by Lia Black
Derek held up his hand. “Whoa, wait. You’re saying the only reason I get turned on around you is because my primitive mind can’t handle your pheromones? Ever think I might just find you attractive? Although with your superiority complex, I find myself questioning why.”
“I—” Kayle couldn’t figure out if what Derek was saying was insulting or somehow complimentary. “That doesn’t make sense.”
“I won’t argue with you there.” Derek sighed and pulled one knee up onto the couch so he could turn his body a bit more towards Kayle. “I’m going to tell you some things that I never thought I’d be telling another person, and certainly not a Variant.”
Derek changed positions again, leaning forward, his hands clasped as he rested his elbows on his knees. “You know about Marc. What you may not know is that I was in love with him. I swore I would never have another partner. Then you came along. I didn’t want you— I still don’t—not as a partner, anyway. Seeing you nearly dead… it made me start to think about things; make promises to a God that never existed. It made me realize how alone I was, even before Marc. So… that kiss in the shower. I guess that was my mind’s desperate attempt to…” He sighed, sitting up and scrubbing his face with his hands. “…I don’t even know.”
“I’m sorry for your loss,” Kayle said, uncertain if it was the right thing to say. The rest of Derek’s words, however, he wasn’t ready to try and understand. The photograph in his drawer made more sense now. It was more than the remembrance of a comrade. It was a memento of his lost love.
“I expect you have lost a lot more. Your mother...” Derek shook his head. “I had no idea there was somebody the Gentry disliked more than human beings.” He sat still for a moment, staring into space, then tilted his head towards Kayle. “Tell you what— I’ll shower at work. It’ll mean I’ll have to come back here to get you, but it’s not that long of a drive.”
Kayle considered suggesting he come with him, but Derek being in the shower was nearly as bad as Derek not being there at all. Being alone for any period of time at the precinct was inadvisable, at least until they could be certain that any cops who might come after Kayle had been weeded out. At this point, he doubted as much.
“I feel badly about this,” Kayle confided.
“It’s not a big deal. And I’ll get the shower to myself because the place is full of ignorant homophobes.” Derek cracked a grin that Kayle assumed was supposed to be ironic.
“Humans are afraid of homosexuality?”
“Not all, but many. They like to pretend it doesn’t exist; that it’s some kind of stubborn rebellion against the cultural norms. What about Apex?”
“Well,” Kayle sighed, “I can speak for the Gentry when I say they don’t seem to have a preference one way or the other, but the other Variants, and my kind especially, see same-sex relations as abnormal for anyone but Clan.”
“Your kind; meaning incubus?”
“From what I have been told, yes. And since there are so few of us, I have to believe it is true.”
“Wait. If an incubus has sex with a woman, how do they, uh, eat?”
“It’s mostly the chemicals released with orgasm. We can absorb them through our skin.”
“So you’re saying that you didn’t actually need to swallow to get fed.”
“I didn’t need to, no. But I like to think I have a much more balanced diet because of it,” Kayle said it smugly, which made Derek laugh. It sent a shiver of something cool and fluttering through Kayle’s stomach and made him smile himself. A genuine laugh from Derek seemed rare, and Kayle felt a spark of pride for being able to coax one out of him, even if it had been accidental.
Derek’s laugh siphoned down into a wistful curve of his lips and he looked at Kayle with sparkling eyes. “You have a gorgeous smile.”
“Oh, I—” Kayle covered his mouth as self-consciousness began to slither back in and remind him that he was failing to keep himself in check around Derek. It was becoming more difficult not to be affected by him. His moods, his expressions, the way he injected emotion into the delivery of his words. The human blood-thralls on Apex only seemed to have two emotions: hubris and despair. They were pretty, dumb creatures who physically resembled their Gentry masters as much as homo sapiens could manage. It was easy to remain impassive around them because they were no more interesting than a floral arrangement, and just as temporary.
Derek’s smile faded and he rubbed his eyes with the heels of his hands. “I’m sorry. I really need to keep things to myself.”
“N-no,” Kayle stammered, “It’s fine. It’s nice to hear.”
“I can’t believe you don’t hear it more.”
“Derek, you have seen what I am without the glamour. There is nothing gorgeous about it.”
Derek shrugged. “If you say so.”
“You must not have gotten a good look then.”
“And you’re not going to show me, are you?”
Kayle didn’t want to argue about this. It was too personal, and anything that involved him always cut too close to the bone.
“Dr. Ray said it was like nudity to you. Is that true?”
“Yes, I suppose it could be thought of like that.”
“You’re uncomfortable, because you feel vulnerable.”
“Because I stand out. Because I am different. Imagine how you would feel if you were the only one in a city not wearing clothes. Nothing to cover yourself and hide your shame, because shame is all that you are.” Kayle bit back something that threatened to be a sob. That damn kiss had weakened his failing hold on his temperament. Yes, incubi and succubae were very passionate, in sex, anger, and misery. The Clan were gods. Being at the top of the food chain in every way left them no reason to fear, or struggle, or experience any of the emotions that anyone beneath them had to. His father was kind, and offered the occasional smile, but he was a rarity.
“Wow. Those Apex assholes have really done a number on you,” Derek’s tone was almost wonderment. “Your father doesn’t see shame when he looks at you.”
“My father…is an extraordinary man.”
“Yeah, I have to agree.” Derek reached over to the side table and shook a cigarette out of his soft-pack. Putting it between his lips, he said. “C’mon. Let’s go outside. I want a smoke.”
Hesitantly, Kayle got up and followed him to the balcony. “I don’t know why you want to make me suffer your smelly habit.”
“Yet you follow me outside,” Derek gave him a crooked smile as he lit his cigarette with a match. In gray light, the orange flame gilded the planes of his face, and Kayle let himself look and appraise until Derek raised his eyes.
Kayle folded his arms, turning his head as Derek blew the smoke away from him.
“I thought my father was pretty amazing too, growing up. My mom died when I was too young to remember much about her, but my dad told me stories about their time together. They were friends and lovers. I always thought I’d grow up, meet a girl like her, and get married.”
“But you didn’t.”
“Nope. I realized I was gay when I was about fourteen. Maybe I knew before that, but I wasn’t sure what to call it. I was so afraid to tell my dad…so sure he’d be disappointed or ashamed.”
“Was he?”
Derek took in a long drag, doubling the time it took to let it all out. “I never found out. He died before I could tell him. I pretended to be normal and like normal girls. I went on dates, but always when it came to the part about making out, I would find some reason not to.” He flicked some ash off the end of his cigarette, watching it drift down towards the alley below. “I seem to make a habit of that; waiting for the right time to say or do something, and I wait too long. It was the same with my partner, Marc.”
“What did you have to tell him?”
Derek fixed him with a heavy look, that lasted well beyond him turning his gaze. “That I loved him. That I needed him to make the decision to love me back, or to end our sexual relationship.”
&nb
sp; “Oh.”
“Yeah,” Derek sighed. “Marc was married when we were partnered. Beautiful woman. He loved her more than anything.” Derek tapped some ash of his cigarette, following it down with his gaze. “She got pregnant, and he was elated, until he found out it wasn’t his.” He paused, taking another long drag on his cigarette. The paper crackled and for a moment, the glow at the end got brighter. “She’d been cheating on him for a while. It’s hard being a cop’s spouse; you want to spare them the gory details of your job; the things that keep you up at night, and show up whenever you close your eyes. So we usually lock it all up tight when we’re with loved ones, but it eats away at you. It took a toll on his marriage. I think he knew, but was in denial.
“Anyway, I liked him from the start. Funny, smart, attractive. But I would never have said anything if he hadn’t made the first move.”
“Then how could he know you’d be receptive?” Kayle hadn’t known that Derek was sexually interested in men until he’d offered him sex.
“I’m open with my sexuality, “Derek said. “I’m not blatant, but I’m honest. If somebody asks if I am married or seeing somebody, I tell them the truth. These kinds of questions come up in small talk all the time, so Marc knew I was gay within the first few days of meeting me.”
“And he wasn’t bothered?”
Derek shrugged, “He was okay with it. Gilchrist— my C.O.— knows about me; he never would have paired me with someone who couldn’t handle it.
“So things were going well for a few years until that night Marc came over, half-drunk and carrying two bottles of hard liquor.” Derek held onto the metal railing, lowering his gaze until his eyes were almost closed. “He told me all about his wife’s infidelity, cried on my shoulder. We were both pretty well lit by then; things progressed. We woke up the next morning, hung-over and naked, in the same bed. I thought that would be it for us. I thought he’d be disgusted that I took advantage of him, and I did take advantage of him, because I’d wanted to for years.” Derek took a last draw from his recently forgotten cigarette and frowned at the inch of ash as he blew out the smoke. Crushing it into a small ashtray glued down to the railing, he picked up the pack and looked down into it, contemplating having another. He sighed and set it down without removing a cigarette.
“He wasn’t disgusted, but we agreed we should stay quiet about it, and we kept having sex. We had a lot of it— always off-duty, of course. Nothing worse than being caught off-guard during a stakeout with a dick in your mouth, I suppose. Marc needed it to forget his wife and how much he’d been hurt by losing a child he’d never had. I understood that. Yet I stupidly let my heart get involved. So yeah, I was waiting for the right moment, and again, it never came.”
“I’m sorry.” Kayle had no idea what more to say. He’d never been in a relationship. The supplements he took had a libido-suppressing drug in them, so he didn’t want sex all the time. After his first feeding from Derek, and with the lack of suppressants, he had been thinking about sex a lot more. If Derek hadn’t called a halt after he’d kissed him in the shower, Kayle would probably still be with him, messing up his bed sheets beyond repair.
Kayle fingered the rough velvet of a tomato leaf from Derek’s small container garden. There was so little green here, so little of every color. Shorebank was one of the larger settlements that hadn’t been razed during and after the war. The Gentry didn’t care much about how the smaller settlements governed, but the large ones like this always had Clan at its head.
“Do you realize,” Derek said, leaning on his arms on the railing, “that this is the most we have actually spoken since we met? Without arguing, I mean.”
Yes. He had realized that, and that it was no small thing. “Your father… was his death unexpected?”
Derek chuckled. “You never expect death. It just shows up when it feels like it. He died of a heart-attack when I was twenty-two and just officially accepted into the police force.”
“I thought you said your career path was already chosen for you?” Kayle was aware that children born since the war were monitored through their early education and given tests to see how they might become functioning members of their society.
“It was, but even so, not everybody makes it. Sometimes the positive personality traits evolve into something negative. Assertiveness becomes aggression, drive becomes compulsion. Not to mention that sometimes people break during the training, mentally and physically.”
“Your father must have been very proud,” Kayle said.
“He was, yeah.” Derek’s gaze was focused wistfully ahead, staring at the brick wall bordering the other side of the alley. “What does it take to become a cop on Apex?” he finally asked.
“In my case, it was mostly nepotism. But I did have trials to complete, and despite what the others say, I have earned my place as a Sovereign guard and investigator. My job is more mental than physical, and one must know how to manage politics.”
“Sounds… a little boring.”
Kayle appreciated the way Derek always went straight to the point, even if it was a bit insolent. “Yes. I suppose it might.”
“Sorry,” Derek apologized. “I wasn’t trying to be an ass. Sometimes I say things without thinking about how it might make somebody else feel.”
Kayle shrugged, “I’ve gotten used to that.”
“No, you shouldn’t be. I’m an ass, but I’m not going to be one of those assholes who chips away at you. When I do that shit, you call me on it. Deal?” Derek had turned to face him and Kayle met his gaze.
“Why does this matter to you?”
“I’m trying to be a better person. Indulge me.” Derek held out his hand to shake on their agreement.
“Fine,” Kayle grasped his hand then wished he hadn’t. He could feel Derek’s arousal, lingering, through the skin of his palm.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
Derek knew he was playing with fire when he’d reached for Kayle’s hand. He felt the tremor run through Kayle, and their gazes locked hard before Kayle mumbled something and pulled his hand free. Derek was acting like an idiot; the little boy in school who pulls on the girl’s pigtails and makes her cry, just to get noticed. It was the proximity to an incubus that had him acting this way. Kayle was from Apex. He was part of the oppressive regime that kept humans under their thumbs, kept them dependent and in fear. Kayle had been sent here not because Derek needed help, but to try and convince him that the killer was not Clan. And even though he claimed to be despised by them, they kept him fed, housed, and alive. He had a job to do, and just like any oppressed worker who hates their domineering boss, he needed to do it or else he’d lose everything.
If he wasn’t still so raw from Marc’s death—if Marc hadn’t died at all— he wouldn’t be feeling like this. He wouldn’t be so vulnerable to temptation… or, he realized, he might be worse, because he’d be recovering from a broken heart.
It was getting late enough to use the excuse of an early morning wake-up for Derek to go to bed. He promised to switch with Kayle tomorrow night, because the unspoken truth was, Derek really needed some time alone to get his head together and take his sexual tension apart.
He stretched out on his back in bed, kicking the sheets off as he fished his cock out of his boxers. It seemed to have a life of its own as it bobbed along his belly, leaving a thread of glistening precome behind. He wasn’t so much pleasuring himself as he was servicing his penis so he could get a few hours of sleep. Normally, he conjured up faceless fantasies of men, but tonight it was Kayle, and not in his human form. In his imagination it was Kayle’s warm mouth holding his cock instead of Derek’s own slicked-up hand. Even as his body responded favorably to the imagery, his mind warned him that this was a bad idea. That sense of it being wrong, of being forbidden, only turned him on more and soon Derek was coming. His abdominal muscles spasmed, nearly doubling him up. Breathless, he blinked hard as his body continued through small aftershocks, and he worried that he’d made a sound. Jerking off when
one lived alone was no problem. He could be as loud and as lewd as he wanted. But when the object of your new deviant desires was just in the next room, things could become…uncomfortable.
His pulse, throbbing through his head, finally began to slow and quiet down enough so he could listen for any stirring in the hall.
Silence.
With a sigh, Derek reached over for a tissue from the box on his nightstand, wiping his hand, before he got up to clean up any evidence of this bad idea he had left on his skin.
The apartment was silent and dark as Derek crossed the narrow hall to his bathroom, He squinted at his reflection in the too-bright light over the sink. It seemed the only time he looked anything but haggard was post-orgasm. Then he just looked stupid. He was coming up on his thirty-forth birthday, the same age Marc had been when he died. Derek never wished it had been him instead of Marc who’d died. He was too selfish and realistic for that. He just wished that Marc hadn’t died at all. He told himself he could handle a broken heart if it meant that Marc was alive and happy in the world, but knew that was the same kind of altruistic bullshit everyone said when they knew the alternative. The truth was that he’d loved Marc, and Derek was sure that Marc didn’t love him back. That’s why he’d waited so long to say anything. He knew they were partners, friends, and Marc liked the sex. But he also knew that Marc denied that he was gay, and would continue to do so, despite the growing evidence that he very well could be.
