Use these three words: red, buoyancy, terra cotta or Lovers such as I (my Richard Harris tribute) or "How dare you toy with my affections?"
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This week, I continue with the saga of Lust Never Sleeps. When we last left our heroes, they were under attack!
Lust Never Sleeps 13: In an Octopus' Garden
There’d been other casualties, Darryl noticed, as the roadster/flying machine careened through the emptying cobbled streets. People whose bodies were stuck at strange angles, limbs twisted, faces contorted in painful grimaces. No one paid the dead any heed, racing past them in a blind panic. Everyone that could was running for shelter: ducking into the nearest doorways or through open windows, racing down the steps into the tube stations, hiding beneath the thickest bushes they could find. Anything was preferable to remaining in the open, a visible target for the enemy.
Whomever that might be. That was one point on which Darryl had yet to be enlightened. And now did not appear to be a good time to ask.
He sat up front, as close to Sawyer as he could get, one hand upon the other man’s muscular thigh. Amandine and Brushton were crowded together in the narrow backseat. Darryl turned his head to find Sawyer’s ex clutching at her top hat, which appeared in imminent danger of blowing off. She glared at Darryl, eyes narrowed.
“What is it, sister dear?” Brushton asked. He had filled his pockets with food he’d filched from one of the wrought iron tables, and now he nibbled at it, while darting fearful glances about them.
“That boy is a monster!” she shrilled indignantly. “I’m telling you, he burned my hand…”
“The beast!” Brushton added his glare to Amandine’s, playing the dutiful brother. Even as he stuffed another handful of food into his face.
Darryl turned around again, ignoring her nonsensical tirade, his attention focused on Sawyer. He cast pensive glances up into the sky, but there was no sign of the little beasts, whatever they were. He couldn’t get Sawyer’s words out of his mind though: That was just the first wave. First of how many? Were they all like those vicious flying things? Or did something worse lurk in the wings?
“Do you and this… Elias person… not get along?” He leaned in to Sawyer, utilizing his need to whisper as a reason to do so. But truth be told, he simply wanted an excuse to inhale Sawyer’s fragrance, to reassure himself with the blond’s scent.
“No, we get along fine,” was Sawyer’s non-responsive response. He turned his head, and his lips met Darryl’s and any other questions he might have had fled from Darryl’s brain.
It was impossible to maintain any sense of his bearings in this strange place, what with all the twists and turns that Sawyer took, in and out of an assortment of side streets and alleys and unsavory looking thoroughfares. It was enough work for Darryl just to keep his balance. The more the car veered, the tighter he clung to Sawyer. He wasn’t complaining, although he could have wished it were under other circumstances. Naked circumstances, to be precise.
It wasn’t until the car took an unexpected turn, squeezing between two tall buildings that seemed to loom ominously closely on either side that they emerged at last alongside a river. This must be the docks Sawyer had spoken of. Now to find the safe house.
Sawyer parked the car in the shadow of one of the tall buildings. On close scrutiny, it seemed old and abandoned. In fact, the entire area looked distinctly uninhabited, Darryl realized. What sort of safe house were they going to?
Brushton jumped from the car as soon as it stopped, reaching his hand to assist his sister out of the vehicle. She dusted off the back of her trousers, regarding Sawyer with a certain amount of impatience. “Well? You don’t intend to sit there all day, surely?”
“Of course not,” he muttered. “Sorry to inconvenience you.” He stepped out of the car, drawing Darryl after him. He kept him close, one arm tight about his chest at all times.
“Fah!” Amandine muttered, stamping her booted foot against the cobblestones. She glared at Darryl, before stomping off, Brushton close behind.
“I say, wait up, Sister!”
“Is she this way with all your… I mean… with all your lovers such as I?” Darryl tried to find the right words, before blurting out his question.
“Only you, lovie, only you.”
“Oh. Well, I’m glad I’m so spec—“
Sawyer interrupted his sarcasm. He pulled Darryl to him, pressing their lips together so tightly Darryl quickly forgot where they were and what they were doing, until a well-aimed missile caught him in the back of his head and he pulled back with a yelp. They both glared in Amandine’s direction, but she gave them a guileless look.
“Come, love,” Sawyer sighed. “Can’t put off the inevitable forever.”
Amandine turned on her heel, stalking toward the docks in high dudgeon, Brushton at her side, Darryl and Sawyer following close behind. Darryl’s eyes surveyed the docks. They were old and rickety-looking. And quite empty. He was having qualms about this safe house. Where the deuce was it? There weren’t even any boats about—not a dinghy or canoe to be seen—which left out the idea that maybe the safe house was actually a houseboat.
The nearer they drew to the water, the murkier it looked. “What river is this?” Darryl asked.
“It’s the Lost River,” Brushton answered.
The Lost River, inside the city of Lust. Interesting.
“Why do they call it Lost?” Darryl asked.
Brushton shrugged. “I forget.”
“Because those who drink its water become lost in their own minds,” Amandine supplied.
Don’t drink the water. Important information to possess.
Shadows seemed to lurk just beneath the surface. As well as something of an unknown shape and size. Darryl peered at it, but the shifting darkness of the water served to obscure his vision.
“What is that down there?” he asked.
“The safe house,” Sawyer replied, just as the water began to bubble and the object in question broke the surface, bobbing alongside the dock.
Metallic, somewhat spherical in shape. As Darryl stared, a hatch opened, and a strange figure appeared.
“Ahoy maties! Welcome aboard!”
to be continued
Now go take a look at the other Flashers!
Sui Lynn m/m
Lily Sawyer m/m
West Thornhill m/m
Heather Lin m/f
LM Brown m/m
Freddy MacKay m/m
Thanks for stopping by, hope you had a good time! See you next week for another edition!
Until next time, take care!
♥ Julie
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