by Kim Fielding
Instead of being dismissive, Parker took a few moments to honestly consider what Jeremy had said. It made sense, really. After all, Parker knew that however much Rhoda cared about him, she couldn’t make him get his life together. But it sure helped to know she was there—like a security blanket—while he was trying to figure things out. And Parker was willing to be that for Wes, if Wes would have him.
“I understand,” he said.
Jeremy gave him a long, thoughtful look and then nodded. “I think you do. But he’s not here today.”
Parker decided to air a thought that had been creeping around his brain. “I know Wes has faults. But is being unreliable one of them? Or lying?”
“Not that I’ve seen.”
“If he changed his mind about showing up, I think he’d say so. Maybe not very elegantly, ’cause he’s not great at expressing himself that way. But I don’t think he’d just ignore me.”
“Then why isn’t he here?”
“I don’t know.” Parker finally admitted what had been bothering him. “I’m worried about him.”
“Why?”
“He sent me this weird text last night.”
Parker showed Jeremy their conversation. Jeremy’s face settled into a concerned frown, and he asked, “You don’t think…. Was he trying to investigate Logan’s death on his own?”
That would be stupid. But why else would he ask about the tattoo? Because he wanted one from the same artist as Logan? That made zero sense.
“I don’t know.” Parker felt miserable.
“Let me talk to Nevin about this.”
“No. We talk to Nevin.”
They returned to the living room, where Drew and Karl strummed “Hey Jude” on their guitars while everyone sang along. The room was so crowded that a lot of people had to sit on the floor or lean up against walls, but the event was still beautiful enough to make Parker’s heart ache. He was immensely grateful to be a part of this. And God, he wished Wes could be a part too, even if they were just platonic. Wes deserved to belong to a family, and while Parker’s extended family might be weird, he wouldn’t trade it for any other.
Nevin and Colin stood with their arms around each other. Colin was clearly audible—he had a great voice and loved to sing—but Nevin appeared to be mouthing the words. Jeremy approached him and gestured at Parker and then the front door. Nevin’s cop sense must have kicked in—Parker saw the lines of his face harden—and he whispered in Colin’s ear. After Colin nodded, Nevin strode for the door with Jeremy and Parker close behind.
It was cold outside, but at least the small porch gave them protection from the rain. “What’s up?” Nevin asked. Parker loved how Nevin and Jeremy were willing to jump in whenever they were needed, even on a holiday.
Parker explained the situation as succinctly as possible. Nevin listened attentively without interrupting and then eyed Parker closely. “You care about Wanker?”
“I think I’m falling in love with him.”
“Well, fuck a duck.” He sounded only mildly annoyed.
“You’re not going to tell me I’m being stupid?”
“Of course you’re being stupid. Love is stupid. The heart is the dumbest fucking organ in the body—even the asshole’s twice as smart as the heart, and my dick’s a genius compared to this.” He thumped his chest. “But life requires more than just smarts, Smurf, and the heart’s also really fucking strong.”
“‘An Ode to Ardor,’ by Nevin Ng,” Jeremy said.
“Shut up, Germy. You’re an asshole. And hang on. I’m going to go get reamed out by Saito for calling her on a holiday.” He jogged down the sidewalk and to the corner, where his purple GTO was parked in front of a hydrant. It was possible he couldn’t find anyplace else to put his car, but Parker suspected Nevin enjoyed flouting parking regulations—especially since it annoyed Colin.
Parker and Jeremy watched the rain while they waited. “What do you think of Bob?” Parker asked, mainly to distract himself a little.
“Seems like a good guy. Did you arrange for him to be here?”
“I… enabled a little.”
Jeremy chuckled. “You’re a lot like your mother.”
“No, she’s always in control and on top of things. I’m a mess.”
“You’re really not.”
Parker tried to imagine what Rhoda would do if someone she cared about went missing, possibly while investigating a suspicious death. She’d probably have SWAT teams and the FBI deployed immediately, and she’d be there, hovering overhead in a helicopter and shouting commands through a bullhorn. But not Parker. He’d dithered all through dinner and then still wouldn’t have said anything if Jeremy hadn’t cornered him. And even then, what did he do? Bleat helplessly and then stand by while Jeremy and Nevin took care of things.
Speaking of Nevin, he was jogging up to the porch, his face set in a deep scowl. “Mother Mary’s tits. Detective Head-Up-Her-Ass is pissed,” he announced when he arrived. He assumed a screechy falsetto more reminiscent of the Wicked Witch of the West than Detective Saito. “‘What was he doing there? Why the fuck was he poking around my case?’ I told her nobody would need to be poking around if she actually took care of her case.”
Parker shook with anxiety. “What is she—”
“She’s sending the goon squad to check the tattoo parlor. She’ll call me when she hears from them.”
Okay. A few deep yoga breaths. Something was being done.
Nevin continued, “How about if we go inside and pour you a few shots of whatever’s strongest? Vodka with a vodka chaser.”
“No.” Parker wasn’t much of a drinker, and he doubted even an entire bottle would make him feel better.
Jeremy put an arm around Parker’s shoulders. “At least go inside. It’s cold out here.”
But Parker didn’t feel the chill. He was numb, in fact, except for the shards of glass churning in his stomach. Nevertheless, he allowed himself to be steered indoors.
Rhoda was right there to intercept them. “What’s wrong?”
But when Parker shot Nevin a desperate look, Nevin gently moved her out of the way. “Boy shit. We got it.” Then he took the lead, Jeremy stepped in behind Parker, and they headed for Parker’s room. Parker felt a little as if he were being guarded by the Secret Service, which would have been funny if he wasn’t ready to puke with worry.
Inside the bedroom, Nevin motioned him to sit on the bed, then perched next to him while Jeremy stood guard at the closed door. “What do you suppose Mom thinks we’re up to?” Parker said.
“Boy shit.”
“Yeah, but what is boy shit?”
Nevin cocked an eyebrow. “Hard-on. King-Kong, pants-tenting, effects-lasting-more-than-four-hours, save-us-Superman hard-on. You needed to be shielded from innocent people’s eyes until the horror abated.”
Parker nodded sagely. “Savagely ingrown whiskers.”
“An attack of latent heterosexuality. We’re stopping you from going to Hooters because you have the sudden urge to eat deep-fried foods and ogle underpaid, underdressed waitresses.”
They continued on like that for a few minutes. It was stupid and they all knew it, but better to be inane than to make himself sick wondering what was going on with Wes. Just as Parker was ready to try Nevin’s vodka suggestion on the grounds that it couldn’t hurt, Nevin’s phone rang.
“Yeah?” Nevin listened for a moment, blank-faced, then looked at Parker. “What does Wanker drive?”
“Morrison.” Ooh, smooth answer, Levin! Parker shook his head to clear it. “A white van.”
“Oregon plates?”
“Um, yeah.”
Nevin’s mouth thinned to an unhappy line. “Yeah,” he said into the phone. He listened again, then looked at Parker. “Try texting him again.”
Parker’s thumbs flew across the screen. Are you there? I’m worried. No obligation—just tell me you’re okay.
The text bubble sat there with no response. He sent another. Kinda freaking out here. Pl
ease just answer. Nothing. Oh God. His heart felt like it might beat right out of his chest, but he tried again. And again. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fine, he’d try calling instead. The call went straight to voicemail.
Parker looked helplessly at Nevin, who said something to Saito that Parker couldn’t hear over the rushing in his ears. Nervelessly he dropped the phone onto the mattress as his vision blurred. He might have fainted if Jeremy hadn’t lunged over to kneel in front of him.
“Breathe, Parker.” Jeremy settled his heavy hands on Parker’s shoulders, grounding Parker and making the buzz in his head clear a bit. “Breathe.”
Bad air out, good air in. Out. In. Out. In. Nice and simple, and he concentrated on that.
Nevin poked irritably at his phone before tucking it into his jacket pocket. When he gazed at Parker, he radiated calmness and control, and his voice was even. “Shop’s closed. No sign of anyone there. There’s a residence upstairs, but nobody’s answering the door. Saito’s going to talk to her sergeant and see if she can get a warrant.”
“Warrant?” Parker moaned. “Doesn’t that need judges and courtrooms and—”
“No. She can get a phone warrant, and that’s quick. But she has to have probable cause, and that’s iffy with what we’ve got. So she’s going to talk to her sergeant and see if they can make a persuasive enough case.”
“They should just go in! Wes might be—” Parker swallowed, unable to voice any of the things Wes might be.
“Or he might be taking a walk after letting his phone battery go dead. I know being patient sucks balls, Smurf, but give the system the time it needs.”
“I can’t.”
“You can,” Jeremy said. “We’re here with you. Let’s just sit tight.”
So Parker sat tight.
Chapter Sixteen
WES WAS in his grandfather’s basement. He recognized the familiar odors of damp concrete and wood and heard the familiar woosh-roar of the furnace, but he couldn’t remember why he’d come down here. Was he supposed to bring up a tool? And… he was on the floor. The cold, hard floor. What the hell was he doing there? Groggy, he tried to get up.
He couldn’t move. He thrashed in panic as he tried to free his hands and feet, but he couldn’t untangle them, and he couldn’t see, and he couldn’t breathe, and oh God was he buried alive had a tree fallen on him was he dead and—
He quelled the urge to vomit, which ironically cleared his head slightly. He fought not to choke on his bile, since something blocked his mouth. And Jesus Christ, his head hurt.
With all the will he could muster, he made his body go limp, slowed his breathing, and got his bearings. He was… tied. Hogtied, actually, and the bindings dug deeply into his skin. He was gagged with a thick cloth, which he couldn’t push out. That made sense when he felt tape—duct tape, probably—across his cheeks and pulling his hair.
Okay. Bound and gagged. Was he blindfolded too? Evidently not. As he turned his head, he could make out a faint light leaking around the edges of what might be a small covered window near the ceiling. So he was in a very dark room. In a basement. But not his grandfather’s basement, obviously. His grandfather had been dead for years. Besides, his grandfather’s basement was in southern Oregon, and Wes was… in Seattle. At the tattoo parlor.
Fuck.
He had received first-aid training at the academy, and his brain was at least clear enough to recognize its own injury. Concussion. That explained the loss of consciousness, the confusion, the headache, and the goddamn nausea—which he’d continue to fight because vomiting with a gag in his mouth would probably kill him, and that wasn’t the way he wanted to go. Hell, he didn’t want to go at all.
He ran through the other concussion symptoms—dizziness, blurred vision, slurred speech, noise and light sensitivity—but in his trussed condition, he couldn’t assess whether he was experiencing any of them. Not that an accurate diagnosis was necessarily his biggest priority right now.
With more deliberate movements than before, he tried to loosen his bonds, which felt like nylon rope. But they wouldn’t budge. He owned a dozen or more tools that could cut that rope easily, but those tools were over four hundred miles away. Hell, even if they were four feet away, they’d be useless without the use of his hands, and fantasizing about them wasn’t doing him any good.
Few other options remained. Thanks to the gag, he could make only muffled moans. Even he could barely hear them over the rattle of the furnace. He could sort of squirm a little on his side, but it didn’t get him anywhere and made his stomach heave, so he stopped. Fine. He would wait. But for what? For Cavelli to come and finish him off?
It was a small solace to know that Cavelli apparently didn’t want him dead, at least for now. After all, if homicide were the primary goal, Cavelli could have slit Wes’s throat while he was unconscious. Instead he’d tied him up and, judging from the bruised feeling along Wes’s back, dragged him down the stairs. Wes didn’t want to speculate on why he was still alive, but as long as he was breathing, there was hope of escape.
And hope of seeing Parker again. Jesus, Parker, whom he’d promised to see for Thanksgiving dinner. Wes found himself yearning for him with an intensity so sharp it made his headache feel like nothing in comparison. If Wes got another chance with Parker, he’d seize it. If there was a Future Wes, he belonged with Parker, wherever and however Parker would allow him into his life. Wes would hang on to him until Parker was ready for him to go—and whether that was in a day, a week, or a month, every minute would be treasured. Just the tickle of Parker’s technicolor hair, the dancing joy in his eyes, the ring of his laughter. His scrutiny, so sharp, so present, and the way he jumped into things without looking twice, like a kid leaping into a swimming hole in August. The taste of his soft lips….
Okay. This wasn’t getting him anywhere, although it was better than panic and much better than worrying about what was going to happen next.
Hey, cheer up, he told himself. At least you’ve apparently solved the mystery of Logan’s death. Now if only he could get a chance to tell Parker.
HE SLEPT for a while, although he’d heard you were supposed to stay awake with a concussion. But he was so tired, and his skull felt like someone was jackhammering it from the inside, and there was really nothing else for him to do. So he dozed on and off, slipping in and out of fitful dreams about his childhood. And then the lights went on, spearing his eyes with bolts of agony.
Yes to the light sensitivity, then.
Two sets of feet thudded down wooden stairs behind him. Wes couldn’t turn to face them, which was especially unnerving, but they obligingly tromped around until they were in his line of vision.
One of them, not surprisingly, was Leo Cavelli. The other, with fewer tattoos, looked older and resembled Leo closely enough that they had to be brothers. Both frowned down at him.
“Motherfucker,” said Leo, giving a hefty kick to Wes’s unprotected stomach. Wes shouted into the gag and spent another several minutes fighting the urge to barf. By the time he was in control of himself again, the brothers were deep in conversation.
“I don’t know who sent him,” Leo whined. “He didn’t say.”
“Well, who the fuck is he, Leo?”
“I dunno. Some dude from Buttfuck, Oregon. He had his license on him, one credit card, and a few hundred bucks. That’s it.”
“No keys?”
“Nah.”
“Then how the fuck did he get here?”
Wes wouldn’t have volunteered the information even if he hadn’t been gagged, but his keys were tucked in a small metal box hidden under Morrison’s chassis. Wes had welded the box there himself a couple of years ago, after an unfortunate incident in which he lost his keys in a Portland club—probably while fucking a guy in a bathroom stall. That had been a major pain in the ass, and ever since, Wes preferred to stow the keys when he was on errands of a dubious nature. Like tracking down killers.
“What about his phone?” the older Cavelli demanded.
>
“I can’t unlock it.”
“You’re totally worthless, you know that?”
“Shut up, Curtis.”
Even if the Cavellis weren’t responsible for kidnapping him and, most likely, killing Logan, Wes would have disliked them immensely. They were assholes.
The Cavellis returned to bickering about who Wes was, why Leo had been stupid enough to attack him, and what they should do about him. Although all of this was directly relevant to Wes, his attention wandered. It was weird, but fear wasn’t the most prominent emotion roiling through him. Regret had that honor. And not even regret about the stupid-ass things he’d done, such as prancing into the clutches of a murderer. Wes regretted what he hadn’t done. He hadn’t had sex with Parker earlier. He hadn’t spent every minute of his life with Parker since they’d met. He hadn’t told Parker how amazing he was and how much he meant to him. He hadn’t allowed himself to fall in love.
God, he hoped Parker didn’t blame himself for Wes’s fate the way he felt responsible for Logan’s death.
Apparently having reached some decision, the Cavellis turned their attention back to Wes. Curtis kicked him—in exactly the spot where Leo had—and it hurt. But at this point all of Wes hurt: bruised stomach and back, bound ankles and wrists, cramped limbs, light-sensitive eyes, stretched mouth, and of course his battered skull. Hell, even his bladder ached; he had to piss pretty desperately. But his heart ached worst of all.
Curtis reached to his lower back and pulled out a handgun, which he pointed at Wes’s head. His hand was distressingly steady. “We’re gonna take away the gag so we can have a little powwow. If you shout or scream, I pull the trigger. Got it?”
After Wes nodded, Leo bent over him and ripped away the duct tape. It hurt, of course, but it was a relief when Leo pulled the cloth out of his mouth. Wes tried to gather enough saliva to spit away the taste of cotton.
