Into the Gloaming

by Mercy Celeste

  “I was planning to get plastered and sleep it off in his bed. Yeah. We’re off tomorrow for the holiday. The girls… interns… I shouldn’t call them girls. Jemma is my age. She’s like maybe six months older than me.” Austin thought about Jemma and how her gaze followed Rory when she thought no one was watching. But she pushed him to admit he had a thing for Rory… Wait? “How old did you say you are?”

  “Twenty-nine. Why? Is that a problem?” Heath’s expression became even more guarded. His ex-husband was reportedly closer to twenty than thirty. Making him almost an old man and probably why he’d cheated. Wait? Twenty-nine?

  Austin tried not to think about ghosts and hallucinations that weren’t real or that someone had left evidence of a sexual encounter in the same room, he’d hallucinated sex in with a man who said he was twenty-two but sometimes looked so much older, and younger at other times. “No reason. I thought you were younger. You look young.”

  “Does age matter to you?” A momentary streak of something crossed Heath’s face. The self-confident, arrogant millionaire persona might be just that. A persona.

  “I’m twenty-nine. So is Rory. And Jemma, too. The other two ladies aren’t much younger. Takes a long time to get a doctorate. Especially if you skip a year here and there, because it’s too tough, and wait tables for your best friend’s father. And if I was going to fuck Rory, we would have already gone there. And it’s not because we’re the same age. I don’t like younger guys. And I don’t like older guys. I’m not all that… experienced. Okay, yeah, maybe I am. But I’m not a slut. And why are we having this discussion in the restroom?”

  Heath cracked his knuckles. The sound echoed in the concrete-walled room. He seemed so fucking large even from across the room. He shook his hands out and then his shoulders… as if he was throwing off tension. “It’s quiet in here. Better than out there. Am I scaring you?”

  “Yeah, a bit. Ya arsehole.”

  Where the hell was the accent coming from? And the fear?

  “Is it suddenly freezing in here or is it me?” Heath swiped one hand behind his neck like Austin wanted to do. His hackles were up and it was very cold.

  The door flew wide open and Rory walked inside, a pissed-off look on his face. “No fucki—” He stopped cold in the doorway, looking from Austin back to Heath. “Oh. It’s you two.”

  “Does this look like we’re fucking?” Austin tossed his hands in the air and winced at the weight of the cast. “And for fuck’s sake, Rory, just announce it to the entire world why doncha.”

  “How much have you had to drink?” Rory stood, feet spread wide, his arms crossed over his chest, chin ducked, looking like the street-tough he really was. And Austin did not like having that look thrown at him. And maybe his dick wasn’t entirely immune to Rory’s bouncer persona… maybe it never had been.

  “About three sips before I spilled the damned thing in my lap. Trying to get it cleaned up. And seriously, dude. What if we were fucking?” Austin shouted at his friend.

  “I’d have to throw you out. This is not that kind of establishment. Why is it freezing in here?” Rory replied, flatly.

  “Ask him, he owns the block and was supposed to have these old places up to code before he sold off the units. Why doesn’t the heat work in here, Mr. Cortlandt? And the water heater. And why…” Austin stopped ranting when all three men in the room stared at him as if he’d lost his mind.

  The leprechaun in the mirror seemed a tad bit startled. So startled he took off his cap. He had a lovely head of copper-colored hair. And pretty green eyes that… shimmered out of view as Austin… “I’m going to be sick.”

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  He shouldn’t feel so comfortable standing in a reeking toilet to have a getting-to-know-you, conversation. He shouldn’t feel guilty when the boyfriend of the guy he wanted to get to know tried to stop them from having sex that they weren’t having.

  Heath didn’t understand why he felt guilty for wanting to have sex with a man who said he was available and seemed interested. Or for feeling like he’d poached on another man’s territory. Or because the man in the middle of this argument spun around and spewed his guts into the toilet.

  Something strange wavered around Austin just before he got sick. Heath stood there blinking, trying to clear his vision. The blurry field wavered out of sight, and the cold that permeated the small room gradually receded.

  “I thought you said you weren’t drunk?” Rory didn’t sound concerned for his friend despite his words. He sounded impatient.

  “He’s not.” Heath stood to his full height and squared his shoulders. He used his size to his advantage in many situations. He wasn’t exactly aiming to intimidate the bartender, but he wouldn’t stand back and pretend he wasn’t concerned for Austin. “All he’s had since I got here was exactly what he said, a sip or two of the J&C you sent him instead of the whiskey he asked for.”

  “I didn’t send him a J&C. I wasn’t at the bar. I’m doing crowd control tonight. I’m just one man, I can’t be everywhere. Jaysus.” The bartender took a couple of steps toward Heath, his Irish definitely up.

  “One man? Where’s your bulldog right now?” The shorter bouncer had been giving Austin some serious go to hell looks most of the night. “Someone changed his drink order. Someone might have slipped more than just a little Jack in it. And that guy seemed a little too invested in your relationship with Austin, by invested, I mean jealous.”

  “What the hell are you talking about? What bulldog? What guy? Dude, what the hell are you accusing me of exactly? Drugging my friend so he’d go to bed with you? If you can’t get a guy without roofying him… I should kick you out of here.” Spitting mad, Rory lunged at Heath. Strange that he seemed so much larger close-up, with anger flaring in his eyes.

  “Your bouncer, Roar. That guy. He’s talking about your bouncer.” Austin dragged himself to the sink to rinse his mouth.

  Rory blinked, confusion replacing the fire in his eyes. “I don’t have a bouncer. It’s just me. Has been all night. I didn’t think this place could get busy enough to hire a regular bouncer.”

  “Stocky redheaded guy, about yay tall,” Austin said, holding his hand up to about even with his ear. “Wearing a tweed newsboy cap.”

  And Rory went white as a sheet. Heath reached out to steady him when he swayed, but Rory slung off his hand.

  “Don’t touch me, asshole,” Rory growled, but he looked as shaken as Austin did. He reached for the sink next to Austin to brace himself.

  “You had to have seen him, he’s been beside you all night.” Austin leaned against his friend. “We both saw him.”

  “No. I haven’t… there’s no one here that meets that description.” Rory argued, but Heath got the sense that he knew more than he was sharing.

  “You asked me if there had been anyone killed over here. Remember? You said you felt like you were being watched,” Austin said defensively.

  “Are you’re saying there’s a ghost following me around, Haley Joel?” The fire was back in the bartender’s eyes. A murderous look that Heath wouldn’t have thought he’d send his best friend.

  “Fuck you, asshole.” Austin launched himself off the sink and got up in Rory’s face, his eyes flaming just as brightly. “I trusted you with that. And you said you believed me. I’m not lying to you. You’ve got a… a person following you around like a shadow and you swear you don’t know him. And if you call me Haley Joel again, I will—”

  Heath grabbed his raised fist and dragged him back toward the door. The band outside so loud no one would hear them screaming at each other… but there was no point in any of this. “Stop it. This isn’t you. Either of you.”

  “And you know us so well, Mr. Cortlandt, Sir?” The bartender snapped at him, his eyes still flashing. His rangy body on alert. He looked huge. And pissed.

  “For a scrawny Irishman you have a lot of balls,” Heath said, laughing. Because this was the strangest thing, he’d ever done in a bar restroom, in his lif
e.

  “Enough to bend you over and make you scream for your daddy,” Rory replied, his lips pulled into a droll pout even as the fire left his eyes. He turned to face the mirror, his eyes closed. He blinked slowly before opening them. And almost sighed in relief when he met his gaze. “Stop laughing, it’s not funny.”

  “It sort of is,” Austin replied, a snicker in his voice. “We’re fighting over… what exactly?”

  “Don’t know.” Rory turned on the tap and splashed his face. He looked exhausted. “I probably should have hired some extra muscle for tonight. Your interns are dancing on the table. It’s like a scene from Roadhouse out there. Irish punk rock band. Lots of booze. And there’s this intense feeling of… weird. It’s just a weird fucking vibe all around. Even for a New Year’s party.”

  “I’ll get them down.” Austin started to leave, but Heath caught his arm. He was still a little green around the gills.

  Rory dried his face with a paper towel and picked up the few that were on the floor. “Jemma is working on it. She’s not plastered yet. In fact, she’d make a great bouncer. She’s tough. I like her. If you don’t hire her, let me know and I’ll give her a job. Might not be as much as she’d make helping run a museum, but the benefits are great.”

  “If free booze counts as a benefit now.” Austin laughed. His color returning to normal as the band plowed into a halfway decent cover of Fairytale of New York. “God, I hate this feckin’ song.”

  And Rory lifted one dark-reddish eyebrow in surprise.

  “He’s been spouting Irish tinged obscenities all evening. Since the drink. I don’t think it was drugged. But… something was off about it.” Heath stepped to the side just as the bathroom door opened and a couple of guys stumbled in, drunk, and… well, Rory would get his chance to break up sex in the bathroom before it happened, after all.

  “Hey, hey, hey, get a room,” he shouted to the two guys clawing at each other. Looking guilty, they broke apart quickly and rushed back into the pub before Rory could throw them out.

  “It’s going to be a long feckin’ night. Why, the feck, did I do this again?” Rory grumbled, checking his watch. “Two hours to midnight. Jaysus.”

  He stopped on his way back out to the pub and pointed a finger at Austin. “Get something to eat. And—”

  “I know, no drinking, or sex in the john. Yeah, yeah, Roar, I got it.”

  Rory blinked, owl-like, his finger wavering in front of Austin’s face. “I was going to say I was sorry for earlier. But that’s still good advice.”

  Someone shouted his name from outside the door and Rory rushed past them on the way to put out one more fire.

  “He seems like a good man.” Heath resumed his lean against the wall. Austin stood near the door looking like he was ready to escape.

  “He is. He works hard. He learned the business the hard way. Mick Callaghan is an unforgiving son of a bitch. But Rory loves him, and he loves the pub. This is his life. It makes him happy.” Austin held the door open and waited for Heath to stop leaning and follow him out.

  “Yeah, it suits him. But that’s not what I meant.” Heath wasn’t done leaning… or getting to know Austin.

  “I know what you meant. And honestly, if you want me to sleep with him to make you feel better about yourself… or were you interested in watching? Or…” Austin gasped, grasping his chest. “Or you want us both? Why Misster Cortlandt, Sir, how kinky of you. And way to get back on the horse, after an ugly divorce.”

  Heath felt the pain of that almost as if he’d been slapped. He reached out and grabbed the smaller man’s unbroken arm and pulled him close. Pushing himself off the wall, Heath leaned over the curator and cupped his face with his free hand. Without dignifying the jab, he closed his eyes and pressed his lips to Austin’s waiting mouth. Austin’s sweet moan as he wrapped his broken arm around Heath’s neck and pulled him lower all he needed to know.

  The door flung open again, catching him in the side. Austin stepped away, a slightly dazed look in his eyes. Two guys went past them to the urinals… and Austin caught the door before it closed and disappeared into the crowd just as the band added a rowdy song from The Dropkick Murphys to their playlist.

  The boys were definitely back. The question was, would Austin be just a rebound fuck… or was Heath having feelings for the first guy he met since breaking up with Clark?

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Britney was a fun drunk. And she could sing every song the cover band threw at them. If you could keep her off the table, that is. Austin had fun with the women while Heath lingered near the bar drinking something served in a white ceramic mug. Probably coffee, to keep him going until midnight.

  Austin suddenly wished for a mug of something hot and sweet. Maybe Rory had some hot chocolate back there. He was tired. But a good tired. A kind of tired he hadn’t been in a long time. Real tired. Not from injury tired.

  Hell, nothing hurt. Not really. His arm still hurt if he lifted it wrong or bumped the cast, so he tried not to do that. His head didn’t hurt much at all anymore. He’d had a dizzy spell in the restroom. He’d been having those since the concussion. His vision would go fuzzy and the room would spin and get cold and he’d lose whatever was in his stomach. And he didn’t know if he could blame it on the drink. The drink was just a drink. Nothing out of the ordinary. Probably meant for someone else who got his whiskey.

  He saw the face of the leprechaun in the mirror right before he spewed his guts. The leprechaun that had been watching them from the bar all this time… with the greenish tweed cap and the freckles and dark copper eyebrows. The same leprechaun who fit the description of Rory’s imaginary bouncer.

  Since the restroom, the stocky bouncer was nowhere to be seen. But Rory was visibly jittery, looking over his shoulder constantly. His temper grew shorter the closer midnight came. And the band played on, jumping from one popular Irish rock or punk band to another with precision. The lead singer with his long black hair and ice-blue eyes could be Bono’s son. Or ghost.

  Austin waited for the crowd to thin, it didn’t. It seemed more crowded now than it had before the restroom conversation. His head ached, and his belly grumbled. He felt old. Wanting to go home and go to bed like some… stodgy old stick in the mud. He was not stodgy. Nor old. He was twenty-nine.

  “They say who you kiss at midnight on New Year’s is the person you’ll spend the rest of your life with.” Jemma sidled up to him in her stiletto heels. She was a gorgeous woman. Taller than the other two, maybe larger boned. She looked like Sandra Bullock if you tilted your head at the right angle. Her long black hair glowed in the strobing lights from the band. Her already tilted up eyes made even more exotic by the makeup she wore. The dress hugged every curve Austin didn’t know she had. She glanced over her shoulder to the stage and the pretty singer as she pulled Austin into her arms. “Dance with me.”

  Austin didn’t fight her. He let her wrap her arms behind his neck as he draped his hands behind her back, a safe distance above her ass. And they swayed to the Bono knock off’s knockoff version of With or Without You.

  “Really?” Austin shouted into her ear. She was taller than him in the heels. “I hadn’t heard that saying.”

  “Oh yeah. I’ve kissed lots of boys on New Year’s. And look at me. All single and everything.” She fluttered her fake eyelashes at the stage.

  Austin followed her longing gaze. “He’s pretty.”

  “Looks gay to me,” she sighed in his ear. “But all the really good-looking ones, here tonight, are. The rest are straight.”

  “What about Rory?” He had to ask. He’d seen the way she looked at his friend when she thought he wasn’t looking.

  “Taken,” she said as the music died. “Or hadn’t you noticed?”

  “We’re not…” He was so tired of explaining his relationship with Rory.

  “And he’s not…” She pulled him tighter as if she would kiss him. “It doesn’t matter what he isn’t… he’s just not available. And neither are yo
u.”

  “I’m not your type.” Austin felt the heat of her chest through his thin shirt.

  “How do you know what my type is?” Her lips grazed his cheek. Her voice husky. Seductive. The singer on the stage angled a murderous gaze upon them. She squeezed Austin’s ass. He hadn’t felt her hand drift down his back. “Is he watching?”

  “Yeah,” Austin replied, he felt her nipples harden as they pressed tight together. Her lips touched his. “Oh.”

  “Just kiss me, and pretend I’m your type, and I might get laid. And you might get laid. We might all get laid. By the ones we shouldn’t want.”

  Austin kissed her, tasting lipstick for the first time in his life. Her body so very firm beneath his hands. Almost made him question things he thought were set in stone. There was no tongue. He didn’t rise to the occasion, but… “Damn, Jemma, you can kiss.”

  “But can I kiss well enough to make you forget both guys?” She said, something flickering in her eyes for a moment. A longing he hadn’t expected… gone so quickly he thought he’d imagined it. “He’s been watching you all night.”

  Austin blinked rapidly. The dizziness threatening to come back. “The singer?” God, no, he’d gone there once, a long time ago. Gotten his heart broken. “I don’t date singers.”

  “I swear, you are the most unobservant person I’ve ever met.” She took control of their dance and swayed him until he faced the bar. Rory stood at the end of the bar, near the leprechaun statue. Which wasn’t watching them. But… Heath was. His eyes sparkling dangerously.

  “Why would he be jealous of…” He ran his hand down her muscled arm, and over her hip… there were no curves. Just an illusion. He gasped. “Does… Heath…” his mind whirled with so many strange visions. “Me or you?”

  “I’m not his type, any more than I’m your type.”

  “But you could be Rory’s type.”