Chapter Twenty-One
Keston
“Starting the morning with a smile?” Ambrose leaned against the front counter, his eyes questioning.
“Yeah, well, I’m still thinking about my brother and his girl getting engaged. She’s a pretty awesome lady.” I was also thinking about all the time Bailey and I had spent together since then, but wisely, I kept silent on that.
“Nice. Glad it was fun, even if you were stuck with a bunch of lawyers.”
Ignoring his dig, I booted up the computer. “We were so busy yesterday, I don’t think I thanked you for taking the weekend.”
“No problem. And I gotta say I was pretty surprised you didn’t check in. I think it was the first weekend you’ve ever taken off.”
It surprised me as well. I couldn’t admit it to Ambrose, but I hadn’t thought of the shop once the whole weekend.
Not Friday night while Bailey was in bed with me, or when I was with him Saturday night and he was so broken up about his sister.
And certainly not while we were having sex.
Nothing and nobody else had been on my mind except Bailey.
And what the hell was I going to do about it?
“Yeah, well, I trust you and Jodi.”
“Yeah? You sure that’s all it is?”
In the middle of checking out the day’s schedule, I stopped scrolling and peered over the top of the monitor.
“What the fuck is that supposed to mean?”
Ambrose stepped behind the counter. “Look, man. I don’t know why you think you gotta keep whomever you’re seeing a secret.”
My stomach twisted with nerves. “I don’t have any secrets.”
Ambrose nailed me with a glare. “Carly got off at the Seventy-second Street station this morning for work, and she swears she saw you on the train platform with a guy. And you were pretty cozy with each other.”
I snorted. “What’re you talking about, cozy?” I left him standing by the front and crossed the shop to get my instruments ready for my first appointment, which was the beginning of a huge project on some football player. Ambrose tailed me.
“Meaning, she saw someone who looks exactly like you with his tongue down the throat of another guy.”
“She’s mistaken.” I arranged the ink colors.
“I don’t think so. She said it was you. And a guy in a suit.”
I had no desire to discuss my personal life with Ambrose. I knew he’d crawl up my ass about Bailey being a lawyer and so establishment. If he ever found out Bailey’s father was a cop, he’d probably force me to make a choice between Bailey as my lover and him as my friend.
And I wasn’t so sure whom I’d choose.
I caught Jodi giving me the eye and frowning, but I deliberately ignored her. What I did and with whom was my business. “Well, I do, since I know where I was. Now how about you stop involving yourself in my personal life so we can get to work?”
“You’ve changed all of a sudden. Must be those richy-riches you’ve been hanging out with.”
“What the fuck is your problem? You don’t like money? You wanna work for free?”
“Don’t be an ass. I don’t give a shit if you’re hiding this guy. Go ahead. But Carly knows what she saw, and I believe her.”
“And I said leave it alone,” I growled and gave him my back. “I gotta get to work.”
The day passed without much interaction between the two of us.
Jodi, always Miss Sunshine and hating the rift simmering in the air, tried everything to lighten the mood—silly jokes, coffee runs, doughnuts—but Ambrose refused to even look my way.
I’d always known he was a stubborn SOB, but this was beyond ridiculous.
At five, I received a text from Bailey: Need to discuss something with you.
I checked my calendar. Have a client in a few. See you later tonight at your place. We’ll talk then?
The door opened, and my next appointment walked in, so I had no time to wait for his response. Ambrose, unusually silent while working, kept shooting me looks. After we’d finished and were cleaning up, he walked to my chair.
“I’m sorry, man. I was outta line for getting on your case.” He held out his hand.
Relieved, I smiled. “It’s cool.” We bumped fists and gave each other a hug. “But you gotta understand Grady is my blood, and I’m gonna be hanging out with him and whomever else he’s close with on the regular. So you need to get used to it. Can you?”
Ambrose shrugged. “I’ll have to. You’re not gonna get rid of me that easily.”
“Get out of here and go home and kiss your girlfriend. I’ll see you tomorrow.
” I gave him a shove, and laughing, he left.
Jodi had gone at five. I checked the computer and entered in some new appointments that had popped up.
I’d just turned off the light and was pulling my jacket off the coatrack, when Bailey walked in.
“What’re you doing here?”
“Nice to see you too. Didn’t you read my text? I had a meeting with a client near Astor Place, so I took a chance you’d still be here.” He slipped off his trench coat and put his arms around my waist. “I figured we could have dinner somewhere and then…”
“I like the way you think.” I cupped that perfect ass. The pull toward him consumed my senses, and I inhaled deeply of his warm scent. “And the way you smell and taste. Maybe I can have you for dinner.”
“Mmm, yeah? Taste me, now.” His tongue met mine and he popped open the button of my jeans. “I like everything about you. A lot.”
“You do, huh?”
Bailey’s eyes glittered with lust, and he nodded, the pace of his breath kicking up. I pulled him into the office by the tie and bit his bottom lip.
“Come show me how much.” No way could I wait until later to be inside him. My body ached to possess his, and I tugged at his slacks and briefs. They fell to his ankles and my business brain shut off. Sex in the shop? Never before Bailey, but he pushed my limits to places I’d never been.
“I wish I could fuck you against this desk and hear you scream for me.” As I spoke, I touched the globes of his ass. He moaned and tilted it upward.
“Do it. Fuck me hard. I want you so bad. Need you.”
“Can’t. No lube or condoms.” I sucked two fingers and slid them past the tight rim of his hole, playing with him.
Never quiet during sex, Bailey’s groans and whimpers echoed off the walls of the small space.
My blood grew hot as pleasure spiraled through me.
I was a starving man, needing to feast on Bailey.
I unzipped and yanked my jeans and briefs down far enough to free my cock.
I fisted it for a moment to gain control, then slid it in the crease of his ass.
It wasn’t perfect, but it would have to do until we were home.
Bailey panted and trembled. Fuck, he was made for me. Only me.
Mine.
Bailey was mine, and I was never going to let him go.
“Yeah. Like that. Oh God, Keston.”
“You love it, don’t you? Love my cock.” Blind to everything but this hunger to own Bailey, I squeezed his ass. Passion claimed me, and I leaned forward and bit his neck. “Thought about you all day. Did you miss me? Tell me how much.” I needed to hear him say it.
“Yes. Oh God, please, I need you. Need you so bad,” he wailed, shivering violently as he hit his climax.
I loved hearing him say he needed me. I gathered him close and moved faster. “You’re everything, Bailey.” I came so hard, my heart thundered and everything went black for a second. Sweat dripped from my brow, blinding me. I tasted blood on my lips, yet I couldn’t stop kissing him, over and over.
“Baby,” I whispered, and he held me tight.
He pulled up his slacks, and after wiping us off, I tucked myself in.
“Well, that’s one way to brighten up a random Tuesday,” Bailey joked, taking some more tissues to dry his hands.
“I have something better than those.” I gave him some disinfectant wipes, and we both cleaned up. My senses still teetered on the edge, and I reached out to him. “Come here.” He leaned on me, and I rested my cheek against his. “So you need me?”
His lips curved against mine. “Maybe.”
I kissed him. “Only a maybe? I’d better up my game.”
His shoulders shook as he laughed. “Oh, trust me, if your game was any more up, I wouldn’t be able to walk.”
I tightened my arms, gazing at the taut shadows of his cheekbones. “Challenge accepted. Now tell me what was so important that you came here to talk to me instead of waiting until later?”
He rubbed his face. “Give me a second to recalibrate. You short-circuited my brain.” Bailey walked around the office a bit before pulling out his phone. “Whew. Okay. Grady sent me the files on Ambrose’s brother.”
I winced. “Sorry. I didn’t mean for you to waste your time—”
“No. I’m not. I mean, I didn’t. There is an issue, I think.”
Confused, I put my hands on his shoulders. “Wait a sec. You’re telling me you actually found something?”
“There’s a possibility the officers violated the Fourth Amendment.”
“What’s that?”
“In layman’s terms, if the police don’t have probable cause, they can’t arrest you.”
“That makes sense.”
“Of course it does, but you’d be surprised how easily law enforcement violates it.
In Lucas’s case, they got a tip he was selling drugs, but I didn’t see any notes of surveillance on the premises, shady dudes coming and going, nothing that would justify them going into the apartment.
Just some vague comment from a CI, which wouldn’t be enough for a warrant.
The arresting officers simply went and knocked on his door—they had no warrant, no probable cause. How did they know he had drugs?”
“Uh, I dunno.”
“Me neither.” His eyes narrowed. “But I’m sure gonna find out.”
My brain exploded. “Son of a bitch, Bailey. But…so…what the hell does all that mean?”
“It means that without probable cause they had no right to even be in the apartment. The fact that they found drugs is secondary to the defendant’s right to no unreasonable search and seizure.”
“English, please.”
Bailey folded his arms. “They had no right to enter the apartment. Lucas said no, but they said they had probable cause and went in anyway.”
“But he did have drugs.” I scratched my head. “They found a whole bunch of shit he was selling.”
Bailey huffed a sigh. “That’s the problem.
We know he’s a bad dude. But the law has to protect bad people as well as good.
I know he was selling drugs, and you know it, but the police must follow the rules, like all of us.
Their search has to be legal, and from what I’m seeing so far, it wasn’t.
They didn’t have probable cause to go to his apartment in the first place. ”
“Damn. I can’t believe Ambrose was right all along.” All his bitching had paid off. “But I don’t understand. Grady’s a great attorney, and he looked through the same stuff you did. How come he didn’t see this?”
“The law has many different specialties, and Grady’s is family law. He might’ve assumed the police did the right thing. I did too at first, but something didn’t feel right.”
“So you do criminal law?”
He shrugged. “I’m a general practitioner. I do family, real estate closings, estates and trusts—although nothing too complicated—and some criminal. It’s how I’m able to stay solo. Anything I can’t handle with my resources, I refer to firms and get a fee from that.”
“And you don’t mind that you gotta suck up to the hot-shot firms?”
Clearly annoyed, he stuck his finger out.
“I don’t suck up to anyone. It’s a symbiotic relationship.
I refer cases to them for a fee, and many times they send their smaller matters to me and I get new clients that way.
It’s business, Keston. Remember the first time I saw you at the club?
You should’ve had your business cards there.
Think of it like this. If you’re busy and can’t fit someone in and they don’t wanna wait, wouldn’t you refer them to someone else you knew? ”
“Hmm.” I rubbed my chin. “I guess. I just never thought lawyers did that.”
“Oh, we lawyers do all kinds of things.” A cunning light kindled in Bailey’s eyes.
“Come home with me, and I’ll give you a more intimate lesson in search and seizure.
” He fisted my sweater and settled his mouth over mine.
A hum of pleasure escaped me, and I allowed him to walk me backward toward the desk.
I was about to suggest we forget going all the way uptown and instead head to my place, when the lights in the shop came on.
“Keston? You still here? Forgot my phone.”
I sprang away from Bailey, who stumbled backward. “Shit. That’s Ambrose.” I gazed at Bailey—his disheveled shirt and tie and his kiss-swollen lips left no doubt as to what we’d been doing. The scent of sex lingered in the air. “He can’t know what’s going on.”
Red patches slashed across Bailey’s cheeks. “Why not?”
A shadow darkened the lights from behind me, and anticipating trouble, I turned to see Ambrose standing there, arms crossed, a tight smile playing on his face.
“Yeah, Keston. That’s what I’d like to know. Why not?” He glanced at Bailey, who stood silent. “Wait a second. You’re that lawyer.” Ambrose’s lips thinned to a white line. “I bet he lives on the Upper West Side, right? Were you guys at the Seventy-second Street station this morning?”
My heart sank as Bailey nodded. “Yeah, why?”
“ ’Cause Keston swore he wasn’t there, kissing a guy on the 2 train platform. But it was you, wasn’t it?”
Hurt-filled blue eyes met mine. “Why would you lie to your friend about us?”