Triangulation, p.38
Triangulation, page 38
part #2 of Borealis Investigations Series
“It’s not that, it’s—I’m just so messed up, North. I didn’t want you to know. You don’t have to stay. You can just go. We can pretend last night didn’t happen, and I won’t hold it against you. Swear to God, North, I won’t.”
Now North released him, and Shaw stumbled back, wrapping his arms around himself, his eyes locked on the floor.
“It happened with me?” North asked. “I mean, the kiss. That’s what happened?”
“It’s not just you. It’s everyone. I just . . . my brain goes haywire.”
“If I kiss you right now, what’s going to happen?”
Shaw shook his head.
Stepping forward, North laid a finger under Shaw’s chin, forcing his head up. He kissed him; it was just as stiff and awkward a kiss as the one from a few hours before. When he pulled back, Shaw’s breathing was shallow and rapid, and his eyes moved rapidly under closed lids.
“Ok,” North said. “Ok, calm down. You’re ok. I’m not going to do anything else you don’t want me to.”
“No,” Shaw whispered, tears starting afresh. “Don’t you understand? I do want you to. You, North. I’ve wanted you forever. I want this. I just . . . Please do it. Please just, just fuck me, ok? And it’ll get better.”
“Maybe I want you to fuck me.”
“Don’t joke around.”
“I’m not joking, Shaw. Well, not entirely. I’m not just going to fuck you while you have a panic attack in the hope that my dick somehow magically cures you. I mean, I’m amazing, but I’m not a miracle worker.” He touched Shaw’s cheek lightly. “I want to figure this out the right way. I want us to be together, for real, with you all the way here.” Shaw’s eyes flicked open, and North grinned and added, “So you can fuck my brains out now and then.”
“When you ask nicely,” Shaw said in a small voice, trying for a smile.
“When I ask nicely.”
North stepped back, studying Shaw, thinking. Some of what Shaw had described went back to Matty, yes. The first person with whom Shaw had made himself vulnerable, really vulnerable, had betrayed Shaw. Had tried to kill him, in fact. That was part of it. And part of it went back to the Slasher’s attack on Shaw, the night that Shaw’s first boyfriend had been killed and Shaw had been left with a scar curling across his thigh, almost taking off his balls.
But something else lay at the root of Shaw’s intense fear of intimacy, and North wasn’t sure what it was. Something to do with the years of loneliness and sexual repression and longing that Shaw had hidden and internalized. It had settled and layered and sintered like snow, becoming glacial and enormous. Maybe, North thought with a flash of insight like sunlight on ice, something to do with their relationship: the years they had built walls between them, walls to keep themselves safe from what they really felt for each other. Walls called friend, buddy, pal, roommate. Walls that wouldn’t come down in one night.
North, however, was willing to start blasting the hell out of those walls. He wanted them down as soon as possible. Rolling his shoulders, he grabbed the hem of the Diederickson Landscaping tee and pulled it up and over his head, hissing as the cotton rasped over tender skin. Shaw’s eyes went wide; he took a step back, his gaze roving over North’s torso with a kind of open abandon that, North guessed, Shaw had never permitted himself. Until now.
North stood there, the chill of the air conditioning raising goosebumps across his chest. He let Shaw look. He took deep breaths, letting arousal build, surprised by how hot it was just to stand there and let Shaw look at him, really look at him, after all those years.
“What happened?” Shaw asked, stepping forward now, his fingers tracing the puncture wounds that North’s nails had left.
North didn’t answer. He just kept breathing, a flush building in his chest, climbing his throat, his skin pebbling with arousal as he displayed himself for Shaw. Then, letting a grin hook the corner of his mouth, he shucked the running shorts and stepped out of them. He was hard now; he thought he could feel his pulse in the tip of his dick. His nipples looked like they could cut glass. He’d never thought of himself as an exhibitionist, but he thought, if this went on long enough, he might get off just like this. Just from Shaw looking at him, with the longing of eight years glowing in his face.
Wild around the eyes now, Shaw reached for the hem of his tunic. He was shaking so badly that the fabric slid out of his grip. He tried again, drawing up the hem, obviously intending to copy North. Panic burned the color out of his cheeks, leaving him ashen. The courage of it—the sheer determination—made North’s heart beat even faster. Compared to this, the intensity of the emotion, of seeing Shaw exposed, of baring himself to Shaw, compared to this, fucking might as well have been hopscotch. Compared to this, every fuck of North’s life had been ok, passable, adequate. He was shaking too, he realized. He forced himself to breathe more slowly; the room had begun to wobble with the intensity of his desire.
Reaching out, he gripped Shaw’s wrist. Shaw looked up; North shook his head, still not trusting himself to speak.
“It’s ok,” Shaw whispered. “I’ll do it. I can do it, North.”
North just shook his head again. After a moment, Shaw released the hem, and the tunic fell back against his legs. North waited long enough that he was sure Shaw understood, and then he released Shaw’s arm and stood straight again.
A full minute passed; it felt like an hour. Then Shaw stepped closer. The loose tunic billowed with the movement, brushing North’s thigh, and North felt himself shake at just that momentary touch. Shaw’s hand came up, and he laid it flat at the center of North’s chest, where the blond fuzz grew in a thick patch. In spite of his best efforts at self-control, North expelled a ragged breath at the touch. He might come. Just like this. He closed his eyes, and the contact was suddenly ten times more intense, his pulse pounding in his temple.
“North Euhemerus McKinney,” Shaw said.
“That is not my middle name,” North managed to say, his mouth full of clouds again.
“Open your eyes.”
North blinked; the faint light in the room still seemed too bright, and his vision blurred as though every surface threw back a glare. He heard the roughness of his breathing. Eight years, he thought. This was eight years coming to the surface. Christ, how had he lived this long and never felt like this before?
With surprising steadiness, Shaw stepped around North, leaving his field of vision, his bare feet making soft, sticking noises against the floorboards. His hand moved too, drifting up North’s chest, caressing the firm pectoral muscle, feathering along his collarbone, and tracing across North’s back. The sensation was overwhelming; North’s upper back had always been sensitive, and now he felt overloaded, his circuits blown by the electric charge of Shaw’s touch. Shaw’s hand fell, grazing the scar on North’s side that he had carried since the Red Week. Tears leaked from the corners of North’s eyes; he squeezed the lids shut, but tears continued to spill down his cheeks.
“I’ve wanted this for eight years,” Shaw said.
North struggled to master his voice. “Then why’d you wait so long?”
Shaw’s mouth found the side of his neck, nibbling, and North gasped. It sounded like a sob.
“Eyes open,” Shaw said, his breath hot on skin made tender from those small, sharp bites.
North forced his eyes wide. Tears streamed down his face, and his heart thrummed in his chest. Shaw’s hand danced across North’s back again, the touch lighting up every nerve so that North wanted to scream or run or fight or fuck. Shaw’s mouth came back to North’s neck, suckling, biting, until North gasped again.
“Please,” he said, his tongue so thick that the word was barely a recognizable sound.
“Please what?” Shaw asked, his breath like a furnace on the raw, tender skin of North’s neck.
“Whatever you want,” North managed to say. “Whatever you’ll give me.” His eyes drifted shut again, tears continuing to leak from the corners. He knew it wasn’t what Shaw wanted, but he couldn’t help himself. He was on the verge of crying or screaming or something; everything was too intense, everything was overwhelming.
Shaw’s soft steps, the skin peeling away from the floorboards, moved around North again. North trembled in the darkness behind his eyelids, not sure what was coming next.
Shaw’s mouth found his. And this time, it was the kiss North had wanted for eight years. Hot, yes. Lighting up North’s brain, tripping every switch, an electric load that melted the wires. That kind of hot. But tender too. And soft. And confident. And utterly, unmistakably Shaw.
The kiss turned into another, and another, and one of Shaw’s hands skated along the sensitive skin of North’s upper back, and the other hand traced down North’s chest, trailing through the dense blond hair, rocking over the swell of his abs, sliding down the length of his dick—too loose, too light, teasing.
“You’re wet,” Shaw whispered.
North groaned something, thrusting into the loose circle of Shaw’s hand, his legs shaking, one knee buckling.
Shaw kissed him again, and his hand tightened—two quick, sure strokes, and North came. His world went white; his other knee buckled, and he heard himself roaring, the vocal equivalent of the snowstorm in his brain. His full weight fell on Shaw, and the slender man grunted, trying to hold him up. It seemed to go on and on, until North was shaking, an arm looped around Shaw’s neck to hold himself up, his face wet as he buried it in that ridiculous tunic Shaw was wearing.
“Ok,” Shaw whispered, helping North to the bed, where they fell together, still tangled in each other. “Ok, you’re ok.”
North was crying, he realized. Not sobbing. Not shaking, not anymore. But the tears kept coming. He had to blink to keep Shaw in his vision.
“I’m more than ok,” North managed to say in a cracked voice. “But I think you fried my brain.”
Shaw laughed softly. He kissed the side of North’s neck; he kissed his throat; he kissed his chin; he kissed his lips. North met the kiss, returned it, still shocked to find that this was the kiss he had wanted—not those strange, cold ones that he had first encountered. This was Shaw. This was who he had loved for eight years.
Shaw wriggled backward, breaking the kiss, and grabbed the hem of the tunic, twisting to pull the garment off and toss it across the room. His thin frame gleamed in the weak light filtering into the room: the scattering of hair across his chest and belly, the mat of reddish-brown fur between his legs.
“You don’t have to,” North said, his voice still sounding like something that had fallen from a great height and shattered irrevocably.
“I know,” Shaw said, moving forward on his knees, his hand coming down to touch himself in a way that made North groan. “I want to.” He smiled; he was shaking again, but smiling now too. “You make me want to.”
Chapter 39
THE KNOCKING STIRRED Shaw out of a pleasant, warm haze that wasn’t quite sleep. His mind had been scoured clean; the night before, with North, still seemed like one more fantasy—another elaborate wet dream that Shaw’s mind had concocted to torture him. But his mind had never been so pleasantly blank before, and when Shaw shifted, he felt the solid lines of North’s body under his arm. Lying there, drifting in the afterglow and in his exhaustion and in the acknowledgment of the overwhelming shift that had happened between him and North, Shaw felt like he could spend eternity this way. No time; only the lingering pleasure, the looseness of his muscles, the feel of North’s skin under his hand.
Perfection, all of it. Except for the knocking.
North grunted.
Shaw burrowed under the pillow.
The knocking continued.
“Go away,” North yelled.
“What if it’s about Pari?” Shaw said from under the pillow.
“It’s not about Pari.”
“What if it’s about Chuck? Or about Beau? Or Shep?”
“It’s not.”
“But what if?”
North smacked Shaw on the ass hard enough that Shaw bolted upright, throwing off the pillow.
“What the hell?” Shaw said, rubbing the red print.
The knocking had reached a new intensity.
“It’s your door,” North said, grinning as he snuggled into his pillow again. “Answer it.”
Shaw found a smoking jacket and a pair of slippers. He shuffled toward the door. He turned, shuffled back to the bed, and slapped North’s ass.
North just raised his head, lazy and predatory, an eyebrow arching as he met Shaw’s gaze. “You are going to pay me back for that.”
“You smacked me first.”
“Yeah, well, you like it. And it’s my job.” North rolled over, baring his ass again, daring him to try again.
Shaw thought about the savage grace in the way North’s naked body shifted, grinned, and swatted him again. Hard. Roaring, North flopped over on the bed, and Shaw shot toward the front door.
Shaw was still grinning when he reached the door. He unlocked it, dragged it open, and stared in shock.
On the stoop, Jadon stood with fist still raised, caught in mid-knock. He was barely recognizable; both eyes were blackened and swollen, and Shaw thought, with shock, that it must have been almost impossible for Jadon to see anything. His skin had split over his cheekbone, along his jaw, at the corner of his mouth. One ear was the size of an apple. He looked, more or less, like a guy who had tried to make out with a baseball bat.
“Jadon,” Shaw said. “Christ, what happened?”
He clutched the jamb with one hand; the other he held in a fist. The heavy summer air drifted, smelling like the cold streets and the morning dew and laundry. Jadon swayed, toppled, and caught himself on the jamb.
“Jesus Christ,” Shaw said. “North! North!”
“No,” Jadon mumbled. “You.”
“North, call an ambulance. Jadon, come here. You need to lie down. Let me help you—”
“No.” His voice firmed, and he shoved Shaw back when Shaw stepped toward him. “This is a message. They wanted to send you a message.” His face twisted, and Shaw realized that Jadon was trying to smile, even while blood from the torn corner of his mouth stained his teeth.
“What message? North, where the hell are you? North! Jadon, you’ve got to—”
Shaw forgot what he was trying to say because Jadon pulled open his jacket, displaying a photograph that had been pinned to his shirt. The shirt was stained with blood, and Jadon fumbled with the buttons, but Shaw barely noticed. All his attention was focused on the photograph: a candid shot taken at a distance, the angle poor but the image clear. In the picture, North leaned on a shovel, shirtless, his face turned to the distance. Shaw recognized the brick house behind North; it belonged to North’s father. It had been taken recently, Shaw decided. After North moved in with his father.
Jadon hissed with pain; his fingers were still working, but one of the buttons snagged. The noise drew Shaw’s attention, and now he really noticed that the shirt was no longer white. Blood soaked it from collar to waist, more blood than the broken skin on Jadon’s face could account for.
“Jay,” Shaw said. “Please, stop. You’re hurt, you need to sit down.”
“This is the message,” Jadon said, his voice tuned too tight with pain. Grabbing the shirt with both hands, he yanked, and buttons popped free. The shirt hung open, exposing Jadon’s chest.
Bile rose in Shaw’s throat, and a horror he’d never experienced before. Someone had cut up Jadon’s chest—a razor, part of Shaw thought clinically, or a scalpel. A thin blade, easy to control. And then cuts had been cleaned and allowed to scab so that each slash was clear and distinct. Slashes that formed two distinct words, their meaning clear in the context of the photograph pinned to Jadon’s shirt.
He’s next.
Declination
Keep reading for a sneak preview of Declination, book three of the Borealis Investigations.
Chapter 1
THIS SIDE OF St. Louis had been murdered. Shaw thought about the comparison as he picked his way over a shifting pile of rubble in the lobby of the decaying Spa Parnassus. Around him, the building revealed signs of a past that had been marked by wealth, prestige, betrayal, and then the slow march of decay. Soot obscured the murals on the walls. When something moved in the shadows and Shaw stabbed out with the flashlight, the beam caught a glint of gold leaf and nothing else. Rats, he told himself. Just rats.
Shaw took another step, balancing on a broken slab of cement, catching a length of rusted rebar with one hand, and then dragging himself across to a jumble of rotting timbers that looked marginally more stable. The wreckage formed a barrier across the Spa’s lobby, one of only two routes that led into the building. This one required Shaw to cross the threshold formed by debris that had fallen when several of the upper floors had been demolished. The demolition work had been abandoned at some point, but the damage had been done. Like the rest of north St. Louis, this place had been killed—allowed to die might be slightly more correct, although Shaw wasn’t sure any real ethical difference existed. It had become a kind of graveyard city, the buildings all monuments to another time. High above, wings flapped, and Shaw glanced up into the darkness of the ruined floors above, where a fleck of September sun shone through one of the upper windows.
Another sound came, and this time Shaw knew it wasn’t a rat. Shaw froze, but nothing else came back to him. He brushed the walkie at his belt, just to make sure it was there, and then eased forward. Timbers crumbled under his weight; when he shifted down onto a span of ancient carpet, it squelched under his combat boots. Shaw grimaced and continued to lower himself down the other side of the debris.
Then he reached an unstable patch, and a piece of cement the size of a dinner plate slid free, carrying Shaw with it. Shaw struggled to stay upright as he navigated the jagged ends of laths and the rusted-out lengths of steel. If he fell now, he had a good chance of getting skewered, so he lowered his weight as much as he could and rode the skittering avalanche of debris toward the bottom of the pile. He hit the ground hard, stumbled free of the scree of cement and broken tile, and put a hand to the Springfield XD9 strapped to his thigh. With his other hand, his wiped his face and his neck, and his fingers came away gray with grit. The echo of the landslide rumbled through the spa.
