Lost in the Echo Read online

  Dark. This dream was dark. Eyelashes brushed over silk that was pulled tight against his eyes, making his head hurt from the crushing pressure of the knot caught between pillows and skull. The need was there to rub fingers against the ache, but his hands refused, seeming to want to keep his arms held wide open, welcoming whatever sacrifice he was being offered for. The shift of sheet would brush against his nakedness, and part of him wanted to laugh, maybe cry out at why he’d be naked mid-run, but his throat was too dry, and a run of choking was all he could manage.

  That soft creak, creak-creak came to a stop, forcing Will to control his coughing and tilt his ear towards the sound, trying to gauge, to understand why the noise would react to his. But then the creak, creak-creak started again, just at the foot of the bed, off to the left, and it added to the gentle sweep of the fan, the soft lap of the sheet.

  A groan, Will relaxed his body completely, giving in to the sounds, how it sang a tripped-out lullaby that pushed him back into the land of dark dreams and bound, naked bodies.

  Images shifted in the darkness: black eyes hidden in a curtain of black hair that made life worth living, if only for four short years. But upset… those eyes had always held a shimmer of water, never quite managing to let go of emotion, yet somehow needing to. It had come once, and no foster-parent manual could have warned Will about the fallout. The fight of a thirteen-year-old boy, twisting beneath the covers, calling out the terrors of being left on his own as a toddler. Nothing had broken those tears. Nothing had let Will get close and just hold, just catch him before he fell—

  Will cried out, digging his heels into the bed, stretching his head back as he arched his body. Fading dreams nearly had him calling out a name he rarely spoke, and he stopped it before it escaped. As much as the hurt needed a name, he couldn’t risk crying it out for fear of losing the memories of all the good that came with the call of it.

  The creak, creak-creak came to a stop, and life slipped into sharp focus for Will. Rope bit into his wrists, bringing with it the deep ache of constantly having his arms held wide and raised slightly off the pillows. That same burn was around his ankles as he lay there spread wide. Life was kept in shadow as a blindfold sent his world into nothing but one huge deprivation tank of sense and sensation.

  Move. Will’s first tug and kick against the rope was to test the tension, his second and third to test whatever strength it would take to get free, his fourth— shouted desperation when he found it didn’t matter how hard he struggled, he couldn’t move. “Let me fucking move.”

  “Move?” said someone. “Curious.”

  Will went still hearing the male voice. He sorted through every person he’d come into contact with over the years. Language. He knew language, how the voice could be manipulated, twisted— but he couldn’t place this new voice.

  “You didn’t ask to be let go and—”

  “Let me fucking go.” Will slammed his head into the mattress. “Let me fucking g—” A heavy creak of bedsprings, Will choked as someone grabbed him by the throat, straining the muscles in his neck. A body and breath pressed in close, coating Will with a threat to never let go if he carried on.

  “Watch your mouth, Mr. Chambers. My friend holding you down here isn’t keen on foul language.” Finding it hard to breathe, Will frowned. The male voice had come from the bottom left of the bed, but someone else, some friend, held him down. Friend’s breath brushed his face, and Will blinked almost instinctively even though the blindfold blackened out the view. He caught a slight hint of coffee, a stronger scent that echoed the freshness of the forest, or Friend had just been outside and carried it back in with him. It wasn’t the type to be bought as a cologne, just a natural scent of life lived in the outdoors. The grip around his throat was hard, vice-like, and more than enough to still Will’s mouth. “Good boy.” The same male voice from the bottom of the bed, and that creaking started again. The fan had stopped, everything carrying its own fresh chill, but that creak. That damn creak, creak-creak, it came again, and Will forced air through his nostrils, making them flare in frustration as Friend’s hand patted his cheek. Then the bed took a natural shape and he was left alone.

  Will thought about his wallet, his car, but if these two men were local, and they had to be to have gone so far into the forest, they would have taken his things by now and left him alone. He came here often enough, and his run was regular, never straying from the path. Never straying from any goddamn path. A glance through his log cabin patio windows would have given away everything he owned: Will knew he’d forgotten to draw the blinds last night. He bit back a groan. The windows. Were these two opportunists or had they been watching since he’d arrived? When he’d wandered around naked, when he’d…

  “Get an eyeful?” he snarled, and the creaking came to a stop again. “You like what you see, you sick—”

  A touch brushed Will’s outer thigh, causing him to hiss and try to move to the side, away from the onslaught. But the sheet was gathered, and Will felt heat touch his cheeks when it was pulled down over his hips, exposing everything he had to the cool air.

  “Oh, right,” said Will. “All about getting fucked, is it?” He snorted coldly, although he was shaking like hell and trying not to show it. “What a disappointment. Trust me to get the fucks who can’t think beyond their dicks an—”

  “You wanna see a dick?” Friend’s voice was nothing but heat and hiss against Will’s face as his hand crushed between Will’s legs, encasing his balls and squeezing until colours exploded behind Will’s blindfold. “I’ll show you a—” Friend cut his words, but didn’t loosen his grip. Will squirmed there, trying to close his legs to ease the intense grip-release-grip agony hitting his body. Friend’s voice was different, trained. Pitch seemed dropped, making it more guttural, more like gravel being sorted through a sieve. It seemed natural enough, the drop from the laryngeal cartilage coming deep. Will couldn’t place it in context to anything he knew, to anyone he knew, and… and that hand was so tight between his legs, making him writhe now.

  “Ease off.” That came from the Voice, now sounding a little tense and close by the bed. Will felt a jolt, almost like a shove, and the grip tore free from his groin. Will whimpered release, although the loss of hand and new grip of cold air only seemed to make his balls swell and throb that little bit more.

  “Right.” That was Mr. Voice again. “If you learn to be a good lad” —the sound came from the bottom of the bed— “you earn the right to do this next trick away from the bed, until then…”

  Earn what? “What the hell do you want from me?”

  A bottle pressed against his groin and Will jerked from the cold assault.

  “I don’t want to have to clean those sheets just yet, Mr. Chambers. I want you to do what’s natural when you awaken in the morning.”

  Will tried to shift away, hide from the coldness between his thighs that demanded he react. “It fuh—” He stopped himself swearing, knowing it was Friend who held the bottle against his groin and how he more than still hurt from the cock-and-ball torture he’d just been put through. Will pulled hard on his stomach muscles and heard the rope creak as he did the same to his bindings. Half in fear, half in just the need to lie still and disappear buried everything else. He was exposed to the room, to a Friend who was anything but.

  “We don’t have all day, Mr. Chambers.”

  “Why… what the hell are you doing?” He addressed that to the Voice at the bottom of the bed. “Why are you doing this?” The need was there to try and grab the sheet, or just curl up and hide how the cold of the bottle stung the heat and hurt in his cock. “Just fuh-tell me.”

  “The bottle?” said Voice. “So you don’t make a mess of yourself. Aren’t we good to you?” The creak of a rocking chair started again as Will groaned his reply. The ache was easing between his thighs, but the insistent need to relieve himself pressed into his groin, followed by a farther press of a cold bottle against his tip.

  “C’mon, I know you like
to mess around with both sides,” said Voice, “so having a guy touch you there should be nothing new for a bi, right? You should enjoy it, really.”

  Will reddened.

  “We’re in agreement, Mr. Chambers. I don’t actually like this, nor does my friend, so can you hurry up, please?”

  Bastard. A rough touch forced his tip into the bottle and Will blushed as he started to do what came naturally. The sound grated, hearing his body react and trickle into a container. It was nothing new walking into a restroom and doing what he needed to do; he’d thought nothing of it in the past. Being naked and bound to a bed? Knowing men watched without trying to ignore what was going on? Will finished and twisted his head into the pillow to try and hide.

  “Not so difficult, now was it?”

  The blindfold helped. They could see him, but at least he couldn’t see them.

  The sound of a cloth being rinsed out came from Will’s right, then the bed depressed at his side. The touch of cool water played havoc with his abs, forcing him to draw in a sharp breath, more from the cold shock over the rough wipes at his stomach, his chest, up, then down his arms. The damp cloth touched his face, forcing Will to twist away for fear of suffocation. But the cloth roughly cleaned despite his protests, leaving fringe, cheeks, and lips slightly damp. His neck now arched slightly, head tilted back, Will chased a bead of water from one corner of his lips to the other as dehydration nibbled at the back of his mind, and as he did, the cloth shifted down his throat, drew dampness over his chest, following the dips and curves to his abs, all to inch towards his thighs.

  “Don’t.” He screwed his eyes shut despite being caught in the blackness of the blindfold. “Please.”

  “Beg me to stop again,” said a Friendly voice in his ear. It carried no sexual tinge, just anger. Will didn’t, and a rough touch cleaned between his thighs. He received the same coolness with a towel before having the sheet pulled up. Just to his hips, no higher.

  The bed took a natural shape again as Friend stood, and Will forced relaxation through his body at the thought of being left alone, of not being touched. He hadn’t let anyone touch for such a long time.

  A hand slipped under his head, encouraging him to lift up as a bottle went to his lips. Will instantly tried to turn away, in no way trusting the holder, in no way trusting the contents, especially considering what he’d just relieved himself into. An angered sigh was given, then the bottle touched his lips again. A little wetness spilt over the seam, and Will caught the scent and taste of orange juice, not to mention the stickiness as it trickled down his throat. His run had been topped with the basic fluids, nothing more, and the need to drink was there. But trust… there was no trust.

  “Drink, Mr. Chambers. My friend here doesn’t seem to have much patience where you’re concerned.”

  “Why me?” Will twisted away from the drink as the grip tightened in his hair. “Answer me and I’ll take your sodding drink.”

  “Take a drink, and I’ll answer your question,” said Voice, still rocking his way through life on the chair.

  A growl, Will took one swig, and a hand pressed over his mouth and nose to make sure he swallowed. Will choked, struggled, then snarled, “I’d have done it without you doing that.” He got another pat to his cheek for his effort. “Leave me the hell alone.”

  Footsteps moved towards the door, two sets on a hard wood floor. “Wait,” he said, a little puzzled, now forced to raise his head off the bed. “I drank. You said you’d answer my question.”

  “Yes, I did.”

  “And?”

  A sigh. “I didn’t say when, Mr. Chambers.” A door opened. “Get some rest and learn from the lesson. From here on in, if I ask you a question, you answer it. That order. No deviations.”

  “Why… What the hell am I supposed to know?” Will snarled in frustration. “I’m just a bloody linguistics tutor, not even head of my department.”

  Quiet, then, “You have time to think about that, Mr. Chambers. You think real hard whilst we’re away.”

  The sound of the door closing only added to Will’s frustrated confusion as he pulled at his bonds. Feeling nothing but a sting from the burn of rope around his wrists and the heavy ache in his arms and balls, he let his head drop back onto the pillows.

  “What the hell am I supposed to know?” Throughout his life, Will hadn’t so much as picked up a speeding ticket. Coke. He’d done a little coke in college, messed around with a few lads, but they’d parted on good terms despite Elliot’s vicious games. Then he’d met Erin, settled, got married as his career had taken off, and he’d moved from Dorset to Lancaster. Even after the split from his wife, there’d only been—

  Will cried out. “Let me fucking go.” Then groaned. “Just let me fucking move, please.”

  Left with nothing more but to lie there, Will closed his eyes, willing sleep on, anything to blackout the tumbling questions fogging up his head.

  CHAPTER 4

  LOST IN THE ECHO

  “Come on, you know you love me.” A hand patted the Kawasaki and Will was transfixed on the bright colours, held in a moment where he saw every event unfold in those flecks of red cutting across a black sky, but he was still compelled to answer with the same words: “Enough not to let you kill yourself.”

  Standing there with a thousand and one motorbikes, jet skis, and all the other possible mechanical wet dreams a company could throw at a seventeen-year-old (and his foster dad’s seemingly bottomless wallet), Will again questioned why he’d been talked into the Kawasaki Event here at Silverstone. He ran a touch over the leather seat, squeezing gently to hear the creak under his grip. Bikes had never been his “thing”. There’d been a friend back at college who’d lost his leg on one of these beauties, some bad luck over black ice, a brick wall, and a car behind that had also decided to crash the party. Giving a look back at the big goof of a kid that had moved aside to let him get close, Will couldn’t stomach the thought of seeing him limp for the rest of his life on a prosthetic leg either. Although, and Will fought a grin here, it would slow the quick little sod down.

  “So?” Eyebrows waggled at him and a shoulder gently shoved at Will’s. Hands went in pockets. “Whatd’ya say?” Puppy-dog eyes came next and Will buried a grin seeing all the tricks coming out to play. “Don’t make me pull the ’kid-who-never-got-anything-because-he-was-left-on-his-own-whilst-his-parents-went-for-a-drink,” he took a deep breath, “because-they-were-alcoholics’ card.’”

  “You finished? Maybe need an oxygen mask after that little speech?” said Will, managing a chuckle as someone buffeted past. Will glanced to his left to try and apologise, but whoever it was had already passed him. A look back, he was a little surprised to see Ryan Matthews. Ryan said nothing, never even acknowledged Will, his look was solely on— for— black eyes. And those black eyes returned Ryan’s glance, one that lasted no longer than a second, yet also seemed to last a lifetime between the two young men it concerned.

  Then it was gone; Ryan walking off into the crowd, a black gaze and a slight blush finding Will. Will’s world crashed around him, and the catalyst was right there in that young lover’s look. Anybody else. Christ, anybody else but Elliot’s kid.

  “Actually, no. Not finished.” Another shove made Will stumble a touch. “There was that time last year when you gave me food poisoning.”

  Will groaned, knowing exactly what was coming out now.

  “Oh yeah.” Black eyes were so alive. “In bed for days, I was. Couldn’t even lift my head off the pillow. All thin, weak, and left whimpering just for some loving an—”

  “Hey.” Following the assault of a gravelled voice, four slaps hit Will’s face, stopping a cry he didn’t even know he was making. “Up.”

  No choice was given as a cold, wet cloth rubbed into his face, making him splutter. At the foot of his bed, that rocking started up again, also a gentle tapping, like fingers keeping a gentle beat on wood.

  “You’ve been gone for a few hours, Mr. Chambers. Lunch tim
e. You’re going to eat now. And if you do it without giving my friend here any hassle, next time you might be allowed to sit up.”

  A hand pressed into Will’s scrotum, just threatening with the crushing weight.

  “Are we clear?” said the Voice.

  Will stilled, thinking things over quickly. Being allowed to sit up and eat might mean losing the rope around his wrists so… Yeah, I can do that. He nodded, just once, and his scrotum was released.

  A touch went to the back of his head, lifting him up a little, but Will still found he jerked away when something warm and wet touched his lips. The grip tightened in his hair. “I…” said Will, hearing how croaky his voice was. “I… What is it? Please?”

  There was quiet, then, “Soup,” said Voice. “Tomato.” The creaking started again and he was back to rocking in his chair. “I know you don’t like any other kind.”

  Just how long had they been watching him? Will tried a frown, but it had little effect in the confines of the blindfold. Then the warm spoon demanded access to his mouth again, and Will parted his lips politely even though the need was there to head-butt this so-called Friend. The soup was hot, but not enough to burn his mouth. He swallowed fast, wanting to get this out of the way, get Friend’s touch off him. The same went for the second and third demand into his mouth, but by the fourth, Will was swallowing fast to ease the hunger pains cramping his stomach muscles.

  “Good,” said Voice. He sounded older than Friend, and yet both men had patience. The heavy creak gave an impression of weight and it was contrasted with Friend’s ability to ghost around and barely stain the room. There was a heavy sting of sweat too. Not from Friend, but from someone who carried extra pounds and cooked a little faster in the midday heat. “Drink, Mr. Chambers.”

  A sound of spoon going into an empty bowl, Will found his lips were wiped, then a bottle touched his lips. He drank, this time even lifting his head to drink hard and fast. He was thirsty enough to feel as though his throat had glued itself together.