The Island (8 page)

He walked up the steps to the bungalow.

Lee was waiting for him on his knees beside the bed. He was still wet from the shower. His naked body gleamed under the lights. His head was bowed. Droplets of water chased down his back.

Long runs on the beach, Shaw told himself. They were a much better way to work himself into a hot sweat. Long runs, long swims, and maybe he’d be able to keep his head.

Shaw remembered how Vornis had attracted the boy’s attention. He whistled sharply, and Lee’s head snapped up. Shaw gestured to the bed and watched as Lee climbed up and lay on his back. He was all long limbs and angles.

Shaw moved to the table, picking up another condom. He looked at the rest of the equipment. Not the cattle prod, Jesus, but the scarf and the cuffs? He’d put them to good use in the past. It was a shame they were instruments of torture to the boy. He couldn’t use them.

A large moth tapped and pinged against one of the lights on the ceiling.

Shaw dropped his towel on the floor and crossed to the bed. He settled himself between Lee’s spread thighs and looked down at him. The boy’s cock was hard, and Shaw felt a jolt of surprise. It grew as he watched it, thickening, hardening, and slowly rising to push up against Lee’s stomach. Shaw wished he could touch it, feel the weight of it in his hand, and trace the thick vein underneath with his thumb. Christ, maybe the kid wasn’t straight after all.

He looked at Lee’s face, and there was no denying the hungry look on it. It couldn’t all have been misplaced gratitude. His green eyes were half-closed, and his lips hung open slightly. He wasn’t passive like the night before. He was eager. Shaw felt even more sorry for him. How long had it been since the kid had equated sex with pleasure? Too bad that Shaw was in no position to give it to him.

Shaw drew the sheet up again, and saw a flash of disappointment cross Lee’s face. Shaw frowned at him.

“Legs up.”

Lee shivered at his harsh tone.

“Hurry the fuck up,” Shaw snapped.

Lee raised his legs, folding them back against his body and holding them there. Shaw eased himself down, checking the sheet was still in place, and made a fist around his cock. He began to rock, leaning his weight on the boy’s legs. The sight of Lee’s body spread underneath his own was almost enough. Almost. He wanted to push his cock into the boy’s tight, hot ass, but this would have to do.

Lee cried out, and it sounded so much like pain that Shaw almost stopped moving.

“Shut your fucking mouth,” he said, and the resentment wasn’t all feigned. This was torture.

“Sorry, sir,” Lee murmured, and the
sir
made Shaw’s cock leap in his fist.

Lee closed his eyes, clawing the sheets. He writhed, and it looked a lot like pain. Shaw, who kept hitting the boy’s hard prick with the back of his fist whenever he finished a rough downward stroke, knew exactly what it was. If he hadn’t been holding himself away from the boy’s ass with his weight awkwardly on his left arm, he would have reached down to help him out with that properly. Or, even better, he’d lie on his back with the boy riding his cock, and he could take care of himself. That image alone almost undid him.

Christ. This was high school shit. Mutual masturbation without the mutual. It had never felt so unsatisfying. He’d never wanted it to end so quickly.

Shaw fixed his eyes on Lee’s mouth and imagined those lips stretched around his cock. He imagined Lee, on his knees, looking up at him with those brilliant green eyes through his dark lashes.

Lee swiped his tongue over his bottom lip, and Shaw came. His whole body jerked, and he pushed his hips forward. He felt Lee’s cock straining between their stomachs and gripped it before he could remind himself it was a bad fucking idea. He fastened his fingers around Lee’s hot shaft and stroked him once, twice, and that was all it took before Lee was jerking and shuddering and crying out as well. It sounded a lot less like pain this time.

Shaw fell sideways onto the bed, panting. He wiped his hand on the sheet. He could feel Lee trembling beside him and resisted the urge to pull him into an embrace.

He wondered what the fuck Vornis would make of the surprise ending to their little show. He wondered if Vornis had ever made the boy come. He glanced over at Lee and saw that he was crying now. Shaw felt guilt twist in his guts and shook it off.

Tears would look good for the cameras.

* * * *

Shaw drew his laptop up onto the bed, turning onto his side so that it was shielded between his body and Lee’s. He made a show of checking news sites first, and stock prices and exchange rates. Nothing to see here, move along.

Outside, the evening buzzed with insects. Shaw could hear the endless heavy roll of the ocean against the sand. God, it was so loud but so soothing at the same time. Everything here was contradictory. The island itself, so beautiful, so peaceful. So terrible. And Lee. Shaw couldn’t see the bruises in moonlight and shadow. Chose not to. Shaw pulled his gaze away with difficulty, before he felt compelled to touch. Before he ran his fingers down Lee’s gleaming torso. His fingers and his mouth, discovering Lee’s skin, his pecs, his nipples; following the dip in his sternum all the way down to his abdomen. To touch, to taste. Shaw squeezed his eyes shut as his cock stirred again.

You’re smarter than this. Focus!

There was only one way he could touch Lee in this place: want, force, take. That wasn’t a place Shaw wanted to go. Not with anyone, not ever. He had to draw a line somewhere.

Focus.

There was no new e-mail from Callie, but Shaw composed one:
Lee Anderson. Info ASAP please
. He deleted the second sentence after he read it. He knew he could trust Callie to make whatever he wanted her first priority. She was dependable. She was more than dependable.

This strange world that they inhabited made their relationship even stranger. They were friends. They trusted one another implicitly. They shared custody of a dog. And they hardly saw one another.

If you weren’t gay
, Callie said all the time, and Shaw always followed up with,
If you were a man…

Shaw had never had a friendship that had lasted. They were impractical in his line of work. They could be dangerous. But Callie had made the transition from trusted colleague to trusted friend. It was such a relief, he supposed, to have someone who knew all his worst secrets and liked him and supported him despite them. Because Shaw surrounded himself with monsters, he was afraid of becoming one. He knew Callie would never let it happen. Not without a fight.

Lee, sleeping, turned over on his side to face Shaw. Shaw took the opportunity to angle the laptop slightly and photograph him. Proof of life would go a long way. He sent the picture with the e-mail, and then deleted them both from the hard drive. His encryption levels took care of the rest, scrubbing everything clean. There was nothing on his laptop that Vornis could use to accuse him of breaching his trust. Because trust was all there was in this business, apart from force, and it was the most fragile of things.

He logged into a social media site next and checked his messages. There was a new one from Stuart:
Hi! Can’t wait to see you! XOXO!

Shaw smiled at that. Stuart sounded more like a flirt every time. He messaged back:
Hi Stuart. Great to hear from you. Love to catch up soon
. He logged off and closed his laptop. Shaw liked hearing from Stuart. Stuart was a sure thing, and there were so few sure things in Shaw’s life.

He looked at Lee, who appeared even younger when he was asleep. His face was untroubled, and Shaw envied him that. He was no stranger to nightmares after six years in the business. He wondered why Lee didn’t wake up screaming. Was it because he believed he was safe in Shaw’s bed? Or were the drugs still flooding his system?

Lee shifted in his sleep and moved a hand up to his face.

Shaw looked at the raw skin and the bruises around Lee’s wrist. He must have struggled at some point. Like an animal, Hanson had said. Shaw expected that Vornis had encouraged it. Vornis liked to break his enemies, and this one was well and truly broken. Shaw wondered if Lee knew that. Had he realized that Vornis was probably already bored with his dazed compliance and would kill him sooner rather than later? He wouldn’t have let Shaw play with his toy if he still coveted it. And eight weeks, by all accounts, was a long time for Vornis to keep a prisoner. Lee’s odds grew shorter every day.

Shaw rolled onto his back and watched the ceiling fan spinning lazily. There was that crazy fantasy again, poking at the edges of his mind: the boat, the ocean, and the salvation.
Focus
. He was about to sell a painting for ninety-five million dollars. He was about to meet a group of the world’s most powerful men. And Shaw lived for moments like these. So why did he feel like shit? Why did he feel like he should be doing something more for Lee? Common sense and a sharp instinct for self-preservation told him there was nothing else he could do. Now was not the time to have a crisis of conscience.

Shaw rose from the bed and headed outside. The night was dark and peaceful, and the stars were brilliant. There was nothing like waves rolling endlessly on a beach to put things into perspective, like staring up at night into a timeless field of stars. The little things didn’t matter anymore. Even the life-and-death things faded.

Shaw stood in the shallows for a while, letting the tiny waves crest and crash around his ankles. The water was cool, and Shaw sank deeper into the sand. He breathed for a while, just stood and breathed, and then turned and trudged back to the bungalow. Lee was still asleep.

Shaw realized he stank of sweat and cum. It wasn’t the sort of scent that usually turned his stomach, but under these circumstances? Yeah, he needed to get clean. Running a hand through his hair, Shaw headed back down into the starlit bathroom and stripped off. He stepped back into the shower. His third shower in a day. That had to be some sort of a record.

He scrubbed his skin clean, looking up at the flawless sky. His bare toes sank into the crushed coral, and Shaw sighed. God, he’d love a place like this one day, without someone like Vornis breathing down his neck. Without the fucking complications.

The cool water stung his shoulders, and Shaw realized he’d burned earlier. Now that was the sort of distraction he could rely on. A few days of itchy, peeling skin would keep his mind off Lee.

He turned around to reach for his towel, and Lee was right in front of him. His eyes were clearer than Shaw had ever seen them.

He stepped into the shower before Shaw could turn it off. “My name is Lee Anderson,” he said under the roar of the water. “I’m with the DEA.”

Shaw raised his eyebrows at that. The DEA? Sure, Vornis had inherited his father-in-law’s business, but drugs were, literally, the least of his sins. The DEA didn’t know whom they’d gone up against. Whoever had supplied their intel had given them just enough rope to hang themselves.

“Fuck,” Shaw said. “Vornis thinks you’re CIA.”

Lee stared at him. “And who are you?”

“Shaw,” said Shaw. “And the less you know about my business, the better.”

“Is that it?” Lee asked. “Is that all you’ll say?”

“You should be thankful I don’t break your neck,” Shaw told him, narrowing his eyes in the gloom. “DEA, CIA, it’s all the fucking same to me.”

Lee’s gaze faltered. “But you’re not like him.”

“I’m not a rapist,” Shaw said, “but I’m a lot of other things. Look, you can either keep your questions to yourself, or you can go back to Vornis right now.”

“Will you really tell them I’m here?” Lee asked.

Shaw frowned. He had that whole kicked-puppy look again. “I said I would. It’s up to you if you believe it or not. I don’t give a fuck what you think.”

Lee flinched at his tone.

“But bring it up again,” Shaw said, “and I
will
break your fucking neck.”

Less shrank back. His chest rose and fell heavily.

The moon appeared from behind the drift of a cloud, flooding the shower with silver light.

Shaw shook his head at Lee. “And what’s this shit with following me in here? You’re not supposed to think for yourself, mate.”

Lee shook his head slightly. “No, he
um
, he—it’s okay. He likes me to follow him.”

“Yeah, I saw that,” Shaw said. “You’re a good little puppy. But I didn’t whistle.”

“Sometimes,” Lee said, the words coming with difficulty, “sometimes I get a treat if I go to him without being called.”

“What sort of treat?” Shaw asked with a frown, knowing he wouldn’t like the answer and wondering why he’d been compelled to ask such a stupid fucking question.

Lee couldn’t meet his eyes. “Sometimes he won’t whip me after.”

“Yeah,” said Shaw in a low voice. His guts twisted. “Well, he’s a sick fuck.”

“Are you?” Lee asked, still looking at his feet.

“Jesus,” Shaw muttered. “Just…just get out of here, okay?” He watched, astonished, as Lee went down onto his knees instead. “What the hell are you doing?”

Lee moved forward on his knees, the coral crunching. It must have hurt, but he didn’t even wince. He was used to worse. “Just let me, please.”

“Oh, fuck, kid,” Shaw said, and then his voice hit another pitch as Lee reached out for his cock. “
Fuck
.”

One slender hand wrapped around his shaft. The other cupped his balls. Shaw jerked back and cracked his head on the wall of the shower recess.

“Don’t,” he said. “You don’t have to do that. You’re not my fucking toy.”

Lee looked up at him, and it was as good as Shaw had imagined. Better, even, because rivulets of water ran over his skin, and droplets caught on his lashes and his lips. He gleamed in the moonlight. He was beautiful.

“I want to,” he said and angled Shaw’s cock toward his mouth.

Shaw had a lot of reasons to push him away. He didn’t want to get any closer to the kid. He didn’t want to be the next man who used him. He didn’t want to be like Vornis in any way imaginable. And Jesus, he’d just threatened Lee, and this was how he responded? That was fucked-up. But every single protest died the second Shaw felt those warm lips close over the head of his cock.