Shadow Aspect Read online

  Cheating corporate guy pulls the money out of his wallet and hands it to me. I count it and slip it in my jacket pocket. Before stripping out of my clothes, entirely. He is stripping off out of his pants and losing his jacket and tie eagerly.

  “Condoms? Yours or mine?” I asked him slipping off my boots.

  “Uh, I have some.” He says digging around for his wallet and pulling one out and putting it on. Of course he does. This guy is a regular cheater. “Suck my cock.” He is all action. No time to waste. I can appreciate routine professionalism. I get down on my knees and began long languid strokes along his shaft, before progressing to sucking him, deep into my throat. He thrusts his hips back and forth, fucking my mouth.

  Unlike good boy, cheating corporate guy has more control and takes longer to really reach an excited precipice that has him hissing and shouting “Fuck, stop.” I have been on my knees for a good three minutes, at least. Pulling back I release him from my mouth with a resounding pop. He still hadn’t taken off his shirt or socks. Classy.

  “Up.” He states and I stand up wondering what position we were going to fuck in. As it turns out it’s two positions. Starting off with the standard missionary, me on my back on bed so he could lick and suck and grope my breasts while he thrusts into me, my legs wrapped around his waist, and then when he really needed to go hard to come off for his climax, he flips me over. Onto my hands and knees so he can ram his cock home.

  Got to say there’s really nothing wrong with a good hard fuck if you can get it every now and then. Unfortunately in my line of work, most of the men who fuck me aren’t particularly brilliant at the actual fucking part. And I never get off on it. I’ve faked it several times for those that wanted to believe they were the gods of fucking. But no john has ever made me climax. My fingers, make me climax. A vibrator makes me climax.

  But I can appreciate it when guys who can deliver a good fuck, came along. I work myself back on him as he slams into me continuously, panting and moaning a lot. Eventually he comes.

  Besides, this transaction is about his pleasure, not mine. Which was why he is fucking me before he clearly has to work for the fuck from his girlfriend later on. We pull apart straight away, he disposes of the condom in room’s bin and we dress in silence. He actually holds the door open for me as we leave the room.

  “You’re right,” He says to me as I pass him in the doorway. I arch an eyebrow at him. “That was worth the price.” Men, so easy to please. Such simple creatures. Unlike good boy, he’d taken a good thirty minutes to get off. We leave the motel together with cheating corporate guy walking out behind me. The feeling of being watched, spied on returns with a strong sense of closeness. I look around again and note nothing out of the ordinary. This is going to drive me nuts.

  “Thanks,” Cheating corporate guy thinks I’m looking back at him as he ducks his head and walks off in the opposite direction to me. Frowning I start walking back to working girl alley. But I can’t shake the feeling of being watched. “Show you’re fucking self.” I yell into the night air. Turning around a few times, I wait for my mysterious guest to come into my line of sight. “I know you’re there, so give it up.”

  As a working girl I’ve never really had any hassles before, I’ve been lucky so far. But I’ve heard of girls who have developed fans, stalkers, men obsessed with them. Men who want to save them, want to hurt them to show them they care. You name it, prostitutes attracted all types.

  A male figure walks out of some dark shadows that encase a building and some surrounding wheelie bins opposite me, as I stand with my back to working girl alley. I’m not sure what I’m expecting, but it isn’t him.

  3

  He’s tall; around six foot six and has long blonde hair. He strides out in a black shirt, heavy, mid calf length woollen coat, black jeans and heavy duty boots. He looks like he just misted out of the black shadows, or they fell back in silence to reveal him to me. He makes a rather smooth entrance and walks directly towards me and I stand my ground, crossing my arms over my chest, to let him know I’m not intimidated by him. He looks like a model. Like I’m going to be intimidated by a fucking model.

  “Miss Phoenix,” He says when he gets close to me.

  “If you’re an officer of the law you are required to identify yourself to me now, even if you’re off duty. Especially now since I’ve asked for you to identify yourself.” I’m startled he knows my surname. No one around here knows my name. In working girl alley I go by Bridget, after the Rone poster girl print.

  He looks rather handsome with his smooth skin, English I think. My skin colour is darker than his and I’m not particularly dark. I have a honey coloured tone to my skin. He has amazing cheekbones, high cut and a square jaw and sharp, piercing blue eyes. “I’m not an officer of the law.”

  “Then how the hell do you know I’m Miss Phoenix?” I ask dropping my hands to my hips.

  “My employer is rather interested in you.” He says casually, hands in his overcoat pockets. His body language seems relaxed and non-threatening and he is a respectable distance from my personal space. Very cautious, I think or falsely alluring. Probably the later.

  “Well then, he needs to step into my office, it’s around the corner, in front of the posters.” I start walking off on him. “Office hours are until I say they’re not and I’m currently between appointments. So I could slot him in.”

  “Miss Phoenix,” I turn around to look back at the handsome stranger. “He’d prefer to talk to you in person about your full skill set, including your other service.” Handsome man takes a hand out of his coat pocket and pointing towards the end of the street, cheating corporate guy had gone down. “The car is this way.”

  “Dude, I don’t know who you think you are but I do not hop into cars with strangers I do not know.” I look him over. I can’t really get a read on him, he is very cool, debonair and calm beyond belief. Which is a little odd. Most males, tended to emit, emotion and wear it all over their body language, highly visible, one way or another. But handsome here, is like a poker face. Unreadable and giving nothing about him or his employer, away.

  “I assure you if it’s about the loss of wages for your business tonight, my employer can make that up to you.” He says producing a leather wallet and without bothering to count notes, grabs a thick handful and holds out his hand to me. His long, neat, manicured nails, between the notes.

  I eye him and then the money and snatch it up and count. I let out a whistle. “Don’t you know it’s not good for your health to carry this much money around this part of town?” That earns me a small smile at the corner of his mouth. “Do you even care to know how much you just handed me?”

  “Not unless I’ve managed to secure an appointment with you, at my employer’s behest, which requires us to go in the car to his place of propriety.” He isn’t coming across like a threat to me, but there is something making me hesitate. An instinct of some kind. Not that I can’t handle myself. Besides, it seems this mysterious employer of his isn’t after sex, rather he is after my other line of business. That has been slow as of late, hence why I’m out here hooking on a cold Friday night.

  “That depends, you said you’re employer is interested in my full skill set. Who referred you to me?” What I do occasionally in daylight hours is a speciality. It is rare and unique and it cost more than a pretty penny for me to take a job on my terms.

  Therefore those who know about what I can do, are limited and my business as a result is for the privileged few and done by word of mouth referrals only. It isn’t exactly illegal what I do, but it is somewhat shady on the ethical side. But I generally didn’t have much of a problem with that. My morals are scrupulously low.

  “Henry McDougal.” He says at me. I riffle through my memory to recognise the name. He wasn’t a one of my corporate clients. I don’t recognise the name at all. “Uh, he procured your current type of service and described you in a way that got my employer’s attention for your other, service.”

&nbs
p; My eyes narrow on him. So Henry had been a john, and something he’d said about me as a prostitute had gotten to this guy’s boss, which had made him know about my other line of work. That didn’t really make sense to me but a small part of me knew it could make sense and might just be how someone else, with insight, into the darker places of Melbourne, might know about me.

  Human’s aren’t too cluey about paranormal beings amongst them. But other paranormals are very clued in to the types of beings that frequented Melbourne and beyond. So it might be that handsome’s boss was a paranormal being. That much, made sense to me. I just had to wonder, what type he was. I’d had run-ins with two types. Sex with one type.

  Werewolves and shape shifters were the most common to cause the most trouble and notoriety amongst the public but not the only ones. They just tended to be the ones, everyone focussed on, made films and wrote books about. Which was fine with me, I wasn’t looking to be the centre of attention and infamy.

  “How’d he describe me?”

  “He said you had an un canny ability that was like psychic de-ja-vu.” Handsome responds to me, dropping his arm down by his side.

  I nod my head. Yep, that sounds like someone after my other line of work. It pays better than hooking. “You got yourself an appointment.” I say back at him as he again points in the direction of the car. We walk off towards it, with the handsome stranger, slightly in front of me.

  The coat made him looked broad shouldered and I see that his hair is utterly straight and goes down to his waist. We walk to an idling stretch limousine waiting around the corner curb. Handsome opens the door for me and stands back.

  I put a hand on the door and the car roof and looked inside first. Nothing but leather seats and a bar fridge with low-level roof lighting. I glanced back up at him, and see nothing in his eyes or face that gives anything away. I slide into the back of the limousine and handsome follows, closing the door behind himself.

  He tucks his coat around him and leans forward towards the small partition window between driver and passengers. Knocking on it twice the car starts to pull away from the curb. He sits beside me, instead of in front of me. I think it’s slightly odd. The hired help usually sit opposite the client, to watch or intimidate.

  “So you know my name, what’s yours?” I ask him checking out his profile as he sits beside me.

  “Tarin Armadel.” He replies holding out a hand for me to shake. I look at it and shake it firmly while I hold his eye contact. Again there is a sense of void from him. He remains masked and unreadable to me.

  “You’re not human are you Tarin?” I say still holding his hand. He glances down at my hand in his.

  “So it’s true then, you can tell that much from just simple physical contact?”

  I let go of his hand. “I can do more with less and even more with more. You’d be surprised at my skill set.” I replied flippantly at him.

  “You are correct, I’m not human as such, like your self.” He says settling back into his seat and looking at me. Not bothering to offer me anything more to go on.

  “Well you’re not a werewolf or shape shifter, I’ve been around enough of them to know the scent and set of behaviours of them.” He looks at me and smiles, producing two rather large, extended fangs from the top of his teeth. They aren’t dainty in the slightest and they look razor sharp.

  “Oh, vampire.” I mutter softly, slightly engrossed in how beautifully white they are and how deadly they look. I should be scared; I know that much even if my body refuses to react in fright at the sight of them. Is it wrong that I think they make him look sexy? The fangs retract and he snaps his mouth shut quickly.

  “The fangs always throw people off. Fucking vampires.” He snorts shaking his head. “It’s all anyone thinks about these days.”

  I frown, I have no idea what else could have fangs like that and be human looking. Then again, the paranormal world is a lot bigger than what I barely know of its small corner in Australia.

  “Sorry,” I mutter, looking away from him.

  “It’s alright. Most people would say the same thing. You’re not the first to mistake me for one of them.” I wait for him to tell me what he in fact is. Silence fills the car and Tarin seems more than comfortable to just sit there in it. I roll my eyes and look back at him.

  “So what are you then?” A small smirk at the corner of that mouth again. Like he’d pleased, I am the one who breaks the silence first and has to ask him to know what he is.

  “A shadow.”

  A shadow, I’ve never heard of one of those before. So I have no context for what that actually means. Great, mister mysterious hasn’t actually told me anything about himself. I push back into my seat again in frustration.

  “You’re the first shadow I’ve ever met.” I reply to fill the otherwise intended silence of the car ride.

  “Congratulations on the milestone.” He says causing me to laugh out loud at him. I shake my head and stop laughing again and run my hands over my raised, denim skirt. Sitting still for long is not my forte, neither it seems is making non offensive conversation with a shadow.

  “Do you have any children Miss Phoenix?”

  “Please, stop with the Miss Phoenix thing. If you know my surname, you surely know my first name.”

  “My apologies.” Tarin pauses before adding “Katelyn.” And smiling. A full blown white tooth smile at me. My eyes look over his teeth. Just normal, perfectly human, polished white, teeth that I bet an orthodontist would kill to proclaim they’d done the work on. “Were you expecting fangs?” He asks noting my line of sight. Looking away quickly at least I have the decency to blush a little.

  “Well, yes.”

  The car slows down. I’ve barely been aware of it moving and where we’re going. I’ve been so busy talking to Tarin, focussed on Tarin. I can’t help but wonder if he’s done some sort of glamour on me, to distract my attention from my surroundings. I’d planned to look out the window and landmark my way to where I was going. I wonder if shadows even glamour, or if that was just a myth associated with fanged types of paranormals of today. I’m about to ask where we were when I recognise the wide and annoyingly bad intersection of Kew Junction that we drive through in the eastern suburbs side of Melbourne.

  The limo turns off the main road and into a few back streets, pulling into the driveway of a large, white double storey mansion. Three words came to mind instantly. Very Rich. Nice.

  4

  Tarin escorts me into the house, excuse me, Mansion. To be honest, my place isn’t exactly much smaller than the mansion. But that is because my residence is a warehouse. So not nearly as glamorous, really. Or classy. Or opulent.

  He opens heavy, wooden, double doors into what is supposed to pass for a dinning room, but seems to be more of a feast hall from the decadence of it. A long table is situated off to the right hand side of it with sixteen heavy, high backed, carved, wooden seats around it. There is food on the table. Not the whole table, but more than enough for one person, at one end of the table. Clearly my company was expected.

  “Are you hungry?” Tarin asks me, slipping off his overcoat and hanging it over the back of the third chair along the table. I can’t help but check him out without the coat on. He is slightly slimmer than the coat gives away.

  “Shouldn’t we wait for your boss?” He turns around slowly and puts a hand on the high backed, ornate chair at the head of the table, nearest the food and I blink. Slow realization hits me. “There is no boss is there? This is about you, right?”

  He lets one of those small smirks form at the corner of his mouth again and I cross my arms. Damn is my radar slightly off with this one. He is good. Or being a shadow allows him to beat my internal system of recognition. Especially since he doesn’t appear as a threat to my instincts. That’s something.

  “What gave it away?” He asks looking back at the food on the table, like he is contemplating it. Tarin picks up a bottle of red wine and uncorks it before pouring himself a glass of wine
. He holds it up to me, I nod my head that I would like one.

  “The car ride, that’s where you slipped up.” I say getting his attention again. He raises a perfectly shaped eyebrow at me and picks up his wine glass.

  “Do tell.”

  “Where you were sitting. Next to me. Bosses sit next to their subjects, the hired help sits opposite the subject, to intimidate, to watch. The boss sits close to the subject to control, to intimidate or awe them.” I pick up my glass, sniff it, and find it smells like red wine, so I drink a mouthful.

  “What was I going for sitting next to you I wonder?” Tarin points to the chair next to him at the table. Between the one with his jacket on it and his head of the table chair. I put my glass back down and follow his direction.

  “Awe, clearly.” I mutter unimpressed with his attempt at feigned innocence. I drop my arms from my chest and walk towards the table.

  Food isn’t exactly a bad idea. I hadn’t eaten in hours. I’d kind of gotten used to having to eat late at night, real late at night on a Friday night because of the hours of working girl alley. So eating earlier than normal isn’t unappealing to me. He pulls out the heavy chair for me and I walk around him, and sit down into it, he pushes it back in with ease before sitting in his own chair.

  “What do shadows eat?” I eye the small banquet for two that has deliberately been set up for our arrival. “What no virgin sacrifice for you to drink blood from?” Tarin laughs at me. It’s a warm, light laugh that makes me think of sunlight on skin. I wonder if he sees sunlight, he is kind of pale. Not deathly pale, but pale all the same.

  “Oh, I drink blood.” He smiles fully at me, flashing fang before closing his mouth. Party trick, I gather. And yet, it makes me clench my thighs together, under the table. He knows he is sexy, damn him, I’m not about to flatter his ego by saying it out loud.

  “So why the lying to me then, and the elaborate charade?” I ask picking up my plate and a fork. I’m thinking of having the shaved meat off the bone that looks like it is still warm. Along with the rather healthy looking, quinoa salad mixture.