Private Dicks (15 page)

"He doesn't tell anyone because of me, because we don't know how my fans will react. That kind of makes me the lucky one, right?"

Elizabeth shrugged. "Kinda. But why wouldn't you tell your fans? You think they wouldn't like him?"

I watched as Jade hesitated then tangled my fingers with his on my shoulder. "I don't want to do anything that might harm Jade's career, and if people know he loves a man, it might cause him some problems."

"Ohhh, the gay thing? That's no big deal. I know a lot of gay people and they're nice."

Jade cocked his head at her, his fingers squeezing mine. "So you'd still come to the band's shows and buy our music?"

"Of course. Daddy always says it don't matter if people are gay, straight, black, white, or purple. As long as they're nice and don't hurt anyone else, it's all good."

I saw Durango smirk out of the corner of my eye. Maybe he wasn't so bad after all—simply a father trying to protect and love his daughter.

Elizabeth wasn't fazed by what she'd said. "You want me to keep the secret?"

Jade looked up at me, a silent question on his lips. I kissed his cheek and answered against his soft skin. "Up to you, love."

"Ohhh, that's so cute. He called you 'love,'" Elizabeth gushed, pressing her hands to her chest.

"Told you he was cool," Jade said. "And you know what? I think it's high time everyone knew how cool and special he is, so how about we consider the secret not a secret anymore."

"Awesome! Tiffany is gonna be so jealous that I know something before her. Can you drop me off at her house, Daddy?"

Durango finally separated himself from the wall. I'd never noticed how dingy my office actually looked until that very moment. "No, ma'am. I think we have some other business to take care of. You know what you tried to do to Mr. Lee was wrong, don't you?"

Elizabeth nodded and dipped her head. "Yeah, and I never liked Griz anyhow. He smelled and had really bad teeth." From all his drug use, I presumed.

"That's not the point, Elizabeth. Any kind of sex at your age is not acceptable and certainly not with someone so much older." He turned to Jade and me. "I'd appreciate some advice on this situation, gentlemen. If you don't think I've been too much of an ass, that is."

I stepped back into my professional role. "I think you need to call the police, Mr. Durango. Elizabeth, do you have a phone number for Griz?" I didn't even like saying his name.

She nodded. "I was supposed to go to his gross hotel again tonight." She looked up at her father. "I never ... did it all the way with him, Daddy. Just, you know … stuff with my mouth, and it was gross."

Durango pulled his daughter into his arms, a look of distress shadowing his face. "We're gonna go talk to someone about it, sweetheart. We'll get through it together, and I'll make damn sure that man goes to jail." He held out his hand to Jade and Jade enclosed it in his. "I'm truly sorry for all this, Mr. Lee, and I swear your name will not be dragged into it."

"You just do what you have to do for your daughter, sir. Mason and I can handle ourselves."

My turn was next and I accepted his handshake with pride. "I'd like to return your deposit, Mr. Durango."

"Nonsense," he scoffed. "You earned it, and I'm going to ask you a favor as well, one that I probably have no right to ask, but will anyhow for the sake of my daughter."

I had already anticipated the request. "The pictures will be destroyed," I said. "Except I suggest you hang onto a couple as proof for the police."

"Yeah, that's a good idea."

We said our goodbyes, Elizabeth giving Jade no less than three hugs. She even seemed to suck up her jealousy to hug me. Jade told her that anytime she wanted to get in touch with him, to just call me at the office, but that part of the arrangement was definitely a secret. The two people who walked out of my office barely resembled the pair I'd met only days ago. It felt really good to have helped.

"I think you should start cutting me a paycheck since I'm so influential in solving your cases and all." I turned to see Jade sprawled out in my big comfy chair, feet swinging over the armrest and a big, honest-to-goodness grin on his face.

I snorted in his general direction. "You can't solve the case if you are the case. Besides, you have more money than God."

He reached out and grabbed my hand, dragging me to him then tugging me so I sprawled into his lap. Not the most comfortable position for either of us, but I guessed I'd live.

"Maybe not God but definitely Adam Levine. And despite being old, he's fucking hot." He managed to duck the swat I directed at his head before trapping my wrist and pressing it to his lips. "But you're definitely hotter."

"Idiot," I growled as his lips moved down my arm. "I guess I could take you out to dinner for your help in diffusing the situation."

He stopped licking me to answer. "Or we could just go home and I could cook for you?"

"Meat?"

"Yep."

"Real meat, not that tofu, veggie, soy crap?"

He snickered, causing my body to bounce on top of him, which in turn made his noticeably half-hard dick more noticeable as it dug into my ass. "Pinky swear," he said. He smirked in that way I knew either meant he was feeling mischievous or horny—or more often than not, both. One of his hands still held my wrist to his mouth while the other inched its way down my belly.

I moaned when his fingers slid under my shirt, one digit slowly circling my sensitive-as-fuck belly button. "Never understood pinky swear," I whispered, tilting my head back as his lips moved over my jaw.

"Have we ever made love in your office?" His words vibrated against my skin.

"You know we have."

"But in this chair?"

Groaning when he raked his teeth over the sensitive spot behind my ear, I struggled to find my words. "Mmm, no … no, not in the chair."

His fingers slithered higher, finding one of my nipples and giving it a hard tweak. "Speaking of chairs …"

"I'm pretty sure there have been no chairs mentioned" I groaned again and arched my back, attempting to arrange my backside into a better position against his erection

"Do you have one of those office furniture catalogues?"

I stopped my squirming and shifted my head so I could him in the eye. "You're kidding me, right?"

He pecked at my mouth. "No. Have you ever sat in that chair in the other room? Fucking brutal, babe. And you really need an interior designer to spruce up this place. Shahara was right; it's kind of depressing."

His words sparked an earlier question I'd stuffed to the back of my mind. "Are you seriously considering taking some time off?" I asked.

"I dunno, maybe. I have a while to think about it. It'd be cool though, right? Solving cases together. Being together twenty-four seven. We could change the name to Cason Lee Investigations. No! Lee Cason." His eyes opened wide and he half-smiled. "Why are you looking at me like that? Don't wanna be my partner?"

I wrapped a hand behind his head and touched our foreheads together. "More than anything."

"Hey Jace, get me a—let's see—triple tall sugar-free caramel nonfat no-foam latte."

"Fuck you, Ciaran," Jason replied in a friendly tone to his coworker and friend, who was—as always—early for his shift. Ciaran always said that if he didn't show up early for things, he'd be chronically late. It almost made sense to Jason.

"Language, guys," Bridget, their coworker and Jason's closest friend, hissed at them. "There are still customers here." She waved broadly to indicate the three or four people that currently occupied small, round wooden tables scattered throughout the cramped floor area. The small cafe was as much a sandwich shop as it was a coffee shop with large windows, a limited amount of space, and a few armchairs scattered around.

Jason shrugged it off; no one was in line, and people in their neighborhood weren't likely to care too much about language anyway. Then he actually looked at Ciaran for the first time since he'd walked in and did a double take. "Whoa, no contacts today?"

"Not today," Ciaran acknowledged, grinning. In their natural state, Ciaran's dark blue eyes lacked a visible pupil, as was the case with many Tuatha or part-Tuatha humans. Or, as Ciaran had attempted explaining once, it wasn't so much that he didn't have a pupil, but more that his eyes looked and functioned a bit differently. The difference also affected sight, so most Tuatha wore special contacts that filtered their sight to be closer to human normal and were also designed to make their eyes look normal.

The Tuatha were a race of beings not originally from Earth, though no one really knew where they came from exactly. They adopted the name Tuatha (inconveniently insisting that the word have no plural or adjective form) from old Irish mythology, which they claimed was based on their race from before they arrived en masse with all the other non-human races a century ago. They were the most prevalent of the races that stayed on Earth, but that wasn't saying much, since most had left as suddenly and completely as they arrived with only historical records to show they existed at all.

Since then, a small percentage of the human population had developed psychic abilities. It was rare for the abilities to present strongly—even most telekinetics, prevalent though they were, couldn't lift anything much heavier than a pebble. Barney Mulligan, the manager of the pub where Jason sometimes worked nights, often joked that he could use a "TKer" to clean up the place when plates got broken or the occasional brawl broke a table.

It was just as well that Jason's extremely minor talent for precognition wouldn't be helpful to anyone, since he sure as hell wasn't going to be telling anyone about it any time soon. Precognition was an extremely rare ability and not one Jason felt safe advertising, especially when that ran the risk of anyone finding out that his younger brother was much, much better at it than he was. Not even Bridget knew.

"I only get harassed by a few stupid asshole customers when I have the freaky eye thing going, so I figure, why not just let it be once in a while?" Ciaran offered by way of explanation.

Jason grinned. "Plus, Wendy will be here soon, and she totally goes for the Tuatha thing."

Ciaran grinned back. "You know it. And hey, on the subject of being into hot people, you should've come to pool night at the bar yesterday.
Eric
was there."

Jason could feel his face flushing. "So what? Why should I care?" He tried to sound like he actually didn't care, but, judging from Bridget's sympathetic look, he'd completely failed. Then again, she'd known him for eight years, so maybe she was just that good at reading through his blatant lies. "Anyway, I told you, I promised Liam I'd take him to that movie he wanted to see. I haven't been spending nearly enough time with him lately."

"Shoulda brought him along!" Ciaran said cheerfully.

"Fuck you, Keer; you know he's only fourteen." Jason replied, but without any heat. He knew Ciaran wouldn't seriously condone his younger brother coming to a bar with them.

"Anyway, not to worry. I am awesome and have pictures for you to stare at longingly,"
Ciaran said, pulling a small, thin digital camera out of his pocket and starting to go through the pictures. "I'll email them to you later, but I thought you'd appreciate this one." Abruptly he stopped, frowning intently at the screen. Jason leaned forward to try and see what he was looking at, but the angle was wrong.

"What is it?"

Ciaran didn't answer for a moment. Finally he shrugged, resuming his easy smile, and handed the camera to Jason. "Nothing. Here's your boy."

"Not 'my' anything," Jason protested, but he took the camera all the same. He had to admit it was a good picture. Ciaran must have taken it candidly—Eric Donahue was sitting at a bar stool, not looking at the camera, pose about as relaxed as Jason ever saw him. His dark hair was casually tucked behind one ear, and his expression was set in his typical Mona Lisa smile. The camera flash had illuminated his intent blue-grey eyes.

"Now, whenever you're done mooning, I actually do want a coffee."

Ciaran chatted with Bridget as Jason moved around making his coffee. Right about then, Jason felt a sudden sense of foreboding. At first he tried to ignore the feeling, but when it persisted, he knew better than to assume it was nothing. He cast around in his mind, trying to figure out what his meager precognitive ability might be trying to tell him. As always, the sense was frustratingly vague and muddled, but the moment he thought of his younger brother, the feeling noticeably intensified. Jason's heart started hammering with a sudden panic, and he completely failed to notice when the cup he was filling overflowed, spilling incredibly hot liquid on his hand. He hissed with pain and yanked his hand away, somehow managing to not spill the cup. "Ow, fuck!"

"What's wrong?" Bridget asked at the same moment Ciaran said, "You okay, Jace?"

"Just … just burned my fucking hand again," Jason said, going for the ice, the pain actually helping him focus on the present and not get caught up in his increasingly negative thoughts.

Bridget winced in sympathy, but Ciaran wasn't so nice. "Aw, poor baby.”

"Cut the shit, Keer; it fucking hurts," Jason said as Bridget helped him fill a bucket with ice water. He winced again when he stuck his hand in. "And it was
your
fucking coffee. Any chance I could get you to trade off early?" he asked, internally relieved to have such a good excuse for the request. He wanted to be out of there and looking for Liam as soon as possible.

"Yeah, yeah, I'm just ragging on you," Ciaran replied, a bit more sympathetically. "You go off and lick your wounds; I'll hold down the fort."

"You going to be okay?" Bridget asked, looking concerned—possibly a little more concerned than a simple burn accident would warrant. Jason hated how well she could read him sometimes. Then again, maybe he was just obvious and Ciaran was just dense.

"I'll be fine. Don't worry about it," Jason replied, trying to look a lot less distressed than he actually was. He pulled his hand out of the ice water, gently toweling it off. He claimed his bag from the corner where it resided and stuffed his café apron haphazardly inside. "See you later."