Dirty Kiss (27 page)

A photo made me stop digging, and my sorrow flared. Red lights provided most of the lighting for the picture, pinking the edges of their mouths, but a flash drenched their faces with a shiny gleam. Jin-Sang looked happy, but there was a tightness around his eyes, and his smile looked forced. The men sitting next to him were what made me stop.

The photos I’d seen of Hyun-Shik were staged headshots and the artfully arranged family shots scattered about the Kims’ household. His strong features were different when he smiled, and the casual photo told a different story than the dutiful son and devoted husband he was, as portrayed by the Kims.

This Hyun-Shik was flushed, from alcohol or perhaps from sex, a dominant masculine presence amid the other men. Jae-Min sat on one side of him, leaning into the frame but far enough away from his cousin so the gesture didn’t read as sexual interest. In contrast to the warm Hyun-Shik, this Jae-Min was mysterious, a distant iciness warning anyone off before they came too close. A study in human nature, I thought, Jae hiding the fire inside of him while Hyun-Shik seemed to come alive.

“See that other guy?” I showed the picture to Bobby, pointing to the fourth man sitting at the table. “That’s the lawyer from the house, Brian Park.”

“Really?” He took it from me, turning it over. “Didn’t he say that he didn’t know Hyun-Shik was gay?”

“Yep.” I nodded. “And I think the Korean on the back says Dorthi Ki Seu. I’ve seen it enough, but I’ll check with Jae.”

“So another lie, but this time from Park. He
knew
Hyun-Shik was gay.” Bobby grinned. “Look at Jin-Sang. He’s practically sitting on their laps. Check out where his right hand is. Park looks very happy to have company on his lap.”

A noise on the staircase made me turn, and I spotted Jae standing in the archway. I held my hand out to him, hoping he’d join us. “Hey, did we wake you?”

“No, I couldn’t sleep. My brain’s too busy.” Sliding onto the couch next to me, Jae leaned against me, and I tried not to smile. His body was against mine, touching me in a nearly solid line. Bobby’s gaze dropped, and he surreptitiously watched us through his lashes.

I wanted to kiss Jae hello but settled for a half-hug around his shoulders, then passed him the photo. “Do me a huge favor and tell me this was taken at the club.”

He studied the picture, his expression flat. Nodding, he turned slightly, moving the photo out of his line of sight and settling further against me. Neko jumped onto his lap, settling into a fierce kneading motion while squinting at me. “Yeah, that’s upstairs. That was a night I was visiting Scarlet, and hyung was there with them. I stopped by to say hello before I left.”

“How well do you know the other guy?” Bobby asked, reaching over to scratch the cat’s head. She purred under his touch, a traitorous sound considering all that I’d done for her.

“Brian? He works… worked… for hyung,” Jae responded. Bobby mouthed the Korean back at me, and I shook my head, not wanting to get into a discussion about honorifics. “He started coming to Dorthi Ki Seu before Hyun-Shik-ah got married. I wasn’t working there anymore, but I think he got a membership. I don’t know.”

“How much does one of those memberships cost? A couple of thousand?” I asked, then choked when Jae named an amount that could easily purchase a sports car. “What the hell do you get for that?”

The look he gave me was pointed, as was the snort Bobby let out.

“You get company,” Jae said, choosing his words carefully. “How much company depends on how much you tip.”

“I should never have become a cop,” Bobby muttered. “I was on the wrong side of the law.”

“I don’t think anyone would pay you to give them a lap dance, much less anything else,” I responded. Jae’s expression turned hard, and he made to get up, cradling the cat against him, but I caught at his waist, pulling him back down. “We’re not talking about what you did, Jae. Just about stuff in general.”

“I didn’t… fuck anyone for money,” he spat, but he let me cradle him back into position. “Not everyone who worked upstairs does that. I needed the money, but not that bad. Look what it did for Jin-Sang. Things were never good enough for him. Too hard to live that way.”

“Isn’t Park into the widow? Victoria?” Bobby said, then rubbed his face when I smirked. “Yeah, I know. You don’t have to say it. Not all guys are happy with just one flavor.”

“Good way to put it,” I responded. “I think I’ve got to go back and talk to Brian Park.”

“Do that tomorrow. Maybe even the day after.” Ruffling my hair, Bobby stood and pissed me off by kissing Jae on the cheek. Sidestepping the kick I aimed at his ankle, he tweaked my nose and said, “Try to get some sleep, Cole.”

I cleaned up a bit, organizing the things that we’d pulled out, placing the photos someplace that the cat couldn’t chew on them. Jae watched me from the corner of the couch, then tugged on a loop of my jeans to make me sit down.

“Stop, leave it. You’re too tired.” His hands were on my ribs, a light caress before he let go. “You’re making me tired. Go to sleep.”

“We can go to bed like an old married couple.” It wasn’t quite ten, but my bruises were mocking my stamina. “God, I hurt.”

“You should have stayed home and not gone out to find Jin-Sang’s things,” he scolded. The long, elegant fingers left off stroking the cat and returned to me, running along my forearm. “You are an idiot.”

Flirting was never my strong point, so it wasn’t a surprise to me when I said, “But I can be your idiot.”

Personally, I put down my horrible flirting to a lack of practice during high school, a key time in social development when boys learn how to talk up the ones they’re interested in. Since I’d spent most of high school drooling over the football players and the swim team when they showered, I didn’t have much time to develop those key speaking skills. When other boys were learning how to woo the opposite sex, I was mastering the ability to sneak peeks at naked male bodies while no one was looking.

“Stop that,” He didn’t pull away, but the sheer ice mask I’d seen in the photo fell into place. I hate that look, hated that he felt like he should hide from me.

“Jae—”

“You make this hard, hyung,” he cut me off. “Sometimes I think I shouldn’t have come here.”

“Why not?” I pulled him closer, ignoring the mewls of protest from both him and his cat. Settling Jae across my legs, I supported his back with my arm, refusing to let him go. “I like having you here.”

“Staying here is too dangerous for me. It makes me want to not leave, and I have to,” Jae whispered, tilting his head back. “It’s easy for you to be who you are, Cole. It’s not for me. I can’t be here with you and not want you.”

“Hey, I’m not talking forever here. We can do this and see where it goes.” The protest was weak, even to my ears. I realized I did want him longer than a few days. I could see him in the house. Waking up next to him or coming in from snapping pictures of naked businessmen wearing bunny slippers and finding him in my… our bed. Those were easy images for my mind to come up with. Even without having sex, I wanted him.

Much more, I painfully admitted, than I’d wanted Rick in the beginning.

“Where can this… we… go, agi?” Jae said. He rubbed his cheek against my temple, much like his cat did when she wanted me to do something for her. “I have my mother and my sisters I have to take care of. My brother, he sits back and lets people praise him for how my mother is taken care of, but he doesn’t give her any money. I can’t walk away from my family, Cole. I can’t.”

“No one’s asking you to.” I sounded confused, even more so than I usually am. “Money isn’t a problem.”

“Yes, it is. Money and family are always problems. She will not accept me if I tell her I love men, and then what will happen to her?”

“This is bullshit, Jae. If you don’t want me sniffing after you, then that’s all you have to say. You don’t need to pretend to be interested in me to stay here. I’m not that guy.” I stiffened as his hands cupped my face and his mouth found mine.

“I’m not pretending,” he murmured.

Our tongues fought, and I wanted to swallow him whole, needing him inside of me. I breathed him into my lungs, not wanting to come up for air. His back arched when I slid my hands under his shirt, holding him closer still. The moistness of Jae’s mouth made me weep, and I was thankful for not drinking a beer. The taste of him was heady enough to make me dizzy.

He came up for air before I did, pulling away for a brief second, and stared into my face. Then I was falling again, when he leaned in, and I pushed him back against the couch to cover him with my body. I stripped his shirt off and closed my teeth over a small bruise on his throat, marking him with a sharp bite before moving down his collarbone.

Hissing, Jae parted his legs, nesting me into the V of his thighs. I tore at his reserves, wanting to strip away every layer of ice he’d thrown up between us. I wanted to see the Jae Scarlet knew and loved, the wild one that I knew lurked inside of him. My fingers flicked over his nipples, and I pinched at one, watching his face when he panted with need, responding to my touch.

The press of his sex jutted against me through his clothes. I rubbed slowly up and down over his body, creating a slow friction between us. When his lips opened for mine again, the heat of his mouth seared me clean through, and I groaned, shifting my hips up, hoping the spare distance between us would cool things off before I lost all control and embarrassed myself.

Moving proved to be a mistake. There was now room for his hand to brush my belly, tracing the smatter of hair around my navel. Dipping a rake of fingernails under the button of my jeans, Jae bit his lip and played dangerous games with my equilibrium when his touch brushed against the crest of hair under the waistband of my boxers.

“Open your mouth for me, baby,” I urged, coaxing another kiss from his mouth. I wanted more than his body, and that scared me. I was willing to take anything he’d give me, set on fire by his mouth and the fierceness he had inside of him. “Let me make love to you.”

He molded into me, fitting into my belly and arms. I bit into the softness of his lower lip, making him moan and twist me into another kiss. I needed to hear that moan again, drawing it out when I suckled on his tongue. Our teeth hit, and he laughed, a deep throaty sound that went straight to my gut.

“Want you.” Murmuring, he pressed his hands on the back of my thighs, frustrated by my jeans. Small pecks at my throat and then a bite, closing in on the pulse that beat wildly under my skin. “Wait, hyung, this is bad. You’re hurt….”

“I like agi better,” I growled, not letting him get away. Pulling up, I lay on him, gasping for air. “Look at me and tell me you want to leave, and I’ll get off of you.”

It was a struggle for him to look at me, even harder for me when he said, “You should.”

“No,” I refused, grabbing at his wrists and holding his hands above his head. “You make me crazy and you piss me off, and fucking damn it if I don’t want you. Are you telling me you don’t want this? You don’t want to try this?”

“Cole.” The heat of him under me burned, and he licked at the corner of his mouth. “When I’m with you… being with you… pulls everything out from under me. I shouldn’t want you, but I do. There’s nothing right with you, your mind, and you go around wishing you were dead. I can’t do that. I have to take care of my family. I can’t take care of you too. I can’t.”

“Yeah, so I’m a mess, but you are too, baby,” I said, pulling him up until he sat against the arm of the couch. Crowding him in, I sat with my knees on either side of his legs. He wavered. I could see it in his tawny, brown eyes, and I pursued that flicker. “You run away from me and then let me catch you. You want this as much as I do. Just admit it.”

He slid away from me, easing out from under my legs. It hurt to watch him stand there, his back to me as he trembled with emotion. No, I didn’t understand what he was going through. I’d made my choices a long time ago and watched my parents turn their back on me, but I didn’t have the familial needs that he did. I didn’t have that cultural pull that demanded I live my life a certain way. Just guilt and a longing to have my father back, but it was a choice I made willingly.