Divine Misdemeanors

Adam Kane, Julian’s longtime boyfriend, had lost his younger brother Ethan in the fight. I think Adam would have agreed to anything in those first few weeks. Even now Adam was doing mostly office work, seeing clients, but not much fieldwork. I wasn’t sure whether that was still grief, or whether Julian couldn’t stand the thought of endangering him. Eventually, if it had to be asked, Jeremy would do it, because at the office he was the boss. It was actually nice that I wasn’t the boss every damn where.

“It’s actually quicker to walk from here,” Julian said. His hands went to his jacket pocket and started to lift a pack of cigarettes out, then he hesitated. “Do you mind if I smoke as we walk?”

“I didn’t know you smoked,” I said.

He gave a brilliant smile, flashing the perfect white teeth that he’d gotten as a model and that now made him picture-perfect when he was working with the local celebrities. “I quit years ago, but lately I’ve felt the need again.” Something passed over his face, some thought or emotion, and not a good one.

“Is the crime scene that bad?” Galen asked, proving that he’d noticed the expression, too.

Julian looked up almost absentmindedly, as if he weren’t really seeing the here and now. I’d seen that look before when he was seeing through his brother’s eyes. “It’s bad enough, but not so bad it makes me want to smoke.”

I debated on whether to ask him what was bad enough to send him to smoke, as he lit a cigarette and began to stride down the sidewalk. He walked as he usually did, as if the sidewalk was a runway and everyone should be looking at him. Sometimes they did. Rhys moved ahead of us, with Saraid by his side. Galen and Cathbodua took up the rear position behind Julian and me. I realized that we could use all the glamour we wanted, but they were clearly being bodyguards. That would be a clue that Julian and I weren’t what we seemed.

He seemed to notice that when I did, because he offered me his arm, and I took it. He began to touch my arm too much, and smile down at me too much. He was playing the part of wealthy lover and businessman or celebrity who needed the bodyguards. I played with him, bumping my head against his shoulder, and laughing at comments that weren’t fu

He leaned over and spoke quietly, smiling brilliantly. “You always were a quick study on undercover work, Merry.”

“Thank you, you, too.”

“Oh, I’m very good under the covers.” And he laughed. He also tossed his half-smoked cigarette into the first trash can we came to.

“I thought you needed the cigarette,” I said, smiling up at him.

“I’d almost forgotten that flirting is better than smoking.” He leaned over me, putting one arm across my shoulders to draw me in against his body. I’d had a lot of practice walking like that with people about six feet tall, though he moved differently than most of my men. I slid my arm around his waist, underneath the jacket, brushing against his own gun that was at the small of his back so it didn’t ruin the line of his suit coat. We strolled up the street like that, our hips rubbing against each other as we walked.

“I didn’t think you liked flirting with women,” I said.

“I’m an equal-opportunity flirt, Merry, you should know that.”

I laughed, and this one was for real. “I do remember that, but not usually this much for me.”

He kissed the skin of my temple, lightly, but there was an intimacy to it, a reality to it that he’d never used when undercover on my arm. There had always been an edge of teasing with it. It let you know he didn’t mean it, so you wouldn’t hold it against him later.

Julian was always touching people, and that gave me a thought. I leaned into him even more tightly and spoke quietly for his ears only. “Are you not getting much touch lately?”

It startled him enough that he stumbled and caused our easy rhythm to falter. He caught himself and me, and we continued our almost lazy stroll up the sidewalk toward all the blinking lights.

“Isn’t that awfully direct for fey culture?” He whispered it against my hair.

“Yes,” I whispered back, “but we’ll be at the crime scene in minutes, and I want to know how my friend is doing.”

He smiled, though I was close enough to know that it left his eyes empty. “No, I’m not getting much touch at home. Adam seems to have buried his heart with his brother. I’m starting to look around, Merry. I’m starting to shop seriously, and I realized it’s not just sex, it’s the touch I miss. I think if I could get more touch I would be able to wait out his grief better.”

I stroked my hand across the flat planes of his stomach, and he gave me a speculative look. I smiled up at him and said, “You can have touch, Julian. Our culture doesn’t see touch as necessarily sexual.”

He laughed then, an abrupt and happy sound of surprise. “I thought you saw every touch as sexual.”

“No, sensual, but not sexual.”

“And there’s a difference?” he asked.

I traced my hand across his stomach again, while my other hand clung to his waist. “Yes.”

“Which is this?” he asked.

That made me frown. “You don’t like women, remember?”

He laughed again, and put his hand over mine where it rested on his stomach. “Yes, but you won’t share your men.”

“That would be a question for the individual men,” I said.

He raised his eyebrows at me. “Really?”

His expression made me laugh. “See, you’d rather sleep with them than with me.”

He rolled his eyes a little and made a waffling gesture with his hands, then gri

I studied his face from inches away. “It’s that bad?”

He nodded, and lifted my hand off his stomach so he could lay little kisses on my fingers as he spoke. “I love Adam more than I ever thought I’d love anyone, but I’m not good without attention.” He let my hand fall and leaned our faces as close together as the height difference and my heels would allow. “It’s a weakness of mine, but I need touch, and flirting, something.”

“Come to the house for di

His steps hesitated, and he almost broke rhythm but caught himself, so neither of us lost a step. “Are you sure?”

“Trust me, as long as it’s not sexual you can get touch.”

“And if I wanted it to be sexual?” he asked.

That made me frown at him, and he looked away, not meeting my gaze. He pretended he was looking at the police and all the emergency vehicles, but I knew he was hiding his face from me, because whatever was in his eyes in that moment he didn’t want to share.

I stopped him, by stopping my own walk. I turned him to face me. “You told me once that your commitment to Adam was your first happiness, that you’d fucked and worked, but never been happy, not really.”

He gave a small nod.

“If you tell me your priority is to keep your commitment to him, then I’ll help you keep it, but if you’re telling me that it’s over and you want sex, that’s a different conversation.”

I watched the pain in his eyes. He drew me into a hug that left no daylight between our bodies. He’d never hugged me like that, and seldom other men unless he was teasing and trying to see if he could make them uncomfortable. But it wasn’t a hug about sex, or teasing. He held me too tightly and too desperately. I held him back and spoke with my face pressed to his chest. “Julian, what’s wrong?”

“I’m going to cheat on him, Merry. If he leaves me this alone for much longer, I’m going to cheat. I think that’s what he’s waiting for, so he can use it as an excuse to break up.”

“Why would he want to do that?” I asked.

“I don’t know, maybe because Ethan always hated the fact that his only brother was gay. He always hated me and blamed me for turning his brother into a fag.”