by Rhys Ford
I’d worked a more Hispanic neighborhood, but except for the language on the signs here, it looked the same. The bubble-slash Korean on the barricaded storefronts was foreign to me, but I guessed they announced the same types of specials that would draw in someone with a tight fist on their wallet. The air smelled a little different, less oil than the streets I’d been learning on but harder spiced, a lingering anise undercurrent that soon was lost under a rush of coppery stink when I sniffed.
Blood burbled in my nose, and I reluctantly touched the bridge. It was tender, but there was no crackling rice sound that I could hear. I chanced a look at my face and winced. A bit swollen where I’d bashed my cheek against the frame, but the bruises forming under my eye and across my nose gave me pause. They promised to be a brilliant black and purple if given a few minutes. If Jae-Min had ice, then I would profess my undying love. When I almost lost my footing on the curb, I gave up ice for the hope of a strong shot of any kind of root alcohol.
The door was sadly lacking a large doorknocker, so I leaned on the bell, feeling the warmth of the light beneath its rubber surface. The door creaked open, and a flustered Jae-Min appeared, his dark hair ruffled as if he’d spent more than a few minutes running his fingers through it. My body responded first, a stirring of my sex inside my boxers. He looked too damned good, lean and sensual in casual cotton pants tied at his waist and a thin white shirt that turned transparent under the porch light. His mouth was wet, drops of water trembling on his lower lip, and my teeth ached anew, less from the rattle of being broadsided by the van and more from wanting to sink into his full lips.
“Hyung!” The feel of his arm around my waist blotted away the pain in my side. It felt good to be touched. I didn’t realize it until just then, but I’d missed being touched by someone other than family. Stumbling forward, I let him catch me, his hands sliding down over my hips as he shut the door behind us. He was smaller than me, slighter in body, but he certainly was strong enough to hobble me into the apartment.
“Am I old enough to be called that?” I mumbled, the ache in my nose beginning to spread across my face, lodging in my cheekbones. “Don’t I have to be at least twenty years older than you? How’s your head?”
“I’m fine, but you look like shit. What happened?” Jae smelled good, a blend of citrus and sex. I might have been imagining the sex part, but the green tea and grapefruit scent was real. Even through the cloud of blood I was trying to breathe through, I could smell him. Being bashed about apparently made me horny. “Who did you piss off?”
“You’ve known me for, what, three days and you think I pissed someone off?” I tried to sound incredulous, but he rolled his eyes at me and dumped me on his couch. My elbow hit the frame, and it stung up to my shoulder. “Ouch. Fuck.”
“Stay there,” Jae ordered before he disappeared into the bathroom. “I’ll get something to wash off your face.”
His cat took a leap from the counter and landed neatly on the coffee table. She pulled her feet under her sleek body and squatted, staring at me with her orange-yellow eyes. A bit of fang slid from under her lip, the barest hint of a threat in case I moved wrong. I shrugged off my jacket, silently hoping that the show of a gun in my shoulder holster would give her pause, but the fang only got longer. Sighing in defeat, I attempted to make some show of affection toward her.
“Neko, right?” I called out to the man making noises behind me. “The cat? Her name’s Neko, right?”
“What?” Jae came back, spreading out gauze and tape on the table and sitting down next to his cat. She mewed at him, a pleasant, sweet sound that belied the evil I suspected lurked within. He stared at my shoulder, edging slightly back on the table. “You’ve got a gun. Why do you have a gun, and why is it in my house?”
“I thought it would be a good idea, considering someone shot at you yesterday.” I drew the Glock out and tapped the bullet load out of it. Checking the chamber, I was satisfied it was empty before taking off my gear and stowing its ammunition in one of the jacket’s pockets. “There, better?”
“Yeah. Thanks.” He scritched at the cat’s ears before handing me a couple of aspirin. I was about to dry-swallow them when he handed me an open water bottle. “Don’t do that. They’ll stick in your throat.”
“Thanks.” Putting the rim to my mouth, I watched his hands as he opened a package of antiseptic wipes. The bottle tasted as I imagined he would taste, spiced sugar and a hint of candlelight, as well as the flat taste of recycled Los Angeles tap water.
“What did you do?” His touch was light as he dabbed off crusted blood from a cut near my eye. I knew from the quick glance at my face in the Rover’s side mirror, Jae couldn’t be very impressed by the battering I’d taken. The car was in better shape, its solid metal body easily shaking off the brunt of the Ford’s assault. “Hold still. It’s dried too much. This is going to hurt.”
“I went to talk to Victoria. You’re right. She’s a bit of a bitch.” I swallowed the girlie scream that scrabbled along the edge of my tongue. The sting from the salve crept slowly over my skin, and I bit my tongue so Jae wouldn’t hear me make noises I preferred to make in bed with company. “That hurts like a motherfucker, just so you know.”
His fingers were warm on my face, the edges of his palms brushing along my lips. My tongue darted out before I could stop it, skimming over his skin. He stopped dabbing at my face, pulling back slowly. I smiled, wondering if the pain was making me bolder or I was just tired of fighting the want of him.
“Did she beat you up? What did you talk to her about?” He pressed back in, nearly straddling my leg when he moved forward. “Hyun-Shik?”
“First, all of this was from someone tailgating too hard,” I said around my gritted teeth. The scrubbing was hopefully working loose any blood, because it felt as if sheets of my skin were being lifted off. “Yeah, I talked to her about your cousin. She held up the ‘poor me’ bit until I started talking about Dorthi Ki Seu. And she really doesn’t like you.”
“I don’t like her, so it’s fine.” Jae shrugged. I played with the hem of his shirt, my fingers brushing along the flat of his belly. His fingers stopped, then started again, his breathing turning shallow. “You’re distracting me.”
“I like distracting you,” I whispered into his palm. “You shiver when I do this.”
Bobby was right about so many things. Somewhere in the drunken haze of last night, I’d made up my mind not to fight what I felt about Jae-Min. I wanted him, and it wasn’t as if I’d been celibate my entire life. I’d just not been with someone since Rick. I was getting tired of satisfying myself, and Jae’s mouth and slender body seemed to be perfect to slake the want in me.
“Don’t tease me.” His voice dropped, a husky, slithering sound that made me harder. “I’m not something for you to play with. Sit still. I’m not done. Tell me about what Victoria said to you.”
“Pretty much nothing. And I’m not playing with you. I’m pretty serious.” I lay there under his hands, wincing when he scraped at my face. Jae sighed, and I gave up my halfhearted attempt at flirting for the time being. “I told her I thought Hyun-Shik was murdered, and she kicked me out. Flat out told me she was glad he died.”
“I think she is,” he said, nodding. Dabbing a new gauze with alcohol, he returned to abrading my skin. “With Hyun-Shik gone, she doesn’t have to bring Will around to the Auntie or Uncle unless they do what she wants. They’re worried that he’s not going to be Korean enough.”
“Not Korean enough?” I cocked my head back to look at him, curious about what he was talking about. “What do you mean? How can he get less Korean?”
“Like you,” Jae said, as merciless as he was about scrubbing my face clean. “You’re Japanese but not Japanese. You don’t know even the simplest things about being Asian. There’s no connection to your mother’s family or blood, is there? They’re dead to you.”
“Hold up,” I protested, grabbing at his wrists and pulling his hands away from my face. “Just b
ecause I wasn’t raised by my mother doesn’t mean her family’s dead. They’re still in Japan being as Japanese as they want.”
“They might as well be dead.” He shrugged, the white shirt catching on the rise of his chest. Jae’s nipples poked ridges into the fabric, momentarily distracting me from what he was saying. “It’s not a bad thing, for you. For Will, his family is right here. Koreans live for their children and their grandchildren. It’s what makes the family go on. Having Will was the only reason Hyun-Shik got married; not because he loved Victoria, but because he had to provide family to live on.”
“So he decided he wasn’t gay anymore because he needed a kid?”
“He wasn’t going to stop loving men but couldn’t afford to be that person anymore.” Jae didn’t struggle out of my hold, settling his knees on either side of my legs. “It was time for Hyun-Shik to grow up and have a family. If he was smart, he would have married a Korean girl, but Vicki was good for Uncle’s business. She came with a lot of connections.”
“You couldn’t have told me this before I headed over there?” I let go of one of his arms, holding the other loosely. Putting the bloodied bandage down on a torn wrapper, he shook his head at me.
“Hyun-Shik put that behind him,” he murmured, dropping his eyes. “Hyun-Shik’s son has to be… sheltered from who his father was. It’s better that way.”
I wasn’t sure if the shyness was real, but the contrite glance he gave me from under his lashes did me in. Victoria had nothing on seduction, compared to Jae-Min. If it was artificial, then he was damned practiced at it.
My hands were in his hair before I even thought about wanting to touch him more. Scraping back the black strands, I paused when I saw the small plaster bandage on his temple. Jae’s eyes widened, and he gasped, unsure of what I was going to do. I had to admit, I wasn’t certain myself, but in the middle of trying to figure out if his cousin had killed himself or if he’d had help, I’d tossed aside my feelings for Rick and was falling for a lying, sleek Korean man. Guilt ate at me, worms of censure working through my thoughts as my thumbs ran over Jae’s cheekbones, bringing a blush to the surface of his pale skin.
“Don’t,” he pleaded. There wasn’t much conviction in his voice. It sounded more like a please than a stop. “You don’t want this.”
“Want this or want you?” There’d been other men who’d caught my interest, but none had really made me lust before. Not like this. I needed to push Jae down and make him scream my name. I wanted his hands on my back and to feel him around me. “No one’s made me need them more since Rick.”
“Nothing good ever comes from it. Not for me,” he said, shaking his head. Jae trembled under my fingers, and the tremor ran down his skin and into mine. “Look at what happened to Hyun-Shik.”
“Is that what this is all about? Do you think you’re going to end up like your cousin?” I pressed my hands lightly on his skull, holding his face up so I could watch his expression. Jae didn’t resist, but he didn’t look pleased at meeting my gaze. A thought surfaced in my mind, bubbling up from a blackness I couldn’t name. It sprang from my mouth before I could stop it, flung out into the open in sharp accusation. “Did your uncle kill Hyun-Shik because he was gay?”
“No!” Jae nearly jerked free from my hold. His hands pushed at my chest, his palms flat against my shirt. “Uncle would never have killed his son. Never. He loved Hyun-Shik.”
“People sometimes kill people they love.” I moved my hands down, running over his shoulders and then down to the small of his back, sliding him forward until he was nearly in my lap. “Trust me, Jae. I’ve seen that up close. Nothing kills like someone who wants to keep someone they love from making a mistake.”
“Why did you come here?” Jae-Min tilted his chin up, a challenge if ever I’d seen one. A tiny scar ran under his left eye, and it made me grin to see the imperfection.
“I came here because someone tried to run me off the road today, and all I could think about was, what if they got to you,” I said. “I think you’re trouble, and I should be kicking myself in the head for wanting you, but here I am, drinking from your water bottle, listening to your cat hiss at me, and letting you peel my face raw.”
I didn’t give him much time to respond. Cupping his face, I bent forward to take a taste of that mouth, drawing out a slow moan when his tongue briefly touched mine. It was a small kiss, and I wanted more.
I pulled him off the table completely, sliding him down against the arm of the couch, and covered him, stroking at his face with my fingers. A press of my thumb on the edge of his jaw parted his lips for me, and I dove on him, drowning in the taste of him until I didn’t have an ounce of air left in my lungs. When I pulled back, he was gasping as hard as I was, shivering under the stretch of my body. Rubbing my mouth against his cheek, I skimmed over the fine down on his skin and sought out one of his earlobes, suckling it onto my tongue.
The dark swallowed up the honey of his eyes, and he panted when I pulled back to stare down at him. Giving him a quick peck on the end of his nose, I said softly, “That’s why I came here.”
“Want you,” he murmured, spreading his hands over my chest. “And you piss me off.”
“Yeah, I piss a lot of people off,” I agreed, licking at his mouth. “But I want you too. God help me; you make me nuts.”
Chapter 9
“LIFT up your arms,” he said softly, tugging at my shirt. “I want to see you.”
For a moment, I was unsure. I knew what my chest looked like. The starbursts of scars weren’t pretty. I was toned and hard, my muscles firmed up from pounding the bag and running, but no amount of time in the ring with Bobby would do anything to lessen my scars’ ugly color or dimpled skin, but I let him lift my shirt up and pull it off.
He didn’t flinch when he saw the damage, and I watched Jae through my lashes as he traced out each keloid, his fingers leaving a whispering tingle on my skin. Bending closer, he kissed the one near my heart, then licked the longer jagged ruin on my ribs.
“What happened?” He stared straight into my face, and I flinched, unable to take the brutal honesty in his eyes. He wasn’t asking what they were. I knew it from his voice. He was asking how it happened and who put them there.
“I was shot.” It sounded so simple. I didn’t have words for the disintegration of my life or the loss of my lover. “A few years back. My lover, Rick, and I were shot. He didn’t make it.”
He stared at me, and I couldn’t guess what he was thinking. A small snippy part of my brain told me never to play poker with Jae, not unless I wanted to be humiliated, because nothing showed through his expressionless face. Then a drop of sadness touched his eyes, and I had to look away. Seeing his iciness fade hurt something inside of me, something fragile that would break if I stared too long.
When his mouth closed over mine, it nearly ruined me.
He slowly explored me, a soft kiss that gentled the fear in my chest. I tasted the wildness in him, a fierce erotic spice that my gut told me would burn if I took a bite.
I’d never wanted to bite into someone like I wanted Jae.
“Am I the first one?” He tilted his head, cupping my face to look at me. His hands felt strong, long fingers caressing my temples as his thumbs traced over my bottom lip. “Since him?”
“Yeah,” I said, shuddering at his touch. “And I feel like shit for wanting you, for needing you.”
“Wanting me doesn’t mean you don’t love him,” Jae replied, a lopsided smile quirking his full lips.
“I think I more than want you,” I said, holding him tightly before he slid away from me, but he stayed, regarding me with a thoughtful expression. “My brain tells me to run because you’re trouble, but my gut tells me something different.”
“What does your gut tell you?”
“That you’re a lot of trouble,” I muttered, and he laughed, a joyous sound that had me chuckling.
“Well then,” Jae said, shifting on my thighs. “Maybe you should decide if
I’m worth the trouble?”
Straddling my legs, he watched me, cautious and controlled, waiting for me to make the first move. It’s always a fallen angel who waits for a man to open the door to hell, and if I was going to be damned for pushing Rick aside, I was going to taste Jae on the way down.
“Yeah, you’re worth the trouble.” He left me for a moment, and I lay there aching until he returned, holding a small bottle of lube and condoms he’d retrieved from a nightstand. Grabbing him by the waist, I pulled Jae back into my lap. Easing his knees on either side of my legs, he bent forward and leaned in for a kiss.
The flat of my tongue fit against the upper curve of Jae’s mouth. With a dipping movement, I traced the sweet pink bow. Slowing my possession, I licked at the corners of Jae’s mouth, sliding the tip of my tongue past its part. Jae moaned, letting me take him, sliding his own tongue against mine in a seductive dance.
A hint of heat curled in my belly, and Jae grew wilder, angling his head so I could kiss his face. His hips moved, rocking against my thickening cock, and I moved my hands down to cup him closer. I felt every languid twitch of his cock through the thin fabric of his drawstring pants, encouraging him by kneading his ass. Digging my fingers into Jae’s hips, I pulled Jae tight against my erection.
“That’s it, baby. Keep rocking me,” I murmured, breaking off our kiss to lick his throat when Jae leaned his head back. The air trapped between us grew hot, smelling of arousal. “God, you feel so good.”
Jae sighed, rubbing his own sex with the flat of his palm. I pushed his hand away, digging past his waistband. My fingers were much cooler than Jae’s hard shaft, and he hissed at the contact. Using the flat of my thumb, I smeared the drop of pearly seed I found at the tip, rubbing it around the head. Velvet soft, it swelled, parting the pout so it wept again.