrapped around his knob, licking and sucking? God, he needed her so bad. Had to have her. Craved her, the heady sensation of losing himself in the wet heat between her legs. His tongue had been there, but not his manhood. A travesty.

  Brian locked his bedroom door, grabbed a tube of hand lotion off of his dresser, and saw to his urge. He stroked himself at a fast pace, images of Helen’s face and naked body in all sorts of sexual situations forming a dirty movie.

  Right at the end, he used two simultaneous images to bring himself home. One, Helen bouncing on top of him. Two, Helen kneeling at his feet, disheveled and sweaty after a good fucking and multiple orgasms. Eyes closed, mouth open, and tongue out, she prepared to accept a face full of his offering with gratitude.

  Yes, he had filthy, politically incorrect fantasies sometimes. So sue him. Fantasy number two delivered the payoff, and he erupted into splintering relief. Climax ebbed, leaving him hollow, because he had no Helen to cuddle and stroke and bask with in the mellow afterglow.

  But piss off, sadness and moping. She’d be in California soon. He checked his phone, ensuring he hadn’t imagined the text. Of course he hadn’t. The little bubble with the thumbs up and lipstick kiss remained. He picked up the mobile and planted a lingering smooch on the screen. Laughing at his foolish heart, he threw the phone on the mattress, tugged his underwear and pants over his hips, and sauntered to his master bathroom.

  As he cleaned off, he took stock of the space, chuffed as he admired his spoils. Elegant yet tasteful, all sleek lines and chrome accents. The shower was a modern glass box, large enough for two, though he’d never tested out the post-Kris remodeled space with a partner.

  Home renovations proved efficient to heal from his ex-wife’s cheating.

  Brian fixated on the luxury surrounding him before he could spend too much time analyzing the state of his heart, the depth and extent of his feelings for Helen.

  She would love the spa showerhead with the LED lights and seven different massage settings to pamper the scalp. After a decadent, steamy shower, he’d dry her off in one of his fluffy towels. Wrap her in a bathrobe and make her a fine cup of imported English tea.

  Whistling a song he’d written after leaving Denver, Brian turned on the hot water and soaped his hands under the steaming jet. What was the most impressive thing he knew how to cook, for when he made her dinner? Shrimp scampi. He dried off. No, braised rabbit. Shite. Was she a vegetarian? There was still a lot to learn about the bewitching brunette from Minnesota.

  A litany of stabbing pains, a thousand times sharper and more penetrating than any of the needles he’d allowed to breach his body, assaulted a spot above his groin. Brian doubled over, eyes watering, and gripped the lip of the sink so hard he feared he’d rip the basin from the wall.

  “Ow. Fuck.” Jamming a hand under his undone pants, he fumbled at the area, mind blanked by shredding agony. Though he expected to brush his trembling fingers against a scorpion or shard of glass picked up from God knows where, he groped at nothing but his own glimmering, throbbing skin.

  Brian shoved his pants down, lips parting when he targeted the source of his grief.

  A bruise, the size of a golf ball and mottled hideous shades of black and mustard yellow and livid magenta, marred the skin right under his waistband. Had he whacked his side on a hard surface? No. He would have noticed and remembered a wallop like that, considering he didn’t drink to excess or do drugs and thus moved with bal
ance and clarity.

  Another disturbing detail came into focus as Brian gawked at his wound. He blinked. Two sets of red puncture sticks lined the top and bottom of the injury. He’d been bitten by some animal.

  His mind spun. Hand shaking, he flung open the medicine cabinet and pawed through contents. A plastic jar of vitamins and a travel size container of shampoo clattered into the wash basin. He snatched a small tube of ointment, wracking his brain.

  A stink washed over him, the unmistakable rot-sweet of decomposing flesh. Meaning a rat or similar had crawled into a crevice unseen and died.

  The slow creak of a door. Out of the corner of his eye, he caught a shimmery, glittery flash. Beside himself, numb from the confusing barrage of sensory input he struggled to categorize, he glimpsed.

  Helen, or a woman who could have been Helen’s twin, stepped out of the shower wearing the slinky metallic gown Tilly described. This was not the woman he’d spent time with in Denver. The thought registered in an instant. Her eyes, though the right color, were dead. Too dark, dull as coal.

  “Who are you?” he whispered.

  “Oh, Brian, oh yes maestro. Fuck me. That feels so good. Come all over my face. You two idiots are making this so damn easy for me.” Her laugh was ugly. She stepped closer.

  The lights flickered. One bulb above his medicine cabinet blew out in a minor detonation of pop and fizz. Another light bulb sparked, the explosion’s aftermath leaving a sooty stain on frosted glass.

  “You’re behind the vase and the live wire in the interview, aren’t you? The knife in the garbage disposal, the hot crystal and pains in my palm?”

  She shrugged one creamy shoulder, her hateful facial expression rendering Helen’s breezy beauty malevolent and garish. “Primitive attempts from my pre-corporeal self, when I was merely some amorphous hitchhiker without form, following the path blazed by the hex. But now magic has fully lifted the veil, and I’m getting smarter every day. Looks like my boss has his hooks in you, so to speak.”

  Feminine fingers brushed the mark on his side, a hand identical to the one he’d held, yet alien in the most important ways. A chill iced his nerves following her invasion of his personal bubble, but the tactile element of her touch didn’t register.

  There was no opposing pressure, no protection offered by the boundary of his form. Her digits slipped right through his pelvis and slid out of an area near his pubic bone.

  Brian backed away, skin crawling at this imposter’s death touch, the impossible and violating penetration.

  “Of course you know where the missing crystals are. Joe’s messing with them, isn’t he? And I’m going to guess that you’re working for him and know the precise location of those stones.”

  “I serve a far mightier master than your sad little wannabe warlock. He’s but our pawn, our puppet. Once we’re through with him, we’ll eat his flesh on a platter along with yours and your girlfriend’s.” She drawled the words in his ear, a breathy rumble bringing with it a rotten, diseased stench.

  Brian coughed, turning his head and guarding his nose against another blast of bacteria breath. “You don’t scare me. Helen will be here in the morning, and she’s preparing a spell to send you and your so-called master straight back to hell where you belong.”

  No idea how true that was, but he damn sure better project toughness right now.

  Indulging fear would cloud his thinking, pump him full of stress hormones, and compromise his ability to make good decisions.

  “Unfortunately for you, we’re a grab bag of surprises. You’ll never see us coming. And that’s a cute threat, but as we both know, your moronic novice witch couldn’t divine an answer from a Magic Eight Ball without sowing utter discord in the force.” She poked a finger into his bruise, setting off another spray of icicle bullets through his bloodstream.

  “I don’t need to see you. I can smell you across the room.”

  She furrowed her brow, tapping her chin and pushing out her lips in an exaggerated gesture of contemplation. “Good to know. Thanks for the feedback on how to improve my stealth factor. Next time I’ll be less stinky. See you soon.”

  The clone backed away, disintegrating into flimsy clouds of translucent mist. She faded, leaving a faint whiff of death and the lingering apparition of her Cheshire Cat smirk.

  Fifteen

  If Joe was to be believed, one or both of the clear crystals resided somewhere in the city. In a shrine. Helen shivered in the mild Los Angeles night. This temple could be anywhere, even beneath the ground of the LAX arrivals loading area where she stood.

  Palm tree leaves fluttered in breezes that carried notes of cigarette smoke and ripe garbage. Under saturated orange security lamps bathing the evening in eerie tones, fellow passengers waiting for rides looked suspicious, the cars idling on the curb suited to transport dark secrets.

  Looping overpasses domed an unforgiving concrete jungle teeming with wild vehicular rumbles. Motorcycles, helmeted drivers fused to seats like futurist robots, whizzed down blacktop pavement, gassing unnatural petroleum odors. An airport employee drove a beeping luggage cart in front of Helen, shooting her a crusty, lizard-like look, though she’d done nothing wrong and wasn’t in the way.

  Everything and everyone in her vicinity morphed into monstrous strangeness.

  Helen poked down jitters and anxiety and fought to snap out of the twitchy fugue. She was piqued from jet lag, and in the context of her agitation and relative nearness to the missing talisman and affiliated scheme, her agitated psyche overloaded the world with spooky meaning. The mind had a tendency to speculate, fill in blanks with menace.

  She inhaled and exhaled with mindful purpose, adjusting her messenger bag and rubbing the achy shoulder under its wide strap. The grimoire had become her constant companion. A weight in her purse, a monkey on her back. Other people felt naked without their day planners or main credit card. These days, Helen didn’t leave home without a volume of witchcraft as fat as a phone book. Talk about added responsibility.

  Yes, she had to follow strict orders to stay away from Left Hand craft, but she’d need the book for reference.

  A sports car with California plates pulled into the loading zone, sleek as hell with paint like polished obsidian and tinted windows cloaking inhabitants in mystique.

  The make and model escaped her, though she swore she’d seen the exact car in James Bond movies. Low to the ground, all curvy lines and rounded hood, the ride stood out as a love letter to international automotive sexiness amidst a sea of chunky SUVs and domestic sedans.

  Her pulse quickened. She knew who owned the car. Woven in with anticipation of seeing Brian, though, was a vaguely icky trace of something related to jealousy or resentment. She didn’t belong in that cool Hollywood car. She made sense in one of the generic, sensible vehicles. Or in Minneapolis, driving her Mini Cooper to the body shop to, at long last, repair an expensive fender dent.

  As predicted, Brian got out of the driver’s side, radiating fame and grandeur in tailored black jeans and an old Led Zeppelin shirt. He slammed the door and strode to her.

  On cue, people swiveled, stared, broke out their phones and snapped pics. Though she moped in the glare of attention not meant for her, at least the peevish response triggered a good self-scolding. With a curse to lift, there was no spare energy to waste pouting that the cool factor of the famous guy she was visiting beat hers by a factor of infinity.

  His hug, strong and confident, paused her sulky episode.

  “You smell so good,” Brian murmured into her hair. “I remember this fragrance from when I held you in Denver. Lilac and jasmine and vanilla and you. Pure you.”

  A disarming rawness shaped his admission. Romantic and intimate, sure, but tender with the distinct quiver of relief.

  Helen closed her eyes and attempted to melt into his body, rubbing up and down his back in tender strokes. But their embrace failed to dissolve her tension, her aggravation. Something was wrong. Something always was. No rest for the wicked, no
break from dancing on the tips of her toes.

  “What happened?” she asked.

  Passersby tittered, stealing candid photos with bursts of greedy clicks. A few of the gawkers had swapped phones for bulky cameras with neck straps and retractable lenses, upped stakes of intrusion that raised the scepter of paparazzi harassment.

  Brian, who no doubt had a sixth sense for such things, flinched in Helen’s arms. He kissed the shell of her ear and pulled away. “I’ll explain in a minute. Let’s get in the car before the hyenas start circling in earnest.”

  A flash went off with a squeal, a blast of light making her squint. A goateed man in plaid shorts advanced, panting as he snatched more shots. She got why people flipped out and punched these assholes, but at the moment they were mosquitos and she had a hydra to fight.

  “Good call.” She grabbed her wheeled suitcase.

  He popped the trunk, which slid open in a graceful, futuristic motion making a spectacle of the car’s fanciness. Hesitant to touch his criminally cool supercar, she handed over her luggage. With a friendly smile, Brian set her bag in the trunk and opened her door for her. “It won’t bite.”

  Leather seats the color of whole milk welcomed her body with supreme comfort, and a cluster of black tree air fresheners hanging from the rear view mirror perfumed the interior with an edgy, masculine fragrance.

  “How’s your daughter?”

  “Pouting like a child who hasn’t got an ice cream, but otherwise fine. I couldn’t convince her to go on the tour, but her bodyguard is doing his job.”

  She’d never met anyone with an on-call bodyguard. Money had a way of solving problems, and Brian was drowning in dough.

  Taking advantage of plentiful legroom to stretch her sore calves, Helen settled her eyes on a dashboard panel of buttons and dials expansive enough to pilot a UFO. She could never date a famous person. They were too wealthy, too different, too egotistical. And being around such a heightened level of excess and entitlement twenty-four-seven would have her irritation piqued at all times.