A Walk Through Fire

by Felice Stevens

  Fuck.

  What he really wanted to do was punch Peter Dent in his nice square jaw and tell him to go to hell, because he knew what Peter wanted. But that was the thing about Peter. Ash wouldn’t treat him like everyone else. Peter knew Ash—or knew the small part Ash let him see.

  Ash’s body stilled. His fingers dug so deep into the fabric of the chair it shredded under his nails. “What…” He cleared his throat, his mouth suddenly dry as chalk. “What do you want from me?” Stupid question. He knew what Peter wanted. And goddamn him, Peter knew there was no way Ash could refuse him or those kids.

  Because he too had seen kids who had been on the wrong side of an adult’s rage and fists. Adults who were supposed to protect children and, if not love them, at least make sure no harm would come to them. Too many adults took in children to care for, not because they loved them or wanted to give them a better life, but because of the money they received from the state. And God help the children who ended up with those people, if they didn’t clean their rooms or cook the meals or…

  Ash shook his head free from his nightmarish thoughts, focusing on his friend’s sympathetic face. His stomach roiled at the sight of all that compassion in Peter’s knowing eyes. “Yeah, damn you. You know I’ll help him. Tell me what you need me to do.”

  Why did he have a feeling he’d made the biggest mistake of his life?

  Chapter Two

  Thank God he was home, with this miserable bitch of a day behind him. After their last bitter confrontation, Drew had dreaded facing Jackie again.

  Who could blame him? The last time he’d seen her, she’d been on her knees, giving his former friend and one of his Wednesday night poker buddies what looked to be a spectacular blowjob.

  The familiar sense of nausea rose in Drew’s throat, but he fought it down as he entered his apartment. Throwing his keys in the bowl on the table by the door, he paused and surveyed the spartan one-bedroom apartment he’d rented in Brooklyn Heights after leaving Jackie’s luxurious loft in Tribeca. He’d never felt comfortable there. It was always her place, never theirs.

  Out of the corner of his eye he caught sight of his cat hopping off his perch by the window, coming to greet him with a loud, rumbling purr. Black-and-white with big yellow eyes, Domino had proven to be a much more loving family member in the two months since he’d rescued him from Animal Care and Control than his wife had ever been. After letting the furry creature rub against his legs for a moment, Drew picked Domino up and carried him into the bedroom, where he deposited him on his bed.

  “What’d you shred today, buddy?” When he scratched under Domino’s chin, he was rewarded with even louder purring and demanding, “pet me, scratch my chin,” head butts. He begrudged the animal nothing. The workers had told him when the cat was brought in, he’d been half-starved, spray-painted pink, and so flea-bitten they didn’t think he’d make it. Running his hands through Domino’s now-thick, glossy fur, he could barely feel the animal’s ribs. “Maybe you need to go on a diet, huh, buddy?”

  As if he understood, the purring abruptly stopped, and Domino gently swatted Drew’s hand. “Okay, okay, kidding.” After spending a few moments giving the cat more chin scratches, Drew changed into jeans and a T-shirt, hung up his suit, then went into the kitchen to get a beer from the fridge. Luckily, he’d stocked up earlier in the week, as he knew after today’s meeting his friends would come over to help him commiserate.

  As if on cue, the phone rang. It wasn’t one of his friends, though. “Hey, D. How’s my big brother?”

  His sister Rachel had called him by the first letter of his name since she was a baby, and it stuck with everyone close to him. Although younger than him, in the dating world she’d always watched over him like a mama bear, offering advice whether or not he asked.

  “Did you see her today? She have the nerve to show up?”

  He couldn’t help but smile. “Yes, Rach. She was there. It’s fine, and in six months I’ll be free again. All done.” He drank down his beer, then flopped on the couch, picked up the remote, and switched on the TV, looking for the Yankee game.

  “Was it awful?”

  His stomach clenched at the concern in her voice. He so didn’t want his little sister worried about him. “I’m an adult. I think I can handle it. I never should’ve married her. You were right.”

  Rachel, who was finishing up her PhD in child psychology, had the grace not to tell him I told you so.

  “So listen to me now. Don’t rush back into the dating scene again. I think you need your friends and family more than anything.”

  “Don’t worry. The last thing on my mind is getting involved with another woman. I’ll see you at Nana’s this weekend though, right?” They went together to visit their grandmother every Sunday. When he was a senior and Rachel a freshman in college, their parents were killed in a head-on collision by a drunken truck driver on the New York State Thruway. From that day forward their grandmother had taken care of them. Now well over eighty years old, her fiercely independent nature allowed them to do only the littlest things for her. But they never missed a Sunday visit. Another thing Jackie had complained about having to do with him.

  “Of course. Love you.”

  “Love you too.” He clicked off and was about to settle in to watch the Yankees take their turn at bat when his doorbell rang. Before answering, Drew braced himself, knowing this would be the beginning of a long night of companionship with his buddies, whether he wanted it or not.

  Standing at the door were his best friends. One had two boxes of pizza from Grimaldi’s. The other had a case of beer with bags resting on top that smelled like meatball heroes from their favorite place in Carroll Gardens.

  “Holy shit, guys. There’s only three of us.” He gestured them inside, and Mike, the one holding the sandwiches and beer, made a beeline for the kitchen.

  “Listen, D, we were so happy you were getting rid of that cheating bitch, we didn’t know what to do first.” Mike shoved the case of beer into the fridge alongside the bottles already there. “But beer, pizza, and heroes work, right?” He flashed a grin.

  “Thanks, man.” Drew grabbed him around the neck for a quick hug, speaking into his good ear. Mike Levin had lost almost all the hearing in his left ear after being wounded during his tour in Iraq.

  Drew cast a fond glance at Jordan, busy opening pizza boxes and arranging the heroes on paper plates. The three of them had been best friends all their lives, ever since their moms met at the playground when they were children. They’d stuck through everything together: his disastrous marriage, Mike almost getting killed in Iraq and his long road to recovery, and Jordan’s coming out as a teenager. Nothing could ever separate them.

  “Thanks to both you guys for being there for me. It actually went a lot easier than I thought. Yeah, she was there with her father, of course, but my lawyer and hers are really good friends so they worked it out. Six months from today I’ll be a free man, and now I can concentrate on getting the clinic off the ground.”

  They gathered their food and sat on either the sofa or the floor. After watching the Yankees kick the Red Sox’s asses for a while, Drew muted the set. “So you guys are all still on board with me, right? It’s going to make such a big difference in these kids’ lives, knowing that they can get the medical and dental care for all the issues they face.”

  Jordan finished the last of his slice of pizza, washing it down with beer before he answered. “Are we dealing with mostly teens? And you said many of them are gay?” Jordan Peterson was a highly respected up-and-coming orthopedic surgeon in the city. He and his partner, Keith Hart, an NYPD detective, spent many hours at local LGBT programs helping teens with bullying and family problems. Jordan’s parents had never been anything less than fully supportive of their son and welcomed his partner Keith like another one of their children. Keith’s parents, devout, Bible Belt Christians, had cut him off when he’d told them he was gay. He’d neither seen nor spoken to them in years.

/>   “Teens, young adults—many identify as being LGBTQ, but some are still too scared to come out. I think that’s why they’re being abused. Either at school or at home, they’re bearing the brunt of someone’s anger and abuse. Rachel said she’ll come by and talk to any of the kids who want to, giving them a way to ask for help if they need it.”

  “And I have the mobile dental clinic ready to help with chipped and broken teeth, as well as crowns and bridges,” said Mike. “Whatever they need. This is a great thing you’re doing.”

  Drew popped some chips in his mouth. “I’ll never forget the show I saw on TV about kids who lived in foster care in this one home, and instead of being taken care of by their foster parents, they were made to work almost like slaves.”

  He glanced at the food he’d left on his plate, remembering how one boy interviewed said he’d sometimes only been fed bread and water for days at a time. But that had been the least of the boy’s problems. “Many of them had suffered sexual abuse as well. It upset me so much I called Rachel and told her this is what I planned on doing with some of my settlement from the lawsuit from our parents’ case.”

  “That’s great, man. I feel sorry for these kids, you know? It’s bad enough to have no family and be part of the system.” Jordan stroked Domino, who’d come to lie on his lap. “They should have some kind of legal recourse to get these bastards who abuse them.”

  “Jordy, I spoke with Keith, and he said if the kids are willing to make statements, the police department would be more than happy to work toward arresting these bastards.” Drew liked Jordan’s partner, Keith, a blond, blue-eyed giant of a guy with a wicked sense of humor. The one thing Keith never found funny, however, was the abuse of children—something he constantly came across on his job.

  “What’s also really good is that I talked to my lawyer today, Peter Dent? You guys met him.” They both answered with nods. “Well, he and his friend, the lawyer on the other side, have agreed to give legal advice to the clinic and kids on a pro bono basis. That’ll be a huge help to anyone who wants to press charges.”

  “Who’s the other lawyer?” Jordan had his hands buried in Domino’s fur as he watched the Yankees’ pitcher give up a grand slam home run. “No, goddamn it. You gotta be kidding me. Fucking Sox.”

  Drew shook his head in disgust at the television. “Uh, I think his name is Davis? Let me get his card.” He picked up his wallet from the table and dug out the business card Peter had handed him with the man’s cell phone number written on the back. “Yeah, it’s Asher Davis.”

  Domino meowed loudly in protest as Jordan’s hands dug into his fur. “Shit, ow, sorry, Dom.” He lifted the cat off his lap, extracting the cat’s claws from his thighs, and placed him on the sofa. “Fuck ’Em and Duck ’Em Davis? Oh man, you must be joking.”

  Drew looked at him in surprise. “You know him?” He’d paid only slight attention to the other lawyer, not recalling anything about the man which would’ve elicited such a strong reaction from his friend.

  Snorting, Jordan accepted another beer from Mike, who sat on the sofa next to the cat. Domino transferred his affection to Mike, stretching his length across his chest.

  He groaned. “Man, this cat’s getting huge. You gotta stop feeding him.”

  Drew threw a chip at him. “He’s not big; he’s healthy.” He prodded Jordan with his foot, wanting to hear his story about the other lawyer. “Now finish telling me why the guy has that rep.”

  Jordan rubbed his thighs with his hands, then cracked his knuckles. “Uh, yeah, you could say I kind of know him.”

  “Sounds like a story. Spill it,” Drew ordered.

  Jordan grimaced. “Before I met Keith, while I was a resident, I had to give a deposition on a malpractice case. Davis was with the attorney on the other side. He was good-looking.” Jordan’s pale blue eyes glinted. “And I was interested at first, but something about him rubbed me the wrong way, so when he asked me out, I turned him down.”

  “Oh man, that must’ve pissed him off.” Drew chuckled and helped himself to another slice of pizza. “He seems pretty full of himself. Kind of arrogant and cocky.” Abandoning Mike, Domino appeared at his side and he slipped the cat some cheese from his pizza.

  “Ahh, you could say that.” Jordan picked at the label of his beer bottle. “He’s wickedly sharp and never takes no for an answer. It makes for a good lawyer, I guess, but not what I was looking for in a lover.”

  “So what was the problem, then?” Mike questioned. “You said no and that was that, right?”

  Jordan shifted in his seat, intriguing Drew further. One thing about Jordan, he never let anyone get the better of him.

  “Uh, not quite. Later that night I went out to a club with some of the other residents, and Davis was there as well. He insisted on buying me a drink, and I refused, which pissed him off even more.”

  “Christ, did he stalk you?” Drew leaned closer to Jordan. “He sounds like a predator.”

  Jordan shrugged. “Somehow he got my number, and he’d call me every few days or show up where I was hanging out after work to ask me out. I knew some of the guys he did go out with during that time, and all he did was screw their brains out and leave.” He took a deep swallow of his beer. “He never called them for another date or even stayed the night with them. You know that’s not my scene.”

  Pushing Domino away with his foot, Drew took another slice of pizza. Perhaps he did need to cut down on slipping the cat extra food. “Maybe he’s calmed down since then. He seemed pretty quiet today at the meeting.”

  Jordan snorted into his beer bottle. “Doubtful. A few years ago I caught him getting a blowjob from one of the panelists at some dinner function we were both attending. I’d forgotten my jacket in the banquet room and went back inside. There was Asher Davis, up against the wall, pants down at his knees, having his dick sucked by the chief of surgery of one the finest hospitals in the Midwest.” He chuckled. “Guys must’ve thought they’d be hidden by the tall, potted plants, but that’s not something one can hide, know what I mean?”

  Holy crap.

  Mike groaned, but Drew was interested in the rest of the story. “What happened? Did he see you? He must’ve been a little embarrassed.” To think he used to be too shy to even kiss a girl in public, and this guy. Wow. A sudden image popped up in his mind of the man he saw today, his head flung back in the throes of an orgasm. He rubbed his eyes hard, willing that picture out of his head.

  “Not at all. He stared me straight in the eyes and grinned.” Disgusted with the outcome of the game, Jordan changed to the Met game, where the score showed they were also losing. “If I remember, I think he even winked at me.”

  Drew couldn’t stop himself from asking the next question. “Jesus, Jordy, did you really stand there and watch?” Mike looked at both of them, his mouth open in amazement.

  At least Jordan had the grace to look a little embarrassed. “Yeah, I’ll admit, I did for a few minutes.” He shrugged, a defensive tone creeping into his voice. “Hey, it was hot; what can I say? I was younger and hadn’t met Keith yet. But anyway, that’s Davis’s rep. From what I’ve heard about him, he came out of nowhere as a scholarship student, and Jacob Frank took him in and made him who he is. Even left him the partnership to his law firm in his will when he died. The guy’s smart as a whip and hard as nails in the courtroom, but a complete asshole in his personal life.” He reached over and grabbed the last of the meatball hero. “He’s drop-dead gorgeous, but only after as much cock as he can get. There’s never been a steady partner I’ve seen him with at any function. As far as I know, he lives and breathes his work.”

  Mike laughed. “Except when he has some random guy sucking his dick.”

  They all laughed. Drew loved his friends. There was never any holding back or nervousness about saying the wrong thing in front of one another.

  His cell phone buzzed. Scrolling to read the message, he chuckled.

  “Well, speaking of the proverbial devil, it’s Mr.
Asher Davis. He wants to meet tomorrow evening to discuss the clinic and the role I see for him.” It took a minute of silence before he looked up from his phone’s screen to see two sets of worried eyes trained on him. “What’s with the looks?”

  Mike looked to Jordan, and Drew’s eyes narrowed. “What the fuck is going on?”

  “Uh, look, don’t take this the wrong way, but you just broke up with Jackie, and you’re kind of vulnerable now.” Jordan played with Domino’s tail. “In my opinion, Asher Davis hasn’t changed. When he decides he wants something, he stops at nothing until he gets it. Then once he uses it, he’s done.”

  Drew sat with his mouth open. This was too fucking crazy. “Are you trying to tell me Davis would hit on me? Like, he’d want to screw me?” Sputtering, he waited for his friends to correct him and tell him how wrong he was.

  They didn’t.

  “You’re insane. First of all, I’m not gay. Second of all, I don’t sleep with men, and third of all, what the fuck?” Were these guys actually serious? Him and a man? “Why would you even think that was an option?”

  “Let’s face it, you aren’t me. I’m stronger than you are. The man is a relentless pursuer when he wants something. He can sniff out the slightest vulnerability in a person; I’ve seen him in action in the courtroom. And if he thinks he’s got you for even the briefest second, he’ll pounce.” Jordan turned off the game and tossed the remote. All the laughter had fled from his voice. “I don’t want you in his crosshairs.”

  Once again, like he’d done all his life, Jordan tried to protect him. “Jordan, you’re making no fucking sense. You’re the one who always says you can’t make someone gay, that they’re born to it. So how can meeting with him make me vulnerable if I don’t have those feelings?”