“Meaning you probably won’t be able to taste it.” Derek put the eggs and bacon on two plates, with toast, and brought them into the dining room. “Eat it anyway. You need to keep up your strength.”
“I know, I know. House cleaning.”
“Not for you. Not today. You’re going back to bed.”
“Derek…” Joe whined. “It’s a cold, not the bubonic plague.”
“It’ll get worse if you don’t take care of yourself. You don’t want to be sneezing when you’re answering the phone on Monday.”
“Yes, boss,” Joe grumbled, but he was happy that Derek was concerned about him. He knew the ‘phone’ comment was more teasing than anything else. He ate, although he could barely taste the food, and had another glass of juice at Derek’s insistence.
“Now back to bed,” Derek said as he began clearing the table.
“How about I get my blanket and curl up on the sofa, instead. I’m not tired, just ugh.”
“All right, but that’s as far as you go,” Derek said firmly as he took the dishes into the kitchen to wash them.
After getting the blanket, Joe settled in the corner of the sofa with the tissues on the side table for easy access. Sherwat climbed up, resting his head in Joe’s lap. “I hope dogs can’t catch cold,” he said nasally, stroking Sherwat’s soft fur. Leaning his head back, Joe closed his eyes, smiling to himself when he heard Derek bustling around.
Suddenly, he was in a barren room, shivering from the cold. Seconds later he felt as if he was on fire. The room was immense, the walls barely visible until, with terror washing over him, he saw them moving closer. He spun wildly, looking for a way out. A door appeared. He staggered toward it. It began to shrink. He fell to his knees, crawling, praying he’d reach it before it disappeared. His hands scrabbled on the knob and it opened. He was free. Intense heat overwhelmed him. Ahead of him he saw figures. Men. Naked, leering at him. He clambered to his feet. Ran in terror. They came after him, hands outstretched, huge phalluses protruding from their groins as they grabbed his arms, his body. He screamed.
“Joe, Joe, it’s all right. I’m here, you’re safe.”
The voice penetrated his horror but the fear was still there as something gripped his shoulders. He screamed again.
“Shh, shh,” the voice said softly. “You’re here, not in your nightmare but here. Home.”
Joe’s eyes flew open. “Derek?” he whispered.
“Yes.” Derek gathered him into his arms, rocking him. “You scared the hell out of Sherwat—and me.”
“It was so real. I was burning up, I was freezing, naked men were chasing me.” Joe moaned. “I knew them, Derek. The men. They were the ones…the ones…”
Derek nodded. “You don’t have to explain. I understand. They’re gone. They’ll never touch you, never hurt you again.”
Joe took a deep, shuddering breath. “I’m sorry.”
“For what?”
“For scaring you.”
“Damn, Joe, you were having a nightmare, a ‘fever dream’ Mom used to call them if I had one when I was sick. I remember how horrible they can be. There’s nothing to apologize for.” He eased his hold, brushing Joe’s hair off his forehead. “You’re burning up.”
“Like in my dream.”
“Yes.”
Joe felt something cold press against his arm—Sherwat’s nose. The dog jumped onto the sofa to lie beside him. “I’m okay,” he said, patting the dog’s head. He turned to Derek. “I really am.”
“I know. Up here.” He tapped Joe’s temple. “Physically I’m not so sure.” Derek chuckled, handing him a tissue. “Your nose is running like a faucet. You need another dose of pills and more OJ.”
Derek went to get them, leaving the pill bottle within easy reach on the side table. Joe got up, heading to his bedroom. When Derek asked, “What now?” Joe said he wanted his book.
“If you’d asked…”
“I know, but you have other things to do. Walking a few feet won’t kill me,” Joe replied. Book in hand, he settled on the sofa. The last thing he wanted to do was fall asleep again. He hoped reading would keep that from happening.
By late morning, Joe began to feel better. The pills, he supposed. Marking his place, he closed the book and went into the kitchen to fix lunch. He knew Derek was upstairs and called up, asking him what he wanted on his sandwich.
“Ham and cheese, and why are you making them?” Derek called back.
“Because I’m bored and I feel better?”
Apparently Derek accepted that because he didn’t argue. He came down a few minutes later, lugging the vacuum, which he put in the closet. Joe grinned when Sherwat finally put in an appearance, deeming it safe to do so now that his nemesis was safely out of the way.
After lunch, Derek ‘allowed’ Joe to strip his bed and gather up his laundry. Joe rolled his eyes, did so, and returned to the sofa. Bored with reading, he turned on the TV and searched for something that would keep him awake.
A while later, Derek joined him. With brief breaks on his part to change out the laundry, he and Joe spent the afternoon watching movies. After supper, Joe told Derek in no uncertain terms that he was going with him when he walked Sherwat. Derek didn’t protest, so, bundled up “Like a damned toddler” as Joe put it, they spent the early evening walking through the park.
The concession Joe made for doing that was that he would go to bed as soon as they got home—which he did after taking a hot shower and another dose of pills. He was vaguely aware of Sherwat curling up on the comforter at the foot of the bed as he fell into a thankfully dreamless sleep.
* * * *
Joe felt much better when he awoke Sunday morning. He was still sniffling and sneezing, but his temperature was back to normal—at least according to Derek after he felt his forehead. They spent the morning as they had the previous Sunday, eating breakfast, reading the newspaper, and working the various crossword puzzles together.
After lunch, they did the grocery shopping. Because he had money now, Joe insisted on paying for part of them. “I have to start sharing the expenses.” Derek didn’t protest, much to his relief. Instead he suggested they also go to an outlet mall not far from the house so that Joe could add to his wardrobe. Joe had no problem with that, so after they returned to the house to put the food away and let Sherwat out for a few minutes, they took off.
“Too many choices,” Joe said an hour later. They’d visited three stores, from cheap to “You have to be kidding”, as Joe had muttered when he looked at the price tag on a pair of jeans.
“What do you need most?” Derek asked. He knew the answer—shirts. All Joe had were the two decent ones he’d bought him for work—and a selection of well-worn sweat and T-shirts.
“A winter jacket so you can have yours back,” Joe replied.
Derek grinned. “Like I can wear two at once? How about this?” He held up a red long-sleeved T-shirt.
“Not bad, and I can afford it.” Joe set it aside.
“This one?”
“Plaid?” Joe grimaced. “I’m not a lumberjack. But this one…” He took a black military-style shirt off the rack, holding it up to himself. “How do I look?”
Derek almost said “Sexy”, which he did. He refrained because it might give Joe the wrong idea. Instead he told him, “That’s a keeper.”
Joe found one more shirt, took everything to the checkout counter, and proudly paid for them. “I think I’ve got enough left for a pair of shoes, if they’re cheap,” he said as they left the store.
Given that the only pair he owned was black tennis shoes that had seen better days, Derek agreed. They went up to the mall’s second level, to an inexpensive shoe store. Joe had no idea what his size was—”I picked these at the drop-in place by trying stuff on until I found a pair that fit, just like with my clothes.”
The clerk measured his foot then pointed Joe in the right direction. He wandered up and down the aisle, picking up and rejecting shoes until Derek wondered if he�
��d find anything he liked and could afford.
Joe did. A pair of black chukka boots—“Whatever that means.”
Derek didn’t try to explain because he wasn’t certain himself.
When they left the mall, Joe was obviously tired but happy, if the smile on his face was any indication. As soon as they got home, he hung up two of his new shirts, coming out of his bedroom proudly wearing the military-style one. Derek whistled, getting an embarrassed smile in return. I was right; he does look sexy in it. Too sexy. As he had at the store, he kept his thoughts to himself.
They ate supper, took Sherwat for a short walk, and watched TV. Joe kept dozing off, sneezing, and then dozing off again until Derek suggested he get to bed. Joe didn’t argue. Twenty minutes later he was sound asleep with Sherwat in his usual place at the foot of the bed.
By then, Derek had turned off the TV and was upstairs. As he got undressed, he had a sudden vision of the two of them sharing the shower and his cock responded. With no other recourse, because willing it to relax wasn’t working, he did what he had to, jerking off as he stood beneath the hot water. He came with a muffled shout of release, very glad Joe was too far away to hear, even if he had been awake.
I’m going to have to be careful to keep my emotions under control when we’re together before I say or do something that will send him running. He wasn’t happy with the idea, but he knew it was the truth. Until he can believe in himself and accept that someone can care about him for who he is now, and not think of him as a whore because of what he went through, there’s not hope for me…for us.
Chapter 8
“This isn’t so hard,” Joe said when Derek finished teaching him how to make out the bills for the clients Monday morning. “But then I was pretty good with math when I was in school.”
“Then guess who gets to do this from now on.”
Joe held up one hand while he grabbed a tissue with the other to blow his nose. “If I catch the guy who gave me this cold…” he grumbled.
Derek patted his back. “As long as you don’t give it to me, we’re okay.”
“But I was taught that sharing was good,” Joe replied with a wink.
Derek snorted before showing Joe a few new websites to use for background checks, and how to access them. His last item of business before leaving was to open a file from a new client with a list of names. “If you find anything you think is hinky, make a note and I’ll double-check it when I get back.”
Joe nodded, knowing Derek wasn’t trying to put him down when he said that. After all, I am new at this, so he has to double-check it. It would suck if I said someone shouldn’t be hired because what looks bad to me really isn’t.
As soon as Derek left to do the two surveillance jobs on his agenda, Joe set to work. He made out three bills, emailing them to the clients as well as printing them out. Derek had told him that he kept hard copies of everything involving his clients as a backup, in case of emergencies.
The background checks were simple enough once he got the hang of going deeper into the information on the applications the people had filled out. The only thing that pinged his radar was one man who seemed to move every few months, although he hadn’t noted it on his application. He had no arrest record other than a couple of speeding tickets, so Joe wondered if his leases had been terminated because he caused problems with his neighbors or the landlords. Since he wasn’t certain how to find that out, he left it for Derek.
By the end of the morning he had finished everything Derek had asked him to do, as well as answering three calls, taking names, numbers, and why the person wanted to hire Derek.
After eating the sandwich he’d brought with him, he decided to see if he could find out anything more than Derek had told him about the trafficking ring he’d worked for—’worked’ being a euphemism for enforced sex slavery. One thing that had worried him since his escape was the idea that there were porn videos featuring him floating around on websites.
“Or did they have an exclusive list of clients they sold to?” he said under his breath as he began digging. “They dealt in porn with kids. Somehow I doubt they’d have advertised online since it’s illegal.”
He was well aware that Brock Weldon had chosen him because, even though he’d been sixteen at the time, he’d looked much younger. It had been the bane of his existence when he got to high school. A couple of the jocks had teased him unmercifully, calling him ‘Baby Face’ whenever they saw him.
From one news story about the break-up of the trafficking ring, he was able to find out that it had no web presence, which was a relief. Still, he wasn’t taking any chances. Derek had told him it was possible to use a major search engine to look for people by using their photos. Taking out his learner’s permit, he scanned his picture into a photo program Derek had. After reading the instructions from the search engine, he uploaded it, praying it wouldn’t find anything.
It didn’t, as far as any porn videos were concerned. What it did find were news stories from his hometown. Most of them were about shows he’d been in while in high school. He smiled as he read them, recalling how proud his family had been.
“Then they got the videos those bastards sent them to punish me,” Joe said angrily. He remembered his father’s words when his captors forced him to call and felt tears well up. He willed them not to fall as he read two more stories in the paper. They had to do with him going missing. His parents had told the police that they believed he’d been seduced, to use his mother’s word, into leaving with a man who had promised him a career in the movies.
Oh, I got that, in spades, just not the way she imagined.
He closed out of his search with one thought. The bastards are in prison. I hope to hell the inmates are treating them the way they treated me.
* * * *
Derek left the agency, heading straight to an apartment building in a low-income section of the city where Mr. Steven Garey, the man the insurance company thought was trying to scam them, lived. He had two photos of the man so that he’d recognize him if he left his building. Parking on the street, he settled in to wait. Twenty minutes later the man took off, wearing a neck brace and using a cane as he walked down to a bar a block away. Derek waited five minutes before going to the bar. His subject was seated in a booth in the back corner, fairly well hidden from view, with what Derek presumed were a couple of his drinking buddies.
He took a seat in the booth next to them, after stopping at the bar to get a beer. He had no intention of drinking it, but he needed the prop. Then he turned on the covert listening and recording device he had in his pocket.
It didn’t take long for one of the men to ask Garey, “When do you get the money for your, umm, accident?”
“Pretty soon, I hope,” Garey replied. “Like you promised, for a cut of the payout, the doc you told me about was willing to back me up about how much pain I’m in because of the fall. He told me what to say and how to act if they insist that I go to one of their doctors. Apparently it’s hard to prove someone, me to be exact—” he snickered, “—doesn’t have severe back pain.”
“Way to go,” the second man said, saluting Garey with his beer. “Maybe I should try something like that. It beats working for a living.”
“Only if you know what you’re doing,” Garey replied. “You fake it wrong and you really could end up with a bad injury. I know a guy that happened to…”
Because he had what he needed, Derek was about to get up and leave when Garey apparently removed the neck brace, telling his friends it was driving him crazy. “The things I go through to make an honest, or dishonest, buck.”
“What if someone sees you without it?” one of the men asked.
“Who?” Garey replied. “I’m not stupid. It goes on again before I get out of the booth.”
Pausing on his way to the door, Derek took out his phone and snapped a couple of shots of Garey without the brace.
Gotta love the stupid ones, and despite what he thinks, he is stupid.
&n
bsp; He drove to the insurance company to talk to the man who had asked him to check out Garey. After downloading the recording and the photos to the man’s computer, and getting a heartfelt “Thank you” in return for doing the job so quickly, he left.
His next stop—after picking up a fast food burger and fries that he ate in the car—was the Sullivan house. It was in a nicer neighborhood in the city, which he was afraid would make it difficult for him to find a vantage point that wouldn’t call attention to him. Difficult, but not impossible he discovered when he saw a small church at the far end of the block.
“Someone watches over fools and private detectives,” he said, pulling into a lot beside it which had four parking spaces. Two of them had signs saying they were reserved for the pastor and the organist. Apparently the others were for anyone who needed them. He backed into one and looked down toward the Sullivan’s place. He had an almost unobstructed view of the driveway—low bushes flanked it on both sides—so he’d be able to see if and when Mrs. Sullivan left.
He scrolled through his phone to find the local jazz station app, brought it up, and settled down to wait. And hour later he was halfway through Dr. John’s “Basin Street Blues” when he saw a car pull out of the garage and onto the street with Mrs. Sullivan at the wheel. He waited until she drove past him and turned the corner before starting to follow her, staying well behind her.
Eventually she came to her destination, a nice motel next to the highway leading out of the city. She parked in the lot and went inside. Derek parked two cars away, slung his messenger bag over his shoulder, and followed her at a discreet distance, getting into the lobby barely in time to see her enter one of the elevators at the far side. He watched the numbers above the door. If she wasn’t playing games, she got off on the fourth floor.
Strolling over to the front desk, he smiled at the clerk. “A woman just came in here who I’m sure is the visiting professor I was supposed to meet. She’s giving a lecture tomorrow evening at the art museum and she left a file behind—” he tapped his bag, “—after the introductory meeting with the trustees, so here I am. The problem is, her name’s not on the file and I’m darned if I can remember what my boss told me.” He frowned as if trying to remember. “Sutton, maybe, or Summers? I know it began with ‘Su’. If it helps, she got off on the fourth floor. Blonde, about five-eight, well-dressed?”
The Detective’s Apprentice Page 8
