Double Blind (7 page)

“Fine.” Ethan drained the water Scully set down before him, then turned to Randy. “Where are we going?”

“A better question might be, ‘Where
aren’t
we going?’” Randy slipped his arm through Ethan’s and led him away from the bar. “Come on, baby. Let me show you my town.”

“I’m not your baby,” Ethan said.

“Come on, Slick,” Randy corrected. “Let me show you my town.”

“Stick it right down his throat, Jansen!” Scully called as they headed back onto the floor, and Ethan felt his ears turn red. Several people looked at him askance, and he felt Randy’s wicked, wicked laugh reverberating up his arm and right into the center of his chest as he led Ethan toward the exit.

“So.” Randy
rested an open palm against Ethan’s shoulder as they leaned against a railing. “What have you seen? What haven’t you? What would you like to see?”

Such innocent questions. And yet Ethan stood there, unable to answer, his knuckles going white as he gripped the metal bar beneath his palms and tried to process the hard left his life had just taken.

When Ethan had arrived in Las Vegas that morning, he had been in a haze, and so had the city. Though it was early October, he’d gone from his air-conditioned car to a wall of heat which, despite being dry, was still hot as hell. After parking his car and pawning his few remaining possessions—save the ring—he’d been more than happy to step into the first casino he’d seen. He couldn’t even remember the name of it, except that it had been small and dirty and, in hindsight, probably crooked. He’d lost his first thousand dollars there. Then he’d wandered around in the heat. After being overwhelmed by a pedestrian mall, he’d gone back to his car to drive around in a daze. He hadn’t even made it to the Strip. He hadn’t cared. He had been reeling, full of rage and pain and things he couldn’t even name.

And now—now what was he doing? He was back on the pedestrian mall, is what. He was on Randy Jansen’s arm, riding out a thousand dollar bet for four hours. A bet to kiss him. A stupid, frivolous bet.

The lights and crowd and noise dimmed in his vision, blurring into a kaleidoscope that started to spin. It stopped abruptly as Randy’s face filled his vision, his dark eyes shooting through Ethan’s internal fog.

“Hello?” Randy raised an eyebrow. “You still with us, Slick?”

Ethan blinked. He felt the pull between despair and—and what, he couldn’t know. Between despair and Randy, as best he could tell. What a bizarre set of poles.

“I don’t want to do this,” he said.

Randy glanced down at the throng of people below them, then shrugged. “We can go somewhere else. Fremont Street Experience was just the closest thing. Have you seen the Bellagio fountains at night? Even as a local, I have to tell you, I never get tired of them. Or the Stratosphere tower.
That
you have to see.”

Ethan thought about correcting his misunderstanding, of explaining that he didn’t know if he wanted to do any of this, not the bet, not being with Randy, possibly not even life in general. Then he decided it would just make things worse. “I haven’t really been anywhere,” he said instead.

Both eyebrows went up this time. “Nowhere? Not even to the Strip? You’ve just been to
Herod’s
?”

The kaleidoscope effect was coming back, spinning around everything but Randy. Ethan shrugged and turned away. “It doesn’t matter. I don’t really care.” The dark edges crept back around his mind, and he pulled away from Randy’s hand. “Forget this. Forget all of this.”

“Hey.
Hey
.” Randy caught him by the arm, and when he couldn’t turn Ethan back around, he used his grip as an anchor to put himself in Ethan’s way and forced Ethan to look at him. “Are you okay?”

No.
“I’m fine,” he bit out, and tried to escape again.

Randy frowned and kept Ethan pinned in place. Ethan gave up and held still, looking away so he didn’t have to meet Randy’s eyes, but he still felt the scrutiny, and it made him squirm as the inspection went on and on and on.

And then it was over.

Randy slid his hand into Ethan’s, and when he spoke, his tone was light and careful. “Let’s start with a walk.”

“I don’t want to take a walk,” Ethan said, knowing he sounded surly and possibly even petulant, but right now he didn’t care.

“I do.” Randy led them toward the escalator, keeping hold of Ethan’s hand. He wouldn’t let go, either, not even when Ethan tugged.

“I don’t want to hold hands with you,” Ethan said when nothing else worked.

Randy rolled his head to the side and gave him a look of amusement. “Baby, it’s Vegas. Nobody gives a shit.”

“
I
give a shit,” Ethan said.

Randy’s eyes twinkled. “Tell you what—I’ll let go if you give me a kiss.”

“You’re a real jerk, you know that, right?” Ethan shot back.

“Usually I get told I’m an asshole.” Randy put his free hand over his heart and looked at Ethan with soulful eyes. “You must really, really love me.”

Rage and indignation swept up in a rush inside Ethan, and he bore down on Randy, ready to vent his spleen. Then Randy batted his eyelashes, and as if someone had waved a magic wand, the rage shifted, and suddenly Ethan was laughing.

Randy was smiling. “There you go. That’s better.”

“You
are
an ass,” Ethan said, but he was smiling now too. He didn’t know why. He still wanted to beat Randy about the head, but suddenly he wanted to—to something. What, he didn’t yet know. He shook his head. “Why the hell are you doing this? Are you that bored?”

Randy snorted a laugh, but to Ethan’s surprise he had the feeling he’d unwittingly hit a mark. “I told you,” Randy said, “you smell good.” But he kept his eyes elsewhere, and Ethan felt a tiny ripple of victory, feeling like he’d scored a blow against a tornado.

“I could give you the name of my cologne,” Ethan said, teasing, then remembered that he wasn’t wearing any.

“Oh, but I haven’t smelled all of you yet,” Randy shot back. “It might not be the cologne. I’ll need to make a very thorough inspection of all your scents before I know what’s drawing me in.”

They stepped off the escalator, and Randy tucked Ethan’s hand inside his elbow. He led them beneath the edge of a huge canopy. Ethan couldn’t quite tell whether it was a building or an amphitheater or something else entirely.

“So,” Randy said, gesturing to the sea of lights and people swarming inside around them, then up at the canopy overhead. “This is the Fremont Street Experience. We won’t stay for it, but they have a show every night. They turn off all the lights and do scenes on the ceiling. They make it day, make it night, make it whatever the hell they feel like making it. Vegas all the way.”

Ethan squinted, trying to see within the space ahead of them. “Is it a stage? But there are shops on the side.”

“It’s four city blocks, baby. It’s a street with a ceiling on it.” When Ethan glared at him, Randy looked at him blankly, then laughed. “Called you baby again, did I?”

“I have a perfectly acceptable name,” Ethan said. “You don’t need to belittle me all the time by giving me pet names.”

“Good God, Slick, get the stick out of your ass! Yes, your name is fine. But don’t you want to be somebody else every now and again?”

The last few days in all their darkness and despair swept up like a heavy blanket around him, kept at bay only by the sheer volume of lights and noise around him. “Yes. But you can’t escape who you are.”

“Jesus. I should have poured that drink down your throat.” Randy stopped walking and let go of Ethan so he could turn to stare at him. “He really did a number on you, didn’t he? You don’t just have a rain shower over your head. You have the whole goddamn wall cloud.”

“I don’t want to talk about it,” Ethan said, his throat closing, lest the emotions clawing at it escape.

“Yeah, that much I’ve figured out on my own. And yet every time I stop talking or get a syllable wrong, you’re right back there, swimming in the shit. So how about we make a deal. Either we go sit somewhere, get you really, really fucking drunk, and you barf it all up, the drink and the story, or we go somewhere fun and distracting, and you don’t think about it at all. You pick, Slick
.
I’m game either way.”

“
Why
are you doing this?” Ethan asked again. “All you get if you win the bet is a kiss. You must be really, really bored. Or insane.”

Randy’s smile turned enigmatic. “You know, it’s interesting how you assume I’m bored, not shallow.” When Ethan just frowned at him, he went on. “I could just be doing this because I’m stupid and flighty, because I enjoy manipulating people, and you’re quite a puzzle to put together. But you assume I’m doing this because I’m restless.”

Ethan faltered for a second, self-conscious. Then he got a better look at Randy’s face and shook his head. “But you are. You’re the other, too, because you
are
an ass, but you’re also restless.”

He watched Randy’s expression try to shutter, but he couldn’t quite manage it, and he just looked surprised. “Do you, Mr. Ellison, by any chance play poker?”

Ethan shook his head. “Never. Why?”

“Because I think,” Randy said, taking his arm again, “that you would be a natural. Come on. You don’t want shops. You don’t want the Strip, either. You want a casino.”

“I don’t want to go back to Herod’s,” Ethan said quickly.

“God no,” Randy agreed. “But Herod’s isn’t really a casino. It used to be, but now it’s sort of casino theater. Billy’s a dick. Worse, he’s a dick with a trust fund. He doesn’t run the place as a business but as a playground for whatever whim has taken him for the moment. He’s vacant and stupid, and all he wants to do is manipulate people.”

Ethan snorted. “Unlike you.”

“Hey!” Randy drew back, looking genuinely offended. “I
play
with people.
With
them. Big fucking difference, Slick.”

“Do you have a nickname I can toss back at you?” Ethan asked wearily.

“Sure,” Randy said. “Go ahead and give me one.”

“I’d be fine with recycling one already in circulation.”

“My CB handle is Skeet,” Randy offered.

“Skeet?” Ethan repeated, wrinkling his nose. “Like the stuff you shoot?”

“It’s a poker term,” Randy said. He aimed Ethan around a corner and back onto the street. “It’s only used in home games, but it’s kind of like a straight. It ranks between three-of-a-kind and a regular straight. Nine and five and two, and a little something in between.”

Ethan had no idea what Randy was talking about. “That wasn’t quite what I had in mind.”