CHAPTER THIRTEEN
The apartment was an uninviting black hole that demanded a routine he was too tired to see through, so Larkin simply ignored the sequence of events that’d been established for his own problematic short-term memory, and walked through the darkness, his path lit only by the orange halos put off by streetlights below, their murky glow bleeding in between the slats of the window blinds.
He dropped his keys on the coffee table, phone, wallet— I’ll forget where I put these —unbuckled his shoulder holster and dumped the weapon carelessly onto the couch.
At his back, the front door quietly shut and then the fairy lights clicked on.
Their warm yellow twinkle washed away the dinginess of the city, fortified the walls, and welcomed them home.
Doyle twisted the dead bolt on the door before letting out a long breath.
Larkin heard him prop his portfolio bag against the bare brick wall before turning the window unit in the kitchen on.
The low, monotonous hum filled the shared space, marking their presence.
Larkin toed off his derbies and left them in the middle of the living room. He yanked the CSU T-shirt over his head, dropped it while walking to the bathroom, and shut the door behind himself. Inside, Larkin finished undressing, turned on the shower, and stepped under the spray.
It was a little too hot.
It made his head swim.
But he didn’t care.
He needed to get the day out of his mind and off his body.
He needed to feel squeaky clean and not like a lint roller that’d collected every little disgusting bit of humanity from the backseat of a taxi.
He needed five minutes to himself, five minutes he didn’t have to obsess about murders and stalking and the police asking him why , why can’t you remember what your attacker looked like?
Don’t you want to help us find your buddy’s killer?
Larkin needed more than his evening dose of Prozac.
He needed a hard factory reset.
He needed—
Larkin pressed his palms against the tile wall and tucked his chin to his chest, allowing the spray to pound the back of his skull.
The rhythmic pulse kept good time, but Larkin didn’t count the beats.
He just stood still and let the shower strip away every negative emotion that burdened him, toyed with him, haunted him, like decades of landlord-white paint peeled away to reveal an original color that hadn’t been seen in so long, even Larkin couldn’t remember what it’d once been.
—yellow like a crown of dandelions—
—orange like campfire flames—
—red like blood—
The bathroom door clicked shut.
Larkin raised his head, wiped his face, pulled the curtain back.
His discarded clothes were gone from the floor. Placed on the counter beside the sink was his folded gray T-shirt and a pair of black trunks.
Gold .
Gold like Ira Oisín Doyle.
What he needed… was Doyle.
Larkin spit water from his mouth and snapped the curtain shut.
He washed his hair and scrubbed his body, then turned off the shower and toweled down.
Larkin dressed in the clean shirt and underwear before opening the bathroom door, steam wafting out like a cheap movie effect.
The apartment had cooled down in his absence, and the circulating air raised gooseflesh on his bare legs.
His mint-green derbies weren’t where he’d carelessly discarded them.
Larkin glanced at the coffee table. His wallet and phone were gone, and the SIG wasn’t on the couch.
Larkin noticed his keys on the hook by the front door.
His gaze moved right, following the brick wall, passing over the television, refrigerator, stove, and stopping on Doyle hovering over the kitchen sink.
Forgoing the use of a plate, his partner was stuffing the last bite of what looked to be a sandwich in his mouth.
Doyle looked over his shoulder, met Larkin’s stare, and promptly coughed out a laugh around the food.
It’d been a long day of turbulent emotion and unfulfilled investigating and an actual fight for his life, but it had ended with Doyle still alive.
Still alive and silly and beautiful and noble and perfect .
And Larkin needed Doyle.
Around a mouthful, Doyle said, “’M sorry. Hungry.” He pointed to the plate on the kitchen table. “I made you one too.”
“Oh.”
“I’m gonna wash up.”
Larkin nodded. He watched until Doyle had closed the bathroom door behind himself, then went to the table. The sandwich was a grilled cheese, cut diagonally—the only acceptable cut for a sandwich, Doyle had claimed on more than one occasion—with a healthy slice of tomato added to it.
Doyle didn’t like tomato in his grilled cheese.
But Larkin did.
Larkin wiped a rogue tear from his cheek with the heel of his hand, picked up the sandwich, and took several big bites.
He finished the midnight meal and was standing before his shelf of plants in the far corner of the room by the time Doyle stepped out of the bathroom.
Larkin’s evening inspection of his carefully curated houseplant collection was a habit Doyle always left him to without interruption, so he wasn’t surprised when his partner’s bare feet didn’t stop but padded all the way into the bedroom.
Larkin wasn’t really checking his plants.
Not tonight, anyway.
He was awake again, with a physicality a hundred thousand times stronger than what he’d felt at La Bo?te Dorée, and he was terrified any sudden movement would kill the desire he’d been robbed of for the last six months.
Larkin glanced from the corner of his eye, watching Doyle through the glass french doors.
His muscles flexed with each breath of oxygen, every pump of blood, his body a temple of vitality ready to sweat, gasp, be brought to his knees, pushed to his limits, no words but for more, more, more, God, more .
Larkin’s skin prickled.
He felt flush.
He felt feverish.
He felt alive .
Larkin needed Ira Doyle.
And he’d have him.
Larkin strode across the apartment, opened the bedroom door, and as Doyle turned, wearing only a pair of boxer briefs, Larkin pushed him.
The back of Doyle’s knees hit the bed and he fell onto the mattress with a sudden protest. Larkin moved after him while yanking his own T-shirt off, climbed on top of Doyle, and pressed their hungry mouths together.
And then Doyle’s hands were in Larkin’s hair, body thrusting up off the bed to meet him like they were opposite ends of two magnets.
Larkin shoved back, rolled his hips, ignited a wildfire in his partner as he pinned Doyle’s wrists overhead and bit his ear, his throat, his chest, marking Doyle as his and his alone.
At one point, Larkin had to let go, had to sit up on his knees so that he could finish undressing them both, and Doyle followed suit.
He pulled Larkin flush against his chest, groped his bare ass, and licked his stomach, down past the dark blond hair at his navel.
Larkin stopped Doyle from going lower, said breathlessly, “Let me make love to you,” and kissed him.
Again.
And again and again.
His blood was pounding in his ears like a tidal wave, a tsunami, by the time Doyle slid out from underneath. Larkin watched as he wrenched open the nightstand, shoved aside its contents once, twice, before making a successful discovery of the lube in the very back of the drawer.
Doyle rejoined Larkin, this time straddling his lap. He leaned down and whispered, “Like this. So you can watch me.”
Larkin put a hand on the back of Doyle’s head and drew him into another tongue-heavy kiss.
He swallowed Doyle’s gasp, eliciting that now-familiar mewl of pleasure.
Larkin kissed Doyle with the assurance of morning light burning away the nighttime mist, of spores making their home in rotten remains, of the first cry at the moment of birth, his fervor that of a learned man splitting the atom—their touch an explosive release of living, of dying, of matter from everything, everywhere —
Nietzsche had said that the concept of love was an expression of egoism, that the lover was ready to make every sacrifice, disturb every arrangement, put every other interest behind his own, that the lover wanted the unconditioned, sole possession of the person longed for, and Larkin agreed.
He agreed because as Doyle, as Ira —who was every quality that gave pleasure to the senses and mind—gripped the headboard in both hands and rode him with total abandon, he couldn’t imagine, couldn’t fathom , not putting this man before every other person and thing in his life.
“More, more, mo—oh fuck, oh fuck .”
Call me selfish .
“Evie, don’t—don’t stop.”
After all… .
Larkin thrust up hard, and Doyle panted, begged, screamed Larkin’s name as he came.
I’m only human.
Plunk , plunk , plunk .
The AC in 5A was dripping, each splash hitting the corner of Doyle’s window unit with a metallic ping that broke the softness, the isolation, reminding Larkin that a world outside this room existed and he would be expected to be part of it when the sun rose in—well, in however many hours.
Larkin couldn’t read the face of the alarm clock from where he was sprawled among the tangled bedsheets and cast-aside pillows.
He’d have to sit up, dislodge Doyle, who was lazily tracing the contours of Larkin’s body, his collarbone, sternum, ribs—
“Sorry,” Doyle whispered as Larkin’s stomach involuntarily fluttered under the ministrations. He kissed the ticklish spot before setting a hand on Larkin’s chest and resting his chin atop.
Larkin looked down and met Doyle’s sated expression. He combed his fingers through thick brown hair and asked, “How do you feel.”
“Reborn.”
“Stop it.”
Doyle laughed, easy and carefree. “I feel really good. And I feel even better knowing we’re so sexually compatible.”
Larkin snorted. “I’ve been told I don’t give off top energy.”
Doyle pushed up. He leaned over Larkin and murmured, “Anyone who’s told you that is obviously not a bottom with only a small domination kink.”
“Small domination kink,” Larkin repeated, brows raised.
Doyle nodded, and he slowly drew one leg over Larkin in order to straddle his hips. “I’m not talking whips and chains. But I know what I like.”
Larkin ran his hands up Doyle’s haired thighs. “And what’s that.”
Doyle leaned down, their mouths a breath apart, and he whispered, “Being climbed like a tree.”
“Jesus Christ, Ira.”
Doyle laughed again, louder, and heat and smoke coiled in Larkin’s belly like a live snake. “How’d you figure it out?”
“How did I know you… wanted to be climbed,” Larkin slowly clarified.
“When you flirt, you utilize a combination of physical and playful techniques, which are inherently more sexual in nature than what’s seen in the sincere, traditional, or polite methods.
But you don’t go on the offense. You flirt to get a rise. ”
“You can’t say it didn’t work.”
“Clearly.” Larkin stroked Doyle’s thighs again and said, “But I knew for certain after I mentioned the need to handcuff you when we were at the Property Clerk’s warehouse.”
Doyle’s gaze momentarily rose upward, in a way that was typical of someone trying to recall a memory. He said suddenly, “Wait, that was you flirting back?”
“I wasn’t flirting—I was being serious. You’re very handsy.”
“ Oh my God ,” Doyle moan-laughed. “I didn’t anticipate you being such a tease.” He took Larkin’s face into both hands and kissed him. Doyle began rolling his hips, nice and slow, breaking the kiss to ask, “This all right?”
“Yeah.”
He kept up the steady friction, the kissing, the touching that made Larkin feel intoxicated—all highs, no lows—before saying, “We really should get some sleep.”
At the suggestion, Larkin opened his eyes, blinked against the glow of the touch lamp, and looked down. Doyle was ready. Him, not so much.
“We don’t have to go again,” Doyle insisted.
But Larkin pushed up and encouraged Doyle onto his back.
Leaning over him, Larkin put his weight on his right hand and began stroking himself with the left.
The sensory experience of their lovemaking was already stored in his long-term memory—the sharp scent of arousal, the taste of sweat, the glide of fingertips on heated skin, the desperate and delicious half-formed pleas Doyle made in the throes of passion, the way he looked like how having sex was a spiritual awakening—and those sensitive memories broke through Larkin’s initial embarrassment and frustration and instead began to provoke a renewed physical interest.
“My recovery time isn’t quite… what it was.”
“It’ll get better.”
When Larkin was ready, he found the lube from within the folds of sheets, and Doyle—legs around Larkin’s waist, their fingers entwined overhead—easily relented.
Remembrance and touch explored, delighted in each other, while the room echoed with cries of “love” and gasps of “you,” and Larkin wasn’t sure—didn’t care—who’d said what.
Only that it’d been said.
“ I love you .”