my chest. “The height of youth and allure. Never aging. Cut at the prime of life, like a perfect rose is pruned at the moment of its greatest glory.”
He walked out of sight while I let his words sink in. He returned with a silver cart, the kind high-end hotels use for room service.
But the only person who’d be ordering this delivery would be Jack the Ripper. I recognized scalpels and speculums among other spotless, stainless-steel implements. I didn’t know what most of them did, but they all ended in sharpened points, viselike jaws, or curling blades.
A sadist’s smorgasbord.
Holy shit.
It was all I could do not to scream. I kept my face as blank as possible. A small sound escaped my lips, but I caught it in time to make it seem like a sexy sigh.
“Anyone can film two boys fucking,” Kristen said, his eyes alight with excitement. “It’s the easiest thing in the world to make that look good. But to show what lies beneath the skin. The muscle. The blood. That’s true art, Kevin.”
I nodded, but Kristen didn’t notice. He was lost in his own vile visions.
“To take what is considered ugly and make it beautiful. To turn pain into pleasure. Showing people what society says they’re not allowed to see… not even allowed to imagine… that’s the role of the true artist!
“You’ll be part of that, Kevin. Yes, there’s risk. Every artist on the cutting-edge faces persecution during his lifetime. That’s why I win awards for those insipid factory-made films I oversee but have to put my real art out under an assumed identity. Oh, it hurts not to be recognized for one’s work.
“But the money helps.” He looked at me just as I turned back to him. I was glad he hadn’t caught me watching for the first moment I was sure Lucas was awake.
“Your friend was right. My movies are expensive. There’s an underground network that will pay almost anything to see the forbidden. It’s made me quite rich.”
“And how do these movies end?” I asked.
“No spoilers,” Kristen teased, putting his finger over my lips. “Shhhh.”
Although I thought it might make me vomit, I had to be sure. I took his finger into my mouth and sucked, as if it were the most delicious thing in the world.
“Please,” I said. “I want to know. It will make it even better, daddy. I’ll do anything.” I slurped and drooled noisily on his extended digit.
“Oh, you’re good,” Kristen said huskily. “I knew you would be. I hadn’t meant to do this, you know. Usually, I get my talent in ways that can’t be traced back to me. But you forced my hand, Kevin. I couldn’t have you going to the police.
“I suppose you were your own casting agent,” he said. “The role of a lifetime. The end of a lifetime. Captured on film. I promise, it won’t hurt, my boy. A lot of it will even feel good. You’ll be young and beautiful forever.”
Snuff films. I’d always thought they were urban legends. Apparently not.
And here I was. A Star Is Born… and then Killed.
Not today.
Lucas’s eyes were finally open, but he hadn’t yet found his voice.
It was now or never.
43
Would you take a life to save your own?
How about just destroy one?
That was the decision I had to make.
Not about Kristen. I’d blow off his face in a second. Not only would it be self-defense, but I was pretty sure I’d be doing the world a big favor. I had every reason to believe he was guilty of even more crimes than I suspected.
No, it was Lucas I was about to put in harm’s way.
Lucas.
He really did look like a heavenly visitor hanging there. But I needed him to be something else. Not just an angel but an avenging angel. One I could turn against Kristen, his creator.
The man Lucas called his “boyfriend.” The man who made him a star, albeit it in a much different kind of film from the one he was planning to shoot today. The man who’d sheltered him for the past few months after his breakdown.
But what else had Kristen been to Lucas? What else had he done to him?
At the least, Lucas had strong submissive tendencies and Kristen a natural talent for domination. Had Lucas been involved in some of Kristen’s more… artistic endeavors? Was he a victim or a willing accomplice? Or somewhere in between?
I had no way of knowing. All I did know was that any minute now, Kristen would notice that Lucas was ready for action. At that point, he’d do what he did best.
Direct.
Lucas would be feeling like I did. Euphoric and dazed. In a sexual frenzy. The strapping but easily manipulated man-boy would be under the total thrall of a man he’d come to know and trust. I could try and tell Lucas what was really going on, but would he believe me over Kristen?
Assuming, of course, I had more than a minute to speak. Did I mention that one of the items on Kristen’s Cart of Terror was a ball gag? The only reason I wasn’t wearing it now was because Kristen thought I was stoned out of my mind. The second I started making sense, I suspected Kristen would shut me up real fast. In that case, the ball gag would probably be the best of my options.
No, I had to make sure Kristen didn’t have a chance to exert his control.
I’d have to take advantage of Lucas’s fragile psyche to get us out of this. There was no time for anything fancy. Unfortunately, I couldn’t think of a quick way to make the boy into a weapon without breaking him first.
If Kristen survived this night, I thought, as I brought my teeth together with every bit of power in my jaw, he was going to be grateful it was only his finger I had in my mouth.
His scream was so loud it brought Lucas completely out of his slumber. “Wha…?” I heard him slur.
I wasn’t ready for him yet. I continued to bear down, wondering if I’d wind up actually biting the finger off. Can you bite through bone? My mouth filled with the hot liquid spurting from the veins I was severing, and I felt feral with the sheer animal bloodlust of it all. It was the drugs, I knew, distorting my senses, but I was enjoying it. The searing gush of life flowing from him to me. Watching his eyes bulge with pain and fear.
Kristen might have been planning to make a snuff film, but I was auditioning for the next Twilight.
I wasn’t the only one with animal instincts, though. Reflexively, Kristen swung at me. Although there was no technique behind his punch, and not much strength, a lucky trajectory brought his fist into my solar plexus. I gasped for breath, giving him the chance to pull out of my mouth. His finger was still there, but covered in a spurting stream of blood that flew in every direction.
“You…” He was gasping and, I saw with great pleasure, crying. “Fuck!” he yelled. He looked up at me. “You’re dead now, boy. Arrgghggh! ” He squeezed the wrist of his injured hand with his other. He was really hurting. “I’m gonna…”
He should have shut up and backed away.
I jerked up my right leg with as much speed as I could. My knee connected with his jaw soundly, cutting him off mid-sentence. And when I say “cutting him off,” I mean it literally. While I wasn’t able to bite off his finger, with some help from me, his teeth made quick work out of slicing through about a quarter inch of his tongue. I watched incredulously as it flew across the room like a worm he’d spit from his mouth.
“Mmmh!” he screamed, the sound muffled by his hands, which flew to his face. Wow, between his still- gushing finger and the geyser spurting from his newly severed tongue, there was a lot of blood. Whether from the
