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  Rusty Knob

  Copyright ©2015 Erica Chilson

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law. For permission requests, write to the publisher, addressed “Attention: Permissions Coordinator,” at the address below.

  Wicked Reads

  PO Box 29

  Nelson, PA 16940

  www.ericachilson.com/wicked-reads

  Printed in the United States of America

  First Printing, August 2015

  ISBN-13: 978-0692505274

  ISBN-10: 069250527X

  License Notice:

  No part of this may be reproduced, copied, scanned, or distributed in electronic or printed form without permission. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the author’s rights. Purchase only authorized editions.

  This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be resold or given away to other people. If you wish to share this ebook with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person you share it with.

  Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

  Publisher Notice:

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Titles by Erica Chilson

  Mistress and Master of Restraint

  -series order—

  Restraint

  Unleashed

  Dexter

  Dalton

  Queen Omnibus*

  Jaded*

  Queened*

  Checkmate*

  King

  Faithless

  The Hunter

  Integrated

  -Coming Soon—

  Hero/Empowered (tentative title)

  Blended

  -Series order—

  Good Girl

  Wildly Wedded Wife (Blended #1.5)

  Widow

  Wanton (Blended #2.5)

  -Coming Soon—

  Warped

  Rusty Knob

  Rusty Knob

  Tarnished

  Dedication

  To my faithful readers, who have stuck by me through the ups and downs, the yanking books from sale, the rewrites, and had the patience to wait until I felt the books were ready. This book is for you, born out of the inspiration during a very trying time in my career. I wouldn’t be the writer I am today without you. Cheers

  Table of Contents:

  Copyright Page

  Titles by Erica Chilson

  Dedication

  Kaden Marx

  Wynn Gillette

  The Test

  Keep the Change

  Pull the Trigger

  Ammo Thief

  Didja Eat Yet?

  Escape Hatch

  Don’t Mind Your Elders

  We Are Rusty Knob

  Urban Hillbilly

  They Bruise Easier

  Scratching the Itch

  Wynn Gillette Bought Me a Drink

  Flushing Traitors

  Red Saturn? Gray Food?

  Willa’s Rocking Chair

  Mentor KM Lives in Rusty Knob!

  Blow My Head Clean Off

  Welcome Home

  Tying Flies

  Suicidal Tendencies

  Sold

  Sacrifice

  Back Off!

  Bacon & Eggs

  Invaded

  Cute Little Assholes

  Not Wynn Gillette

  We Need a Cure

  Let Us Grow Up

  Good Boy

  Teenage Wynn Bad Boy

  Enter Sandman

  Miss Me

  Own IT!

  Goodbye

  Kaden Marx

  National Suicide Prevention Lifeline

  acknowledgements

  About the Author

  The townsfolk of Rusty Knob, West Virginia, see the Gillettes as ignorant wastes of space– worthless drunk sponges. As the youngest, Wynn may be a Gillette, but he doesn’t act, nor think like one. At only seventeen, he studies hard, plays basketball harder, and works the hardest.

  Wynn is numb to his core, no longer feeling the hits that keep knocking him down to the ground. He’s unable to see the bright future laid out before him. Royce Kennedy, a distant relative, tries all he can do to save the youngest generation of Gillettes from the dark shroud of bitter ignorance infecting them via their neglectful upbringing.

  Wynn’s studying is to the backdrop of drunken chaos, his relationship with friends and family are tainted by a narrow world view, and his life is filled with more questions than answers. His every dollar earned is bled dry come payday, only to have his parents piss it down the toilet or blow caustic smoke to billow in the air.

  A warped sense of loyalty forces Wynn to be his family’s enabler, and he’s paying the ultimate price. With the support system of Royce, the mentor of the school district’s LGBTQ online community, and Wynn’s friends, they try to prove to Wynn he deserves anything he needs, whether he earns it or not. Growing up in an ignorant wasteland, he never learned love, friendship, and respect are unconditional, can never be purchased, and should never be abused.

  Wynn Gillette is at a crossroads. One thing’s for sure, he cannot continue on this destructive path. Wynn has to end the only life he’s ever known, breaking the bitter legacy passed down from one generation to the next. One way or the other. Permanently.

  Rusty Knob

  •Rusty Knob• Book One •

  Kaden Marx

  6 years ago

  Good Lord, how am I supposed to survive this?

  I’m a pervert.

  Being a skinny gay kid in an intolerant wasteland is one thing… being a pervert is another.

  My buddy Warren’s voice follows me down the drive as I walk to Gillette Holler, combined with the repetitive sound of an axe chopping through rounds of wood. “Kid, just another hour or two ought to do it.” A shiver works its way down my spine when I realize who’s wielding the axe. “Kade’s coming by, so I’ma go fix us up something to drink. Be back in a jiffy!”

  “Kay, War!” Overenthusiastic and ever-helpful, I have to close my eyes to the sound of a grown man’s voice spilling out of a young boy’s throat.

  It’s ninety degrees in the shade today, and my body reacts to the sight I’ve been longing to see. I wipe sweat off my brow with the sleeve of my thermal, but I’m not drenched because of the layers upon layers of clothing I’m wearing to hide my rack of bones and scars. I’m sweating because I feel guilty for being keyed-up by a kid who’s almost twelve.

  I’m a pervert.

  A gay pervert.

  But I’m not a pervert because I’m gay. No matter what my granddaddy thinks, that is. I’m a pervert because I’m closing in on seventeen and I’m drooling over a child.

  I concentrate on walking without tripping over my size fifteens. I’ve been known to trip over air because of my height. I’m closing in on six and a half feet and barely weigh a buck-fifty.

  The first time social services was called in on my granddaddy was because I walked headfirst into a wall. The second time was because I fell down a flight of stairs and broke my arm.

  I tripped, I said.

  They didn’t believe me, they said.

  So I lied and agreed with them, I said.

  So my granddaddy lost me six mon
ths ago because the state thought he was physically abusing me. I get to live in a huge house in town with my new foster dad and brother, and I have a college fund to any school I want to attend. I also have no privacy, especially inside my head because of my three therapists.

  You should have seen the look on Dr. Hearst’s face when I told him I was a pervert. I laughed for twenty minutes because of it, and left with an increase in my dosage of Lexapro.

  Royce Kennedy is my new foster dad, and I would have picked him if I was given a choice. Bren is my new baby brother, and I like him for the most part. Except when I wake in the middle of the night to the little asshole checking to see if I’m still breathing, and when he steals all the sharp knives and cuts my steak and butters my bread for me.

  Social Services should feel bad for not believing me in the first place, and I should feel a bit guilty for lying about Granddaddy beating me.

  But I don’t.

  My granddaddy was abusing me by messing with my head– twisting me up by calling me a little faggot, a cocksucking queer. He said I was too ugly, too skinny, too dumb to make anything of myself. He said I’d end up on the streets, selling my man-pussy by becoming a pimp’s bitch– the very street I’d be on when he kicked me out if I ever touched another boy.

  Six months back, my social worker came by on a surprise home visit. She found me in a pool of my cooling lifeblood because I missed my dad. Missed him with every fiber of my being, and I didn’t want to live anymore, especially with the foulmouthed asshole who was tearing me down every waking moment of my life.

  My dad left me nine months ago because a log kicked back wrong when he was felling a tree. The heavy weight crushed his chest and all the organs held within. If the kindest man on earth, the man who was every stereotype of a lumberjack, couldn’t survive this world, how was a skinny, dumb, gay kid supposed to survive without him?

  I died.

  I died, and when I was resurrected, the life I had been living no longer existed and I was placed in a new world with hopes and dreams and a future.

  No one else knew I was gay– hell, I didn’t even know. I didn’t feel the stir until this super-sweet, ever-helpful, always-in-my-face kid broke me. Wynn was only wearing a smile and a pair of cut-off shorts, and I was fucked. Yeah, I’m blaming the victim. Back off! I try to never look at the kid, and I sure as shit will never touch him.

  Now when I look in the mirror, I see a pervert staring back at me from the face of a guy who looks like he walked away from a concentration camp, with his frizzy shorn hair and pockmarked skin that seems to think he moisturizes with lard every night.

  I’m gross, and Wynn is precious– innocent, kind, and something worth protecting. The fact that he causes blood to pool in my groin makes me physically sick. The first time I woke up to a wet dream about Wynn, I puked. The second time, I felt like an asshole. The third time, I whacked off to the memory.

  I’ve since lost count, my dreams are vivid, and I no longer feel sick about it, either.

  I kick a rock, refusing to look at my surroundings. I pop my thumbs through the holes in my shirtsleeve cuffs, making sure my scars are hidden. I walk up the rough pathway to the Gillette’s shack, on the verge of losing the breakfast Royce made me and Bren. Sure, I’m nervous over seeing Wynn, but that’s not why I’m ready to retch.

  Corbin Gillette does his damnedest to force his family to live like rats. Even my asshole of a grandfather made sure I had food in my belly, a roof over my head, and a safe, warm place to rest my head. He may have made me feel like shit, but he didn’t outright neglect me on purpose.

  When I was younger, Warren and I would try to fix shit around here, to clean the house and mow the lawn, and to help Cora and Willa out with the chores. But I got sick of seeing bruises bloom on my buddy’s face for making an effort.

  “Ya think yer shit don’t stink, boy? Ya think what ta good Lord provides ain’t good ‘nuff fer ya?”

  Warren and I stopped trying, but little Wynn hasn’t got the memo yet. I pretend I don’t see the sheen in Warren’s eyes when all of Wynn’s hard work is for naught. Corbin will go on a rampage, destroying furniture and whipping his dick out to piss on freshly scrubbed floors.

  “Hello, Mr. Gillette,” I say politely as I move to pass the bastard. He’s sitting in a broken lawn chair, with weeds growing up near his ears, drowning his troubles in beer while watching his youngest chopping the wood he should be splitting.

  Corbin Gillette hasn’t worked a single second in his entire life, unless you call drunken destruction work.

  “Kade,” Corbin says with a sneer. The gleam in his eye suggests he’s remembering all the times he beat me, and he’s savoring it since he’ll never get the chance again.

  The man knows– the man knows I have impure thoughts about his boy, and he’s beaten me a few times because of it. But Royce Kennedy has more power than Corbin’s fictitious God. The bastard hasn’t laid another hand on Warren, Wynn, or me since the last time a few months ago when he was kicking my ribs in for staring at Wynn’s ass. At least, I think that’s why I was being beaten, but it could be the guilt of being a pervert talking. With Corbin, he never really needs an excuse of any kind to take his frustrations out on your hide.

  “Are you going to die soon?” flows without thought. I’ve been obsessed with death since my dad died, since I tried to kill myself. “Why does a bastard like you get to live, while the good ones die?”

  “We all go home to the Lord eventually, son.” Corbin’s voice is soft for a change.

  I roll my eyes so far back inside my head, I fear they will never come back down again. I snort at the irony of Corbin believing in an invisible man floating amongst the clouds, reaching down to move human-shaped game pieces. When He gets bored, He flicks a piece from His game of global domination.

  I think God needs some competition. Maybe then someone would actually punish the assholes and reward the innocents like Wynn.

  I don’t believe in an Almighty Power. Royce forces me to go to church every Sunday, and not once in six months of sermons has Corbin Gillette graced us with his presence. But I’ve heard him a billion times spouting out about God to serve the purpose of infecting his sons with his ignorance.

  The fizzy snap of a beer can tab popping draws my attention. Corbin raises an eyebrow at me, always knowing what’s playing out inside my head. He points at his youngest son, smirking. In a nasty, snide voice, he rumbles, “Enjoying the view?” Then he swills more than half a beer, eyes never leaving mine.

  My eyes tug to the side, unable to resist the power of Corbin’s words, then I quickly snap my eyes shut. Not that I can erase what I just saw– no, never that.

  Imprinted in my brain is the split-second slice of time of the arc of Wynn’s muscular back as he swung an axe over his head. He’s still wearing those wet dream cut-off shorts from last summer, even though he’s went through two or three growth spurts since. No shoes. No shirt. All messy curls and big, blue eyes, with a tiny blond trail of fuzz leading down his torso, and hard, round ass cheeks flexing beneath denim. Young, sun-kissed skin glistens with the potent, hormone-laced intoxicant of his sweat. I’m just thankful I’m not within sniffing distance, or I’d make a complete pervert out of myself.

  The kid isn’t even twelve yet, and he’s a full-sized man. If it wasn’t for the suffering of blood loss as it travels rapidly to my dick, I’d be jealous. I know Warren is jealous of his baby brother.

  Wynn is tall for his age, proving he’s going to be almost as tall as me when he’s full-grown. Except he’ll never look sickly because he’s skin and bones like I am. His perfect, striated muscles are a curiosity to me, since no matter how much I eat and weight train, I can’t grow an inch.

  I wince as a montage of naughty acts play out in my mind, the very acts that make me a pervert.

  Furious, I lash out at Corbin. “I hope you do the world a favor and rot in this chair,” I grit out, knowing he’d kill me if I raised a hand to him. “Worthless waste
of life.”

  “Wait a few years,” Corbin drawls out, sounding disgustingly proud of himself. “And I’ll be selling Wynn ta da highest bidder. He sure is growing up ta be a fine lookin’ lad. My son can be a workhorse or a studhorse, buyer’s choice. Better get ta earning some serious dough, faggot, ‘cuz Wynn’s top dollar.”

  The back of my hand flies up to stop my breakfast from escaping, amusing Corbin. “I got enough cash to last two years with Willa. I didn’t expect to make a dime on the boys, thinking they could bring in money from working. But Wynn’s special– special in the way Willa ain’t. I suspect I’ll be able to live the rest of my life in comfort once I sell Wynn off.”

  A firm hand wrapping around the back of my neck stops me before I can murder Corbin Gillette in his own yard. I’m tossed closer to Wynn, tripping over my own two feet.

  “Get in the house, old man,” Warren warns. “C’mon, now. Quit talkin’ that bullshit, especially ‘round comp’ny.”

  Corbin struggles to his feet, body ruined from the drink. Warren supports his father as the man runs off at the mouth. “It ain’t bullshit. You know it ain’t.”

  “Yeah… yeah… yeah…” Warren releases a strained laugh. “I know you think it’s happening, old man. But you keep forgetting how I keep saying I’ll kill you first. I’ll burn Gillette Holler to the ground with you and Momma in it if you try to hurt Wynn the way you harmed Willa.”

  “I already got a buyer sniffing ‘round for him. I figure if I keep holding out, getting some more work out of Wynn before I give him up, I can increase the price.”

  Heart beating out of my chest, my eyes seek out the boy who is completely oblivious to what’s going down. Wynn is splitting wood like a natural born lumberjack with a wide grin on his face. “Is this true?” I shriek.

  “Forget about it,” Warren mutters flippantly, rolling his eyes, as he tries to maneuver his dad across their dumpster of a lawn. “This ‘buyer’ doesn’t want anything from Wynn except his happiness. He doesn’t want his ass any more than he wants yours. So relax. I hope it’s the truth for Wynn’s sake, believe it or not.”

  Bewildered and flabbergasted, “Royce?” spills from my lips.

  “Yeah, Dad was upset because Royce wasn’t going to pay for a legal adult when it came to me. Royce said if I wanted to leave, he’d take me in, but I better bring Wynn with me. So let’s hope Dad’s not blowing smoke up our asses, ‘cuz whatever else he has planned might not be in Wynn’s best interests.”