Tough Love

by Heidi Cullinan

She gentled, but not all the way, not until Steve added the sharp pressure of fingernails, half-moons digging into her skin. The pain stilled her, made her relax—a little too much, though, and Steve could feel the shakes and sobs threatening to push out of the anger she’d leashed.

  He lessened his grip enough to draw her back against him. “Stay with me.” He turned the hold into a steady massage. “Listen.”

  Caramela choked on a sob, but she held it in and nodded. Yes, she’d listen.

  “Jansen is an ass, and he fucked this up. Yet he’s not a bad man, and you’ve hurt him in front of friends, friends who are already on edge. If you strike him again, you will deal with me. Do you understand?”

  Her whole body tensed, and she blew angry breath from her nostrils. Steve tightened his grip, pushing his fingernails in with more authority, and she calmed down, back to the edge between cracking and exploding.

  Steve had to check the instinct to brush his lips over her hair and whisper good girl.

  He cleared his throat.

  “Bleeding out Jansen will not stop what you’re trying to hold back. Fear of these people is unnecessary. Mitch and Sam are good folks, Randy too. Whatever Cooper did to you, they are the other end of the map.”

  She almost broke—two sobs, but she swallowed them with no tears, and when the smooth skin beneath Steve’s fingers began to pucker from pressure, she eased back into control.

  Steve forced his attention to the room at large. Caramela seemed stable, going back to the bouncer to fold herself into his arms. Sam had Randy under control, and Sam himself was stable, at least for now. Mitch, however, needed a leg up.

  The trucker stood a head taller than Steve did and was a little bit wider, but he had the same uneasy edge he’d always carried in the valley. Right now he pirouetted on a knife point. Steve grimaced, wishing Randy would have checked with him before he decided to play secret baby.

  That Chenco was Cooper’s son blew Steve’s mind too, but there was no denying the confirmation on Caramela’s face when Randy confronted her. It was the truth. It was out in the open. Now they had to deal with it, Mitch included.

  “Tedsoe, we need water and probably a whiskey for Randy. In a minute Sam will need you.”

  Mitch nodded. He couldn’t look away from Caramela, though, trying to see Chenco, his brother. Trying to see Cooper.

  “Mitchell Allen Tedsoe. Go to the bar, get the drinks, and get your shit together.”

  This time Mitch gave Steve a curt, grateful nod and disappeared from the room.

  A glance at the couch revealed the shoe was out. Sam held a heavy packet of gauze over the wound, watching the angry red pool beneath his hand as he shouted for more bandages. Randy was pale but conscious and reassuring Sam he was fine, telling him to calm down.

  Steve caught the bouncer’s gaze, indicating Caramela and the door. She needs to get out of here.

  The man nodded in relief, surrendering her with his indifference. When Steve blinked in surprise, the bouncer only murmured something about “Can’t handle the blood, man” and ducked out of the room.

  Who tossed his friend off to a total stranger?

  With no other real option, Steve took over herding Caramela. She didn’t fight him—she’d slid under his command pretty hard, but she was still in character, which impressed him. Remembering the fury with which she’d landed the heel in Jansen’s shoulder, he directed her patiently to find her bag and keys. She didn’t put up any resistance until he led her down the hall toward the back entrance.

  “Stop. Where are we going?” She stiffened in his arms. “You mean you’re taking me out of here? I don’t even know you.”

  It was good to hear she at least had some sense. Steve relaxed his grip so she could move away and face him. “You needed out of the room. I was going to settle for a little fresh air for now. But now that we’re talking—yes, we need to work out what happens next.”

  She folded her arms over her chest. “Nothing happens. You can all leave me alone.” When Steve only stared back at her, not in the mood to dignify this with an argument, she glared back for a few seconds then crumpled. “Why are you here? Why did you follow me? Is this part of his sick game?”

  Steve frowned. “Whose sick game?”

  Caramela’s lip curled. “Cooper’s. Mitch’s. Whoever else is in on the fun of ruining my life.”

  “Mitch isn’t playing any game. He had no idea you existed until two minutes ago. He’ll come around in a minute. He’s not a bad guy.”

  She was not convinced. “I have his old journals where he wrote incoherent essays full of rage and homophobia. Cooper loved to tell me how someday my big brother would come back and kick the shit out of me. This was before he found out about the drag.”

  “For the record, Mitch is gay.”

  She stilled, studying Steve hard. “Bullshit.”

  “No shit. Mitch is queer. Loves cock as much as you and me.” Steve jerked his head back toward the dressing room. “Sam—the young one—is his husband. Randy’s gay too. Hell. Every last one of us is. So you can stop worrying on that score. As for the drag thing—” Steve shrugged. “I doubt it’s a big deal. He’s not exactly a judgmental kind of guy. Maybe he was when he lived with Cooper and when he denied the truth about himself, but not now.”

  Caramela said nothing, only continued to hunch over, holding her arms over her chest.

  Steve’s phone buzzed in his pocket. Pulling it out, he found a text from Randy. Steve smiled. When Caramela frowned, he waved his phone at her briefly before lowering it to text back. “Jansen says he’s sorry.”

  She shook her head in disbelief. “What?”

  “Jansen can be a real ass. He knows it too.” He finished his message, waited for Jansen’s reply, then looked up once he got it. “He’s inviting you to the house.” Which was Steve’s house, but he’d let the technicality slide for now. Especially since this was exactly what he wanted, to get to know Chenco, to help him. Caramela too.

  Caramela didn’t recoil, which was a good start. “Why?”

  “Because he wants to meet you.”

  “Jansen, or my brother?”

  “Everybody wants to meet you, Caramela.”

  The comment caught her up a little. “You can call me Chenco.”

  Steve raised an eyebrow. “Figured you were still in character.”

  “Yes, but…” She eased a fraction. “Thanks. Not many people get it.”

  Steve gave a curt nod. “As you pointed out, you don’t know me, but if I may offer my advice—I think you should come meet Mitch. Meet all of them. You struck me the other day as someone looking for family. I’m telling you, you hit the fucking mother lode.”

  “I put a stiletto through the shoulder of the mother lode?”

  “Well, once you get to know them, you’ll realize this was probably the best way in. If you knew how Jansen introduced himself to Sam, you’d give him a matching wound in the other side.”

  Caramela bit her lip and smoothed her hands over her dress. “I need to change.”

  “Do you do this here, or at home?”

  “Home.”

  “How about I take you, wait, and drive you to my house to meet everyone?”

  She gave him an arch look.

  He gave it right back. “I think you’re holding yourself together with your sequins. You shouldn’t really be driving.”

  He expected a barrage of you don’t own me and who do you think you are, but she surprised him. “You’re leather, aren’t you? You’re one of those BDSM tops or whatever.”

  He crossed his arms lightly over his chest. “I take it that’s a problem for you?”

  “Let’s just say Booker has a boyfriend into the same, and I’m definitely not interested.”

  Steve wanted to hear all about this, but not now. “Helping you has nothing to do with bondage and discipline, dominance and submission, masochism and sadism.” He paused. “All right, it has a bit to do with discipline and dominance, but it’s more abou
t my personality than anything else. I want to give you a ride because you’re probably in shock and shouldn’t be driving. I’m inviting you over to my house to meet your brother who doesn’t want to bash you. I am not suggesting anything to do with sex.”

  He watched her face as she digested his speech. “The stuff you rattled off—bondage, discipline, dominance…” She frowned. “You said two D words and two S words. It doesn’t make sense.”

  Steve was about to ride her for focusing on the alphabet when the real point was he meant to reassure her, but she wavered, and he realized she’d latched on to the acronym because everything else was too scary to contemplate.

  Yeah. No fucking way she was driving a car.

  “Your options are,” he began, his voice quiet but firm, “I drive you, your friend drives you, or I call you a cab.”

  “I can’t afford a cab.”

  “I said I’d call you a cab. I’d foot the bill.”

  Her head jerked up again, her gaze heavily suspicious. “It’s over twenty dollars at the rates they charge to take me all the way to the flats. Why would you do that?”

  “What I’ve gotten to know of you so far I like, for one reason. You’re Mitch’s little brother, for another. I also enjoyed our conversation the other day, and I’d want to help you on your own merits as well.”

  She rubbed at her arms, clearly not calmed by the idea of kindness from strangers. Eventually she said, “You can drive me.”

  He’d been ready for her to tell him to go to hell. Pleasantly surprised, Steve pushed off the wall and came to her side. Right off they had trouble—when he herded her to the back exit, she balked.

  “There’s no clear access to the front this way. Also there’s a lot of glass, and I’m barefoot.”

  “You can’t go through the front. They’ll mob you, and you’re already about two shoves away from coming apart.” He glanced around, then at her bag. “Any chance you have ballet flats in there?”

  “No. My other shoes are in the car.”

  Steve turned Caramela gently so she faced him. “I would like permission to carry you.”

  “You keep messing everything up and fixing it at the same time. You scare me. You make me feel like I’ve gone crazy. I don’t do this. I don’t let total strangers drive me home then over to their house. I certainly don’t let them carry me in character across a parking lot full of fans.”

  Steve said nothing. She let out a breath then started to crumble. Steve didn’t reach for her this time. She had to make this leap herself, or it wasn’t going to work.

  “Okay,” she said at last. “I’ll do it, but explain to me exactly what’s going to happen, please. I know you said you were going to drive, but can you…spell out what happens now?”

  Steve spoke slowly, his voice soothing but firm. “I’m going to carry you to your car. I’ll drive you to your house. I will wait while you change into Chenco, and then we’re going to talk, you and me, before we meet your brother. We can do it in a neutral space, or in the car, or at a coffee shop before we head to my house.” He hesitated. “Or I can drop you off and we can do the meet-up tomorrow.”

  “No. I’ll keep avoiding.” Caramela rubbed her arms and looked over at him reluctantly. “Probably shouldn’t have told you that.”

  Yes, but she had, and her urge to confess to him made something deep and pleasing hum in Steve.

  She rounded her shoulders, hunching her body into a protective stance. “I really thought you were all in on Cooper’s scam. I know you’re not now, or at least I’m pretty damn sure, but Mitch…well, I’ve lived in mortal fear of him for years. That emotion is hard to shake off on somebody else’s word.”

  “If Mitch or anyone else were to attempt to harm you in my house or simply on my watch, there would be some serious hell to pay. Words are all I can give you right now, but I mean them.”

  “All right. Your house is fine.” Her hand trembled, however, when she brushed a lock of hair out of her face. “I feel a little weird. Like I might throw up or float away. Or melt into a puddle, or blow up.”

  “You’ve had a big scare tonight. You’ve had a hell of a time lately too, from what you told me the last time we met.” He took a step closer, not touching her but making a gentle, subtle wall around her. “I’d prefer to stay with you while you change. I’ll wait in the kitchen if you want, but I need to be able to hear if you go into shock, as I’m not entirely convinced it’s off the table. When you’re Chenco again, we’ll talk and reassess whether it would be better to meet Mitch and the others tonight or wait.” He pursed his lips. “If we wait, though, I don’t think you should be alone.”

  Her nostrils flared. “I’m not that unstable.”

  Steve didn’t dignify the lie with a reply.

  She lifted her head and looked him in the eye—defeated, but she held his gaze. “You’re right. I’m not very okay just now. I shouldn’t do this. I don’t know you, but I’m tired and scared so I’m doing it anyway. You may carry me to my car. I warn you now, though, if this ends up being the opening act to some sick game, I’m gonna fight you like hell.”

  The declaration made him want to smile, but Steve didn’t allow himself the indulgence. Instead he inclined his head in a small bow and held out his hands.

  She stared at his hand, drew a shaking breath and stepped into his open arms.

  FOR THE FIRST time since he’d started drag, Chenco went out of character while still in women’s clothes.

  Flashes between personas like the one when Mitch had come backstage were common, and those instances always stemmed from Chenco growing too nervous or upset. As Steve hefted Caramela into his arms and carried her out the door of Club 33, however, it was she who did the abandoning. She held on for about five seconds in Steve’s grip before sliding away, and Chenco had no choice but to move forward.

  “We’re heading into the parking lot now,” Steve said as he rounded the building. “If you can’t bring her back, do your best to fake it. You’ll regret it later if you don’t.”

  How had he known the difference in the personas? The exposure made Chenco feel dizzy as he let out a breath. “I can’t.” He tried again, but she was water in his hands. “She’s gone.”

  Steve’s grip tightened on him. “Breathe,” he commanded.

  Chenco did. “I think—I think it’s because she hurt Randy. She’s threatened it before, but she’s never actually done it until now.” The white-hot moment returned, and he found the shadow he’d been trying not to look at. “She almost put it in his neck.”

  “Almost isn’t doing. May be best, though, we let her rest. What would she do right now if she were okay?”

  Chenco tried to think. He was in the arms of a hot leather daddy Caramela had sung her heart out to. Thinking took some work. “She’d wave and ham it up, blowing kisses and drawing hearts in the air. Except she wouldn’t. No way in hell would she go off with a stranger.”

  “Would they think she would?”

  Chenco considered. “They liked me singing to you. I think we’re writing a new chapter for Caramela right now, so anything goes from a fan perspective.”

  “You’re switching pronouns. Is she back, or are you getting lost?”

  Chenco honestly didn’t know. “Both, maybe.”

  He shifted his grip and leaned down to Chenco’s ear. “Caramela,” he said, his Spanish accent achingly perfect. “I want you to come back from here to the car. Chenco will hold you, but he needs you right now. We need you until we clear the lot, and then you can rest. Do you understand?”

  Chenco shut his eyes, dizzy as the full weight of his battered queen filled his headspace. She wanted to cry, but she held on, for Chenco, for Steve. “Yes. I understand.”

  Steve’s lips brushed Chenco’s ear, bleeding the tension out.

  It was Caramela who waved, but as he never had before, Chenco felt himself prop her up, aware of her limits, of his own, conscious of how bizarre the whole situation was and how much trust he’d blindly giv
en Steve, trust based on a few glances, a conversation, and a projection of strength. Who was this guy who carried him? Why did he keep showing up? Why should Chenco trust him?

  With no answers, Chenco couldn’t calm himself. So as Steve climbed into the Nova and Caramela slipped away, Chenco went about getting some.

  “How do you know Mitch? How do you know my dad?”

  Steve pulled into traffic as he answered. “I knew Mitch when he was first out, which meant knowing Cooper a little. I know your brother a lot better than I do your father.” He glanced at Chenco. “Mitch isn’t his dad. Just looks a fuck lot like him. He’s not a gay-basher. He’s a gay, married man.”

  Chenco nodded, still processing that. Mitch was gay too, and married. The idea made Chenco’s brain sort of shut down.

  Steve continued to speak as he drove. “It was just Mitch and Cooper since Mitch was eight. Mom ran off, which has always been hard on Mitch. He went through a dark phase where he tried to bully his way out of his orientation. Hated everything and anyone gay in high school from what I was told. I would suppose that’s when he wrote those journals.”

  Chenco rubbed his arms and stared at the dashboard. “They’re fucking terrifying.”

  “Whatever you read in them, remember all that vitriol was how he thought of himself. You don’t grow up with Cooper Tedsoe and come out with your head on right.” Steve eased his hands into a casual position on the steering wheel. “By the time I met Mitch, he was out, at least to himself, though he was involved with some not-so-good BDSM. Some of us from the local scene found him, shaped him up as best we could, taught him how to play safely. He got into trucking and started coming and going from the valley, and eventually he returned with Randy. Shit, but they were a pair. Two north ends and nothing but trouble. I did my best to help, but I had my hands full with something else at the time.”

  So his brother was into BDSM too, and this Randy. And Steve, and Booker. Chenco frowned. Was there something in the water in the valley, or what?

  Steve went back to his story. “Mitch left the valley, but he kept coming home, and he could not stop trying to get his dad’s attention whenever he was in town. Take him out of the RGV, and he’s strong enough to make most men bend just for looking at him, but bring him here and he’s eight years old again, wondering why his mama didn’t love him enough to take him too. Cooper made Mitch the reason for everything wrong in his life, and he put it all on him, right up until the day Mitch beat him down. Stopped short of killing him, and then Mitch left and never returned. Seven years he’s been gone, but back ten minutes, he was the same as the day he’d left. The old fuck is dead, but he’ll haunt his boy forever. Cooper was a brute, an ass, the kind of shit-heel who gives sadists a bad name.”