The Beast of Bodmin Moor Read online

  “It’s safely lost? I just haven’t found it yet, that’s all. It’s a smidge smaller than the van.”

  “So…a yes on both counts.” Jake nodded—to himself, it seemed—like a pup on a parcel shelf.

  “That wasn’t a question, so I don’t have to answer.” Phin noted. “Mine is Finley, derived from the Old Irish Gaelic ‘Findláech’. So, there you go…two Celts aboard a campervan in Kernow. Perfect,” Phin grinned.

  “Sláinte…” Jack inclined his teacup at Phin before having a slurp.

  “Sláinte agatsa,” he responded, a mite absentmindedly, afore adding… “Jack?”

  “Oh gawd. Why do I have a bad feeling about this… Yeeees, Phin?”

  “You’re a Jedi?” seemed as good a guess as any. “It’s not bad, I promise…it’s just that, you…um, haven’t had your turn.” This caused such a splutter, his foxy friend promptly sprayed tea like a sprinkler. “Jack, you mucky pup!” Sinewy shoulders started quaking as he clamped his lips shut, eyes bulging as if they were about to plop onto the tea tray. “What!?”

  “Fuck—and before you ask—No. Oh hell….” That did it, Jack threw his head back and started yukking it up with gusto. It seemed a very un-Jacklike laugh—sort of unshackled somehow—which was most oddsome.

  “Spoilsport. Can I do some slurping then…or…p’raps what you just did? When you’ve finished spraying your tea?”

  “There’s really no need to reciprocate…” Jack sobered in an instant. “I don’t—”

  “Okay, but I still want to. I’d do it every ten minutes, if you’d let me. Then you’d have time for a cuppa in between…” Phin assured him.

  “Why do I believe you?” Jake groaned, but his honeyed skin had flushed a fetching rosy hue. He really did ask daft questions sometimes, only he knew the answer, surely?

  “Because it’s true?” That was Phin’s best shot.

  “I asked for that…” Jake snorted.

  “You did…were you doing hinting?”

  “Hinting?”

  “For confirmation that I wanted to? Cos, I do. Whenever you wish, I’m easy…but then we’ve already covered that. I’m telling far too many truths, I seem to be on a roll. That never ends well…” Phin admitted.

  “Which is exactly what worries me most.”

  “Pardon?” Phin had no idea what that meant, but he’d sounded sort of…sad.

  “That this won’t end well,” Jake clarified.

  “It won’t. It can’t end well. Not even if you wanted to stay with me forever, y’daftie. One of us would die first, I’d hope it was me. Unless you shot us both, now that would be a plan.”

  “Phin. Please hush up.”

  “Was that happy hinting?”

  “Yes.” Jake’s grin was devilish when he pounced to snaffle Phin’s very breath with oh, so greedy lips…

  28. Jake

  Jake turned over and clambered onto his hands and knees, hoping to hell that clutching this particular straw wouldn’t break the jackal’s back. Cool fingertips slalomed down his spine in a shiver of flame, igniting sensations so intense that singeing fur might have seemed a far-too fitting scent. For sanity’s sake, at least.

  “Hmm…I have the finest view in all of Kernow…” Phin murmured, sandblasting Jake’s skin with blowtorch breath. He wasn’t sure if Phin was thinking aloud or talking to him, but Jake was wound way too tight to rustle up a coherent metaphor, let alone fathom Phin. He could scarce focus on holding them together, his entire self was snarled with anticipation; muscles bunched, tendons tugged so taut he was quivering like a snare drum.

  The tongue that started to dapple Jake’s coccyx was a swirl of torture too incendiary to endure. Somehow, they did. Somehow, they remained riveted to the spot and survived Phin’s brain-battering, body blitzing assault on their senses. Intact.

  “Gnnhhh…”

  “Ha…your turn for tickle-torture, d’you surrender?” The glee in Phin’s tone was utterly unseemly. Jake must remember to point that out…later.

  “Never,” he growled.

  “Really?” Phin blew a stream of cool air across damp skin and Jake almost shot through the roof. The one thing tethering him to the planet was his lock-jawed death grip on the pillow when Phin began to meander his tongue in a mind-boggling trickle down the tightly clenched crack of his arse. If Jake so much as relaxed one muscle, he was convinced the rest would unravel with uncontainable consequences.

  “Fuck…” he groaned, bowing his spine, arching his hips towards the fiery flickering dead-set on skewering his self-control. “Phin…please…” he groaned, despite having no idea what he was pleading for. Christ, he might combust if this didn’t move on sharpish, or stop. Something…anything. Soon. Maddening slithers of moist bliss… coaxing his cheeks apart. Teeth clenched tight. Fists clenched tighter still. “Phin! F’fucksakes… Please!”

  A brief flicker of teasing tongue was swiftly followed by a blistering spear that almost blew his mind. It really didn’t help that this first time for everything plunge into new territory went both ways. It definitely didn’t help that his cock was encompassed in a firm grip about a snatched off breath later. The former he’d steeled himself against…the latter was such a shock to his system, Jake damn near passed out.

  “Phiiiin!” His head snapped back, every muscle trembling, teetering on the edge of endurance. Phin stabbed deeper still, fluttering the confounded thing while sweeping his goddamn wrist. “Gnnnngggh…” Jake tasted the bittersweet tang of his own blood when his guts convulsed, cramping in spasms too intense to—Fuck no…Jack…help me. The jackal whimpered but hunkered down, the scruff of his neck tremouring to attention, coat twitching as if a thousand fire-ants were scurrying across his skin.

  Jake dragged in a jagged breath, then dipped his head to bite down on the pillow; teeth tearing into fabric as if it were rice paper. The blood boiling in his brain was so loud he could scarce hear the inhuman noises crawling up his throat. The back end of his body wasn’t faring any better, his hips were straining toward the tongue still swirling as Phin picked up the pace up front. He couldn’t hold—Jackplease—Jake threw his head back with a hideous howl when the heat crouched in the pit of his guts erupted like lava and scorched his system with an incandescent blitz of bliss. Then the world went black.

  Jake hadn’t blacked out since the first year the jackal had entered his life in a frenzy of fur, teeth and claws. Even then, he hadn’t been engulfed in darkness without warning. That had only happened once before.

  The night of the sex; the night he met the woman that changed his life…but not in the way Jake had ever expected. The earth had not ‘moved’. His whole existence had…shifted. A place of shadows, darkness, and loneliness so desperate, he’d never dragged himself from the pit of despair into which he’d plunged. Jake had felt safer huddled in his dank cave of depression; the too bright, too loud, too terrible truth dulled. Diluted still further by the drink that deadened his senses—but fuelled the flames of fury—rather than drowned them.

  He wasn’t even angry with Her…his rage had only one enemy. Himself. Jake specifically. The jackal was just…being a jackal. Jake would rather he wasn’t one from his own body but couldn’t blame Jack for that. It was clear they’d become something of a package deal, so it seemed ludicrous to apportion blame, but Jake didn’t initially think of Jack as an…extension of himself. He was just a squatter who didn’t have any more choice in the matter than Jake. That much was obvious; no one with the will to live would have moved in with Jake and his moribund wretchedness. Unless he was a masochist with a death wish.

  Glastonbury Festival: 2 years ago.

  Jake and a bunch of mates had sallied forth to Glastonbury for a (hopefully) hedonistic weekend immersed in music, mud, drink, drugs, and dreadful toilet facilities.

  The weather had been the only thing that failed to deliver. It was actually rather mild and not-at-all muddy. He couldn’t remember a great deal about Friday night. Suffice to say, Jake didn’t wake up
next to anyone he could ever recall meeting before, let alone remember their names. He was fairly sure he’d only copped off with one of the tent’s inhabitants…which may have been wishful thinking; not being a fan of goatee beards, in general.

  Saturday had dawned far too early at around midday. It was…bright. And loud. Jake felt a bit better after downing a plastic cup of flat lager and eating something inedible. The best that could be said of that was, it didn’t promptly reappear…at either end.

  After a few hours of stumbling around greeting long lost strangers, Jake happened upon his tent rather by chance and was warmly welcomed back into the fold, as if he were a soldier returning from the trenches. The rest of the day passed in a blur of bodies, bands, dope and drink. Jake had a bloody good time. Probably.

  Darkness had descended on their last night of revelry by the time he returned from his evening pilgrimage to the portaloo. Jake had been weaving his way through a sparsely sprinkled part of the crowd when he saw Her. She was standing in the shadows, the cool night breeze tugging at her rippling raven hair and the filmy fabric of her dress. She was alone—yet didn’t seem the slightest lonely—just utterly self-contained, absorbed in thoughts infinitely more interesting than anything happening around her.

  Jake stood transfixed. He couldn’t tear his eyes away from her lithe form, which hinted at supple grace, even in stillness. Then she turned her head…and stared straight at him, through him. He couldn’t even be sure she was looking at him…except, he was certain of it. This being highly unlikely, nonetheless, he tore his gaze away and glanced over each shoulder to see if someone far more desirable was standing behind him. Apart from a few stragglers meandering in aimless circles, he was the only soul encompassed by her amber gaze. Jake could feel it burning through him like dark flame…as if in beckoning. He had smoked way too much.

  Jake had definitely drank far too much, having not been entirely sober since Friday, but summoning ethereal temptresses with come-hither eyes still seemed excessive, as aspirations went. Ah well, at least he was too wasted to be mortally wounded when she (rightfully) knocked him back. So, Jake came-hither…

  He’d like to believe he glided over and seduced her with a dash of debonair charm and charismatic allure. Jake did not. He stumbled, mumbled something incomprehensible (even to his own ears) and then stood blinking, struck dumb by her beauty and the fiery intensity of her gaze. It was like staring into goblet of whiskey back lit by flickering flame.

  Jake couldn’t have torn his eyes from her face if his life had depended on it. It did. Or at least, his life as he knew it. Should he have fled? Beyond all shadow of doubt. But never once since that night had Jake believed there’d been a damn thing he could have done to avert the events that unfolded. His fate had been sealed from the moment she…found him.

  Those being the words she’d whispered at his lips: ‘I found you’.

  Her kiss unleashed a need so desperate it felt as if it would rip Jake to shreds if he didn’t act upon it. Deep, drugging, insistent, impossible to deny, even if he’d wanted to. There was nothing further from his thoughts—he had none—there was only the deluge of desire that encompassed them both. Jake knew she felt it too, he could sense it…smell it…which surely should have seemed strange but didn’t.

  He found himself tugged deeper into darkness and an onslaught of sensation; the scent of her skin, the sound of sighs, gasps and low, rolling groans. There was only lust; lips, teeth, tongues and nails clawing at flesh. They were just two creatures of the night, satiating a need too gnawing to resist. Her arms clutched as if she were intent on imprinting herself on his very bones as she sank her teeth into his neck, and he tangled fingers into her hair to hold her there. More…was the only word Jake could remember, resounding ’round his head, drowning all else. He didn’t think to wonder who she was, why she wanted him, nor what she’d meant. Jake didn’t even ask her name.

  The sounds drifting on the night air seemed as fitting as the lush grass he laid her upon. Burying himself in the body beneath his own felt necessary. Yet, even as he took her, Jake knew he’d been claimed too. She rolled him onto his back, eyes nailing him to the ground as her hands grasped his wrists like steel cuffs. Her hips were as hypnotic as the gaze ensnaring his own when she writhed above him—beneath him—when he flipped her over to take her from behind.

  This was the sex he’d always craved but feared he might never find. He’d loathed himself for wanting it and coveting something darker, more…real. Basic? No…Primal. Feral. The sort of sex he wouldn’t dream of unleashing on a woman, for fear of being uncouth… cruel. Ignoble.

  A need that had propelled Jake into new territory. He’d always found both sexes attractive, so he sought encounters with men, convinced he must have got it all wrong and must crave something other…rather than more. It was certainly more honest—far more fleeting—because they were shags with like-minded men, rather than lovers. It was more satisfying; Jake found that he preferred lean, hard bodies, but it still didn’t salve a soul thirsting for so much more…

  His guttural growl alongside that final thrust had been unearthly; echoed in the cries that clawed the air alongside the scoring of nails across skin. The shuddering of his body had wracked his bones when the darkness exploded in a white-hot rush that obliterated… Everything.

  *

  Jake woke, surrounded by scents of dawn; dew, moss, bark, grass, the ground itself. Scuffling critters scuttled in the undergrowth beneath the rustle of leaves. When he opened his eyes, Jake had to slam them shut, against a light so bright and colours so intense they seemed alive. Something was very wrong…and yet, very right.

  There was no trace of the hangover he undoubtedly deserved. Jake felt…new. Renewed. Which was ludicrous, when he should have felt as sick as a dog with a banging head to boot. Instead, he felt…invigorated.

  Jake lay there, pondering this for a while, luxuriating in the lush tickle of grass beneath him and the whisper of wind caressing his skin. Before abruptly springing to his feet when it occurred to him that he was stark, bollock naked. Outdoors. On the outskirts of a field. At Glastonbury.

  Jake was more concerned about his lack of attire than the fact he’d just moved faster than he had ever done in his life. It customarily took him ten minutes to crank so much as a reluctant eyelid open…which was bloody weird in itself. Nevertheless, a flash of white alerted him to a far more immediate concern; the presence of pants strewn artfully across a bush, not far from Jake’s jacket, crumpled jeans and the remnants of his T-shirt. Thank fuck for that; there was only so much coverage to be gained from two bandanas. Claiming festival chic would somewhat stretch credulity as a fashion statement.

  Jake donned his pants and jeans and…arranged his tattered T-shirt around himself. Best of all—at least for the next five minutes—was the discovery of a slightly squashed packet of cigarettes and a lighter in the pocket of his leather. Jake parked his arse on a mound of grass and lit up, inhaling deeply. Better…

  The strange intensity of the world he’d woken to and the fact he’d been starkers had been rather distracting, but as Jake smoked, memories of the night before finally began flickering to the fore. Quite where they’d been hiding for the last five minutes, he knew not, but once the floodgates opened, Jake was engulfed in the most vivid reel of images ever conjured by his mind’s eye. They were not hazy flickers of memory; it was akin to watching a blue(ray) movie inside his head.

  Despite the fact he’d patently had the best sex of his life, he felt no pang of disappointment upon waking alone. There was no instant need to find her, no desire to hunt her down and make her his own. Make her his own? What the hell? He’d woken as Jurassic Jake. Well-weird turns of phrase aside, Jake knew—with bone-deep certainty—that last night had been something other. Something that wouldn’t work, couldn’t work, if the world impinged upon it. He’d just doom himself to disappointment if he tried to track her down, but more than that…Jake neither hoped, nor craved, to see her again. That sho
uld have seemed strange in itself. It didn’t. It had just been…a moment. A snatch of time out of time; one that could never be replicated nor confined to everyday life. She had left him, after all…she’d clearly felt the same. Best to let sleeping dogs lie…

  ∞∞∞

  Jake’s eyes flickered open and he found himself staring into drowning pools of beautiful, bewildered brown. Phin. Cool fingers swept soothing strokes through his hair, smoothing it away from his face.

  “Jack…” His angel face lit up with a beam of relief.

  “Hi…um, sorry…” he mumbled.

  “You don’t say sorry, you daftie. Does that happen lots?”

  “No…sometimes. Not for a while. My blood sugar must be shot t’shit…” Jake groaned, hoping the latter didn’t sound too blatant a lie.

  “D’you want a cup with a drop of tea in it?”

  “Please…” Jake chuckled. Phin grinned and shuffled to the edge of the bed before slithering to the floor.