Cash Plays

by Cordelia Kingsbridge

  They were trapped.

  Next to Dominic, Levi shifted from foot to foot, the corkscrew glinting in his hand.

  “Drop it,” one of the guards said.

  Levi hesitated, and for a moment Dominic worried he was crazy enough to actually challenge five gunmen with nothing but a wine key. Then he huffed out a breath, dropped the improvised weapon, and raised his hands. Dominic followed suit.

  “Bring them here,” Volkov called.

  Keeping a cautious distance from them both, the men herded Dominic and Levi back to the main room of the warehouse at gunpoint. The place was a disaster area—tables and chairs overturned, folding screens splintered to bits, silk draping shredded. Broken glass and abandoned poker chips littered the floor, and half the surfaces in sight were riddled with bullet holes. They’d managed to extinguish the fire, though.

  Most of the patrons and staff had fled. The only people remaining were the guards and those attendees who were connected to the criminal organizations behind the gambling ring, including Volkov, Rocco, Milo, and—Dominic saw with a sinking heart—John Williams and Jessica Miller. She was watching in horror while Williams stood beside her holding her upper arm in a tight grip.

  Dominic and Levi ended up back-to-back inside a ring of bristling guns. “That’s all you’ve got?” Milo taunted from just beyond the guards, smirking at Levi. “I thought you were supposed to be some kind of badass.”

  “Why don’t you come a little closer?” said Levi.

  But Volkov was the only one who dared move within reach, stepping inside the circle. He looked between the two of them and said, “This is your boyfriend.”

  “Yes,” Dominic said, though it hadn’t been a question so much as an observation.

  Red-faced with outrage, Williams shook Jessica by the arm and said, “You knew about this, didn’t you? You sneaky little bitch—”

  “She didn’t know!” Dominic snapped. “I tricked her and manipulated her into inviting me here. She had no idea.”

  Jessica swallowed hard and looked at the floor.

  “The Parks must have sent them,” Milo said to Volkov. “You saw how Mansfield reacted to this one—he obviously recognized him and rushed to get his precious Danny out of here. This whole thing was a setup—”

  “Silence!” Volkov bellowed. Everyone in the room jumped except Rocco. Once he had their attention, Volkov turned to Levi and said, “You are homicide detective. What interest do you have in silly games that hurt nobody?”

  “I don’t care about illegal gambling or whatever else you have going on here,” Levi said. “My only concern is this gang warfare. The Parks didn’t send me and they’re not setting you up. They’re being targeted just as much as you are; so are Los Avispones. Somebody inside one of your three organizations is sabotaging you all, trying to bust up your alliance.”

  The guards in the circle, who were clearly drawn from all three groups, reacted with low mutters and shifty glances. Levi had struck a chord.

  “This is crazy.” Milo pushed past the guards to stand next to Volkov. “He’d say anything to talk his way out of this. Who are you going to listen to, your old friend or a lying Jew—”

  Volkov backhanded Milo with his giant paw. Milo went crashing to the ground, and a stream of blood spattered across the cement along with one of his teeth.

  “My apologies,” Volkov said. “I do not share his disgusting beliefs. I have great respect for Jewish faith.”

  “Um . . . thanks,” said Levi.

  “It will not stop me killing you,” Volkov said, a note of remorse entering his voice, “but I want you to know is not for that terrible reason.”

  With their backs still pressed against each other, Levi sought out Dominic’s hand with his own. Dominic laced their fingers together.

  His mind raced, searching for any solution to this catastrophe, but he had nothing. If he’d been stronger, if he’d been smarter—

  The deafening rapid-fire burst of semiautomatic rifles drowned out every other noise as high-powered rounds chewed right through the walls of the warehouse, taking out several men before anyone realized they were under attack from outside.

  Dominic hit the ground flat at the same moment as Levi, then rolled over Levi’s body to shield it with his own.

  “Dominic!” Levi gave him an exasperated shove. “For fuck’s sake—”

  The barrage continued unabated, filling the air with plaster dust and screams and the smell of blood. Dominic lifted his head just high enough to take in the scene. A few feet away, Volkov had done the same to Rocco as Dominic had done with Levi, though in their case Volkov’s enormous body completely engulfed Rocco’s small frame. Jessica and Williams were nowhere to be seen, but at least she wasn’t lying dead on the ground.

  The surviving guards were shouting to each other, scrambling for cover, and returning fire even though the enemy had yet to actually enter the building. A man who’d been posted outside raced in screaming, “Utopia! It’s Utopia!” before a bullet took him in the back.

  “I told you!” Milo howled from where he still lay prostate on the floor, cradling his bloody mouth. “The Parks must have sent them to ambush us!”

  Tucking Rocco against his side with one arm, Volkov army-crawled across the floor at an impressive pace. Neither he nor any of the guards gave Dominic and Levi a second glance. In the sudden nightmare of this unexpected siege, all concerns beyond survival had been forgotten.

  “We gotta go,” Dominic said. “They’ll storm this place any minute.”

  Levi nodded. Dominic shifted off him—but as they turned on their stomachs to face the other side of the warehouse, Levi stopped and looked back at Milo, who was struggling to rise as well.

  Moving like a rattlesnake, Levi darted toward Milo on his belly, grabbed a dead guard’s gun, and pistol-whipped Milo with such force Dominic heard the crunch of broken bone through the gunfire. Milo slumped to the floor, unconscious.

  A chilling smile flickered across Levi’s face. “Now we can go,” he said, and dropped the gun.

  They quickly crawled to the far wall while bullets whizzed by overhead. When they reached the hallway by the restrooms, they jumped to their feet and ran for it.

  Nobody stopped them this time. They burst out the back exit and sprinted into the night free and clear, leaving the turmoil of the warehouse and the wail of approaching sirens behind.

  Levi was a faster runner, his body built for speed and endurance, but Dominic managed to keep pace ten feet behind. Only when they’d gone about a mile past the warehouse did he start flagging. Though he ran most days of the week, hauling his two-hundred-twenty-five-pound body through a five-minute mile was asking too much.

  Besides, they couldn’t keep running forever with no destination in mind, and this area was totally deserted this time of night. “Levi,” he called out as he slowed to a jog.

  Levi glanced over his shoulder, startled, and circled back. His eyes swept the empty streets, and then he grabbed Dominic’s wrist and dragged him into a narrow alley between two buildings.

  “We need—” Dominic said, but that was all he got out before Levi slammed him up against the cement wall and kissed him.

  Already short of breath from the run, Dominic gasped against Levi’s lips. He tried to pull away, but Levi had an iron grip on his hair and the nape of his neck, holding him in place for Levi’s devouring mouth.

  The show of force sparked Dominic’s own aggression. He was feeling it too—the adrenaline of battle, their close brush with death, their desperate flight—and it had his blood up and his heart racing. There was no reason not to give in.

  He hated craning his neck down, so he grasped Levi just beneath his ass and lifted him to a more comfortable height. Wrapping one leg around Dominic’s thigh to steady himself while they kissed, Levi rucked Dominic’s shirt out of his trousers, wrenched open his belt, and tore through his fly to thrust a hand into his boxers.

  Dominic hissed at the touch to his hardening cock. He
bit down on Levi’s lower lip and sucked until he was rewarded with a muffled whimper.

  Levi pushed himself off Dominic’s body, landed lightly on his feet, and dropped at once to his knees.

  “Oh my God.” Dominic was bowled over by the sight of Levi kneeling in a filthy alley, flushed and tousled and messing up his expensive suit.

  Luckily, he had enough presence of mind to rip the button camera out of his jacket, shut it off, and shove it into his pocket before things went any further.

  Levi spat into his palm, freed Dominic’s cock, and gave it a few brisk pumps, but he dove in and took it into his mouth before it was fully hard. Dominic yelped, his head thumping back against the wall. The scorching wet heat of Levi’s mouth got him the rest of the way there in record time.

  Bracing one forearm against Dominic’s hips, Levi gripped the base of Dominic’s cock with his other hand and bobbed his head at a rapid pace, sucking with desperate urgency. He moaned raggedly as he worked, the sounds vibrating through Dominic’s shaft and into his balls. All Dominic could do was stare slack-jawed, twining his fingers through Levi’s curls while he watched.

  Levi was usually careful when he gave Dominic head—not hesitant, not at all, but mindful of Dominic’s size. Now he was just throwing himself full-tilt into the blowjob, forcing Dominic’s cock down his throat, swallowing it deeper than he ever had before. He fucked his own mouth so hard he was choking around Dominic’s shaft, gagging on it, but that only seemed to spur him on more.

  “Fuck!” Dominic felt woozy, which was no surprise because there was absolutely no blood left in his head at all.

  He could admit there was a wicked part of him that enjoyed watching Levi struggle to take his cock, whether in his mouth or ass. Seeing Levi’s slender lips stretched wide around his thick shaft, feeling the clutch and reluctant release of Levi’s throat as the head of his cock plowed sensitive, previously untouched flesh . . . It made him want to ravage Levi’s entire body and leave him a wrecked, panting mess.

  He knew this had to be ruining Levi’s jaw, so when he felt his orgasm rising, he did nothing to hold it back. He gasped a warning and bucked his hips as hard as Levi’s restraining arm allowed.

  Crying out in release, Dominic shot the first few pulses straight down Levi’s throat. But when he just kept on coming, Levi had to pull back, and the last two spurts caught Levi across the mouth and chin.

  Levi coughed, wide-eyed. Dominic leaned heavily against the wall, shaken by his bone-rattling climax, and admired the picture Levi made with come decorating his beautiful face. He’d never let Dominic give him a come-shot before.

  Levi wiped his arm over his mouth, seeming not to care that he was smearing Dominic’s come over the sleeve of his jacket. His eyes searing into Dominic’s, he rose smoothly to his feet, seized Dominic’s tie, and yanked straight down.

  Dominic fell willingly to his knees. Fair was fair—but he was still dazed from the best blowjob of his life, so he could only blink dumbly while Levi got his own cock out of his trousers.

  “Open your mouth,” Levi snarled, his voice guttural with both lust and the aftermath of having his throat reamed out by a cock Dominic’s size.

  God, Levi’s voice might be fucked up for days.

  Dominic was still moaning in arousal at the thought when Levi’s cock invaded his mouth and plunged down his throat in one stroke. That quickly refocused his attention.

  Levi leaned over Dominic to support himself with one hand on the wall. Cupping the back of Dominic’s head with the other, he snapped his hips, mercilessly pistoning his cock in and out of Dominic’s mouth.

  Levi wasn’t small, but Dominic had sucked plenty of cocks in his time. He could deep-throat Levi no problem and take a face-fucking like a champion. So he breathed steadily through his nose, relaxed his throat and jaw, and let himself be used for Levi’s pleasure.

  “Yeah, take it.” Levi sounded like he’d been gargling sand and broken glass. “Take it, you fucking—”

  He didn’t finish his thought, just sped up his thrusts. This was the first time he’d ever been this brutal with Dominic. Even though Dominic knew it was because Levi was angry and keyed up, he loved every goddamn second of it.

  Dominic had both hands on Levi’s hips, mostly to keep himself from being knocked backward into the wall as Levi plundered his mouth. He could break away in seconds if he had to, but the thought couldn’t have been farther from his mind.

  Groaning, Levi shoved in balls-deep once more and held Dominic’s face flush to his groin while he came. Dominic didn’t struggle; he kept his body loose, his throat working around Levi’s pulsing cock.

  Levi dragged it out, fucking back into Dominic’s mouth a few times, but he eventually withdrew with a slick pop and stepped away. Dominic fell forward onto his hands, gasping for air, his vision swimming. Okay, maybe he’d been more oxygen-deprived than he’d realized.

  He took some time to recover before pushing himself back upright onto his knees. He stretched his jaw, cleared his throat, and put his clothing to rights, then dared to look over at Levi.

  Levi had paced halfway down the alley and was standing with his back turned. Dominic needed to be cautious here. A life-or-death fight and rough oral sex wasn’t going to make Levi forget what he’d walked in on at that warehouse, or what it meant for their relationship. He would still be angry, as he had every right to be, and Dominic wasn’t sure he could talk his way out of this one.

  Dominic heaved himself to his feet and caught himself against the wall as a brief wave of dizziness overcame him. “Baby—”

  Levi whirled around. “Don’t call me that, you manipulative son of a bitch!”

  Stiffening, Dominic took a step back. Levi wasn’t angry—he was livid, all but spitting fire as his body vibrated with barely contained violence.

  “How long have you been gambling again?”

  “About two weeks,” Dominic said. He’d done enough lying.

  “Oh my God.” Levi covered his face with both hands so his next words came out muffled. “I’m so fucking stupid.”

  Dominic’s jaw dropped. “No, you’re not—”

  Levi let his hands fall and glowered at Dominic. “I’m a goddamn detective. All the signs that you’d relapsed were right in front of my face, and I didn’t figure it out. It didn’t even occur to me!”

  “Because you trusted me,” said Dominic. He had trouble breathing under the pressing weight of his own self-reproach. “You believed that if I was having trouble I would come to you. But I didn’t tell you—and that’s on me, Levi, not you. It’s never stupid to have faith in someone you love.”

  The fury was bleeding out of Levi’s face, but the profound misery that replaced it was even more upsetting to witness. “You didn’t just not tell me you’d relapsed, Dominic. You went out of your way to hide it from me. You ignored me, picked fights with me on purpose—why do all that instead of just telling me the truth?”

  “I . . .” Dominic looked away, already regretting his decision to be honest. “I didn’t think you’d . . .”

  “Didn’t think I could handle it?”

  “I didn’t think you’d still respect me if you knew.”

  Deathly silence fell over the alley save for the frantic scrabbling of some small animal at the far end. Levi stared at him.

  “You really think that little of me?” he said, his voice faint.

  “That’s not what I meant—”

  “Yes, it is.” Levi shook his head, looking shell-shocked. “You don’t trust me, Dominic. You don’t trust that my feelings for you are strong enough to survive seeing you struggle with something difficult. Seeing you make a mistake.”

  Dominic flinched from that raw truth. “I was going to tell you everything after tonight.”

  “Sure you were.”

  “I was! You don’t understand—it was different this time. I didn’t start gambling again because I wanted to.” Dominic spoke faster and faster, desperate to get the words out. “You know
Jessica Miller, the woman I was looking for? I found her through Sergei Volkov’s underground casinos. I got backed into a corner and I had to gamble to protect my cover and make sure she didn’t get hurt. Then it was the only way I could stay connected to her, and I thought I could get her out of there and bring the LVMPD a big organized-crime case at the same time. I had to keep gambling, but it was only temporary. I was going to quit after the case was over—”

  “God, stop.” Levi’s expression was vaguely nauseated. “Are you even listening to yourself?”

  “You don’t understand,” Dominic said again.

  “Oh, I understand perfectly.” Levi stepped closer. “You are a compulsive gambler. There is no such thing as safe or ‘temporary’ gambling for you. You’ve told me yourself that you would say anything to justify pursuing it. Can’t you see that’s what you’re doing now?”

  “This was different.” Irritation swelled in Dominic’s chest, shunting his guilt aside. “I had everything under control until you showed up. You should never have been there—you’re Homicide, not OC. I had to blow my cover to protect you. Now Jessica’s in more danger than ever before and I have no way of helping her!”

  “Don’t you dare put that on me,” Levi spat. “Has it occurred to you that if our covers hadn’t been blown, that entire warehouse would have been full of innocent people when Utopia started shooting? It would have been a fucking massacre.”

  Dominic blinked, rocking back on his heels.

  “And I’m not responsible for your mistakes. You should have handed that case off to another PI at your firm the moment you knew it was connected to gambling in any way.”

  “I couldn’t do that.”

  “Why not? Because then you’d have to admit you’re less than perfect?” Levi eyed him with disgust. “You say I put you on a pedestal, Dominic, but you do that to yourself just as much. You can’t stand for anyone to see you as anything other than this happy shiny image you project: Roguish golden boy. Laid-back American hero. Everybody’s charming best friend.”

  “Fuck you,” Dominic said, suddenly breathless.