Total pages in book: 83
Estimated words: 82187 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 411(@200wpm)___ 329(@250wpm)___ 274(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 82187 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 411(@200wpm)___ 329(@250wpm)___ 274(@300wpm)
That hit Day hard.
Because God wouldn’t notice he wasn’t home either. And that realization shattered him.
Day needed to feel important and wanted as well.
“Okay,” he whispered.
Callum placed his hand on the small of his back and guided him into the town car. The door closed, cutting off the chill of the night.
Inside was heated. Dark. Soothing jazz played low through the speakers. His favorite.
He leaned his head back, closing his eyes again, and when the man reached out and brushed their fingers together, Day didn’t pull away.
“You want another hug?” he asked in that soothing voice.
Day turned and slid into his arms, resting his head against Callum’s warm chest, letting the beating of another heart settle his aching one.
It wasn’t sex. It wasn’t deceit, nor infidelity. It was two souls in the midst of hurt, taking solace in each other.
Day curled his fingers into Callum’s soft coat. “Cash used to listen to me, now it’s like he can’t hear me. Or he’s just choosing not to.”
“I know. But don’t give up on him. Cashel sounds like a good man. He’s noble and selfless, putting his life on the line every day to save others.”
“Yeah he is…he’ll try to save everyone but me,” he said bitterly.
Callum kissed the top of his head.
“You just need to remind him of what he has…or he’s going to lose it.”
Nothing else was said for the rest of the drive, it was just silent peace and an understanding between friends.
Ramon Vasquez
Vasquez pressed his thumb to the screen and stopped the recording.
He curled his lips slowly.
“Son of a bitch,” he whispered.
What in the hell did I just watch?
It was Lieutenant Leonidis Day. Atlanta’s ass-kissing, brown-nosing, picture-perfect police officer. The moral compass of the entire goddamn division.
The footage was shaky—Vasquez had zoomed in from across the street with his outdated phone—but he’d caught enough.
A man had stepped out of a town car as if he was arriving at the Met Gala, not a late-night hookup. Fancy getup, bald head gleaming, beard trimmed as if he had a full-time stylist.
And Day? Day had melted into the guy’s arms like hot wax.
They’d stood there a long time, hugging, whispering. Then the guy guided him into the car like a gentleman escorting his lover home after a night of discreet luxury.
Vasquez leaned back in the driver’s seat and let out a low chuckle.
“You dirty bastard.”
So that was who Day really was, huh?
All that self-righteous posturing, loyalty and unyielding love-for-my-man, was all bullshit, because there he was, sneaking off with a man who belonged on a cologne billboard.
Vasquez laughed, louder, low and ugly.
He sipped his coffee—that’d never tasted so good—marveling at his good fortune.
He hadn’t been planning to go to Havens, he usually hit the shitty gas station for his nightcap brew. But something told him to treat himself, so he did, and hit the damn jackpot.
He rewound the video.
No kissing on the lips, or hands on the ass. But come on.
A pickup off a dark corner in a chauffeured tinted vehicle. A long, emotional hug. A whispered something against the cheek before they disappeared inside and rode off.
Probably to fuck on some silk sheets at the Four Seasons.
Vasquez sat there for a long moment, the weight of his discovery bouncing around in his head like a new toy.
This…this was leverage. This could shatter Godfrey.
He could drop the footage in an anonymous email to the entire department. Let it bleed out like a good scandal deserved. Wipe that cocky smile right off Day’s face and crack the foundation of God’s world.
But…not yet. This moment needed to matter.
He started his car, tossed the phone onto the seat beside him, and headed back to the precinct with delight thrumming in his blood.
The narcotic’s task force office was empty. Most of the team must have been off-duty or still at Briarcliff doing cleanup from the warrant clusterfuck.
But Godfrey was in there. Alone.
Vasquez stared and plotted like a stalker from behind a half-wall partition.
The big man sat slouched in his chair as if the weight of a city was pressing down on him. He had his elbows on his knees, head buried in his hands, papers and files spread across his desk like a crime scene.
Vasquez tilted his head, mouth twitching in smug amusement.
Poor bastard.
Working himself to the bone while his husband was in the arms of another man.
I hope you’re ready for that desk to keep you warm at night, Lieutenant.
Vasquez tucked his phone back in his pocket.
Not yet. I’m gonna let this fester. I want it to really sting when I finally bite his ass back.
The breakroom lights were low, and he didn’t bother to turn them up. He made a beeline toward the vending machine when he heard him.
A silken voice, as smooth as bourbon going down slow stopped him in his tracks.
“You’re just in time.”