Every detail down to the way he breathed. His physique. His posture.
“I need to open a tab.” The sentence came out far quieter than Kellen intended. He took a breath—any attempt to steady himself—and met eyes with the bartender. Only to see her giving him a skeptical stare in return.
“It’s closing time. We’re not selling any more drinks.”
Kellen hesitated, vision locking uncomfortably with the heavily-lined eyes staring back at him. “Um…” It was involuntary, miscalculated: the glance he passed back toward the booth he had come from. Where that boy was still sitting. Leaned over the table, a phone in his hand, seemingly speaking into the microphone on it.
“Eros?” The bartender asked.
Kellen blinked. “What?”
“Well, you tell me.” She set down a glass she had been drying and glanced at the booth. “What do you need a tab for?”
I don’t know what’s happening, it sank in on Kellen with a growing thread of panic. The way she asked the question seemed like she was testing him. In a movement that felt more like an impulse than a decision, Kellen jerked his thumb over his shoulder. “He told me to start a tab at the bar.”
Several seconds of silence. The bartender’s lips parted. “Eros told you to start a tab?”
Eros? The question repeated in Kellen’s mind. “Yes.”
Another unnecessarily long silence followed. “For how much?”
That was a test. It came out in the way she asked it. Kellen smiled faintly. “A grand.”
She said nothing as she moved over to the computer and began tapping on the screen. “Can I see some ID?”
Kellen handed her the Jay Sandler ID.
A few more taps on the computer, and the thermoprinter spat out two receipts. “Sign there.” The bartender presented him with a pen and a signature line.
“Grey Goose VX 1 lr Bottle – $1,000,” was the only item on the receipt. Kellen drew a cursive “J” and completed the signature with an elaborate squiggly line.
“We do use collections,” the bartender commented. She stabbed the receipt on a chit spike and turned away.
Walking back toward that booth felt like leaving reality in the background. Can he see through that thing over his eyes? The question drifted through Kellen’s mind. It had to be part of the outfit. The tight black jeans, the top that didn’t conceal anything below the first ab line. The spine tattoo made of small black letters Kellen couldn’t quite make words from at this distance. The detached sleeves covering both forearms. In the dream, those wrist had been bound. In the dream, the blindfold was no different from the restraints digging wounds into his wrists.
The dream? Kellen’s footsteps halted involuntarily across the floor.
The dreams weren’t real. This boy wasn’t real. He couldn’t cross over into reality.
And yet, he looked very real as he stood from the booth, tucked his phone into his back pocket, and started toward the place on the floor Kellen had stopped.
“Did you open a tab, Jay?”
Have I been drugged? Kellen blinked at the figure in front of him. He hadn’t eaten anything, hadn’t had anything to drink here.
“Earth to Jay.”
Kellen felt like he couldn’t react. “I opened a tab.”
“Good. Our driver should be here already.” He started toward the front entrance of the building. Kellen watched him walk ahead, how he brushed his fingertips across the side of a long table, then made the right turn straight for the double doors.
“OF HIS WIN,” the visible portion of that spine tattoo read. Small capital letters, vertical print.
This was real. It had to be. There was a different feeling in the dreams. A feeling of connection, wordless understanding. It wasn’t like this. Not how Kellen felt now, so hopelessly at a loss to what was happening. Coincidence. It was all just coincidence.
“‘Our driver’?” Kellen quickened his stride and caught up shoulder-to-shoulder with the informant.
“For safety.” That figure turned and lifted a smile to Kellen. The boy’s hand met the handlebar on the door, and he pushed it open, then held it for Kellen.
It was half impulse, whatever made Kellen step a stride ahead and lift his arm in the way of that boy and his path to the second set of double doors.
The informant hit Kellen’s arm like he truly didn’t see it in front of him. He stopped short, hands immediately lifting to feel out what he had walked into. A light touch to Kellen’s wrist, a second one to his forearm. And then the boy was reaching tentatively toward Kellen’s body.
The urge—need—to move out of reach seized Kellen like instinct. He resisted it—and still failed to mask the split-second flinch that darted through his muscles when those fingertips touched his side.
“Can you not?” The boy’s lips pressed with a small, unamused smile, and he lowered Kellen’s arm out of the way. He continued to the outer door and pushed it open. This one, he did not hold.
Outside, warm, humid air replaced the dry, freezing AC of the building. And with it, a new sense of reality sank into Kellen’s skin. This wasn’t a dream. He was on a job, and he had next to no idea how he had presented himself so far.
The informant stood on the sidewalk outside the front door until a black sedan rolled up in front of him. The tinted-black passenger side window rolled down, and a driver Kellen could only barely make out said one word: “Eros.”
The informant took three small steps toward the edge of the sidewalk, then reached out until his hand touched the side of the vehicle. Then he easily found the handle and pulled open the door to the backseat. “After you, Jay.” He turned back toward the sidewalk.
He’s good at pretending, but he can’t actually be blind, Kellen silently concluded. But the next moment, he was registering something else: the car in front of him; the fact that once he got inside, that vehicle could take him absolutely anywhere; the fact that he was unarmed.
“You need to know you could be walking into a trap,” Marcus had said. “We don’t know of a reason why someone would go through all this trouble to set up a trap that would presumably only take down one officer.
“…But more importantly, we don’t see sufficient motive for this individual to cooperate with us.”
“Please, Kell. Please, please, please—for the love of god, for the love of our CHILD, Kellen, please stop taking these jobs.”
“Thanks,” Kellen murmured as he passed the informant and entered the vehicle.
“Where to?” The boy asked when they were both settled in the back seat, and the doors were closed.
Kellen glanced at the figure one seat over from him and took out his phone. He opened a search browser.
“No places at all in mind?” A small, amused scoff, not unlike the one he had given in the darkness of that booth. “I’m not asking you to take me to the Joanna Capris. Anywhere with accommodations will do.”
“I’m from out of town,” Kellen muttered. M-O-T-E-L-S W-I-N-C-H-E-S-T-E-R A-R, he tapped out into the search bar. “Crown Inn?”
“Not that one,” the boy’s response came so swiftly, it almost seemed reflexive. A few seconds of silence followed. “It’s boring. Pick another.”
Kellen hesitantly looked back at his phone. He scrolled a little. “Knights Inn…?”
“The one on Main?”
Kellen tapped the option and glanced at the address. “Yes.”
“Take us to Knights on Main, please.”
The drive was silent. Kellen wordlessly kept an eye on the route on his phone until the vehicle came to a stop in front of Knights Inn.
Something hushed was exchanged between the informant and the driver before the vehicle departed, and Kellen saw a small device change hands. The boy was fastening it to his wrist like a watch as the car drove away.
Kellen stepped slowly onto the sidewalk right as a late breeze picked up on the night air. It lifted locks of the boy’s dark hair and drew soft whisps across the blindfold he wore. Kellen silently raised a hand to his own forehead and swept back escaped strands from his hair tie.
“Jay.”
A small silence.
“What?”
“Can I take your arm?” He held out his hand.
Kellen said nothing. With reluctance gnawing like rats at his bones, he stepped within reach of the stranger and let him grasp his arm. They entered the building.
The room smelled like soap. As soon as the door clicked shut behind them, the informant released Kellen’s arm. He stepped into the small entryway, and put a hand to the wall, then held out his other arm and snapped his fingers in the air. His arm moved a little to the left, and he snapped his fingers a second time. His hand touched the doorframe just ahead of him. “I’m going to use the bathroom,” he said. And his voice was suddenly different.
Kellen watched as the boy walked into the bathroom and shut the door behind himself. He can see at least something, Kellen thought for the second time.
There was a bed, a floor lamp, and a nightstand within the small room. Kellen passed the sleeping accommodations and stopped in front of the window. His fingers encircled the tilt rod hanging beside his head, and he flipped open the blinds. Took a moment to survey the dark parking lot below, then flipped the blinds shut again.
Water started running in the bathroom.
Kellen folded his arms across his chest, and his back sank against the wall. His eyes lifted briefly to the ceiling light, then down at the untouched bed. Coincidence. Was coincidence like this even possible?
“You are a seer.”
I’m nothing.
Kellen’s hands lifted slowly to his face and froze there for almost ten seconds. Cold. The cold temperature of his own hands and the sensation it left across his warm face. Air. The smell of soap that permeated the air from no specific source.
The water shut off in the bathroom, and Kellen abruptly lowered his hands. He watched as the bathroom door opened, and the informant stepped out.
The boy put a hand to the wall and felt his way into the main space of the hotel room. When the small hallway ended, he again held out his arm and snapped his fingers in the air. He found the bed and sat down on the edge of it.
“Jay?”
“I’m here,” Kellen responded.
“You can sit down.”
Kellen passed his tongue across his lips. “How do you know I’m not?”
“I’m not stupid?” The boy shrugged.
That movement. That movement on that boy. It brought attention to his bare shoulders, his lean form.
Kellen’s arms tightened across his chest. “What’s that device on your wrist?”
“It pings my location to management,” the informant answered easily. “There’s no recording on it—either audio or video.”
“But there was audio recording in that Exotix place?”
Those pierced lips parted. The corners lifted just a little. “Everything is recorded at the club. Inside and all around the building.”
“The gang pimps you out? Do they own that building?”
“Does the gang pimp me out.” A full smile cracked across that boy’s face, and a breath of amusement escaped his throat.
Kellen distinctly felt the air evaporate from his chest. He didn’t know. He didn’t know why. Again, that spindling, mounting feeling of becoming over-adrenalized. Like something was gravely wrong, even though no signs of it were visible. His eyes flickered from the boy’s perfect smile down momentarily to the smoothly cut set of abs on full display below his crop top. Almost fearfully, his vision recentered. “You can take that blindfold thing off,” he spoke finally, voice unintentionally weak.
The boy’s face sobered. One second. Two. Then, he smiled faintly. “Yes, an Exey member owns Exotix.” A pause. “And I never take it off.”
Kellen watched him wordlessly. Never?
“Are you done asking questions?” Again, that faint smile. “Actually, I expected quite a bit more than that.”
“What’s your name?” Useless question, the inner voice in Kellen’s mind immediately criticized. But he found himself pensively watching the boy for a reaction.
A strange, unexpected stiffness stole over the figure on the bed. The boy was perfectly still for about five seconds, and then he stood up. He lifted a hand like he was aiming for the wall, but his fingers struck the bedside lamp instead. Hard. Like a reflex, the boy’s fingers darted out and caught the teetering structure before it fell, quickly stabilizing it. Then he had a hand to the wall, and he turned back to face Kellen. Low, steady, but with an undertone of fear Kellen understood like a native language: “You should know my name.”
Kellen’s back abruptly lifted off the wall, his arms loosening, clarification less than a second from coming out of his mouth.
And far too quickly, that boy took four retreating steps toward the door.
Kellen froze. Silence. Suddenly, he could hear his heartbeat in his throat. “Alexei,” he said finally. Swallowing quickly to clear his throat, “‘Alexei’ is the name they gave me, but people were calling you ‘Eros.’”
“‘Eros’?” Incredulity. Though it was incredibly hard to determine the meaning of it without being able to see his eyes or the expression of his brows. “You thought ‘Eros’ might be my actual name? Do you know what ‘Eros’ means?”
Kellen’s lips parted.
Finally, relaxation stole across the figure against the wall. Another faint smile touched his pierced lips. “It’s a stage name. Alexei is my real name.” He was quiet for a moment. Then, taking a step back toward the bed, “Your turn.”
A car horn went off from somewhere outside. Kellen’s brow flinched. “My turn?”
“What’s your name?”
Kellen’s arms silently closed across his chest again. “Jay.”
“Come on, I know ‘Jay’ isn’t your real name. I wouldn’t be surprised if your guy told me I would meet Jay before he even knew who Jay was going to be.”
Kellen was silent, surveying the boy in front of him. The way he breathed. Every small movement. How. How could it be so similar? Was he misremembering the dream, or was his mind superimposing what he remembered onto this real person in front of him?
“A partnership like this relies on mutual trust, you know that right?” The boy moved back to the bed and sat down.
Trust. Trust to tell each other the truth. Trust not to lead each other into danger. Trust not to kill each other. “You can call me Jay.” The words left Kellen’s throat deadpan.
The boy hardly reacted to his answer. Either he truly didn’t show a hint of sentiment, or it was covered by the red cloth across his face. Another silence passed. “Your friends want the ringleaders. But if your friends don’t dismantle the business they run, others will just take over for them. If I learn I can trust you, I will show you the ringleader’s business, and you will see everything you need to take it down. Then, I will show you the ringleader.”
Kellen felt his shoulders hit the wall again. His eyes lowered to the floor for a moment, then lifted slowly. “Is it one or multiple ringleaders? You switched from plural to singular in the middle of that.”
Silence. Air so quiet, the vents could be heard. Those pierced lips parted slowly. “You won’t find anyone with better information than me.”
Kellen shrugged faintly. “I just asked a question. One or multiple people?”
Hesitation. Despite the tight control this boy clearly had over his own composure, hesitation showed on him in bold red in the seconds that followed. “One person.”
Kellen bit his lip. Silently released it. His shoulders lifted off the wall and lightly settled back against it. “One person?”
“One,” the boy whispered.
Another silence. “One person controls all of XI?”
The boy’s back straightened. “You want the kingpin, and I am telling you the kingpin is one person.”
“Someone you’ve met?”
Silence.
“Have you met him or not?”
The informant’s lips parted slowly. Still, he said nothing.
It hit with a sting straight in the chest, sudden realization of how young that boy looked, sitting there on the bed. “Alexei.” Kellen’s shoulders melted off the wall again. His arms loosened from across his chest. “You’re playing a very dangerous game, here. If you turn on your gang, you can’t expect them to protect you. If you overpromise to law enforcement and can’t come through, they won’t protect you, either.”
Kellen watched the silent form on the bed a moment longer. He flipped the bottom of his shirt out of his pants and started for the door.
“You know what I do for money,” Alexei’s voice froze him in his tracks. When Kellen turned back, the boy was still sitting there, facing the wall Kellen had walked away from. A second or two passed, and he turned slowly, sightlessly, to face Kellen standing by the door. “But you have no idea who I am.”
No idea. It was the last thing Kellen saw as he glanced back before shutting the door behind him. Alexei must have heard the door open, heard it begin to swing shut. He probably thought he was alone as he lowered the dark fabric sleeve on one arm to rub at the skin below. And Kellen saw the mark. Layered, course. Some of it years into the healing process, some of it as fresh as from a few days ago.
The raw scars left by rope restraints running a ring around Alexei’s wrist.