Desperate Enemies 3 Adam Carpenter (books like beach read .TXT) 📖

The man he loved, the man whom just two days ago he'd found in the arms of another man, he had made a first overture toward him. And Rich did to him. “Marc, there's so much waiting for us. . . please, tell me you'll hear me out.”

“Only if you'll forgive me.”

Rich felt the bitter words hit him, swallowing them down but still not enjoying the taste. He said nothing, turning away from the group and heading out in the night, not unlike Parker had done.

“I don't know about the rest of you, but I could use a drink,” Edgar said.

“I couldn't agree more,” Rose said.

“Just not champagne,” Marc said.

“No, it's not yet time for bubbles,” Rose said.

* * * *

The Bayside Hotel was quiet on this night when Rich North arrived in the lobby. Just a couple patrons were inside the hotel bar, a lone guest walking through the lobby, heels clacking against the hard tiles. The man behind the reception desk was busy on the telephone and paid Rich no mind; good thing, Rich didn't want to be stopped or disturbed. He made his way down the corridor, where he came to Danvers Converse's office. He could hear the blare of the television from inside, a good indication that his quarry was present.

Rich was here to settle the score, no matter what he had to do.

Without knocking, he turned the knob and found it opened easily. A man like Converse, he was over-confident, cocksure, immune to anything in life. And why shouldn't he be? He held the power still, even if his secret was known to them all. He was a killer and he had escaped detection all these years. Rich had to find out where Elissa was buried, only then could they finally bring this entire episode to a close.

Danvers looked up from a bank of television screens on the wall, fumbling with the remote when he noticed his guest.

“What the hell. . .” Rich said, staring up at the images on the screens.

Six monitors, each of them displaying flesh upon flesh, men upon men. That's when Rich noticed that Danvers was naked, his withering body hairless and pale, and that his hand had been in his lap; jerking off his small dick to sexual videos just a short while after his greatest secret was revealed. What kind of sick perv was this guy?

“You're disgusting,” Rich said.

“Oh, contraire, look again,” Danvers said, nodding toward the screen. “Tell me who you see.”

That's when Rich realized these weren't just any movies, he could see himself on one of the screens. . . no, two of them, and in them he was having sex, one with Paolo, another with Aaron—the videos that Danvers had blackmailed them into making, he was watching them now. And not just Rich, there was a video of Parker and Russell Allen, the man who had worked for Danvers and taken a bullet for him. There was even a video of Rich and Marc, sucking one another off in the elevator. My God, that had been their first night in Wonderland, even before they had moved to Eldon Court. The remaining two screens were filled with other men, none of whom Rich recognized, but in each screen many of the men had one thing in common, big dicks and hairy bodies. All that Danvers lacked, it was what he most desired.

“Why, Danvers? Why did you do all this. . . to us?”

He spat at Rich. “What do you know of me?”

“I know that you once loved George Saunders,” he said.

“Yet no one wanted me to love him,” he said. “Not that bitch, Elissa. She wouldn't let him go; she wouldn't let him be with me.”

“And so you killed her?”

“And look what it got me,” he said, “George was empty after the incident, he'd lost all sexual desire and gradually, he just began to wither away. His mind and his body, gone. What had happened was too much for him. I lost it all.”

“You've been trying to fill the void ever since,” Rich said, “With men who remind you of George.”

“You come along, move onto Eldon Court just as I'm ready to make my move to reclaim it. Troy had come of age, George had begun to decline so much, they said it was only a matter of time before he died. . . and still I had nothing. I wanted to reclaim the land where he and I had fallen in love. . .”

“And in the process, destroy all of us.”

“What right did all you boys have to be happy?” he asked. “Society shunned me for loving men, why do you get a free pass to love who you want?”

“Times have changed; we have men like you to be grateful for,” he said. “Men like Drew Saunders and Gerald Green, who paved a difficult path so Marc and I, Edgar and Jack, Dane and Sawyer could be happy. It was supposed to be that way for Paolo and Aaron, but your sick plans to destroy our lifestyle ended up destroying Aaron's life.”

“I'll still do it,” he said. “The Wonderland Palaces will be a reality.”

“No, they won't,” Rich said. “It's only a matter of time before the authorities find Elissa's body, and with Troy now knowing what happened. . . it's over, Danvers. Admit defeat on the Wonderland Palaces and we'll make it all go away. No one will know what you did.”

“Like I would believe a word out of your mouth,” he said.

“On my honor,” Rich said, holding up his right arm.

“Honor? What does a man like you know of honor? You who have everything you ever wanted, but it's never enough. Look at you up there on those screens, all naked and writhing in ecstasy, you'd fuck anyone wouldn't you? Your lover, your neighbor, just so long as you get what you want.”

“So that makes us the same,” Rich said, “and yes, I'm guilty of fucking anyone, sure. Even my enemies.”

With that, Rich took a