Chapter 14 #4
“What if we’d stayed a local garage band?
Practicing wherever we could find a place that didn’t annoy the neighbors and make them call the cops.
Playing weekend gigs in front of a couple dozen or a couple hundred people who love the music.
Getting paid enough to cover gas and expenses, our instrument maintenance, maybe a few six packs.
Every Monday we’d go back to our jobs at the coffee shop, the car wash, the restaurant, the service station, no one recognizing our faces. ”
At Roy’s inquisitive look, he filled in the blanks.
“Steve was assistant manager at a coffee shop. Pete was a mechanic. Loved his cars. Tal worked at the car wash. I was a waiter at a restaurant.” His lips curved.
“‘Are you ready to order, sir? Can I tell you about today’s specials?’” Then his gaze darkened again.
“They’d be alive, wouldn’t they? I’d trade where we are now for that in a heartbeat. ”
“Yeah, but life isn’t lived like that. Not if you’re really living it.”
DJ’s attention went back to their hands, his thumb sliding across Roy’s knuckles.
“Tell me about your first private security job. As an adult,” he added, with a touch of amusement.
“You started in the military, protecting high value visitors, politicians who wanted to visit the hot spots. Still have the uniform?"
Roy shot him a look. "Do you ever stop?"
"Never. Have cock, will use it whenever the occasion calls for it, and most occasions involving a silver fox bodyguard do."
Roy freed his hand and propped it by DJ’s hip as he took a sip of his own coffee. “C’mon,” DJ coaxed. “Moss told me that a Hollywood celeb you’d covered on a USO tour recommended you to a buddy of his when you went private, and ever since, you've been in demand.”
“Ah hell, that job.” Roy shook his head.
" Dudley’s actor friend had a stalker problem.
The ‘stalker’ was an ex-girlfriend. Thanks to the bomb threats, he was living in terror of getting into his car, walking out his door, jumping off the diving board into his fancy pool, or even sitting on the toilet. ”
“She was a Lethal Weapon fan,” DJ noted.
“Veronica Mars as well. She’d hired tech nerds to infiltrate every smart device the guy had owned.
When he wasn’t worried about exploding, his HVAC was a roller coaster of extremes, acid rock exploded through his bedroom speakers at two a.m., and worst of all—according to him—his coffee maker refused to work. ”
Roy pursed his lips. “If she’d stuck to the bomb threats, figuring it out would have taken longer, but the personal shit pointed right to a pissed off ex.” He sighed. “The dumb son of a bitch is back with her now. Said her devotion had impressed him.
“I got more selective as time went on. Real threats, to people worth protecting. My people are laying their lives on the line, so I won’t let them be wasted on someone who prefers being stupid to being alive.”
DJ winced. "Harsh but fair, I guess. So how many get turned down?"
"About 75%. Some really don't need my level of services, and I just point them to better day-to-day security options."
“So you handle your clients like a parent. ‘You respect me, I respect you. You don’t, I will not hesitate to smack your ass in front of the whole world to teach you manners.’”
“Harsh but fair,” Roy acknowledged.
DJ chuckled, and Roy leisurely perused the light smile on his face, his free hand under his head, biceps bunched, his upper body stretched out. The sheet was pulled low on his bare hips.
DJ’s eyelids fell to half mast, his lips settling into a sensual invitation. But the tempting oblivion that Roy taking command could offer him wasn’t the right call this morning. “Sex is a good escape at times. Other times not.”
“And you get to make that call.”
“What can I say? It’s good to be called Master.”
DJ’s mouth tightened, but his hand dropped back onto Roy’s, still braced at his hip. Abruptly, his face creased, as if a dozen needles were stabbing him. “I can’t hear it, Roy. I can’t hear the words. Or the notes. They float around me, but they don’t come together.”
Though his distress made it his first impulse, Roy didn’t reassure him. He let DJ get it out.
“I’ve spent all my life connected to a muse that wanted me to create.
It’s made me feel that’s who I am. That that’s what’s important about me.
My brothers are fucking dead. They gave up their lives.
Should I really give a shit that my creative faucet has been shut off?
Oh, after making me more money than I could spend in ten lifetimes.
Cry me a river, bitch. Better yet, let me give you an enema with it. Using a fireman hose.”
“Dory.” Roy set aside his coffee and gripped his hand again. “Don’t give yourself shit. That’s a pit you don’t want to fall into. Just talk. Say what’s inside you.”
DJ took a breath that hitched on a half sob. “I don’t worry that I can’t be something else, do something else. It’s knowing I’ll never again be as much or whole or complete as I was when I was doing this. With them. I need them.”
It was like the earlier tears. A faucet had been opened, and the flow of words came fast and unchecked.
“But maybe now I should be content to have something less.
Be something less. Because I was lucky as hell to get it to begin with.
Kind of like what Gilda was saying about the cartilage.
When you're young, you lived life fully, so it's okay when you start to creak and have arthritis and shit and can't do so much, because you did do it, you know? You didn't miss out. You didn’t waste the gift.”
“If it helps, you’d be a hell of a museum employee.”
“You’d be the hottest shepherd ever.”
“Tell me something I don’t know.”
“How about you tell me something I don’t know?” DJ rubbed his face, visibly pushing himself away from the darker path of his thoughts. “What band would make you forget to protect me? Who could make you shove me aside and say ‘Hey, watch your own ass. That's so-n-so, for God's sake."
Roy chuckled. "No one," he said seriously. "The better question is who would make me consider it.”
When he didn’t say anything further, DJ’s eyes narrowed. “So what? It’s top-secret intel? Or something you’ll only tell your soulmate?”
“Something like that.”
“Jerk.” DJ did his best to punch him with his free hand. Roy quelled the motion, then kissed him, curling fingers in his tousled hair.
When he drew back, he didn’t go far, staying eye to eye with his troubled submissive. “Nothing needs to happen now,” Roy said quietly. “But you know there are other musicians out there that feel the music and magic you do.”
DJ stiffened. “I can’t even think of auditioning anyone. It hurts too much.”
“I know. You’ll take what time you need, and the interest, the desire, will come when it’s ready. If it’s ready.”
“Yeah. You know, if it’s okay, I think I want to sleep a while longer.” As DJ turned over on his side, wrapping his arms around a fat pillow and closing his eyes, Roy raised a brow and laid a hand on his hip.
“I’ll give you fifteen minutes. If you’re not in the shower, I’ll dump cold water on you. We’ll eat on the back deck. I made a breakfast casserole.”
DJ said something uncomplimentary into the pillow. Roy let it go and picked up his coffee, moving to the doorway. When he reached it, he looked back at the inert lump in the bed.
He’d assumed composing music and lyrics was the lifeboat DJ needed to keep the grief from drowning him, but after this conversation, Roy was having a different thought. Simply reestablishing his bond with music might be the vessel he needed.
Recalling what Mick had told him, Roy pulled out his phone to verify the location of The Rocking Duck and the show schedule.
After they visited the erotic shop tomorrow, Roy knew where he’d be taking his submissive next.