Rough Canvas (36 page)

“What— What is he doing here?” Her voice was shrill.

“Claiming my property,” Marcus snapped. Thomas had a moment to feel the shock

of the double meaning before Marcus swept an arm in a gesture around him. “I’ve contracted for this work that you just deliberately vandalized. Which, if you weren’t 187

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related to the artist and dependent on him for your wasted, narrow-minded life, I would take out of your bank accounts, your house. Every fucking thing you own.”

“Don’t you dare curse at—”

He stepped forward, his expression robbing her of the words. Thomas put up his

hands to block him. Marcus didn’t advance, just pressed against Thomas, his eyes leveled on his mother. Thomas felt the heat of Marcus’ body as if he had emerged from hell in truth. “Don’t you dare tell me what to do.”

“Marcus.” Thomas knew words wouldn’t diffuse this, so he changed tactics. “Mom, you need to leave.”

“I won’t—”

“Now,” he ordered. He glanced over his shoulder. “Now, Mom. Just… You need to

leave.”

A muscle twitched in her cheek, a spasm of nerves, her eyes suddenly bright with new tears of frustration. She was still shaking. Something hurt so badly in him he was afraid he was going to rupture. She looked frail, alone. And his paintings were arranged in the backdrop behind her, two choices of his life side by side, and the most important one pressed hard against him. In a way, he wished he could just close his eyes and make it all disappear, stop feeling at all.

She left. The door made a quiet thump, the wood hitting the latch and open padlock hung upon it. Thomas curled his fingers into Marcus’ shirt, suddenly aware of how close together they were, Marcus’ thigh pressed against him, his chest under Thomas’

hands.

Closing his eyes, Thomas inhaled Marcus to try to make the moment into

something different, knowing it was likely lost. But his body was aware of how

temporary this moment could be, such that it could override almost any distraction to make the most of it.

Behind Marcus, the paint dripped off the canvas. Until now, Thomas had kept the door locked except when he was in here, to make this room about his art and

everything inside him that drove it. But he hadn’t barricaded it enough.

“Thomas.”

“Don’t. Just…don’t.” Thomas opened his eyes, turned his head so the brilliant green eyes were close, close enough to make him dizzy. “All the bullshit aside. Did you miss me?”

In answer, Marcus kissed him. Raw, angry, teeth scraping, his hands shoving

Thomas’ away to grab the front of his shirt and yank him harder against him. He pushed his thigh between Thomas’ legs, backing him up to the counter, unleashing a brutal strength that didn’t feel as if there was anything controlling it. Thomas knew he was a strong man, but he’d never gone full out hand to hand with Marcus.

Marcus hooked his hand in the back of Thomas’ jeans, hauled him hard up against him, his thigh pressed in tight on his balls, making Thomas feel the steel length of him.

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Then Marcus moved his hand to the front, opened Thomas’ jeans and reached in,

gripped him.

“Les…Rory…” Thomas managed to tear his mouth away and gasp. “They might

come check…”

“Then you better let me fuck you with no arguments to slow us down,” Marcus

growled. He pulled at Thomas’ shirt, simply tore it open and shoved him to the floor, making him stumble and fall, roll to his back. Marcus was down on him in an instant, his hand gripping Thomas’ throat, holding him flat to the floor in an instant as his mouth and teeth closed over Thomas’ nipple.

Thomas bucked, thrust against Marcus, but his knee firmly anchored him and

Thomas couldn’t dislodge him, even though he gave it his full strength, suddenly fueled by his own delayed reaction to the intensity of what had just almost happened here, what it all meant.

Marcus was terrifyingly invincible when he was furious. And Thomas wanted it so badly he could come from the power of that anger alone.

She’d destroyed it…but she couldn’t destroy this, could she? He shoved it from his mind, the idea of Marcus being painted out of his life by slaps of thick white paint. He tried to rear up again and Marcus slammed him back down by that hold on his throat so Thomas could only latch onto his hip with one hand, clinging, pulling, digging in, seeking some sense he was in control.

Marcus worked him in the other hand now, his touch rough, sure, jerking him off with no intent but to prove he could bring it out of him whenever he chose.

“Marcus—” he had to gasp around the hold on his throat, but Marcus was

relentless, releasing him only for a moment to pull him over, shove him back down on his stomach, yanking up his hips so Thomas had to scrabble for purchase on the throw rug before Marcus was jerking down his jeans, still fisting his cock, his mouth on his bare spine while Thomas shattered, unable to get a rhythm, unable to do anything but go along on the ride.

He savored every brutal touch, even as he knew this was being taken by force, no choices in truth. Marcus fully intended to fuck him whether he said no or not. His fury and violence had to go somewhere other that breaking his mother’s neck, and

apparently this was the channel for it.

Thomas welcomed it. Needed it.

Marcus plunged his fingers into his ass, working him with those clever fingertips.

Thomas spurted, shouting out hoarsely despite himself.

While he was still jetting milky fluid into the rug, Marcus rammed home deep,

hard, ruthless. This wasn’t making love, or having sex. Or even fucking. This was ripping Thomas’ soul out of his body through his cock. It had all the vicious brutality of rape, every touch intended to punish, to prove Marcus had power over him. Yet,

because they couldn’t stop being themselves, all Thomas wanted was more. He

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tightened his ass muscles, moved back against Marcus and earned a snarl, but he kept doing it.

Marcus seized Thomas’ hair and yanked his head, holding it at a savage angle,

letting Thomas feel his strength, his ability to snap his spine, his life in his hands.

Thomas knew he could do anything to him. But that sword, like his life, could have two edges. He worked Marcus’ cock inside him, squeezing, stroking as Marcus pumped.

Felt triumph when hot seed flooded him, going deep and then overflowing, leaking down his buttocks, his quivering thighs.

Silence brought disquieting thoughts, the smell of fresh paint. Thomas closed his eyes. Marcus sat up on his haunches and abruptly yanked Thomas up by the shoulders, collaring him. He held him back against his body, still embedded in his ass, making him face the painting.

“Is that what you want? Are you going to wait until she whitewashes your whole

fucking life?”

Thomas stared at it. A part of the tree still remained, and behind the paint he saw faint traces of limbs, both of the tree and the bodies. As if knowing what the most painful and tempting part of the painting had been, his mother had painted the lovers entwined under the tree first, obliterated them entirely. He put his hand up to Marcus’

on his throat, laid his fingers over his long ones.

Stroking the knuckles, Thomas stared at it some more. Moved up to Marcus’ hair, the feathering at the forehead, feeling him, working backward in his awkward position down to where Thomas could grip the shoulder of Marcus’ shirt and hold on, gripping tightly enough to strain the seams.

Marcus let out a sigh, pressed his lips to Thomas’ throat. Bit hard, suckled the skin past the point of pain while Thomas stayed still, trembling. Marcus’ hand slid over his pubic area, gently took his semi-erect cock and began to manipulate it, fondle it, making Thomas jerk at the hypersensitivity of its post-climactic state.

“Christ, you drive me crazy. Can you fix it?”

Thomas nodded. “I took photos of all of them,” he said thickly, though he

shuddered at the idea of another night like the one when he finished it. “Kept the sketches. I can recreate it. I’ll just change the lock and make sure she can’t get in. You can take the rest and I’ll ship it up to you next week.”

Marcus nodded. “All right.” He took a deep breath, his chest expanding against

Thomas’ back. “I’m not here just for that, pet. Get dressed. I bought a piece of property.

The Hill farm right down the road. I want you to go look at it with me.”

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After dropping that major bomb, Marcus withdrew almost politely from Thomas’

ass. He asked where he could clean up, which he proceeded to do at the utility sink, using paper towels and soap. As he gestured to Thomas to take his place, he refused to answer any questions, simply told Thomas he’d meet him in the car.

Thomas saw his sister at the door of the store as he crossed to the parking lot. When he opened his mouth, she nodded, waved him on. “We’re quiet right now. Just come back for the post-lunch rush.”

“I told your sister I would have you back in an hour, assuming you get a lunch

break.” Marcus was standing beside the rental car. “She told me to take as long as we need.”

When Thomas got in, Marcus pulled out of the gravel parking lot, gunned the

engine to pull ahead of a slow moving pickup truck. Mr. Gardelli, coming to get more fertilizer, Thomas assumed. Who’d probably be eyeing the fast car and muttering about Yankee invasion. “I like your sister,” Marcus commented.

“She wants to ditch the next semester to stay home and help. Says I shouldn’t be carrying it all.”

“She’s right, but not about the college part. You set her straight.”

“I did, but she’s got a stubborn streak.”

“Thank God she’s the only one in the family. It can be a pain when they’re all

infested with it.”

Thomas sent him a narrow glance, but Marcus said nothing further, just gave him a bland smile.

The Hill farm was five miles down from the hardware store, set back a half mile from the road. It was a rambling old farmhouse, built in the 1940s, in need of work, sitting on ten acres. Mr. Hill had died last year and Mrs. Hill was comfortably ensconced in an assisted living facility. It hadn’t been an actual farm for ten years, but the Hills had had some small plots for a roadside produce stand to supplement their social security.

There was a barn with a loft, a storage building, as well as a well-laid-out yard that Mrs. Hill had once kept cultivated with flower gardens. A swing hung from the old live oak in the front yard, which also had the remains of a tree house from when the kids were younger.

“Have you been inside before?” Marcus asked as they got out of the car.

“Yeah. We grew up with a couple of the kids. Mrs. Hill baked a lot. We stole a pie from her window once and she chased us all about five miles up the road with a

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spoon.” Laughing all the way, Thomas remembered. He remembered he’d hung back to get the brunt of it because Rory hadn’t hit his growth spurt and was too young to outrun her, shorter legs and arms pumping. He’d been shouting joyously, still too young to know what the word bitter meant.

Marcus was on the porch, had unlocked the door and was letting it stand open. He turned. Gestured to the barn. “Lot of space there. It has a loft. The whole thing would make a great studio.”

Yeah. It would.
Thomas was gripped between anticipation and apprehension. He didn’t want to think it, hope it, because he knew it wouldn’t work.

“Marcus, what are you doing?”

Marcus studied him in that intent way again. “Just what I said I was doing.

Reclaiming my property.”

He tilted his head toward the door, then stepped in, disappearing. Thomas swore softly, went up the stairs and followed him. He’d always liked the big wraparound porch. Sitting on the bottom step, spitting watermelon seeds at Johnny and May Hill, keeping an eye on Les as his Mom and Mrs. Hill shared cake and talked.

There was no furniture in the big kitchen except for a dusty oak table that had been left there. The paper on the walls was harvest gold seventies floral and stripes, but the smell of old wood preserved by quality care and brought out at this particular time of day by the sun was soothing. There was a quiet to the house, as it waited to become a home again. Perhaps to the two men regarding each other across the room.

“We could restore this together.” Marcus put it out there. “Mix of old and new, traditional with our own tastes.”

“Marcus, you live in a penthouse.”

Marcus shrugged, settled back against the counter, crossing his arms, watching

Thomas with those brilliant green eyes. A dragon’s eyes. “I live anywhere I want to live.

I can maintain a residence here and in New York. There’s a small airstrip nearby that can handle private planes. I can fly back and forth as needed to the gallery. Both of us could go there whenever we want to. I have an excellent general manager. She’d be delighted to take on more responsibility.”

“You don’t belong here. You don’t fit. You’d hate it after a week. Local theater consists of the high school’s biannual production of Gershwin, or Rodgers and

Hammerstein. No gourmet shops.”

“There’s only one question relevant for you to answer. Do I belong with you?”

Thomas swallowed, looked away. “That’s not the issue.”

“I just made it the issue. Do you belong to me, Thomas?”

A pause, a quick jerk of his head. He couldn’t deny it, had said it before. Marcus’

eyes flared, quick and hot, but still he didn’t move. The room seemed to be getting smaller.

“Then, next question, same question. Do I belong with you?”

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“That’s not for me to say. I can’t—”

“If it’s not for you to say, then it’s for me to say. Why the hell are you so afraid to take this for yourself? I say I do belong with you. To you.”

Marcus’ eyes traveled around the kitchen. “There’s a good fresh market right up the road,” he mentioned, changing the direction of the conversation, putting Thomas off balance. “The sign caught my eye. Strawberries, flowers and boiled peanuts. Ordinary things, put on a sign like the most amazing treasures. Reassuring, basic. I picked up some excellent tomatoes and green peppers from a woman wearing a purple and red hat that any pimp on the strip would envy.”