Love, Like Water (26 page)

“Well, you coulda drove here,” Eli said, “but you mighta kept going, and we’da got a call from you from Flagstaff or someplace when you ran outta money.” He grinned and gave Josh one of his patented pecks on the lips. Josh had gotten a lot of them in the last couple of weeks, whenever they felt sure they were unobserved. “Tucker has more faith in you than that—he’s just worrit you’ll get lost. Now go on, or we’ll be necking in this truck all through your appointment.”

“I’d rather neck,” Josh said.

“Me too.” Eli leaned across him and opened the door. “Git.”

“What’s the name of the café?”

“Myrtle’s. Can’t miss it—it’s just four blocks down. If you get out early, come on down and we’ll get joe for the road.”

“Okay.” Josh got out of the truck and closed the door. With a brief wave, he turned and walked through the steel and glass doors of the office building.

E
LI
finished his cup of coffee, turned down the waitress’s offer of another refill, and checked the time on his cell phone. Nearly time for Josh’s appointment to be done. He’d read the newspapers here, flipped through the magazines, chatted with a couple of the regulars he knew from his bar-hopping days (Was it only a couple of months since he’d been down this way? Seemed it was, though it felt like longer), and was just about ready to go. He figured a nice leisurely stroll down Central and he’d meet Josh coming out.

The sun had gone down and a nice nippy breeze had sprung up, but the sky was clear. The balloon festival Albuquerque was famous for was next week, and from all forecasts, it looked like it would be a nice weekend. Eli wondered idly if Joshua would be interested in seeing it. It was something he needed to ask.

The last couple of weeks had been… strange. Amazing, but strange. Tucker had kept both him and Joshua too busy to get into mischief, and they’d had to be careful with so many people around, but they’d claimed cautious stray moments in a barn or shed, or on one of their rides as Eli introduced the ranch to Joshua.

He’d done as he’d promised, and taken Josh back out the canyon to check on the culls there, and that was one of the memories he’d keep ’til he was old and gray—of Josh salsa-dancing in the icy spray of the waterfall, stark nekkid, until the cold got to him and he went after Eli, dragging him down onto the grass and making love to him there in the dappled sunlight.

And then there were the nights. Not enough of them—Josh usually crashed after full days like the ones they’d been having, since his stamina still wasn’t what it should be. But the nights Eli heard the step on the porch, the faint creak of the screen door, and the soft pad of Josh’s sneakered feet…. Yeah, those nights were worth all the lonely quiet ones. The look in Josh’s eyes as he came into Eli’s bedroom told Eli exactly what kind of night he was going to have: lazy and amused meant long, slow lovemaking, with Josh biting the pillow as Eli pummeled him steadily from behind; hot and hungry meant a fast and desperate fucking, with Josh’s legs practically around Eli’s neck and his hands clamped to the slats of Eli’s headboard. And sometimes, there was just… lovemaking. Quiet and easy and comfortable.

And afterwards, after the slow fucking and the heated fucking and, sometimes, the fucking that wasn’t fucking at all—that, that was the best part, when, sodden and sated, the two of them cleaned each other up and clung together through the rest of the night, Josh’s breathing in Eli’s ear and his body warm and soft beside him. He supposed it was sloppy and sentimental of him, but he’d never had a lover before—not a real one, one who wasn’t just another trick who, even if he stayed the night at a hotel somewhere, always ended up leaving before breakfast.

Not that Josh didn’t leave before breakfast. But it was different.

He was wrapped in thought and didn’t notice the guy approaching until he was right in front of him. He stopped and met the guy’s friendly smile. “Hey,” the guy said.

“Hey,” Eli said back. The guy looked familiar.

“You used to hang out at Charlie’s, didn’t you? I haven’t seen you in a while.”

Charlie’s was one of the gay cowboy bars further down the street. Eli used to hang there, but it had been quite a while. That must be why the guy looked faintly familiar. “Yeah, I work a couple hours from here, so don’t get down as often as I used to.”

“Yeah, thought so.” The genuine smile didn’t fade, but the eyes flicked from Eli’s face to a point behind him. Eli was just about to turn when he felt a crashing blow to his back. His knees buckled, but when he reached out to catch himself on the guy in front of him, he stepped back and let Eli hit the sidewalk. “Fucking fag,” the guy said, all pretense of friendliness gone.

Another voice said, “Get him down here,” and Eli felt someone grab his shirt collar and yank up, cutting off his air and his ability to yell. The blow to the kidneys had left him half-paralyzed and disoriented, but he kept struggling, trying to get to his feet, trying to twist out of the steel grip on his collar, trying to…. The baseball bat that had hit him in the back came around and smashed into his face, and then darkness took him.

T
HE
receptionist had gone by the time the appointment was done, but McBride pulled up the scheduling program on the laptop and put in Joshua’s next one, for the same time the following week. Josh wasn’t sure if he was happy about it; each session seemed to get more grueling and he felt drained. He never intended to talk much at all, meaning to let the shrink take the lead and show Joshua what he wanted to hear, but somehow he always got Josh talking, and then it was two hours later and Josh felt like he’d been stripped, skinned, and deboned. But he also felt… eased, was the best way he could put it in his head. He felt like maybe some of the stuff he’d been carrying around wasn’t
necessary
anymore. And while there was still a lot he needed to deal with, he thought maybe there was some hope after all. That he wouldn’t drown in bad dreams. That he wouldn’t feel so worthless that he’d take another walk into the desert. That maybe, just maybe, he might someday, someday, be able to let go of the death of that pregnant girl in that warehouse. Not forget. Not forgive himself. But let go.

Maybe.

He walked out of the building and looked up the street in the direction of the café that Eli had mentioned. There wasn’t any sight of the cowboy. Josh checked his cell phone for the time and saw he was running a few minutes late. Eli probably hadn’t finished his coffee, or got caught up in a newspaper article or something. He moved at his own pace, Eli did. Joshua smiled a little to himself, and started walking up the street.

For it being a major street close to the university, it was pretty quiet—well-lit, but not a lot of traffic for an early evening just past rush hour. Joshua supposed it was busy during the day, but at this time of night, the businesses were closed and the bars not quite hitting their evening stride. And it was Tuesday, after all, hardly a night for drinking. But the restaurants he passed were lit, and there were enough cars passing that he didn’t feel uncomfortable.

But when he was halfway to the café and he still didn’t see Eli, he started to get a bad feeling. And after years of being in the police and the Bureau and in danger, he’d learned to trust his feelings. Something was not right.

He found the café and looked all through it, but there was no sign of Eli. One of the waitresses came over and said, “You looking for somebody, hon?”

“Yeah. Cowboy, gray hat, blond hair, wearing a blue plaid shirt?”

“Oh, Eli? Yeah, he was here. Marty, when did Eli leave?”

“Oh, about ten minutes ago,” the other waitress said from the coffee station. “Said he had to meet somebody. Guess you guys just missed each other.”

“Guess we did,” Joshua said. There was a roaring sound in his head, and his hands were ice. “Thanks.”

“Any time. Y’all come back soon!”

“Yes.” Joshua turned and moved quietly and quickly out the door.

Ten minutes. Shit. It wasn’t even a five-minute walk to the shrink’s. Could he have gone for the truck? No, he said he’d meet Joshua on the street or in the café. And he wasn’t in the café.

So he was somewhere on the street. Start there. Josh set off at a quick walk, letting his eyes skim over the street before him, the sidewalk on either side of it, looking for… what?

That
. Joshua bolted across the street, dodging the light traffic. If he had seen it earlier, he would have dismissed it as a bundle of newsprint, but he knew what it was that the breeze had blown up against the doorway of a storefront—a hat. A gray Resistol with a matching gray band. Joshua picked it up, but froze when he saw a dark discoloration on the brim. The streetlights didn’t give enough illumination to add color to it, but Joshua knew what it was. God knew he’d seen it often enough.

Blood.

He stood a moment, holding the hat, and trying to listen through the pounding in his head. It was in a doorway, equidistant between two alleyways or accessways or whatever they called them here. Eli could have gone through the door or been picked up by a vehicle. Or gone down one of the passages. But which?

The breeze—from the east. The hat would have blown here. He turned and ran up the street toward the dark opening between the two buildings, and bolted down it.

There was a steady, rhythmic thumping coming down the passageway, a sound too fucking familiar. He passed a dumpster, overflowing with construction materials, and without thinking, swept up a long piece of metal as he ran. It was too light for an effective weapon, but it seemed sturdy enough. Around a corner, the yellow light over a series of loading docks showed him three men surrounding something on the ground. One of them had a baseball bat and as Joshua ran silently toward them, he saw the bat rise and fall, and rise again, dark streaks on the pale wood.

The others were standing, watching, and cheering the man in low whispers. “Hit him again! Fucking faggot!” one said, and then the metal pole was whistling around, and the speaker went flying from the force of Joshua’s blow. Josh kept moving, whirling to take out the hitter, but the third man jumped on Joshua’s back, trying to get his arms around Josh’s neck.

Stupid redneck,
Josh thought savagely, and flipped him over onto his back, giving him a quick stomp in the solar plexus to drive the air out of him. The first man jumped back into the fray, apparently no more than momentarily dazed by the pole; he wrenched it from Joshua’s hands, but Josh kicked it loose and it went clattering off to the side. Josh followed up that kick with a second, driving the other man back against the concrete block of the loading dock.

The hitter came after him with the bat, but Josh ducked his wild swing and punched him in the gut. He was just about to hit him again when he heard a decidedly menacing click. He
knew
that sound, and its unexpectedness shook his focus for the first time in a very long time.

The hitter swung again and Josh kicked the bat out of his hand, just as he had the pole, but the guy went after it. “Cool it, Ben,” the first guy said. “Let it go. I got this.”

He did. In the dim light, Josh couldn’t make out what make of gun it was, but he knew what kind it was—the kind that killed people.
Fuck
. He stepped back, his hands raised, his mind clicking over all the possibilities….

The second guy got up from the ground, still wheezing, and punched Joshua in the face. Josh saw the blow coming and turned so that the guy’s blow only glanced off his cheekbone, but he went down as if he’d gotten him full face. “Pansy,” the guy said in disgust, and spit on him.

On the shadowed ground, Josh shifted, and drew his legs up, as if he were cowering, but eased forward so that his weight was on the balls of his feet. The man with the gun stepped forward, his broad face grinning in the sickly yellow light. “Well looky here. Looks like we’re gonna get two faggots for the price of one.”

Josh, keeping his eyes on the gunman, was aware of the others coming up on him on either side. “Hold the gun on him—he’s some kinda ninja or something.” That was the guy with the bat. “Don’t want to make too much noise, but I’m sure gonna enjoy pounding this asshole into dust.” He laughed. “You wanna scream, fairy, you go right ahead. Ain’t nobody in these buildings—they’re all closed up for the night.”

“
I
heard you,” Josh said, and exploded upward, right into the gunman, who’d moved just a bit too close. He drove him back against the dock, and wrenched the gun from his grip, then drove his elbow into the man’s throat. The man collapsed, gurgling.

Joshua whipped around and shot the guy with the bat in the knee. The man screamed and fell to the ground. Then he turned to the last man, who started to back away. “Oh, no,” Joshua said softly. “You get your fucking ass back here and sit down.” He indicated a spot next to Bat Guy. “Right there.”

Shaking, the man sat down. “You got a cell phone?” Joshua asked, still in that soft voice. At the man’s nod, Joshua said, “Get it out and dial 911, then hand me the fucking phone.”

The man obeyed.

“Lie down, on your belly, hands behind your head.”

Joshua backed away, towards Eli. He couldn’t think about Eli right that second. No. Could
not
think about Eli. When the 911 operator answered, Joshua said, “My name is Joshua Chastain. I interrupted a hate crime in progress. We need a couple of ambulances in the dock behind Marino’s Bakery on Central—I don’t know the address.” He kept an eye on the three men as he spoke. He didn’t dare look behind him at Eli. “One throat injury, one gunshot wound, and I don’t know the condition of the victim. And send police, please. Lots of police.”

Carefully, the gun still trained on the men, Joshua stepped to Eli’s side. “For your sake,” he said to the men, “he’d better be alive, or those ambulances won’t be needed.” He eased down into a crouch and touched Eli’s throat. His fingers came away wet, but the pulse was still there. Thready, weak, but there. “Eli?”

There was no response. “Fuckers,” he said to the men. “He survives, or you don’t. And don’t think that being in custody will help you. I can get to you anywhere, and nobody would know any different.
Pendejos
like you, you die easy. I’ve had lots of practice. Fact is, maybe I should just take you out now and save someone else the trouble later.” He tilted the gun sideways, then back. The rage was building. “It would be easy. You came at me, I defended myself. Did I tell you I’m ex-FBI? They kicked me out because I was too quick to kill.”