by Sidney Bell
It must’ve shocked their waitress to spend nearly two hours with a slow-moving pair only to have them suddenly throwing money on the table and rushing out.
When they’d made it back to the car, Sullivan immediately pulled the camera and binoculars out, handing the latter to Tobias. It wasn’t quite dark out yet, so they could still see everything with relative clarity.
They watched Spratt move through his rooms with the air of a man staying in for the night. He removed his suit jacket and hung it in the closet before heading into the kitchen to wash his hands and start preparing food.
He didn’t get far before he abruptly lifted his head like he’d heard something, then turned and disappeared into the basement. Tobias scooted forward on his seat as if those extra three inches could help him see down the stairs. “What’s he doing, do you think?”
“I don’t have any more information than you do,” Sullivan replied, though not unkindly. “But I don’t think he’ll hurt whoever is down there. It looks like he needs Ghost—if it’s Ghost—to trust him, remember?”
Sullivan proved to be right; not five minutes later, Spratt returned to the main floor, this time with Ghost in tow. Hair tousled, feet bare, wearing a too-large button-up shirt that was on the verge of slipping off one shoulder, and a pair of black shorts. His hands were cuffed in front of him.
“Oh, God, that’s him,” Tobias whispered, too horrified to even say I told you so. Not that he would, but still.
He watched through the binoculars with his stomach roiling. “I figured it would be something like this, but I didn’t want it to be true. But why else do you send a prostitute, right?”
“He doesn’t look hurt, at least. He really is...” Sullivan trailed off.
Resigned, Tobias said, “You can say it. He’s gorgeous.”
Sullivan was quiet a second. Then he said, “I was going to say hard to read.”
Tobias slid a glance at him, found Sullivan still staring at the camera screen. “You don’t think he’s attractive?”
“I think he’s nice to look at, yeah,” Sullivan replied, brow creasing. “But so are lots of people. It’s not going to change my life. Are we really having this conversation right now?”
“No.” He ignored the warmth in his chest currently competing with his disgust at what he was witnessing, instead refocusing on the kitchen, where Spratt was talking, gesturing with one hand, and Ghost was listening and watching, his expression attentive but somehow dull at the same time.
“Could be consensual,” Sullivan said, though he didn’t sound like he believed it. “The sex slave thing—it’s not an uncommon fantasy for Doms, but there’s usually more, well, sex, in the whole sex slave thing. Or at least lust.”
“Handcuffs take it a little far, but I agree about that last part,” Tobias said, because there was no discernible chemistry between the two men in the kitchen. Weirdly so, considering one of them was an attractive hustler who looked like he’d just crawled out of a client’s bed.
For the next hour, as Spratt cooked and Ghost sat at the counter watching, their conversation ebbed and flowed like that of any other couple making dinner, but the body language continued to be off. Tobias couldn’t put his finger on it, exactly, but something niggled.
“Something’s wrong,” he said.
“He doesn’t look injured.” Sullivan took a couple pictures. “Stop making that face. I thought they might be torturing him or something, and when Ghost came upstairs like that, I was worried we were in for some pretty fucked-up shit too, but they’ve been perfectly civil. The restraints seem to be preventative, not punitive. Doesn’t look like Spratt’s even touching him. I’m less worried than I was, honestly.”
“No, something’s wrong.”
Sullivan sighed, but Tobias grabbed his arm. “I know him. Something is wrong.”
Sullivan studied him in the yellow glare of the sodium lamp beside the car. “Can you explain it?”
Tobias avoided his gaze in favor of watching Ghost carefully. It took a while, but he finally realized what it was. Ghost wasn’t playing.
Ghost was always playing. He was always aware of what the people around him expected, and he reinforced it with every breath. Even with Church and—he forced himself to be honest—Tobias, Ghost was pretending. He was playing the role of friend. Tobias was never certain how much of that role drew from real life, but he couldn’t pretend anymore that it wasn’t a performance.
Perhaps the better way to say it was that Ghost was always acting. He was constantly in flux. Ghost was a verb, always, and sitting like a dull lump in Spratt’s house, he looked very much like an object.
Tobias didn’t say that though. It might feel true, but it would only sound stupid. Instead, he said, “I know all the different people he can be, but he isn’t being anybody he’s ever been—he’s...he’s blank. Ghost is never blank. He’s always got something working. I can’t make it sound right.”
“Maybe this is who he really is,” Sullivan said, but more doubtfully. “Maybe this is what he’s like when he drops all the bullshit.”
Tobias tried to keep his tone even rather than frustrated when he said, “Sure, his friends for years get the act, but a cop he’s known for ten minutes who tied him up in the basement gets the real thing?”
Sullivan’s lips twisted wryly. “Fair enough.”
“And he’s not here willingly or there’d be no need for handcuffs. No. Something is really wrong. This isn’t him playing Spratt.”
Sullivan’s shoulders tightened. “Okay. I believe you.”
Tobias squeezed back, the air in his throat catching. “Thank you.”
Sullivan’s fingers tapped on the steering wheel in an erratic pattern for the next twenty minutes as Tobias watched Spratt and Ghost through the binoculars.
“A cop is going to have motion lights in his backyard,” Sullivan said finally.
“Probably.”
“He definitely has an alarm system. Whatever we do, it’ll have to be fast. And quiet. We don’t want any well-meaning neighbors calling the cops either.”
“What do we do?”
“We do what any good PI does.” Sullivan gave him a thin smile that didn’t reach his eyes. “We snoop.”
* * *
Apparently snooping consisted of a much smaller camera in Sullivan’s pocket taking the place of the Mark III, a couple of enormous bottles of cheap malt liquor that Sullivan called 40s ineffectually hidden in brown paper bags, and a long amble down the alley behind Spratt’s townhouse.
Where Sullivan waved his arms in a parody of drunkenness and purposely set off the motion light before setting his bottle down.
“Here.” Sullivan lounged against the nearest fence and pulled out a new pack of Marlboros. He tapped the box against the heel of his hand several times, then tore it open and took two out.
“You don’t have to inhale, but at least pretend to,” Sullivan said quietly, lighting one and passing it over. “And we’re thinking deep, drunken, middle-of-the-night guy thoughts, so get expansive.”
Tobias figured that meant it was his job to keep the motion light on. So he pretended to smoke, which was ugh, disgusting, why did anyone do this—
“Oh, God,” Sullivan groaned, sounding downright pornographic, and Tobias’s whole body tightened before he realized Sullivan was reacting to the cigarette.
“This is a side of you I haven’t seen before,” Tobias said, equal parts repulsed and amused. “Where’s your nicotine gum? Did you leave it in the car?”
“That stuff is horrible. It tastes like an ashtray.”
Tobias brandished his cigarette, which was on the verge of going out because he wasn’t smoking it. “This tastes like an ashtray.”
Sullivan was unbothered. He only tipped his head back, blowing several smoke rings that floated into the night, pale gray in the sharp light
from the fixture above Spratt’s back door.
Faintly, Tobias heard the click of the camera working.
“Take a drink,” Sullivan offered.
“Isn’t this illegal? An open container or something?”
“Yup. But if anyone asks, they’re Slurpees.”
Tobias made a face. No one in their right mind would believe they were drinking Slurpees, but Sullivan was too busy reuniting with his lost love to care.
“I really hope this isn’t going to take you back to day one.” Tobias made a show of stretching his arms over his head. The light stayed on. “I’ve heard it’s almost as hard to quit smoking as it is to quit heroin. How long’s it been?”
“Four years.”
“And you’re still using the gum?”
“Look, I’ve heard quitting smoking is almost as hard as quitting heroin, okay?”
Tobias grinned helplessly. He liked Sullivan so much. “So you didn’t kick the habit so much as you just switched delivery systems.”
“Four cold, lonely years.”
“Oh, my God.” Tobias rolled his eyes, still painfully amused. He took another slug of his drink and winced. He didn’t understand rebelling via substances. Between the alcohol and the cigarette, his mouth tasted horrible.
Sullivan angled his body to the right and poked Tobias in the stomach, making him jump. Sullivan laughed, turning still farther, and the camera went click again.
“Fuck,” he said loudly. “I knocked over my bev-er-age.”
Tobias laughed too, playing along, and waited while Sullivan went down on one knee and took a couple more pictures from that angle before standing up and starting to mosey farther down the alley.
They made their way to the cross street, where they turned left and came to the mouth of the underground parking garage. Sullivan hesitated there for a long second.
“Think it’s assigned parking?” Tobias asked.
“If it is, I can find out what he drives.” He flicked the cherry off his cigarette, then put the filter in his pocket. “Head back to the car. Take this.” He shoved the small camera into Tobias’s fumbling hands but held on to his drink. “Still have that business card I gave you? If I’m not there in twenty minutes, it means I got busted. Call Raina and tell her everything. She’ll know what to do.”
“I’m not leaving you.”
“You promised to obey in the field,” Sullivan reminded him, his dark eyes hardening, and Tobias stared at him for a long second.
“You better be so careful,” he said finally, and shifted his things into one hand so he had another free to yank Sullivan in for a kiss. It started out angry, almost biting, but softened as Sullivan refused to bite back, instead cupping Tobias’s face in his hands and gentling the pressure of his lips.
“I’ll be fine,” Sullivan whispered, and then he smacked Tobias on the ass—which, bruises, ow—and jogged away.
And Tobias headed for the car, pausing only to drain his 40 into the gutter. He kept the bottle to recycle later, though.
If it hadn’t been for his worry about Sullivan, it wouldn’t have chafed at all.
Middle ground.
That didn’t make the twenty minutes go by any more quickly, though. On the plus side, he did get a chance to check his voicemail, where he found a message from the woman he’d called at the human trafficking website looking for a contact in the interest of tracking down Mama and—by extension—Ghost. She apologized for the delay in her response and gave a spiel about interviews and donations. Tobias deleted it. Even if it’d been what he was looking for, it was a little late now.
When Sullivan got back, he held up a hand before Tobias could say a word, and scrawled out some notes about the vehicle that’d been in the 2600 C spot. “Spratt drives a dark green Range Rover. Camera? Let’s take a look at our options.”
* * *
Sullivan thought of that kiss later. Tobias’s fingers locked in his shirt outside the parking garage, his lips demanding and worried in the dark. It was an outlier.
He was pretty sure Tobias still hadn’t entirely put together what was coming up. He was vibrating in the passenger seat like a shaken-up bottle of soda, his eyes always on the windows of the townhouse, as if he’d forgotten Sullivan was there.
Sullivan couldn’t reconcile the two. A kiss like he couldn’t bear to let go. Complete obliviousness to what he was going to ask Sullivan to do. As soon as he realized what had to happen, he would ask, and damn the consequences to Sullivan. Tobias might be sorry about it. He’d probably get those big blue eyes working. Hell, it wouldn’t even be an act, because inside, he was soft. He didn’t want to hurt people, didn’t want to anger people. He’d feel bad, but that wouldn’t stop any of this from unfolding.
Sullivan understood. Ghost’s safety was more important than Sullivan’s job or feelings. He even understood why Tobias felt that way. Tobias had hired him, Tobias wanted it casual, Tobias had always made his priorities clear, and Sullivan had never been at the top of that list.
That kiss, though. It hadn’t felt casual or unimportant. It sure as fuck wasn’t professional. It was...if Sullivan had dared to trust it, he’d have thought that kiss was evidence of something real growing between them.
But he didn’t dare, because he wasn’t stupid. That wasn’t how the world worked.
Chapter Twenty
As they drove back to his house, Sullivan wrestled with where to go next.
The obvious answer, of course, was to tell a reliable cop.
Unfortunately, neither he nor Tobias were in the habit of hanging around with cops, and walking into a precinct would be incredibly dangerous; there was no way of knowing whether they were getting someone who would rescue Ghost and catch the bad guys or if the cop in question would hand them over to Spratt and/or blow their brains out. Raina had contacts in the police department but wasn’t close enough to any of them to trust their ethics without doubt, not with the risk of bullets in the brain as an outcome.
The district attorney’s office wasn’t much of an improvement. Both he and Raina knew plenty of lawyers, several who seemed ethical, but he wasn’t sure he’d trust his life to any of them. The other problem with going the lawyer route was that it would take time. The district attorney’s investigators didn’t work like cops—they were meant to scare up evidence about existing cases and subpoena witnesses through guys like Sullivan. Even if Sullivan could find someone who took him seriously with the evidence he had against Spratt and Tidwell and the balding man, it would likely take forever to go through back channels like that. Ghost might not have that much time.
Which left Lisbeth.
She was a contracts lawyer, not a prosecutor or public defender, but he figured that was as close as they were likely to get.
So after they dumped their stuff in the living room, Sullivan sent her a text.
I think I ran into trouble in the police department. U know someone local with impeccable ethics and a good rep?
“My friend’s an attorney,” he explained to Tobias as he typed. “Not criminal, unfortunately, or she’d have a much better idea of who to contact, but maybe she’ll have a name she can recommend.”
The response only took a couple of minutes—Lisbeth was nothing if not prompt—and it sent his heart into his shoes.
I have a contact I would trust with my life, but he retired about three months ago. He’s somewhere en route to Yellowstone in an RV. He refuses to use cell phones these days, but I’ll call his daughter.
Five minutes later, another text came through.
Daughter expects to hear from him in about a week. She’ll tell him to call me and that it’s urgent. I can tell him to call or come home then. Will that do?
“Damn,” Sullivan muttered, turning the phone over so Tobias could read it.
“We can’t leave Ghost in there for another week.” Tob
ias caught Sullivan’s wrist.
“I know.” Sullivan eased himself free so he could send a text to Lisbeth thanking her. And, if he was honest, also because he didn’t want Tobias touching him right now.
“So what do we do? Can we break him out? Is that...can we do that?”
And there it was. He’d phrased it as a we, but Sullivan knew what he was really asking. Save him for me. Put yourself and your career at risk for a guy you’ve never met and for me, a guy who screwed you over and apparently isn’t averse to doing it again.
It hurt. A guy who could barely stir a finger to be Tobias’s friend was more important than the risk to Sullivan’s life and career. And yeah, Sullivan would do it anyway because it was the right thing to do—and if he was honest, because he didn’t doubt Tobias would go in alone if he refused—but it would’ve been really nice for Tobias to at least seem conflicted about risking him for Ghost.
He took a deep breath and told himself to get his shit together. It wasn’t like he hadn’t known where he stood. “The alarm is probably only off when either Tidwell or Spratt is in there. So we either have to deal with the alarm or a cop.”
“Yeah.”
“I’m not attacking a cop,” Sullivan said flatly. “Dirty or not.”
Tobias shook his head, a little taken aback. “No. I wouldn’t ask you to. I don’t want to either.”
“Then we need to go in when they’re gone during the day.”
“I don’t suppose you know how to disarm an alarm without anyone knowing?”
“Nope. We’ll have to be quick enough that the security system doesn’t bite us in the ass.”
“How long would it take someone to respond?”
“No idea. Minutes, though. I’d be shocked if it took more than ten.”
“How’s that work? Security guards?” Tobias lifted his eyebrows. “Actually—maybe that would be good. We could throw a football through a window, and when they come we’ll say we heard someone yelling for help. They could go in and get Ghost.”
“Not all security companies use guards. Some of them try to contact you and then, if they can’t, they call the cops.”