Page 48 of Shades of Henry
He’d been worried about getting caught, sure, but he’d also been exhilarated and sort of excited. The last three days he’d been part of an investigation, and sure, it had consequences forhimbecause he’d be really excited about not getting arrested, going to trial, maybe going to prison, but it also had bigger consequences than that.
Martin Sampson was dead. And yeah, he’d been all about the street hustle until he’d figured out Henry was Davy’s little brother. But he’d been a person—someone real to all the people Henry knew, and he’d been murdered. And Henry was going to get a chance to set that right by figuring out who really did it.
Did that benefit Henry? Well, yes. But finding who the killer was also benefited the memory of a guy who had maybe been sabotaged from the start. His father was a crooked drug dealer, and an all-around nasty piece of work. Henry had never thought he’d be grateful his own old man was a short-sighted homophobic redneck, but damn if Robert Sampson didn’t make Paul Worrall look like a prize.
That gave him something he hadn’t had since Malachi had bent him over and forced him to break the law.
It gave him purpose.
FLASH!The curve of Lance’s throat when he’d thrown his head back while in the throes of climax.
It was the first time in his life that Henry could even say “making love” in his head.
FLASH!The sublimely uncomfortable look on everybody’s faces when Henry asked who had been purging bile in the sink and toilet.
Cotton’s game little wave. Billy’s grim eye-roll. Fisher’s embarrassed shrug. Zeppelin’s sheepish grin. Even Randy’s bashful look away.
Zeppelin had looked at Fisher and said, “Dude! Why? You’re fuckin’ perfect!”
And Billy had snapped, “So’s Lance, but he’s the one who takes the sink when the rest of us are going in the pot!”
Henry’s face went cold, as well as his fingertips and his toes.
“All of you?” he rasped, looking at them helplessly.
“Not me,” Curtis muttered. “I thought they were whacking off in the bathroom.”
“Dude,” Randy said, “I don’t need to whack off in the bathroom. I pretty much bump a table and that’s a candlelit dinner right there.”
Henry looked at Curtis helplessly. “You’re excused?” he said, because he was seriously at a loss.
But Curtis surprised him. “No,” he said, looking away. “I’m not. I knew what they were doing. I… I should have said something, at least to all of them.” He swallowed. “I was mostly just sort of jealous because I couldn’t make myself do it.”
But Lance!Henry wanted to flail his arms.How could Lance do that to himself?
But Henry knew the answer. All he had to do was ask himself whathehad to be ashamed of, and he’d see the entire slideshow—every time Mal talked him into giving in, every time he closed his eyes and begged his family for forgiveness.
Lance had so much less to be ashamed of, but his body was on camera for everyone to see. The one place he could prove he had no shame was the one place he couldn’t hide any flaws.
But Henry had felt him in the dark, had tasted his kisses, willingly and freely given, and knew Lance was flawless.
FLASH!The worry in Lance’s eyes as he’d kissed Henry goodbye, while Henry was still in bed, drowsing, and Lance was off to work a twelve-hour shift.
FLASH!Jackson Rivers eating at Davy’s table, looking exhausted still, cutting Kane’s niece little shapes out of her sandwich while Ellery Cramer looked at him with that same worry.
FLASH!The worry in Kane’s eyes as Jackson and Davy had spoken quietly about Martin Sampson, because Jackson couldn’t investigate the guy’s death without investigating his life.
FLASH! FLASH! FLASH!
All of it,all of it,swirled around Henry’s brain in the big frightening amalgam of the things Henry was trying to right in the present, so overwhelming he didn’t even see the scary things that had been trying to get him in the past.
And still it was all secondary to his worry about Lance, and the feel of Lance under his hands, under his body, the night before.
Click.The door opened, and Lance walked in, blinking.
“Everybody asleep?” he asked, puzzled.
Well, sort of. They’d all fled as Henry had stood there, gobsmacked, almost betrayed in a way. He’d put the sink back together, minus a heinous-smelling clog and a desperately needed uncorroded U-joint. He’d come back from the hardware store, and they’d stayed in their rooms, leaving the illusion he was alone.
