Nexus

I

S
OMETIMES
there were just not enough hours in the day, and no matter what I did, I could not get everything done. I had gotten extra pressure when my boyfriend—partner, the man I would take a bullet for—had told me we had to go out of town to his grandfather’s eightieth birthday party. Due to the fact that I was a senior associate at the law firm where I practiced, I had to work extra long and extra late to clear my schedule so I could get away. As a result of that, we had not been able to fly out together, but I had made sure we would be sitting side by side for the trip home. Holding the man’s hand during takeoff and landing—he was a nervous flyer—was really something I enjoyed.

Getting off the plane at the Blue Grass Airport in Lexington, Kentucky, I made my way down the stairs toward the baggage claim. I turned my phone on as I walked and called my sentinel, Jael Ezran. Along with practicing law, I was also a warder, which meant I hunted and killed things that went bump in the night. I stood between people and the demon horde along with my fellow warders—five of us altogether—with our sentinel Jael Ezran. Every city had five warders and one sentinel to lead them. Every night we took to the streets in pairs, one of us rotating to have a night, or more than one, off. If there wasn’t much going on, only two went out. If there was a lot of activity, then Jael patrolled with us and we’d be out in teams of two or three. It just depended on the creatures from the pit.

But in the light of day, I would normally be at work doing the lawyer thing at Kessler, Torrance and Price. I would be a partner soon, Mrs. Kessler had told me. She liked me, the board liked me, and the fact that my caseload was the heaviest of the associates and my win record was close to perfect had put me over the top. And I was pleased—tired but pleased—that I had proven myself beyond a shadow of a doubt to be one of the men who would see to the firm’s enduring legacy. And now I had been told to catch my breath.

It was not in my nature to rest on my laurels once I had shown what I was capable of, but to my surprise, it was what the other partners at the firm wanted. Everyone strongly suggested I take on fewer clients, the consensus being that they wanted me around for the long haul, not burned out at thirty-five. They hoped I could now enjoy my time off, so that when I was at work, I would be 100-percent invested and not worried about missing out on time with my partner, the wonderful guy they got to see and talk with at every company function. Lately I had been offered time-shares, cabins in Aspen, villas on Lake Cuomo, and a cabana in Tahiti. They wanted me to stay, and they knew me well enough to know that if Joseph Locke was happy, I was happy too. Over the years, after seeing how everyone at the firm responded to the man I loved, I was so glad I had gone with my gut.

I had been courted by many firms out of law school but had decided on a smaller, more prestigious one many of my peers had promised would never promote me. I was gay, I was black—it would never happen. But I had sat with the managing partner and owner, Helene Kessler, and looked in her eyes, and her gaze was unwavering when she spoke candidly about my future and what she could see for me if I worked hard and made a believer out of her. She wanted me because of my brain. The rest—color, sexual orientation, even the car I drove—meant nothing.

As time passed, I saw that my decision had been the best one I could have made. I was proud that I worked for a law firm that had no concerns with the fact that I lived with and loved another man. I had heard horror stories from some of my fellow attorneys at other firms and could only say that, in my experience, there had been no problem with my homosexuality. Helene Kessler ran her firm based on performance, end of story. She didn’t really give a damn
who
you slept with… except for her brother-in-law Ray. The man in question was who I had just finished defending, and the people in his bed were of paramount importance to her.

I had been called to her office two days ago, and unlike our usual meetings, she was not sitting at her desk and inviting me to do the same. She was instead standing at her window, watching the rain pelt the glass. When she turned and looked at me, her eyes were clouded.

“Mrs. Kessler,” I said softly, gently, crossing the room to her side.

“Helene,” she corrected as she had been lately.

It would be strange to start calling her by her first name, but as she had become insistent, I had to honor her wishes. “Helene,” I acquiesced. 

Silently, she passed me a file folder, and I was surprised to realize I was looking at the arrest sheet of her sister’s husband. I started flipping through it immediately.

“He needs to seek treatment for sex addiction and drug addiction,” she told me, her voice flat and hard like it never was.

I skimmed the contents. Her brother-in-law was found with copious amounts of cocaine and with one—no, two— prostitutes, and—

“Ray was discovered with three escorts….” She trailed off.

“Where was—oh,” I said, because I finally saw the name of the third girl, woman—no, girl, just barely eighteen. Christ.

“Passed out, all four of them. The hotel manager called the police when there was no answer in the room after check-out time, and when he went in no one would wake up.” She took a breath. “Ray needs to be confined to a hospital so he can be treated,” she sighed. “His wife, my sister, is just….” She looked at me, saw me squinting at her. “Oh God, Marcus, we both know I was thinking of a judgeship, and now this? Jesus, I just need it to go away. I got it on Judge Rojas’s docket for the morning, so…. Just keep him out of jail, throw him in a psychiatric facility, and have them try and cure him of being a sex addict. Lock him up and throw away the key. I don’t give a damn, just—”

“I’ll handle it,” I promised, hand on her shoulder.

She nodded, covering my hand with hers for the briefest of moments before she started rubbing the bridge of her nose under her glasses, a quirk of hers when she was nervous.

“It won’t go away,” I said honestly. “But we’ll deal with it as quickly and quietly as we can. I promise you won’t have to deal with it. I’ll take care of everything.”

“I know you will,” she said. “You’re the only one I trust.”

I was pleased to hear it, and when I had gone straight to her office after court that morning, she had been waiting for me.

“It’s done. He’s in a treatment program, and he’ll do his time, six months, at that facility.”

She nodded, waiting.

“Your sister was there,” I said gently. “She cried a lot.”

“She’s an idiot.”

“You can’t help who you love.”

“Oh no?”

I shook my head. “You married the perfect man, and he died too soon, and I’m going to say this to you because we’re friends, aren’t we?”

“Of course,” she snapped. “Do you think I spend my holidays with just anyone?”

I smiled at her. “Now listen. It’s time, you know. Woman does not live by work alone.”

“Time to do what?”

“Date.”

“Bite your tongue,” she chided me, getting up and walking to the huge window in her enormous corner office.

“We’ll work on it.”

She made a dismissive noise.

“Don’t push me. I’ll have Joe call you.”

Her head turned so she could see me over her shoulder. “You and I both know that he’s irresistible. Please don’t sic him on me.”

“Well, then, I want to see you take a man to the opera fund-raiser in two weeks. If I have to go, you have to have a date.”

She grunted and did a quick turn so her back was against the glass. “What else about Ray?”

“If he messes up again, he’s going to do time, and there’s nothing you’ll be able to do about it.”

“Okay.”

“I talked to Weber Ford at the
Chronicle
, and he said he’d bury it as far back as he can.”

“Thank you.”

“You can’t be blamed for your family.”

“Oh, yes I can. Everything they do reflects on me.”

“It’ll be all right.”

“Or it won’t, but I refuse to just cover it up and end up owing the wrong people too much. It’s not worth my soul.”

“No. It’s not.”

“Thank you, Marcus. I’ll look forward to having you as a senior member of this firm.”

My gaze settled on hers in question.

“It’s time. We both know it is. Everyone here knows it is. You’ve worked hard; you’re the only one at this firm that every board member believes in. We’re voting Friday. I’ll have good news for you when you get back from your trip to… I’m sorry. Where are you going again?”

I chuckled. “Kentucky.”

Her face scrunched up tight. “What on earth for?”

“It’s great there, actually, and Joe’s grandfather is turning eighty.”

“I suspect he’s not the draw, but instead your charming partner.”

I arched a brow. “You think Joe’s charming?”

She laughed then, for the first time in days. “Yes, Marcus, I certainly do.”

“Huh.”

“Marcus.”

A voice saying my name brought me from my thoughts and into the present. The phone had been picked up on the other end, but not by Jael, because he would have called me by my warder name, Marot, and not my given name. There was also the voice itself to take into account. What I was being treated to was a sound much softer, smoother, richer, a smoky tenor in comparison to the usual growl of my sentinel.

“Ryan,” I said, knowing the man’s voice as well as my own. He had been my fellow warder a long time.

“Hey.”

“Tell Jael I landed in Lexington and I’m good, all right?”

“Will do.” He yawned first and ended with a sigh.

“Why’re you there?”

“Jael is thinking he wants to cook when Deidre’s warders come to visit next week.”

I wasn’t going to touch that one. “I’m sorry?”

“Well, you know that Deidre Macauley, the sentinel he’s been seeing from Edinburgh? She is having her warders fly over here to meet Jael, and he was thinking it would be a good idea to show them how well he could take care of her, so he was going to cook.”

“Okay.”

“Yeah, see, Malic thought the same thing. He thought Jael should have the dinner catered or take everyone out, and then the warders could see that he actually has money and can provide well for their sentinel.”

Being a sentinel, being a warder, was not a paid gig. Some sentinels and some warders were nowhere near the top of the food chain. Because of Jael’s inheritance and some very shrewd investing, his family fortune had grown tenfold in his lifetime. He could provide Deidre with quite a nice life, if that was what she wanted. Having met the lady, however, I knew that no man would ever have to take care of her. It would be nice for him to show off for her warders, though.

“I don’t get the cooking.”

“Neither do I, but whatever.”

“So you’re there teaching him how to cook something.”

“Yep.”

“Should I even ask what?”

“No, don’t ask. You don’t wanna know.”

I laughed at him because he sounded so pained. “Sorry,” I chuckled. “Just tell the big man I’m okay, and I’ll see you in a week.”

“What are you doing there again?”

“Joe’s grandfather’s birthday.”

“Oh, that’s right.”

Something occurred to me. “Maybe Deidre’s warders would like the idea of him cooking, of her being more involved with a man who treated his own warders like family—maybe that’s what’s up with the cooking.”

There was a moment of silence before he answered me. “Christ, it must be exhausting to be you, thinking about everything all the time.”

I grunted.

“I’ll call you if anyone dies,” he said.

“That’s not funny,” I told him.

“Did you pack your swords, or did you leave them at home?”

“Why would I pack my swords to come to a birthday party?”

“It
is
Kentucky.”

“So lemme get this straight. You’ve been all over the world,
Mr. I-Used-To-Be-A-Model
, but you think Lexington is some hick town where packing hook swords would be a good idea?”

“I have no idea.”

“I know you don’t. You’re just talking out of your ass.”

He huffed. Normally he wasn’t like that; he was thoughtful, not prejudiced against a place he didn’t know. Something was wrong.

“Are you going to tell me?” I asked.

“Tell you what?”

I stayed quiet and waited.

“It’s nothing.”

“Sure.”

“I’m just irritated.” He sighed deeply, breaking down. “One of Deidre’s warders, Collin something, artistic type with A Flock of Seagulls haircut, is already here, and I’m thinking from the looks of things that he finds my boyfriend somewhat appealing.”

If I were there, I would have wished Collin with the ’80s retro haircut good luck. No one was taking Ryan Dean’s hearth away from him… no one. And since Ryan was the kind of gorgeous that people stopped on the street to watch walk by, he really had nothing to worry about. But he loved Julian Nash desperately, so it wasn’t all that surprising that he was worried. It was, however, needless.

“You know, I’ve actually met Julian,” I soothed him. “He’s kind of the loyal type.”

“No, I know. It’s just… where does Collin get off disrespecting me?”