Chapter Forty
The station at night was a different beast. The usual clamor had drained into something leaner, more skeletal; phones bleating out in lonely bursts, the shuffle of a few uniforms haunting the bullpen like ghosts working overtime. A hive that never truly slept, only changed its tone.
Rick’s office, with its blinds half-drawn and its air stale from smoke and coffee gone cold, felt carved out of that darkness.
He’d turned off the overhead light when it started to hurt his eyes.
Only a desk lamp now glared on the litter of takeout cartons and case files.
The weight of his holster dragged harder after six hours on duty, suspenders gnawing at his shoulders.
On the couch opposite him, Ash sprawled like he owned the night. Long limbs, head tipped into the lamp’s glow, lashes cutting shadows across his cheeks. A picture of easy decadence, as though even exhaustion bent to his style. Leave it to him to turn police overtime into a magazine spread.
Rick forked lo mein into his mouth, chewing without appetite, when Ash’s head lifted toward the blinds, eyes scanning the figures moving outside. “What?” Rick asked, chopsticks hovering.
Ash let his gaze drift across the bullpen for another second, tracking something unseen, then shook his head. “Thought…” He cut himself short, gave a little shrug, almost a smirk. “It’s nothing.”
Rick let it go, though he kept watching him.
The kid was a live wire, tuned to currents other men never caught.
Could the stress be getting to him? Rick felt his own chest tighten, a shallow ache, the sense of something circling just outside the light.
He focused on the food again, though the noodles tasted of cardboard.
His thoughts swirled back to that afternoon, the steam-heavy bathroom, Ash’s lips against his, skin slippery, the ghost of it now gone sour with distance.
That had been hours ago. Too damn long. The stretch of time chipped at him, made his cock twitch in frustration.
Or maybe it was the moon, still swollen tonight, tugging at him, heat under the skin.
The old monitor droned on, various surveillance tapes spilling a grainy procession of bodies in bars and sidewalks.
People drifted in and out of focus, silhouettes made of static, laughter reduced to phantom gestures.
Minutes stacked in silence, broken only by the scrape of chopsticks and the whir of the player.
Rick’s vision blurred. Time smeared itself across the room; a half-hour gone, maybe more.
Ash lounged with a carton balanced on his thigh, plucking noodles absently, almost bored, when his hand froze mid-air. “There,” he said.
Roused to attention, Rick leaned closer, reading the timestamp. The Green Fairy, three nights before Elliot Price turned up faceless in the gutter. In the corner of the shot, a man lingered, half-hidden, watching something off-screen. Then he rose, slid toward the bar, and vanished out of frame.
“You know that guy?” Rick asked.
Ash’s jaw flexed. “Yeah. His name’s Griffin. A bartender at the club Jimmy went to the day before he died. He was on me last night.”
Rick’s head snapped up. “The hell do you mean ‘on you’?”
Ash’s eyes slid sideways, bright purple under the lamp. “Waited for me outside the Eclipse. Followed me around. But don’t worry.” A half-smile. “I handled it.”
Rick set the carton down, chopsticks snapping against Styrofoam. “Handled it? And you didn’t think to tell me this before?”
Ash’s mouth curved into something that wasn’t quite a smile. “I don’t run to the cavalry every time someone looks at me funny. I take care of my own shit.”
It was old wounds speaking, Rick knew that.
So he fought the urge to slam his fist into the desk, to shake him until those damn walls cracked.
He swallowed the growl and let it smolder in his gut.
“This Griffin fella—he could be a suspect,” he said at last, his voice quieter, rougher.
“Worth checking out, I reckon. But not worth parading in front of the Captain just yet. For now, we keep this between us.”
Ash nodded, lashes flashing in the lamp’s glow, face all gleam and shadow. “He works nights, so his place is empty ‘til morning. Could be worth a snoop. Didn’t look like much when I was there, though.”
Rick’s nostrils flared. “You were there?”
Ash’s lips twitched, sly. “Yeah. We, uh… hooked up. Three nights ago.”
The fury raked his ribs like claws. “You what?”
Ash settled into the couch, all calm, infuriating provocation, as though daring him. “What? A boy has his needs. And you…” he tipped his head, voice sharp as glass, “were too busy trying to pin me for a murder I didn’t commit.”
The chair scraped hard along the floor as Rick stood.
His pulse thundered, his fists itched, his skin felt too tight over his bones.
Rational thought told him he had no claim, no right; but the thought of Ash in another man’s bed, another man’s mouth on him, made his blood sing hot, savage.
It was unbearable. He needed to tear it away, burn it out, erase it.
“Get up,” he said, the growl ripping out of him before he could temper it.
Ash smiled, wicked and knowing. “Rick—”
“Now.”
He hauled him from the couch and out of the office, pressing him forward across the bullpen, palm firm at Ash’s nape.
The night-shift cops barely spared them a glance.
Right now, Rick didn’t care who saw, didn’t care if the whole damn station buzzed with whispers.
Ash moved in front of him with that loose-hipped swagger, docile only in appearance, but Rick felt the tension alive under his touch, the pulse at his neck hammering under his thumb.
He herded him down the corridor, past the vending machines, into the antiseptic glare of the men’s room, rank with bleach and old plumbing.
The door hadn’t even swung shut before Rick shoved him to the tiles, mouth crushing mouth. Teeth knocked, breath seared; this was no kiss but a collision, a conflagration. Ash arched into him, fingers sliding into Rick’s hair, erection pressing shamelessly against Rick’s thigh.
The sink took the brunt of them, the mirror shuddering in its frame as Ash’s spine hit porcelain. He yanked down Rick’s zipper in one sharp tug, hand diving inside to rub the stiffening length through the damp cotton of his briefs. Their bodies pitched together, trembling with violence and want.
“You’re impossible,” Rick murmured against saliva-slick lips, desire hotter than reason.
“And you like it,” Ash answered with a smile sharp as a blade, reckless, complicit. He pulled him closer, opened his mouth wider, squeezing Rick’s heavy balls through the fabric.
The door squeaked. A rookie stepped inside and froze.
Rick’s head snapped around. “Out.”
“But I have to—”
“OUT!”
The officer bolted.
Ash’s laughter rang like shattered glass, but Rick smothered it with another kiss, forceful and claiming.
He spun him toward the stalls, shoved him inside.
The wooden door clanged, lock snapping home.
Rick’s hand went to his fly and dragged his cock out, freeing it from the press of wool and cotton.
Precum oozed from it in translucent ropes, the scent of sex already musk-thick in the air.
Ash didn’t waste a second. He sank to his knees and took Rick into his mouth, no teasing licks, no warm-up, just wet heat swallowing him whole.
The sudden suction made Rick’s breath stutter.
He thought he’d spill before they even got to the main course.
With a growl, he gripped Ash under the shoulders, hauling him up, then spun him roughly and shoved his trousers down to his thighs.
Ash bent forward without hesitation, palms braced on the stall wall, shirt rucked up his spine, his body a taut, trembling line, offered like a dare.
Rick spat into his palm, slicked himself quick, though Ash hardly needed it.
When he spread him wide, thumbs digging into the firm curves, Ash’s hole was already wet and glistening, tight as if untouched, like it hadn’t been ravaged by a monster less than twenty-four hours ago.
Rick pressed in, thick crown breaching the clutch of muscle, tearing a gasp from Ash’s throat.
The vise-tight clasp made Rick’s vision spark white.
He gripped Ash’s hips hard, driving deeper until every inch of him was locked inside that magnificent heat.
“Fuck—” The word tore hoarse from him as he withdrew, slow, leaving only the swollen head lodged in. Then he went utterly still.
Ash twisted, tried to push onto him, but Rick’s iron grip held him pinned.
His nails screeched faint lines into the wood as he writhed, cheek mashed to the cold surface, frustrated whimpers spilling out.
“Don’t stop.” His voice cracked, desperate.
He tried to grind back, to suck him in, but Rick only clamped harder on his hips, immovable.
“Beg for it, pretty boy,” Rick growled into his ear, breath hot and merciless.
Ash’s head rolled against the partition, his lips parted, raw need spilling out. “Please, Rick. Fuck me. I’ll die if you don’t.”
Only then did Rick slam forward to the root, burying himself in one brutal stroke, forcing a ragged cry from Ash’s throat. “Like this?” he rasped.
“That’s it,” Ash moaned. “Faster.”
Rick obeyed with a curse, pounding deep and hard, hips slapping flesh, each thrust punching through resistance until Ash’s cry broke high, half agony, half exaltation.
He set a savage rhythm: piston after piston, each drag searing along nerves so raw they felt incandescent.
The stall rattled with every impact, hinges shrieking as if they’d rip loose.
A roar tore out of him, half man, half beast. Stress, suspicion, rage—all of it burned away in the furnace of Ash’s body.
His rhythm turned feral, the kind of hunger that couldn’t be disguised.
Ash braced and pushed against him, that reckless ease now a counterpoint, a wicked song meant to undo men stronger than Rick.
Each thrust sent vibrations rattling stall and tile; each gasping moan branded another wordless claim: mine, mine, mine.
The world shrank to pressure and motion: the slick vise milking him, the tremors rippling through Ash’s thighs, the raw sounds spilling from his throat. Rick’s hips hammered mercilessly, every stroke wrenching another ragged cry. “Say that you’re mine,” he ground out.
“Yes—fuck—I’m yours,” Ash gasped, trembling.
Rick didn’t know if he meant it, but the words still hooked deep, made something shiver at the core of him.
His hand snaked around to seize Ash’s cock, rigid and leaking.
He fisted it roughly, his strokes matching the ruthless slam of hips.
Ash’s moan cracked too loud, the dual assault tearing him apart.
His whole body coiled, muscles locked, and with one more frenzied push, he broke, spine arched, teeth bared, ecstasy ripping through him.
Cum splattered the door in hot streaks, Rick’s fist drenched as Ash convulsed in his grip.
The sight of him undone dragged Rick over the edge, too.
He rammed deep, stayed buried to the hilt, and let himself go—release tearing out of him in a low snarl, cock pulsing as he flooded Ash’s gut with his seed, branding him from the inside out.
They sagged together in the aftermath, chests heaving, legs trembling.
Only the harsh glare of the overhead bulbs, the slow drip of a faucet, and their ragged breathing filled the air.
Rick pressed his forehead to Ash’s shoulder blade, sweat cooling too fast, heart still hammering its claim.
“You drive me out of my skin,” he whispered.
“Then stay inside mine,” Ash said softly, his hole clenching around Rick’s cock.
Rick’s arms wrapped firm around Ash’s waist, drawing him close as if he meant to crush the distance out of existence, to bind them into one shadow, one breath.
The city could wait. The case could rot.
All that mattered was the boy shivering beneath him, marked, filled, his own possession made flesh.