Black On Black (Quentin Black Mystery #3) (18 page)

Then she lowered her mouth.

Minutes later, Black let out a low groan.

“Fuck...”

His mind went to Miri––to what she’d done to him his last night in San Francisco.

The instant he let himself go there at all, every single part of him was at full fucking attention, and not just his cock. It had been months now. Months and months of nothing but frustrating Barrier sex with Miri, not being able to touch her, to even really feel her light much since he didn’t want to get any of this bullshit on her.

More than that, he couldn’t go far with Miri, not now.

Not until he talked to her.

He found himself remembering what she’d done, letting himself go into the memory, something he’d fantasized about for months too––only to be reminded it wasn’t her again as the seer with her mouth on him blew her own light over him.

He didn’t want her light, though. He didn’t want her body either...
 
or even her mouth.

He hadn’t been lying about that.

He was still trying to fight them, fight their light at least, when the human woman moved closer, her hands massaging his shoulders and chest, sliding into his hair.

He struggled briefly against the chains.

But really, there was nothing he could do.

Once the thought really sank in, he fought to close his mind.

He put all of his focus there, on shutting down everything, closing all of it, so she wouldn’t feel it at least. He could do that much for her, make it so she wouldn’t feel any of what––

Eight

BREAKING A PROMISE

“––DON’T THINK I don’t know what you’re doing right now,
Doctor
Fox.”

I snapped back, breathing too hard, fighting my expression still.

My whole body hurt. I couldn’t move at first––couldn’t breathe. I felt like someone just punched me, hard, in the stomach, leaving me without air. If I’d been alone I think I would have bent in half, gasping with my head between my knees.

My stomach hurt in that heavy, deep-down way, like I’d eaten bad food.

I had to fight briefly just to keep from throwing up.

I don’t know what I looked like for those few caught breaths, but from my end, it was as if time stopped. Like everything just blurred out. The world rotated around me, broken.

When I could see again, Nick grinned at me, his eyes slightly unfocused.

He shook a finger at me. “I know exactly what you’re up to, doc...”

His voice held a distinct slur. Pressing an index finger to his temple and and swiveling it with the same hand that held his beer bottle, he grinned at me, nudging Angel who sat in the red leather booth next to him.

She was watching me with a different expression on her face. Her eyes studied mine, openly concerned. I fought to smile at her, to normalize my expression, but since I still felt like I might throw up, I’m not sure how successful I was.

“...You’re not as clever as you think,” Nick smiled at me. “Or maybe you just forget to compensate for those of us who actually
know
you...” He motioned at Angel, and––less explicably––back at me. “...Those of us with some glimmery...
 
shiny kinds of glimmers. Of your usual m.o., doc. Of your
modus. Capiche?”

I forced myself to smile, to put every last fragment of my mental focus on Nick, on Angel, on the room where my body was actually located.

Whatever I’d just seen, whether dream or reality, I couldn’t think about it.

I couldn’t think about that now.

I just...
 
couldn’t.

“Glimmery shiny kinds of glimmers?” I pursed my lips in mock puzzlement, arching an eyebrow at Angel. “You been hanging out at the tranny clubs again, Nick, with cousin Haru, listening to him butcher Whitney Houston?”

Angel burst out in a laugh.

“Hey.” Nick pointed at me with a mock scowl. “Don’t go dissing Haru. He’s gotten a lot better. Have you heard him sing lately?”

Angel giggled from next to him, which was unusual enough that I couldn’t help smiling.

It came close to a real smile that time.

“Have you?” Nick demanded, glancing at Angel when I shook my head. “Angel here used to be in love with Haru, you know...”

“Guilty as charged,” Angel said, holding up a hand and winking at me before she downed the last of her margarita, sucking the dregs off her ice cubes. “He’s very pretty, doc. You should see him outside a dress...
 
at the gym...
 
pumping iron...”

“Boy’s got some pipes,” Nick said to me authoritatively, nodding once.

I burst out in a real laugh that time.

Grinning and still shaking her head at Nick, Angel motioned with her chin for me to let her out. When I slid out of the booth to accommodate her, I glanced around at the rest of the bar and realized how packed it had gotten compared to when we arrived.

We were seated in the quietest part of the room, in a line of leather booths along the exposed brick wall, but now people filled all the booths and most of the tables.

I wasn’t a big bar person, but I liked this one.

Long blue lights hung from the ceiling like ocean teardrops, and a giant fish tank filled a wide pillar in the center of the room, blocking off some of the noise from the stage, where I knew there’d probably be a live band later since it was Thursday. The bar itself was on the modern end, with neon pink lights dripping down the wall in the back, but the overall space was dark enough that it still had the vibe of a cozy dive more than one of the neon-bright tech bars that dotted most of downtown.

The fish tank, filled with huge, colorful, saltwater fish, shone its own blue light on our half of the room. That, combined with blue-tinted accent lighting placed strategically in areas of the ceiling and floor gave the room an underwater and strangely insular feel, even with the increasingly loud laughter and talking from the bar’s patrons.

I glanced at Angel as she regained her feet with a bare hop to straighten her balance.

Gripping my arm in a friendly way, she leaned by my ear.

“You okay, doc?” she murmured.

When she pulled away I nodded, giving her a wan smile. “Just a headache. I’m fine...
 
it’s already going away.”

Still studying my eyes, she nodded, then looked down at Nick.

“I’m getting another round. Everybody in?” She pointed at each of us in turn, but barely glanced at Nick to confirm he’d want another of his beer and shot of tequila combination orders. The look she gave me held more of a genuine question. “...Doc?”

After the barest hesitation, I nodded. “Sure. Let’s make it a night.”

“That’s the spirit!” Nick said, downing the last of his beer and plunking the glass on the table. “Get her a shot too, Ang, my love.”

Angel rolled her eyes at him, but didn’t argue.

Sliding deeper into the booth as she walked away, I moved over on the seat so I wouldn’t have to get up when she got back. Relaxing into the leather, I sighed, realizing that in spite of everything else, I missed this. I missed just hanging out with my friends, being a normal person. It seemed like nothing in my life had been normal at all over the past half-year.

Shoving Black out of my mind when that sick feeling wanted to return, I focused on the fish tank instead, watching the fish inside undulate and swim peacefully.

I only turned towards Nick when I felt his stare. I met his gaze and was a little startled to see the degree of concentration that lived there, in his dark brown eyes.

He was drunk, but still coherent. Which meant his mind would still be sharp.

Truthfully, I was relieved.

I was beginning to think I’d have to do this another night.

Maybe over dinner at my place...
 
or brunch maybe, while we were all nursing hangovers tomorrow. Nick never could turn down a little hair of the dog, and all three of us had the day off.

I just had to get the timing right.

Tonight was supposed to be timed right, but it hadn’t been.

It definitely hadn’t gone how I planned.

I picked tonight specifically to invite Nick and Angel out because I thought for sure Black would be asleep. His four days were up. Being about nine hours ahead, it was early morning hours where he was. He usually worked nights, not often later than three or four a.m., and slept to around noon when he did sleep. I figured by the time we’d had a few drinks and I worked my way up to talking to Angel and Nick, Black would be out cold.

Four days seemed to be his limit before the drugs stopped keeping him awake.

Or maybe after four days, the downsides of being awake outweighed the downsides for being unconscious. Either way, it had been four days.

Usually when he crashed after one of his four-day stints, he slept like the dead.

I didn’t even feel him dreaming.

“You talk to him?” Nick asked abruptly. “Recently, I mean.”

I jumped a little, feeling caught.

“Black?”

Nick nodded, once. His dark eyes continued to study my face. “That joker still call you? Even though he bailed?”

Hesitating another beat, I nodded. “Yes.” Taking another breath, I leaned closer to him over the dark wood table. “I need to talk to you and Angel about that, actually.”

“Oh?”

“Yeah.”

Studying my face a second longer, he scowled. “What if I don’t want to talk about your psychopathic groin buddy, Quentin Black?”

I lifted an eyebrow, leaning back. “You brought him up, Nick.”

He settled his muscular weight deeper into his seat, giving me an annoyed wave.

“I brought him up to satisfy my not-so-idle curiosity as to your status with him. Not to talk about him for the next hour or whatever. Jesus. I’d rather get a root canal.” His mouth curled into a faint frown as he looked over my face. “You know I’m in love with you. You know that...
 
right, Miri?”

My heart stopped beating in my chest.

It started up again with a violent jerk. For a few seconds, I could only gape at him.

His words completely wiped out everything that had been in my mind.

On the plus side, they also briefly wiped away my fears around Black.

Once I could think straight again, my mind spun.

Holy crap. Nick had his own agenda tonight.

He might have even planned this. Maybe not
specifically
planned it, since I’d invited him and Angel out, but maybe he’d been waiting for an opening and decided to take it when it came. Maybe he even saw my invitation tonight as an opportunity to lay this on me, assuming he got enough of a buzz going and the moment seemed right.

Nick and I hadn’t been hanging out as much since Angel first got me to admit that me and Black were seeing each other.

She’d done that in front of Nick––deliberately, I suspected––probably because Nick told her what happened between us that night all those weeks ago, when we’d both been drunk and Black first took off. But that had been months ago.