by Rhys Ford
“You taste good,” he murmured softly. My hand rested on his thigh, and he played with my fingers, drawing on my palm. Relaxed and warm, he sighed and said, “You make me feel safe.”
“I’d do anything to make you feel safe, babe,” I replied. “You know that.”
“Now,” Jae whispered. “I know that now. I like feeling… safe. Like I can fall, and you’ll… be there. Even if you don’t catch me, you’ll be there to help me get back up.”
“Do you mind if I try to catch you?” I cocked an eyebrow at him. “I’ve fallen from some pretty high fucking places. It really hurts.”
“No, I don’t mind,” he sighed again. “But, sometimes Cole-ah, I will fall, and you won’t be able to catch me. It’s just something I’ll have to do by myself, but it will be okay if you help pick me up. I don’t mind falling. I just… don’t want to open my eyes and find I’m alone.”
I pulled my fingers from his and cupped his chin, forcing him to look at me. “I will always be there to pick you up, Kim Jae-Min. Whether you want me to catch you or not, I’ll be there to kiss and make it better. Okay?”
“Okay,” Jae nodded, solemn, and quiet. There were so many words left unspoken between us, and they hung there, heavy and silent, like teardrops needing to be kissed away. He murmured something, but I didn’t catch it.
Frowning, I kissed his full mouth. “What did you say?”
“Kamsamida.” He looked away, ducking his head so I couldn’t see his face. “Saranghae.”
I grumbled and drew him closer, wrapping my arms tight around his waist. “I am really going to have to learn Korean.”
“Not yet, agi,” Jae teased. “Not until I’m ready to have you hear what I say.”
“God, you drive me fucking nuts.” I shook him lightly, enough to make him laugh. My cell phone started crooning something about bad boys. I frowned at Jae. “Did you change my ringtone?”
“I thought it matched you,” he admitted, reaching for the phone and handing it to me.
“We were having a moment there,” I grumbled as he slid off me. Grabbing his pants, he tugged them on and padded off to the kitchen. I watched his ass, then slid my phone on to answer it. “Hello?”
“Cole-sshi?” The man on the phone was either drunk or having a stroke. From the sounds of conversation and clinking glass coming from the speaker, I was betting on drunk. “It’s David Park.”
“Hi,” I replied, frowning when I looked at the clock. It was way too early to be drunk dialing someone. “What’s up? Where are you?”
“At a place,” he mumbled something else, but it was in Korean and I was lost.
“Hold on.” I stood up and went into the kitchen. Holding the phone out to Jae, I said, “It’s David. He’s fucked up, and I can’t understand what he’s saying.”
Jae listened to David for a few moments, then cradled the phone against his shoulder so he could turn off the oven. He nodded and said de a few times, agreeing with whatever David was selling him. After a minute, he said something firmly and turned the phone off, then rubbed at his face.
“What?” I asked, taking the phone from him. “What’s going on? Why’s he drunk? It’s not even eight o’clock. I thought you guys were supposed to be hardcore drinkers.”
“You guys meaning Koreans? Even we have our limits.” He snorted and slapped my arm. “We should go get him. He’s down at a club on Wilshire.”
“Tell me he didn’t drive.” My stomach growled, but I ignored it.
“I don’t know,” Jae said, grabbing his keys. “But I told him to wait. Come on, before he changes his mind.”
I closed the door behind me, then realized I was barefoot. The cement was rough on the bottom of my feet, and I grabbed Jae’s keys so I could get a pair of Vans from the foyer. Slipping them on, I commandeered his Explorer. “You tell me where to go. I’ll drive, and you can get him into the car.”
“Okay,” Jae said, sliding into the passenger seat.
“Did he tell you why he’s sloshed off his ass?” I asked, backing the SUV out.
“Yeah, tomorrow’s Helena’s service. Kwon told him he’s not welcome.” Jae shrugged when I shot him an incredulous look. “It’s complicated. The family blames the Seongs.”
“Okay, I can see that,” I said, coming to a stop sign. “So how come he called me instead of having someone from his family pick him up?”
“Because someone snuck into Shin-Cho’s hospital room and tried to shoot him again,” Jae replied calmly, as if it were as common as finding a penny on the street. Giving it a moment’s thought, I had to give him that it was getting way too familiar an event in our lives, something that had to be rectified as soon as possible. “They chased the guy, but he got away.”
“Did anyone see who it was?” I asked. “Wait, let me guess: some Asian guy with black hair.”
“Doesn’t matter,” Jae replied, running his hand over my thigh. “They found a Korean man in a rental car about three blocks away. He was shot in the head. David says they think it’s Choi Yong-Kun.”
“So it’s over, then?” I almost sighed in relief. “Fuck me.”
“It might be, but I don’t know,” Jae said grimly. “Unless Choi Yong-Kun somehow could shoot himself in the back of the head, then I’d say no.”
Chapter Nineteen
IT LOOKED like every cop in Greater Los Angeles showed up for free donuts and coffee at a strip club and got the address wrong. Throw in some dance kids, some blinking LED pacifiers, and someone scratching some beats, and it would be a full-blown rave.
Seong Ryeowon, however, didn’t look like she was in much of a mood for a party.
We’d hunted David down at the bar. It cost me a bit to get him liberated since he ran a tab, and the large Korean man at the door had explicit instructions not to let him wander off without paying up. I forked over my card and made them give me a receipt. After a few seconds of glaring at me, he shambled off and came back with a strip of paper written in hangul and a total that would have paid my electric bill for a few months.
It took me nearly twenty minutes to get David down from the fourth-floor club and into the car. Pouring him into the back seat, Jae strapped him down with both belts, hoping to keep him from sliding around in the SUV, then we drove to the house Seong Ryeowon rented.
The same house where we found the outdoor rave being thrown by the men and women of the Los Angeles Police Department.
Scarlet spotted us first and hurried over to where we parked. With the cops blocking off the cul-de-sac, I had to find a space a few hundred yards away, and by the time I got the back door open, Scarlet was by the car.
She was dressed the most masculine I’d ever seen her in Converse sneakers, a white T, and jeans. Her face was bare of makeup, and her long black hair was pulled back at the nape of her neck. She looked young, an androgynous man who made heads turn in both admiration and confusion.
The kind of guy who’d get his face kicked in if he was in the wrong neighborhood.
“Hello, musang.” She kissed Jae’s cheek and slid her arm around my waist. “I’m glad you’re both here…. Is that David? Oh God, it’s David! We thought he was missing. Is he okay? What happened?”
“Yeah, no. Not missing. Just really fricking drunk.” I’d gotten the belts off him, and had my hands around his upper thighs to yank him toward me. “Stand back. I think he drank his bones loose. He’s kind of liquid.”
David proved he had more liquid in him than his bones. I’d almost gotten him clear of Jae’s car when he sat up and horfed all over my back. The hot, steaming fluid coursed down my spine and right into the gap between my waist and my jeans. It hit me, the side of the car, some of the seat, and the back seat floor mats. Its reek, however, was as pervasive as a London fog.
Two things happened simultaneously. I screamed blue bloody murder and let loose every fucking swear word I’d ever heard in my lifetime. The second, and more potentially dangerous thing, was my bellowing got the attention of the armed police
officers barricading the house.
About half of the horde broke off and headed toward Jae’s car, weapons drawn and shouting for us to drop to the ground. Jae backed away from the car, and Scarlet held her hands up, alarmed at the amount of guns pointing her way. David chose to ignore my shouting, the cops, and the guns, and instead, decided to hose down the front of my jeans before I could get clear of the splash zone.
“Oh, fuck you, you fucking son of a bitch.” I was grabbed from behind and yanked hard. The cop holding me caught one whiff of what I was covered in and gulped, twisting quickly to get away from me. I had a stronger stomach than he did, but he threw me off balance, and I stumbled back. Nearly sliding off the curb, I got clear of the SUV and shook off what I could from my jeans, breathing through my mouth to avoid the fumes.
Most of what David threw up was booze, if not all of it. Judging from the amount he came up with, I’d say the bar pretty much earned what they’d charged him. If someone came near me with a match, I’d probably burst into flames.
I put my hands up, but the cops were much less interested in me now. Scarlet took over, sliding around me in as wide a circle so she could to talk to one of the older policemen. The one who’d grabbed me let Jae and I put our hands down, and grunted either an apology or an order for me to go bathe. I’d have liked the first one, but wouldn’t have said no to a bath.
“Let’s see if we can get the boy into the house,” I muttered, making my second attempt at corralling David. Hooked over my shoulder, he started waving his hand around, and jabbered to everyone around us in Korean. Jae took one look at the inside of his car and sighed heavily, shutting the door on the mess.
“Give me the keys.” Jae held out his hand. “I have a gym bag in the back. There’s a pair of sweats you can wear. Maybe a T-shirt.”
“I’d kiss you, but….” I shrugged as best I could with over a hundred and fifty pounds of drunken David over my shoulders. “Actually, the keys are in my pocket. Can you grab them?”
He gave me a skeptical look. I returned it with a wide-eyed innocent one.
“I can’t reach.” I jiggled David a bit. “You’re going to have to grab them.”
“Pfah,” Jae grumbled, and turned his head to avoid getting close to me.
“Oh, so it’s not that you don’t want to feel me up? It’s that you don’t want to smell me?” His fingers dug into my front pocket and snagged the ring on his keys. He shook himself when he got clear of me. I’d have taken offense, but at that point, I wanted to be as far from me as possible.
“Cole, come.” Scarlet hurried me along. “Let’s get him in the house.”
A portion of the lawn was cordoned off, and I had to make a wide circle to get to the front door. Something dark was on the lawn, but I didn’t stop to take a look. I should have foisted David on one of the many black-suited guys standing near the house, but I was already soaked to the skin in soju and whiskey, so it made little sense to share the misery. Nearby, someone must have had an out of control fireplace flue, because a faint trail of smoke lingered around us, and closer to the house, there was an odd scent to the air, a sour, burnt chemical flavor that stuck to my tongue. I wasn’t sure what was worse: the evening air or David.
A soft-voiced woman greeted me at the door, giving me a deep bow as she asked me to enter. I took a second to kick my Vans off, juggling David as best I could. He moaned and made an urping sound, threatening to douse me again.
“I swear to God, you hairball on me again,” I growled. “I’ll drop you. Right here. Right now.”
I dumped David onto a bed the staff led me to, and asked the officious woman if there was somewhere I could shower and change. Ten minutes later, I emerged from the hot water smelling of citrus soap with a faint undertone of booze. Jae was waiting for me in the guest bedroom where they’d stashed me, perched on a wide, comfortable looking chair. I’d put on the sweat pants and shirt Jae had on him. The pants were a bit short, and the thin cotton T-shirt was ridiculously tight across my chest and back. I felt like I was a twink trolling for a good time. My own clothes were nowhere to be seen.
“Where’s my stuff?” I looked around, and he handed me a pair of fluffy house slippers. “What’s this?”
“Put them on. It’s considered polite to provide guests with footwear for the house. And your stuff’s in the wash.” Jae sniffed at me experimentally. “You still smell a bit… alcoholy… but not a lot.”
“Yeah, I smell like a Harvey Wallbanger.”
“That sounds… dirty.” Jae eyed me. “Did you make that up? What is that?”
“It’s a drink. Do enough of them, and you’ll be banging the walls, trying to walk,” I replied, sliding my feet into the slippers. They strained to accommodate my feet, but surrendered admirably. My heels stuck out over the end of them. “If I trip in these, don’t try to catch me. Save yourself.”
“Are you done?” He shook his head and headed to the door. “One of the detectives wants to talk to us about David.”
The detective in question was Wong, whom I’d already spoken to. He was a pleasant-faced Chinese man who looked like he could break a tree in half with his bare hands. This theory was confirmed when we shook hands, and I was left with the feeling he was being careful with my wee, delicate little body. Like my brother, his barber set the haircut razor for Hedgehog #4. Unlike Mike, he was quite concerned about my adventures in carrying David back to his lair.
“Please, sit down,” Wong said, gesturing to one of the many chairs in the long formal parlor. “I feel like I’m going to break someone or something if I move around too much.”
There was a coffee set on the heavily carved wooden table set up near a pair of French looking davenports. A silver urn steamed a fragrant promise of nicely roasted and brewed beans, while a tempting array of dainty cakes glistened on a plate nearby.
Poking at one of the frothy concoctions with a fork, I asked, “If I eat one of these, I won’t suddenly shoot up into the chimney, and have to kick a lizard named Bill to get out of here, right?”
“Please excuse Cole. He’s missed dinner. It makes him cranky.” Jae gave Wong a look that would have done a basset hound proud, and sat down. He poured a cup of coffee for himself and lifted the urn slightly toward Wong. “Coffee?”
“Please,” he smiled. “Thanks.”
I didn’t like his smile.
To be fair, I’d had great sex with my lover, then gone to rescue the Seong Prince errant only to have him chuck up his drinking binge down my boxers, and now a Chinese guy with a wedding ring was smiling at my boyfriend. And yes, I’d missed dinner. That tended to make me cranky, but I was mollified when Jae passed the full coffee cup over to me, then poured himself and Wong one.
I was easily mollified. Jae’s wicked side smirk at me didn’t hurt.
“What was all the police action for? David wasn’t gone twenty-four hours yet.” I picked at a piece of cake. It was green and had some sort of nut shaving on top. I waited until Wong was taking a sip of his coffee before I pecked at a bit of it and put it on my tongue. It was not too sweet, and kind of creamy.
I had no fucking clue what flavor it was supposed to be. So I handed it to Jae and went for something brown. In most worlds, brown meant chocolate. Maybe coffee. So my odds were good it was something I’d recognize.
“Mrs. Seong informed me you know about her son’s relationship with a South Korean officer named Choi.” Wong flipped through his notepad.
“Choi Yong-Kun,” I confirmed. “David told Jae-Min… that’s a lot of hearsay. He should probably tell you himself.”
“Why don’t you both start with where you were from about three this afternoon to when you arrived here at eight?” Wong suggested.
“Um, we were at the office running down some contacts,” I started, tracing our movements from the florist to the hospital and then back home. Jae frowned a little when I said we were hanging out while he was making dinner, but I kept it clean enough for Wong’s purposes.
&nbs
p; “That’s when Park called you?” he asked. “You, specifically, Mr. McGinnis?”
“Yeah,” I replied. “But he sounded drunk, and I don’t speak Korean, so I handed the phone to Jae.”
Jae relayed what David told him over the phone about being forbidden to attend his fiancée’s funeral service, and then the discovery of Choi’s body. Jae looked perplexed. “He seemed to think that everything was over now, but it didn’t make sense, because from what David-sshi told me, it sounded like Choi Yoon-Kun was murdered.”
“He was,” Wong confirmed. “A patrolman was alerted to the presence of Choi’s body and immediately shut down the area where his car was found. I don’t have anyone able to place David Park in the area, but four hours ago, his family contacted us with concerns about his safety following a conversation he had with a Mr. Sang-Min Kwon, his fiancée’s father.”
“Yeah, I know Kwon.” I rumbled. “Kind of an asshole.”
“Unfortunately, that isn’t enough of a reason to kill someone these days.” Wong clucked in concern as I choked on the piece of cake in my mouth.
“What about Kwon?” Jae sat forward, cocking his head at Wong. “What happened to Kwon?”
“Around two hours ago, Sang-Min Kwon was found staked to the front lawn of this residence. At the time of discovery, he was still mostly engulfed in flames, most likely fueled by an accelerant of some sort. So I’m going to have to ask both of you, where were you two hours ago, and can you help confirm David Park’s whereabouts for that time? Or are we going to all be taking a trip down to the station?”
“FUCK me,” I whispered under my breath, and Jae sighed, resigned to my coarse, uncouth ways. He pursed his lips when I looked his way. “What?”
“I forgot to feed the cat,” Jae grumbled at me. “And it’s stupid that I’m worried about that right now.”
“It’s not stupid,” I argued. “The cat’s evil. She could be having Thai food delivered right now and charging it to my card. Kwon’s dead, and so is Choi. Who the hell are we going to blame this crap on now?”
