The Gilded Mirror

by L. M. Somerton

  “You stay right here. Call 911, then call Sancha but do not come into the store. Do you understand me? This is not negotiable.” Gage drew his gun. “Do it, Landry. Then get away from here. Got to the café.” Landry nodded, trying not to panic. He pulled out his cell and got dialing as Gage shouldered his way through the door.

  Having decided that, in this case, attack was the best form of defense, Gage slammed his way into Treasure Trove. The door had been latched, but it gave way with a crack of splintering wood. Pain lanced through Gage’s already injured shoulder, but he gritted his teeth and ignored it. With a speed born of experience, he assessed the situation even as he weaved down the central aisle of the store toward the cash desk at the rear. Underfoot, broken glass and china crunched at every step. “Seattle PD, armed police, drop your weapons!”

  A blur of bodies was engaged in a full-on fight behind the cash desk and nobody took a blind bit of notice of him. Gage caught sight of Petey on all fours, half-hidden behind a wooden trunk. Except he wasn’t hiding. He was whacking at the legs of two men with what looked like an antique carpet beater. The two strangers in the store bore a remarkable resemblance to the men that had tracked Gage and Landry on the waterfall hike, the same men that had taken the map, though they weren’t now wearing balaclavas. Gage ducked as a gun, knocked from someone’s hand, flew overhead. Keeping low, he scuttled forward.

  One of the men landed at his feet with a thud and he wasted no time in rolling him onto his front then cuffing him. The man didn’t resist, seeming dazed. Blood trickled from his nose. Pushing his prone form to one side, Gage got cautiously to his feet. Mr. Lao was busy channeling his inner Jet Li, delivering a sound thrashing to the other man who still had a grip on his gun but had absolutely no chance of using it.

  Gage looked on, impressed as Mr. Lao delivered a spectacular kick to the man’s jaw, bringing him to his knees where Petey bashed him across the back of the head with his carpet beater, laying him out flat. Gage only carried one pair of cuffs, but he did have cable ties in his pocket and used them to incapacitate the second man.

  “Thank you for your invaluable help, Detective Roskam,” Mr. Lao said, grinning from ear to ear. He grabbed Petey’s hand and pulled him to his feet. “Nicely done, Petey. I think you’ve proved the usefulness of that carpet beater. Packs quite a wallop, doesn’t it?”

  Petey, face flushed and hair tousled gave him a high five. “We rock.”

  “Would one of you’d like to tell me what’s going on?” Gage surveyed the damage around him. It seemed to be limited to the immediate area around the cash desk. Petey and Mr. Lao both started talking at once and he had to hush them.

  “One of you, please.”

  “I’ll make some green tea, Mr. L, while you talk to Gage,” Petey said. “I think we could both do with a cup, don’t you?”

  “Fine idea. Make a cup for the detective as well, he’s looking a little tense.”

  Gage shook his head. “On second thoughts, I need to let the cavalry know that they don’t have to come charging in here, guns blazing. Landry’s outside and he must be climbing the walls by now. Give me a minute then you can tell us all at the same time what’s been going on.” He checked on the two men on the floor. One was moaning while the other was out cold but breathing fine. He nudged the noisy one with the toe of his boot. “Quiet, moron, or I’ll give you back to the old guy.” The threat worked and the moaning subsided to muttered curses. Gage made it one step outside the door onto the sidewalk before he got an armful of Landry.

  “I thought I told you to get away from here.” Landry clung to him like a limpet.

  “I did. I made the calls like you told me to. I walked at least ten paces down the street, which was really far but then I decided it would be safe to peek through the window, but I couldn’t see anything. Is everyone okay in there, Mr. Lao and Petey?”

  “They’re fine and apparently quite capable of looking after themselves. You can come in but be careful where you walk because there’s a lot of broken glass and china on the floor.”

  “What?” Landry squirmed out of Gage’s arms and ran inside.

  “I’m kidding myself if I ever thought I’d have any control over that boy,” Gage muttered. He was about to follow him inside when two patrol cars screeched up to the curb. Sancha scrambled out of one of them.

  “Holy mother, Roskam. If this is your idea of taking the afternoon off to catch up on your sleep…”

  “You can’t blame me for this, Sancha,” Gage protested, glaring at his uniformed colleagues who were all laughing. “There are two criminals inside who need to be taken in, so you lot can deal with that rather than standing around smirking. They may need to see a medic.”

  “Did you not get enough action last night?” Sancha stood with her hands on her hips, scowling.

  “Seriously, it wasn’t me. Mr. Lao and Petey took both of them down before I got the chance to get involved.”

  “You sound so affronted.” Sancha bent double, laughing.

  “I had to barge through another door. How about some sympathy?” Gage rubbed his sore shoulder, but Sancha got even more hysterical while the patrol officers went into the store to collect the bad guys.

  “You are definitely dealing with the paperwork on this one,” Sancha said, wiping tears from her eyes.

  “I’m off duty,” Gage protested. “I need sleep even more now. Fuck me, I’m getting too old for this.” He groaned as a fire truck, sirens blaring, pulled up in the middle of the street. Carson and his entire crew spilled out.

  “What the actual fuck, Gage?” Carson stomped toward him.

  “Nothing’s on fire, Carson.”

  “I don’t give a shit. Someone put in a call for paramedics, and where they go we go, so we’re here. Now, where’s Petey?”

  “Inside. He’s fine. Shall we all go in. Jesus, I’m getting a migraine.”

  Everyone trooped into Treasure Trove and the number of people made the store seem cramped and claustrophobic.

  “Who wants tea?” Petey shouted above the general hubbub. There was a chorus of requests and a lot of waving hands. Mr. Lao was handing round a plate of cookies while the two sizable uniformed cops were dragging their protesting prisoners toward the door.

  Gage took in the scene, mouth open.

  “You’re going to catch flies in that.” Landry gave him a smacking kiss right there in front of everyone. There were cookie crumbs around his mouth. “Mr. Lao’s girlfriend made these cookies—they have real stem ginger in them.” He thrust one into Gage’s hand. “I’ll get you a cup of Mr. Lao’s disgusting tea. I’m not having one because, bleh, but your stomach’s made of cast-iron.”

  Carson walked over to them, his arm around Petey’s shoulders. Petey gave him a shy smile. “Thanks for coming to the rescue, Gage. I was really pleased to see you, even though you did break the door and it’s not been that long since it was fixed.”

  “From what I saw, you didn’t need me at all.” Gage crunched on his cookie. “This is excellent.”

  “Well, we didn’t have any handcuffs. At least, we didn’t have any down here because Carson keeps a few pairs in my apartment, and I’m sure you and Landry have a supply, but I wasn’t going to run upstairs for them and leave Mr. Lao on his own. Did you know he’s been studying martial arts for over sixty years?”

  Gage caught Carson’s grin and scowled. “I didn’t know that. No one ever thought to mention it.” Landry was taking care to look in a different direction. The ninja in question wandered over. “Quite a mess they made. They kept falling into things. Very odd. Still, I have great insurance, and Landry keeps a detailed record of the stock. With a detective as a witness, I should have no trouble with my claim. Petey, you need to clear some of these people out of the store. They are all too big and clumsy. They can drink tea and eat cookies on the street.”

  Carson grinned then bellowed some orders that had everyone in a uniform trooping out to the sidewalk. Bemused, Gage took in the destruction, the
abandoned carpet beater, and the spots of blood on the floor. Sancha took pity on him.

  “You and Landry get out of here. I’ll take statements from our two superheroes and then follow the arresting officers back to the precinct to interview the wannabe criminals. What a pair of losers.”

  “The same losers we saw when we were hiking in Bellingham,” Gage said, “and probably the ones who attacked me here. I can’t be a hundred percent sure, but if you interrogate them about their movements, you might get lucky.”

  “So this takes us back to Landry’s treasure map,” Sancha said. “For a single piece of paper, it’s managed to cause an awful lot of trouble.”

  Landry had grabbed a broom and was sweeping glittering shards of glass and broken china into a heap.

  “Leave that, Lan. I’ll do it,” Petey said. “You were looking dead on your feet hours ago. You and Gage really do need to get some sleep.”

  Landry leaned on the broom. Gage wondered if it was the only thing holding him up. He held out a hand to Landry, who propped his broom against a nearby wardrobe before taking it.

  “Sounds like great advice,” Landry said, fighting a yawn.

  “So now you’re learning to take orders,” Gage muttered. “I’m going wrong somewhere. You, me, bed.”

  “Yes, Sir.” Landry managed half a smile. “See, I can be obedient.”

  Spluttering his disbelief, Gage guided him to the door. “Of course you can.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  “This is so unfair!” Landry attempted to hump the pillow Gage had lodged beneath his belly. He was naked, his wrists cuffed behind him, a spreader bar keeping his legs apart. “My ass is in the air, why aren’t you taking advantage with that big, fat d—?”

  “Landry… That mouth of yours is going to get you into a lot of trouble.” Gage planted a couple of hard smacks on Landry’s exposed cheeks. “What did I tell you earlier?”

  “To be quiet and still. To meditate on my situation.” Landry thumped the mattress. “But that was before you got the vibrator out. I don’t like my situation! I am not the Dalai Lama—he seems like a cool dude, but even he couldn’t meditate in this position.”

  “Quit whining or I’ll gag you.” Gage held the offending toy against Landry’s balls then turned it on. “We haven’t spent nearly as much quality time together recently as we should. You’ve been taking liberties. You’re a brat, a bad influence on Petey, and I feel the need to remind you that you are my submissive. My obedient, compliant, sweet-natured submissive.”

  Landry snorted. Then regretted it as his balls got another dose of vibration. “Please, Sir. Need you in me.”

  “That’s what you want. I decide what you need, and as Mr. Lao is keeping the store closed today while the door is replaced, I have all the time in the world to make sure those needs are appropriately met.”

  “Don’t you have to work? We slept all yesterday afternoon and all night.”

  “Nope. Sancha and I both have the day off because we closed the money laundering case. Not that it was money laundering in the end but regardless, I have a whole day to torture you.”

  “Oh goody. But you got to come already. I gave you a world-class blow job, you said so. Then I got you breakfast in bed and I let you share my coffee.”

  “You had a whole pot.” Gage shifted the vibrator from Landry’s balls to the sensitive skin around his hole.

  “Your point being?”

  Gage replaced the vibrator with his tongue and Landry screamed. “Too much! Too good! If I don’t come, I’m gonna pop!”

  Gage carried on rimming him, probing with his extremely talented tongue, pulling Landry’s ass cheeks apart for better access. Landry could no longer form coherent words as a wave of heat swept down his spine and a sheen of perspiration coated his skin. He panted, unable to suck in enough oxygen. His dick was so hard it hurt. He felt loose, ready, but Gage still tormented him, replacing his tongue with one finger, then two and a liberal dose of lube. Landry had a fleeting thought that he might require the services of a brown paper bag if he got any closer to hyperventilating, but the thought dissolved into vapor as Gage thrust into him.

  “Are your shoulders okay?” Maddeningly, Gage stilled.

  “Gage…”

  “You’ve been in cuffs a while, so tell me you’re okay or I stop.”

  “Every single part of my very cute anatomy is absolutely perfect,” Landry hissed. “But various bits of me are going to die of frustration really, really soon. They're going to curl up and die. Is that what you want?” He jiggled his wrists in an attempt to demonstrate just how okay he was. Jiggling his ass came next and that drew a curse from Gage who finally, finally began to move. Landry sent a silent prayer of gratitude heavenward.

  Apparently inspired by divine intervention, Gage proceeded to pound Landry into the mattress. Landry squealed his delight and went with the bouncing, quite happy for Gage to take full control. Gage grunted with every thrust, punctuating his efforts with a few well-chosen words.

  “Fuck. You’re. Tight.”

  Landry grinned, as much as he was able when his face was being rubbed against the bed sheets. He loved being the cause of Gage’s inability to communicate with more than one word at a time. Landry couldn’t reach for his dick but came regardless and as soon as he started Gage reached around his body to give him a helping hand. He may have screamed, he wasn’t sure, but the moment was worthy of vocal proclamation. To Landry’s delight, the normally stoic Gage was in accord and yelled as he came, his body shaking as his second orgasm of the morning rolled through him. Emotion overwhelmed Landry and he sobbed his joy, dampening the sheets with his tears. For a long while, Gage held still, sucking in deep breaths, gripping Landry’s hips as if preventing his escape. Landry had no intention of going anywhere. His sobs turned to giggles.

  “That was phantasmagorical!” His body shook with laughter.

  “I don’t even know what that means.” Gage struggled with the handcuffs and spreader bar. “Keep still! Why do they make these padlocks so damn small?” he complained.

  Once Landry was free, Gage flopped onto his back pulling Landry on top of him. Landry did his best frog impression, spreading his arms and legs to cover as much of Gage’s body as possible. They were both hot and sticky, but Landry didn’t care. He needed close contact. He needed to know that he still had Gage’s full attention.

  Gage stroked his back and his ass, patting his hole with a finger. “Not too sore? I got a bit carried away.”

  “I like feeling you.” Landry licked Gage’s neck, enjoying the salty taste. “Both me and my butt are fine.” He didn’t resist as Gage lifted one of his hands and stroked his wrist.

  “You’re going to have marks here. I should use padded cuffs rather than the real deal.”

  “I like feeling them too,” Landry said. “You know I do. I’d soon tell you if there was anything you did I didn't like. I have a safe word, remember?”

  “I know you do, but I wouldn’t hurt you for the world.”

  “Then do you mind not squeezing quite so hard. Can’t breathe.” Gage released his grip a fraction. Landry hummed his happiness, planting little kisses on Gage’s chest. “I think you’re getting hairier.”

  “Do you mind? I could always wax. I can’t believe I said that.”

  “Tempting, but no. I love your fur. Maybe one day I’ll get some too.”

  “You’re so blond, it wouldn’t show if you did. Besides I love you smooth.”

  “Feel so good. Warm and happy and…” Landry drifted into a doze and woke disoriented, still wrapped in Gage’s arms. “What time is it?”

  “A little after ten. You dropped off again.”

  “You should have woken me.”

  “You need the rest and besides, I like watching you sleep. I love the way you snuffle against me and rub your nose into my chest. It’s very cute.”

  “You make me sound like a puppy.”

  “Not that cute.”

  Landry gasped
in mock indignation. “I’m awake and hungry. We should shower. Can you call your friend in England today? I want to know what’s going on with my portrait.”

  “Slow down! You may be awake but I’m still considering it.” Gage yawned. “And you wish the portrait was yours! I wonder what it’s worth.”

  “Millions, I guess. Hard to put a price on something like that. I suppose it’ll go back to the family it was originally stolen from. It’s pretty well documented where it came from, and there’s an empty frame waiting for it in some museum.”

  “Well, we’ll find out soon enough. Let’s get clean, then I’ll take you out for breakfast.” Gage wound his fingers into Landry’s hair, giving the strands gentle tugs. “I need bacon.”

  “You wanna come shower with me?” Landry felt strangely shy as he asked.

  “Hmm, wet, soapy Landry seems like a good deal. Lead me to the bathroom, gorgeous.”

  Showering together lasted as long as the hot water did. Landry dropped to his knees and sucked Gage’s dick until he was satisfied it was clean and shiny. Gage rewarded him with a little protein appetizer before breakfast then jacked Landry’s cock while he fingered his hole, holding Landry up when his knees turned to jelly. Landry toweled down then dressed in a daze, soppy grin fixed to his face. He was so distracted he put on odd socks, one red and black stripes the other blue with yellow dots. He held out his feet, wiggled his toes and shrugged. “Petey is a trendsetter! Who knew?” He shoved his feet into an old pair of runners. He had dressed for comfort in soft jeans and a long-sleeved tee. Gage looked relaxed and comfortable in dark blue chinos and a pale blue polo shirt. Landry licked his lips and tried not to make his drooling too obvious—Gage was just as yummy dressed as he was naked.

  Having decided on Basim’s diner for breakfast, they strolled along the street hand-in-hand. Two guys were already hard at work repairing Treasure Trove’s front door under the watchful eye of Mr. Lao, who must have opened the store’s security shutters for them. Mr. Lao gave them a wave as they passed, and Landry promised to bring back a couple of waffles, which were Mr. Lao’s biggest weakness.