Loverboy (Dartmoor Book 5)

by Lauren Gilley

  Alec was back a moment later, hands held at a nervous angle in front of him.

  “Shut the door, please.”

  He did, and came to stand in front of Ian’s desk, delicious in his skinny black pants and gray sweater.

  “Do you know who the client in New York is?” Ian asked him.

  “Marco Mancini.”

  “Yes, but do you know what he is?”

  Face pale with uncertainty, Alec said, “Your…client?”

  “He’s a mafia don. I sell him cocaine and marijuana.”

  Poor sweet Alec; his face went from pale to bleached-bone white. His lower lip trembled as he sucked in a fast breath. “No,” he protested weakly. “You…you…”

  “I’m a drug dealer, darling, yes. I also own several porn studios, which, while not illegal, is admittedly unsavory. Oh, and a handful of strip clubs. A fairly successful escort business – it’s New York-based, of course. There’s not a market for that here in Hicksville.” His heart thundered against his ribs; his hands were clammy and he wrapped them both around his cool glass so Alec couldn’t see them shaking.

  He sent a mocking smile to his young lover. “There you have it. I sell drugs and sex. All I need now is to sponsor a band, and we can add rock ‘n’ roll to the mix.”

  Alec’s blue eyes seemed huge through the lenses of his glasses.

  Softly, Ian said, “This is the part where you hate me.”

  Alec stood blinking at him for a long moment, then drew in a deep breath that jacked up his shoulders. “No.” His voice wobbled. Then, firmer: “No. No, Ian, I don’t hate you.”

  Ian was…dumbfounded. “Why not?”

  Alec shook his head, a small rueful smile breaking across his face. “I just can’t.”

  Ian sucked in a breath. “Feel like dinner?”

  ~*~

  Walsh’s wife Emmie was very small, very blonde, and very pregnant, her belly not at all hidden by her loose cream sweater. “I have a whole new respect for mares,” she joked as she and Whitney sliced and arranged chocolate cake onto dessert plates. “And they do it for eleven months instead of nine.”

  “Well that sounds terrible.”

  “Eleven months, and no epidural.”

  Whitney made an “ouch” face and set a fork on each plate. “Makes a girl glad she’s not a horse.”

  “Hmm.” Emmie licked a spot of frosting off her thumb and slanted a look at Whitney that was suddenly assessing. Not in a cruel way, but in a shrewd one. Horsewoman look, Whitney guessed. “You doing okay?” she asked, and it wasn’t the rote “hi, how are you” of their meeting an hour ago. A real question, one between girls, meant for the snatched moments when the boys did their biker thing. Another of those small moments that meant so much to Whitney, being included in the sisterhood.

  Whitney took a deep breath. “Yeah, I’m good, actually. This is all a little–” She gestured to indicate the moment, the club.

  “Weird, and different, and scary?” Emmie guessed.

  “Kinda. Yeah.”

  “Trust me, there are still mornings I wake up and wonder how the hell I ended up married to an outlaw biker. I’m not sure it’s ever going to seem logical in the context of the world.” She shrugged. “But we’re happy, and it makes sense to me. So. Whatever. You’ll get there.”

  Whitney smiled. “Thanks.”

  ~*~

  “I need to get in touch with someone in London,” Tango said.

  He sat with Walsh and Shane at the three chairs at the head of the long dining table, drinking vodka on the rocks.

  Shane’s brows gave a little jump of interest, face staying impassive. “What sort of someone?”

  “Someone’s parents. Or siblings. Whatever family he’s got left.”

  Walsh sent him one of his flat, unnerving, calculating looks. “Just a stab in the dark here, but I’m thinking you don’t have that many English friends.”

  Tango felt his face heat, but he shook his head. “A mutual friend of ours, actually.”

  Walsh and Shane shared a glance. “Ghost wouldn’t like it,” Walsh said. “You understand that?”

  “Yeah, and I don’t care. I’m not asking for club reasons. This is personal. I know Shaman from…” It frightened him, if he thought about it, that his brothers had no idea what sort of past he shared with Ian. They’d cut the black dog off his back and throw him to the wolves in a heartbeat. “From before,” he finished. “I want to find his family. Let them know he’s still alive.”

  “In hopes his daddy will come drag him back home by the ear?” Shane asked, ghost of a smile playing across his lip.

  “Because he needs them,” Tango said, making firm eye contact with both half-brothers.

  Walsh swirled the contents of his glass, ice cubes clacking together. Thinking. “Albie could help, I’m sure.”

  Tango released a breath he didn’t know he’d been holding.

  “You have anything for us to go on?”

  “No, just a last name. Byron.”

  Walsh nodded; he looked like his mind was made up, and when that happened, he wasn’t usually dissuaded. “That’s enough.”

  “Thanks,” Tango said, and felt a surge of lightness in his chest. It was a start. It wasn’t much, but God, it was a start, and that was more than he’d had in a long time.

  ~*~

  Ian’s favorite restaurant in the city was a tiny wedge of space snugged in behind a larger, flashier steakhouse. He took people he wanted to rattle into the steakhouse. He’d only ever gone into the nameless, impossibly chic little restaurant in back by himself. Well, and with Bruce, because he was always lingering in the shadows with his gun and his ham fists.

  The place had no name that he’d ever seen – not above the door, nor printed on the menus, the menus themselves changing between each visit. It was multi-national and gourmet, but all the ingredients that didn’t need to be imported were locally grown, organic, farm to table. The interior was simple, unadorned, but incredibly elegant in its clean lines and low lighting.

  They were shown to a table in the deep corner, where it was dark save the three flickering candles in glass lamps on the table, and the hidden can lights above that had filters that turned the floors and tabletops into galaxies of pinprick stars. The hostess was to be their waitress too, and she carried a bottle of wine as she escorted them to the table, uncorked it, and filled the two waiting glasses before melting into the dark and stars and leaving them to their menus.

  Alec glanced around in obvious wonderment. “Oh wow,” he breathed. “This place is…” His gaze came to Ian’s, glasses painted with tiny stars. “What’s it called?”

  “I don’t know, and I imagine that’s the point.” Ian had to smile, a soft brush of warmth teasing at his belly as he watched Alec examine his wineglass like it was magic.

  “Do you come here a lot?”

  “Only ever by myself,” Ian admitted, and was surprised when his voice caught, a betraying snag of emotion he would have rather kept hidden.

  Alec studied him a moment, the glamour effect of his glasses hiding his expression. Finally, he said, “So what do you recommend?” and lifted his menu.

  Ian let his eyes trail down the list of offerings, and realized he hadn’t thought about Kev all day.

  ~*~

  “You want to walk down and see the horses?” Kev asked when they were standing beside her car, the cold night tugging at their hair and jackets.

  Whitney’s heart gave a girlish flutter at the idea. She wasn’t convinced there had ever been a little girl in the world who hadn’t longed for a pony. But she said, “Would that be okay with Emmie, you think?”

  He snorted. “I’m pretty sure Camille was conceived in that barn. She won’t mind us just looking. And her working student lives up above. Becca. She hasn’t turned the lights out yet, so I say it’s fair game.”

  She blushed a little, thinking about Mercy and Ava entangled and pressed up against the front of a horse stall. “Conceived? Really?”r />
  “I think Becca kinda walked in on them.”

  “Oh God.” She laughed.

  “So yes?” He reached into his jacket pocket and came out with three carrots. “I have treats.”

  “Then yes.”

  She slipped her arm through his and together they walked down the gently sloping driveway, listening to the calls of whippoorwills and the bone-dry rattling of bare limbs overhead. Their breath misted, white clouds visible in the ambient light cast by the glowing barn windows.

  Whitney wrapped the moment up in silk and laid it in a special place in her memory, a little chest dedicated to perfect, peaceful, important moments.

  The double barn doors stood open a crack, warm champagne-colored light spilling between them, and Kev hooked a hand around the edge of one and pushed it wider. A horse whickered, welcoming treat-bearing visitors.

  “Wow,” Whitney said, not knowing how else to describe the long aisle stretched out before her. Rich, golden brown tongue-and-groove paneling. Black iron grillwork. Sleek, well-groomed heads of all colors bobbing over stall doors. She spotted several open-fronted, empty stalls with black mat floors and hose racks she thought must be for bathing. A partially-open door through which she could see saddles and riding paraphernalia. The aisle itself was brick, and as she started down it, footfalls ringing, she glanced up and spotted a chandelier housed in the cupola.

  “Okay,” she said. “The house was gorgeous, but I think the barn might be even nicer. Talk about luxury horse living.” She let out a low whistle, and several horses pricked their ears in interest. One, a shiny chestnut with a white face, bobbed his head, and she smiled.

  “It’s pretty unbelievable,” Kev agreed. He broke a carrot into pieces and handed them to her; they were cold and damp from the fridge, fresh-smelling. “Here, hold your hand like this.” He demonstrated with a carrot wedge balanced on a flat palm.

  “Horse Whisperer over here,” she said, smiling.

  He blushed. “No. Em just showed me once. I kinda…I like being here. It’s peaceful, with the animals…” He trailed off, high cheekbones going scarlet, staring down at his toes.

  “I get it,” Whitney said, touching his shoulder, drawing a smile out of him.

  The vulnerability in his eyes was almost too much to look at. Almost. She couldn’t have looked away if she wanted to.

  She hauled her gaze toward the row of stalls. “We don’t have enough for everyone,” she lamented, and approached the inquisitive chestnut, who’d stopped bobbing his head in favor of staring fixedly at the carrots in her hands, nostrils flared as he caught their scent.

  “Hiya, handsome,” she said as she approached, carrot held as demonstrated. “Well, I’m assuming you’re handsome and not pretty. I can’t see the hardware,” she said, snorting.

  His name plate, shiny brass, read Prince. “Okay, so handsome it is.”

  He took the treat off her palm with a quick movement, the brush of his whiskers and damp velvet of his lips a surprise. She laughed in quiet shock. “For some reason I didn’t think it would feel like that.”

  “Weird, huh?” Kev fed a carrot to the horse next to Prince, an obscenely large black one whose name plate read Apollo. “This is Emmie’s horse,” he explained. “She’s says he’s Widowmaker, but I haven’t seen it yet.”

  The horse nudged Kev’s empty hand, ears flicking back and forth, thick, muscled neck shining under the barn lights.

  “I wouldn’t want to,” Whitney said, shivering a little.

  They moved down the line, handing out all the carrots they’d brought, stroking chestnut, and bay, and black, and gray noses. By the time they were done, and wiping the dampness of horse slobber off their hands onto their jeans, Whitney swore she could feel that her blood pressure was lower. It put her in a warm, fuzzy headspace, where the truth didn’t seem so scary, and obstacles seemed surmountable. This, she realized, was why Emmie put up with the stall-mucking and the early mornings and the blazing afternoons on the arena sand. The way being around these animals made you feel like life was something you could take hold of by both hands, rather than a mere survival test.

  “You ready to head home?” Kev asked.

  “Yeah.”

  ~*~

  “Can I ask why?” Alec said, and his tone lacked all traces of accusation; he was only curious. He’d taken his glasses off and folded them away in his pocket, eyes pale and bright and a little unfocused, full of candlelight, lovely as the London summer sky Ian thought he’d forgotten how to miss.

  Ian didn’t need the question clarified. He sighed and pushed fingerling potatoes around his plate with his fork. They were drizzled in truffle butter and tasted like indulgence. His stomach cramped at the idea of another bite.

  “I decided, years ago, that I wanted to be a wealthy man. And I knew that wasn’t going to happen through normal channels.” He sighed again. “I also wanted to be a powerful man. And no one has more power over people than the provider of their favorite vices.”

  Alec speared a fry on his fork tines, but made no move to eat it. His gaze grew raw, almost wounded. “Why did you want it? Money and power?”

  Ian shrugged. “Every man wants it.”

  “But you’re not every man,” Alec returned, softly, dampening his lip with a slow swipe of his tongue that made Ian’s knees tremble beneath the table.

  “That’s what you think,” he tried to joke, but it fell flat.

  “What happened to you that made you so angry?”

  “Oh darling,” Ian said on a broken breath. “That’s not a story you tell the person you’re sleeping with.”

  ~*~

  Whitney’s fingers started to flicker against the steering wheel on the drive home: that familiar urge to pick up a paintbrush. The horses had inspired her in a visceral, artistic way, the kind of mania that hit hard and demanded she paint the moment she was within reach of her palette.

  “I need to paint,” she said as she climbed out of her car in the alley behind the bakery. “Like, right now.”

  “Is this an emergency?” Kev asked, and she saw the glint of his smile in the security light.

  “Absolutely!”

  He laughed and waved for her to lead the way up the iron staircase.

  Whitney went straight to her art supplies, stacked neatly on the bookshelf beneath the window, and Kev headed for the kitchen.

  “Nightcap?” he asked. And then, like he anticipated a protest, “Just a small one.”

  “Sure, why not.”

  Setting up her easel was a matter of a few brisk movements; a little push from the heel of her hand when one leg wanted to stick. She propped up a fresh canvas, no sketching, no planning, nothing, and slid her paint tubes from their case.

  Kev was setting a small glass of wine on the coffee table for her by the time she had her browns and whites and a deep coal black selected.

  “Thanks. I need to get–”

  A paper cup of clean water landed beside the wine, and she sent him a grateful smile.

  He smiled back. “Just don’t get the two mixed up.”

  “That would be bad.”

  He sat down beside her on the couch and settled in to watch her work. She was self-conscious about her work, and normally the close observation would have left her twitchy. But Kev didn’t feel like “observation.” If anything, his warm, steady presence beside her had a grounding effect; she tended to drift at times, while painting.

  The horse took shape in rough, bold strokes. She realized she couldn’t get the anatomy – all the delicate angles of legs, shoulders, and hindquarters – accurate, so she went for an intentionally unrealistic look. Thick layers of color, lots of shadow, shaggy green grass covering the hooves she couldn’t hope to capture.

  “Wow,” Kev said, and he sounded awed.

  She glanced at him over her shoulder, vision blurry-edged from staring at the paper. His expression hit her in a vulnerable place: the softness in his eyes, the warm half-smile lifting one corner of his mouth.r />
  “What?”

  “I wish you’d take classes or be part of an art show or something,” he said, tone wistful.

  Whitney laughed, but it stuck a little in her throat, caught on uncertainty. “Why do you wish that?”

  “Because you deserve some credit.”

  “I don’t do it for credit.”

  “What if you could do something artistic for a living?”

  “That’s a nice dream, but not the sort of thing that ever happens.”

  “Look at Ava,” he countered. “And Sam. Their art makes their living.”

  Whitney set her paintbrush down on the tray of her easel, careful not to smudge the tip against the paper. “You almost sound like you’re trying to talk me into something.”

  “Yeah. I think I am.” He pitched forward at the waist, elbows braced on his knees, gaze sparkling with some hopeful emotion she’d never seen in him before. “I’ve been thinking about some things. About me getting better. And I think I’ve been doing it all wrong.”

  “Okaaaaay.”

  “I’m fucked up. I get that. My brain broke a long time ago–”

  “Kev.”

  “–And it’s like I – we – have been trying to put it back together and fix it. Like all of a sudden I’m supposed to teach myself to not be depressed, and not want to shoot up, and to feel good about myself or something.”

  She couldn’t argue that they hadn’t been hoping for that, and hearing it put in blunt terms made her feel horrible and guilty. They were trying to fix him. Hearing him say it aloud made it seem more hopeless than ever. People weren’t cracked china; you couldn’t line up their pieces and adhere them with a little super glue.

  “Kev, nobody thinks you’re broken.”

  He gave her a look. “That’s sweet – you’re sweet – but don’t lie. You all think that.”

  She bit her lip, unable to argue.

  “So far,” he continued, “I’ve been shit at working on me. And I’m just a giant waste of space.”

  “Please don’t say that.”