The Russet Taint

The rain came down red in the south end of town, something to do with the foundry just outside the city limits. Lana liked to catch the water in a bowl and paint herself with it. She drew letters and hearts on her neck, over her collarbone and sternum. The water dripped slowly down her chest, pooled in her cleavage and stained her clothes. Sometimes her boss made her wear a white dress. It never stayed white for long.

Lana knew she looked good slaked with russet, but the new kid looked even better, pretty with his white skin burnished and gleaming all at once. She caught sight of him running in off the street, barefoot, city as a limousine. He had money, or he used to; Lana could smell the dollars on him, could smell the dollars on any trick, but his money scent was faded, washed away by rain or sweat or tears. She watched him wander around the hallway, watched him smile a heavy smile while he took in peeling paint and rotten wood and tired boys and tired girls just looking to make a living.

He looked broken, kind of beaten in his worn cashmere sweater and faded torn jeans. Lana couldn't remember ever meeting somebody who didn't look that way, but there was defiance in him, too. She could see it in his shoulders, in the swiftness of his eyes, the way he glared and frowned.

She tried to guess his age and couldn't; the baldness threw her off, but it made her lick her lips as well. She thought about pressing her mouth to his head, about kissing a trail down the curve of his skull to the nape of his neck. He'd gleam in her hands, all battered elegance and pride. He'd beg for her, but only because he wanted to.

He walked up and down the hallway, up and down, paced a steady line through the crowd. It seemed to part for him, this maybe-rich boy fresh from the mansion. Lana could understand why. There was something about the way he walked, some inner fire that made him strong. Maybe self-preservation made people keep their distance. Maybe his ice would burn.

It didn't stop Lana touching him the next time he came close to her, just a hand to his arm, the contact short and firm and to the point. The muscle under his shirt didn't feel anything but soothing, so his fire didn't come from flesh. His eyes, though, when he stopped and turned and looked her up and down, they made her body flush.

His voice was lush and made her think of sunsets and sex, or maybe just of sex, the heated kind of sex with sweat and blood and tears.

Lana fiddled with her hair. "You need some help?"

"No."

"Right," said Lana, and put her fingertips on his chest. "You know exactly what you're doing."

He opened his mouth and then closed it. He shrugged, and his shirt shifted beneath her hands. "How hard can it be?"

"Oh," Lana whispered, and twisted thick spirals in the fabric. "You'd be surprised."

He didn't answer that, and she stretched up and licked at his throat for a while, until he grabbed her arms and held her steady. His grip was hard and made Lana moan and squirm against him. She curved gentle hands around his head and brought him close.

"Listen to me," he murmured. "I'm going to be a whore. That's no reason to fuck one."

-

She followed him endlessly in the months after that, careful to keep her spying covert. He worked the sweeter side of town, where the money people lived. She thought maybe it had something to do with his name; three months into his stay at the house, she'd learned his name was Luthor.

Rumors followed him like rats stalking the piper. Daddy died in a shootout with the cops. Daddy used him up until he ran. Daddy kicked him out on the streets for one too many public blowjobs like a little back alley whore, and junior Luthor came to the house to continue his good work.

Lana thought Daddy probably lost it all and left Lex with nothing and nobody but those who wanted to break him. Times were, Lana wondered if the rich side of town really did sweeten his lot, or if the rumors made it rough like downtown was for everyone else. But he didn't have to work where he did, and for a while Lana had to wonder if he enjoyed it when he bled.

-

Soon after the name-learning it came to light that Lex really did enjoy spilling his blood for dollars, but only because it earned him enough money that he could skim a bigger cut than usual.

It made the house tense and left Boss deeply displeased. He called them all to muster, hauled Lex up to the front and smacked him in the face. Lex dropped to his knees and stayed there. It would've been a wise move, except Boss had feet and legs and wore boots with steel toes. Lex got kicked until his ribs cracked, and the snap of it was loud in the silence previously broken only by Boss's grunts and Lex's cries.

"Let it stand as a lesson," Boss said, panting, his fat chest heaving and sweating. "Where's Clark? Somebody needs to supervise this former-rich-boy prick."

Lana turned her head and looked over the assembly, spotted Clark lounging at the back, his hands in some girl's hair while she licked and kissed at his neck. "Right here."

He was clean and neat, apart from the kissing girl playing with his collar, and no sweat or blood stained his skin or clothes. Back from one of his nicer tricks, maybe, looking to cut loose and play. Clark liked to play. He had a lot of nice tricks, too, pretty women and prettier men who wanted to suck his cock and then get fucked until they begged. People liked it when Clark hurt them. Lana understood why. He looked innocent and farmyard fresh every single day, cruelty dressed in kindness and concern. His beatings came with a friendly face, and they always went back for more.

Lana watched him nudge the girl away and stroll to the front, saw Boss put a hand on Clark's neck and murmur something in Clark's ear. A question, maybe, Can you get it up for this? Clark shrugged and crouched down beside Lex, still lying and gasping on the floor. Clark stroked Lex's head and reached down and squeezed Lex's ass, and when he looked up again his face wore a smile.

-

So Clark and Lex were double-acting it up on the high side while Lana kept grafting it downtown, and it was hard to keep the envy quiet whenever they walked in stinking of blood money. She went and found a pretty boy so she could get on her knees and fill her mouth with cock, the only way the words wouldn't come choking out to gag her, but in the end it was the rat rumors running after them that kept her from venturing close.

-

In the end, Clark showed up just when she needed him, her latest trick fucking her ass to a pulp in an alley just off Main Street. It hadn't come up in the initial negotiations, no mention of things like, "Hey, whore, let me hear you beg," or, "Hey, slut, I wanna see you bleed." Since her silence wasn't a requirement Lana exercised her right to scream, and she screamed and screamed until the pounding stopped and the hand pushing her face into the dirt disappeared.

Wet noises, hitting noises, they made her close her eyes and rest her forehead on the ground. When she opened her eyes after a final crash and lifted her face out of the grime, she saw most of her trick lying smashed in with some trashcans, and Clark leaning against the wall, all casual and lean.

"Hey, Lana." His voice was a purr, and he nodded at her ex-trick. "Having a rough night?"

"Screw you, Clark." Lana forced herself to her hands and knees, tried to hide her cuts and winces from Clark's pushing eyes. "I could have handled it."

"Sure." He grinned and lifted her straight, held her arms tight and close in to her body. His fingers brushed her bruises and traced her bleeding cuts, and she felt tears rising and could have cursed for that.

"Clark," she tried to snap, but it came out like a gasp.

"Oh, yeah," he murmured, holding her wrists with one hand behind her back, squeezing her breast with his other. He came across the bite her ex-trick planted on her nipple, and he squeezed and squeezed until she moaned. "You like that, don't you? You like being hurt. You're such a good whore, Lana," he whispered in her ear, brought his head down low and sucked a bruise onto her neck. "So pretty when you cry like that."

Lana bit his shoulder, snarled, "I don't want you, Clark," and swiped at her neck when he let her go.

Clark stood back. Lana felt his eyes on her, but she didn't look back while she put on her dirty white dress and fixed her hair back in a loose clip, slipped her feet into her stilettos and wiped the tears from her face.

"You're spying on my partner."

Figuring honesty the best policy in Clark's hot little world, Lana squared her shoulders and said, "Yes. From the second he walked through the door."

"Me, too," Clark said, and something wanting in his voice made her look at him twice, because it sounded like maybe he wanted to make Lex scream as much as she did. She lifted an eyebrow, and he smiled at her and licked his lips, slow and dirty.

-

Lana ran into Lex that night, right where Clark said he'd be, naked in the shower watching blood swirl away from his body. His body was pale and smudged dark in the places he'd been hit, by Clark or by his tricks. He didn't look around when she walked in, too busy staring at the big, blank nothing in the distance to notice her, until she touched him, put her hand on his face and kissed his throat.

"Leave me alone," he said, and tried to step away.

Lana ignored him, just leaned in and ran a finger down his chest, hummed in her throat. "Daddy crashed and burned, huh, baby?" She smiled, feigned sympathy. "People whisper, you know. Just little breaths of air. I've wondered, Lex," she murmured, trailing her nails over his skin. "Were you a whore for everybody before you came here? Or were you just for daddy?"

He shoved her away, smacked her hard in the face. "Get lost."

"Oh, no," Lana said, licking the blood from her lip. She heard the door open behind her, heard Clark walk into the room. "Playtime's just beginning."

-

Lex looked a little afraid as Clark walked into the room with a smirk on his face and a sway in his hips. Lana liked that look on Lex. It made his blue eyes wide and pretty, and the way he parted his mouth and licked his lips made her heart beat a little faster. Clark seemed to like it, too, reaching down to lazily touch himself through his pants, a move crude and delicious that had Lana thinking about his cock, how big it was, how hard it was for her and what they were about to do.

"What do you want?" Lex asked, like he didn't already know.

Clark reached Lex and pulled him close, ran his hand over Lex's naked chest. "It's always been for money," Clark said, squeezing Lex's ass, just like he did that first time out in front of everybody. "I've never had you just for me."

Lex went still for a long, long moment and then began to struggle in Clark's grasp. Lana watched for a few seconds, enjoyed the way water droplets glittered and shone on Lex's skin as he moved, wondered if his sweat would glitter the same way while they fucked him. Then she sauntered over and put her hands on his shoulders, leaned her face in close and sucked dark bruises onto his pale, pale skin.

"I've been waiting to hear you scream," she whispered to his body. "So long, Lex. I've wanted to make you scream for so long."

"Bitch," Lex swore. "You think I'll scream for you?"

"Oh, yes," said Lana. "If I want a man to scream he'll scream, believe me." She licked his nipple and then bit down, and Lex let out a gasp in response to her teeth, struggled again when she took Clark's hand and raised it to Lex's face. Clark took the hint and put his fingers in Lex's mouth, moved them slowly, in and out. Lex was biting, Lana could tell, as if he didn't know that biting only got Clark hot.

"I should do this to you all the time," Clark said, and touched his thumb to Lex's cheek. There was tenderness in the gesture. It surprised Lana until she thought about the look in Lex's eyes, the sweetness hidden behind grief. Then she understood, even felt a little tender herself, and she found herself stooping to lick and kiss him gently on the stomach, his belly tense and quivering against her tongue.

"Some of us settle for the russet taint, Lex," she said, reaching up to touch her hand to his lips, open around Clark's fingers. "You just don't know when to quit."

Clark grinned at her over Lex's shoulder and took his fingers out of Lex's mouth. They were slick with Lex's spit and a faint hint of his blood, life as lube when Clark forced Lex's legs apart with his knees and pushed a finger into his ass. He held it there, gnawing at Lex's shoulder, and Lex waited, tense and shaking until Clark started to move his finger and make Lex shift and groan as his cock began to rise.

Lana got down on her knees and licked his balls, slid her hand around him and put her finger in beside Clark's. So small, such a tight little hole. "We're going to fuck you so hard, Alexander."

"Yeah," Clark said, forcing another finger in Lex's ass and stretching him wide. "So hard, Lex, so hard. We're going to make you cry."

Lex didn't say anything to that, just looked down at Lana, furious and distressed when she sucked his cock into her mouth. She kept her eyes open, kept looking at his face, such a pretty flush on his cheeks, such a hot sheen of sweat across his head. She thought again about kissing him there, and decided she would when it was all over, when Clark had used him up and dropped him fucked and bleeding to the floor. She'd crawl over him and lick the sweat from his brow and the tears from his cheeks, and then she'd kiss that trail all down his head to the nape of his neck while she played with his cock and made him hard for her again.

Clark's eyes were dark like the night sky when he unfastened his pants, lifted Lex up and started to lower him onto his cock. Lana sat back to watch and enjoy Lex's little gasping breaths as Clark tugged him down. "That's it," Clark whispered, sweat rolling down his face. "Open up for me, Lex, take it all. So tight, Lex, always so tight. Why do you always have to feel so good?"

"Clark," Lex gasped, and Clark licked his palm and slid his big, slick hand down Lex's body and took hold of his cock, jacked him hard and quick.

"Say it, Lex," Clark whispered. "Say it just like always."

"Oh, god," Lex moaned, bucking into Clark's hand. "Please, Clark. Please, just fuck me."

Clark gave in to something then, fucking Lex wild, fast, holding Lex's hips and levering himself in and out of Lex's body, deep red bruises spreading over Lex's ass and thighs as he took it all and cried. His head rolled back and he pushed his face into Clark's neck, hiding his tears. Lana watched and bit her lip, reached down and touched her clit and pinched and rubbed, moaning when Lex shuddered and shot come all over her face.

Clark met her eyes, growled low in his throat and turned Lex away from her, hid him from her gaze. Lex put his hands against the shower wall and sagged while Clark used him, bit him, broke him into pieces. "Come on, Lex," Clark grunted into his neck. "Again. I want to see it again," and Lex seemed to shatter even more as Clark pushed into him one last time, biting his neck and drawing blood as he jerked and came with a shout.

-

Lana came quietly out of sight, watching Clark's hips tremble then grow still. She licked her fingers clean and rose to her feet, eyes fastened on Clark as he turned Lex and held him upright in his arms. He kissed Lex, slow and soft on the lips like it meant something real, and Lex closed his eyes and sighed.

She slipped from the room and closed the door behind her. She didn't stay to spy, but rumour said they stayed in there a long time.

-

The next day brought Lana another trick in another alley, and she worked her body until she got the guy off, then pulled down her white dress and took her money and left him fastening his pants.

It started to rain as she made her way through the crowds, and she was russet again by the time she arrived at the house. She wondered where Clark and Lex were working it, if they lip-kissed for their clients or if they kept it for private, if Lex always looked like that when he begged. She wondered how long it would take them to come back.

She wasn't surprised when they didn't.