by Lisa Henry
“Yeah.” Daniel twisted his body. “Come on, please, Marcus.”
That hit Bel like a bucket of cold water. “You want Marcus?”
“Yeah,” Daniel said. “Not some fucking hillbilly. I want Marcus. You can do it right, Marcus. How I need it.”
Well fuck. That hurt more than it should.
“Am I a hillbilly?” Bel asked.
“You got no right to call yourself a master.”
Bel shook his head. “I got no idea what you’re talking about, Whitlock.”
“I’ll try and come, Marcus, I promise.”
Shit. Bel knew he shouldn’t ask, but he couldn’t stop himself. “You don’t always come?”
“Gonna try.” Daniel slumped back down onto the mattress and was silent for a long while. When he spoke again, his voice was softer. “Gonna fix this place up.”
“Yeah, that’s about the only good idea you’ve had so far.”
Daniel smiled at him in the moonlight. “I’m caught up here. Help me out?”
“How are you caught up?”
The cuffs rattled on the bars of the bed frame. “I need to piss, man, real bad.”
“You still sleeping?”
“I need to piss.”
Bel studied him. Might be a trap. If he unlocked him, would Daniel try to leave? Would he fight if Bel tried to stop him? Bel figured he could take Daniel, if it came to that. He could bring him down safely.
“If I let you up to piss, you gonna come right back in here and go to bed?”
Like Daniel was a child. Jesus, that about killed Bel’s hard-on. Except the way Daniel arched, eager, his breath coming faster, brought it right back. “Yeah,” Daniel said. “Promise.”
Bel sighed. Daniel had made him promise not to unlock him for any reason. But Bel wasn’t gonna sit here and deny the guy the right to use the bathroom. He got up and walked over to the bed. Daniel looked up at him. That face—so hopeful and anxious. Daniel Whitlock could give Stump a few pointers.
Bel turned on the lamp so he could see to put the combination in. The padlock clicked open, and he set it aside. Daniel swung his legs carefully over the side of the bed. His erection was tenting the front of his pants. Bel watched him pad across the room to the bathroom, told himself to look somewhere besides Daniel’s ass, but what was the point in even trying? Daniel didn’t close the bathroom door all the way, and Bel listened to him piss—good Lord, he hadn’t been kidding about needing to go—then flush, then wash his hands.
He didn’t come out straightaway, and Bel started to get nervous. “Whitlock?” he called.
He heard the scrape and knock of a cabinet opening and closing. Then a muffled thud.
“What are you doing?” His hand went to his holster. Shit, what if Whitlock had a weapon?
The bathroom door slowly creaked open. Bel stood there, ready to draw if necessary. Daniel came out carrying a large shoulder bag. He crossed the room, his eyes on the floor, then went to his knees in front of Bel. He set the bag down. Pressed his forehead gently against Bel’s right leg.
“What’s that, Whitlock?” Bel asked, tensing at the contact. He didn’t know if he wanted to jerk away or grab Daniel’s hair and push his face onto his dick. “What are you doing?”
Daniel unzipped the bag. “You can use anything in here.” He drew out something that reminded Bel of a giant lollipop, the head glinting in the moonlight. Bel took it. A paddle, he realized, looking at the holes drilled in it. And a fucking heavy one. Made of some kind of metal. Probably aluminum, and cold just like the room. Bel tried to imagine hitting someone with it. He was embarrassed by the way his cock swelled, because there shouldn’t have been anything hot about this.
“That,” Daniel said, handing Bel another paddle. This one was longer and made of wood, but the surface had a rubber tread on it, like a tire.
Jesus.
Daniel pulled out a strap next. Thick and wide and well-worn. He set it at Bel’s feet. Scooted the bag closer to Bel. “Anything.” He didn’t look up.
“You want me to use this shit on you?” Bel still couldn’t quite believe it. Though maybe he shouldn’t be surprised. Whitlock was a fucking hazard—to everyone in Logan, including himself.
“Yes, sir.”
“This what Marcus did to you?”
A nod.
“And you . . .” Bel didn’t know what to ask. “You like it?”
No response.
Bel slapped the aluminum paddle against his hand. Daniel flinched but still didn’t look at him. Didn’t move.
Bel sighed. “Get up, Daniel.”
Daniel held position. “Make me.”
“We’re not doing this tonight.” Tonight? How about ever?
Daniel, kneeling on the floor with his knees spread and his back bowed, breathed heavily. An occasional twitch ran through him, his shirt rippling. “Can I stay like this?”
“You . . .” Bel’s mouth was dry. “You need to get back to bed.”
“Not tired. Make me tired.”
Bel leaned down and took Daniel by the wrists, drawing him to his feet. “You must be tired, Daniel, you’re sleeping.”
“Am I?” He smiled at Bel, then his gaze drifted over Bel’s shoulder. The smile vanished. “Look.”
Bel twisted his head and stared at the front wall. “What?”
“Fire,” Daniel whispered.
“Yeah.” Bel walked him back toward the bed. “There was a fire. It’s gone now.”
“My hands.” Daniel raised them, looking at his palms. “My hands are burned.”
“They’re not.”
Daniel pulled back, shoving his hands under his armpits. He hugged his body, looking around the cabin furtively. “My hands hurt.”
“You’re sleeping, Daniel. You’re dreaming it.”
“My hands hurt,” Daniel repeated. “There’s fire in the walls. Washin’ down like water. Didn’t know it would do that.”
“You’re sleeping,” Bel told him again, and reached out to grab him.
Daniel moved quickly. Threw a punch that Bel barely had time to block, and then he was . . . fuck, he was going for Bel’s utility belt. Bel got a hand on his gun first, pushed it down into the holster the way he’d been taught, because if some nutjob was going for your firearm you had to get between them.
“Daniel!”
The guy could scrap, that was for sure. His hands were on Bel’s, trying to lift his fingers, trying to get the gun. Bel lifted an elbow without even thinking and caught him right in the chin. Heard his jaw snap, and shoved him back. Fast and hard.
Daniel fell onto the bed, and Bel stood over him panting.
Fuck. Crazy.
Bel grabbed Daniel’s right arm and cuffed it. No quiet trusting look in Daniel’s eyes now. He struggled this time, twisting like a wet cat and spitting out curses. Bel got a knee on his chest and leaned over him to cuff his left wrist.
“Settle the fuck down,” he ordered, straightening. “You ain’t going nowhere.”
Daniel bucked and thrashed.
Crazy fucker.
Bel went back outside, slamming the door of the cabin behind him.
Daniel woke up to Belman unfastening his cuffs. His jaw ached. The whole side of his face ached. He squinted in the early morning light, expecting to see Belman’s uncomfortable smile. Got a frown instead.
Daniel sat up, carefully touching the side of his face. “What did—”
Shit.
Why were his paddles all over the floor?
He leaped off the bed and hurried over to shove them in his bag. “Were you going through my stuff?”
“No,” Belman said. “I let you up for a piss, and you came back and told me you wanted me to use that weird shit on you.”
Daniel burned with embarrassment. “I used to . . .” He closed his eyes. “When I was in school, I ran track. Trained like hell, every day, because it tired me out. In college, I didn’t have time for that. But this one guy, he used to, used to do this stuff, and it ki
nda worked for a while.”
“Marcus,” Belman said.
“Yeah.”
“But you didn’t get off on all that.”
Hell, Daniel should’ve known better than to think he had secrets. “Not like I was supposed to.”
Belman’s face was expressionless. “That where you got the idea for all this stuff?”
“Yeah. Doesn’t work so good on my own though.”
“I don’t even know what half that shit is.”
Daniel’s hand shook as he zipped the bag closed. “The usual stuff.”
“Usual for what?”
Daniel looked up sharply. “I don’t expect you to get it, but he kept me under control, and it was good. Because for once I could wake up the next morning and not have to ask what the fuck I’d done, okay?”
“You do a lot of crazy shit, before Kenny?”
Daniel shrugged. “Yeah, enough. Never hurt anyone though, that I know of.”
“That you know of,” Belman repeated.
Daniel shoved the bag under the bed and stood. It hurt to move in front of Belman. Not physically, just . . . Hurt to think about what Belman knew about him. He’d come to love Belman’s visits, which was incredibly pathetic. Shit, Daniel could remember being sixteen and investing all his effort in an online friendship with some kid from Texas because he didn’t have anyone in his real life to talk to. This was sadder: some cop barely old enough to drink, who wasn’t his friend, who only barely tolerated Daniel because it was his job to.
Who kissed me.
And you think that’s ever gonna happen again, now that he knows?
“I better get goin’,” Belman said.
Daniel nodded.
“I’ll see you tonight.”
Still?
Something like hope burned inside Daniel’s chest. He fought to keep it out of his voice. “See you, then. Sorry about . . . about last night.”
“Yeah,” Belman said brusquely.
He left, and Daniel sat on the edge of the bed for a long time, trying not to think anything.
Finally he got up, dragged the bag out from under the bed, unzipped it, and dumped its contents onto the floor.
He threw the wooden paddle first, and it cracked against the soot-stained windowsill. Didn’t break, though, so Daniel had to retrieve it and swing it against his ancient dresser a few times until the head snapped off. Then he sawed the leather strap against the edge of the trunk at the foot of his bed. He used his teeth, too, trying to tear the leather apart. He stomped on clothespins and hurled plugs against the wall. Why’d he keep this shit around anyway? Wasn’t like Marcus was coming back.
He threw the broken paddle in the trash, and the mangled strap. Walked outside, intent on hurling the aluminum paddle into the woods. Hesitated. Drew back and struck his own ass with it. Fuck, the thing hurt. You didn’t need another person swinging it to make it hurt. The aluminum was heavy, and Daniel could feel the ache deep down in his muscles. He hit himself again.
Asshole. You let him see. You showed him.
Daniel flung the paddle as far as he could, watching it land in the ivy that pooled around the trees.
You ruined it.
Ruined what? What was there to ruin?
Daniel walked back inside, stepping on the scattered clothespins again, kicking the straitjacket tangled on the floor. He picked up a nearby plug, pulled down his pants, and inserted it dry. His eyes watered at the burn, but he gritted his teeth and sat on the bed again.
You let him see.
You ruined it.
“You doin’ all right?” Uncle Joe asked Bel.
Bel was in the station parking lot, leaning against his cruiser, and choking down some god-awful coffee. He could barely stay awake, and he blamed Daniel Whitlock. Blamed Daniel Whitlock and his own stupidity in promising Daniel he’d look out for him at night. What, was he gonna do this until Daniel was too geriatric to wander out of the house in his sleep?
It’s just until we find the guy who set the fire.
Until we prove Clayton set the damn fire.
He thought about Daniel last night. “My hands hurt.”
Sleepwalking didn’t make you schizoid, did it? And yet Daniel seemed to see shit, hear shit that wasn’t real. What was that about? Just part of being unconscious—you slipped into some kind of twisted nightmare world where your hands burned and you wanted someone to beat the shit out of you?
“Don’t want to go under,” Daniel had said, that first night in the hospital.
Bel couldn’t do a damn thing to keep him from going wherever he went.
Bel thought about the pictures from Daniel’s file. A face that wasn’t even a face. Missing teeth. Broken bones.
Bel could look at those pictures and try to imagine the pain, but he couldn’t begin to imagine the anger and the fear. Maybe that was what had stayed with Daniel, long after the swelling went down, the scars sealed split skin, and the bones mended. Stayed locked so deep under Daniel’s conscious thoughts that maybe Daniel could almost believe he’d beaten them.
“’M all right,” he told Uncle Joe.
Tired as fuck from babysitting a psycho. But all right.
“Be better if it wasn’t so muggy,” he added.
“Feels like summer,” Joe agreed. He leaned against the hood of the cruiser next to Bel. “Wanted to talk to you about last night. The trailer park?”
Bel nodded. “Diggler radioed, but I was out near Kamchee.”
“You patrol 601 at night.”
“Yep. But I been swinging by Whitlock’s cabin once a shift.” Didn’t say how long he’d been staying. “Just until we got someone nailed for the fire.”
“Needed someone at the park last night. That eight-year-old kid who ended up with a busted face? Four stitches.”
“Logan’s two foot across. It was just bad timing. I got there as soon as I could, and I bet there was at least a couple guys coulda got there even sooner.”
“You bet, huh?”
“Wasn’t Avery out by First Baptist and the drive-in? He coulda been there in five minutes.”
“Ain’t the first time this week someone’s radioed and you haven’t responded right away.” Uncle Joe cocked a brow. “You wanna tell me what’s going on?”
Bel downed some more coffee. “Not really.”
“Stay on your assigned patrol then. All right? I’ll have Day make a pass through Kamchee tonight. His territory’s closer.”
Bel didn’t look at Joe. Fuck no. He needed to be out there. Not Day. Had to stop himself from saying it out loud. The vehemence of his reaction surprised him, even if he was a little relieved. Might not be a bad idea to take a break from Daniel. “All right,” he made himself say.
“All right.” Joe patted the hood of Bel’s cruiser. “I’m talkin’ to one of Clayton’s buddies—R.J. Hinton—today. I’ll let you know how it goes.”
He walked off.
Bel pulled out his phone to text Daniel. Hesitated, thinking about the ice locks. Wondered if this meant Daniel was reduced to three hours’ sleep tonight.
He’s managed years without you.
He started typing: Can’t come by tonight. Sorry.
Thought about saying something else. See you soon? Sleep well? You gonna be all right?
Fuck it; when had he turned into Whitlock’s mama?
He hit Send and pocketed his phone. Finished his coffee and got in his cruiser.
Daniel was still sitting on the bed when his phone buzzed. He must have been dozing, because the sound made him jerk, and he couldn’t remember what he’d been thinking about the second before it happened.
He read Belman’s text three times.
Set the phone down and went to the kitchen.
He’d used up all his anger throwing his BDSM shit, so he made some decaf tea and tried to warm up the knot of cold in his stomach.
Belman wasn’t coming back.
Belman hated him, couldn’t face him. And Daniel had been a fool to believe th
ere was anything there besides a sense of obligation.
So it was back to the ice locks tonight. And for the next however long he lived. He shut his eyes. Wasn’t gonna feel sorry for himself. He finished his tea and went back to the bed. Picked up his phone and checked his messages.
It was a risk, sure, but what the fuck did he care anymore? Belman wasn’t going to look out for him. Stupid to think it would’ve lasted. He needed more than Belman was offering anyway. If he hadn’t been such a coward with Master Beau, he’d be safe by now. Safely locked up anyway.
He was a coward now as well. He was too scared to ask outright for himself, but maybe he could leave it to chance. Chance, and whatever it was in his sleeping brain that fixated on Greenducks like it was magnetic north.
He typed out a text to Master Beau and sent it.
I’m at Greenducks most nights. Maybe I’ll see you there.
Daniel was at a table with three guys. One was laughing, and Daniel couldn’t remember what was funny, but he laughed too. He liked the way the air moved in here—it was heavy and it smelled bad, but the weight of it was comforting. He’d always liked feeling wrapped up. Used to sleep with all the covers on in the summertime and wake up sweaty. Hadn’t minded the straitjacket or the body bag when Marcus had put him in those. It hadn’t been sexy like Marcus had wanted it to be, but Daniel hadn’t minded.
He laughed again. Shouldn’t be thinking about Marcus. He tried to focus on the guy who was telling the story. He watched the guy’s mouth move but couldn’t hear the words. Maybe it wasn’t air around him at all. Maybe it was water. Everything felt dull and muted and slow. Daniel felt weightless. He drifted a little.
The guy was still talking. Not a good-looking guy, but maybe it’d be all right to go home with him. Daniel needed a good fuck. He put his hand on the table. The guy ignored it. Daniel felt frustrated. He ran his palm through a ring of water one of the glasses had left on the table. Said something and wasn’t sure what. But the guy stopped talking and looked at him.
That was a start.
The guy looked like he was about to say something to Daniel, but then the door opened and everyone turned, listening to the footsteps descending the stairs into the basement.
Daniel didn’t turn, because he was looking at his hand. The back of it had red, scaly skin. Little purple marks. Was dry and cracking, lines appearing even as he watched.