Rough Canvas (Nature of Desire 6)

And so it went. Sometimes no more than a few lines, but Marcus always sent him one a day at least, some longer, some shorter. Like a damn lovesick schoolgirl, Thomas kept them all stored, rereading them, imagining Marcus talking, sitting across from him, feet stretched out and braced on the opposite sofa while Thomas did the same on the facing sectional in Marcus' apartment.

Marcus' arm lying loosely over Thomas' shins as he sipped his wine and they talked. Thomas lacing his hands behind his head in a casual pose, teasing Marcus about his fancy lifestyle.

Marcus had even sent him a box whose contents Thomas was glad he checked out only when he was alone. He'd socked it away in the shed, not daring to look at it again.

Jesus, would it ever stop hurting? He bent over, shifted, trying to relieve the pressure.

Why do you keep answering me at two and three in the morning? What was the last thing I said to you? You make yourself sick, I will come kick your ass personally. . .

Farm people get up early. . .

Don't feed me shit. . .

Some of it made him grin. Other times Thomas' throat clogged up as he ran his fingers over the words on the screen. Even when the cell phone got filled up and he had to delete a lot of the messages, he was weak enough to keep one in particular.

You know I'm not going to let you get away with this forever. You're just pissing me off.

The threat in Marcus' voice had a seductive touch that reached through the electronic waves and gripped Thomas in all the right places every time he listened to it. Do you want me pissed off, Thomas? You want me to come bust your ass, take all your choices away?

The prince coming to rescue the princess in the tower. Marcus was a prince all right, but Thomas knew this wasn't about rescue. Each time he heard that menacing Master's tone, his cock hardened and his heart jumped into his throat, butterflies exploding in his stomach. He made himself erase it at last and cursed himself for an idiot for the next several days when he wanted to listen to it again, like some addict needing his heroin fix.

He glanced at his watch. Two-thirty a

. m. Maybe he could send an email to Marcus now before he made himself go off to bed. At six a. m. the deer corn trailer would arrive and he'd have about two hundred bags to unload.

When he logged on, the cell phone rang on the counter, startling him in the quiet of the early morning hour. Wiping the sweat off his face with one arm, he hobbled to the phone.

He shouldn't answer it. But it was the first time Marcus had called at this time.

During the day, there was the pretense that Thomas was doing something else.

Working, with family, whatever. To ignore it now would be like ignoring him if he stood right in front of him, and the bastard probably knew it.

Plus he wanted to hear his voice. Why'd he delete that message? Marcus wasn't calling as much anymore, and Thomas didn't think it was because of the email option. It was as if he realized the power of sensory deprivation. Duh. Who better than a Master knew the power of turning Thomas' own defense mechanism against him?

Opening the cell, he noticed it had a full battery. Crap. No excuse there. If he mimicked low battery beeping noises, Marcus would see through that pathetic attempt and laugh at him. "Hey. "

"Hey yourself. " The first notes of his voice, God, the first syllables, made need coil hard in Thomas' stomach, twisting the pain. Thomas leaned over again, tried to breathe.

Sought something to say. "I just finished the last one. "

"Just now. "

"Yeah. How'd you know?"

"You've got that dazed sound to your voice like you're coming out of a month of solitary. How's it look?"

Thomas turned, his gaze sweeping over them, resting on that largest canvas specifically. "I don't know. It's different from the others. " Son of a bitch. He slid down the side of the counter, pressed his hand to his abdomen. Quit. He didn't want to talk.

He wanted to hear Marcus talk, let that voice pull him out of the place the painting had taken him, into a place somewhere in between it and here. "Don't know if you'll like it.

If it'll sell like the others. Don't know. . . " Don't know anything. But talk. For the love of God, talk.

"Unfortunately, selling and liking are two different things, because most of the buying public wouldn't know talent if it bit them in the ass. It's my job to educate them, Thomas. "

Thomas leaned his head against the cabinet, closed his eyes. "You know, it's funny you've never called me anything but that. Most people assume I'm a Tommy, Tom. " Thomas covered the mouthpiece, coughed into a used rag and noticed without much interest he was coughing up flecks of blood again.

"When did you have a full night's sleep last?"