Chapter 11
Danny felt a much needed lightness infuse his limbs as he returned home after a quick stop at the precinct. The week had ended strained and unfulfilling, with case work and Zeus work alike, but none of that mattered today. In a few hours he’d be able to ignore everything that made him feel fractured and empty because with Cho, all the power that eluded him in the rest of his life came back under his control.
He had to applaud himself for earlier, for lightning jumping into Cho’s apartment and leaving dinner. He’d wanted to look around so badly, especially in the bedroom, which he hadn’t seen much of during their last romp. Anything more personal or sensitive had to be up there. But Danny knew better than to give the game away. Cho would know. Cho would be watching. Clever criminal that he was, there was no doubt in Danny’s mind that Cho had his home under heavy surveillance. So Danny had put on a good show to make sure the man had no reason to doubt his intentions.
Planning to relax at home for a while before he headed out again, it was rare that Danny simply allowed himself to exist within the walls of his family house anymore. Often he sequestered himself in his bedroom or never came home at all. The morgue had a few places where Danny could crash, and he did so more often than not. But today, having something to look forward to later, the house didn’t feel as suffocating.
“Hey, John, are you—?” Joey’s voice called out just as Danny turned the corner for a clear view into the dining room. The boy cut off when he saw Danny. He sat at the table with his backpack and several open books spread out, along with a notepad and the local newspaper. “Oh. Hey.”
“Hey,” Danny said, slowing his walk but feeling compelled to continue into the dining room now that he’d been spotted. Sometimes he still forgot that it wasn’t just him and his father who lived here. “Dad was at the precinct when I stopped in. He’s probably on his way home.”
“Sure.” Joey nodded, black eyes darting down to his books. He wore another T-shirt with a lightning bolt on it today. Where did he find them all? Though it seemed as if they put lightning bolts on everything lately in this city.
“Homework?” Danny asked the obvious, smiling and trying not to seem too forced or like he was merely looking for an excuse to move through the dining room into the kitchen.
“Yeah.” One word answers were par for the course with Joey, but Danny was trying at the moment, couldn’t he see that?
Reaching the edge of the table, Danny glanced at the organized mess Joey had created, but it was the newspaper that drew his attention, since the front page sported a photo of him—of Zeus during one of his many standoffs with Thanatos. Danny’s good humor threatened to drain out of him and he had to fight to keep his smile.
“That doesn’t look like homework,” he said, picking up the paper to read the headline—SIX MONTHS OF SAFETY, it said. Right.
“Idle reading between AP US History chapters,” Joey shrugged.
The story was about the anniversary of Thanatos’s disappearance. About the likelihood of his death even though a body had never been found.
No, there wouldn’t be a body. There couldn’t be.
“You sure you want to be reading this?” Danny gestured with the paper before letting it drop back to the table. The general rule around the house was to not talk about that night, just like Andre and Lynn made an effort to never bring up how the events of six months ago had gone down.
Joey’s head raised slightly, enough for his eyes, so black Danny couldn’t see the irises, to center on him and hold him captive. Not that Joey was trying to stare him down; his gaze always did that to Danny. “It’s okay,” Joey said. “It’s about how much safer the city’s been since Zeus chased Thanatos off. Fewer Elemental attacks. Less crime in general. All over the city. Even the mob families have been quiet.”
Danny huffed before he could stop himself. “What do you know about mob families?”
Joey frowned. “I know Zeus stopped one from taking an armored car once.”
“Yeah, that Prometheus and the Titans got away with instead.” Damn it. Why couldn’t Danny say things without mocking in his voice? He didn’t mean to, the words just came out of him that way when Joey was around, like every ounce of resentment and guilt he felt was reflected back at him from those dark eyes.
“What do you got against Zeus anyway?” Joey challenged.
They’d had this discussion. Danny had said a few too many times that Zeus hadn’t done enough that night at the power station. He couldn’t help it. He knew Zeus didn’t deserve Joey’s devotion.
Joey’s eyes stayed trained on Danny, hooded despite looking up at him from his seat at the table. “He’s a hero. He tried. Good guys can’t save everybody. No one else even stood up to Thanatos. Why can’t you get that? The city gets that,” he jutted his chin at the paper.
The city loved Zeus. The city was filled with gullible people who wanted something to believe in to make them feel safer. The city got to separate the man from the superhero and go about their lives in ignorance.
It was easy to love a hero. Men were harder.
“You’re right,” Danny said even if he didn’t believe it. He would not be brought down today, not today, not even by his own hang-ups. He pulled on a smile. “Need help with anything? I took APUSH in high school too, ya know. Might even remember a few things.”
Joey sat there like a five-foot-six huddled ball of tension.
“I’m home!” John called from the entryway.
Danny couldn’t miss the look of relief on Joey’s face or the release of stiffness from his shoulders.
“I’m good,” Joey said with quiet loathing in his words. “Da—” He practically bit down on his tongue. “John’s home,” he corrected.
Wondering how often Joey called John ‘Dad’ when he wasn’t around, Danny’s gut twisted. Stella often encouraged it. She said it helped kids adjust to being part of a family again, even if the situation was temporary. It wasn’t as if saying ‘Dad’ was forbidden. Danny should tell Joey that. He should say…something.
But he didn’t.
“Hey,” John smiled as he came into the room. “What’s everybody up to?”
Refusing to let his good mood dwindle, Danny didn’t want to be in the dining room anymore. “Just grabbing a drink, Dad. You want anything?” he offered, then quickly made scarce to escape into the kitchen. His time with Cho couldn’t come fast enough.
ß
It didn’t come fast enough, which was why Danny found himself walking into Cho’s apartment building almost twenty minutes early.
“Whoa! Careful, little guy,” Danny said as he was nearly plowed into by a young boy charging down the stairs from the second floor. He looked about ten, dark skin, closely cropped hair, and striking blue eyes—Water leaning. A pregnant woman who had to be his mother hurried down after him, looking frazzled. She had the same complexion but her eyes were brown.
“Sorry,” she smiled at Danny before hurrying on. “Michael, slow down!”
“No problem!” Danny called after them. He hadn’t seen anyone the last couple of times he’d been to Cho’s building. Considering some of the neighborhood, with Haven not too far away, Danny had expected a rougher crowd for Cho’s neighbors, but then his apartment was actually really nice for such an old building in a bad part of town. Danny hoped the woman knew what she was doing living in a place like this, with no idea that a supervillain lived a few doors down from her.
He knocked when he reached Cho’s apartment. This time they’d have dinner, and Danny would lay the groundwork for the rest of his plan. As long as things always veered to sex, Cho would be suitably distracted from guessing his true intentions.
Danny was distracted too, admittedly, because he did want the man—that body, that smirk, those eyes—but once Danny got this out of his system, he knew he’d be able to move on to someone better. Maybe then h
e’d be ready for something real. Maybe someday, the danger would be lessened enough that he wouldn’t have to worry about a girlfriend or boyfriend being bait for his enemies.
As Cho opened the door, Danny mustered the smile that had started to slip. The unimpressed eyebrow raise and the way Cho didn’t open the door completely to invite him in told Danny that he wasn’t pleased by the earlier home invasion. Or maybe he was. There was a hint of that smirk again.
“I only left the food and the note.” Danny held up his hands. “No peeping. I had some time to kill this afternoon and thought you’d think it was…cute.”
“Cute,” Cho repeated with his lilting voice. “Breaking into my house is cute?”
“You break into places all the time,” Danny said.
He had Cho there, and the man’s amusement betrayed itself, but he didn’t gesture Danny inside just yet.
“Plus, you steal things,” Danny pointed at him accusingly, “whereas I left something for you. I think that should earn me some brownie points.”
“Points?”
“Yeah. How about we keep score as long as points can be traded for lewd acts in the bedroom?”
Cho’s paltry front dissolved in lieu of a grin. Stepping back finally, he opened the door the rest of the way. “You’re lucky you chose dinner from somewhere I like because believe me, Sparky, the points are in my favor at the moment, and I plan to cash in all of them later.”
Glancing down Cho’s body appreciatively, the last traces of the tension Danny had been carrying were forgotten. He slipped inside the apartment past Cho, feeling accomplished and more confident each moment he sparred with the man for verbal dominance. Hate him or not, he did enjoy their scuffles.
Cho was in jeans again and a thick, intricately-woven, heather-grey sweater. He really did look good in everything—and nothing. Seeing him in sock-clad feet was alluring too.
Danny toed off his shoes to appease the man’s rules but was once again struck by the apartment. He found himself staring, not only because of its general impressiveness but because Cho had dinner ready and waiting for him. The sandwiches were laid out on platters, with a plate for each of them at the kitchen island—Cho didn’t have a dining table—as well as the salad tossed in a nicer bowl and the cookies spread over a plate of their own. There was also a bottle of wine, not yet opened.
“Don’t flatter yourself too much,” Cho said as he crossed behind Danny into the kitchen and brought out two wine glasses. “You’re the one who insisted on buying dinner. Wouldn’t want your stamina to wear out later. Wine?”
“Please.” Danny smiled as he took up the stool he’d sat in before. Things were progressing even better than he could have hoped. Waiting for a nod from Cho, he started to fill his plate. “Buy me something expensive next time, and we’ll really have this affair in full swing. Wait…forget I said that. You’ll just steal something.”
Cho chuckled and took the stool next to Danny, passing over a nearly full glass of wine. “I do have money, Danny.”
“Money that comes from criminal activity, so it’s basically the same as stealing.” Danny never lost his smile as he took a drink to try the wine. Heady and delicious—just like Cho.
“Yet that didn’t stop you from eating my Thai food.”
“That was an emergency.”
“Uh huh.”
“Fine. But I think the foundation of this arrangement is agreeing to disagree.” Danny took a large bite of his salad.
“About buying you something pretty? Because I could get on board with that.”
“I said expensive, not pretty,” Danny said with a half-hearted scowl.
Cho shrugged, “Why not both?” then trailed his eyes down Danny’s lanky frame. “Of course I can imagine several things from my own closet draped over that body, and then we could avoid any moral conundrum.”
Danny shivered at the direction this was going. “Such as?”
Taking a drawn out bite of his own salad, Cho pulled the fork from his lips and teeth slowly. “How about...one of my best dress shirts. And nothing else?”
How did the man do that with just his voice?
“Though I have stolen some lovely jewelry over the years. Lucy kept most of what we didn’t fence, but a few pieces spoke to me.”
“Around here?” Danny turned his head to look at the apartment.
“Now, now, do you think I’d be so foolish as to have anything traceable in my home?”
“Maybe not traceable, but that doesn’t mean not stolen.” Danny licked his fork enticingly.
He was on the end of the island, with Cho perpendicular to him at his right. Even the way the man sat with one foot dangling to the floor, the other propped on the rung of the stool, was poised and purposeful and picturesque. Before becoming Zeus, Danny never would have believed a man like Cho would show interest in him. Holding such easy sway over someone who oozed sex appeal made Danny feel more powerful than even his lightning could offer.
“Anything else?” Danny asked.
Cho eyed him approvingly, like he was envisioning so many naughty scenarios. “Mmm…” he hummed low and sultry, giving Danny goose bumps as blue eyes scanned him leisurely then flicked to his face to capture his gaze. “But if we get too distracted, we’ll never finish dinner.”
Danny laughed. He had to concede on that. So they ate. Drank wine. And cast each other frequent, furtive glances as they talked.
“Tell me, Sparky, any new villains tripping you up?”
On his second sandwich by now, Danny paused before taking another bite. “Worried about competition?”
“Maybe.” Cho inclined his head. “Heard more about that Virgil Labs case of yours. The one that interrupted our first night. It pays for me to keep tabs on other criminal elements in my city.”
“Looking for pointers?”
“Believe me,” Cho said with a slight chuckle, “if the police knew anything useful, I’d know by now too. But it seems this mystery thief even surpasses me when it comes to making a clean getaway. Any insider knowledge you’d like to share that a certain do-gooder hasn’t made public yet?”
Danny shot him a disbelieving stare. He should never discuss an ongoing case with someone outside the precinct, especially when that someone was a wanted criminal. But then maybe it was safer to keep on Cho’s good side as long as he didn’t give away anything that Prometheus could use someday.
“First of all, I’m not admitting I’d tell you if I did know something…but no. Whoever it is might actually get away with this. Either they have amazing tech or an unknown Elemental power, but I have no clues as to which it is or what or…anything.” Danny took an aggressive bite of his sandwich. He hated when answers eluded him, especially when such a high profile case had the captain breathing down his neck. “It’s simpler when the bad guys make a big show of things so I know who they are.”
“Such flattery,” Cho smiled, watching Danny while taking a long drink of his wine to finish the glass. He reached to pour himself another.
“What about you?” Danny asked, nudging his own empty glass forward.
“What? Trade secrets?”
“No, I mean…well, I’d certainly take any if you’re offering. But I meant…you know a lot about me. Most of what I know is from your case files.”
“My rap sheet and a rough childhood sum me up better than you might think,” Cho said as he refilled Danny’s wine to match his own. “And I don’t know everything about you. For example, do your parents know what you get up to at night?”
Danny schooled his features to keep from reacting too viscerally. Parents—plural.
The names of the power station victims had never been released to the public. Cho didn’t know Danny’s mother was among them. Danny didn’t want him to know. If he did, he might more easily guess at Danny’s intentions being here.
“I don
’t hide that I’m Zeus from my family. But we’re not talking about me.”
“Are you asking how my day was, Danny?”
The inherent tease in the words would have almost been infuriating, but in some ways that’s exactly what Danny was angling for. Anything he could use against Cho would be an asset. Ways to better get under the man’s skin, cater to what he wanted, what he liked. All while still playing their familiar game.
“How about one thing?” Danny said. “Tell me one thing about Mickey Cho that I couldn’t read in a case file. Like…this apartment,” he turned outward on his stool, “your artwork,” he gestured at the photograph on the wall that had so intrigued him that first night, then raised his refilled wine glass before taking another sip, “why you have such good taste in wine.”
“Or whether or not I’ve seduced any other electric young men out of their pants?”
Danny smiled around the rim of his glass. “Whose pants came off first?”
“Yours,” Cho answered plainly.
About to protest, Danny recalled that the first time someone lost their pants it had indeed been him. “True…”
“How about something basic,” Cho said, pushing the plate of cookies Danny’s way and snagging one for himself. “Mickey? Is reserved for Lucy. Malcolm, I almost take as an insult. Never had much deference for my old man’s decisions where I’m concerned.”
“Okay,” Danny nodded—good to know. “So you prefer Cho? Or Ice Man?”
“Mal,” Cho said with a momentary drop in his guiled expression.
Mal. Of course, the way Cho had entered it into Danny’s phone. “Mal it is,” he said and snatched up a cookie. “So if we’re on a roll, Mal, how about another question?”
“I’m listening.”
“Where do you keep your costume? Got it locked away in some safe house, set to explode and take an entire city block with it if you don’t check in every twenty-four hours?”
Lovesick Gods Page 14