A Wicked Beginning

by Calinda B

  “Hey…!” she yelled, trying to keep her paper cup upright. Poised over Mano’s shoulder with her hands dangling over Mano’s back, Jayze plucked the waistband of his pants, and started to pour her cold coffee remains down his legs. “Ooh, commando!” she cried, revealing Mano’s smooth skinned ass. The tail of the snake tattoo which wound up his stomach, slithered out from his thigh, and coiled along the base of his spine. “Are you sure you want this Mano?” She allowed a trickle to spill from the cup.

  “Hey, back atcha,” Mano replied, dropping her to the ground, the Peet’s cup splattering to the ground, and the last of the coffee soaking into the dirt. “Fight fair, wench.” Severe bounded up and down, barking in delight, like a yapping yo-yo.

  Jayze laughed and put her hands up. “Okay, I surrender, oh, Man with Special Gifts.” She straightened her clothes. “I’m sure glad you’re my friend, Mano. I don’t know what I’d do without you.”

  “Probably have one less friend willing to love you even though you make stupid mistakes,” Mano said, reaching down to pick up the crumpled paper cup.

  “Like you’ve never made a stupid mistake?” Jayze teased playfully.

  “Huh,” Mano grunted in response. “Let’s just say I’m not making any at the moment. Not that I can tell anyway.”

  Chapter 37 – Cam

  The afternoon was quiet when Cam took a stroll up to the parking lot. The kids were all in counsel with Mark and Lightning Rod, and he’d been given a break. He needed it.

  When he reached the Land Rover, he unlocked the door, and rummaged around in his glove box for his smokes. He hadn’t touched one for days, but just now, he could use the distraction. Before lighting up, he looked around for signs of the dreamling. Nope, couldn’t make out any ghostly apparitions anywhere. Just to be sure, he said to the emptiness that surrounded him, “This is my choice, you know. I get to decide what, when, and where I do things.” He put the cigarette in his mouth and flicked the lighter. Relaxing against the side of the car, he gazed up at the blue sky and the clouds, then turned his attention to the trees. Man, it was good to be out here, away from the busyness of city life. He wished he could share this moment with Chérie. Well, not the moment with the cigarette, he qualified, but the beauty out here was stunning. Trees, mountains, circling hawks, the flutter of small birds in the foliage, and brilliant blue, blue sky…

  The week out here had been fantastic so far. In a couple days, he’d be heading back home to see Chérie. He couldn’t wait to share all that had happened. His cock throbbed thinking of her, and his hands and face got all buzzed at the thought of touching her delicious skin…kissing her honeyed mouth. Oh, yeah, he couldn’t wait to renew with the ka too…to dip into the sacred well, he thought with a wicked smile.

  The kids were a handful. There were 12 of them, bruised and broken on the inside, like he had been. By the end of the week, though, they seemed happy…lighter…freer. And they all felt bonded, like a healthy family, not the fucked up kind they all shared back home. No, this family felt dignified from having grown in an environment of integrity. They’d shared some weighty moments in council and some tense moments in the woods. They’d embraced the physical, hiking miles and miles, and challenged themselves with things like falling backwards into the waiting arms of fellow camp mates, or being led blind-folded through the woods. They’d worked together as teams, building a raft using found materials and helping each other through an obstacle course. One of the high points of the week had been the zip-line (Mark had called it the Death Slide for drama sake). The kids had climbed to the top of a 30’ trestle. For some, that had been the first challenge. Then, fully helmeted, with a harness around their hips and sturdy leather gloves on their hands, they’d taken the leap, jumped off the edge of the trestle, and sailed along 300’ of cable through the tree tops to where Mark and Lightning Rod were waiting.

  It was Cam and another fellow’s job to get them going. Cam felt thoroughly qualified for the task, being an adventure junkie. Once they’d gotten past their fears – some took more coaxing than others – the kids had been ecstatic. Yeah, as challenging as this week had been, the rewards far outweighed the challenges. Cam knew he’d found his calling.

  As he stood there, he thought about how there’d been no freaky dreams, no star dreamling on his trail, nothing evil had happened this week. Maybe that part was over. Maybe it had all been some sick moment in time, and now, having embraced a new career, he could just get on with his life and…and what? Settle down with the ka? Not likely. More like keep following the adventure trail. Still, he couldn’t help but wonder if the hard parts…the perplexing parts…the can’t make sense of anything parts…if those were behind him. But no, just as that thought had whispered through his head, he heard a rustle coming from the trees and tensed. Shit. This better not be what he thought it was. He sure didn’t want to deal with the star dreamling.

  “I’m not afraid of you,” he called to the trees. “I’m done with that.”

  “I hoped you’d feel that way,” said a female voice.

  What the fuck? Did the dreamling turn into a woman? Smoke escaped from his nose and mouth as he peered into the green foliage. He took another drag off the cig and waited, squinting into the dense forest.

  “I’m not afraid of you either,” the voice called.

  Was that a familiar voice? Cam thought he’d heard that voice before. “Then come out here where I can see you,” he called. He exhaled sharply when he saw who emerged from the woods. It was Angela fucking Myers. “What the hell are you doing here?”

  “Looking for you, what do you think?” Angela gave a breezy laugh. She was dressed in tight pink shorts that showed no panty line signs of underwear underneath, a low-cut black spandex short sleeved top, and pink tennis shoes. The edges of a pink bra peeked out of the spandex, cupping her abundant cleavage. Her taut muscular legs were long, lean, and oh, so sexy. Her hips were full, and her breasts…well…Cam caught himself ogling her breasts, and then forced himself to look at her face. She laughed. “Like what you see, cowboy?”

  God, she was so different than when he’d had her in San Diego. Back then she’d been this compassionate, ultra-uptight woman who insisted on covering her body in ridiculously conservative clothes. Now she was anything but conservative. Her hair, now a rich, dark purplish brown, hung loosely around her shoulders. Her curvaceous body swayed and undulated as she strode lazily towards Cam. Her vivid ocean-blue eyes glittered with seduction. Cam groaned inwardly at his body’s response to her. It was immediate hard on time. Shit, this couldn’t be good on any level.

  She walked right up to him and took the burning cigarette out of his hand. Taking a puff, she blew the smoke out to the side of Cam’s face. “Close your mouth, cowboy. You’ve seen this before.” She gestured to her body.

  Cam pulled himself together and snapped, “What the hell are you doing here? How did you know I’d be here?” Angela took another drag off the cigarette before returning it to Cam. He flipped the half-smoked Camel on the dirt and ground it out with his hiking boot.

  “I told your cute little girlfriend that I’d be in touch. She’s so cute she reminds me of a Cocker Spaniel,” Angela said in a childish, sing song voice. “Did she forget to tell you that we ran into one another?”

  “No, she told me. She tells me everything. Tell me how you knew that I’d be here,” he demanded.

  “Ooh, getting all tough-guy on me again? That’s so sexy. Light me up a cigarette, will you?”

  “No!” Cam barked. “Get your own damn smokes.” He backed away from her.

  “That’s not very nice, Cam,” Angela cooed. She walked up to him, touched her soft cheek to his stubble covered chin, and whispered, “I can see where you keep them. They’re quite evident. Why, they’re as evident as this is.” She reached down and cupped his cock with her hand. Cam jumped backwards.

  “Get away from me, Angela.”

  “Why should I?” She again stepped towards him, reached in his shirt
pocket, and plucked the pack of cigarettes out. Then she fished around for the lighter, purposefully taking her time. “Light this for me, will you?”

  “Light it yourself,” Cam barked. “Keep the whole damn pack.”

  “I just might do that,” Angela replied, flicking the lighter to her cigarette. “All the better to cast my spells…” She blew another lungful in Cam’s direction. “This pack is marked. It’s got your scent all over it.”

  Shit, he never considered the magic element. That was so outside of this thought process. Realizing his mistake, Cam lunged for the cellophane covered pack.

  Angela snatched it out of his grasp. “Ah, ah, ah, Cam, these are mine now. You gave them to me. I’m going to keep them and use them.”

  Cam gathered his wits and looked intently beyond her shoulder, far off into the woods. When Angela turned her head to see what he was looking at, he deftly grabbed the pack of smokes from her grasp.

  Angela turned back around and gave a sharp laugh. “It doesn’t matter, Cam, now those contain both our essences. Whether I hold them or you hold them, I can still work my magic.”

  Cam felt his temper flare. “What the fuck are you talking about? You’re fucking nuts.”

  “Nuts I may be, but I intend to get what I want.”

  “And what’s that?”

  “Why, it’s you, Cam. Surely you know that by now. I’ve made myself quite clear in our dreams together.”

  Cam’s face twisted into a grimace. “So it is you!”

  “None other,” she said, rotating in a circle, like she was a fashion model. “Aren’t you excited?”

  “No! Not in any way. Disgusted is more like it.”

  “Well, you will be. I guarantee it.”

  Angela continued to move closer to Cam. With his back at the edge of the woods now, there was nowhere he could go without turning around. He didn’t want to let her out of his sight. She pressed her breasts into his chest and rubbed her hips suggestively against his hard cock. “Stop this,” Cam growled. “Get away from me.”

  “I think you like this, Cam. The body never lies.” She looked down at his member, straining against his jeans. She pressed her lips against his.

  Cam tightened his lips into a hard line, grabbed her by the shoulders and pushed her away from him. He snarled, “I said, get away from me.”

  She gave him a hard stare. “I have no intention of getting away from you, Cameron Delaney Tyson…none at all. I shall pursue you to the ends of this Earth until you are all mine.” Bringing the cigarette to her lips, she inhaled. “Mmm, I’m taking you all the way in, Cameron Tyson. Pure magic...”

  A shiver rolled up Cam’s back. A peculiar sensation pulsed out of his belly like he was being pulled against his will. It seemed as if she had a rope attached to his intestines. Cam felt a strange tug like his entrails were being pulled through his bellybutton with a crochet hook. It was almost like when he was being probed in the woods by the star dreamling. Was she the dreamling? He was revolted at the thought of being so mercilessly stalked by her if that were true.

  “What’s the matter…Cam?” she coolly inquired. “Cat got your tongue, hmmmm?” Then, without reason, her demeanor shifted, her eyes becoming icy and cold, void of life.

  Cam scrutinized her insane orbs like an eye doctor performing an examination. He waved a hand back and forth in front of her face. Nothing…she’d really lost her marbles. He decided to try a different tactic. “Angela,” he began in a soft voice. “It’s great to see you again. I can see you’ve changed.”

  Yes,” she said absently. “I have.”

  “I’ve got to get back to work here. I’m at the end of a week-long stay with a bunch of teenagers, and I’ve got to get back to them.” She nodded. Okay, this was a good start. “I’m going to walk back down the trail here and get back to the camp, okay? Can you find your way back to your car?”

  “I’m not going to my car, Cam. I’m going to stay with you tonight. Mark asked me to participate in one of the groups tomorrow.”

  That seemed odd to bring in an outsider on the last day, Cam thought. He knew how groups worked. They’d all formed a bond and were not likely to feel warm and fuzzy about a newcomer. “Did he now? How do you know Mark?”

  She reached for Cam’s hand. “He’s my brother, silly.”

  Cam gently eased his hand out of her grasp. Of course he was her brother! Mark Myers. Angela Myers. Why hadn’t he put two and two together? He could just kick himself. “Okay, Mark’s your brother. I didn’t know that. But you can’t stay with me, Angela. I’m bunking with a friend of mine.”

  “We can move him,” she said. “People change roommates all the time.”

  Now she was acting weirdly submissive towards him. Man, oh man, she had more than a few screws loose. It was just his luck to have hooked up with insanity last year. “No, I don’t think we can, Ang,” Cam responded, using the nickname he’d called her last year. “I don’t believe that’s a good idea.”

  The vacant look disappeared, and Angela came back to her senses. She dropped her smoke and daintily ground it out. Then, she snaked a long fingernail along Cam’s cheek, causing him to shudder as his cock twitched back into action again. “I think it’s an excellent idea, Cam.” She leaned in and bit his earlobe gently. “I’m going to make you feel real, real good.”

  Cam shivered involuntarily. He swallowed hard before continuing. “Now, Angela, what would the teens think? We have to maintain our propriety, now don’t we?”

  Again, Angela’s eyes switched back to a “nobody’s home” status. “I suppose,” she said as her voice trailed off into a whisper. “I do try to keep up my decorum with my clients.” She tugged at her spandex neckline as if to move it further up on her chest.

  “That’s right, Ang, we’ve got to keep up appearances.” He spied the office where Mark was supposed to meet him.

  Angela snapped back to her bitch self again. “Cam, I’m going to give you the best orgasm you’ve ever had in your life.” She reached down and caressed his genitals.

  Taken by the sensation of her touch, he closed his eyes for a moment before gently grasping her hand and removing it. She had a weird hypnotic effect on him. But having been with the ka, he really, really doubted anything could get better than that. In fact, as he thought of Chérie, his heart pulsed in warmth. “Chérie…” he uttered softly before thinking, I could use some help here, babe.

  “What did you say?” Angela snarled.

  “I said, whoo-wee, it’s hot out here.” Cam tugged at his collar.

  Angela’s eyes narrowed to slits. “Did you say Chérie, Cam? If you did, you’ll wish you hadn’t.”

  “No, Ang, why would you think that?” Cam quickened his stride. When he got closer to the office, he called out. “Hey, Mark, you in there? There’s someone here to see you.”

  Mark called out from his office, “Out in a sec, Cam.” He emerged from the small building, squinting at the late afternoon sun. “Oh, hi, Angela, when did you get here?” Glancing at Cam he asked, “Do you know her, Cam?”

  Cam stood before Mark, shifting uneasily. “Uh, yeah, we used to work in the same office building.”

  “Oh, we did more than work,” Angela cooed, reaching out to touch his hair.

  Cam twisted away from her. “We went out a couple of times, Mark. Just a couple of times.”

  Mark looked uneasily from Angela to Mark and back again. “This isn’t the one you told me about, Angela, is it?”

  Oh, great, Cam thought, ominously. What did she say to Mark? He really liked the guy, respected him. Now was he going to lose all credibility with Mark Myers? Here goes this gig.

  “It’s the same one, big brother.” She and her brother watched Cam for a reaction.

  Cam just stood there, gritting his teeth, an awkward silence settling over the trio like a giant weighted cloak. Finally, he spoke. “I don’t know what she said to you, but it was only a couple of dates, that’s all. It was while Chér and I were split up. But we
’re back together, and we’re going to stay that way. I even asked her to mar…to commit…I even popped the question to her,” he added, struggling to find meaningful words to whatever it was he and Chér had decided to do. “We’re going to do it when we get back home.” Cam looked over at Angela. Her eyes gave off a chill colder than Natalie Epic’s big freeze at the car. He swore he could even feel the sub-zero frost rolling off her skin.

  “Angela, I’m sure there was just a big misunderstanding,” Mark soothed. “Why don’t you go wait in my office for a minute, and I’ll tell Cam what he needs to do next. Then, I’ll be right in to get you settled and oriented. Okay, sweetie?” He gave her a warm smile. “Will you do that for me?”

  Angela smiled back and nodded. “You’re a good brother,” she said, touching his cheek. “I’ll be waiting.” She turned back to Cam and switched to her evil persona. “I’ll be waiting for you, too. Tonight…”

  After she was out of earshot, Mark turned to Cam with an angry frown. “What did you do to her? What did you do to hurt my sister?” He leaned in towards Cam menacingly.

  Cam’s neck corded, and his breath quickened. His muscular body tensed. “What did I do to her? What did I do? She was lonely when I saw her in San Diego. I was missing my girlfriend – we’d just broken up. Me and Angela - we got together a couple of times. That was that. She seemed sort of predatory, Mark, no offense meant. I had to block her number when we stopped seeing one another.”

  Mark blew out his bluster with a sigh. “My sister’s got some problems.” He rubbed his face. “She told me that she’d met the love of her life, and she was going to do whatever it took to get him. She’s been pretty obsessive about it. I thought she’d met ‘the one,’ and that she was taking her medication and pursuing therapy – for herself, I mean, not her own practice.” He pushed his fingers through his hair. “I can’t believe she made it through college and all her exams. The Gods either blessed her or cursed her.”

  “What medication is she on?” Cam asked.