by Rhys Ford
IT WAS midnight before James knocked on Alex’s front door.
He’d been awake, sitting on the couch with the TV set to a show he had no idea about. Mrs. Who spent a good amount of time kneading her claws through his jeans, the pinpricks enough of a reminder for him to catch her and clip them, but he was too taken over by the day to care. Instead, he watched as chef after chef seemed to compete with one another in some sort of Lord of the Flies marathon until only one man was left standing, a stern-faced Asian man dressed in a shiny suit, who then introduced the next opponents.
It wasn’t until Alex recalled seeing those same two chefs in other kitchens that he realized he’d lost the evening and he’d been stuck on the couch through quite a few very different shows.
Fortunately, James’s arrival shook him up enough to get off of the couch and answer the door.
“Hey,” the detective said, kissing Alex on the corner of his mouth. He held up a bag of food, the name of their favorite Thai restaurant in bright red letters screened on the white plastic. “I brought you a late dinner. I’m guessing you didn’t eat.”
“No,” Alex replied, making a face. “And Mrs. Who only eats tuna. I gagged even at the smell of seafood.”
“Well, luckily there’s not a sucker or shrimp to be found in here.” James coaxed Alex to the living room with a gentle nudge. “Come on, let’s get some food in you.”
“Screw the food,” Alex grumbled, plopping down on the couch. “It’s been a long day, and I’m—damn it, I’m glad it was you that showed up. Isn’t that shitty of me? Some guy dies in a squid suit, and all I can think of is Oh good, James is here. Life’s gotten much better.”
“Yeah, I thought that too,” James admitted. “Well, about seeing you. Hell, food. In you. And unlike our deceased cephalopod fetishist, you’re not going to expire from eating poisonous mushrooms. I have it on good authority any fungi contained in these boxes are purely for nutritional purposes. Although there might be some vegetables in here that are as shady as fuck, but the ’shrooms are on the up-and-up.”
“It’s always good to know the alignment of what I’m going to eat. Hey, I’ve got a question, are we ever going to fuck?” Alex surprised himself, probably as much as he did James, because the words no sooner left his mouth than he immediately wished the couch would swallow him up whole. “I have no idea why I said that. Shit.”
“Yeah, we are,” the other man promised. “I just wanted to… take my time with you. Enjoy falling in love.”
“Are we? In love?” He studied the detective, and his heart skipped and danced a bit in his chest. “Wow. I guess I never—”
“Never knew what it felt like?” James offered him a bite of a spring roll, its end dripping with a sticky hot sweet sauce. “Yeah, it kinda kicks you in the gut, huh? So yeah, we’ll do all sorts of things. Probably in about half an hour or so—”
Something dark filled James’s deep amber eyes when Alex leaned forward and sucked the sauce off the offered roll. Tossing what was left from Alex’s bite back into the tray, James grabbed Alex’s hand and tugged him up off the couch.
“What?” he mumbled around a mouthful of tofu, rice paper wrapper, and bean thread noodles.
“That damned mouth of yours. Screw it,” James growled. “Thai food can wait. I’m going to find us a bed.”
THEY GOT as far as the stairs up to the second floor. Alex debated if his ass hitting the third step qualified as getting far enough up the steps to be called upstairs. He certainly had time to contemplate it because he’d been halfway through one of the most delicious kisses he’d ever experienced when the cop suddenly stopped. Left gasping and wanting more, Alex sat in bewildered confusion while James fumbled with his jacket, digging for something in one of the pockets.
“What the fuck?” Alex blinked. The foggy haze of desire in his mind was starting to dissipate under the perplexing absence of the man he’d been groping when James grinned and came up with a bottle of lube.
“I got you covered, babe,” James quipped. “Or at least got me covered. Whatever floats your boat.”
“Thought you’d get lucky?” Alex smirked back.
“Yeah, I’d hoped to.” James bent over and kissed the crook of Alex’s neck. “I just didn’t know it was going to be tonight. You sure about this?”
“Oh yeah.” Alex shifted, the hard edge of the step digging into his ass. “But maybe not on the stairs.”
“Bed or couch?” James glanced over his shoulder to the living room. “Couch is closer.”
“Couch.” Alex swore under his breath. “Okay, I’m not going to get OCD about fluids.”
“Sure you will,” James replied. “Because you’re you. I’ll just have to spend a lot of time scrubbing the hell out of the cushions afterward, but it’ll be worth it.”
He felt James’s arms under him, and then the world tilted a bit when James lifted him. Gasping with surprise, Alex grabbed at James’s shoulders and hooked his legs around his lover’s waist.
“I can walk, you know.”
“I’m trying to be manly here.” James gave a mock wheeze. “It’ll offset my shoddy performance in a few seconds when I come too soon and leave you unsatisfied.”
Alex was snorting his doubt when James dumped him back onto the couch and the air whooshed out of his lungs, leaving him breathless and panting. The panting and lack of air continued to dog him as James quickly shed his clothes and his dick bounced free, a flushed pink monster of a cock eager to get down to business.
“Um, I don’t know if all that can get in.” Alex gulped, shifting until he fit in between the back and arm of the couch. “Have you got anything smaller? Something less? Maybe a sampler plate?”
“You’ll be fine,” James promised, covering Alex with his hard long body. “Let me show you how it’s done.”
James took his time, touching places on Alex’s body he didn’t even realize had nerves until James’s hands and mouth nipped, pinched, and stroked there. There was a bit of a shock when James’s blunt fingers, warm and slick with lube, teased at his hole for a brief second, but the surprise was replaced with a gasping need when James slid two digits up into Alex’s passage.
After that, he could only hold on and writhe on James’s stroking fingers, each play of tips inside of him touching his core and sending currents through him. Just when he thought he couldn’t stand it anymore, James withdrew and Alex groaned out loud, disgruntled at the sudden emptiness. The snap of a condom on James’s cock was enough to send tingles through Alex’s spine, a muted promise of things to come.
“Lift your legs for me, baby.” James nearly purred when Alex hooked his hands under his knees and spread himself open. “Yeah, just like that.”
His cock fit up against the furl of Alex’s body, and suddenly Alex’s mind blanked, focused only on the press of the hot length of flesh pushing on him. His lungs burned and he realized he was holding in his breath, anticipation gripping his brain.
“Breathe, Alex,” James said, stroking at Alex’s stomach. “Just breathe.”
He inhaled, and James suddenly filled him.
It was too much to take—not James himself—but the feeling of being poured into. Everything around him snapped into focus, too bright, too stimulating—everything so much more than Alex expected. Then James began to move, and his awareness snapped back in, closing down until only the two of them existed.
The press and pull of James inside him seemed to last a short forever, but Alex needed more. He moaned in shock when James’s cock hit his gland; then the climb to his release began. His balls reached up, curling and folding in on themselves as tiny shockwaves burst out from them. His cock went rigid, slapping against Alex’s belly with a wet smack of its leaking head. James reached down between them and smeared the clear dew around Alex’s slit, toying with the shaft until Alex thought he would lose his mind.
He lost it anyway.
He came in an explosive geyser, jerking strands of hot liquid in the tight space betw
een their joined bodies. James thrust with another snap of his hips, and he leaned over Alex, gripping the back of the couch with one hand as he worked Alex’s spurting cock with the other. Somewhere deep inside him, James’s heat was captured in its latex sheath, but Alex could feel its warmth, enjoying the spread of its touch along his insides.
“God, I love you,” James whispered as his cock softened slightly in Alex’s tight clench. “And damn, you’re going to be the death of me.”
“No more dead bodies,” Alex promised. “Including yours. I don’t think I could take it.”
“REALLY?” ALEX looked at the cupcakes Giselle had ordered for Swag Saturday. “Zombies?”
The display itself was nice, a gothic spread of candied eyeballs, gummy skeletons, and now, garishly colored minicakes. Worms, also gummy in nature, poked out of chocolate cookie crumbs masquerading as dirt. Tombstones and decayed limbs completed the graveyard theme, and when Giselle broke one open, it oozed what smelled like raspberry gel from its interior. She licked at it, turning her tongue a bright pink, which she showed Alex in mocking defiance.
“They’re actually just dead people,” she said with a wicked grin. “Pretty cool, right? Especially since they’re now calling the shop Death by Comics. You should change the name.”
“I’m not changing—” He cut himself off, shaking his head. “God, why do I put up with you?”
“Hope you’re not talking about me.” James stepped up behind Alex and wrapped him into a hug. “Wow, those are….”
“Cool?” Giselle offered.
“I was going for gruesome, but sure, we can go with cool.” James kissed Alex’s ear and whispered, “I just stopped by to see if you want to catch some lunch, but I forgot you’ve got a Geekfest going on.”
“Hey, I wear my geek badge with pride,” Alex muttered, but he leaned into the hug. “And no, Giselle, I am not changing the shop’s—”
He was cut off when his other salesperson on duty came in through the back door. A scrawny scarecrow of a young man, his face was bleached nearly as white as the transparent skeletons filling one of Giselle’s crystal punch bowls.
“Hey, um…. Alex?” Charlie stuttered. “You might want to rethink that. Guess what I found in the alley behind the store?”
More from Rhys Ford
Murder and Mayhem: Book One
Dead women tell no tales.
Former cat burglar Rook Stevens stole many a priceless thing in the past, but he’s never been accused of taking a life—until now. It was one thing to find a former associate inside Potter’s Field, his pop culture memorabilia shop, but quite another to stumble across her dead body.
Detective Dante Montoya thought he’d never see Rook Stevens again—not after his former partner falsified evidence to entrap the jewelry thief and Stevens walked off scot-free. So when he tackled a fleeing murder suspect, Dante was shocked to discover the blood-covered man was none other than the thief he’d fought to put in prison and who still makes his blood sing.
Rook is determined to shake loose the murder charge against him, even if it means putting distance between him and the rugged Cuban-Mexican detective who brought him down. If one dead con artist wasn’t bad enough, others soon follow, and as the bodies pile up around Rook’s feet, he’s forced to reach out to the last man he’d expect to believe in his innocence—and the only man who’s ever gotten under Rook’s skin.
Murder and Mayhem: Book Two
Whoever said blood was thicker than water never stood in a pool of it.
Retiring from stealing priceless treasures seemed like a surefire way for Rook Stevens to stay on the right side of the law. The only cop in his life should have been his probably-boyfriend, Los Angeles Detective Dante Montoya, but that’s not how life—his life—is turning out. Instead, Rook ends up not only standing in a puddle of his cousin Harold’s blood but also being accused of Harold’s murder… and sleeping with Harold’s wife.
For Dante, loving the former thief means his once-normal life is now a sea of chaos, especially since Rook seems incapable of staying out of trouble—or keeping trouble from following him home. When Rook is tagged as a murder suspect by a narrow-focused West LA detective, Dante steps in to pull his lover out of the quagmire Rook’s landed in.
When the complicated investigation twists around on them, the dead begin to stack up, forcing the lovers to work together. Time isn’t on their side, and if they don’t find the killer before another murder, Dante will be visiting Rook in his prison cell—or at his grave.
RHYS FORD is an award-winning author with several long-running LGBT+ mystery, thriller, paranormal, and urban fantasy series and is a two-time LAMBDA finalist with her Murder and Mayhem novels. She is also a 2017 Gold and Silver Medal winner in the Florida Authors and Publishers President’s Book Awards for her novels Ink and Shadows and Hanging the Stars. She is published by Dreamspinner Press and DSP Publications.
She’s also quite skeptical about bios without a dash of something personal and really, who doesn’t mention their cats, dog, and cars in a bio? She shares the house with Harley, an insane gray tuxedo, as well as a ginger cairn terrorist named Gus. Rhys is also enslaved to the upkeep a 1979 Pontiac Firebird and enjoys murdering make-believe people.
Rhys can be found at the following locations:
Blog: www.rhysford.com
Facebook: www.facebook.com/rhys.ford.author
Twitter: @Rhys_Ford
By Rhys Ford
MURDER AND MAYHEM
Murder and Mayhem
Tramps and Thieves
Cops and Comix
415 INK
Rebel
Savior
Hellion (Coming Spring 2019)
SINNERS SERIES
Sinner’s Gin
Whiskey and Wry
The Devil’s Brew
Tequila Mockingbird
Sloe Ride
Absinthe of Malice
Sin and Tonic
COLE MCGINNIS MYSTERIES
Dirty Kiss
Dirty Secret
Dirty Laundry
Dirty Deeds
Down and Dirty
Dirty Heart
Dirty Bites
HALF MOON BAY
Fish Stick Fridays
Hanging the Stars
HELLSINGER
Fish and Ghosts
Duck Duck Ghost
WAYWARD WOLVES
Once Upon a Wolf
KAI GRACEN
Black Dog Blues
Mad Lizard Mambo
Jacked Cat Jive (Coming Spring 2019)
There’s This Guy
Dim Sum Asylum
Ink and Shadows
Clockwork Tangerine
Creature Feature 2 with Poppy Dennison
Published by DREAMSPINNER PRESS
www.dreamspinnerpress.com
Published by
DREAMSPINNER PRESS
5032 Capital Circle SW, Suite 2, PMB# 279, Tallahassee, FL 32305-7886 USA
www.dreamspinnerpress.com
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of author imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Cops and Comix
© 2018 Rhys Ford.
Cover Art
© 2018 Reece Notley.
[email protected]
Cover content is for illustrative purposes only and any person depicted on the cover is a model.
All rights reserved. This book is licensed to the original purchaser only. Duplication or distribution via any means is illegal and a violation of international copyright law, subject to criminal prosecution and upon conviction, fines, and/or imprisonment. Any eBook format cannot be legally loaned or given to others. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and
retrieval system, without the written permission of the Publisher, except where permitted by law. To request permission and all other inquiries, contact Dreamspinner Press, 5032 Capital Circle SW, Suite 2, PMB# 279, Tallahassee, FL 32305-7886, USA, or www.dreamspinnerpress.com.
Digital ISBN: 978-1-64405-152-8
Digital eBook published November 2018
v. 1.0
Previously published in Grand Adventures by Dreamspinner Press, March 2014.
Printed in the United States of America