Midnight Pretenders (BL)

Chapter 49

I HAVE BIG DREAMS for myself. Big dreams of success… A florid kind of success that will drown me in rapturous pleasure and intoxicating satisfaction that no one will ever understand but me.

“Give me hot as hell!”

The loud squealing voice of the photographer spouting demands from where she stood a couple of meters away from me, had my entire nerves rolling into an automatic flowing motion.

I have big dreams…

I instinctively put my hands on my partner’s waist without even trying to ask, pulling her closer to my body. She tensed under my touch, meeting my intense stare directed on her face. But she soon recovered and tried to level her eyes at me, our heated gaze clashed in a stimulating tension.

“Yes, that’s it! Give me more intensity! More desire!”

My beautiful partner eventually succumbed to the orders of our photographer as she openly put her soft hands on top of my shoulders, letting her smooth fingers ran from the side of my neck down to my clavicle. I partially opened my mouth as a response, feeling the sudden chill of her touch spreading warmth all the way down my spine. I gripped the sides of her hips, holding her closer, and our chest touched. Then I leaned my face down to hers, attempting a more provocative pose but she nervously took a step back and hesitated. I could even see the slight reddening of her cheeks.

I smirked at her reaction. And it made me feel more daring.

“That’s so on point, David! Make her submit to you!”

“You’re clever, huh?” I heard my partner muttering to me under her breath. But I ignored her and chose to focus more on the angles of my poses. She soon let her hands roam down to the sides of my body and up to the skin on my back. Her sharp nails dug and left a scratching trail against the smoothness of my skin and the mere sensation earned a hissing sound of arousal from me.

Feeling thrilled with the sudden challenge she started, I tried teasing her back by slowly inching my lips just above her nose. And at the moment it touched her, her pupils dilated with excitement and I flitted my eyes down to her plump lips. I could not help but feel the innate masculine desire springing out of me. It must have been caused by her skin rubbing against my stomach and the way her hands danced all over my chest and back. And as I let myself be devoured by this overwhelming power of attraction while being in front of the camera, I began to feel like a completely different person in front of these people.

"Hotter than that! Closer! More sensual!"

I could feel an indistinctive joy seeping into my nerves, out of my skin, and it’s letting me lose myself under the blinding lights flashing at me. It’s so… exhilarating.

“Magnificent! Kiss her neck, David! That’s so good! Look at my lens! Just like that!”

‘Keep the compliments coming’, I mentally said in my head. I let myself play along to the incessant commands the photographer kept shouting at us and further risked a chance to give her what she wanted. And soon, I heard my partner’s breath hitching when I made an attempt to bite her on the side of her neck. Yet she still leaned her back more to give me better access. I smirked again and took advantage of her passive response, then I slowly pulled my head back to stare at her eyes.

“One last pose and we’re good!” I heard the photographer demanded.

My eyes remained connected to my partner’s. And it’s like we’re almost having a conversation. With the way she looked suggestively at me, I could clearly read what she was trying to say. Before I knew it, I was already leaning closer, our noses touching. Then, I’m slowly closing my lips on hers.

“Perfect! That’s it! Kiss her!”

I felt the tug of her teeth as it gently bit the seams of my lips and my mouth reflexively opened at the sensation. The reaction promptly gave her a chance to put her tongue in, invading me and tasting the nicotine inside. Then I eventually let myself go… I let my brain shut for a few seconds. But even though I did, I could still hear the subconscious voice inside my brain warning me...

Stop it.

What are you doing, David?

I have big dreams.

Colin will get mad.

Big dreams of success...

You’re letting her put that tongue inside you?

Big… dreams…

Yuck.

“And that’s it! That’s a wrap! Thank you, beautiful people!”

The sound of whistles and hands clapping in the background had me instantly pulling away from that pretentious kiss. It was like waking up from a druggy reverie that had consumed me so much, and I was finally turned back to my old self. My partner took time to open her eyes though, and I could still see the lust drawn all over her face as she looked at me with deep longing. I reluctantly smiled down at her, feeling momentarily lost in the situation. Then I cautiously took a step back just to keep things civilized between us.

“Just what I wanted, Breslin,” I heard Annalise, our photographer, telling me this from a distance and I quickly turned to look at her, ignoring my partner. She pulled me into a big hug and landed a pat on my back. “Still no disappointment. You always surprise me, honey.”

“Thank you,” I said with a smile.

“And you, Tanya. Gosh, my golden star!” She then turned to look at my famous partner standing next to me and gave her a bigger grin, “The kiss was honestly a stellar act! You gave me so many exceptional shots. I swear, I'm really gonna have fun printing out my negatives after this.”

“Really? Well, it won’t just be me in those pictures, will it? Tell that to my partner,” Tanya said in that seductive husky voice of hers, but she kept her emerald eyes glued to me while giving Annalise her response, “Your new hot guy is definitely one of a kind, Lis. Can I have him?”

I froze and instantly felt a nauseating chill run all over my body upon hearing her flippant remark. That’s just a joke, right? I tried to ignore Tanya’s serious gaze at me as Annalise only laughed at her words, oblivious of that intonation in her model’s voice that seemed to strike something more.

Annalise returned her gaze to my face and spoke again, “One reason for me to keep you, Davey. You would not believe it. But once people like Tanya start chasing you around, next thing y’know… Your face will be all up on the covers of high-end magazines in the industry.”

Her words had me imagining of cameras all around me, and I instantly grinned at the thought. Not so bad, though. Yet, still could be dangerously tempting.

“But of course, we’ll need to work more for that,” Annalise added, “And you’ll gonna be my best Madonna experiment.”

I found myself blindly holding on to that promise as I excused my presence from them and leave. I went straight back to the dressing room in a haste, trying to calm myself. As soon as I closed the door behind me, I searched the top of the vanity table filled with makeup and perfumes for some tissue. I then found a box of it inside the top drawer and quickly pulled a few sheets to rub my lips so hard. The disgust finally hit me. I can still taste the cherry-flavored lip gloss inside my mouth and I took a mental note of brushing my teeth before going home so it won’t leave any remnants inside me.

Yuck.

So much for making an impression on those people. If only I didn’t have to do this. But I have to.

I looked at the beautiful face staring back at me in vain empathy, from the mirror, and instantly felt an enormous distaste to what I just did.

“You’re horrible,” I irritatingly said to my reflection, still rubbing my lips with apparent revulsion. Yet not long after, I spoke again.

“But you f*****g killed it.”

As soon as these honest words left my lips, a smile slowly crept up across my face. Laughter came bubbling out of my mouth bringing me to a hazy euphoria. I could still feel the heat of the lights flashing on me; hear the sound of every click while the camera zoomed in on my beauty. I closed my eyes and held that blissful feeling for a bit longer.

I can’t believe I’m finally doing this.

“You’re gonna be famous,” I told myself. Like a chant, I played my words over and over inside my head. Like a broken cassette tape. I let it sink in me.

You’re gonna be famous. That’s right… And I'm gonna f*****g LOVE it.

HIS BACK WAS STILL turned at me when I opened the front door of our apartment. He had his headphones on again, a sign that he’s still drowned in his own world of rhythm and rhapsodic mania. He certainly hadn’t heard me coming in. I smiled at how vulnerable he looks right now. Good thing that he has the habit of locking the door, though. Yet, what would I have done if I didn’t have a key then?

I paused by the hallway in front of the door and indulged myself for a moment at the sight of his comfortable self, sitting alone on the couch with his feet propped up and his Gibson Les Paul guitar resting above his legs.

My beautiful Colin.

I silently watched as he moved to lean across him, still oblivious of my presence, and strummed a chord on the strings of his guitar. When he finally hit a note that he liked, he stopped and reached for that old journal beside him where he writes down all his compositions. He must be writing another song again. I kept standing there, just smiling, while I took off my jacket.

'Some good old experiences,

Some new and intense…'

I heard him softly sing those words in a whispering note to the air and the soothing sound of his voice made me feel itchy with longing underneath my fingertips. I quickly dropped my bags on the floor and walked towards him, failing to endure the intense urge to touch him. As soon as I wrapped my arms from behind him and settled them on his chest, I rested my head on the side of his neck and kissed him on the cheek. His hands automatically found mine in a tight grasp. And with a surprised intake of breath, he immediately relaxed after seeing my face.

“David,” he uttered my name. Soft, deep, sultry, and manly... These are the sounds of his voice every time he speaks in his natural manner. But when he starts singing, it's entirely on a different level… Just imagining him doing it in front of me, instantly makes my body heat with desire. It always turns me on. I quickly sought for a kiss from him just to fill up the lust daring to crawl out of my chest. And with a quick brush of my lips over his, Colin slowly moved to control the motion between us, kissing me down to my jaw as he pleasantly searched for a way to make me feel more intoxicated. 

“How was your day?” I asked him, inhaling his scent as it brushed away the fatigue I felt from today's photoshoot.

"Same old, same old," he nonchalantly responded back at me, leaning back and I grinned down at him.

I moved around the couch to sit on its arm and ran my fingers through Colin's disheveled hair. Then I asked again, “How about the band? Did it work with them?”

He met my stare with a glint in his eye. I grinned back at his expression because it’s the classic Colin way of saying that things went so well for him, and he’s happy.

“So did they all agree with your rules?”

“Who cares about rules?” he told me, his smiling eyes sparkled with delight as he happily strummed another random chord on his guitar. “As long as I have members, everything will go the way I say it should be.”

I laughed at how confident he sounded with his prideful remark. And because I just find him adorably enticing, I planted a soft kiss on his forehead and asked him another question, “So, have you finally got a name for the band?”

“Yeah,” he replied with discernible enthusiasm. “You'll be the first one to know once I’ve finalized things with them tomorrow. We still haven’t filled in the spot for the drummer yet. But Evangeline told me this morning that she’s got someone she’ll recommend. So I might drop by her bistro tomorrow, to talk to her.”

“Evangeline?” I frowned, and the mental image of a tall woman standing behind the bar counter of her bistro with that usual Davidoff cigarette stuck between her lips like a permanent fixture, instantly entered my mind. “When did she even start knowing people who play drums?”

Evangeline was like our mother back in Rockville where Colin and I used to live during our teenage years. It was right before we decided to move out of the town and chose to live together in the city. After high school, Evangeline was the first and last person to know about the relationship between us and she was also the only person to completely accept who we are.

I never once had a warm relationship with my parents because of how distant they used to be while I was growing up, and Evangeline was the closest thing to a parent for me and Colin. After everything that had happened to us way back then, we never really got any closure from our respective families after coming out. And now, just looking back on the memory of a hot-blooded transwoman with her long blonde hair tied up in a high ponytail spurting out a whole book of wisdom at me back in my high school years, made me miss her all of a sudden.

“Exactly,” I heard Colin commenting, and the deep sound of his voice pulled me out of my momentary trip-down-memory-lane. I laughed at the accurate sound of that word and met his eyes as they stared back at me. “But I'd still try. Maybe she does know someone that good.”

“And by good, you mean exceptionally genius in the field, right?” I teased back, knowing fully well how much of a perfectionist he is when it comes to his craft.

That’s one big thing to keep in mind when working with Colin. He’s the type of person who would say ‘trash’ like a f*****g shameful curse word. And believe me or not, hearing him say it straight to your face will definitely do some serious damage to your ego. I’ve seen it happen before. And I see no reason for it to never happen again anytime soon.

“It depends on who plays the instrument anyway,” he casually responded back with a shrug, but a distinctive edge on his voice said otherwise. I laughed at his cryptic change of mood and playfully rubbed the fluffy bed of his hair to smoothen out the frown forming on his forehead.

“You’ll gonna find him,” I told him with utter optimism, and his face slowly eased into a soft smile as he pulled me down for another lingering kiss.

“Damn, if that doesn’t just sound so sexy coming from you,” he softly whispered back against my lips, his breath fanning a wisp of air onto my cheeks. I grinned at his silly remark as we dove down for another kiss that was followed by another and another and another…

I soon felt his hands slowly roaming all over my back with his fingers tracing down the indented trail of my spine over my shirt. I sensed the heat emitting out of my pores from the slow rubbing of his chest against mine. My mouth instinctively opened when I felt him asking for an entrance, and I submissively let him put his tongue in for a taste. Soon after, our teeth began clashing into a frenzied battle of dominance. And as I tried to readjust myself to settle on the couch beside him, a strange falling object hitting the floor below us caused a distraction to Colin. He immediately pulled away from me and picked up the folded piece of paper that had fallen out from my back pocket.

“What’s this?” He asked, slowly unfolding it. I watched as his eyes immediately widened while he silently read what was written there. Whatever it was, it absolutely looked like something he could not believe was really there.

“What’s wrong?” I asked, feeling nervous all of a sudden.

“I wonder if people in the modeling industry really hand out their business cards like this,” He gave me a raised brow and slowly handed me the paper to see it myself.

415-878-****, Tanya Kordova xoxo

Fuck. That. b***h.

“I have no idea how this ended up with me,” I said in blatant annoyance.

“So, you’re earning personal clients now?” Colin asked me with an apparent flinty tone laced in his voice.

“She’s a woman.”

“Oh, it's from a girl? Then I should feel very relieved,” he sarcastically replied, crossing his arms against his chest. I immediately took note of his obsessive temper showing. And instead of getting offended by his suspicious grudge, I conceitedly smirked down at his expression.

“Are you actually getting jealous, Colin Keaton?”

“Well, can you blame me?” he bit back and firmly pulled me to his chest, “When you’re this f*****g beautiful, how can I not? Girl, guy, gay, or what. I'd be f*****g jealous because I'm the boyfriend. ”

I felt my heart pounding upon hearing his words. And as I let my emotions ran with clouded arousal, I raised my hand up to his face to run my fingers down his cheeks, “You don’t have to. I’m f*****g all yours, Colin.”

“Then consider yourself lucky,” he said back, taunting. And just to prove his statement to me, he forcefully thrusted his hips against mine.  “You just f*****g turned me on.”

I laughed because it was hilarious yet I can also feel myself getting turned on by those words. And as soon as the laughter died down between us, Colin hungrily grabbed the back of my neck and pulled my face down to his, letting our tongues meet again in a collision. I slowly let myself compliantly caved into his kisses and dominant control. It was an intense heady experience, having me consumed by his aggressive desire.