Once the panic has been diffused, everyone is detained as witnesses, and again I find myself sitting in a room, waiting for hours to tell my story. This time Irus is next to me. Good luck prying him away from me now. Eventually, I wind up relaying what I saw ad nauseam.
“Describe the man again.” Yet another detective wants to know the same shit I just told three others.
“Oh, for the love of God. One of y’all recorded my statement. Go listen to it, for Christ’s sake.”
“Mr. McCoy, we just need the description of the man one last time.”
Fuck. “Dark hair, pale skin, tall, and lanky. I have no idea what color his eyes were or how bad his breath was. Just let me go home!”
“Tall, dark, and pale. Got it,” the man says with a sigh. He opens the door and speaks with a passing uniformed officer. “Hey, can you show these guys out? We’re done here, for now.”
“Wait,” I say. The man turns to me, raises an eyebrow, and waits for me to speak.
“He was wearing an army type jacket, you know, like on M*A*S*H.”
The guy scribbles a note and says, “We’ll call if we need you. If you remember anything more, let us know.” He leaves the room, and we follow two uniformed officers outside.
We get a cab to my Jeep. I’m so tired, but I manage the long drive to my place. I don’t bother parking the car in the garage. Hell, I don’t even bother to get out. I’ll sleep right here. Damn, we’re back to practice on Wednesday. I need some sleep.
Irus opens my door and ushers me inside. My stomach gurgles.
“You want a bath?”
“Oh God, no. I just want to eat and sleep.”
“I’m not as great a cook as Auntie, but I’ll whip something up,” he says with a grin. “You go relax.”
Slowly I make my way up the stairs to my room. With an exhausted sigh, I face-plant onto my bed. I’ll just close my eyes for a minute.
Chapter Twenty-Five
Jackson McCoy’s House
Irus Beaumont
Jacks is dead to the world. Nothing’s moving his ass. Not even my yanking off his shoes, but I work to untie the laces anyway. The muffled snore coming from his pillow does something to me. I think about Kane. About the madman who tried to kill him, and the same gut-check feeling for Kane resonates through my chest when I look at Jacks. What the fuck happened today? Was that lunatic someone sent to scare Jacks or Maddox? Did Paul have something to do with it? Frank has made some pretty heinous insinuations about why Maddox’s husband was killed. And it had worked, right?
As much as I hated doing it, I cornered Kane the morning before he left and asked about Maddox. I needed to know about the man Frank trusted. Kane wasn’t angry with me, but the sadness in his expression made me hug him close.
Kane whispered, his cheek pressed to my chest, “Why are you asking me about this now, Rus? As I’m leaving?”
“I know you don’t like to talk about it, but I need to know if Maddox can be manipulated. I need to know if I have to protect Jacks. What Jake did to you—”
“Protect Jacks? From a ghost?” Kane pulled back to look me in the eye. “Jake’s dead. Let’s leave him in his grave.” The thin trail of scarring across Kane’s cheek seemed longer just then, a stark reminder of how that bastard had cut into him with a knife. A fragile jag from the corner of his eye, down his soft cheek, to the small pucker at the curvature of his full lips. I rubbed the juncture with my thumb and Kane closed his watery eyes.
“Leave him dead, Irus.” Kane’s soft voice was a throaty whisper, cloaked with emotion and remembered fear.
How could I do this to him? “What about Maddox?”
Dewy with tears, Kane’s lashes rose. “Maddox stopped working on whatever cases he had, too ripped apart by the death of his husband and consumed with finding the killer. With finding Jake. He became a consultant for the various investigations. Jake killed in at least five different states.”
The conversation with Frank replayed in my head. “If someone wanted Maddox off a case, would killing his husband work?”
“I know it would cripple me,” Kane said, a catch in his voice. “You or Garrett gone would just destroy me.”
Loud snores tug me back to reality. Away from the memory of making my best friend relive his nightmare. Gently I slip the trousers off Jacks. He stirs and rolls over, muttering something about a go route. I shake my head. The boy even dreams about football. The love of his life is this game we play. The game we live, eat, and breathe. The bed makes a small sound when I sit down next to Jacks’s sleeping form. Hard not to think about a long life together. The idea of not being married baffles me more now than it ever did in the past. Kane never wanted the family life with me, so I pretended to agree, but I’ve always wanted what Auntie Linda and Uncle Clyde have together.
The kid Jacks once was, the little boy I remember being so enamored with, is something I’ve avoided thinking about for obvious reasons. Memories of Paul. The anger. The violence. Memories of comforting a boy older than me, yet still so small, the rough jersey covering his naked body. Auntie gave Paul a vicious beating and we sat, not witnesses to the violence but hearing the altercation. I remember hiding the boy’s face as he cried into the crook of my neck. I can still feel his hot tears on my skin. I let him cry himself out. In the car, he slept with my arm around him. For years, I wanted to see him again. Dreamed about him for a long damn time. With great sorrow, I finally packed him away when I was sixteen and Kane came into my life. Now, as I watch Jacks sleep and the food grows cold on the bedside table, I can see the face of that sweet, innocent kid I fell in love with as a child.
I’m loathe to think Paul brought us together back then. Instead I like to think Auntie’s game was responsible. I got to play with Jacks, and he sat with me to watch the game. Hell, I pulled his hair just so I could touch it, touch him. Even then he had long hair for a boy, but so did I. My Auntie Linda kept it braided, but when Auntie Beulah had me, I could let my hair fly wild. Auntie Linda would be so exasperated when she got me back from Beulah.
“Damn that man! He let your hair out again. Irus, what are you doing letting your braids go?”
“Auntie Beulah said I could.”
“None of that sass, young man. He is your uncle Bert.”
“She can be whoever she wants to be!”
I’d get so upset, and Auntie Linda didn’t understand. Eventually, she would, but it was hard for Auntie Beulah. I don’t want it to be so hard for Jacks.
He shifts again in the bed, whispering a play call, and turns toward me more. I need to get him out of that jacket, so I sit him up. “Come on. Let’s get you comfortable.”
“Jet sweep fake.” A few inaudible words. “Pass on the fly,” he mumbles.
“Boy, you ain’t gonna be passing nothing ’cept passing out.”
“Reverse flea flick…”
He’s out. Kid’s down for the count. I just managed to get his jacket off him. The fabric is soft and a shiny gray. I love him in this color. In the closet, I find a decent hanger to drape the suit, and notice a small dresser inside. I’ve never actually been in his closet, and if I turn to my right, it goes back a little ways. The dresser is the end cap, and on it sits framed photos of his mother. Opposite her is a framed, signed 8x10 glossy of Joe Namath, and the handwritten note with it says: Dear Jo, from one Joe to the next, you have a great son. I was inspired to meet him. Joe Namath.
So Jacks got his momma a personalized autograph from ole number twelve. When did Jacks meet Joe Namath? It couldn’t have been recently. In a second it dawns on me: Jacks must’ve been introduced to Joe at some function or another by Paul. From what I gather, she had quite the crush on Namath, just going by the posters hiding behind all the clothes. I push a few things aside to see the old posters, browned and weathered. This is like a minishrine.
“This used to be part of her room, back when the loft was divided.” Jacks startles me and I jump.
“Don’t scare me like that, man.”
“Sorry. I left the posters up.” He drags his fingers across the chiseled face of the ole gunslinger. “He was my first crush too. Mom knew it, I think.” Jacks licks his lips. “I find myself drawn to cornerbacks now, rather than quarterbacks.”
“The night Auntie brought you home, you fell asleep in the car,” I say.
Jacks scrunches his face, an expression I love, as he thinks about that night. “I was tired, but I don’t think I fell asleep.”
“No, you did doze a little. You fell asleep leaning against me. I spent that ride memorizing your face. Your hair was still a little wet, but the top was dry. Do you know, you’re one of the reasons I wanted to keep my hair so long.”
“Why are you telling me this?” Jacks looks uncomfortable and it makes me nervous.
“I want us to get married before the next play-off game,” I blurt, like a fool.
He laughs. “You’re a crazy bastard, you know that, right?”
“The look in Maddox’s eyes when he thought he was gonna lose Frank haunts me. I want to wake up every morning glad you’re alive and in my bed.”
“Well, technically, it’s my bed.”
The distance between us is too wide. I close it in microseconds. I grab him in my strong hands, drawing him to me, bumping him with my nose. “Smart-ass, I’m trying to propose to you.”
“I know.” A nervous chuckle. “Makes me feel weird.”
“Weird? Why?”
“Well, you’re asking me in a closet.”
“So?” I ask, too intent on what the closeness of his body is doing to me. I catch a whiff of sleep sweat, and it makes me want to nuzzle his neck.
“You’re asking me to be out and proud, to publicly marry you. I’ve spent the majority of my life cowering in the closet and so have you. Now you want it to be all sunshine and roses, with Liza singing in the background.”
“Hells no! We’re outta the closet now. We don’t have to hide and we shouldn’t.”
“I still don’t know if I’m ready.”
“Seize the moment, baby. I’ll take care of everything,” I say, as I brush his soft lips with mine. I work my way down his throat.
“You’ll take care of everything?”
“Mmm-hmm, just say yes.”
Jacks breath quickens as I palm his crotch.
“You’re using sex to get what you want,” Jacks says in an accusatory whisper, but his hands slip under my shirt, exploring the muscles of my back. I love the feel of his fingers digging into my skin.
“Will it work?”
“It might,” Jacks whispers.
“Oh babe, I love you.”
Jacks stiffens in my arms and a small place in my heart breaks. I don’t understand. Is it possible I’ve completely misread this, does Jacks not love me? I pull away, more than a little annoyed. “What’s the hang up here?”
“What’dya mean?”
“I said I loved you. Then you get all prickly. What’s the damn deal?”
“Truth is, those words don’t mean anything to me. Paul still says he loves me. He said it all the time. He’d say it when—”
“Fuck Paul. Let’s leave him out of our relationship.”
“A part of him is always with me. I can’t…I’ve tried to put him away, in my head, but it’s hard.”
There’s remorse in his eyes and pain. I’m not being fair, but I want to tell him how much I love him. Jacks reaches for me, but now I’m pissed. “How can you think my words mean the same thing as Paul’s?”
“I don’t think they mean the same thing. The words just trigger something in me, and I can’t help it.”
“How do you feel about me, Jacks? I need to know.”
Jacks touches my face. His fingers feather along my jaw as his thumb grazes my cheek. “I’m addicted to you,” he whispers. “And it terrifies me because everything I learned about relationships is from Paul.”
“What would your momma say about love?” I barely get the words out. The lump in my throat makes my voice stick. “About us?”
“She’d laugh and tell me to marry your ass.”
“So, Jackson… What’s your middle name?”
He looks embarrassed. “Namath.”
“What? You’re kidding, right?” I laugh so hard, tears threaten, and he punches me in the arm. “Sorry, sorry. No, no, listen”—I school my features—“Jackson Namath McCoy, will you marry me?”
His face is still flushed from my laughter, but he pulls it together. “You realize marrying me comes with Jared. I will figure out a way to take care of that kid.”
“I’m counting on it,” I say. “You’ll make a great dad. This is gonna sound weird, but that’s part of what I love about you. That day with the kids impressed me. The way they interacted with you proved to me you’re a good man.”
“Ha! Until then I was just the guy you took a swing at, huh?”
Heat floods my face. “Your helmet broke my hand.”
“No, your dumb ass broke your hand on my helmet.”
“You’ve never been just that guy I broke my hand on. Even if I didn’t realize who you were, I have to think we were destined to be together.”
“Destined?” Jacks asks, the sound of laughter in his voice.
“I fell ass over tea kettle for that little blond boy my auntie rescued.”
Jacks stills. “That’s a long time to carry a torch.”
“You’re worth it,” I whisper.
“Fine,” Jacks says, his voice a harsh croak. He clears his throat. “If you’re wanting to marry me, you need to not ask me in the closet. Out and proud, right?”
“Fuck yeah,” I say, tackling him through the doorway and onto the bed, kissing him, inhaling his sweet flavor. Jacks curls his legs around my body. The heat of the man infuses me with a need I’ve been denying lately.
“Wait…wait,” I say with a gasp, breathing so heavy, I feel like I’ve been running gassers all night. Our foreheads rest together, and I close my eyes to the sensation of Jacks rolling his hips, trying to get me to take him. His tongue grazes my lips. I pull back. Time to be clear. “Jacks, I’ll never say I love you.”
The blue of his eyes deepens. The grip he has on my neck is solid, almost painful, and our lips brush together as I whisper, “I’m addicted to you, Jackson McCoy, and I want you to marry me.”
“Well, when you say it so sweetly,” he says between kisses, “how can I resist?”
Chapter Twenty-Six
The Tacoma Mall, Tacoma, WA
Jackson McCoy
The mall is crowded today. Can’t understand why I dislike crowds so much, considering I play in front of one every Sunday, but I’m definitely feeling uncomfortable. Merchandise bearing the Highlanders logo is in nearly every storefront. Everyone is excited to see us claw our way into the divisional round.
“Why are we spending our only day off in a packed mall?” I ask.
“Look, last night I was less than suave.”
“Got that right.”
“Thanks,” Irus says. He gives me the stink eye.
“You said it,” I say, avoiding a kid on roller blades who’s being chased by his mother, I assume. Irus reaches for my hand to steady me. He doesn’t let go. I fall into step with him. The heat and pressure of his palm discombobulates me. I look around to see if anyone is watching us.
“I was thinking—while you slept—”
“You watch me sleep?” I ask. “Creepy.”
“Shut up.”
“Sorry.”
“Anyway, I thought perhaps I’ve been too pushy with the whole marriage thing. Ya know? Too hard.” He pauses, squeezes my hand, and continues, “Too soon.”
Irus seems sad. Sort of wistful. My hesitancy to marry him might be breaking his heart. Not what I had in mind when I started up with him. “We have a game to prepare for, but I’m willing to revisit marriage. No one wants to make a home for Jared more than me. No insult, but I’m not willing to rush into a marriage just so I can have custody of the kid.”
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“Yes, you are,” he says. “And I took advantage of your willingness to give up a part of yourself to make that happen.”
Irus tugs on my hand so abruptly I bump into him. His dark gaze traps mine and he says, “I am addicted to you.” He takes my other hand. “So, I’ve decided to court you.”
“What?” I laugh. Irus smiles patiently. “Court? You mean like date?”
“Laugh if you will, but I intend to socialize with you in the usual manner, with engagements in mall walking, consumption of food-court fare, window shopping, hand holding, and making out in the back of a darkened movie theater. Does my proposal sound appealing?”
“There you go, flaunting that fancy education of yours.”
Irus shrugs. “I do have a degree in communications. So, what do you say?”
“Gee whiz, do I get to wear your letterman’s jacket too?”
“If you play your cards right, I’ll give you a promise ring.”
Irus starts walking again, still keeping an easy grip on my one hand. I stuff my other into my jeans pocket. A cluster of teens loitering outside a cell phone store notices us. They begin texting, and one of them takes a picture with a phone. Of us. Holding hands.
“We’re going viral. Did you factor that into your dating equation?”
His grip on my hand tightens. “Don’t you let go because of them.”
Somehow, he reads my mind. This is all new to me. I’ve never held hands in public with anyone. Not even my mother. Paul would try to hold my hand, but I’d pull away every time.
“Hold up your head, Jacks. Don’t let anyone else dictate your actions. You don’t allow it on the football field.”
“Out here I have no clue what I’m doing. On the field it’s different.”
The view opens up into the food court. The place is crowded and noisy. Irus drapes his arm over my shoulder and leads me in the direction of the food stalls. The walking motion forces me to wrap my arm around his waist.
“There, that feels good, doesn’t it?” Irus murmurs the question softly. Almost like a seduction. The sound does things to my belly. He stops walking, and I ease into his embrace a little more. “What sounds good?” he asks.
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