‘OK,’ I say. I close my eyes and this deep, deep, hauntingly beautiful voice pours like oil from a jar into my ear. Smooth. Smooth. It is so poignant I feel tears start to gather at the backs of my eyes. In my mind Cash is singing it. As the song progresses, the man’s voice becomes richer and richer and the words resonate and ring in my ear. Under that patch of Cash’s night sky, I became witness to someone else’s darkness. Finally, the man’s voice becomes rousing and powerful, a screaming crescendo like the kind of thing you would hear at a heavy metal concert.
When it is over I turn my head and look at Cash with new eyes. I thought I’d see the real him and he would not live up to my fantasy, but he is even greater than what I believed him to be.
‘Why don’t you make music like this then?’ I ask softly.
‘My record company doesn’t want it.’
‘Why?’
‘The fans don’t want it,’ he says with a shrug of his broad shoulders.
‘How do you know your fans don’t want it?’
He sighs. ‘Your fans never want something different from you. They just want more and more of the same. Every artist in the current climate, no matter how successful, has found that out. When they produce the kind of music that they think is special, their critics are quick to accuse them of indulging themselves and their fans simply don’t buy their records.’
‘But if you don’t love what you are doing …’
He flicks away the cigarette butt and laughs, a short bitter laugh. ‘Well, Wildcat, we all have to do things we don’t want to. I’m sure all those people working in chicken processing factories or collecting the refuse or finding things to recycle from rubbish dumps would rather they weren’t doing those jobs, so I can’t complain too much about singing teeny-bopper stuff.’
‘They don’t have a choice. They’d probably go hungry, or be homeless if they don’t. You have enough money behind you to be brave.’
He stands up and looks down at me, an odd expression on his face. ‘Brave? You want to see bravery?’
I feel fear clutch at my stomach. He has just smoked a joint. We’re a crazy distance from the ground. He’s going to do something stupid. We’re both going to die. ‘Don’t be an idiot,’ I say sternly.
Fixing his eyes on me, he lifts his hands out to shoulder level on either side of him and he starts walking backwards on the narrow ridge with a kind of elegant dance move.
‘Stop it. This is stupid,’ I shout, my voice full of panic.
‘Why? You wanted me to be brave and this is what bravery means when you go against billion-dollar record companies,’ he says as he carries on walking backwards.
‘OK, I got it. OK. I got it. Now stop. Please. You’re scaring me.’
‘Look, handstand,’ he says, and suddenly he is on the palms of his hands.
With my heart in my mouth I stand shakily. ‘I’m going back in, you stupid freak. Go ahead and break your neck. As if I give a shit,’ I cry, my voice trembling with emotion.
He rights himself and stares at me. For a few moments we are both standing on the roof staring at each other. Then he hunkers down on his haunches.
‘Don’t give me them eyes, baby.’
‘Yeah, well,’ I breathe, embarrassed by my own outburst. ‘Can we just go back into the house now?’
‘I’m sorry I scared you,’ he says softly.
I wrap my arms around myself and nod. ‘Apology accepted.’
‘Remember when Prince was so furious with his record company he went around with the word slave written on his face. He was not kidding.’
I lower myself back down into a sitting position. ‘But you could create something original. Something special,’ I say earnestly.
He shakes his head. ‘The record companies don’t want creativity or something special from their artists. In fact, they do everything in their power to turn us into homogenized, processed ‘stars’. Fucking puppets, that’s what we are. They give us the tune, they give us the words, they even give us our dance steps. We sing their words and move to their commands and even before our sell-by date comes around the machine will have already picked and begun grooming our replacements.’
‘That’s exactly why you need to follow your heart. You should reach for the stars. I believe you can touch them because you have a truly unique talent.’
I lean back against the chimney and he walks up to me. ‘Your concern is touching though,’ he says softly. ‘Thank you.’
I open my mouth to deny that I care, but I can’t. Not when his eyes are so naked and sincere. For a few seconds neither of us moves. Then the mask drops back over his face and he is Cash Hunter the star, the celebrity, the irrepressible skirt-chasing bad boy again. He puts his finger under my chin and smiles cheekily.
‘Ready for another round of basket weaving?’ He smiles wickedly.
‘No,’ I whisper, but my eyes look at his lips hungrily.
‘Fuck,’ he says, dragging his thumb along my lower lip. ‘You’re driving me mad, Wildcat. I can’t even think when you look at me like that. All I want to do is bury my cock inside you.’ He drags his thumb along my lower lip.
I stare at the smoldering pits of green fire as they come closer and closer. Sparks fly between us. His mouth is warm and tastes of smoke. I thought I would hate it, but it is sexy. Everything about him is infuriatingly sexy. Our lips part reluctantly. I stare at him. The silky strands of shoulder-length brown hair dusted with gold lift in the breeze and fall about his strong neck. I reach out a hand and curl a silky lock around my finger.
‘What shampoo do you use?’ I whisper in a hypnotic daze.
He grins. ‘Something called Ten Voss. Why? Is it turning you on?’
‘Screw you, Hunter.’
‘Excellent suggestion,’ he growls and, putting his spread palm on the small of my back, pulls me close to his body. I know that I will never forget this moment for as long as I live. When I went up on the roof and shared something real with Cash Hunter.
He helps me down the roof and through the window.
I watch him close and secure it. Then we walk down the corridor, silent as mice. At my bedroom door I turn to face him. I see the look in his eyes.
‘Cash …’
‘Uh … huh?’
‘What happened between us earlier was a kind of temporary insanity. I … we really shouldn’t do it anymore. It’s … er … not right. I … well … work for your dad,’ I stutter.
‘You’re right, we shouldn’t do it again,’ he murmurs as he reaches behind me, opens the door and pushes me in.
Chapter Fifteen
Tori
He kicks the door closed with his heel and our mouths crash together, our tongues twine, and our hands pull and rip each other’s clothes off in a wild frenzy.
Then we are naked. His fingers are like fire on my skin. Everywhere he touches burns. I press my naked body into his hardness and rub myself restlessly against him. He propels me backwards until the backs of my legs hit the bed.
Locked in a kiss I vaguely hear the sound of a condom packet tearing. Our mouths make a sucking sound as he pulls away. He takes a pillow and throws it on the bed.
‘There’s no one to save you now,’ he says thickly, and turns me over. My face lands in the pillow.
‘Lift your ass higher and show me your pussy,’ he orders.
I obey, spreading my legs wider to give him a better view.
‘Look at that. Hot, wet and ready.’
Splaying my legs wide open, he gets between them and finger fucks me. A fiery stream of pleasure rushes through my veins as juice gushes out of me and soaks his hand and the bed. My orgasm is immediate and shockingly explosive. I bite the pillow to
keep my scream muffled. Possessively, he grips my ass and keeps his thumb jammed inside my pussy while the waves of contractions race from my core to the tips of my fingers and toes. I hear his voice come from far away.
Gripping my butt cheeks he pushes into me. Thick, hot and incredibly hard. It seems to take forever to journey into me. Finally, he is in and I squeeze and milk his cock with my pussy. My muscles dance around his cock making shudders race through him and his dick pulse inside me.
‘Goddamn you,’ he says in a low lusty voice, and starts to ferociously pound my pussy.
‘Oh yeeees,’ I hiss
With the sinews of his shoulders straining and his neck and chest red, fucking me hard, he shoots hot cum into me.
‘That was so amazing,’ I pant, gazing up at him.
Pulling out of me, he crouches between my legs and, to my shock, I feel his hot, velvety tongue lapping at my wet folds, his tongue slicing through. His mouth suckling.
‘Oh God! Again?’ I squeak.
‘I’m gonna make your sweet, achy pussy come so hard, you’re won’t be able to breathe,’ he says, and spreads my slit with four fingers of his magic hands. Opening me right to my sphincter he gets engulfed in my heat, my scent, my flesh. Until I go rigid and climax again. When the aftershocks subside, he pulls up to me.
‘Nice basket,’ I whisper hoarsely.
He chuckles. ‘I was working with a grade A, premium pussy. I could spend all day weaving.’
I turn my head to look at him. ‘Do you realize that your thumb is still inside me?’
He grins. ‘Yup. Pussies are where I’m at.’
‘Would you mind terribly taking it out?’ I ask in a mock English accent.
That makes him laugh. ‘Only if I’m going to replace it with my cock.’
‘Holy crap. What are you? A sex addict or something? Have you not had enough?’
‘Are you kidding? I’ve barely started.’
‘Oh, yeah?’ I look down and his cock is already an exclamation mark.
I roll on to my side and crouch next to his body. ‘Do you ever think of anything else but getting laid?’ I ask, wrapping my hands around the base of his cock.