Page 3 of Dark Passion

“Is it all you thought it would be?”

“Yeah, those dudes are hot, and then some,” he said, not taking his eyes off the opening act, and sipping on a straw every time he probably wanted to stroke his cock. I knew the feeling, because I was having one of those moments.

I thought I’d met Julian in that bar, and Mason had met Julian’s friend earlier. I didn’t remember who it was, because the only time I’d seen Mason again was in passing.

I’d been tied up, so to speak with Julian, and after meeting him with his gorgeous face and body, I thought that was it for me. I wanted him and I’d do anything to have him, and I did. Mason and I had traveled down the same roads leading to ultimate disaster for me if I hadn’t gotten away from that open lifestyle, and I’d gone cold-turkey like an addict to break myself from my dark passion with whom I thought was the love of my life, and I’d be with him, and we’d grow old together.

It took time to break away from Julian, and I’d fallen off the wagon a couple of times, hoping this was a phase and I’d grow out of it, like a pair of pants my mother had bought that had been too small. My desire for the bondage lifestyle never left me, however, finally after several tries and things becoming worse, I refused to go back to Julian.

I knew if I’d gone to him again, I could never leave. Ever. Even though he’d abused me in every possible way for the years I stayed, and took everything he had to give, seeing him had me wondering,What if?

I might have been lucky to get out when I did, but it appeared Mason wasn’t as fortunate as I had been, because he looked as if every part of him had been touched from his pretty face to his beautiful blond thick silky hair. That hair was always healthy and shining. It was still thick, but from where I sat some parts had fallen out, and the remainder looked matted and hadn’t been washed for months.

Mason looked like a man who had been sleeping on the streets or in a shelter. His clothes had this strange smell I couldn’t quite place it at the moment. Perhaps it had been the cab with people hopping in and out with their different odors.

The nasty odor appeared to have been covered up by some kind of cleanser used to clean up the smell of pets. I thought less of that, because someone might have sprayed the car before it was taken out for the day.

Looking at Mason, he appeared to be at least forty, perhaps it was someone else. But that didn’t make sense. When I knew him a few years back, he was nothing like this shell of a man in front, driving a cab as if he’d given up and had been resigned to this life that faced him.

Mason must have been destroyed by the man he’d fallen in love with too easily and too quickly. I guess you could say I’d been the lucky stupid dude who had slipped from under the control of the mighty and all-knowing Julian Page.

When I had been with Julian, he’d controlled my every action from the time I rose from my bed to the hours I’d been forced to sleep with him and other men, especially after he’d been up all night in sessions with other young men he’d chosen for me to fuck, while he’d restrain them with ropes and handcuffs, and whatever he could think about to bring him pleasure. He’d watched, and he’d only join in when they were eager to impress him by sucking my cock, and he’d join in only when he thought I was enjoying a particular man too much, then he’d push them out and take over.

Perhaps Mason had broken off from his Master as well, because when I knew him he did nothing but satisfy the man he’d taken up with as I’d done. Mason and I were the same age then, barely twenty-one, when we came across Julian and one of his friends on a double date. I didn’t want to remember that night, but I chose to forget it because the things he’d done to me and with me would have me, even now, begging for him to take me back.

I’d have to admit to myself that he was my drug, and I could never be near him again.

As I stared at Mason, some of those days and nights came back to me, but I didn’t know the name of Mason’s lover, but then most of Julian’s friends had pseudonyms or aliases anyway. Only fools like me and Mason didn’t know any better than to confess everything to an older man who had no one’s interest but his own.

I’d tried to forget all those names, incidents, and near misses in my past, but somehow the trail led back to me like a ghost looking for an empty body to inhabit.

“You’re not seeing a ghost, Daniel. It’s me,” Mason said, glancing in the mirror with a smile that once would light up an old man’s heart, not to mention the young men who’d trailed behind him, some even stalked him, as if he’d left them breadcrumbs the way you’d feed birds.

“You look great,” he said. “The years have been kind to you, my friend.” I couldn’t remember whether we were friends or not, but I guessed we were. At least, he thought of me as a friend, and I probably needed all the friends I could get now. What was I to say, because he looked like shit in that soiled shirt and from the smell of the cab, and what appeared to be part his body odor, mixed with pine? It appeared Mason hadn’t gone home for a shower in a week, if he had a home to go to. “I’ve been pulling a few all-nighters. They let me do it when they are short on cabbies and a holiday is coming up, and people are coming to Manhattan. I love this time of year, not hot and not cold. The shopping, the coming snow, the city all lit up.”

“Do you own this cab?” I asked, because the closest I’d come to knowing anything about cabs was riding in one, and having to pay high fees and those tips. I was thinking about contacting my limo service, or using Cole’s. After all, Max got me involved in this shit storm he’d created, and this might prove to be costly, and according to what I met at my club, Max would pick up the tab.

Looking at Mason’s appearance, I shouldn’t have asked that question, but I wanted him to feel as if I thought of him having prospered in the time he’d spent his youth being a sub. Youth should count for something besides being used up, because once it’d gone and you had nothing to show for it, you looked like Mason. It was his pride and dignity I was trying to feed, but making a poor attempt at it all the same.

I wanted Mason to lie to me, and let me go on my way, and maybe both of us would feel better that day.

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