Shattered Glass (49 page)

operation. The other seven people in that file are buried somewhere unknown, along with the girl. Dench had a strike of conscience. He tucked evidence in two safety deposit boxes. If he handed over Peter’s box it meant jail time. The second kid’s box was a death sentence for everyone involved. Buchanan thinks he keeled over from the stress. By then he had hidden both sets of passports.”

“Until Peter dredges some of them up, minus the most important evidence.”

Luis grunted his agreement. “Del and Frank see Alvarado in custody, they watch the interview tape and see that he’s ready to deal.”

“They had to get rid of him,” I finished. “So how’d they set up Cai?”

“They went after Alvarado. In an effort to save himself, he tells them that your boy has the passports.” “Peter, not boy,” I corrected offhandedly. It was getting uncomfortable that people were describing him as a boy. Even if to Luis I was a kid.

“Leila offs Alvarado, and that’s when Nikolaj comes back to the house. Probably to off Alvarado himself. Now they have a witness, but the boy takes off before they can take care of him.” “They don’t know who he is and can’t ask Alvarado because he’s dead,” I guessed.

“Yep. Nikolaj ran out of the house, so he was nice and visible to all the neighborhood, but none of them recognized him. Then you come into the station and ID him. They know who the kid is now, but they also know you’re involved with Peter. So, instead of going after Peter directly, they decide they

do two things. Get you off the case somehow and then use Nikolaj as leverage. They arrest the kid. Then comes a second problem”

“Cai’s figured out that there’s one more safety deposit box that no one knows about but him.” If I wasn’t so anxious to get out of there, at this point I could have made a crack about how good things do come from fucking with witnesses. But I was tired and all I wanted to do was go back to the hospital.

“Nikolaj tells them he has the evidence. But he’s in custody.

And then Peter goes straight to you when the kid is arrested.

Next thing they know, the kid is at your house and guarded by the FBI. They can’t get to him. They can’t get to the brother.

Until the kid leaves to see his shrink.” I knew the rest. “Were all of them involved?” I didn’t want to hear that Dave had been involved in this disgusting event.

Everything I believed in the world would have come crashing down on me if I learned he was capable of this monstrousness.

“You want to know about Buchanan?” Luis asked. I kept eye contact and waited, angrily contorting a paperclip during the interim. Luis pulled a package of Mexican taffy out of his pocket and offered it to me. I chose a green one and stabbed the pointy end of the paper clip viciously into it. “Haven’t heard his whole story,” my partner continued. “From what I hear, he was funneling money only. They didn’t tell him about the girl’s death or the illegals until after you got suspended.” At which point Dave came to spy on me. Although it was good to know he wasn’t the worst of the worst, I was ashamed to admit I might have stood by my best friend even if he’d been more involved. I had my limits, but did they stop at cover-ups?

Which made me consider something more relevant to my future.

Could I ever be a good cop after this?

52:14

Fifty-two hours, fourteen minutes. That was how long it took for the doctors to move Peter from ICU to his own room. Of those hours, I spent less than thirty minutes alone with him.

Alone meaning Zhavra and Darryl were either asleep, home or down in the cafeteria.

We spoke very little. Peter was tired, and the times where he stayed awake for extended periods, I gave to his mother. In return she gave me dirty looks and informed me I would not be “dragging her son with me to hell.”

I responded in my typical mature and professional manner.

“Surely not for just the one blow job. I don’t even think I was that good. It’s because I swallowed, isn’t it?” She spat something in Russian at me. It only made me flash her every tooth in my head.

“Austin,” Peter warned. I winced, refusing to turn around to look at him until Zhavra brushed by me with her arms open.

“Petya, you are awake.” She kissed his forehead. I’d seen him do that exact same thing to Cai. The memory made my heart contract.

“I’ll go hang out in the waiting room.” I worried that Peter was listening to her about going to hell. Was he rethinking the last two weeks now that things had settled? Was I? And what did it say about my current mental state that ‘settled’ was the term I used to define where we were now?

“Wait, Austin. Mamma, it’s nearly ten and you’ve been here

all day. Go get some sleep.”

“I do not think you should be alone with this man, Petya.” “I’m twenty years old, mamma,” was all Peter said. I wasn’t sure why I was on the receiving end of her glare that time.

“I see you early tomorrow.” She kissed him again, her lips lingering on his cheek and her eyes closing. A wave of guilt passed over me when her hand slipped into his and squeezed.

The other hand shook slightly as she swept it over his forehead.

“I can take you to your hotel, Mrs. Dyachenko,” I offered.

She considered me with a hard look, then her wrinkles smoothed. “Thank you, but Petya wishes to speak with you. I will have a cab.” Gently taking her purse from the side table, she headed for the door, stopping next to me. Without turning, she said, “You may pick me up. Early. Do you understand early?” “Between noon and one?” I grinned.

“He’s kidding, mamma,” Peter interrupted and sighed at me after she had left. “Do you have to antagonize her?” “I’m an ass. It’s what I do. Does she have to act like I’m going to toss you on your stomach and assrape you in front of her?” I sat to his side and dragged a finger over his hand.

“Pretending you’re not thinking about it?” “You look like shit. Fucking you is not in the cards. I was thinking blow jobs.”

“Can you sit on the other side?” He moved his hand away.

“Why?”

“You know why. Can you just do it?”

“I don’t give a fuck about the colostomy bag, Peter. It’s temporary anyway.”

“What if it’s not temporary?”

“Then I guess the rest of my life will be resigned to doggy style sex.” The words were out of my mouth before I could think about them. “I mean however long…when we’re…that wasn’t a fucking proposal.”

“Okay.”

“Don’t smile like that. Smugness doesn’t become you.” “Okay.”

“Scoot the fuck over. You’re hogging the bed.” “I can’t move myself. I’ll split my stitches.” After some maneuvering, I lay down next to him and used my arm as a pillow. The other hand was firmly attached to the remote control. I flipped to baseball. “Do you even like sports?” “Hockey.” He took the remote and replaced it with his hand.

We watched most of the third inning before he spoke again.

“Austin, about being exclusive.” My stomach tied itself into knots.

“Yeah?”

“It’s not the end of the world if you want to change that.” “That what you want?”
What the fuck?

“You are just out. It’s too soon for you to be exclusive.” Because he sounded so tired, I held my anger in check. “Is that so?”

He blew out roughly. “You’re angry. Again.” “You’re telling me how I feel. Again.” “Just think about it.”

“Think about fucking anything that moves until I can decide if I want to be exclusive to someone? How many dicks do I have to suck to get to the center of my gayness?” “Or dating or just being with men like you. It doesn’t have to

be reduced to fucking. But yeah, you’re going from gay to relationship in two weeks.” His heart monitor accelerated. I needed to control my anger and not perpetuate or escalate the argument.

I squeezed his hand and scooted until on my side, facing him.

“Listen to me, because this is about as serious as I get.” His nose twitched, nostrils flaring. I forgot what I was going to say when the epiphany hit. “Your Tourette’s,” I said, smiling in wonder.

His face became icy still. “Fuck off.” I laughed and kissed his nose. “That’s why you give those glacial looks. You’re controlling your twitches.” “Not just twitches, Austin. You have this idealism that’s just not realistic when it comes to me. My nose twitches. My nostrils flare. I clear my throat twenty or thirty times an hour. I get facial ticks. Sometimes I bark. Still think it’s so cute?” The monitor ticked louder.

I did think it was cute. To me, everything about Peter was cute. But my nose was broken and that was his go-to appendage when he was pissed off. I decided to ignore his question for now. “When I was sixteen my grandfather told me he’d cut me out of his will if I saw my faggot friend ever again. I think he and my dad knew what I hadn’t admitted to myself.” The burrow of Peter’s brows amused me. “I didn’t care. Not about the money.

Not ever about the money.” I dragged my arm from under my head and smoothed out his brow with my thumb, willing him to relax. “It wasn’t until after Jesse died, when I was vulnerable, that he struck.

“He was astute. A genius lawyer. He figured me out and how

to get to me. ‘Just you remember, boy, fags live alone and die alone. And anyone associated with them. Do you want a family?

Don’t you want a normal life? Or do you want to die alone?

Hear me, boy?’”

It hurt when Peter pulled back from my hand, turning his face to the ceiling. I guess I had my answer, but maybe I needed the nail driven in further to fully appreciate how much I was alienating him with my commitment issues. Which were less issues than needs. “He knew what I was, and he knew that I needed to be part of a family more than I needed to be myself.” “Austin—”

“So I really don’t need to fuck a bunch of men to figure out who I am and what I want, Peter. I just need to fuck one.” “Okay.”

I exhaled at Peter’s universal word for an excited yes.

“Okay,” I said.

“I come with a lot of baggage.”

“And a colostomy bag.” He gaped at me. I lifted his sheet and looked at his stomach. “Seriously, that’s gross.” He reached up and flicked me on the nose. “Ow! Christ!” My eyes were watering, and my nose throbbing, but I was smiling as I leaned in and kissed him.

“God, you’re an ass.” He laughed.

I Might As Well Grow a Vagina with All This Sharing Nurses awakened us at four to check his abdomen for infection, and I decided to stay awake so I could pick up his mother at six.

The nurse lifted his gown and prodded his stomach. The small bullet hole was patched, but the slash from sternum to below his

belly button was panic inducing. I avoided looking at his wounds and used the time to catch him up on the case.

“So all of those people are dead?” Peter asked.

“The seven women and men who shared the safe house with the girl were killed, along with four more at the whorehouse, they think. None of the cops was part of that, so they say, and Leila isn’t talking anytime soon. They haven’t found the bodies yet.”

“Joe?”

“We think the stress of keeping the secret caused his heart failure. He had called Ron several times to intimate he had evidence but wasn’t sure what to do with it.” “He died protecting Iss.” He smiled a little, but it was melancholic. I hadn’t destroyed his cop—hero completely. He wasn’t the good man Peter had thought, but he wasn’t a monster. “Romantic in a bizarre way.” “Since when are you romantic?”

“You’ve known me two weeks, Detective Glass. I know how to cook, I like beer, I want to stick my tongue in your ass, I secretly love that disgusting cat Cai brought home and I’m romantic
. Still so sure about me?” “I’ll rethink the exclusive nature of our relationship if you bring home another cat. Or another brother. You can have all the beer you want. It’s not detective any longer. I’m unsure about the tongue in ass. I’m equally disgusted and intrigued.” Obviously, I wasn’t that disgusted. I was also hard.

He took a deep breath. “They fired you?” “They were probably going to, but I quit.” “Aren’t you some kind of hero or something?”

“Who announced he’s gay to the stationhouse, slept with a suspect, concealed evidence of his lover’s crime, housed a murderer and is best friends with a crook?” He relaxed into the pillow and yawned. It set off a chain event. I yawned. The nurse checking his vitals yawned. She also loitered a little too long during our conversation. “What are you going to do now?”

“Devote a few months to learning about gay sex." I bit his nose gently and cradled his jaw in my hand. “After that? Maybe I’ll try private investigation.”

“Cool. I can be your man Friday.” My brows popped up at the reference. He smiled and shook his head, then turned to the television. With a touch of his hand, the screen flickered on. “I like that I can surprise you.” Suddenly, he turned off the television and cocked his head. “How’d Cai get free?” “The FBI. They tracked him down. Rosa is a pretty important witness. Her son demanded full attention.” “Is Cai still in trouble?”

I shook my head. “Angelica is fighting to get him released.

They have to formally drop the charges. He’ll probably be free tomorrow.” I raised my brows at the nurse who was eyeing us sideways and pretending to write things down on the chart. Who was she trying to fool? Her pencil wasn’t even touching the paper.