Runaway Model (17 page)

Just fucking fine.

If Stoney wanted him gone, he'd go.

Fine.

The next few hours were a blur. Without his concert to look forward to—without any concert ever to look forward to—Kyle was at a loss to know what to do.

He found himself walking in the center of town along a green river that seemed to run in a circle. He didn't remember how he got there.

It was dark now. The open-air restaurants and taverns buzzed with rich laughing Texans drinking expensive drinks. Oil people some of them. Had to be.

Of course Kyle thought about Bryce. But he couldn't call him. Not again. He felt guilty already about calling him and then dropping him the minute they had a stupid disagreement.

Anyway, that guy was a fucking billionaire really. He'd dined at the White House.

Kyle couldn't force himself into that kind of life. He wasn't good enough for a man like that. Kyle was a runaway from England. A school drop-out. A music blogger.

A
failed
music blogger.

Bryce seemed to like Kyle well enough now. But he'd soon learn to despise him.

Just as Stoney despised him.

He thought about the night he'd gone up the gold elevator with Bryce. It was the first time he'd entered an elevator with an older man since the episode with Stoney. He could have had Bryce's wallet out of his jacket in the piano bar, and Bryce wouldn't have noticed until Kyle was long gone. But he'd felt... something.

And he'd been so lonely. Being a pickpocket, always being on your guard, always watching for the first opportunity to get away clean... it was a lonely business.

He'd sensed that Bryce was lonely too. He wasn't a fortysomething predator who needed a fresh eighteen-year-old in his bed every night to feel alive. He was a real man looking for something real.

It was a funny thing to say about a hookup, but Bryce had a sweetness to him. Kyle felt safe in his arms. They fit together, didn't they?

Physically they fit.

But they came from different worlds.

Kyle had spent the last two years working as a thief. At first Stoney's ring seemed to bring him luck. If nothing else, it brought him confidence. If he could pull Stoney, he could pull anyone. Many pickpockets worked in teams, but he'd never again found a partner he trusted quite as much as he'd trusted Michel.

Besides, he didn't need to split the money with anyone. There was something about Kyle's face that made it easy for him to meet and distract lonely strangers. He could see that life wasn't always this easy for homeless boys, but his crooked little smile was his secret weapon. People couldn't resist trying to draw him closer.

Sometimes Kyle didn't even have to steal. Yes, it was rob and run when it came to the men. But the women he pulled weren't usually looking for sex. They might ask him to help carry their shopping bags or to escort them to a wine bar, and they often tipped well just for the pleasure of having a good-looking boy on their arm. Vegas was a convention town, and a convention could be a miserable experience for a middle-aged married woman shut out of the usual afterparties and strip clubs.

Some women wouldn't pay—it often seemed to be a matter of pride with women not to pay for companionship—but they'd buy him little valuable things he could return to the store later. Many high-end Vegas stores had a no-refund policy, but Kyle understood how to kickback ten or twenty percent of the price to the manager to make those policies go away. It was funny how many middle-aged women never noticed that boys Kyle's age didn't wear watches. He'd bought and returned the same diamonds-and-titanium chronograph to the same store eleven times. By the sixth time, the manager knew to bring out a bottle of Krug from the back of the shop whenever Kyle walked in with a new woman.

After those first few weeks, Kyle didn't have to sleep in squats or tunnels. Sometimes he rented a room in one of those three-hundred-dollar a week motels behind the strip. Sometimes he made friends with kids his own age and stayed at their place a night or two. For several months when he was seventeen, he lived on the couch of a girl who wanted a boy around to discourage her stepfather's wandering hands. A gay boy, because she didn't feel safe around straight boys.

Sheryl probably never really knew how much Kyle earned on the street. Once he'd given her a pair of diamond earrings he'd nicked by mistake, only to realize later they were too valuable to be easily pawned. He could tell from the way she swallowed her smile that she thought they were cubic zirconia. They were friends for awhile, but his free spot on the couch vanished when she graduated high school and left her family's home forever.

Being a thief sounded like more fun than it was. Kyle was dead tired of it. He was always playing a part. He felt as if he was behind a piece of glass, unable to really talk to anyone. Unable to really touch anyone.

Blogging Stoney's North American tour was supposed to change all that. He'd be a real music blogger. Maybe step up to a job as a music journalist. He was eighteen now. Old enough for legal work, even in America, if somebody would only sponsor him.

Kyle twisted the ring on his finger. Lucky, was it? Maybe not any more. Being a thief had spoiled his chances with Stoney.

Being a starstruck idiot had spoiled his chances with Bryce...

Kyle drifted into a bar playing bad cowboy music. All cowboy music was bad to Kyle's ears. He ordered a draft. Watched the bartender fill the glass.

He never looked away from the bartender's hands. Not for one little second.

Still he couldn't drink it. Couldn't make himself swallow.

He pushed it away untouched and ordered a Stella in the bottle. The bartender gave him an odd look but said nothing. Kyle paid for both drinks, tipping generously the way he'd learned in Vegas.

I have nothing to live for. Me life is over. How deep is the water in that river?

But no.
Fuck no.

He wouldn't let Roman Nigel win. The stalker had very efficiently and very effectively separated Kyle from everything in his life that ever held meaning for him. Fuck him. If he thought he'd destroyed Kyle, if he thought he was going to win that easily...

Fuck no. It was never gonna happen, no fucking way.

He'd show the creep. And he'd show Stoney. One day the musician would see the value in Kyle. One day everybody in the world would see.

He didn't finish the beer. He left the half-full bottle on the bar.

It was time to catch a cab.

***

T
he front of the plane was almost empty. No one sat in the aisle seat next to Kyle. He'd heard a rumor this airline was making it more difficult for people to upgrade to first class if they weren't willing to pay the price.

Kyle, who would never be afraid of spending money to get what he wanted, approved of the policy. He didn't enjoy the extensive search they gave him for buying a last-minute first-class ticket for cash, but he'd known it was coming. The TSA workers eyed his thick wad of hundreds without comment. It wasn't illegal to have money. There was sweet fuck-all they could do about it.

You only had to fill out the form for having more than ten thousand dollars in cash if you were leaving the country. Of course Kyle couldn't risk doing that. He'd overstayed his legal tourist visa a long time ago. Once he left America, there was no guarantee they'd ever let him come back.

There were two world capitals—London and New York. London was closed to him.

That left New York.

Kyle sang a bit of the old corny song to himself. Oh, he'd make it, all right. He'd prove himself. He'd show them all.

Now he clutched a cranberry and vodka, the closest thing they had to a pomegranate martini on this flight. The pink color matched the stone in his ring.

"Another?"

Kyle watched the flirtatious flight attendant mix the drink. He was twenty-three or twenty-four. Naughty almond eyes. Tight arse. But Kyle focused on the FA's hands, not his trousers. You could hear the crackle when he twisted off the caps on the two airline bottles of mid-priced vodka.

He moved to add the juice from an already-open can.

"No, mate. Open a new can for me. In front of me."

The FA glanced up to meet Kyle's eyes. Kyle knew this boy understood instantly. "I'm glad you asked me that. I'm not allowed to open a fresh can any more unless the customer asks. Stupid cost-cutting policy. I'll be glad when they change it."

"Thanks, mate."

Kyle still didn't know when or where Roman Nigel might have slipped him the drug. He still didn't really understand what had happened. All he knew was Stoney was so afraid of a scandal he'd kicked Kyle out of his own fandom.

Fuck him. Fuck the whole music industry. Kyle didn't fucking care.

The FA sat down in the seat next to him. Touched his shoulder. "I don't know what's wrong, Mr. Marchane. But maybe you want to put on sunglasses."

Kyle touched his own face. Felt the track of silent tears. He patted down his jacket, feeling around for the Oliver Peoples shades. They were the twin of a pair Stoney owned.

"I lost someone too," the FA said. "He was only careless once. That was enough. They found him... what they found of him... outside Matamoras."

"I'm sorry. I'm OK. I'll be OK. I know you don't need this on your job."

"It's OK. You're the only guy awake in first. Nothing to do but mix drinks and swap sad stories."

"It's too soon for me to talk about it."

It will always be too soon.

Kyle realized he was twisting the star sapphire on his pinky. He needed something to do with his hands. He pulled out his laptop. "I'd better get some work done."

"Yes, Mr. Marchane." The FA backed into the galley. Only after he'd gone did Kyle notice the business card left sitting on the empty seat. Kyle put it in his pocket. A man starting over couldn't have too many friends.

Wireless access was free to first class passengers on this flight. But even if he'd had to pay, Kyle would have gone online. He needed to start deleting his fan accounts now. He knew if he waited, he wouldn't have the strength.

Do it while you're still numb, mate.

It didn't take as long as he thought it might. Then, suddenly, for the first time in years, he had nothing to do and nowhere to go on the internet.

I'm all alone out here.

I always was.

***

I
t shouldn't have hurt so bad to let Kyle slip away. Who was he really? Just a good-looking eighteen-year-old player who hooked up with Bryce Auburn for a wild weekend in Vegas.

Bryce was twenty-eight. He was supposed to be the mature adult here.

He had no business fantasizing about a boy with no visible means of support. A boy whose claim to fame was a flirtatious smile and a blog about a rock singer.

Sometimes sex is just sex. Fun for the moment, and then it's over. Bryce should know that by now.

But what if Kyle was hurt? What if he was in trouble? Kyle had a predator tracking him after all.

Bryce told himself he had to know if Kyle was OK. Bryce wasn't going to track him down. He'd never do that. Kyle felt hunted enough with one stalker after him.

He didn't need two.

Bryce just wanted to check a few things behind the scenes to make sure Kyle got away safe.

He felt a bit silly typing in the URLs. He was the CEO of a petroleum development company, not a fangirl.

He went first to the StoneysSecret blog.

It was gone.

He checked it twice on two different browsers. Then on a different computer. Then on the landline instead of the wireless.

It wasn't Bryce's computer or Bryce's ISP.

The StoneysSecret blog had been deleted without a redirect or an explanation.

Vanished as if it had never been.

He went to the StoneysSecret YouTube channel.

Gone.

Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram accounts.

All gone.

What did you expect? Trip reports as usual? He knows his stalker found those accounts.

Maybe Bryce shouldn't have Googled "Stoney Rockland Kyle Marchane" but he couldn't resist. He opened a report about their relationship and then closed it again, his cheeks hot. It wasn't a report. It was an explicit fanfic.

Bryce wasn't the only person who noticed the way the ends of Kyle's mouth crooked upward. But he hadn't expected to read such a frank description of the way those lips would look wrapped around a man's cock.

There were multiple hits on Instagram for #StoneyRockland #KyleMarchane. Bryce switched to his iPhone 6 and quickly pulled up several blurred images of Kyle being escorted by three men, one of them a guard he'd seen with Rockland's crew.

The photos were all much the same. Different or sometimes identical versions of that scene. There were a few random comments posted underneath, enough to let Bryce know there was a heated discussion elsewhere.

Then he found it. This Instagram photo was no different from the rest except for the hundreds of comments appearing underneath. Evidently this thread was the place for a discussion of all things related to the relationship, real or imagined, between the rock star and the runaway blogger.

The person who posted the photo also left the first comment.

"Guys, I was there. This is real. I know a lot of us believed that #StoneysSecret #KyleMarchane made up a lot of crap about his relationship with #StoneyRockland but I took this picture for myself. #NotPhotoshop #NoFilter This happened. Stoney's people came for one of us. He chose a fan. I think it's a great moment for all of us in this #fandom. It shows us what's possible. As for the #FakeFans #fangirls who are angry because Stoney chose a boy, let me say this. Stoney doesn't owe you anything. He has a right to be who he is and a right to choose who he wants and a time to come out when he feels ready. He doesn't owe us any explanation. All he owes us is the music and the performance. He doesn't owe us his private life. That's it. That's all I'm gonna say."

Maybe that's all she had to say but everybody else had plenty more.

Bryce couldn't believe what he was reading. After what Stoney had said to Kyle in front of all of them? Kyle had forgotten, thanks to the lingering effects of the memory blocker.