Beautiful Beast: Part 1 of 3

  BEAUTIFUL BEAST

  Part One

  By Jenn Marlow

  Copyright © 2015

  All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  All characters appearing in this work are fictitious. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  Table of Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Prologue

  His eyes were the epitome of darkness. Jet black in color and empty, they were the eyes of someone soulless and devoid of all of life’s precious forthcomings. So why had Alex fallen prey to the man who bore them? Why had the lust overcome her in such a way that she even enjoyed pain?

  She was bent over the chair, her panties around her ankles and her ass up in the air, naked and on display. He stared down at her darkly—if not a little angry—at her defiance. She knew that her demeanor towards him would have to change—if it hadn’t started to already. Her body trembled as he lashed her with his belt, and she wondered when her resolve had left.

  She felt a level of heated arousal steam from her core that she never knew existed before, and every time he cracked his belt against the flesh of her ass, she felt her womanhood threaten to geyser with pleasure. The burn of the leather against her skin made her clit dance with excitement. Through the pain, there was an unforeseen and unexplainable pleasure.

  The auction flashed to the forefront of her mind, and the memory seemed like a distant dream—something made-up. Standing on the warehouse stage in front of millionaire men, like a slaughterhouse pig, she was sold to the highest bidder. Her intrigue and anxiety had caused her to strain her neck to see the man holding the red ticket in the center of the room, only she couldn’t pinpoint him through the crowd.

  Her heart raced and her mind made its own imagery of what the man looked like and who he was—but nothing prepared her for the man who came to claim his prize. He was young and gorgeous, with chestnut brown hair, an egomaniacal—but very seductive—smirk, and a firm, muscular physique. She could appreciate his beauty, despite everything. But as soon as she saw his eyes, she knew he was exactly what she thought he was. She knew there was no goodness there.

  Now, as she lay over the dining room chair, her ass blood red from abuse, she found herself appreciating more than his beauty. She found herself entrapped by lust and fueled by disdain. And it was then that she knew that her new master had already taught her something: sexual desire and emotions did not always intertwine.

  Chapter 1

  She felt the weight of him crash against her, and she contemplated on it for a moment. He was light, lighter than usual. She grimaced before pushing the swing away from her body with more ease than she was comfortable with. He was losing more weight.

  “Denny…” The swing flung into her body again, as her words trailed off. Usually, she would have made a small but audible breath when he crashed against her, but not this time. This time it was almost as if nothing was occupying the seat of the swing. It was as if it was empty.

  It was a beautiful day outside, a little chilly for spring, but pretty nonetheless. The sky was a stereotypical, yet very gorgeous, blue. It was deep, crisp, and vivacious in color, one that she rarely had seen in real life. To top it off, it had puffs of white effortlessly strewn across the entire length of it in a littered fashion. At least, as far as her eyes could see, the beautiful plumps of clouds seemed to go on forever and ever. But she couldn’t even enjoy it; she couldn’t see the world like everyone else did—not anymore.

  As beautiful as her heart knew it was, she couldn’t enjoy it; she couldn’t see it that way. The clouds reminded her of the fluffy cotton balls used to dab rubbing alcohol on the inside crease of Denny’s arm, and the blue reminded her of the uniforms the nurses wore, the ones she had seen for far too many days, for far too many years. His illness was in everything. There was no escaping it. Something as simple as a beautiful day at the park could even remind her of the horrors he faced, and the ones she faced with him.

  Even the weight of the boy in a swing could remind her that he was likely dying, little by little, bit by bit. He crooked his neck so that he was looking over his shoulder, straining to look at her the best he could. She smiled in response before pushing against his back again to fling him back into the air.

  She didn’t really have anything to say. She just wanted to say his name. As much as she hated being pessimistic, she didn’t know how many more times she’d actually be able to say his name, or at least say it in his company.

  So, she called out to him often, without any need or urgency, nor any true merit. It happened so often, in fact, that he didn’t even look at her strangely anymore. He would just turn, see if she needed anything, and let it go if she didn’t. He never seemed to question it. It was as if he understood on some level, and she hated that he did. But what she hated more was that she wasn’t as supportive as she should have been. She knew that he shouldn’t have those sorts of pessimistic thoughts; it was her burden to carry, not his. But she didn’t want to shield him from the reality of it either. So, some days she would find herself protecting his outlook on life, and others she fell pessimistic and encouraged him to do the same.

  Denny turned his head back around to face away from her with that same sense of understanding. The amazing thing though was that his enthusiasm didn’t falter. Instead, it seemed amplified when his focus turned back to the world in front of him. He called out in glee, as the wind whipped across his hair and skin, as the swing lifted him into the air and back down again—over and over. She knew she wasn’t being supportive. Dammit she knew. She knew her constant sadness was a reminder to him, as well—especially if her tone indicated what she was truly feeling. Denny was going to die.

  She pushed him again, and when his light body flung into the air effortlessly, she smiled. She knew he loved to swing. He always had. It made him feel freer than he had ever felt before. He felt at peace. She knew it was probably strange for a sixteen year old boy to enjoy it so much, but she chose to ignore it. She liked that he enjoyed something so simplistic and child-like. She reveled in it, in fact, until she saw his body soar out of the swing’s seat and crash against the ground with a horrifying thud.

  “Denny!” she screamed, her body instinctively lurching towards his collapsed form.

  As she hurriedly approached him—his head face-down in the dirt—she couldn’t help but hear a faint noise coming from his crumpled form. It was gasped and muffled, and it terrified her. She began to panic as she finally reached him and flipped him over hurriedly. It was then that the noise was amplified so that she could hear it; and, not only that, but see his face.

  He was laughing.

  Laughing.

  “What the hell!?” she screamed, punching his arm—in the moment, not really caring if it bruised him. She hated being scared.

  “You’re going to have to lighten up, Alex. I’m not dead yet,” he giggled, with a little too much familiarity for her own comfort. She didn’t like that he was so upbeat about it all. It almost seemed morbid to joke about his own pending death; she didn’t like it at all.

  Alex had been taking care of her brother, Denny, ever since she was nineteen years old. He was ei
ght when she took him in and had already been living with cancer for three years. It was crazy to think that something as simple as a routine check-up when he was only five years old led to a diagnosis that no one expected; one that would ruin everyone’s lives. Ewing sarcoma of the bone is what the doctor had announced that day, and it was localized in his pelvic area—which was good news—if there was good news for such traumatic realizations.

  The survival rate was pretty good, they said. It was around seventy percent for children who had it caught early, but unfortunately for Denny his cancer was a little more aggressive than was originally anticipated. After two rounds of chemotherapy—or in Alex’s definition, half of a year worth of painstaking bullshit and hell—his tumor finally seemed to stop growing. It didn’t shrink like was hoped though. From there, it was a lot of chaotic radiation therapy and even several surgeries later that he was even first proposed to be cancer-free. It came back though—and in full-force. And there it stayed and remained today—back with a fucking annoying vengeance.

  After their mother’s death eight years ago, Alex took Denny in and ever since then it was a constant struggle to keep the cancer at bay. He had routine doctor visits to check for any abnormalities, and one day… there were. One day their world crashed around them again. The last couple years had been the same rollercoaster of emotions as before. Chemotherapy, radiation, and surgeries, and then a whole other ordeal of shit commenced from there.

  If it wasn’t trying to tote him to and from doctor appointments, it was the money issues that came from it, and even having to take care of a sick teenager all while trying to maintain a job in order to do it all. It was too much sometimes, and she knew that she had lost herself a bit in the process. She knew that she looked upon him with sympathetic and mournful eyes, and he was right. He wasn’t dead. Not yet.

  “You’re an asshole, Denny,” she replied, extending a hand for him to grab so that he might pull himself back up. He giggled again before standing up. She smiled when she noticed his height. He had grown so much in the last year or so. At sixteen, he stood nearly six feet tall, but it didn’t surpass the shock over his weight. He was way too thin. “I have to get to work, so let’s get you home.”

  And so they went. Home. The home the two of them shared for eight years. At only twenty-seven years old, Alex had inherited a teenager to care for. It wasn’t easy, and she forwent a lot of her life’s goals to care for him. But she didn’t mind. She just wanted to see him get through this.

  His chances at survival were good in the beginning, but then the doctor said some sort of bullshit about the survival statistics being based on a five year rate. He had lived over five years since first being diagnosed, so he was part of the seventy percent who “survived.” Too bad he still wasn’t out of the woods. It was back; the fucking cancer was back; statistics be damned.

  Leave it to the doctors, she thought, to hide and manipulate survival rates like they did. Five years doesn’t really mean a lot when you’re a child. Five years is nothing when you have your whole life ahead of you.

  And Denny did.

  He was smart—so smart, actually. Not in a my-kid-is-so-smart-he’s-smarter-than-all-of-the-other-kids sort of way…but in a genuine, non-biased sort of way. The kid was intelligent. Despite being absent from school consistently, he still seemed to remain in the top five percent of his class, and in one of the top school districts in the area.

  He was smart.

  He had a future.

  If only he could shake this disease he had unfortunately been dealt.

  They were hopeful that after his most recent bout of chemotherapy that the tumor might stay in the decreased state it eventually wound up being at the end of the latest round. She didn’t want to get her hopes up. It seemed like Denny was never going to get out of the woods from here, but she was hopeful that they could operate again. And maybe, just maybe, she could keep her brother for a little while longer. And maybe he could experience adulthood before the cancer reared its ugly head once again.

  She hated that she had to think of it that way—a matter of “when” rather than a matter of “if.” But if the past was any indication of the future, then it would be back. And maybe even worse next time.

  She was unfortunately enthused that they were already in the books to go back to the doctor in three days so that he could have his new run through of tests—for the millionth time. At least after they looked at the test results they could decide whether or not he was a candidate for surgery. Dr. Morris seemed hopeful, and there was something about the man that gave Alex hope, too.

  She hated it because she knew where the rabbit hole of hope led. Because no matter how much hope she possessed, it was the same as it had always been. They fight the cancer with chemotherapy and radiation, only to get surgery and for the damn tumors to come back later.

  So many rounds of the painstaking bullshit had already been trekked across in order to get to that point; so many fucking rounds; and so many fucking times before. It was why he was so dangerously thin. He could barely eat, and when he did, forget keeping food down. Not to mention, he rarely had the energy to do anything.

  Today had been a good day for him though. Today was the exception. They had ventured outside and enjoyed a day at the park. Denny even had the energy to play that disgustingly morbid and cruel prank on her. Today was definitely an exception. And now—as she looked over—there he was, a smile plastered on his adorable face, texting.

  He was doing so with so much joy and contentment that she had to feel a little optimism; and optimism, or any other positive emotion for that matter, were rare commodities in her life. They weren’t almost non-existent; they were non-existent. They were truly what one would call a rainbow-colored unicorn, make-believe and completely ridiculous.

  As she felt her cheeks crease and ache a little as her lips curled upwards, she realized it had been so long since she had smiled. Today was a good day indeed. Today was what made the bad days’ worth going through. Today was one of the days that the bad days made her appreciate all the more.

  The ride home was pretty uneventful. Denny texted—just like every other teenager—to God-knows-who, giggling all the way. All while she drove her beaten up little white sedan in the direction of the home they shared together.

  She was frustrated by the sputtering engine and the overall aesthetic of the car. It was the first thing she had ever bought herself. It was new when she got it at seventeen and she made payments on it until recently. It was paid for. Finally. But man, was it horrible now. It still ran pretty well, despite the occasional sputtering. But it looked atrocious.

  People had backed into her, rear-ended her, side-swiped her; it didn’t matter. It seemed like anyway someone could damage her car, someone did. It was a total mess. It looked like a dented in soda-can traipsing down the street. People even seemed to avoid parking next to her, as if she was some horrible driver. She couldn’t blame them though. By the looks of it, she was—even if none of the accidents were actually her fault.

  She had gotten insurance money from a couple of the accidents, the ones where people actually were kind enough not to merely run away from the scene. And though she actually had gotten her car fixed a couple of times, after a while, with everything going on, she decided to put some of the money away for more crucial matters, typically matters of the Denny variety.

  She pulled her little-engine-that-could car into the first available space in front of their apartment building. Before she could even stop, Denny flung his door open and enthusiastically jumped out. She had to admire his tenacity—as her car veered to a stop—to be a regular teenage boy, even with everything else going on in his life.

  She wondered who he had been texting; and then the great debate seemed to slither its way into her mind. Had it been a girl? Did she want it to be a girl? Part of her loved the fact that her little brother was able to date, but another part of her feared it. She feared for her brother, feared him getting his heart broken and
putting more stress on him than necessary. But more than that, she feared for the girl. No one knew what was going to happen to Denny—not she, not he, not the hypothetical girlfriend, not the doctors. No one knew.

  “Eat some dinner!” she managed to blurt out before he slammed the door shut and headed towards the apartment building. She watched him turn and smile through the passenger window’s glass, and she smiled before she turned the wheel to head out and towards The Office.

  Chapter 2

  She pulled into the empty parking lot, knowing that it wouldn’t be that way for long. It was still early. Before long there would be an entire parking lot full of people. The Office was her place of employment; it was her office. But, it wasn’t an office at all. Not in the traditional sense. It was a gentleman’s club. Nothing more, and nothing less.

  As soon as she got out of the car, she could smell the stench of the building in the air. It was musty and stale; her lungs strained to breathe through the thickness of it all. It was disgusting. Even if it was meant to be “classy” and “up-scale”—as far as gentleman’s clubs went—it still smelled like sweaty men and cigar smoke.

  It was as if the air surrounding the building was like a smog; all the foul odors formulating together to create one mass of pungent gas. Alex even wondered if it would eat away at the ozone before long. She knew that the smell was coming from the building itself, and that there really wasn’t a gas surrounding the area outside, but the logical reason wasn’t quite as entertaining as her imagination.

  She slammed her door shut and tightened her jacket around her for security, as she walked towards the large red building. The lights were already illuminated purple, and they danced off of the oversized glass doors, which never allowed passers-by a view. She held her jacket closer to her body. It wasn’t cold, but she felt the need to have it close. She didn’t want to appear as if she was one of the acts. She wanted to seem classier than that. But, in reality, she was one of the acts. She just didn’t want anyone to know. Truth be told, she was a bit ashamed of it.