ADAM 

 

 

One Week After MARCUS Troy’s Funeral

PRESENT DAY

 

Setting foot in the house always made me feel a strange sense of relief. My room, the one Marcus and I shared, was the same. It should have been traumatic being in here, but it wasn’t. It was an old habit, , nostalgia. Even a murderer’s lair becomes home if you live in it long enough. I had been dodging Rho’s calls ever since I left the office to go see Ian. I figured I could use the relief from having to lie for at least one more night. I felt exhausted just thinking about it. There are times when I wonder if it’s at all worth it. This constant war, this struggle. Sometimes I just want to give up. I want to forget, but I can’t. The past continues to haunt. Marcus still visits me in my bed, only this time he’s inside my head, and part of my worst nightmares.

I’m almost afraid to go to sleep.

I took off my waistcoat, placed it on the back of the sofa. I took off my shoes. I poured myself a drink, and knocked it back in one go, and it burned my insides. I loosened my sleeves and was about to head to the bath, when I heard the buzzer. I didn’t allow any servants at this hour, so I padded barefoot to the downstairs floor, and opened the front door.

The face I saw made me feel the same panic he always did, but I tried to maintain a calm exterior. The fifty-five year old man pushed past me and went in before I could even utter a greeting. He went straight to the bedroom and I followed wordlessly. I watched as The Superior took off his scarf and placed it on the back of an armchair. His suit was perfection, everything about him was refined and meticulous.

“How are you, Wade?”

He wasn’t smiling. “Why don’t you answer my calls?”

“I must not have noticed—”

“Listen to me, boy, I’m not Marcus. I’m not Rho, who will listen to all your lies and not know the difference.”

“I’m sorry—”

“Ian came to the office?”

I nodded. “He and Rho got into a fight.”

“Over you.”

“Sir, I...I was just...”

Wade took off his coat and placed it on top of the scarf. “Some kid from the wrong side of the tracks becomes owner of the throne,” he said. “It’s only natural for you to start thinking that you’re a big shot. That you control this,” he started loosening his sleeves. “That you are able to fool around and not be noticed.”

“I took care of Ian, he won’t bother us any more—”

It felt like there was an explosion. My head jolted, and my face hurt. I realized that Wade hit me, when I saw him with tightened fists. “I hope you’re not under the impression that you are in charge here,” he said. “After all, you’re just a little boy, pretending to be a man! No one takes you seriously. It’s like when companies hire Abercrombie models for their campaigns, the models don’t think they’ve started running the show! They’re just a pretty face with no brains.”

He grabbed my throat and pulled me toward him. “Did you sleep with Ian?”

“I just went there to talk—”

“Answer my question.”

“It just happened. I didn’t plan it.”

“You know what that makes you, right? A whore.”

“Please, sir...”

“I don’t blame Ian,” he said. “Who could resist that ass? Marcus really knew what he was doing when he invested in you.”

He tightened the grip of his hand and I struggled to breathe. “You’re the best piece of ass I’ve ever had,” he said, in a low voice. He let go of my throat then.

I was still trying to figure out what to say, when Wade placed a hand on my back and he pulled me close and ran it over my ass. “You know, don’t you,” he said, his voice hoarse. “That I can’t stay away from you,” he mouthed the words into my ear, then kissed my neck, moved up to the ear. “I know every spot on your body that drives you fucking wild,” his tongue was licking the area underneath my ear, and going lower. I was trying to push him away, but he had me in a vicious grip. “I know how to turn you into a whore.”

It didn’t help that his touch was making my body feel things that were contradictory. I was afraid not only of him, but of my own betraying lust. He turned me around, stood behind me and his hand slid to my front, and he fumbled with my pants, and he struggled with the clasp a bit before he opened it and slid a hand in.

I hated that when he touched me, my body liked it. That I felt a deep, excited sensation in my belly, of a pressure building up. The slow, imminent release of hormones flooding my system. He pushed me onto the bed, and twisted my arms, tying both my hands behind my back with what seemed like cable ties. “Wade, please!”

There was no pleasure any more, just fear.

“Stop talking!” He grunted, and ran his hand all over my back, stopping at my back and then he lowered my pants. “Lie still, or I will hurt you.”

So, I focused on laying still. I didn’t speak from fear of being hurt. He was running his hands all over me. He forced my legs apart, straddled me on the bed and I grabbed the sheets to get away from the pain that followed.

 

***

 

I was still trying to lay still when he got off me, and I watched him put his clothes back on, and cleaning himself up. He freed my hands, and allowed me to move. I sat on the edge of the bed, and he came up and when he tried to kiss me, I pulled away from reflex, it wasn’t a conscious decision, but it pissed him off. He forced me into kissing him, and then broke off. “I don’t want you to take my threats lightly,” he said. “Next time you decide to not answer the phone I’m going to take it to the next level. You’re mine now. You do as I say. Don’t question my authority and I will let you live.”

I kept staring at nothing.

When he was gone, I felt oddly alone.

My phone kept ringing in the dark, and it broke my trance. It was Rho. I wanted to run to him, to just forget about all this, and just go somewhere with him. But the Superiors would find us anywhere.

No.

This journey had to reach its ultimate end.

Someone needs to die, someone needs to live.

The winner gets all.

Good boys don’t cry.