Complementary Colors (7 page)

“Jesus,” Roy said. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen weather like this.” We dripped water up a flight of steps. “Sorry, there’s no elevator.”

“I’m surprised there’s electricity.” I ran a hand along the pitted railing. Missing rungs left gaping holes and very little support.

A blaring TV from inside one of the units was drowned out by the angry yell of a woman. She didn’t speak English so I had no idea what she said, but going by her tone, it couldn’t have been good.

“I’m down here.”

We made our way through discarded toys, forgotten drink cups, and the occasional article of clothing to a door close to the end of the hall.

Roy fumbled for his keys. A man wearing a pair of boxers stumbled out of another apartment. He held up his beer can like he could shield himself from the items hurled at him.

The woman who didn’t speak English finished her assault by pegging him in the head with a Bible.

She slammed the door, and the man screamed, “Bitch.”

“C’mon.” Roy pulled me inside. More yelling was followed by a crying infant. “Sorry about that.” He flipped on a light.

Roy’s apartment consisted of a cramped kitchen in one corner separated from the rest of the space by a length of countertop. There was less than two yards between the sofa and the bed. A table and set of chairs ate up the blank spot on the other side of the room, and a bookshelf crowded the wall.

Everything was old, worn out, and rumpled.

Roy stared at his feet while he rubbed the back of his neck. “I know it’s not what you’re used to.”

Which was exactly why I loved it. “It’s perfect.”

He gave me a questioning look. I dropped the raincoat on the floor and wandered over to the bed. A patchwork quilt covered thin cotton sheets. Everything had been carefully folded down. I touched the head-shaped dimple in the pillow.

“Let me make you some coffee.” Roy squeezed by me. There was a clink and scrape from the kitchen. “Do you drink coffee? Or would you rather have tea? It’s nothing fancy, just those little store packets.”

“Coffee is fine.” I kicked off my shoes and unbuttoned my shirt. There was no place to put it so I left it on the floor at the foot of the bed.

“Are you hungry? I can throw on a can of soup.” A cabinet door opened and shut.

My pants wound up with the shirt.

It was warmer inside Roy’s apartment, but not much. Definitely not enough to convince my testicles to quit burrowing into my stomach.

I stretched out on Roy’s lumpy mattress. His pillow smelled just like him: rich, earthy, with a slight spice. It wasn’t strong enough to be cologne, and it mixed too well with the smell of clean sheets. I knew then that wonderful scent was all him.

“The coffee will take a couple of min—” Roy stood on the edge of the linoleum staring at me. The coffeepot percolated behind him on the counter.

I propped my head on my hand. “I think I’m cold, Roy.”

“I’ll turn up the heat.”

“Why don’t you come over here and join me instead?”

“The coffee.”

“It will keep.”

“You need to eat.”

“No, what I need is your cock in my ass.” I bent my knees and spread my legs.

Roy closed his eyes for a moment. The microwave beeped, and he returned to the kitchen. When he came back out, he carried a bowl of soup and set it on the bedside table. His gaze stayed on the ground.

“Here.” He stirred it with a spoon. “It’s just canned, but it will help you get warm.”

“Look at me, Roy.” He stopped moving. “Quit playing innocent and look at me.” The hunger in his eyes turned them black. I sat up enough to pull his shirt out of his pants and slide my hands up his stomach. His skin burned my fingertips.

Roy clasped one of my hands between his. “You’re freezing.” He tugged the comforter around my shoulders. I grabbed him by his face and slammed our mouths together.

The surprised sound Roy made vibrated across my tongue. I forced him to open wider, to take me deeper. He resisted only for a moment, then he wrapped his arms around me, cupping the back of my head as he pushed me into the mattress.

I locked my legs around Roy’s hips and rolled us over. He didn’t even have time to look surprised before I’d yanked his jeans open, freeing his cock. The thick length of flesh curved toward his stomach.

“Tell me what you want,” I said.

Roy watched me with wide eyes.

“C’mon, Roy, you gotta have some idea.”

His chest heaved with every breath.

“Alright, then I’ll decide for you.” His jeans abraded my cock and balls on my way down his legs. I closed my lips over his dick and took him to the back of my throat.

“Oh, God.” Roy put his hand on the back of my head. “God, Paris, that’s…” A tremor ran down his legs.

I hummed around him as I pulled to the tip. Another downstroke made him tighten his grip on my hair. Every slide of my lips milked another bitter drop of precum.

Roy pumped his hips, pulled my hair, and forced me to take him so deep it became a choice between obeying and breathing. I struggled to time my inhales with the pulls on his cock.

I was sure I was close to passing out when he pulled me up and under him. Roy kicked off his boots, shoved his jeans down his legs, and yanked his shirt over his head so fast a couple of the buttons popped off. Then he covered me with the scorching mass of his body.

“I want to fuck you.” A primal growl followed his words.

I yanked his hair. “Then do it.” He attacked my neck with violent kisses. “That’s it…more.” He pinned my wrists above my head with one hand. “Yesss—”

Roy fumbled with the drawer on the bedside table. He pulled away from me long enough to pour lubricant over his cock. It dripped in silky rivulets down the length.

He dropped the bottle and collected the excess on his fingertips.

“Now,” I said.

“Just let me…”

I twisted free and flipped over on my stomach. “Fuck me.” I drew my knees up and put my ass in his face.

“Goddamn you.” He pushed the head of his cock into my opening, then his powerful legs pummeled me with every thrust.

I managed to pull myself up on the headboard. The change in angle tightened my body until every pump he gave me skimmed across my prostate. Electric bursts rode up my spine.

“Harder.” I had to lock my arms to keep from being smashed against the wall.

Flesh slapped against flesh. Sweat sprinkled my back. An inferno seared away the chill in my bones.

“Good, so gooood—” I clenched.

To keep his rhythm, he had to grip my hips with enough force to bruise. The glorious assault added pain to the pleasure.

The hum growing in my balls spread until all I could feel was his cock sliding in and out, striking sparks of pleasure that threatened to burn me to ash.

A groan ticked out of Roy’s chest, becoming a guttural roar, but he somehow kept from coming until I barked out a cry and shot all over his pillow.

His breath on the back of my neck was almost as hot as his lips when he brushed small kisses against my skin. It bothered me how the gentle touch felt better than his cock in my ass, his hands bruising my flesh, or being pinned and made helpless.

My ass hurt when I perched on the barstool Roy had pulled up to the counter. I wondered why we sat there instead of the table until I saw the duct tape on the rungs of the chairs.

Roy caught me looking. “It came with the apartment. Otherwise, I’d get rid of it.”

“Their version of furnished?”

“Yeah. At least the bookshelf was usable.”

“I hope the sofa and bed are yours.”

“Salvation Army but yeah, they’re mine. Believe it or not, the mattress set still had the tags on it.”

“I believe you.” I’d sent enough unworn shirts with Alice when she changed out my wardrobe.

Roy took a bowl of soup from the microwave. “Here.” He sat it on the counter in front of me.

“So why were you out in the rain?” He finished assembling two sandwiches. He put the one with the extra meat in front of me. I switched it with his. He frowned.

“It was either the rain or my sister. I chose the rain. If I’d known you were wandering out there, I would have bolted a lot sooner.”

The blush in his cheeks was dark under his caramel skin. He ate part of his sandwich, and I chased the letter-shaped pasta around the bowl with my spoon.

“If you dislike her so much, why not make her leave?”

“I can’t.”

“Why not?”

“Do as I say, Paris, or I’ll make sure you spend the rest of your life in this hellhole.”
I traced the vein in the back of his hand. There was a scar between his first two fingers, at the base of his thumb, another near his wrist. I touched each of them.

“I do construction in the summer and get cut up a lot.”

“What about this one?” There was an inch long, raised bit of flesh just under his middle knuckle. Roy flexed his hand and put it in his lap.

I propped my chin on my fist while he concentrated on finishing his sandwich.

“So tell me, what does the great Roy Callahan do on his days off?”

He caught a piece of tomato trying to escape. “Not much time off.” He ate it. “But when there is, I usually sleep or watch a little TV.”

Was the relic sitting on the opposite counter even color? “It works?”

“Mostly.”

“A few more years and it will be an antique.”

He chuckled.

“How much do you pay for this place?”

“Seven hundred dollars too much.” He shrugged. “But it’s dry and people leave me alone.”

I had a hard time believing someone as imposing as him ever had to worry about being bothered. But he did stick out like a sore thumb in his blue jeans and flannel shirts.

“Where are you from, originally? Not from here, I know.” While he talked with a Southern accent, it didn’t have the same twang as the natives.

“Arkansas.” He nodded at the bowl of soup. “That’s going to get cold.”

“Why did you leave?”

“There was nothing left to make me stay.” He finished off his sandwich.

I pushed mine over to him. “I ate lunch before I ran into you.”

He gave me a look that said he suspected I was lying.

“Promise.” I gave him a slow smile.

He took a bite of the sandwich. Chewed. Swallowed. “Where are you from?”

“Here.”

“You don’t have an accent.”

“My family was transplanted from a few states up north. But I was born here.”

He nodded. “Have you always done art for a living?”

I took a bite of the soup. It was still warm, but barely. “Not always.”

“How old were you when you started?”

“You realize you can get answers to all these question with a quick search on the internet or any number of art magazines.”

“I’d rather talk to you than read about you.”

“Reading about me would be safer.”

For me. For him. For my heart.

“How do you figure that?”

I petted his hand. “Because you’re a good person and I would ruin you.”

“Why would you ruin me?”

“I ruin everyone, Roy. I’m a disease.”

“Don’t say that.”

I shrugged. “Why not? It’s true.”

“According to who? Your sister?”

“Por favor, señor, ¿ha visto a mi hijo?”

I pressed my fingers against the pain stabbing my temple.

“Are you okay?”

“Fine.”

“Me llamo
…”

Roy made me look at him. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing?”

“You’re pale.”

I laughed and pulled away. “Lots of time indoors will do that.” The spoon tumbled from my hand.

Roy went to turn up the heat.

“I said I’m fine.”

“You’re shivering.”

“A drink would be far more effective than heat.”

“Please eat.” He sat.

I ate a few bites of soup, hoping he’d quit staring at me. He didn’t until half the bowl was empty.

Roy went to the kitchen and came back with a glass of orange juice.

“You forgot the vodka.”

“I’m all out.”

The juice tasted weird without the alcohol. “See, you’re so wholesome you don’t even keep booze in the place.”

He finished pouring himself a glass. Roy capped the jug and stood there rubbing the scar on the back of his hand. “My cellmate tried to get a little too friendly and didn’t want to take no for an answer. Neither did the guy in the shower. Or the meal hall. After that, I wasn’t very popular. I learned really fast it was better when people were afraid of you.”

“You went to jail?”

“Prison.” He took the OJ back to the fridge.

“There’s a difference?”

“County and Federal. So yeah, here’s a big difference.”

People like Roy didn’t do things bad enough to wind up behind bars. It was impossible.

“Why were you in prison?”

He stayed on the other side of the counter. “I killed a man.” For a moment, I thought I saw tears in his eyes, but it disappeared behind the glass he drank from.

“What happened?”

“Does it matter?”

“Yes.” Because there had to be a very good reason for someone like him to hurt anyone.

He put the empty glass in the sink. “I was in a bar fight, and a man died.”

“And the reason for the fight?”

“It was just a fight.”

“I don’t believe that.”

“Then we’re even.”

“Even? How.”

“You lied about eating.”

So he did know. “Big difference. Tell me. Please.”

Roy scrubbed his hands over his face, then folded his arms over his chest. He stared with no expression on his face but somehow looked destroyed.

He cleared his throat. “The crowds were really bad on Fridays. Construction workers, truck drivers, guys from the college. It was pretty normal for things to get rowdy. I was in the back by the pool tables with a bunch of other men on my crew.” The tick returned to his jaw.

“Keep going.”

“I really don’t…” He sighed. “Like I said, it was crowded. Some of the other guys got too friendly with this girl, a waitress. At some point, one of them made a pass. She turned him down, and he didn’t want to take no for an answer. By the time I saw what they were doing, they already had her shirt off. There had to be fifteen other men standing around, and none of them did a damn thing to stop it.”