The waiter chose that moment to show up with their drinks. “Here you are, gentlemen,” he said, swooping down with the grace of a swan. It was kind of weird. Jack had never seen anyone move like that other than dancers. “One beer for you,” he said, pushing a smoking bottle toward Jack. “And— Oh fuck! I’m so sorry!”
In all his grace, the waiter had dumped Ryan’s drink right into his lap. Ryan shot up, grabbing a napkin from the table and dabbing at his crotch.
Part of Jack was mortified. Literally the only thing worse would have been Ryan leaving because Jack was such a douchebag. But another, filthier part came forward and seized the opportunity.
“Damn, babe, we haven’t even finished dinner yet. I didn’t think you’d be that wet already. Should I go ahead and get the check?” A long shot, but he had to take it or the evening would be over before it started.
Anger flashed in Ryan’s eyes for a second, and then his lips split in a grin. “Hey, fuck you, all right? It’s fucking cold.” But he couldn’t keep the laughter out of his voice. The waiter had grabbed a cloth from his apron and was hovering awkwardly, clearly not sure whether he should reach for Ryan’s lap and help with the cleanup.
“It’s fine,” Ryan said, rubbing at his pants a few more times.
The dick-print showing through those tight slacks had Jack biting his tongue. For the first time in a long time, he could see himself on his knees, a cock in his mouth. Would he like it as much as he hoped? Only one way to find out, but he didn’t think he was there yet.
“If you could just bring me some more napkins, please?” Ryan said. “That’d be great.”
The waiter nodded and dashed off.
“You okay?” Jack asked as Ryan wiped up the wine that had spilled onto his seat.
“Yeah. Just not the greatest start to the night, you know?”
“Sorry.” Jack wasn’t certain which part he was apologizing for. He couldn’t promise he’d be able to stay out of his own head and enjoy the moment, and if he couldn’t, then they’d be right back where they were before the clumsy waiter.
But by the time their main course arrived (with Ryan’s comped because of the wine mishap) the two of them had fallen into an easy conversation. Jack told Ryan about the phone call with his mother, and Ryan talked about how his family would always wake him up at the crack of dawn until he’d moved out because they were convinced that sleeping past 5 a.m. stunted your growth.
“I’ve never heard of anything like that.” Jack snickered, stuffing his mouth full of chicken.
“Yeah, my family was crazy. It’s not even like they had anything for me to do— they just honestly believed that. Probably still do. So I studied my ass off before school started. Part of why I became a lawyer. There were some times I really wanted to know if I could sue the pants off them.”
“But what would you have gotten out of that?”
“I was twelve! I wasn’t thinking that far ahead!”
Jack wiped his mouth to hide another laugh. “Okay. You win.”
“But what was worse was my brother. He actually believes them. He’s only a little over five feet, and he thinks it’s because they let him sleep too long when he was a baby. He blames them for everything.”
“Oh no,” Jack said, downing the rest of his glass.
“Yeah. I love their crazy asses, though. I don’t know what I’d do without them.”
Jack knew that feeling. But his still came with the risk of denying who he was. He was questioning more and more if that was worth it.
He paid the check and they started toward the door, but Ryan stopped before they made it more than halfway. “Holy shit.”
Jack turned and looked back at him. “What is it? What’s wrong?”
“My brother.”
Jack followed Ryan’s gaze to the stout man standing just inside the door, clearly trying to get a table. He could see the family resemblance, the high cheekbones, tiny nose, thick lips. But Ryan’s brother was a little thicker around the middle and definitely no slave to fashion. His clothes were oversized and dull. Jack glanced at his date again, how his entire outfit looked like it had been tailored to fit him, the warm-peach polo shirt, the bright-blue pants. Ryan was a man who knew his colors. His brother seemed to be the exact opposite.
“Mike?” Ryan called. “Mike, is that you?”
Mike turned in their direction, shock, then excitement registering on his face. “Rainey!” He came around the host’s stand and made a beeline for them.
“What did he call you?” Jack asked out of the corner of his mouth.
Ryan didn’t answer. It was too late to press him further because Mike was already on them, throwing his arms around his brother.
“How the hell have you been?”
“Fine,” Ryan said, but something about his voice sounded off. Jack turned around and tried not to laugh. A perfect portrait of family awkwardness played out in front of his eyes. Ryan scratched at his head, his expression mortified. Mike, on the other hand, sported a huge grin, apparently ignorant to how bothered his brother seemed.
“I haven’t heard from you in weeks, Rainey. Where have you been?”
Ryan closed his eyes as though calming himself. “Please stop calling me that.”
“What is that?” Jack asked.
Mike turned toward him, eyebrow raised. “He with you?” he asked Ryan.
“Yeah. Sorry, this is—”
“Jack,” Jack said, holding out his hand. Mike shook it, but he didn’t look like he trusted Jack at all. It was odd, and a tendril of unease snaked its way down Jack’s spine, but he shook it off. “Mike, was it? It’s nice to meet you.”
“You too.” But Mike didn’t seem like he meant it.
Jack turned back to Ryan. “So yeah. What’s that all about, Rainey?”
Ryan cringed and Jack knew there was a story worth hearing behind it. “Nothing. Nothing at all. Can we go, please?”
“No way. Not until you have a drink with your little brother,” Mike insisted.
“I’m down for that,” Jack said.
Mike chewed the inside of his cheek. “Not to be rude . . .”
Jack braced himself. That statement was almost always followed by something that made him want to punch someone in the face.
“Then don’t be,” Ryan said. “Mom and Dad aren’t here. You don’t have to act like a brat.” He clapped his brother on the shoulder and let out a laugh, but it was clearly fake. The air around them was suddenly super uncomfortable, and Jack wanted nothing more than to get the fuck out of there before anything got worse.
“I was only going to ask what you guys had been doing before I got here, Rainey. Wasn’t trying to be nasty.”
Ryan narrowed his gaze, but nodded. “We were just having some dinner.”
There was that eyebrow again. Any higher and it was going to get lost in that mane of hair. “This a client of yours? Did I interrupt you prepping for a case?”
“No, nothing like that.” Ryan bit his bottom lip, a war playing out on his face, before saying, “Jack is just—”
“We were on a date,” Jack said. The word tasted funny, like it hadn’t been cooked all the way through. And he found himself scanning the restaurant, making sure there weren’t any of his family members lurking in the shadows.
Ryan’s mouth fell open, and Mike raised an eyebrow, apparently impressed. Jack’s face was on fire, but he fought it back, because the excitement spreading over Ryan’s face was enough to suppress his own discomfort.
“You didn’t tell me you had a boyfriend, bro.”
“That’s because I don’t,” Ryan said, though he cast a sidelong glance at Jack as if for confirmation. “We’re just trying things out.”
Mike swept his gaze over Jack again, as though sizing him up for the first time. “Come join us, then.” And he grabbed Ryan and frog marched him over to the bar.
Jack followed, dodging the daggers Ryan shot at him with his eyes. He pulled up a stool and ordered a whiskey
sour and an incredible hulk.
“Really, Mike, we’ve gotta go.”
“One drink won’t kill you.” Mike looked at the cup the bartender put down. “Well, that one might,” he said. “It’s pretty strong. You’ll never know what hit you.”
Ryan gave a defeated sigh. He sipped the green concoction the bartender had slid in front of him and winced.
“No one ever told me what this Rainey thing is all about,” Jack said.
Ryan’s expression soured and, for a second, Jack wondered if he was about to throw his drink in Jack’s face.
Mike laughed. “Okay, so when we were younger, Ryan here used to say that everyone drove him crazy and the only time he could find peace was when it rained outside. Cuz no one else was around, you know? So every time it rained, he would go outside and just sit in it. I can’t tell you how many times he got sick from doing that dumb shit.”
“That’s enough,” Ryan said. “It was a long time ago. I know better now.”
“You did it the night before your high school graduation.”
“There were fifty people in the house! What was I supposed to do, sit there with them talking at me about what I was going to do with my future?”
Mike turned to Jack. “It was a hundred degrees outside. My parents had the AC blasting in the house and his dumbass caught the flu.”
Ryan shrugged. “Kept everyone away, didn’t it?”
“But they still made him go to the ceremony the next day, because everyone had come to town for it. Got half the class sick.”
Ryan almost looked ashamed. “That wasn’t supposed to happen.”
Mike clapped him on the shoulder. “It was years ago. Everyone is fine now.”
“And yet you still brought it up.” Ryan downed the rest of his drink. He stood up. “It was really great to see you, Mike, but we’ve gotta get going. I’ll call you, okay?”
Without waiting for a response, he turned and headed for the door. Jack was confused, but a cue was a cue, so he shook Mike’s hand and followed Ryan outside. He found him at the corner, forehead pressed against the brick.
“Hey, what’s up?”
Ryan looked at him, eyes sparkling. He was silent for a long time, and then said, “Remember when I said my parents thought that sleeping past five stunted your growth?”
“Yeah.”
“Well, before I realized how batshit they were, I believed them. Why would they lie to me, you know?” Jack nodded. Ryan wiped a tear away. “I overslept a lot when I was a kid. And for a while, I was scared they were right. So I started sneaking my mother’s heels. Just so I’d know how to walk in them when I wound up short. And then one day my dad caught me in them.” He turned around, slid down the wall. “He beat the shit out of me.” Ryan cried freely now, head cradled in his hand. “Having a gay son was one thing. He could deal with that, he said. But no way was he raising a cross-dressing nancy-boy. He’d die first.” Ryan let out a bitter bark of a laugh. “If only dear old Dad could see me now.”
Jack hoped he was doing a good job of hiding his disgust. His own parents had been shitty, yeah, but he couldn’t imagine being accepted for being gay, only to be looked down on doing drag.
Ryan looked back at Jack. “That’s why I spent so much time trying to get away from them as I got older, even if it meant going and sitting out in the rain. I liked how I felt wearing the heels. And I wanted to do more. But I didn’t trust him anymore. I dunno, I guess I thought he’d be able to see on my face how much I wanted to dress up, or something. So I kept my distance. It was safer that way. At least in my mind.”
Jack pulled Ryan to his feet and embraced him.
“No one ever knew,” Ryan whispered.
“I’m sorry,” Jack said. “We should have left when you first wanted to. I’ve just been fucking up all over the place tonight.”
“It’s not your fault,” Ryan said. “I thought I was past this, but I guess I’m not.”
“It made you into who you are.”
“Some broke-down drag queen who has to play lawyer during the day because she can’t make a living doing what she really loves?”
“Hey.” Jack put himself in Ryan’s field of vision so he was looking him in the eye. “You are not broke-down. You’re as good as any of the other bitches out there doing it full-time, if not better, and you know it.” He used his thumb to wipe away one of Ryan’s tears. “We’ve all got fucked-up pasts. But we got away. We’re winning.”
Ryan clearly thought he was full of shit, but faked a smile anyway. “Thank you.”
“Nothing to thank me for. All I’m doing is telling you the truth.” He took Ryan’s hand in his own. “Let’s get back.”
“Where?”
“Doesn’t matter. My place or yours.” He led Ryan across the street. “We can watch TV. I could fuck you. Maybe I could kick your ass in Monopoly. It’s up to you. Anything you want.”
Jack preferred the second option, but he wouldn’t push it. They had both been emotional in the last few hours, so the night was about healing. There was always time for more sex, and Jack couldn’t think of anyone he’d rather have it with than Ryan.
So why was his mind already rifling through the closet, picking out looks for Sheila?
I walked into the club, taking a quick moment to scan the room and make sure I’d stay inconspicuous. Hundreds of people and I didn’t recognize a single one of them. Perfect.
I sized up the crowd as I passed them. I wouldn’t be able to take down most of these guys, even on their worst days. Some of them I could probably overpower without too much trouble, but they weren’t why I was here. The main attraction would show themselves before long. In the meantime, I slid up to the bar and ordered a whiskey. None of those namby-pamby drinks for me. I’m a man, and I drink like one.
Being around all the shirtless, dancing men didn’t repulse me as much as it had the first time I’d visited a place like this. I might even be getting used to it. I downed my liquor and ordered another before moving closer to the stage. Tonight’s performer was still a mystery to me, but tonight was the last night they’d be alive. I promised myself that.
I reached into my pocket and fingered the handle of my knife, just to be certain one more time that I hadn’t forgotten it, because then the whole trip would have been for nothing. I smiled to myself and swayed to the music until the show started.
As soon as the voice came over the speaker and announced that tonight’s victim would be some bitch called Sheila, I let myself be swallowed by the crowd. The key to being a good serial killer was to never look too suspicious, and a man by himself in a club like this, hovering around the stage was definitely suspect.
When Sheila (or whatever his real name was) stepped out, the crowd erupted. Clearly, the man had fans. People who would be devastated when the body was found, and that made what I was planning that much sweeter. They’d never know I’d been among them. Watching. Waiting. Using them as my shadow and wall.
The man on stage wore a sparkling silver gown with one sleeve and a brunette wig pulled back into a tight bun. The blood-red lipstick was a stark contrast to the rest of the look and was even more pronounced when the lights went down and a single spotlight shone onto him.
All in all, it would have been beautiful on a real woman.
A somber expression graced Sheila’s face as he surveyed the audience. A piano started in low over the speaker, framing an obvious ballad and, a moment later, the man on stage started to fake it.
“What you gave me, I know you gave me . . . You remind me all the time.”
I knew that voice. Christina something. Addison? Austin? Aguilar? I remembered that one song about the genie, but forced the thought away. It didn’t matter who the singer was. Nothing mattered except my plan.
But I wondered what had inspired the queen to perform this of all songs. The lyrics were a dark, heartbreaking story of love gone wrong. A woman, falling in love with a man who wasn’t right for her, walking on eggshells and tryin
g everything she could to keep him happy, even at the risk of losing herself. Halfway through, as the bridge built and built to what must be the real power of the end of the number, I thought I saw tears in the performer’s eyes. And then the man on stage was definitely crying, microphone in hand, performing as though he was really pouring his heart out for everyone to see. Who had hurt this poor son of a bitch? I might ask before I put him out of his misery, but I doubted it.
When the number ended, applause erupted all over the club. It went on for nearly a full minute before Sheila announced a short break and disappeared from the stage, dabbing at his eyes with a tissue he’d pulled from his fake tit. I debated making my move now, but that would be too risky. People were expecting the show to go on and, if the main attraction didn’t come back, people would get suspicious. So I’d wait. I wasn’t in any rush.
Two more glasses later, my head was getting foggy. Who had I come here to kill? What was their name? Something about the music made me want to move. I’d never liked dancing, but whatever this song was seemed to be rewiring me. I moved with the beat, all but forgetting my mission and, before long, a stout man with adoration in his eyes sidled up to me and closed the space between us. The fairy was bare-chested, covered in glitter, and grinding his ass into a total stranger’s crotch. Big mistake. But I didn’t want to stop dancing. Especially when I finished the last of my cup and felt that familiar twitch as my dick came to life.
I closed my eyes, imagining a woman’s ass pressed against me, because at least then I could keep my alcohol down. My head swam, and next thing I knew I was fully hard and the fleshy, denim-clad cheeks had been replaced with a hand. My first instinct was to snap. But this could be useful. I hadn’t had a halfway decent blowjob in ages and, when I opened my eyes, I found the queer staring up at me, bottom lip caught between his teeth. Swallowing my disgust and throwing caution to the wind, I let myself be led off the floor and toward a couple of doors bathed in red light.
They turned out to be bathrooms and, before I knew what was happening, I was being shoved into a stall in the men’s room and, the faggot was pulling down my pants, freeing my cock and sinking to the ground.
Anyone But You Page 9
