Trick of the Light Read online

  Karl could feel blood dripping from his cheek where it had scraped against the sidewalk; he started coughing as the flurry of dust got the better of his lungs. The better of his eyes, too. He fumbled in his blazer for a kerchief, wiped at the dust and grime on his face, careful of the scrape, until he could finally see again.

  And stared at nothing. Had his rescuer already gone?

  "Are you okay?"

  Karl yelped, jerked back. The words had come from right in front of him, like inches from his face, but there was no one… "Um. Am I losing my mind?"

  "No," the voice said quietly, and Karl didn't think he was imagining the thread of amusement in it. "You're still only as crazy as you already were."

  "Trick of the Light?" Karl asked softly, heart thudding in his ears.

  Something brushed his cheek, just over the scrape. "Yeah."

  "What are you doing here?"

  "Nothing you need to know about." The touch fell away from Karl's cheek, and a hand rested heavy on his knee. "Are you okay? Can you stand?"

  Karl nodded and put deed to word by pushing to his feet—and promptly tripping over a bit of rubble and pitching forward. He landed against something hard and warm. Strong, slender arms wrapped around him, then slowly slid away, hands resting on his shoulders as Karl righted himself. "Sorry."

  "No complaints from me," Trick of the Light replied. His voice was faintly tinny, probably something to warp it. That feather light touch rested on Karl's cheek again, shifted enough Karl could feel a hand cupping his face, which was already flushed and growing hotter by the second. "I still owe you big time for saving my life."

  "Pretty sure you just saved mine. Should we, uh, be doing this outside? I'm sure me looking like a weirdo is going to give you away to somebody with sharp eyes."

  The hand fell away. "Yeah. You should get inside anyway, before The Malignant Asshole makes another pass to double check I'm gone."

  "And rescues some pretty young man or woman so he looks good on camera," Karl muttered as he stepped carefully over rubble and debris, stumbling his way back into what was left of his poor office. "I just finished fixing this place after the last time." He raked his hands through his hair, only making it more filthy and disheveled but not really caring.

  The whole front area was gone, and his desk had barely survived. The back was more or less intact—if he didn't count the rapidly accruing water damage from a broken pipe. "Guess I'm working from home for a bit."

  "Your cats will approve."

  Karl looked toward the sound of his voice before remembering there was nothing to look at. "Yeah, probably. I hope they didn't, um, bother you."

  A soft, pleasant laugh filtered across the ruined office. "They were quite insistent that I pay for use of the couch with lots and lots of petting. They're cute. What are their names?"

  "The one with the white patch is Rolex, the other is Hamilton."

  Another laugh. "Cute. I get the Rolex reference, but not the other one."

  "They're both watch brands," Karl said, rubbing his nose. "I, uh, collect them. And those cats are exactly like luxury watches—over-priced and think they're better than everyone else."

  The laughter grew louder, and Trick of the Light's hand rested on his cheek again. "You're—"

  Karl never got to find out what he was, as a pulse of energy seemed to radiate through the place, making his hair stand on end, leaving his body feeling like he'd spent too much time in the sun. He turned, stared through the hole where his window used to be at The Magnificent Sunrise, who was walking around the ruined street with a pinched look on his face, ignoring the other people clustered outside as he looked for signs of Trick of the Light.

  Like all members of the G.O.D., Sunrise wore dark red pants and jacket, a black shirt and boots. He also wore red fingerless gloves and a tight-fitting hood over his head that completely hid his face, with slits cut for his eyes. Emblazoned on the back of the jacket was the ring of stars crest of the G.O.D. Inside the ring was Sunrise's crest: a rising sun, almost black at the horizon, shifting through deep reds all the way to brilliant gold at the end of the beams of sunlight. His brother (well, everyone assumed they were brothers), Sunset, had a similar crest, but it was all blues and violets and didn't have the beams of light.

  "Does he have special hearing or anything?"

  "No, thank god," Trick of the Light replied. "Wave at him like you're an idiot and he's the prettiest thing you've ever seen."

  Karl groaned inwardly but did as told as Sunrise turned in his direction and noticed him standing there. Sunrise nodded at him, like a king acknowledging the attention that was his due, then turned away to keep looking around elsewhere. Letting his hand fall, Karl murmured, "You should probably get the hell out of here."

  "If you grabbed me and turned me in, you'd get a few million and a medal from the mayor, and they'd probably pay off all this damage, too. Could buy all kinds of fancy watches."

  "I don't like the Dogs," Karl replied. "Go out the back way. If you need it, I keep a bike out there for days when I don't want to deal with the bus."

  He heard the barest swish of fabric, footsteps on the bits of glass and brick littering the floor. Then the barest brush of lips feathered across the back of his neck. Karl froze, then shuddered hard. "Looks like I still owe you. See you around."

  Then he was gone, leaving Karl confused, flustered, and more than a little turned on. He apparently had a thing for being flirted with by criminals he couldn't see. That wasn't a highly specific kink at all.

  Blowing out a breath, Karl once more ventured out to the street to see if there was anyone who needed his help.

  "You should stay inside where it's safe," a deep, rumbling, faintly-muffled voice said.

  Karl turned, dredging up another idiot smile as Sunrise walked over to him. "Um, hi. Wow, you're enormous in person. Um, yeah, I wanted to see if anybody was hurt that I could help."

  "Medics are on their way to take care of the wounded. You don't do anyone any favors by being underfoot and getting yourself hurt." Sunrise clapped him on the shoulder. "Did you happen to see anything? We're hunting a very dangerous man."

  "Oh? I heard you killed Trick of the Light last night," Karl replied, shoving his hands into his pockets, letting his hair fall in his face as he looked up with a fawning smile. "That's just incredible. Is someone out to get revenge for his death?"

  "Please go back inside," Sunrise repeated and strode on past him further down the street to where a cluster of people was beckoning to him.

  Karl turned the other direction, down to another pair of damaged buildings, and joined the crowd helping those trapped inside. 'Medics are on their way'. Please. Everyone knew they usually waited until everything was over because they didn't want their expensive equipment damaged. If it was bad enough, of course, they had to move quickly, but something like this? Ha, they wouldn't show up until Sunrise was gone.

  The sound of a chopper drew Karl's attention, and he looked up expecting to see one of the news stations. Instead, it was a dark green chopper marked with a crest of three ivy leaves on a vine with a small white flower in the middle of them. That was the logo of the DeVine Corporation. They owned basically everything, and rumor had it they were involved in some pretty heavy government projects as well.

  Some even said DeVine was right in the middle of Project Starlight, but to be fair, those same people accused everyone of being involved in that old conspiracy theory.

  But it didn't make any sense they were skulking about a super hero disaster area.

  "Karl!"

  He turned at the familiar sound of Mariana's voice, alarmed by the frantic tone. "Mari! Are you okay?"

  She rushed in close and hugged him tight; Karl frowned as he realized she was trembling. "I saw your office, thought you'd been hurt."

  "No, I'm fine. Sorry I worried you." She drew back and he kissed her temple, brushed back her gray curls. "You sure you're okay? Anything happen to the coffee shop?"

  "I'm
fine, thanks to this handsome fella here." She pointed a thumb over her shoulder, pulling free of Karl's hands to turn toward the man that stood nearby.

  Tall drink of water fit him pretty well. He had dark, dark skin and hazel eyes that looked pale by comparison. He wore dark jeans, a maroon, brown, and white plaid shirt, and a plain black hoodie. A black Stetson rested on his head. He touched his fingers to it as he smiled at Marianna. "Ma'am, always an honor to help a lady. Ya'll like to keep things exciting round here, don'tcha?"

  "Like, not so much. But it's true we're rarely bored," Karl said with a sigh.

  "Glad I'm just passing through, then," the man said. "I wouldn't—" He broke off as the chopper abruptly swerved and a sleek, silvery little number came down between the buildings and lowered a ladder. Sunrise abandoned the group he'd been talking to and strode toward it, grabbed the ladder, and simply hung there as the aircraft flew away again. He must have worn himself out too much to fly; normally Sunrise zipped about all over the place like walking was something only mortals did.

  "That man is crazier than a drunk butterfly, as my mama used to say," the man in the Stetson muttered. "Ma'am, if you don't need me anymore, I've got a friend who's probably anxious to hear from me, so I'd best be on my way."

  She patted his arm, not at all subtle about the way she lingered. "You get along, and thank you again for saving me."

  The man tugged at the brim of his hat. "Ma'am." He nodded to Karl, shook his hand, then turned and strode off, vanishing quickly in the dust and cold drizzle that always followed in Sunrise's wake.

  "How does a butterfly get drunk?" Karl asked.

  Marianna snorted and swatted his arm. "Does it really matter? Come on. I'll give you a coffee with a slug of something under the counter in it. You're gonna need it, by the look of your office."

  "Ugh, don't remind me," Karl said with a groan, rubbing at his temples as he followed her back down the street to the coffee shop.

  It took the rest of the day to put the remains of his office in some sort of order, then sort through all the claims and other emails that came through as he sat in the coffee shop and chugged coffee, two of them with generous amounts of whiskey added.

  By the time he was finally able to close up shop and head home, it was just past midnight and the bus driver looked as done with the day as Karl.

  He dragged himself up to his condo and flicked on the lights—then dropped his laptop case when he saw his cats mewing and purring and sucking up to a whole lot of nothing in the middle of the stretch of floor between living room and kitchen. "How…" He shook his head. "You break into corporate buildings all the time, why am I asking? Better question: Why are you here?"

  "A friend of mine says I have impulse control issues," Trick of the Light replied. The cats mewled in protest as they were set on the floor and Trick of the Light stood, or at least that was what Karl assumed he was doing.

  The assumption was confirmed by the soft tread of feet on rug, followed by fingertips on his lips. "Um."

  "Most people start freaking out right about now, you know," Trick of the Light said, sounding… thoughtful, maybe. Like he couldn't quite believe his own words. "You don't freak out, though. Why not?"

  Because he'd fawned over Trick of the Light from practically the first day his name had appeared in the news. Because apparently the whole invisible thing turned him on, but they were close enough he could feel the body heat of a man he couldn't see, so Karl was reasonably certain his interest in the situation was apparent to all parties. "Um. Curiosity got me in a lot of trouble growing up. I was once so curious about the backroom men kept vanishing through in this old jewelry shop my dad used to take me to, I accidentally got an eyeful of what grown men do together naked. My father was, uh, less than amused. I'm pretty sure if he'd had any meteor in his blood, he would have used his powers to burn that place to the ground."

  Trick of the Light shook against him, and a moment later, a heavy weight settled in the hollow of his throat. Laughing, Karl realized. Trick of the Light was laughing so hard no sound was getting out, and he had to lean on Karl to keep from falling.

  Wow, that was not convincing his cock to behave even remotely. He really hoped Trick of the Light didn't mind being a turn-on.

  "I shouldn't do this," Trick of the Light whispered. "I came here to thank you again, that's all. But I really, really want to do this." He kissed Karl again, hard and determined.

  Karl moaned, closed his eyes, because the whole kissing someone who wasn't there thing was making him a little dizzy. Kissing Trick of the Light was going to make him explode. Holy crap, holy crap. Apparently even the craziest fantasies on the planet did occasionally come true.

  Eyes closed, the kiss was normal enough, except a thousand times hotter than he could ever remember any kiss being. Trick of the Light's tongue traced his lips before pushing inside his mouth. Hot hands cupped the side of his face, slid back to cradle his head, fingers tangling in his hair.

  Karl moaned again, reached out, and spanned his hands on what seemed to be Trick's sides, then slid them back to wrap his arms around Trick's waist. They shifted, and a thin but well-muscled thigh pushed between his thicker ones, rubbing against his cock.

  Tearing away from his mouth with a last, sucking bite to his bottom lip, Trick trailed hot, wet kisses along his jaw, around to his ear, teeth biting sharply at the lobe. "Turn out the lights," Trick murmured, then kissed him hard again, leaving Karl aching and desperate.

  He whimpered and flailed out an arm, smacking the wall half a dozen times before he finally managed to hit the light switch. The room plunged into darkness, save for the dull glow of distant city lights along the edge of the windows on either side of the room.

  Teeth nibbled at the underside of his jaw and deft fingers went to work on his tie and the buttons of his suit. Trick of the Light didn't bother to remove the clothes, just spread the layers open enough to touch him, hands hot and his mouth hotter.

  Karl moaned as lips wrapped around one of his nipples, tongue dragging across it before Trick of the Light slowly moved away to work the other one, then kissed his way steadily down Karl's chest. "I think I see why your impulses get you in trouble."

  Trick of the Light chuckled, drew back. "Do you want me to stop?"

  "No!"

  Laughing harder, Trick of the Light deftly opened Karl's pants, pushed them and his boxers down out of the way. Cool air washed over his skin, in sharp contrast to the mouth lazily trailing kisses along the length of his cock. "I admit I usually resist this sort of impulse."

  Usually? So he'd given in at least a few times? That probably shouldn't make his blood hotter, but heck if it didn't. Karl whined, fumbled until his hands found Trick's hair and gripped it gently.

  Making a soft, approving sort of noise, Trick of the Light finally took Karl's cock into his mouth and started sucking. Oh, god, it wasn't possible for anything to be hotter. If anyone tried to tell him it was, Karl would call them a liar.

  Karl had never had anyone go down on him so easily, either. Usually it was a token reciprocation, or something along those lines. No one had ever wrapped their mouth around him and sucked him off like it was the only thing they'd ever wanted to do.

  He would have really, really liked to have figured out how to make it last forever, but Trick of the Light was entirely too good at blowjobs, and the thrill of getting a blowjob from Trick of the Light was more than enough all on its own. His fingers tightened in Trick's hair, and he tried to voice a warning, but all that really came out was a garbled attempt at Trick's name.

  Trick of the Light didn't seem to mind, if the way his fingers bit down on Karl's hips was anything to go by.

  Pulling away once Karl had stopped trembling, Trick of the Light slowly moved back up his body and pressed a soft kiss to his lips. "So far as impulses go, this is one of my better ones."

  "It would be better still if you fucked me."

  Whatever he'd expected, it wasn't for Trick of the Light to fre
eze, then rest heavily against him and moan, cock giving a twitch that a dead man would notice. "Seriously? You'll let me?"

  "Uh, yeah," Karl said. Who the heck wouldn't? What kinds of lives did other people lead that they'd refuse a chance to get fucked by Trick of the Light? Because that sounded a little too exciting a life for him, but he was going to happily die trying. "But we'll have to go in the bedroom because I don't have lube out here, and I have a firm policy against experimenting with kitchen substances."

  Snickering in his ear, Trick of the Light dragged him away from the wall and urged him toward the bedroom. Two sets of glowing yellow eyes watched them from the couch, full of judgment and discontent over a lack of dinner.

  "Don't let them fool you," Trick said. "They suckered me earlier while I was waiting for you."

  Karl laughed. "You're doomed now, if the cats have you. They never let a good servant go."

  "Mine—" Trick of the Light broke off.

  Karl ignored the slip, imagining how terrified the guy must be. Any bit of information, no matter how small, could be used against a super. More than one hero and villain had died because the dumbest detail had gotten out.

  He left his bedroom light off, stripped off what remained of his clothes, and threw them in the general direction of the hamper by the closet. Laughed softly as Trick of the Light pushed him down on the bed. He started to ask if Trick of the Light could see in the dark or something, but that fell under the same heading as knowing he had a cat.

  Instead he twisted away to grab the lube he'd left on the nightstand because he'd been too lazy to put it away. He'd barely turned back around when he was grabbed and moved, spread out in the middle of the bed on his stomach. Soft kisses pressed down the length of his spine, stopping at the curve of his ass.

  Karl tried to form words, but the ability to speak fled once and for all as a warm, slick finger nudged at his hole, slowly pushed inside. Shivering, moaning, Karl pushed back on it, eager for more even as it burned. Trick of the Light said something he didn't quite catch, pressed another kiss to the base of his spine, then worked a second finger inside him.