by Rhys Ford
“Fuck, you’re pathetic, McGinnis,” I scolded myself. After turning off the lights, I’d just lain down when my phone chirped at me from the nightstand. The screen flashed, staying bright long enough for me to grab it.
It was a small text, nine letters sent through wires and dusty air, but they grabbed my heart and shot waves of lightning through its dead flesh. After pressing the phone to my lips, I returned Jae’s text, bouncing his word back to him. The knot in my chest unraveled when I inhaled deeply, and for the first time in almost a week, unfettered air struck my lungs.
“Saranghae too, baby,” I murmured into the air, hoping the stars would pick it up and wrap him tight until I could hold him again. Cradling my phone, I fell asleep, letting Jae’s cat and pixilated affection keep my nightmares at bay.
Chapter 9
I DANCED back, shuffling my feet and ducking my shoulder. It’d been too long since I’d been in the ring, and my gloves seemed heavier than I remembered. The smell of my padded helmet at least was familiar, dried sweat and rank desperation creeping past my nostril hairs. The cheek protection on my helmet made it hard to see, but Bobby insisted I buy a full mask, saying he didn’t want to mess up my pretty face.
Personally, I think he was taking advantage of my diminished line of sight and blasting the side of my head with his fists. He denied it. The ringing in my ears, however, gave me all the evidence I’d ever want.
I got a jab in, one strong enough to rock Bobby’s head back. It probably was a mistake. Taking the shot. Not that the shot was a fluke. I could box. I could hit hard. I knew how to put my weight against the punch and follow through. God knows, I pounded the shit out of Mike growing up and then moved on to bigger, stronger guys in high school who decided the McGinnis boys needed a beating.
No, taking a shot at Bobby’s head was a mistake because it told him all bets were off and I was willing to go a few hard rounds.
I didn’t know if my healing body could take it, but I wasn’t going to have much of a choice. He narrowed his eyes and he curled his shoulders in, hunting me across the mat with a predatory stalk.
Yep, definitely a mistake.
JoJo’s was normally a loud, raucous place. Men shouting and grunting as they worked through their routines of bag work or sparring. The few women who made it past the door and into the stink were hard-eyed and lean-bodied, serious athletes who came to the boxing gym to learn the sport or to hone their muscles. Most of the men were gay and blue-collar. It wasn’t a place for twinks or ass-wiggling flirtations. You walked through JoJo’s doors ready and willing to get pounded on or pound the crap out of your body.
From the look in Bobby’s eyes, I was seriously considering going to join the twink spinning class down the street if it would keep me safe from his gloved fists.
Oh, he hit me, but not with his hands. “So, that stupid grin on your face because of your boy, or did you finally see some sense and get a new piece of ass?”
Luckily, I could still see through the wash of red across my eyes to find Bobby’s face with my fists. The smack-smack of my gloves hitting his padded head only went so far. I needed to feel him stepping back, giving way under my blows. Unfortunately, Bobby retreating back across the ring wasn’t the only thing that gave way. A twinge in my shoulder burst into a larger, spreading fire, sparking a panic in my nerves. My upper arm muscle gave out first, then the ball joint, my movement scraping down to a slow crawl. Clutching my arm to my side, I didn’t see Bobby’s roundhouse until it was too late.
Then all I saw was the caged wire overhead lights hanging down from JoJo’s camo-gray high ceiling.
Oh, and birdies. Small blue birdies. Roger Rabbit had nothing on me.
“Shit, kid!” Bobby’s face swam into view, a wavering mash-up of eyes and a nose with a mouth slanting upward toward his right ear. “I thought you were dodging down.”
“Can’t,” I mumbled through the birds. “Arm gave out. Fucker, you hit me blind.”
“Yeah, well, we’re even. You were beating the crap out of me.”
“Step back, you damned gorilla,” JoJo grumbled from behind Bobby, shoving him aside. His sun-wrinkled face was a blur of burnt umber and yellow teeth. He hadn’t shaved that morning, so a thin mat of gray and black whiskers covered his loose jowls. “Didn’t you see the boy was favoring that arm, Dawson? What’s wrong with you?”
Bobby rumbled back at JoJo but cleared a space for the old man to get in. “JoJo, did you miss the part where I was the rug and he was beating the sand out of me?”
“I’m good.” I tried sitting up, but the gym swirled a little bit. Bobby slid his arm under me and hoisted me to my feet.
“Let’s go get you checked out. I probably gave you a damned concussion.” Bobby sounded worried. It was hard to see his face because everything was skewed and a bit dark. Blinking, I tried to clear away a fuzzy line across my right eye, focusing on the black ant trails it made.
“Shit, dude.” I dug my heels in. “You knocked my fucking helmet sideways. I can’t see a damned thing. I’m fine. Just need to shake it off.”
“Go on! Get back to what you were doing,” JoJo grumbled at the boxers crowding around the gym. “Dawson, get your boy off the mat and watch his head.” JoJo’s palm was bright pink, his leathery skin stretched tight over his bony upright fingers. He took my helmet off, and I breathed a sigh of relief, sucking in air. “How many am I holding up, McGinnis?”
“Two,” I answered. He gave me one of his patented shar-pei frowns but let Bobby hoist me under the ropes.
“Get him into the showers. If he starts tossing his cookies, you get him to the ER,” JoJo muttered at Bobby’s back. “Fucking asshole. Next time you don’t watch where you’re hitting him, I’m going to give you an ass kicking myself.”
“I think you pissed him off.” I was speaking to Bobby’s armpit. Straightening made my head spin a bit, but it was better than before, and I was no longer whiffing my best friend’s sweaty hair clumps. “Pissed me off too.”
“Yeah, I thought I’d see if I could get you mad. Shake things up a bit.”
As apologies went, I’d had better blow jobs from the air dryers at a bus station, and those only ruffled the hair on my crotch.
“Yeah, I don’t need things shaken up,” I replied sarcastically. “Least of all my fucking brains.”
“Said I was sorry, Princess.”
By the time we got to the showers, I was feeling better and my legs were responding on their own. I detached from Bobby’s grip, stripped, and headed in to let the shower work my muscles loose. My arm stopped tingling, and, slowly, my shoulder responded. I’d strained it too much, and in a couple of hours, I was going to be purple and black from the bruising I’d given myself. Bobby joined me, taking up the next stall, eyeing me every once in a while to make sure I was steady.
“He texted me last night,” I said over the pounding water. “Told me he loved me. In Korean, but fuck it, I’ll take what I can get.”
“Good,” Bobby grunted. “You guys are good together. At least he makes sure you eat your vegetables.”
“Dude, I am a vegetable.” Laughing, I dried off and headed to my locker. Sitting down on the bench between the locker rows, my fatigue hit, and I sagged, letting my muscles begin their complaining.
“You okay?” Bobby touched my shoulder. “Really, if you’re feeling it, I’m taking you in, Cole.”
“No, I’m fine.” Scrubbing at my face with the towel, I soaked up the water dripping from my hair. “I sent him a saranghae back and went to bed.”
I left out the part about hugging the phone like it was my long-lost teddy bear, but there was only so much of my pride I was willing to swallow.
“Good.” Bobby grabbed me by the chin and stared down into my eyes. I tried getting loose, but it was useless. I didn’t know how he didn’t rip his dick off when he jacked off, because his damned grip was like hardened cement. “Pupils are normal. Okay, I feel better now.”
“I don’t.” I wo
rked my jaw around. “Shit, that hurt.”
“Poor baby,” he snorted, pulling on his boxers. “Get dressed so we can get out of here. I’ve got some stuff to tell you about that Lee murder.”
“You couldn’t have started the morning off with that?” I grumbled.
“Nah.” He slapped my ass, leaving it stinging. “Got to get you into shape. Once you and Jae get back together, you’re gonna need your strength for all that hot rock-star sex you’ll be having.”
MY EARS were still ringing a little bit when I unlocked the door to my front office. I’d arranged for Martin’s daughter, Sissy, to come in to answer the phones in the afternoon, promising her dad she’d do her homework while she worked while guaranteeing her she’d have access to a heavy-duty Wi-Fi. But Sissy’s arrival was a few hours off, and the office was cold and lacking the smell of brewing coffee.
I took care of that first, then handed Bobby a bunch of napkins. Undoing the bacon, egg, and cheese burrito I’d gotten from a drive-thru taco shop down the street, I poured a container of tomatillo sauce over the whole mess and wrapped the tortilla back up.
“Talk to me about Lee,” I said before Bobby could bite into his burrito.
He raised an eyebrow at me. “This can’t wait until after I eat? Not like she can get any deader.”
“Nope.” I selected an extra crispy french fry from the nacho cheese soup the server ladled over my papas order. “I paid for the food. You sing for it.”
“Okay, keep your panties on. I got some notes on my phone,” Bobby grumbled. He scrolled through a few screens until he found what he was looking for. “Here we go. Got in touch a few days ago with the deet who pulled Lee’s case. You were busy being emo, so I figured it could wait. It’s a guy by the name of Jenkins. Stan Jenkins.”
“Wait, why is that name familiar?” I playfully slapped Bobby’s fingers as he made a grab for my fries. “Fuck off. You can have what I don’t eat.”
He made a fist and shook it under my nose. “Fuck off yourself, Princess. Or I’ll tag you across the head again.”
I let him have the fry.
Chewing with his mouth open so I could see his prize, he continued to read, “The name’s familiar because it’s Stagnant Jenkins.”
“Fuck, he’s still around?”
“He’s only got a year left, and then he’s off to a duck blind in Wyoming. Or wherever it is that people go to shoot ducks out of the sky.” Bobby stole another fry, shaking the cheese off before he folded it into his mouth. “You might say he’s moving even slower on this one than he does his other cases.”
“Why the fuck do they still have him around?”
“Because he’s old and has shit on everyone wearing a gold badge since the Pony Express,” he shot back. “Now shut up and let me finish.”
“Sorry, Your Highness. Please, continue.”
“Anyway, Jenkins caught the case but hasn’t really done much with it. Wong contacted him a couple of days ago about a possible connection to Choi, so Stan’s been trying to shove Lee off on him.”
“Like Dexter needs another case.”
“What Chinese family names their kid Dexter?” Bobby looked up from his phone and caught my glare. “Okay, onward. Jenkins did learn a couple of things you might be interested in. Autopsy came back. Eun Joon Lee was pregnant when she was killed. About four months along.”
“Fuck—” I left off picking through my fries.
“Yeah, hope the asshole who killed her gets caught in a crocodile pit. A gay crocodile pit. Very horny gay crocodiles with really big fat dicks. Barbed dicks.”
“No, no.” I waved my hand to cut off Bobby’s protest. “Eun Joon Lee couldn’t have kids. That was one of the things she and her husband fought over. The neighbor told me that.”
“Maybe Eun Joon wasn’t the problem.” Bobby wiggled his fingers toward the ceiling. “Maybe Mr. Lee’s swimmers were DOA and she went elsewhere to get her burrito filled.”
“That was probably the most disgusting thing I’ve ever heard you say.”
“Ah, kid.” Bobby bit into his food with relish. “You haven’t been listening to me, then. So Mrs. Lee’s bundle of joy might not have been all that joyful?”
“Terry, Gyong-Si’s soon-to-be-ex assistant, said his boss would have private counseling sessions.” I made air quotes and winked. “Maybe that last time she went to see him, they argued about her being pregnant.”
“So he sent someone to kill her?” Bobby eyeballed me warily. “Kind of quick thinking on his part. And he’s got a hired killer on speed dial?”
“Hey, I’m hashing things out.” Complaining only made Bobby roll his eyes at me. “It’s something to look at.”
“Yeah, it’s something for Wong to look at,” he shot back.
“It’s Jenkins’s case,” I pointed out. “And you know he’s not going to do shit about it. Probably the only reason they gave it to him is because there’s no leads. It explains why the police report says they came in through the balcony. There’s no fricking evidence of that. Jenkins just lowballed the investigation.”
“Sounds like him.” Bobby leaned back and patted his flat stomach. “Okay, I’ve got to go run this off. I don’t suppose I can say something to make you drop all of this shit.”
“Probably not.” Shrugging, I balled up the remainder of my now-cold fries into the crumpled drive-thru bag. “Wong’s up to his balls in Na’s murder, and he’s still got Choi’s death hounding him. Lee’s not going to get the time of day because she was given to an asshole who’d rather warm his chair than catch a killer. The guy’s solve rate must be in the negatives.”
“Fault belongs to the captain in charge as much as Jenkins.” He tapped out a few letters on his screen. “Got some good pictures of the report he filed. I’ll forward them to you, but it’s not much. He hasn’t spoken to the husband since they found the wife, not even to talk about the pregnancy. For all we know, Mr. Lee found out about the unexpected miracle and did her in.”
“Dunno,” I admitted. “But I’ll be careful. What’s the worst that can happen?”
SISSY arrived right on schedule with her slightly older brother, Mo, in tow. I’d only contracted one of Martin’s children at a time, but they decided they’d both squat in my office whenever possible, if I didn’t mind. To be honest, I felt better having Mo with Sissy if I were out. He was built like a slab of redwood melded to granite and wouldn’t put up with anyone giving his sister shit. Sissy was no slouch, despite her petite, willowy frame. I’d seen her hold her own in a game of touch football with her brothers and cousins. Upon second thought, maybe Mo was there to stop Sissy from taking out anyone who pissed her off.
I strongly suspected every baby born into Claudia’s brood endured Green Beret training before it was allowed to bear the family name.
After showing them their assistant responsibilities, I settled in to read Jenkins’s report. Sissy sat down to do her homework, while Mo picked up the broom and headed out to sweep the front porch. I watched him for a moment through the screen door, and something on my face caught Sissy’s attention.
“He likes sweeping.” Sissy’s voice was nothing like her grandmother’s. Claudia dripped brash Southern hospitality and burnt molasses, where her granddaughter sounded as if she were ready to anchor the evening news. “I’ll do the dishes and dust. Even trade. We don’t believe housework is for women in our family, Uncle Cole.”
“Oh, I know that.” I reassured her with a small, tight smile. “I was just… thinking about your grandmother.”
Sissy glanced out the screen door at the last place Claudia’d been before the ambulance took her. “Oh, the porch. Yeah, she’s pissed off about that. Said she’d gone for some groceries down at the farmers’ market that day. I think she was more mad she paid money for stuff she didn’t end up using.”
“She talk to you about what happened?” It was difficult not grilling a sixteen-year-old girl about her grandmother, especially since the older woman was the closest th
ing to a mother I was ever going to get. “I told her I’d understand if she didn’t want to come back.”
“Hah, good luck trying to get her to stop,” she snorted, returning to her math homework. “Nothing stops Nana from doing anything she wants to do. Not a bullet. Not anyone. You’re as much family to her as any of my uncles. She’ll be climbing those steps up to work on principle alone.”
“She’s a good woman, you know?” I murmured, finding my spot in the report.
“Yep,” Sissy agreed. “And like my dad says, everything we do is to make her proud. Guess that holds for you too, Uncle Cole.”
I SHOOED them out at five. They went reluctantly. Apparently, sharing a Wi-Fi network at home meant splitting it with the rest of their siblings. Here at McGinnis Investigations, Mo and Sissy were the sole riders of my bandwidth train. It affected Mo so much he offered to move into the conference room and sleep on a cot if I needed him to.
So I assured him there wasn’t any need. That’s when he upped his offer to include mowing the lawn and mopping the floors. It was tempting, and as I wavered, Sissy yelled at him to get into the damned car.
Being a smart young man, he got into the damned car.
Locking up behind them, I was making plans in my head to loop around to speak to Eun Joon’s husband when I spotted a battered white Ford Explorer parked behind my recently returned Rover. I stood staring at it, waiting for it to disappear into a haze of smoke or sparkling, laughing demons when I blinked.
I blinked. Car was still there. My heart was not. It’d decided to hook little barbs into my lungs and throat to climb up to the base of my brain. It lodged there, whispering carelessly about throwing itself onto glass shards of doubt. I told it to shut the fucking hell up and headed down the walk to my house.
And found a broken angel had fallen down onto my stoop.
He looked good. I’d not seen him in over a week, and seeing Jae… hurt. It was more than just a pretty face and a lean body I could make sing under me. I missed the shy smiles he gave me when our eyes met while we watched television and the murmuring complaints he made when I stole a raw mushroom when he cooked. I wanted my Sunday mornings lounging in bed with our toes tangled together to protect them from the cat and the taste of his mouth when I kissed him after he’d had his first cup of tea.
