Pent Up (12 page)

Andy stood slowly. “Why?”

“We spent your fifty K, right? You saw your tribe and they saw you.”

“Boring, huh.”

“Not how I’d spend a Thursday night, no.”

Coming back into the gallery he put his face right at the nape of Ruben’s neck to whisper, “Le’s go,
niño
.”

Ruben rolled his shoulders as goosebumps crawled across him. The warm boozy exhale and the butterfly scrape of Andy’s dragged knuckles stood Ruben’s hair on end. He told himself it was just the sweet tang of alcohol calling to the drunk in him, but it was something more insidious; the intrusive chumminess didn’t make him feel lonely, but more as if Andy had noticed him out in the cold and wanted to help. Ruben’s grinding loneliness had gained a rich, handsome, drunken witness.

What did the other guests see in the corner? Two members of the same asshole club? Two unclaimed bachelors with fuck-you money? Two tame wolves circling a garden of sheep?

Ruben didn’t move away or tip closer. His face burned and his heartbeat seemed slow. And yes, that was wood in his fancy new trousers.

Jesus.
What was wrong with him?

“S’matter?” Bauer squinted unsteadily at him, drunker than he’d seemed a few minutes ago. He stroked the side of Ruben’s neck with his fist.

Ruben frowned. To his credit, he didn’t step back. “’Cause I’m starving and you’re loaded. We stick around, you’re gonna end up married to one of these bony dames.”

“You wish.”

No, I don’t. That’s not what I wish at all.

OUTSIDE THE
museum, Andy tried to send the car away. “Night’s too nice.” He thumped on the hood. The Israeli driver wavered, gripping the door’s handle with loose fingers.

Ruben caught up. “You’re sloshed.”

As soon as he said it, he heard Peach’s menthol drawl in his head.
It’s a mug’s game, kiddo. He’ll get high before you’ll get him sober.

Arguing with a happy drunk made Ruben feel like apologizing to all of South Florida for forcing them to put up with him for four decades. How was he supposed to force his drunken boss into the car without making a scene? He liked Andy a lot, respected him and trusted him. They weren’t friends but they were friend-
ly
, right? Too friendly, then. Ruben could no longer control the situation adequately.
Time to quit this shit.

Ruben nodded to the driver, who popped open the sedan door with a polite, “Mr. Bauer.” One advantage of their cover story: a public bodyguard couldn’t give orders, but if they were “friends” then Ruben didn’t have to get mugged in the park if he didn’t feel like it.

Andy rubbed at his nose with numb roughness. “S’right across the park. We can walk.”

Peach was right, he did know this song.
By heart.
“I can’t.”

“Trees.” Whatever that meant. Andy obviously disagreed.

“Yeah.”

“Shhh’p.” The sound didn’t seem like a word, and Andy didn’t clarify.

“Wallet’s at home, bub. What’ll I give the muggers?” Ruben shrugged out of his jacket and tossed it on the seat. If he had to lift his boss into the car he would.

Exiting couples waved at them, but Andy, shifting unsteadily in the gutter, paid no attention to them. He stared at Ruben, asking a silent, inscrutable question with his thick eyebrows. The chauffeur pretended to be deaf.

If Andy was one of his friends in Miami, Ruben would have smacked his head and left him there on the corner to find his own way across the park. If Andy had been some insulting drunk tourist, Ruben could’ve decked him and slung him across the seat, ladling “Aww, man” apologies over him. If Andy was family, he’d have machoed his way through, crossed his arms and growled till he got his way. If Andy had been a chick, Ruben could’ve flirted and wheedled him into the vehicle, charm-bullying him into submission and manhandling him to keep the peace.

None of the above.

Andy laughed at something and teetered on the curb. His tousled hair gleamed like brandy under the sodium street lamps.

Makes no sense.

Ruben regarded his boss carefully, from a yard away. “Tell you what, buddy. You still feel like walking once you’re home, we can stroll down Park Avenue.” Never happen, but whatever treacherous hope lived in him wished they could stretch their legs under the shadowy trees where no one would see.

Andy screwed up his face like a teenager, about to bitch and groan no doubt, but something stopped him before he could. He straightened. “Right.” He unleashed a lottery-winner smile.

“What? It’s a date.”

“It’s a deal. You sold me, Oso.”

Ruben caught the driver looking at him and flicked his eyes skyward as if to commiserate:
rich assholes
. Then he stopped himself. This Israeli kid didn’t know Ruben was in on the joke because he saw Ruben
as
another rich asshole.

Without further protest, Andy slid smoothly into the town car and dropped his head back on the leather seat. “Well?”

“Well.” Ruben walked around the car, not waiting for Eli to trot over and open the door, and climbed inside.

The driver started the engine and pulled into traffic, headed for Eighty-First. “The club?”

“No, Eli.” Andy raised his voice to speak through the partition. “The Seventy-Ninth transverse. Early night, I guess.” He pressed something and the privacy glass slid up, hiding them from the front seat. The shark-Andy had swum away, again leaving the ragdoll.

The traffic sliced into the trees, black and pewter through the tinted glass.

When Ruben rolled his head on the seat, he caught Andy grinning crookedly at him.

“Thanks for all the song and dance in there, my man. You were great tonight.”

“Yeah. I dunno.” He stared through the windows at nothing, anything.

“Hunnerd percent. They all loved you.” Andy grunted. “Good job, Oso.”

Ruben wished for a cigarette. He wished he didn’t want one. “You’re hammered.”

“Not even close. Just relaxed.” His eyes drooped happily.

What Ruben needed was a shower and about thirty feet and steel beams between him and Andy Bauer.

“But—”

“Relax.” Andy flicked his arm with a finger. “You’ve got it covered.”

“I do. Says you.” Instead of retaliating or reacting, Ruben laced his fingers together in his lap, conscious of Andy’s splayed legs bumping against his as the car curved through the dark trees.

How could it only have been a week? Joking and bickering like this, smiling and snapping at each other, they sounded like… something else.

I like this guy way too much.

Central Park watched them through the tinted glass.

“Suit looks great,
Señor
Oso.” Andy coughed. “Me parece increíblemente guapo.”

Whatever that meant, it sounded positive. Ruben blinked and turned, drunk on the attention. Greedy for it. “Yeah, okay. I don’t
habla español
.”

Andy checked out Ruben’s shoulder, the legs, the glossy loosened tie. “Means handsome.” It came out a whisper and Andy looked away out the windows.

Uh.
“Thanks.” His heart thumped blindly in his chest. Any second it would stumble and knock something breakable over and smash it to pieces. “You got good taste, Bauer.” Too fast, too fast.

Andy closed his eyes. The rhythm of the car rocked his skull against the leather upholstery. “You ought to learn, one of these days.”

“To dress?”

“Spanish. Might come in handsome.” He snorted in slow motion and looked back. “Handy. That is.”

“Sure. Right after I finish medical school and my MBA, before I start my talk show on the space station.”

Andy smiled and sighed, square jaw clamped. “It’s not that hard. Beautiful language besides.
Claro
.”

Clearly.
He’s teaching me.

The town car veered to the left, and Ruben had to grip the door to keep from being shifted against his boss’s strong legs. They passed under some kind of bridge and then slowed to a stop. They inched along in the Park’s crosstown traffic.

He could imagine himself on Andy’s terrace, staring down at Central Park. He looked out the window at the passing trees: nature boxed in so a few penthouses had something to look at.

Andy rolled his head to watch Ruben watching him.

Buddies.
Yeah, right.

Andy pushed himself back, shifting his weight. His hand scraped Ruben’s and… remained on the seat, separated by a millimeter or two. The light hair on his wrist brush-brushed the wisps on Ruben’s, rocked by the car’s motion.

Ruben swallowed. He wanted to slide the hand away from the delicious feathery scrape, and at the same time wondered how long Andy would leave it there. He wondered what would happen if he closed his dark square paw over Andy’s, laced their fingers and squeezed. He could imagine the way their knuckles would intersect and the exact pressure of Andy’s smooth palm against his.
That skin.

Occasionally the car jostled them as it navigated potholes and pedestrians, gently rocking their shoulders, but their two hands stayed nailed to the firm, soft leather, barely touching, but touching nonetheless. That warm strip of Andy’s hand made it hard to breathe.

Why didn’t Andy move his arm back? Then again, why wouldn’t Ruben? As the car glided under the black trees, Ruben’s whole being, all his attention, tightened around the half inch of faint contact between their skin. Ruben imagined he could feel Andy’s pulse, then realized he was hearing his own as it jarred his skull.

If the brushing contact wasn’t an accident, removing his hand first would send a clear message. Easier to leave it there in case.

In case of what?

In case he was a queer? In case his boss was another? In case they needed to go out together to spend another fifty thousand American dollars to buy nothing in particular in a room full of strangers? The money and the man had gotten all jumbled in his head.

Maybe that was it. Ruben had gotten sucked in by all the sloppy luxury and forgotten whose it was. He wasn’t gay, just broke, sober, and lonely. Even if Andy was some kind of closeted homo, he had no interest in playing house with some middle-aged macho he’d known for a few days and rescued from a couch. Ruben had clocked the predator in him. If Andy wanted a dude, he’d lease some Calvin Klein model with a trust fund and a degree in corporate espionage.

And still, and still…. The butterfly stroke of Andy’s wrist hairs dried his mouth and pricked his eyes, and Andy had no clue.
I want him.

All too suddenly, the car sliced out of the trees across Fifth, headed east.

I’ll quit in the morning.

The unwelcome thought landed cold and jagged inside his head. He needed to find an apartment and a real job. Andy needed a high-end security service protecting him. And they did not need to be hanging out together under any circumstance, at least till he’d gotten himself sorted. Ruben would do what needed to be done.

When they turned south onto Park Avenue, Andy blinked… handsome, lazy, and expensive. “I really could use a walk; clear my head.” His biscuity skin looked warm under the tux shirt where he’d unbuttoned. “C’mon. We gotta date, huh?”

“I don’t think so.” Ruben tugged at his collar. “I’d like to ditch the suit.”

Andy smiled strangely.

“No. I mean put on some jeans. If you’re trying to go get mugged, I don’t want to mess up my new rags.”

“You’ll come?” A smile lit up Andy’s square face.

Sirens ahead. Flashing emergency lights strobed the inside of the limo as it glided to a stop. They both craned to see.

Two firetrucks in front of the Iris. A crowd of annoyed rich people squawking, the older ones in robes.

Ruben didn’t wait for the driver to open the door. “We’ll hop out, Eli.” He climbed out and Andy followed.

“No date.” Andy looked annoyed and petulant.

A black Irish doorman tried to herd the tenants back inside. “…False alarm. Very sorry…. Yes, ma’am, we have.” The other doorman was trying to stem the tide lurching under the lobby’s greenwall. “Elevator’s broken.”

A flash of Peach saying those exact words.
Take the Steps, kiddo.
Ruben didn’t smile.

Andy’s hand rested against his lower back. “Two secs.” He sauntered to the front desk, barging past the oldsters and too drunk to care. He ducked his head and murmured a moment with the porter.

Ruben stared at his boss’s handsome profile until he realized he was staring. Deliberately turning 180 degrees, he stepped into the elevator mob. Selfish disappointment simmered in his gut. He’d leave tomorrow and that’d be the end of this insanity, but he’d hoped.

A moment later, Andy joined him, hip to hip. “Break-in upper floor.” They shared a look.

Paranoia is catching.

Ruben asked, “Think you can climb thirty-six flights fucked up?”

“No, Rube. You’re gonna carry me upstairs.” He squeezed Ruben’s neck playfully, sending a sharp, sweet jolt down his spine and legs. “Or forget your damn clothes and we could catch that walk.”

Seriously?

Anxiety rippled through Ruben. About thirty people remained in the lobby. They could duck out for ten, and by the time they got back….

Ruben lowered his head. “You don’t wanna check upstairs?”

Andy leaned against him. Could he be that bombed?

The alarm stopped blaring and the silence rang in his ears. The entire lobby lowered its collective shoulders. The elevator doors opened.

Ruben wavered.
Why not, huh?
Central Park was so close. They’d be back in—

“Mr. Bauer?” Black Irish was back. “We have a situation.”

The doorman’s face was all guilt and apology. Maybe he could get fired for that kind of breach. “Your assistant surprised an intruder.”

“How?” Andy’s voice hardened and his tipsiness seemed to evaporate.

Ruben’s fists tightened. “Hope?”

“She wasn’t injured, but she’s shaken up.” He ushered Andy and Ruben to the front of the line past the undisguised irritation of their neighbors. “The NYPD should be here in the next three minutes.” His eyes flicked back to a squabble at the front desk. “Scuse me, sir.”

The other tenants piled on, glaring at them, but said nothing. In the silent elevator, Andy looked green but stone sober.