My months in heaven, his in hell

This chapter is perfectly skippable if you're looking for the erotica. I would appreciate if you read it, but I find it preferable you read all but this to nothing at all if stuff like this bores you. I get that we all know where this is going and the intros become tedious if they only open to crap. So skip you must, stay if you will, but please, please- read your fill.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

He'd always flailed before, nothing unusual there. It was the shuddering, halting movements that should've given away that he wouldn't wake up. No matter. I wrapped the blue-in-the-face body up in a trash bag. It was easily taken care of, all I had to do was take him out with the rest of the trash. Getting a new pet, that was the trick.

I loaded him up in my van and drove to the larger of my two warehouses. I admit I jumped a little when I accidentally ran that red light, but no one seemed to notice and I felt silly afterwards. I arrived in the usual half hour.

I hopped out of the van and jogged around to the back. I was still a little nervous, so of the five, I hauled the body's bag in first. Ha, get it? Body bag. I crack myself up.

I lugged the body seven steps, set it down for a second, and then lugged it the rest of the way to the door. I didn't need to see in the darkness to set right inside the door, where I usually set trash until it was picked up on Thursday. I pulled the door mostly closed behind me. It was as I was turning away from it that I saw him, standing on the sidewalk, breath visible in the morning cold, watching me.

He was young, maybe eighteen, maybe nineteen. He'd gelled his hair up into stiff spikes, but I guessed it to be naturally a light brown. His huge eyes were gray. There was some acne scarring, but a little sandpaper would take care of that. He was lean, not scrwany, and not athletic. His perfect little nose suited his average face. He didn't look anything like the Asian beauty not thirty feet from where he stood, but I was falling too fast in love to care that he wasn't up to my usual standards.

I walked back to the van, and glanced back at the kid, casually, like any delivery man might glance at a kid staring at him at six in the morning. "Can I help you?"

"I was actually wondering if I could help you. Looked like you were having some trouble there." His musical but obviously masculine voice sealed it: he was going to be mine. I loved every inch, from his ratty old sneakers to the one earbud still in his ear to the top of his spiky hair.

"Ah, that was the heaviest of them," I said, the morning, the tragedy, and his beauty scrambling my brains. His face fell and he nodded, starting to walk past me. "But-" he turned around, instantly attentive. "-I may have strained a muscle hauling it in." I fake giving him a once over, as though I hadn't already memorized him, focusing for an extra second on the tear in his jeans. Maybe it was fashion, maybe he was too poor for another pair, but I was pretending to think him in need of money. "What do you say I give you ten dollars to haul the rest of it in for me?" Either he was as poor as an old man would think him looking at his torn jeans, or he was just a typical teenager, always in need of some extra cash. It didn't particularly matter why his eyes widened at the ten dollars: he was about to step off the public street into my domain.

"Sounds good!" He scrambled into the van and grabbed a couple of trash bags, bounded to the door that appeared, for all intents and purposes, to be firmly shut, and waited with a patient grin on his face. It would've been the easiest ten bucks he ever made- hell, maybe I'd even give it to him once he was mine.

I chuckled good-naturedly. "Hold your horses boy, let me get the light switch pole so you don't trip over yourself." While I had my head in the driver's side of the van, I slipped my pair of handcuffs from the glove compartment to my back pocket. The roll of duct tape was sitting innocently on the passenger seat; it was time to change that. I snatched up the pole with enthusiasm, shut the door, and walked past my pet to the middle of the warehouse, where I hooked the string hanging from the single, naked light bulb in the ceiling.

He ambled in and made to set the bags next to the body bag. "Ah-ah," he glanced up, looking caught but unsure what he'd done. "If I'm paying you, you're going the full nine yards. That corner, please." I pointed to the far corner. He grinned and jogged over. Behind my back, I ripped off a piece of duct tape and tossed away the roll.

I stepped up behind him as he set down his burden. I slapped the piece of duct tape over his mouth. Predictably, his hand shot up to his face. I caught them, and drew them behind his back. He squirmed delightfully.

I reached back for the cuffs and got one on him, but he spun out of my reach, stepped on my foot as hard as he could, and ran for the door, ripping off the duct tape as he went. Damn it. I lunged after him and hooked an arm around his waist. I drew him back away from the door as he kicked and thrashed, making only low grunts. In a second, he'd get it together enough to remember to scream.

I set him down, spun him around, and kicked him between the legs. The soft whimper made my heart sing. I reached behind my kneeling pet and clicked his other wrist in place. He drew a deep breath, so I slapped a hand over his mouth. One hand over his desperately turning face, another around his wrists, I hauled him over to the duck tape and slapped a piece across his mouth.

With a smile, I looked into those usually huge, now tremendously huge eyes, and pinched his nose shut. He thrashed, shuddered, and trembled. Finally he stilled. I checked his pulse, just in case: this was how I killed the last one. He was okay. Better than okay, he was mine.