Intoxicating, page 24
He hit play and grinned into the camera. “Hey, everybody, it’s me, Wyatt Hudson, here today with an extra-special video. I promised you guys if I hit one million followers that I would finally give in and take part in the boyfriend challenge—well, husband in my case—and let Linc do my makeup on camera. Well, three days ago, I hit that magic number, so today is the day. I hope you enjoy.”
Wyatt propped the camera up on the shelf. “Before we get into that part, I just wanted to thank you guys. It’s insane how quickly life can change. I spent twenty-two years feeling like I would never measure up, never be loved, never have anything real in my life.” He took a deep breath, overwhelmed by thoughts of his past, blinking back the tears pricking at the back of his eyes. “Sorry. I’m super sappy today. But it’s been five months since the scandal broke with my dad and I don’t even recognize my life. Four months ago, I started this YouTube channel for my makeup tutorials, and I’ve already hit a million subscribers. A giant scandal will do that, I guess, but I’ll take it.”
He laughed, then sobered. “Three months ago, I officially started intensive therapy sessions with my new shrink.” He rolled his eyes. “I know, I’m so LA. Two months ago, they offered me my first chance to speak out against conversion therapy and help draw attention to the horrors that happen inside. It sounds crazy, but the more I talk about the abuse I suffered by Victor Osborne, the less power it has over me. He may not be in prison, but he’s also no longer running camps that hurt kids, and there’s some comfort in that. While I haven’t pressed charges, others have. Hopefully, they’ll get justice and he’ll go to jail.” He paused, swallowing hard, his gaze darting toward the bedroom before turning back to the camera with a grin and holding up his left hand. “And one month ago today, I got to marry the love of my life.”
He leaned into the camera.
“I’m not telling you all this to brag. I know not everybody has a trust fund to fall back on or a soft place to land, and getting out of an abusive situation is never easy. Sometimes, leaving means going into an even worse situation. Sometimes, the people who are supposed to love you, no matter what, kick you out. But I’m working with my grandmother and some very good friends to help people who feel trapped get out of their bad situations, no matter what their financial circumstances, and to help people who feel they have no place to go, feel safe.” He blushed, suddenly awkward. “But that’s for another day. On to the fun stuff.”
He picked up the camera, panning it around the room. “This is our loft in the fashion district, and by our loft, I mean it belongs to my fabulous sister-in-law, Ellie. Now, you all know my best friend, Charlie, is in New York, staring in that off-off-off Broadway production that’s supposed to be, like, the next Hamilton or whatever, but you might not know that Ellie is their costume designer, so the girls are subletting their loft to us until they come back, which I’m hoping isn’t for a very long time. Because I love it here. Isn’t it cute?”
It was hardly more than two rooms. A small upscale kitchen with its natural wood and stainless-steel appliances bled into a cozy living room, which Ellie had decorated in her funky bohemian style. A brick half-wall separated the living room from the king-size bed and the door, which led to the bathroom. It was small and expensive, like everything else in LA, but Wyatt loved it. He loved it because it was his home with Linc. At least, for now.
Wyatt flipped the screen outward so he could turn the camera toward the hall, letting his audience see what he saw. As he came to the bedroom door, he stopped short, mouth suddenly dry. He’d heard Linc come in a bit ago, but he’d been in the kitchen trying to get enough coffee on-board to do his video.
Linc lay on the messy bed, still in his work clothes. Well, most of his work clothes. He wore black pants and his white button-down shirt, top button undone, and his sleeves rolled to the elbow, his legs crossed at the ankles. How could black socks look so fucking hot?
Papers surrounded Linc, his black-framed reading glasses perched on his nose as he squinted at something on his phone screen. Wyatt’s dick couldn’t help but take notice. He hit pause, setting the camera on the dresser before crossing the room. Linc looked up just as Wyatt snatched his phone and tossed it to the end of the bed, displacing Linc’s papers as he straddled his lap.
“Hi,” Linc said, amused.
“Hey, Daddy,” Wyatt murmured, capturing Linc’s mouth in a dirty kiss. “You’re home early.”
“Therapy today.”
Wyatt paused briefly to look at Linc. “Did it go okay?”
He gave a half-nod. “Same as always, I suppose. Emotionally draining. Figured I’d work from home for the rest of the day.”
Wyatt hummed his approval, returning to his previous exploration. “Good idea.”
“I’m a little busy here, brat,” he rumbled.
Wyatt rocked his hips against Linc’s, moaning when he felt Linc already hardening behind his zipper. “You’re supposed to be doing my makeup for my video today. My audience loves to see your face on camera,” he said. He bit at Linc’s jaw, then his lower lip, rapidly losing interest in his own project. “Besides, you can’t lie here in your Daddy clothes and not expect me to jump your bones. You know what these glasses do to me.”
Linc threaded his fingers through Wyatt’s curls, tugging his head back to bite at his throat. “I forgot about the video,” he admitted, grinding their erections together through the thin layers of material. “Wanna go do that now?” he asked, knowing full well Wyatt wasn’t leaving that bed until Linc fucked him.
Wyatt yanked his shirt over his head, flinging it across the room, his fingers going for the buttons on Linc’s shirt. “They can wait. I need you inside me. Now.” Linc started to take his shirt off, but Wyatt shook his head. “Leave your clothes on, especially the glasses. I just want to do this.” He lowered his head and licked over Linc’s flat nipple.
“Fuck,” Linc hissed. “You’re being a very bossy bottom right now.”
Wyatt slanted his lips across Linc’s. “Yeah, what are you gonna do about it?”
“Pants off. Now,” Linc growled.
Wyatt really had the best life ever. “Yes, Daddy.”
* * *
The End
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June 5th, 2009
“Dammit, girl. How could you not tell me?”
Elijah flinched at the fury in his grandpa’s voice. In the twelve years he’d been alive, he’d never heard the elder Elijah raise his voice at his mother. Even when she deserved it. Which was all the time. She badmouthed Elijah’s dad constantly. He was dead, and she still couldn’t seem to stop blaming him for everything bad that happened in their lives.
“Because it wasn’t any of your business,” his mother said, her tone cold enough to send an icy trickle of fear along Elijah’s spine. “Eli had no right to tell you. We could get in a lot of trouble.”
“No right? No right? You’re lucky I’m a gentleman or I’d slap the taste out of your mouth. That’s my grandson. That man hurt him. Him, not you. He had the right to shout it from the goddamn rooftops if he wanted to. A right you stole from him with this…joke of a settlement.”
She scoffed. “Easy for you to say. Elijah and I might need those seven zeroes if he can’t pull it together. He’s already had to bow out of one deal because of his panic attacks. If he can’t get past this, we’ll have to survive somehow.”
Guilt curdled like bad milk in his stomach. He was trying. Couldn’t she see that? Elijah swiped at the tears on his cheeks, his face hot, pressing himself deeper into the tiny alcove at the top of the stairs. They wouldn’t see him. They didn’t know he was listening. There was no way to even know he was there, but still, he felt vulnerable. He pulled his legs to his chest, wrapping his arms around them, and rested his cheek against his upraised knees.
He thought she’d be happy now that she had the money, but she wasn’t. Every time he cried, every time he woke up screaming, she looked at him with such disgust. Sometimes, she tried to bribe him with video games or candy. “Just smile. Come on, Eli. You’re an actor. Just act like it never happened until you forget that it did happen. I know it doesn’t seem like it now, but this could be the best thing that ever happened to us.”
“You greedy bitch.” Elijah’s gaze went wide, and he bit down on his lower lip until he tasted copper. His grandpa’s voice trembled as if he was barely holding it together. Elijah knew that feeling. “When my good-for-nothing son died and left you penniless, I made sure you and the boy would want for nothing. I gave you my home, I paid off your car and your thousands of dollars in credit card debt. Hell, I even paid for all three of your trips to rehab. But that wasn’t enough for you. You shoved that boy in front of a camera the first chance you got, profiting off my name and my legacy.”
“Eli loves acting,” she swore.
It was true. Elijah had loved it. There had been nothing better than putting on a costume and pretending to be somebody else for a while. It didn’t matter who. But that was ruined now. The one thing that Elijah had loved more than anything was now dirty and ugly and twisted. Now, every time there was a camera on him, his skin crawled like there were millions of ants underneath it, and his stomach swooped like he was on a roller coaster.
“You treat him like he’s a cash cow. He has no friends, no hobbies, no life. Only work!” his grandfather shouted.
“Elijah is a star. He has been in four blockbuster films. He’s walked a hundred red carpets. I did that. Not you. Not his father. He has a career because of me. He will be set for life because of me. Do you know what I was doing at twelve to survive? I promise you, I didn’t have a house like this.”
“Jesus. Do you even hear yourself? You’re so desperate to make him into the star you could never be that you sold out your own son.”
She gasped. “I did no such thing. How dare you? I love my son. He was supposed to help Eli. I never thought—”
“Don’t give me that horseshit,” his grandpa snapped. “Everybody knew the rumors. Hell, I haven’t stepped foot in Hollywood in ten years and even I’d heard what kind of man he was. You ignored it, just like you ignore anything that doesn’t suit your narrative. You ignored it because of his connections, because of greed. You let that man—” Elijah went cold and then hot as his grandpa choked on a sob. His grandpa never cried. Ever. Not even when his dad had died. “You let that man take advantage of Elijah, and then you signed this—” Papers slapped against a hard surface. “And you told him it didn’t matter.”
There was the loud crack of skin on skin. “You smug bastard. It’s so easy to swoop in after the fact and act like you would have done things differently.”
“Smug? Of course, I would have done things differently. I would have called the police.”
“Do you think the police would have done jack—”
“I would have called the police,” he shouted over her. “And if that didn’t work, I would have called the FBI. I would have kept calling until they arrested him.” He halted, taking a deep breath. When he spoke again, it was softer. “I would have let that boy tell his story. You put a gag order on a twelve-year-old boy and told him what happened to him didn’t matter. How long before you shoved him back in front of the cameras?”
His mother tsked. “What good does dwelling do? It won’t make it go away. It won’t change what happened. He needs a distraction. He needs to get on with his life.”
“You’re a monster. I’ve always known it. I just let myself believe you would at least be tender-hearted with your own child. Now, I see the truth. You’re not fit to take care of him. The boy’s coming with me.”
There was a long silence. Elijah picked up his head, his hands trembling as he rubbed his eyes, his heart beating just a little too fast against his ribs. Oh, please. Oh, please. Oh, please. Dread pooled like tar in his belly. His mom would never let him go. She said it all the time.
“You’re insane. I’ll never let that happen,” she said, clearly shocked at his grandpa’s words.
“Oh, yes you will. You will or I’ll go to the press, and you’ll be on the hook when this piece of shit sues your ass for violating the contract. I promise, whatever number he asks for will make this look like cab fare.”
“You’d hang me out to dry like that? You’d only hurt Eli. They’d demand the money back.”
“My grandson will never want for anything. The boy is coming with me, and don’t even think about touching this settlement. It belongs to Eli, and I’ll go broke before I let you touch even one penny of that blood money.”
“What am I supposed to do?” she asked, indignant.
His grandpa sounded disgusted when he said, “I’d tell you to get a job, but I don’t trust you not to go adopt some poor kid from the orphanage and throw him into some dog and pony show. You leave us alone, and I’ll make sure you get a big, fat check every month. But if you press this issue, I’ll ruin you. That boy needs peace and time to heal. He doesn’t need some harpy screaming in his ear every day, making him feel worse.”
“I’m his mother. He won’t want to go.”
“He’ll go. That boy needs somebody on his side…and that will never be you.”
There was the sound of boots on the stairs and his mother sobbing from somewhere below. Elijah couldn’t bring himself to move. He just sat there, numb, feeling like somebody had taken a sword and cut him into two pieces. The Elijah before and the Elijah after. Before Elijah had color and happiness and warmth, but the other Elijah—the Elijah he was now—had nothing but gray and empty and cold. He was always so cold. He didn’t know if moving to Montana would put him back together, but he couldn’t help but feel like staying in Hollywood would only ensure his two pieces drifted farther apart.
A shadow loomed above Elijah, and then his grandpa was hunkering down beside him. His long gray hair hung to his shoulders, and his brown eyes were red where they should have been white, but he gave Eli a wet smile. “Your dad used to hide in this same spot when he was a kid.”
Elijah said nothing, but he nodded, wiping the snot dripping from his nose on the sleeve of his black T-shirt.
“How’d you like to come stay with me?”
“For how long?” Elijah managed, his voice raw.
“For as long as you want. Sound good?”
Eli managed another nod but couldn’t help saying, “She’ll come to get me eventually.”
His grandpa ruffled his hair. “You let me worry about your mother. Let’s go get your things.”
His grandpa’s hand was rough, but Elijah gripped it anyway. He held on for dear life because he just knew if he let go, all the monsters in his life would keep him there, and Elijah needed to be as far away from this town as possible.
* * *
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