Jon Michaelsen's Blog: Ramblings, Excerpts, WIPs, etc., page 15

Exclusive Excerpt: The Sodden Sailor (A Nick Williams Mystery Book 11) by Frank W Butterfield

Blurb:

Sunday, February 6, 1955

It’s Sunday night and Nick has decided he wants to get back in the kitchen to make a couple of pans of lasagna for dinner, something he hasn’t done since he and Carter moved into the big pile of rocks on Nob Hill.

Captain Daniel O’Reilly, pilot of The Flirtatious Captain, is bringing a friend for dinner. Instead of his latest love interest, the captain introduces Nick and Carter to an old friend, a man who is on his last legs and who has a favor to ask: can Nick and Carter help him get his girl and her son out of Red China?

That’s where things begin but it’s far from where they end…

Excerpt:

The sun had set when we headed out for dinner. We brought Captain O’Reilly and Murphy along with us. Since none of us knew where we were going, I stopped one of the bellboys and asked him about the place that Tony had said was at the end of the beach. He knew where it was and suggested we take a cab since it was after dark and we might get lost.

The cab driver dropped us off in front of an old wood-frame building that looked like it was falling apart. But there was some serious jazz coming from a jukebox inside and that immediately got Carter’s attention.

We walked in and found a mix of people and a lot of noise. No kids, which made sense. The place was more like a juke joint than a restaurant. Once I realized what kind of place it was, I relaxed a bit. There were couples in the life, here and there, but mostly it was either loud groups of sailors and marines in uniform or loud groups of fishermen or loud groups of women gathered together. They were all competing to be heard over the horn of Miles Davis. There was every color under the rainbow but one. The four of us stuck out like snowflakes.

Tony saw us, walked up, and hugged me. “Come on in.” He pulled me over to a table where a grinning Chinese man was holding an unlabeled beer bottle in one hand and chopsticks in the other. He was shoveling some sort of seafood into his mouth as fast as I’d ever seen anyone do.

“Lee, this is Nick.”

The man put down the chopsticks and the beer, swallowed, and wiped his hands on his grungy shirt. “How are ya, Nick?” He offered his hand, which I shook.

“Fine.” I pointed. “This is Carter. And Dan. And Johnny.” Everyone shook as Tony and I brought a couple of stools to the table.

“I didn’t know you’d be bringing friends.”

“They’re the reason we’re going to Hong Kong.” I had to shout to be heard.

Tony nodded. “Let’s eat and then we can all go for a walk on the beach and talk about whatever it is you’re doing.” Once again, I was struck by the hardness in his voice. I looked at his face and saw a grit and a determination I wasn’t expecting. I wondered about that.

. . .

Carter charmed a hamburger sandwich out of the cook by using his southern accent. The rest of us ate whatever Tony ordered for us. I had no idea what most of it was but one dish reminded me of the raw fish that John had made for us over on Kauai that was similar to a dish I’d had down in Mexico.

Lee pointed out that the food was a mix of different things: Portuguese, Japanese, Chinese, Hawaiian, even Korean. I liked it all. The beer was a local brew that didn’t seem to have a name. All I knew was that it was cold and went down smooth.

I paid for dinner but it came to less than twenty for all us so I added another twenty and we made our way down to the water. Once we were twenty or thirty feet away from the place, I finally felt like I could talk in a normal voice. There were a few couples sitting on the sand and necking. We made our way past them and to a spot where there were picnic tables and sat around one of those. We’d each brought a fresh bottle of beer. Lee produced a bottle opener and passed it around.

“Who makes this?” I asked.

Tony replied, “It’s a place up near where we went today. Not really legal. But it sure is good.”

I nodded. “It sure is.”

Tony got right to the point. “I brought Lee out so you could meet him. I get the feeling that you have some job you’re doing in Hong Kong that might not be on the up-and-up.”

I nodded, surprised for a third time at his change in demeanor. I put up my hand. “Wait. Before we go on, what is this?”

I could see his white teeth in the dark as he grinned. “What’s what?”

Carter asked, “Yeah. What is this?”

Tony took a chug of his beer and shrugged.

Lee answered. “Tony used to do some work for the O.S.S.”

Murphy slammed his hand on the table. “That’s where I recognize you from, isn’t it?”

Tony laughed. “Sure. I know you from working in Chungking.”

Murphy added, “And Canton.”

Tony nodded but didn’t say anything.

I asked, “Did this involve the Nationalists?”

They both said, “Yes,” in unison. They laughed and clinked their bottles together.

I asked Lee, “What about you?”

Tony said, “You’ll never get any answers from him.”

Lee took a swig of his beer and said, “I did my work for the Kuomintang. Lotta good it did ’em, but I did.”

O’Reilly reached over and clinked his bottle against Lee’s. “God bless the generalissimo.”

“Hear, hear,” echoed the other three.

. . .

Once O’Reilly had laid out the plan, I added my latest ideas. After some back and forth about the feasibility of it all, I asked Tony and Lee, “Are you two in?”

They both nodded. Someone had started a bonfire on the beach and I could see their faces in the firelight. They both looked tough. More than I would have expected.

“How much?” asked Lee.

“A hundred a day plus all expenses.” I replied.

He nodded. “Sounds good. When do we leave?”

“At 7 in the morning from the airport. Tony knows the plane. Bring your black tie, if you have it.”

Lee laughed. “The one called The Flying Fireman?”

I nodded and looked at Carter who shrugged.

“You a fireman?” asked Lee.

“He used to be,” I answered. “Don’t you—”

Carter put his hand over my mouth and said, “Just enjoy it, Nick.” He took his hand away and kissed me. I just nodded in agreement.

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Exclusive Excerpt: Cottonmouths: A Novel by Kelly J Ford – Enter the Goodreads Giveaway!

Blurb:

This was Drear’s Bluff. Nothing bad happened here. People didn’t disappear.

College was supposed to be an escape for Emily Skinner. But after failing out of school, she’s left with no choice but to return to her small Arkansas hometown, a place run on gossip and good Christian values.

She’s not alone. Emily’s former best friend—and childhood crush—Jody Monroe is back with a baby. Emily can’t resist the opportunity to reconnect, despite the uncomfortable way things ended between them and her mom’s disapproval of their friendship. When Emily stumbles upon a meth lab on Jody’s property, she realizes just how far they’ve both fallen.

Emily intends to keep her distance from Jody, but when she’s kicked out of her house with no money and nowhere to go, a paying job as Jody’s live-in babysitter is hard to pass up. As they grow closer, Emily glimpses a future for the first time since coming home. She dismisses her worries; after all, Jody is a single mom. The meth lab is a means to an end. And besides, for Emily, Jody is the real drug.

But when Jody’s business partner goes missing, and the lies begin to pile up, Emily will learn just how far Jody is willing to go to save her own skin—and how much Emily herself has risked for the love of someone who may never truly love her back.

 

Excerpt:

From behind, the woman standing with a guy next to the Love’s Truck Stop air pump looked like any other woman: long hair, too skinny, big purse, big sunglasses. But when the woman turned and smiled, Emily’s chest tightened and her insides tingled in a forgotten but familiar way. Rumors of Jody’s return had come as whispers around town, but until now Emily had lacked proof.

A warm breeze blew petroleum fumes and cigarette smoke into her face while she sought further confirmation of who she’d seen. Gas spilled onto her hand. Startled, she released the trigger on the pump and swiped her hand across her jeans. She sheltered her eyes from the sun to scan the parking lot. But the woman and the guy were gone.

Back on the highway, Emily tried to keep her mind as empty and barren as the farmland that rolled by. When that didn’t work, she turned up the radio and hit scan, unable to settle on the station offerings from the nearest town—country or Christian or the same four pop songs on repeat interspersed with commercials for pawn shops and car lots. Midway through the miles she punched the radio off and tried to tell herself that her new fast food job and her time at home were temporary, though she’d been back a month already. She hadn’t meant to apply for the job. She’d talked to the woman at the temp agency like her mom had suggested. The woman had responded the way Emily had expected: sorry, but they didn’t have anything for someone with her lack of professional experience. Best try fast food, the woman had said. The woman’s coworker had lifted her eyes, and Emily had detected smugness in her smile. Angry and wallowing in self-pity, she had asked for and filled out a job application during her value meal lunch at a restaurant she’d spotted on the way home. She hadn’t expected the manager to offer her a job—on the same day that she applied, after a rushed interview whose only purpose seemed to be to ensure she wasn’t a criminal. She had accepted. There was no choice.

Soon, though, she lied to the empty passenger seat, she’d get a call for a job she really wanted or some other professional job she didn’t really care for, but at least it would be a real job, something that could make a dent in student loan and credit card accounts that sat on the brink of default and whose balances kept her up at night. That sounded good until the CDs and candle holders and assorted junk drawer contents in the last moving box she couldn’t bring herself to remove from her car rattled in the back seat. If she took that last moving box inside her parents’ house, she feared she’d never leave Drear’s Bluff.

The dream of next week dissolved into the hot, stale air that surrounded her. She had sold her couch, her bed, her pots and pans. There was no need for those things now. Where she was headed, the cast iron skillet had been seasoned before she was born.

Her mom would cook the beans, potatoes, and cornbread the way her own mother had taught her. Dad would recite the Lord’s Prayer because it required no thought. And Emily would stare at her plate of food and let it go cold while pondering the headset and the cash register and the brown and blue uniform in her back seat, whose fibers still held its last tenant’s stench of fryer grease and body odor—items for a life she had not expected to return to when she left for college, for a job that would not have been offered to her at all had she not removed the name of the state university from her resume—though two years hardly called for its inclusion.

Two years in, after failing to meet the grade requirements to keep her partial scholarship and other financial aid, she’d quit. Six months after quitting, she’d gotten a call from her mom asking why they had received a student loan bill in the mail when she wasn’t supposed to graduate for at least two more years. Now, here she was. Back with debt for a degree she hadn’t earned.

As the road came into sight—the one that led to her childhood home, and her parents, and their accompanying disappointment in her—she drove past it, beyond the mile markers, in a direction she had not driven in years, led on by a thought formed in the parking lot of the truck stop with no idea what she would find once she got there.

Drear’s Bluff ’s main drag looked like every other small town. There were the necessities: a post office, a floral shop for homecomings and Valentine’s Days and birthdays and graduations, and the feed store. Here, the men were men and women were women. Roles were handed out and passed down like the matriarchs’ afghan quilts, biscuit recipes, and stories.

She slowed the car when she came to the Quik-a-Way gas station-slash-everything mart and roadside diner. Every Sunday for as long as the Quik-a-Way had been around, the old men sat at the counter, sipped their hot coffee, and waited for their wives to finish gossiping. They never tired of talk about the good old days, when the farms were theirs alone, no corporate middlemen to answer to, no undue rules and regulations. All the farmers, including Emily’s dad, would pull on their green John Deere hats and disappear behind storms of dirt that trailed their tractors. They prided themselves on eating their Cream of Wheat and tightening their belts and working hard like everyone in Drear’s Bluff had been taught. Folks liked to slap their knees and joke that there were only two classes of people in Drear’s Bluff: poor and dirt-poor. The poor weren’t really poor. They just liked to say they were. The dirt-poor were still dirt-poor but they liked to think they weren’t. And most of the working fields, the ones that paid for supper, were good and gone.

Out of habit, she spied the parking lot for familiar vehicles. She didn’t recognize any of them. These cars belonged to the current crop of seniors and juniors who were there to grab a burger or a Mountain Dew before they headed off to evening shifts at restaurants and stores in towns bigger than Drear’s Bluff. They didn’t know now, but in a year or two these kids might appreciate the simplicity and comfort of having somewhere to go every day that required no input, no guilt. You went to school. You ate lunch. You went home.

Once she left the highway and the outskirts of Drear’s Bluff behind, the smooth asphalt shifted to a rumble. She cursed the potholes in the dirt road, unearthed by thunderstorms and hardened into craters that destroyed tires. The branches hung low and thick with dust kicked up from what little traffic barreled down the deadend red clay road. The dust drifted into the car, coating the dashboard and causing her to sneeze. The soaring grain silos of Johnston’s farm came into view. Along with their farm, they kept a stable of horses that they sometimes rode in the Old Fort Days Rodeo Parade. The horses dotted the horizon. As she’d done as a child, Emily adjusted her gaze so that the sky and grass looked connected by the barbed wire fence with a Frankenstein stitch, so that a horse looked like it’d been caught on the metal thorn. She navigated her car farther into the deep recesses of woods, past roads without markers and faded No Hunting signs riddled with buckshot, past the entrance to Lee Creek, where countless teenagers had indulged in their first drink, smoke, kiss, and heartbreak.

Two pale, skinny, and shirtless teenage boys walked along the side, near a dry ditch. One of the boys held a shotgun. The other, a red plastic gas can. Their ATV had probably run out of gas while they were out in the woods shooting songbirds for sport. Emily slowed the car when she passed them. She lifted an index finger off the steering wheel for a one-finger wave. Two sets of dead eyes stared back at her, like the boys had been beat on a few too many times. They returned the gesture and disappeared in the car’s cloud of dust.

Her nerves pricked as she drew closer to that familiar plot of land. She came to the end of the road and paused at the faded black mailbox and the metal farm gate that stood wide open. Knots that had begun to cramp her gut told her to turn around, best to let some things lie, but a stronger current of curiosity and what ifs overtook her and she made the turn. Trees in desperate need of a trim scraped the sides of the car until she came to the clearing. Her heart drummed at the sight of the trees, the dirt drive that snaked up the hill, the chicken house, the uncut grass—all recognizable but unfamiliar.

She would have put the car in reverse and driven ten miles back to the highway, beyond the high school and the Quik-a-Way, back home, back from the past, shaking her head at the notions that had occupied her mind since she left the truck stop—but there was a witness. She leaned against the long metal panes of the chicken house and let a cigarette burn down in one hand while she gnawed on a fingernail of the other like it was sugar cane. Jody Monroe.

Adrenaline thrummed through Emily. She swallowed hard, tried to ease her mouth for speech. The rumors were true.

Buy Links: 

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Skyhorse Publishing is running a hardcover giveaway on Goodreads! Enter for your chance to win a Hardcover version of Cottonmouths! https://www.goodreads.com/giveaway/show/241701-cottonmouths

Exclusive Excerpt: Idyll Threats (A Thomas Lynch Novel) by Stephanie Gayle

Blurb:

In the summer of 1997, Thomas Lynch arrives as the new chief of police in Idyll, Connecticut—a town where serious crimes can be counted on one hand. So no one is prepared when Cecilia North is found murdered on a golf course. By chance, Chief Lynch met her mere hours before she was killed. With that lead, the case should be a slam dunk. But there’s a problem. If Lynch tells his detectives about meeting the victim, he’ll reveal his greatest secret—he’s gay.

So Lynch works angles of the case on his own. Meanwhile, he must contend with pressure from the mayor to solve the crime before the town’s biggest tourist event begins, all while coping with the suspicions of his men, casual homophobia, and difficult memories of his former NYPD partner’s recent death.

As the case unfolds, Lynch realizes that small-town Idyll isn’t safe, especially for a man with secrets that threaten the thing he loves most—his job.

   Excerpt:

SATURDAY, AUGUST 9, 1997

2230 HOURS

I didn’t make small talk, didn’t ask about anyone’s evening plans or even say goodnight. I snuck out the station’s rear exit; the metal door squeaky with humidity, got into my cruiser, and drove to a secluded road. I parked and sat, watching the darkness grow, swallowing one tree at a time. I’d driven to the woods to think. Or not to think. To be alone.

I did a lot of that.

An insect symphony played, all percussions. I didn’t like so many bugs so near. I was city-bred, used to roaches and the occasional mos- quito. Something pinged against my windshield. My hand went to my gun. Reflex. The action recalled last year’s report on gun deaths that I’d read earlier today. In 1996, only 55 cops in the U.S. died on the job from gun-related incidents. I bit my lower lip. In a year less likely to end in a police funeral, my partner, Rick, had beaten the odds. Been shot dead by a dealer. I could hear Rick in my head. “What can I say, buddy? I’m exceptional.”

A bug adhered itself to the passenger window, its fat body vibrating against the glass. To hell with this. I turned the key in the ignition. Time to go home.

He sped past my cruiser, his convertible’s top down. Doing 55 miles per hour, at least. I flipped on my lights and siren and cut a U-turn. The car fishtailed before the tires bit down. The frame shuddered as I lowered my foot. The driver slowed, then stopped his car. He stared ahead at the pocked road, hands on the wheel.

I approached slowly. You never know whether the guy you’ve stopped is an upright father of four or an anxious kidnapper. If he was the former, I didn’t want to scare him.

The crescent moon turned his gray hair silver. He turned toward me when I reached his door. Blue eyes. I’ve always been a sucker for blue eyes. “Sir?”

He started when I spoke. Not unusual. I’m a big guy with a deep voice.

“License and registration, please.”

He handed over both. His watch was a TAG Heuer. A real one. I’d seen the fakes sold on Canal Street. His name was Leo Wilton. Age forty-nine. Address in Ashford, CT. Thirty minutes east of here.

I considered running his plates. Screw it. Too much to hope he was a serial killer.

I returned his papers. “The speed limit on this road is 35 miles per hour.”

“That right?”

“Lot of wildlife out here. Deer. They do nasty things to cars.” Or so I’d heard. I’d been here seven months and not seen one. I suspected the locals invented things.

“Sure. Sorry ‘bout that.” He looked directly at me. Straight men don’t stare into each other’s eyes, unless they’re about to fight. This guy wasn’t angry. My body responded. My brain fought back. I was within town limits. I could be spotted. But it had been a long time since I’d scratched this itch. Five and a half months: a long winter, a stone cold spring, and a summer with no skin in it. I craved contact.

“You see a lot of action out here?” He waved his hand at the trees, their needles pointier, ominous at night.

“Action?” He was hitting on me. I hadn’t mistaken it. “Not exactly.” In this town, with its picket-fenced homes, action was unknown. Everyone here was hetero or doing his best to pretend to be. I gave him a small smile, just a quick pull of my lips. It was enough.

“You want to go somewhere?” he asked.

I chewed the smooth skin inside my cheek. I was off duty, but in uniform. A hell of a risk, but he looked nice in the moonlight, like a foil wrapped gift.

“There’s a place not far from here,” he said.

Had I known what would result from this encounter—the secrets, the lies— I would’ve gone home and slept alone, again. But murder doesn’t call ahead; warn you that it’s coming. And if it had, I wouldn’t have believed  it. In  this sleepy  town named  Idyll, murder  seemed impossible. So I walked, light-headed with lust, unaware that each step brought me closer to death and near destruction.

He led me to a disheveled shack I’d heard of but never seen. The cabin by Hought’s Pond was condemned. In New York, to be con- demned required one of three Cs: crack house, critters, or collapse. Here in Idyll, Connecticut, public disapproval was enough. The house, a shingled box, had a sunken porch, rotted roof, and windows shot out by teens with BB guns. Jack is a dooshbag was spray painted on the front door. Above the tag, a frayed No Trespassing sign dangled. This place was a blight in its postcard-perfect town. No wonder they’d con- demned it.

He gripped my shirt and tugged me down so my face was level with his. I stiffened all over. He smelled of peppermint, his lips thin and slick. He reached under my shirt, his fingers tickling my abs. “Some- one’s been working out.”

I grunted. We stomped up the creaking stairs in unsteady lock step. My cock throbbed, halfway between pain and pleasure. Our bodies bumped. “Ah,” I said. I nipped his neck. He held me closer. We crashed through the cabin door. My foot connected with a can. It rattled across the floor.

“Hey!”

We jerked apart. A couple lay on the floor, half undressed. They reared back, as if struck. Near them, an oil lamp glowed. Too dim to warn this place was occupied. “You can’t come barging in here,” the girl said. She lifted her ass to wiggle into her jeans. Metal winked. Belly button ring. She was young. Twenty or so. Her hair a waterfall of brown. Her panties pink lace, a good girl’s version of sexy. She smelled fresh from the shower clean. But her tone and company told a different story. Even in the feeble light I saw her friend was daddy material. His hair thinning on top. He fumbled with his zipper and half-rolled to his side.

“Let’s go,” I said, but Leo crossed his arms. “Not so fast,” he said.

“Faster.” My lust had fled when I’d seen the couple. I touched his hand, but he yanked it back.

“You miss the no trespassing sign?” Leo raised his voice to fill the space.

The girl thrust her face forward. A white oval with red lips. Just kissed. Pretty, and angry. “This your cabin?” she asked. Her tone left no doubt she knew the answer.

“Stop arguing,” her friend said. He stabbed his arms into his jacket. “He could arrest you,” Leo said. He pointed to my badge.

The couple blinked. They hadn’t noticed my uniform. But now they stared, eyes on my badge. I inhaled. It hurt. A lifetime of work, burnt to ash. And for what? A quickie in a rotting cabin? The man got up from the floor and hurried past, hand to his face. Like a pedophile on a perp walk.

The girl looked smaller now, her eyes on the door. “Guess you don’t have any real criminals to chase, huh?” She shoved her feet in her sneakers, not bothering with the laces. As she stomped past I smelled coconut. The door smacked shut and bounced, the wood warped by damp.

“Why the fuck did you do that?” I said to Leo.

“What?”

“Point out my badge. I’m not looking to advertise.”

He spread his arms wide. “Now we have the place to ourselves.” He smiled. I didn’t.

“You don’t bully people because you want a fuck. Got it?”

“Yes, sir.” He saluted.

“I’ll lead you to your car.” Make sure the bastard left town, and fast.

He snorted. “I can find it. I’ve been here before. This place isn’t a

secret.” He pointed at my badge again. “Except to you, I guess. Later,

Chief.” He stepped around a discarded condom. I let him go. He knew

my rank. From the cruiser and my badge. He could report me. Ruin me. If he hadn’t already.

Broken glass littered the floor. The space smelled of pond algae,

like corpses in advanced stages of decay. Multiple people had come here

for sex? Why? And how had I almost been among them? God, I was

like Rick. My dead partner. Risking my career for a stupid fix. Moonlight

shifted through the roof ’s holes. A pattern of spotlights played

on the sprouting floor. A cracked window shivered. In it, I saw myself,

a hulking dark shape. My badge glinted, the only bright thing in that

lonely space. I bent down and blew out the oil lamp flame.

 

Exclusive Excerpt: Evan Sent by J.P. Bowie

Evan Sent by J.P. Bowie

Blurb:

Fiction and reality become intertwined when a young movie actor playing the role of a detective finds himself in a real-life drama that threatens to bring a sudden end to his career.

Evan Ericson is young and beautiful, a former fashion model and a gifted actor. When he is offered the role of a detective in a new film noir indie movie, he jumps at the chance, certain that this is his opportunity to leave behind the notoriety of appearing in porn movies and his dependence on drugs.

Mark Henderson is an out-of-work actor searching for his big break. When, by sheer chance, he lands a part in a new indie movie, he can’t believe his luck. Nor can he believe it when he meets Evan Ericson. Sparks fly at their first encounter. When rehearsing their roles, Mark’s world is rocked by Evan’s kiss and a new Hollywood romance is born.

But things thought long buried in the past have a nasty habit of rearing their ugly heads, and being stalked and threatened by a manic drug dealer is not something either Evan or Mark envisaged in their future together. Will Hollywood magic be enough to keep them safe or will Evan’s bad-boy reputation tear them apart?

***

Evan has helped out a one-time friend by giving him enough money to go home and escape the clutches of a loan syndicate. Now Evan is being threatened by this same syndicate and he calls on Dave Franklin and LAPD cop for help…

Excerpt:

Evan jerked his head toward the studio door, where the silhouette of a large figure was framed in the doorway. Dave…let’s hope this is good news. “Hey, Dave.”

He waved and hurried over to his friend from his modeling days. Tall, broad-shouldered, his dark-brown hair now lightly streaked with gray, Dave Franklin was still an imposing presence. He caught Evan up in a bear hug and kissed him on the forehead.

“You look even better than I remember,” he said, holding Evan at arm’s-length, his gaze sweeping over Evan’s face and body. “Why did I ever let you go?”

Evan laughed. “You were married to your job, if I recall.”

“And you were traipsing all over the world. Well, it’s good to see you. I’m glad you called me. Where’s your friend?”

Looking around, Evan spotted Mark talking to one of the sound techs but watching him and Dave at the same time. “Hey, Mark…when you’re done, come meet Dave.” Mark crossed the studio floor and approached them, a nervous expression on his face.

“Dave, this is my boyfriend, Mark Henderson.” Evan took Mark’s arm and drew him in close. He watched as the men shook hands, and Mark seemed to relax under Dave’s broad smile.

“Good to meet you, Mark. Sorry about the circumstances, but chances are I’d never have heard from Evan if there wasn’t some kind of problem.”

Evan tried not to feel guilty at Dave’s words. “We’ve talked…but you’re right, Dave, I’m terrible at keeping in touch, but it’s good to see you.”

“Is there somewhere we can talk in private?”

Mark gestured at the corridor that led to the break room. “There’s no one taking a break right now. We can use the room while it’s empty.”

“Good enough.” Dave followed them as they led the way past the camera and sound equipment. “So, this is where it all happens. I’ve never seem a movie in progress before.”

“You should stay and see Evan in his next scene,” Mark said. “We can ask Charles if it’s okay that you watch him in action.”

“That’d be great.” They entered the break room and sat at one of the tables.  “So, here’s the deal.” Dave kept his voice low even though they were the only ones in the room. “Castro wants fifty thousand—you don’t have it, but you can offer him a helluva lot more.”

Evan stared at him in surprise. “I can?”

“Yep. You can offer him fifty thousand dollars’ worth of cocaine, which on the street will rake in five, six times as much. And if I’m right about the punk, he’ll leap at the chance to acquire that much blow.”

“But where the hell would I find that amount of coke?”

Dave grinned. “Oh, we have some lying around. Okay, I’ve talked with the chief, and with your help we’re going to put together a sting operation. This is how it will work. You will call Castro and make the offer. Sound very nervous. You’re an actor, so you can do it. Make him believe you managed to acquire the coke by devious means, which of course you cannot divulge to him. He won’t question you too much, but he will be suspicious of the quality. He’s gonna want to check it out. You will have to meet with him face to face.”

Mark shifted uncomfortably. “Won’t that be dangerous? Evan alone with a criminal?”

“Don’t worry, we’ll be there, only Castro can’t know about our involvement.”

“So, I meet with him, then what?” Evan asked, leaning forward in his seat.

“You’ll have a sample for him to check out. You’ll wear a wire. Any conversation you have with Castro or his cronies will be picked up by us and recorded as evidence. Don’t worry, wires are totally unnoticeable these days. Tiny, like a thread. Once he’s okay with the quality, he’ll arrange with you a time and place for the drop-off. You will hand the cocaine over, and that’s when we step in and arrest him. We figure once he’s out of the picture the rest of the cartel will dissolve. There might be somebody there who thinks he can become the kingpin, but that’ll be easier for us to deal with. Castro is the one we want, and from what I’ve heard about the guy, he might just sing about the rest of the thugs he’s involved with.”

Mark visibly shivered. “It still sounds dangerous to me.”

Dave nodded. “There is a danger factor, I won’t deny it. These guys are volatile, and Castro will be suspicious. It’s up to you, Evan, to come across scared enough to get them off your back. That you’ll do anything to be free of the debt. How d’you feel about this?”

Evan chuckled. “Well, I’ve got the scared part down perfect. I won’t have to act too hard to make them believe it.”

“Are you sure, Evan?” Mark asked. “About this, I mean? What if these guys are armed?”

“Oh, they will be,” Dave said grimly. “They don’t go anywhere without guns. So, yeah, there is a distinct possibility there will be a show of arms. But they’re not gonna shoot you, Evan. Castro will want the deal, I’m sure of it.”

“How sure?” Mark snapped.

“Sure as I am about anything to do with drug dealers. Number one, they are greedy. Money means everything to them, and a deal like this will look mighty sweet to Castro.” Dave paused and looked at Evan, a frown creasing his forehead. “Okay, now this has to be entirely your decision, Evan. I’ll understand if you don’t want to get involved. I won’t underestimate the danger aspect of it. All I can do is tell you that we will be with you every step of the way.”

“Okay, I’ll do it.” Evan smiled at Mark and took his hand. “I’m not gonna be on my own, babe. I’ll have LA’s finest at my back. It’ll be fine.”

The door swung open at that moment and two of the crew stepped inside. Dave stood and indicated with a jerk of his head that they should leave. Just then his cell phone rang.  “Franklin. Yeah? Okay, be right there. Sorry, guys.” He gave Evan and Mark a rueful look. “Have to take a rain check on watching the movie action. Gotta head into the precinct right away.”

“That sucks,” Evan said. “And here I was ready to show you my acting chops.”

Dave grinned. “Next time.” Evan and Mark walked him over to the exit. “I’ll be in touch once I get the details ironed out with the chief. If Castro calls again, tell him you’re working on a deal to get him his money. That’ll shut him up for a while.”

They said their goodbyes, then Mark dragged Evan into a dark corner of the studio and wrapped his arms around him. “I don’t want you to do this, Evan, I really don’t. Surely we can work this out without you having to put yourself in danger. We can get a loan, pay this Castro guy off and get on with our lives.”

Evan leaned into Mark’s embrace and nuzzled his throat. “I think there’s more to it than just paying off Dareck’s debt. What Dave is trying to do is put some bad guys out of business, and I’m all for that. A year and half ago I gave up drugs. It was tough. I wasn’t exactly an addict, but I came pretty close, and I saw, because of the company I kept, some really bad scenes. Guys strung out so bad they had to be taken to the ER. Some didn’t make it. During that time I had unprotected sex with men, and sometimes I had no clue who they even were. I was lucky. At the end of it all I was clear of STDs. I was broke, but I still considered myself lucky. I don’t judge people who get off on drugs, but a part of me wants to see guys like Miguel Castro shut down, put away for a nice long stretch, and the drugs he sells just that little bit harder to get.”

“So, this is like a crusade?” Mark frowned at him. “You want to put your life in danger in order to stop one drug dealer when there are a hundred more like him out there ready to take over his business? What about me, Evan? What about us? If anything happened to you now, I just don’t know what I’d do…”

“Nothing’s gonna happen to me, babe. Okay, I wasn’t going to admit this to you…” He caressed Mark’s face with is fingertips. His voice was low and rueful, although his gaze never moved from Mark’s as he explained. “I’ve been in something like this before, when I was younger. Not with the cops, just me and a friend who wanted to help a guy we knew being threatened by drug-dealing scum. We set a trap for them, pretending we were buyers and we…well, we beat the crap outta them. All those years of having to defend myself in foster care and the institution paid off, I guess. I wasn’t exactly a street fighter, but I knew some moves. I’d met Dave by that time and I called him when it was all over, and he took them in. This time Dave and a bunch of cops will be right there the whole time. If things get testy they’ll step in.”

“Just like that? This isn’t a movie, Evan, where it’s all planned out, choreographed, rehearsed. Things could go really wrong. These are real criminals we’re talking about.”

“I know that,” Evan said, more sharply than he had intended, and Mark stepped back from their embrace, his expression etched with worry. Evan immediately regretted his outburst. “Sorry…” He laid a light kiss on Mark’s lips. “It’ll be okay, sweetheart. I know this isn’t a movie, but Dave won’t go in without a solid plan. Castro and his men might be armed, but so will the cops—”

“That’s supposed to make me feel better?” Mark groaned. “What if you get caught in the crossfire?”

“Mark, come on, babe. You are looking at this as the worst possible scenario. Chances are Castro will go for the deal, I’ll back off and the police will take over.”

“You make it sound so easy, and I just know it won’t be.” Mark put his arms around Evan again and laid his head on Evan’s shoulder. “I won’t sleep a wink if you agree to go through with Dave’s plan.”

“I’ve already decided.”

Mark sighed. “I know you have. Damn you.”

“I love you.” Evan tilted Mark’s head toward him and kissed his lips gently. “Very much.”

Mark’s eyes brimmed with tears as he stared at Evan. “I love you too, even though I hate you at this moment.”

Exclusive Excerpt: The God Killer (Sheffield and Black Book 1) by Charles Alan Long

Blurb:

The first victim is hung in crucifixion position—a gash in his side and a wreath on his head. Homicide detectives Dylan Black and Vivienne Sheffield are baffled by strange words written in Scrabble tiles, the dead man’s discarded glass eye, and wolf hair left at the scene.

The victim’s neighbor, a college student and mythology buff named Trevor McDaniel, is convinced the victim is not meant to represent Jesus, as the detectives first concluded, but rather an ancient Viking god who was killed by a monstrous, mythical wolf.

Four months later, the second murder is even more bloody and bizarre. The killer has beheaded, speared, and partially mummified a woman. This time he has painted Egyptian hieroglyphs on the bedroom wall and left behind a man’s severed hand and seven scorpions.

Eager for publicity, the killer writes self-aggrandizing letters to reporter Aggie Rhodes and signs them Fenrir, the Wolf—naming himself after the mythical god killer. Soon Aggie realizes the madman is embedding messages about his crimes in the text, and she vows to beat the monster at his own game and end his reign of terror.

With the city’s citizens in a panic and few clues to go on, Black and Sheffield desperately search for answers with the aid of Trevor, Aggie, Chief Medical Examiner Nikolina Petkov, and friend and fellow officer Amadeo Perez. The investigation takes them from the zoo to the university to the morgue and even to a strip club. As the hunt progresses, Detective Black finds himself entangled in a secret relationship with Trevor—a relationship that just might alter the Wolf’s next move.

Can Black and Sheffield solve the Myth Murders before the Wolf kills again? Or has he already chosen one of them?

Chapter 1

While classic U2 played on the radio, Detective Dylan Black reviewed what he knew about the crime: white male, 58, lived alone, suspended in crucifixion position, gash in his side, wreath on his head, tortured. Like most U.S. cities, homicide was not uncommon in Normandy, Ohio, but ritualistic murder was a whole other game. This crime was unfamiliar territory for Black, who wasn’t entirely certain he was ready for the challenge.

Looking out from the sanctuary of his Lexus, Black surveyed the melee: three news channels vied for a story, an ambulance and four police cars were parked like flotsam at the end of the circle. Several officers stood talking rather than working, likely caught up in the gruesome details of the crime. Black didn’t see the chief medical examiner’s SUV, and he wondered if she’d even been notified yet. By now, officers should have strung yellow crime tape and started combing the crowd. This was clearly an unusual case, and the last thing the Normandy Police Department needed were accusations of carelessness and incompetence. Black wished his partner was here; but last he’d heard, the station said she couldn’t be reached. With a deep breath, he gathered his strength and stepped from the safety of the sedan into the balmy July air.

“Detective Black,” one reporter yelled, and the swarm of media turned his way. He squinted into the glare of lights. “Can you tell us about the victim?”

“Is it true he was tortured?” another asked.

“Do you have a suspect?” a third called out.

With a dismissive wave, Black continued his insistent stride toward the dead man’s apartment. Leaving reporters in his wake, he muttered, “No comment.” Then he said to Officer Ari Davis, who looked like a Scandinavian model, “Handle them. Give them the basics and no more.” Black patted the man’s chiseled cheek. “They love that face of yours.”

Black crossed the sidewalk and directed the show: He ordered two officers to string crime tape, two officers to interview neighbors, and the rest to search the nearby park. Once everyone was on task, Black entered the apartment building. Inside the entryway, he was surprised to find his partner, Vivienne Sheffield, talking with another officer.

“About time you got here,” she grumbled in jest.

“Was in the middle of washing my hair.” He ran his fingers through his short, black hair. “Thought you couldn’t be reached.”

“Yeah, well they got me, and I beat you here. Listen, this murder sounds like a real mess: bloody, violent, staged, and rife with symbolism.”

“Have you been in there?” Black asked.

She shook her head. “Was just about to enter. Ramsey was filling me in.” Officer Ramsey looked a little green around the edges, like he’d just seen his first brain surgery. “You can go, Ramsey. I’ll fill Detective Black in on the details.”

“Okay,” the officer responded, in an uncharacteristic quaver.

“Oh, and tell the techs to be ready to spend some time in there. And make sure the kid is okay.”

Ramsey nodded and then turned to flee.

“‘The kid’?” Black asked.

“Yeah. College student who found the vic. He’s pretty shaken up.”

“Where is he?”

“In Apartment C.” She gestured toward the door. “Right across from the dead guy’s.”

Sheffield’s blonde hair was styled in curls rather than harnessed into her customary ponytail, and she wore a full complement of makeup instead of her usual hint of eyeliner and lipstick. Vivienne Sheffield was an attractive woman, and tonight she looked a bit like a curvier Charlize Theron. Black animatedly looked his partner up and down, arched a brow and smiled.

“What?” Then she shook her head. “Don’t say it.” She ran her hands self-consciously down her fitted red dress. A self-confident woman in a world still dominated by testosterone, Sheffield suddenly wished her breasts weren’t so prominent and her gown didn’t accentuate her curves.

“At least you won’t be able to tell if you get blood on your dress,” he said. “You can go right back to your date.”

She socked him playfully on the arm. “Shut up.”

“I hope your date appreciates that dress. I’m jealous.”

Sheffield knew the latter statement wasn’t true, because Black had fumbled his opportunity. One night while working on a case, after long hours, some Szechuan chicken, a couple of drinks, and an unexpected touch of their hands, she had kissed her partner on the lips in the hope he would reciprocate. The kiss had felt wrong from the moment their lips touched. She apologized, he apologized, and then they talked it over briefly in clipped sentences. The discussion had ended with no closure, and the infamous kiss became their unspoken secret.

Dates were a rare commodity for Sheffield these days, but tonight’s lucky man was a manager named Bill something, who worked for the electric company, drove a Porsche, and filled out a suit nicely. Regrettably, she wanted to be here with Black more than she wanted to be at the opera with Bill something.

“Let’s go inside.” She handed Black latex gloves and paper booties.

As her partner entered the residence, Sheffield stealthily eyed him from the back. Medium height, stocky, with black hair and blue eyes, Dylan Black filled out his Levi jeans in a way that made her pulse race.

Everything in the dead man’s apartment had its place. Every line was sharp, crisp and even. Maybe a little OCD, Black thought. One wall of shelves was filled with books. Once he was close enough to read titles, whole categories were discernable: WWI, WWII, the Korean War, the Civil War. A vase of dying flowers served as the centerpiece on a heavy oak dining-room table. A bundle of mail was strewn across one end of the table like it had fallen from the sky. Magazines like National  Geographic and Newsweek lay haphazardly amid white envelopes. The air was frigid, a stark contrast to the oppressive summer heat outside. No signs of struggle were apparent in the large, open living space. However, the master bedroom told a much more disturbing and macabre story. Moving in slow motion, the detectives stepped into the room, allowing the horror to hit them gradually. The only sound was their paper booties on the hardwood floor.

“Jesus!” Sheffield gasped.

“Literally,” Black replied.

Lawrence Adams was suspended in crucifix position with one arm tied to each side of the bed’s wooden canopy. His head hung forward, and a wreath adorned his white, thinning hair. The bed’s gauze canopy had been removed and wrapped around the old man like a crude diaper. Bite marks covered his bruised and battered body, and a large gash in his side exposed tissue and bones. Staring at a bloody knife at the end of the bed, Sheffield bit her lower lip and wondered how long Adams had suffered before finally succumbing to his injuries.

“The perpetrator had control,” she stated. “This wasn’t an act of unrestrained rage. He toyed with him—maybe for hours.”

“He pierced his side and suspended him like Jesus,” Black said. “Is this supposed to look like a crucifixion?”

“There’s no wooden cross.”

“Maybe the psycho couldn’t make a cross, so he opted for the closest alternative, suspending him from the wooden canopy.”

“The killer must be a religious zealot.” Sheffield leaned her head back and shook her curls away from her face.

Black groaned. “Damn, I hate when religion is involved.”

“Isn’t this guy a bit old for Jesus?”

“But an older man is easier to control than a young guy. It’s probably more about the symbolism of the act than the physical similarities.”

“Is that supposed to be a crown of thorns?” She pointed to the victim’s head.

“Looks like shrubbery to me.”

The detectives moved about the room with investigative intent—opening drawers, checking under the bed, and looking in closets. Black found a King James Bible in the top dresser drawer and wondered if Adams had been targeted because of his faith. On the nightstand lay a bloody tooth that didn’t look human. Sheffield glanced at her partner and shook her head. Both surmised the killer had left the tooth as some kind of symbol, but neither had any idea what it meant. Next to the tooth was a Scrabble board with nonsense words written in game tiles: yggdrasil, sleipnir, vegtam, mimir, and fenrir. Black jotted the words on his notepad.

“Make sure they get a photo of this,” he said, to no one in particular. “I’m not too up on my Bible trivia. Maybe they’re anagrams. I bet our guy likes to play games.”

“He has feathers in his back!”

“What?” Black looked up to see two large, ebony feathers protruding from the victim’s shoulders. “Holy hell.” Neither detective knew what to make of this. They moved closer and peered up at Adams’s face.

“I think he’s missing an eye,” Sheffield proclaimed.

“Did Jesus lose an eye, or am I missing something here?”

Sheffield gently raised the dead man’s eyelid, and bloody ooze dripped onto her latex glove.

“Let’s bring the techs in.” Black looked in the mirror and caught his own somber expression.

“Does he have a cat?” Sheffield asked, pointing. “Is that cat hair on the bed?”

The two detectives leaned over and almost bumped heads. Black poked the hairs with a gloved finger.

“Looks like pet hair,” he observed.

“I’ll tell the techs about this.”

“Sheff?”

“Yeah, Dylan?”

“This one’s gonna be ugly.”

Buy Links:

Available from both Amazon (in paperback and Kindle) and from Smashwords (in most e-formats). Here are the links:

https://www.amazon.com/God-Killer-Charles-Alan-Long/dp/0615520596/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1496026848&sr=8-3&keywords=the+god+killer

https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/240895

 

Exclusive Excerpt: Hijacked Love by Ethan Stone

Blurb:

It’s the winter of 1971 and FBI Agent Zack Pomeroy is hoping to make a name for himself when he’s assigned the case of the century—the hijacking of an airplane by D.B. Cooper. Zack’s used to hiding his sexuality but working with Duke Magruder is even more of a challenge. Not only do they do have vastly different personalities but also contrasting opinions on how to work the case. Nonetheless, Zack is able to earn Duke’s begrudging respect.

Until Duke learns Zack’s secret.

When Zack finds a lead on the case Duke not only refuses to listen, he also refuses to work with Zack any longer. Zack’s career and his assignment are at jeopardy but that doesn’t mean he’s about to give up on finding Cooper, no matter how many years it takes.

Hijacked Love is a blend of mystery and historical fiction with a bit of romance thrown in.

Excerpt:

Chapter 1

Talk about being at the right place at the right time. It was 1971, the day before Thanksgiving and my first day at the Portland FBI office. I was finally meeting my boss, Agent Milton Donaldson. We were shooting the breeze when Donaldson’s secretary dashed into his office.

“Sir, there’s been a hijacking!”

Donaldson glanced at me and shrugged. “Looks like you’ll be hitting the ground running.”

My plans for Turkey day were going to hell. Phil was not going to be happy.

I followed Donaldson down a hallway and into a large conference room where half a dozen men in matching dark suits and ties milled around a table and talked over one another. Donaldson’s presence hushed everyone as he strode to the end of the table. I stood off to the side.

“What do we know, gentlemen?”

Everyone began talking at once. Donaldson straightened, crossed his arms, and scowled. This was not a man I ever wanted to anger. The room quieted, and Donaldson pointed at a barrel-chested man with a receding hairline. “Duke.”

“Flight”—Duke paused to review some notes—”305. Northwest Orient Airlines flying from Portland to Seattle. Just after takeoff, a male passenger gave a note to a stewardess informing her he had a bomb.”

“What does he want?” Donaldson asked.

A couple of men started to speak, but Duke drowned them all out. “Two hundred thousand dollars, four parachutes, and a fuel truck standing by in Seattle to refuel the aircraft on arrival.”

Donaldson pointed at another agent. “Felder, get on the phone with the Seattle office. Let’s make sure we’re working together on this one. I don’t want any pissing matches about who’s in charge. This is a joint operation.”

“Yes, sir.”

“The airline’s president, Donald Nyrop, has been informed of the situation,” Duke continued. “He’ll call me back once he’s made a decision.”

“Good,” Donaldson said. “We’ll wait for his call. Whether or not he agrees to pay the money determines our next action. I don’t want anyone harmed if we can avoid it. Do the passengers know what’s going on?”

An agent sporting thick sideburns spoke up. “The pilot has already announced that landing in Seattle is delayed due to minor mechanical difficulty.”

“Good. What do we know about our hijacker?”

“Nothing yet,” Duke said. While others had taken seats, he had remained standing, and alternated between pacing alongside the table and leaning over it. “I’d like to be on the ground when it lands so I can interview the witnesses.”

“I’m fine with that. I’d like you to wait until we get a call from the airline president. You’ve already talked to him and it’d be better if he spoke to you again.”

Duke nodded and leaned against the wall, crossed his arms, and tapped his foot impatiently. It was easy to tell he was Donaldson’s right-hand man. I’d researched most of the agents I’d be working with but the name Duke didn’t ring a bell. Then it struck me. Wayne Magruder. Twenty-five year veteran of the Bureau. He’d worked in offices all across the country and in several different departments. He had a reputation for closing cases as well as for being a hard ass. Magruder didn’t work well with others.

Donaldson issued assignments to almost every agent in the room before a phone on the wall rang. Duke grabbed it. “Magruder.” He nodded. “Send it through.” He put a hand on the speaker and said to Donaldson, “It’s the airline president.” A moment later, “Hello, Mr. Nyrop. This is Agent Magruder. Have you made a decision?” Pause. “I think you’ve made the right choice, sir. We’ll be in contact soon.” He hung up and turned. “He’s paying the money and has instructed his employees to cooperate fully.”

“Okay, Duke, get your ass to Seattle. Work with agents there to get the money. Interview anyone released when the plane lands. Let’s figure out who this guy is.”

“Yes, sir.”

Duke dashed past me and was almost out the door when Donaldson glanced at me and blinked as if he’d forgotten I was even there.

“Magruder…wait.”

He stopped. “Yeah?”

“This is Special Agent Zachary Pomeroy.”

Duke looked at me and I extended my hand. He shook it briefly, obviously uninterested.

“Call me Zack,” I said.

He didn’t reply, instead facing his boss again.

“I want you to take Pomeroy with you.”

“Sir, I don’t need—”

“It’s not a request, Duke,” Donaldson snapped. “He came with good recommendations after years of dealing with organized crime. I was going to assign you to train him anyway.”

Duke inhaled then slowly let out his breath. Without looking at me, he said, “Fine. You better not hold me back.”

“No, sir, I…”

He took off down the hallway with long strides.

“He’s not joking,” Donaldson said. “He will leave without you.” He patted my back and pushed me out of the room.

I jogged until I caught up with Magruder. “Do I have time to make a phone call?”

“You got a wife you need to check in with?”

“Uh, no.” I did have a partner, but I couldn’t exactly tell Duke that.

“Nobody else matters.”

Arguing would be pointless so I followed Magruder outside to his car, a cherry red 1966 Mustang. I whistled as I slid into the vehicle. “She’s beautiful.”

He grinned for a moment. “Thanks.”

Moments later, we were on our way to Seattle, driving well above the speed limit. After my attempts at conversation were met with monosyllabic responses, I stopped trying. We made it to Seattle in just under two hours. The Seattle office was expecting us, and we were ushered into a conference room and given quick introductions.

“What happened while I was on the road?” Duke demanded, apparently not catching the looks of irritation on the other agents’ faces.

“We’ve gathered the money the hijacker requested,” Special Agent in Charge Gary Floyd responded. “Agent Walker has handled all that.” He gestured to a smallish man with slicked brown hair and wire rim glasses. He sat at a table and had a knapsack full of cash in front of him.

I shook Walker’s hand and introduced myself. “Call me Zack.”

He smiled and held the grip a second longer than normal. “Ernest, but my friends call me Ernie.” I got the feeling that Ernie was gay like me. I couldn’t be positive, of course. It’s not like FBI agents wore colored hankies in their pockets while on the job.

“Enough with the goddamn small talk,” Duke snapped. “What’s going on with the case?”

“Please excuse Duke,” I said. “His mama never taught him manners.”

Everyone chuckled except Duke, who scowled at me instead.

“I got the money from different banks in the area,” Ernie said. “Ten thousand unmarked twenty dollar bills. Most have serial numbers beginning with the letter L. That makes it easier to trace.”

“I assume you’ve got a list of those serial numbers?” Duke asked.

Ernie nodded then stood and closed the knapsack. “We’re good to go, sir.”

Floyd lifted the receiver in front of him. “Let him know his demands have been met.”

I glanced at my watch. It was 5:24 p.m. No doubt Phil would be expecting me home any minute. At that point, I had no idea when I’d make it back. So much for the transfer giving me a more reliable schedule.

Duke tapped a foot. “Let’s get to the airport, Pomeroy. I want to be there when the plane lands.” He left the room without a word to anyone else.

“We’re on our way, too,” Floyd said as he grabbed the bag of money.

I tugged on Ernie’s shirt sleeve. “It was nice meeting you. Maybe we’ll run into each other again.”

He smiled. “I’d like that.”

In the car, I said, “How have you survived this long in the Bureau without learning you attract more flies with honey than you do with vinegar?”

Duke snorted. “I don’t need or want your opinion about how I do my job, Pomeroy.”

“Suit yourself.”

 

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B06Y5MLDCJ/...

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/3...

Exclusive Excerpt of Drama Luau, the fourth Nicky and Noah mystery, by Joe Cosentino

Blurb:

Theatre professors and spouses, Nicky Abbondanza and Noah Oliver, are on their honeymoon at a Hawaiian resort, where musclemen in grass skirts are keeling over like waterfalls. Things erupt faster than a volcano when Nicky and Noah, along with their best friends Martin and Ruben, try to stage a luau show. Nicky and Noah will need to use their drama skills to figure out who is bringing the grass curtain down on male hula dancers—before things go coconuts for the handsome couple. You will be applauding and shouting Bravo for Joe Cosentino’s fast-paced, side-splittingly funny, edge-of-your-seat entertaining fourth novel in this delightful series. Curtain up and aloha!

Excerpt:

The olive-skinned, barefooted muscular men wore loincloths (malo), coconut necklaces, shell bracelets and anklets, and flower (lei) head garlands. With the powerful emerald mountain behind them, the dancers (‘olapa) aerobically executed hand signs, knee sways, and foot stomps toward the turquoise sea (makai), as their deep, full voices chanted to the goddess of the ocean (Namakaokahai). The lead dancer (alakai) and the dance captain (kumu) moved front and center executing their tree in the breeze hand gestures. The dancer helper (kokua) made gestures to the ocean waves behind them.

“Stop!”

The ‘ukulele, steel guitar, and bass accompaniment ended. The dancers slouched and looked toward the rows of tables and chairs facing them.

“Kimu, stand further upstage.”

“Nicky, they don’t know what upstage and downstage mean.”

“Thanks, Noah. Kimu, stand behind the other dancers, so Kal and Ak are the focus of the dance.”

That was me, Nicky Abbondanza, Associate Professor of Directing at Treemeadow College, an Edwardian style private college in the quaint state of Vermont. My husband and the love of my life, Assistant Professor of Acting at Treemeadow, Noah Oliver, is by my side, right where I like him. Why am I directing a luau show at the Maui Mist Resort in Hawaii? Our honeymoon in Maui was a gift from our parents. But when the customers of my parents’ bakery in Kansas became glucose intolerant, and the clientele of Noah’s parents’ dairy farm in Wisconsin found themselves lactose intolerant, Noah and I were left tolerating the bill. So my department head and his husband hit the internet and found this luau show directing job, which came with free airfare, hotel, and food for two. Enticed by the gorgeous tropical location and the gorgeous luau dancers, Martin Anderson, Professor of Theatre Management at Treemeadow College, and Ruben Markinson, director of one of the top gay rights organizations in the country, decided to tag along and keep us out of trouble. Since Martin and Ruben are our best friends, that was more than fine with Noah and me.

Since you can’t see us, I am thirty-six, tall, with dark hair, green eyes, a Roman nose, cleft chin and long sideburns. Thanks to the gym at Treemeadow College (named after Tree and Meadow, the gay couple who founded it), I am pretty muscular. One minor thing. Actually, it’s pretty major. I have a nine and-a-quarter by two-inch penis, which causes Noah to tell everyone we are “going clubbing” when we have sex.

Noah is handsome with wavy blond hair, crystal-blue eyes, porcelain skin, and hotter and sweeter buns than any found in my dad’s bakery. Martin is short, thin, and bald. As an incredible gossip, he resembles an alien looking for a good piece of news to bring back to his home planet. Ruben is tall, thin, distinguished-looking, with salt and pepper hair and two large eyes watching over Martin. Though Ruben would never admit it, like his husband, Ruben revels in the dish too.

I said to the dancers, “The opening (ho’i) number will be fine. Let’s move on.”

Whereas the first dance was an introduction to the dancers, the second number, in honor of the creation gods (Kane and Lono), is a sensual dance, where the muscular dancers get to flex, grunt, and gyrate.

Sitting next to me at the front table opposite the stage, Noah rested a hand on my knee. “Did my character work with the dancers pay off?”

I nodded. “They all seem like characters to me.”

Noah squeezed my hand as the five dancers came on stage, now wearing grass skirts. Kal (short for Kalani), at twenty-five, is tall, strikingly handsome, muscular, the leader of the pack, and he knows it. Ak (Akamu), at thirty-five, was once the stallion of the troupe, but a receded hairline and wrinkles had transformed Ak to dance captain. As leaders, Kal and Ak take focus in the dance numbers, either dancing downstage center or up center on the platform in the shape of a volcano. Pretty ironic since Kal and Ak are ex-lovers and ex-friends.

Current lovers Keanu (dancer helper), at medium height with a growing paunch, and Ahe, young, small, and cute as a button, took their places midstage and looked at each other adoringly.

Finally, Kimu, at medium height with a bull dog face and protruding belly, stood farthest upstage. The only straight member of the troupe, Kimu, said, “Are you girls ready to dance?”

Keanu left his lover, Ahe, and approached Kimu. “What a surprise, Kimu. Liquor on your breath.”

Leader Kal added, “Yeah, Kimu, during the last number you were wavering more than the palm trees near the stage fan.”

Kimu answered, “Hey Kal, is it true that you gave Keanu a pity lei?”

These guys are worse than the divas I work with in the theatre. “Can we please start the number?”

 

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Exclusive First-Look Excerpt: Promoted to Death by Meg Perry (Jamie Brodie Mysteries Book 14)

Blurb:

Elaine Pareja didn’t have any fans among her colleagues in the psychology department at Santa Monica College. When her promotion application is denied and she is terminated, no one is sorry to see her go. When Elaine is reinstated for no apparent reason, it causes a revolt in the department. When she turns up dead, her colleagues turn into suspects. But Elaine was a keeper of secrets – other people’s, and her own. Jamie Brodie and his friend, business librarian Sheila Meadows, join forces with the police to pick their way through the tangled web of Elaine’s life, searching for the thread that led to her death.

Exclusive First-Look Excerpt:

At 5:15 Pete texted me. Leaving campus now.

A half hour later he pulled up in the drop-off circle and I climbed in. “Hey, how’d it go?”

“I resigned, effective at the end of spring term. June 10.”

“Dr. Canaday wasn’t surprised, was she?”

“Not by that, no. She may resign herself.”

“Why?”

“Elaine got reinstated.”

“What?? How the hell did that happen?”

“I’m not sure. It was over Verlene’s protestations.”

“Let’s just throw the faculty promotion process out the window, shall we? Not to mention sleeping with a student! How the fuck are you all supposed to work with her now?”

Pete set his jaw. “I’m not going to any longer than I have to. Verlene and Elliott may both resign in protest.”

“Holy shit. How to decimate an entire department in one move.”

“Yeah. Everyone else will be job hunting, too.”

“Can Aaron afford to take the time to find a desirable job?”

Aaron’s husband, Paul Thayer, was one of the top home stagers in Los Angeles. “Yes, Paul’s income is far higher than his. Verlene and Elliott can both be choosy, too. Curtis and Audra can’t quit without having somewhere else to go.”

“Was there any reason given?”

“Elaine was terminated because of her involvement with our student, on top of her poor evaluation. None of that has changed. I don’t understand what has.”

“Maybe she knows something damaging about someone influential.”

“It would have to be someone incredibly influential. For the college to potentially expose itself to a lawsuit from the union and the state faculty association… I can’t imagine what could have overridden that.”

“Would the board of trustees have done this?”

Pete frowned. “They’ve never interfered in that way, to my knowledge. They vote on faculty hires but it’s supposed to be a formality. They’ve never stated a position on a faculty firing. Besides – a majority of the board would have to vote to reinstate her. I can’t see that happening.”

“Would your college president do it?”

“No. He wouldn’t.” But he didn’t look as sure as he sounded.

When we got to the Y we found side-by-side treadmills and stepped on. I couldn’t run without uncomfortably jarring my shoulder, but I set a steady uphill walking pace that wouldn’t overtax my lungs. Pete built up his pace until he was running hard, slightly uphill, legs pounding, jaw grimly set. When he was about to drop with exhaustion, I said, “You should start cooling down.”

I could tell that he thought about objecting, but then he tapped the controls and began slowing down. I slowed my own pace until we were both walking comfortably. Finally he sighed deeply and stopped. “Shower at home?”

“Yeah.”

In the parking lot Pete turned his phone back on; his voice message alert chirped immediately. He checked the screen. “Elliott, Aaron and Curtis.”

“All wanting to discuss the events of the day.”

“No doubt.”

Pete began returning calls as soon as we got home. Elliott, only four years from retirement, was still on the fence about his decision. Aaron, after discussions with both Dr. Canaday and Paul, would hand in his resignation tomorrow, effective at the end of spring semester.

Pete called Curtis as he opened a pill bottle for me. “Hey, man, sorry it took a while to get back to you. What’s up?” He listened for a full minute. “No, I’m gonna teach online. Adjunct. Jamie found several positions. No, at real schools. Yeah, he can add me to his insurance. How much? Good God. No, of course not. You have to take care of your family. Yes, and I’m sure Aaron would too. You bet. I’ll see you tomorrow.” He ended the call and sighed.

I said, “Curtis can’t resign.”

“Not yet. His wife works too, but for a small dental practice. He has the kids on his insurance. If she adds the three kids and Curtis to hers, it’ll cost $2250 a month.”

“Holy crap. He’s going to search for another job, right?”

“Yeah. He was afraid that we’d think he wasn’t supporting us if he didn’t resign right now.”

“And you’ll write him letters of recommendation.”

“Sure. We all will. Audra, too, if she decides to move.”

“It’s gotta bite, leaving a tenured position.”

Pete shook his head. “I can afford to be an adjunct. Curtis and Audra can’t.”

 

******

 

The next evening…

It was nearly 7:30 and starting to get dark when we neared home. We were laughing about something as we turned the corner onto 17th Street – and our laughter died immediately as we saw Elaine Pareja pacing in front of our gate.

Pete muttered, “Oh, for God’s sake.”

I hissed, “What does she want?”

We stopped in front of the gate. Pete said, “Elaine. What the hell are you doing here?”

“First, I want to apologize to Jamie. For what I said the other day.” She seemed to be supremely uncomfortable. “That was uncalled for and I’m sorry.”

In my experience, people said what they really thought in times of stress, but I didn’t argue with her. “Thank you.”

“Second -” She stopped and waved her hands in the air. “You can’t all quit.”

Pete said, “Sure we can.”

“But -”

Pete held up his hand. “Elaine. Did you seriously believe that any of us would sit meekly by and be bullied by you and whoever engineered your reinstatement? You said you wanted to drag the department through the mud. You’ve gotten your wish; you’ve wrecked the department. The only person to blame for your predicament is yourself.”

“But I have to teach five classes in both summer terms.”

“Tough shit. You should have considered the consequences of your actions.”

“You’re all tenured. You’ll have to start all over again.”

Pete said, “I’m going to teach online as an adjunct. The others are willing to start over. None of us want to work for an organization that can be blackmailed into subverting the promotion process and retaining a sub-competent and unethical faculty member.”

Elaine was getting mad again. “Are you accusing me of blackmail?”

“I’m saying that there’s no logical reason for the college to reinstate you. The only conclusion I can draw is that you’re holding something over someone in a high position. If that’s how the college wants to operate, that’s on them, but the rest of us have professional reputations to consider. We won’t change our minds.” Pete’s gaze dropped to Elaine’s waist. “Elaine. Are you wearing a gun?”

What the fuck? I froze, fearing that any movement on my part might produce a disastrous result. Elaine scowled. “So what? I have a permit.”

Pete’s tone was far more casual than mine would have been. “I’m feeling threatened by that, Elaine.”

“You’re feeling threatened?” She barked a laugh. “Too damn bad, pal. I’ve been put through hell because of the rest of you. I intend to be threatening. All of you are going to be very, very sorry.”

Pete raised an eyebrow. “It is not in your best interests to threaten us.”

“Pah!” She whirled away and stomped down the sidewalk.

We watched until she turned the corner onto 17th Street. I let out the breath I’d been holding. “Holy shit. Should we call the police?”

“Yes.” Pete reached into his pocket for his phone. “I’ll call that sergeant I talked to on Saturday.”

I unlocked the gate as Pete made the call, then locked it behind us and hurried into the house. Pete spoke with the police for a few minutes. When he hung up I said, “How did you spot the gun?”

“She kept waving her hands, which lifted the edge of her jacket. As cops we were trained to scan people we encountered for guns. I guess my training kicked in.”

“You were so calm.”

He grinned at me. “So were you.”

“Ha! Only outwardly. I was afraid that any movement would provoke her.”

“Same here. When someone’s aggressively disturbed, it’s best to handle them calmly.”

“Could you tell what kind of gun it was?”

“Looked like a .38 Special.”

I inhaled deeply and blew out another breath. “You’re calling those gate people tomorrow, right?”

“First thing in the morning.”

 

Check out the details and look for the upcoming release date: at: https://megperrybooks.wordpress.com/

Exclusive Excerpt from Good Boys (The Solomon Mysteries Book 1) by Keelan Ellis

Excerpt: 

As soon as they got in the car, Paul noticed how much Tim absolutely reeked of smoke. “Please tell me this isn’t going to be a thing. It’s gross, seriously.”

“You sound like Maura,” Tim said. “Get off my back.”

“Sorry,” Paul said.

A few minutes of silent driving passed before Tim said, “So you got that guy’s number, huh?”

Paul looked over at him. “Why do you care?”

“You’re my partner. Aren’t I supposed to care about that shit?”

Paul shrugged. “I don’t know. Are you? I never had a partner who did before.”

Tim nodded emphatically. “Yeah, I am supposed to. I’m sorry your partners before me were dicks.”

Paul sighed. “No, they weren’t. Not all of them. They just didn’t know what was okay to talk about. They weren’t completely unselfconscious like you. I do appreciate that though, Tim. I like how you are. I do.”

“Are you drunk?”

“On two beers?” Paul asked, closing his eyes. “Yeah, I got his number. I don’t know. He seemed a little, I don’t know, skittish or something.”

“You must’ve intimidated him with your beauty and charm, Paulie.”

“Duh,” Paul said, smiling out of the side window at the lit-up Harbor as they passed through it, heading east.

When they got back to the house, Tim went to shower and Paul changed into flannel pants and a T-shirt. He flipped through channels on the television and settle on CNN, half- watching news about a conflict in the Middle East for a few minutes before grabbing a beer from the fridge and a handful of crackers from the cabinet.

Tim came down, thankfully no longer smelling like an ashtray, and they watched TV until Colbert was over. Then Tim yawned and said he was heading upstairs.

“You coming?” he asked.

“Ah, no thanks, Tim. I’m good on the sofa.”

Tim frowned. “Seriously? Why are you making this weird? You can’t even fit on that sofa; your legs hang off by at least a foot.”

Paul shrugged. “I don’t want it to be weird, man. I don’t like sharing sleeping space with someone I’m not screwing, okay? I appreciate it though; for real, I do. Okay?”

Tim rolled his eyes. “Okay. Night, then.”

“Night.”

Paul spread the sheets over the couch and pulled a faded quilt from the hall closet. It wouldn’t be that bad. This was only for a week or so and then he’d…. He stopped thinking about it at that point, because he had no idea what he was going to do. He needed to find a place quickly.

He managed to fall asleep without too much trouble. He got in about two hours of sleep before waking up with a shooting pain in his hip. He tried stretching his legs over the arm of the sofa, which sort of helped, but as soon as he pulled them back in, the cramp returned. He rearranged himself at the other end of the sofa—which in reality was more like a glorified love seat—and lay down on his other side, but it didn’t help.

“Fuck,” he muttered, sitting up. He had to sleep. He had a case to solve, a goddamn red ball case, and he needed a full night of sleep. He huffed out a hard sigh, made a decision, and crept upstairs, taking his phone with him, just in case.

He slid into bed as carefully as possible, but apparently Tim was the soundest sleeper ever because he didn’t even stir. He was snoring softly through his little Irish nose, and Paul thought he was sort of adorable. But only in the way of a slightly funny-looking child.

Paul thought it would be hard to fall back asleep, but he must have gone right under, because the next thing he was aware of was the sudden weight of Tim’s arm across his chest, groping for something. Oh fuck, again? Is this happening? His mind raced with panic, but after a second or two, he became aware of a phone buzzing on the nightstand. Tim was reaching over him to answer it.

“Cullen,” he mumbled, still leaning on Paul’s chest. Paul pushed him off and he rolled onto his back. “No… oh. Shit, hang on.” Tim held the phone out. “Answered your phone,” he said, and rolled away as soon as Paul took it from him.

“Solomon,” he said, hoping to hell it wasn’t someone from work. That’s the last thing he needed.

“Hi. This is Jayden? You came and talked to me today?” Her voice was much more timid than the attitude-laced bravado from that afternoon.

“Yeah, sure Jayden. Of course. What’s up?” Paul sat up. She was calling in the middle of the night, so this couldn’t be nothing.

“Um. Hey, you are gay, huh? I thought you were messing with me.”

“What?” Paul half felt like he was dreaming. Why was she asking this?

“That guy who answered your—”

“Oh! Ha ha, no. I mean, yes, I am gay, but that was my partner.”

“Your—?” She sounded totally confused.

“I mean, my work partner.” Paul was aware that this probably didn’t clear up much of anything. “I’m not sleeping with him. I mean, I am, but only because I don’t have a place to— Look, forget it. Why did you call me?”

“I thought of something. I’m sorry to call so late. I guess it could have waited until tomorrow. But like, yeah, I should’ve waited. I’m sorry.”

Paul struggled to repress an impatient sigh. “That’s okay. I’m glad you thought to call. What’s up?”

“I couldn’t sleep,” she said, her voice catching and sliding almost into a whisper. “My brain wouldn’t shut down, you know? I kept going over and over the same shit, and then I remembered, and I couldn’t believe I hadn’t thought to tell you this before.”

“Okay,” Paul replied patiently, glad they were on the phone so he didn’t have to refrain from shaking her.

“Darren told me he felt guilty about this guy Javon was seeing. He said it was his fault they met. He said he could tell the guy was bad news and he never should have let Javon anywhere near him.”

Paul sat up, suddenly fully awake, and turned on the lamp. Tim groaned and pulled his pillow over his face, and Paul yanked it away. “It was his fault they met? Why?”

“I don’t know. It was someone Darren knew, but he wouldn’t give me a name. Like I told you, he was older and Darren was afraid I’d tell Miss Joanna.”

“Okay. Did he give you any specific reasons he thought the guy was bad news?”

“He said one time he called when Javon was with the guy, and the guy snatched the phone out of Javon’s hand and hung it up. He didn’t want him talking to other people, maybe, or to Darren specifically, even though they were just friends. There was probably more to it, but that’s all I know, I swear.”

Paul didn’t answer right away. He was thinking. Jimmy Pratt’s face had popped up behind his eyes the second Jayden had said the guy was someone Darren knew. He’d been a little overly hostile about gay people, but Paul had assumed it was cultural. That was probably classist of him. Jimmy might have another reason entirely to feel defensive about it.

“Detective Solomon?” Jayden said, still almost whispering.

“Yeah.” He rubbed at his face. “It’s good that you called, honey. Thank you. Hey, do you by any chance know a guy named Jimmy Pratt who works at Heinz Auto?”

“Ugh, yes,” she said, and Paul could swear he heard her roll her eyes. “He’s a dirtbag. When I first met him I thought he was cute, but he makes rude jokes and looks at me like I’m garbage. I try not to go in there if I can help it.”

“Okay. Thanks. Call if you think of anything.”

He hung up and looked at Tim. “That Pratt kid. I think we should be looking at him.”

Tim nodded. “Yeah, okay. It’s only three-thirty, though, man. Can I go back to sleep?”

“If you can sleep. I don’t know if I can now.”

“You should try, at least. I got a feeling tomorrow might be a long one.”

Paul nodded and turned off the light, then swung his legs back into bed. He fell asleep eventually, to the sound of his partner’s soft snoring.

 

Exclusive Excerpt: The Yellow Canary (The L.A. After Midnight Quartet) by Steve Neil Johnson

Exerpt:

December, 1956

    Chapter 1

He heard the music, wisps of sullen jazz that ached with loneliness, through the open back window as the unmarked patrol car cruised past the bar. No name above the bar door, just a flashing sign in the shape of a caged bird, the glow of neon reflecting yellow ripples in puddles on the gum-scarred sidewalk.

Jim Blake leaned back in the rear seat and told himself to relax.  All he had to do was wait for someone to ask him home.  How hard could it be?  He rested his right hand on the armrest, but his fingers couldn’t keep still.  He lit a Chesterfield and tossed the match out the window.

The Santa Anas had kicked up that evening, a restless wind scuttling leaves and litter in the gutter, an arid heat that blew through the window and left his face taut and his throat dry.

At the wheel Sergeant Hollings slowed to a stop down the block, nestling the Plymouth Savoy between two parked cars.  He glanced over his shoulder at Jim and beamed.

“You ready to get lucky?”  Hollings’s grin was wide.  His bristly dirty blond crew cut and chubby cheeks gave him a boyish look, despite being nearly forty.  But Blake had heard around the precinct house that the sergeant’s amiable manner belied a stubborn streak and an unerring sense of right and wrong.  It had kept him from involvement in the gambling, prostitution, bookmaking, and loan sharking payoff scandals that had almost brought the department down.  Hollings wasn’t one to ever back off, and that had gotten him in trouble with the brass and left a once promising career floundering in Vice.

Blake wasn’t going to let that happen to him.

Riding shotgun, Detective Ryan shifted in the front seat to look back at him.  He had a beer keg for a belly, so it wasn’t easy.  “Let’s look you over, you handsome devil.”  He raised one bushy eyebrow—thick as a mustache—and licked his lips.  “Mmmmm, they’re going to eat you up.” He was enjoying himself too much to even try to wipe the smirk off his face.

“The tie will get them,” Hollings commented, playing along and nodding approvingly.

“Yeah, they like bright colors.”

Blake felt his cheeks flush and smiled gamely; he had expected a hazing on his first night on the job, and it looked like he was going to get it.

Hollings gave him a wink.  “Go get ‘em, tiger.”

Climbing out of the back seat, Blake hesitated on the sidewalk, pulling on his sport jacket.  He was a big man, six foot two, with broad shoulders.  He had bought the jacket hurriedly this morning from a men’s store on Vermont, and it felt a little tight.  It was hard to find jackets off the rack wide enough to accommodate the span of his shoulders, and he hadn’t had time for alterations.

“Oh, a little piece of advice,” Ryan said, leaning out the window, his expression suddenly serious.

Blake bent toward the front passenger window expectantly.

“If you have to pee, hold your dick tight and your buns tighter.”

Shaking his head, Blake forced a grin, and turned down the street.  Hollings rolled down his window and stuck his head out.  “And if they ask you if you’re butch or fem, be sure to tell them you’re fem.”  He chortled loudly.

He made his way toward the bar.  The sidewalks were nearly empty tonight, but it was early.  A few figures, their voices scarcely carrying above the din of traffic, huddled at the corner, and across the way a man exited a tavern, quickly put a hat on his head obscuring his face, and strode rapidly away.

Blake remembered this strip from shore leave during the war, spanning Fifth Street from the downtown central library to the blocks east of Main, where dozens of bars had been plastered with warnings for service members, off-limits to military personnel.  The queer run.  The streets had been filled with people then, carousing from bar to bar, the all-night coffee shops packed, the parks alive with shifting shadows.

He wondered briefly if he’d made the right choice.  He’d also been offered a position in the abortion unit in the homicide division, but had turned it down.  Investigating and arresting the victims of botched back-alley abortions—mostly poor women, Negro and Mexican, who didn’t have the money to go to the legit physicians who clandestinely performed the procedure—left a sour taste in his mouth.              Maybe this wouldn’t be so bad.  And in a short while, he would be out of Vice, and he could forget the whole thing.  He’d had bad memories before.  The war.  The war, and other things.  No, he’d made the better choice.

The city had changed so much in the last decade that he hardly recognized it upon his arrival last week.  The sprawl spread straight to the ocean, and gas rationing and the tops of headlights painted black to protect the city from bombing had given way to a building boom and streets snarled with traffic.  The new super highways promised to change all that, and construction was underway all over the city.

Gone were the days when servicemen squeezed two to a bed in overcrowded Ys, and the sound of snoring young men would follow him down to the communal bathroom late at night, where a constant commotion of soldiers coming and going from the ports in Long Beach and San Pedro left the showers busy all night long.

After what had happened here, it was a wonder he could come back.  But ten years was a long time, and the city had called to him, first in his nightmares after the war ended and he had returned to Wisconsin.  And then, as a gnawing ache that wouldn’t let go until he gave his notice to the Milwaukee Police Department and hopped a train to the coast.  Yes, a short stint in Vice, and then he would be on to better things.  He’d be making $464 a month, one dollar and eighty-two cents per hour after taxes, social security and his contribution to the Widow’s Fund were taken out.

And all he had to do was sit at the bar and wait for someone to ask him home.

Though sodomy was a felony that could carry a life sentence in California, none of that would even come into play this evening, he had been assured during training.  Section 647 of the Penal Code prohibited soliciting a lewd act.  A misdemeanor.  A vag-lewd rap.

A sudden gust of dry wind lashed at his face, and he closed his eyes against grit flung upward from the sidewalk.  It had always been a dirty city, that hadn’t changed.  Bits of litter squabbled in the gutter, and the front page of a tattered tabloid darted up and pressed against his ankle, then was swept away.  He had seen the scandal sheet earlier that evening: an obviously doctored photo of a city councilman and a sultry blonde B-movie actress cropped in the shape of a heart below the masthead, and the blazing headline proclaiming the two had run off to a secret love nest in Mexico.  The whole city was talking about it.

As he approached the bar, his stomach didn’t feel right, and he drew deeper on his cigarette, as if that might soothe him, exhaling a plume of smoke through his nostrils.  He tossed the spent cigarette into the street and quickly lit another.

Blake hesitated at the door, gazing up at the neon sign above, momentarily mesmerized as the yellow glow played on his face.  He couldn’t tell if the bird was supposed to be flying, or just trying to escape his cage.

Music drifted through the closed door.  Now it was rock and roll.  He recognized the song by a singer who was raising a ruckus with young girls—the one who sounded like a Negro—and had been popping up on The Ed Sullivan Show.

He took one last drag—forgetting he had just lit the cigarette—flicked it in the gutter, and stepped inside.  It took his eyes a moment to adjust to the dimness of the bar, a lazy pall of smoke hanging in the air and softening the shadows.   The establishment was filled with well-dressed gentlemen, alone and chattering in groups; at first, it seemed like any other after-work spot, most of the men in suits and ties, a few more casual.  An ordinary layout: a pool table to the right, a brightly lit juke box opposite, and beyond the crowd of men, a liquor bar and stools at the far end.  A bit better heeled, perhaps, than the cop bars he’d frequented in Milwaukee.

But then something happened he wasn’t so used to.  He felt every eye in the bar drift his way, assessing him in a manner that was hard to define; a bold stare, then the gaze shifted away.  There had been a lot of that during the war, in commissaries, in the barracks, in the holds of aircraft carriers, in the open shower stalls at the Y.  Eyes that lingered, then drifted.

His face felt suddenly hot and the room overbearingly oppressive.  He found himself avoiding the glances of the men he passed and headed straight for the men’s room.  His training had led him to think this would be easy, but now that he was here, inside the bar, he felt something strangely like panic.  The can was in an alcove off the far end of the bar counter, next to a side door that led to the alley.

Blake was relieved to find himself alone in the bathroom.  He splashed water in his face at the sink and patted his cheeks on the revolving cloth towel from the wall dispenser.

He gazed into the small mirror.  A crack, snaking diagonally across the glass, seemed to separate his head from his body in a disturbing way.  He had never liked the way he looked—seeing too much of his father in his square jaw and wide-set eyes that seemed too dark to be blue—but others seemed to differ, and he had noticed people’s admiring glances since the days he played football in high school.  His hair was black and wavy—sometimes to the point of unruly—and an unrepentant curl often looped down on his forehead that no amount of Brylcreem could keep in place.

He was a lot older now than when he’d last been in L.A., nearly thirty.  He’d been a kid back then—with fake papers to get him into the Navy—but tall and broad and scrappy enough to convince his commanders he belonged there.

Jack Spencer had been young, too, just a few years older.  His terrible death still haunted him for so many reasons.  His death, and the long, hot train ride to Barstow, where Blake told lies to Jack’s parents, maybe the best thing he had ever done.  They had been kind people with hurt in their eyes, and he’d wondered at how different Jack’s childhood must have been from his, in this small desert town surrounded by brothers and sisters.

His own mother was barely a memory, the Ivory soap she smelled of long after she bathed him, the flowered cotton apron she wore in the kitchen when baking him brownies.  And after she was gone, only his father, always with a bottle; he’d seen him only once upon his return from the war.

When he went back into the barroom, nobody seemed to notice him.  He found an empty stool at the far end of the bar near the restroom and sat down.  He glanced around casually as he waited for the bartender, who stood at the other end of the counter mixing a drink, to fill his order.

Idly he wondered why his training officers had chosen this particular bar.  There were so many along this strip, like the Crown Jewel, with its neon crown above the front door and a strict coat and tie dress code.  Maxwell’s, near Pershing Square, with its unsavory crowd of self-pitying drunks, shrieking queens and young studs looking for an extra dollar and a place to sleep for the night.  And further west, the bars on La Brea, lots of them, and the Pink Poodle on Pico and the Red Raven on Melrose.  He’d heard about them all in training.  His eyes came to rest on a cage hung above the bar, fluttering with yellow canaries.

“I think it’s sad, keeping them like that, stuck in a smoky room.  They ought to be out, making things more beautiful in the world.”

Blake turned to the speaker, who was sitting on the next stool, noticing him for the first time.  He was slight, somewhere in his thirties, nattily dressed in a crisp business suit, his hat lying beside his drink on the bar.

“My name’s Jim.”  Blake offered a firm handshake.  The man’s eyes brightened and he looked heartbreakingly glad someone was talking to him.

“I’m Charlie.”

“Good to meet you, Charlie.  Come here often?”

“Not so much.  I’m not really a bar person, you see.  I work downtown, with the Department of Transportation.  Accounting.  How about you?”

“I’m new in town,” Blake drawled.  He remembered what he’d been taught.  Be friendly.  Engage them in conversation.  Gain their confidence.  Act like they’re the most interesting person in the world.  Wait for the pass.  Or any attempt at physical contact.  “Still looking for work… and a place to stay.”

Maybe he had gone too far too fast, because the man swallowed nervously, an expression of longing on his face, as if he wanted to ask Blake home but didn’t dare hope, and looked away shyly.

Suddenly he felt sorry for the guy, and wondered if there was someone else, anyone else, he could snare.  His eyes began to wander around the room, pausing on a figure who looked like none of the others, standing aloof, leaning in a dim corner by the juke box, the neck of a beer bottle gripped in one hand, his thumbs planted in the pockets of his Levi’s.  He had on a skin-tight black T-shirt that showed off his narrow waist and muscular chest.  His biceps were large and in the dimness Blake spotted a tattoo, something winged, like so many men got in the war.  The man was pointedly ignoring everyone in the bar; when his eyes rose and he surveyed his surroundings, it was as though he saw through them.  Trade, Blake thought.

A queeny young man who appeared underage kept passing by the man, looking him up and down in undisguised admiration.  The boy’s shirttails were tied in a knot at his abdomen like a calypso dancer, and his pastel lavender Capri pants could get him arrested on the street.

The man in the black T-shirt continued his pose of utter indifference, but that didn’t seem to deter the kid.  Through the fog of smoke and milling bar customers, the boy seemed to sense he was being watched and caught Blake looking his way.  He tilted his blond head, his eyes narrowing, his mouth forming a frown.

Blake turned away.  He didn’t want to arrest a kid.  Finally the bartender approached, the sleeves of his white dress shirt rolled up, and asked for his order.

“Draft beer would be fine.”

“You got it.”

The bartender nodded, looking him over in something akin to recognition, and went down the bar.  Just then, the kid in the calypso shirt leaned over the bar and spoke to the bartender in a hissing tone, glancing over at Blake.  There was a knowing smirk on the young man’s face, and Blake couldn’t be sure, but he thought he heard the words, “Hollywood Reject.”

The bartender didn’t seem to need a moment to think about what he’d been told; he went directly to a high shelf behind the bar, rather ceremoniously picked up a glass, and filled it from a tap and set it on the counter before Blake.             Blake couldn’t be sure, but he thought a murmur arose from the crowd behind him.  To Charlie, the bartender said, rather pointedly, “Can I refresh your drink?” He gazed down at the slight man and subtly—so subtly Blake wouldn’t have noticed if he wasn’t alert—shook his head at him, warning.

Charlie swallowed and blinked, and looked over at Blake, his eyes suddenly filled with anxiety.

“Oh,” he said, in almost a whisper.

Blake peered down at the dry glass in front of him and realized he had been made.  Glancing down the bar, he saw all the other glasses were dewy with condensation, taken from a refrigerated box under the bar.

The music on the juke box had stopped and the room was strangely quiet.  He looked around and was struck by the realization that everyone in the bar was watching him.  Not directly, but out of the corners of their eyes.  Waiting.  He had seen that look before, like cattle in a slaughterhouse.  Several men broke from their friends and headed for the front door, putting their hats on before they got outside.

Charlie swiveled toward him, as if to get off his stool, panic written on his face.  He lost his balance and his knee touched Blake’s and his right palm landed briefly on Blake’s shoulder.

It was enough.

Blake slid his badge and identification onto the bar beside his glass.  “You’re under arrest,” he announced.  “I want you to get up quietly and follow me.  Do you understand?”

Charlie nodded, but he couldn’t seem to stand on his own, and Blake had to grip his arm with both hands to keep him from collapsing.

The bar patrons stared at them, openly now, and there was something in their gaze Blake hadn’t seen before, and it wasn’t the look of cattle.  Suddenly he felt unsafe.  The front door appeared way too far to him and the path too crowded, so Blake pulled Charlie past the restroom and to the side door.

The door slammed shut behind them, and when nobody followed, the sense of alarm Blake had felt just moments before quickly dissipated.  A stale wind blew down the dark cobblestone alley lined with dumpsters overflowing with garbage.  It brought a fetid smell to his nostrils and he could feel slick grease on the stones under his feet.  One direction led to utter darkness, the other, the lights and traffic of Fifth Street a dozen or so yards away.  A scattering of stars rose overhead.

Charlie collapsed to his knees, clinging to Blake’s legs.  “Please,” he begged.  “Please don’t do this.”  He looked up pleadingly.

“It’s just a vag-lewd charge,” Blake said gruffly.  “You pay the fine and you forget it.”

“I’ll lose my job,” he whimpered.  “I’ll lose everything.”

Blake looked toward Fifth helplessly and wished he could just get out of this stinking alley.

The grip of Charlie’s hands tightened on his slacks.  “I’ll have to register for the rest of my life.  I won’t be able to get another job.”

“Not if you plead.” He wasn’t actually sure of that, but he felt a strange need to reassure this slight little man who had looked at him with such longing minutes before.

“Please,” Charlie whispered.  He looked up at Blake and light from Fifth Street glinted on his darkened face, catching the tears welling in his eyes.

Blake was getting annoyed now.  His training officers would be wondering what was taking him so long, and that sick feeling in his stomach had come back.  “Look,” he said, shaking his head, “it’s just the way things are.”

Then Charlie’s entire body began to shake.  Blake had seen grown men cry before, in the war, in battle, but not like this.  His whole body seemed to convulse as he clung to Blake’s legs, and a deep sound came from his throat, an eerie wail that floated in the darkness all around them.

“Aw, c’mon.  Get up.”

Charlie shook his head, silent now, cowering at his feet.

“You knew what you were doing, coming here.”

“I’ll never come back here again.  I promise.”

Blake sighed.  His mouth was dry and more than anything he needed a cigarette.  Reaching into his jacket pocket, he found his Chesterfield pack and lit up.  He tossed the match on the ground.

He looked to the far end of the alley, lost in darkness, a darkness pure and deep.  He could let him go, he thought.  Just let him walk into the night.  No one would know.  Tell Sergeant Hollings and Detective Ryan there had been no nibbles tonight.  Try as he might, he couldn’t get any of the fruits to make a pass.  He wasn’t cut out for it.  He must not have whatever they were looking for.  Then he could just up and quit this job and forget the whole thing, forget the assessing eyes that lingered, the smoke hanging low, the hot oppressiveness of the bar, forget that ache that had brought him back here in the first place.  Just hop the next train to Wisconsin and crawl on his knees to get his old job back.

He sighed again, exhaling a plume of smoke.

Charlie looked up at him hopefully.  His voice croaked.  “Please?”

Then Blake heard something in the opposite direction, perhaps the backfire of an engine, and he turned his head and saw the unmarked Plymouth crawling down Fifth.  It stopped there, at the entrance to the alley, and through the windshield he could see Hollings and Ryan gazing at them and knew his decision had already been made for him.

 

 

 

 

Chapter 2

 

 

Paul Winters loved their nights out with the girls.

He grinned and winked at David across the table in the Roman Room of the Biltmore Hotel.  David took a sip of wine and grinned back at him.  Earlier that evening they had picked up Jeannie and Pat, Jeannie sitting across from him in the front seat of his Ford, Pat with David in the back, just like a real double date.  They had joined a dozen of their crowd at a long table under wrought iron chandeliers in the Pompeii-inspired sunken dining room and to all intents and purposes they appeared to be a group of married couples sitting side-by-side enjoying a night on the town.

After a toast to Paul for winning another high-profile case and sending a Sunset Strip gangster to life in prison for the killing of a mobster rival, the conversation turned to the other headline everybody was talking about.  City Councilman Bullock had run off with a starlet named Victoria Lynn and they were reportedly holed up in a love nest in Tijuana.

Paul had seen her in supporting roles in several films—she made at least three a year—and remembered her as a rather stiff blonde beauty.  Jeannie, who worked as a make-up artist at Universal and knew all the Hollywood gossip, was holding court.

“It’s all a big lie,” she announced breathlessly.  She had a shiny turned-up little nose, bouncy auburn hair, and a petite frame.  Paul had brought her as his date for last year’s Christmas party at the D.A.’s Office, and they’d had a big laugh together when everybody said what a great couple they were.  “None of it even happened.  It couldn’t have happened.”

Parker Huston, two seats down, leaned his chubby torso forward in his seat, his cheeks red from a bit too much to drink, and picked up a steak knife as if readying himself for battle.  He rarely suffered being wrong about anything regarding movies or the film industry’s social scene.  The fact that he worked as a librarian and had no connections whatsoever in Hollywood or to movie stars was beside the point.  “Now, dear, how is that possible?  It was in Confidential, and everybody knows that particular publication has spies everywhere and pays for information.”

Pat suddenly came to attention.  Nobody—especially Parker—was going to question her girlfriend’s credentials on anything Hollywood.  Or maybe she was just wrangling for a fight because her high heels fit too tightly.  She had looked so miserable in full make-up, a frilly dress and a stole that evening, instead of the jeans and checkered shirt she usually wore for her landscaping business, that Paul felt sorry for her.  Even her short hair, usually straight and the color of straw, had a limp wave in it.  Everybody had been instructed to make a big fuss about how good she looked, but Paul just saw a boy forced into drag.

David had known Jeannie for quite a while through his political activities and a homophile magazine the two volunteered at, but the girls had become close to them only after a frantic call in the night from Jeannie that Pat had been arrested for masquerading.  Paul had quietly advised her attorney that the late nineteenth-century law against wearing the apparel of the opposite sex had been ruled unconstitutional in 1950—despite the fact that vice officers continued to use the statute to arrest men and women whose clothing violated gender norms.  Pat had been released the next day.

“Go ahead,” Pat urged, eyes shining, “Tell them.  Tell them about Victoria Lynn.”

Jeannie glanced around at the surrounding tables to make sure no one was listening, then bent low in a conspiratorial whisper.  “She’s a Lizabeth Scott, if you know what I mean.”

That caused a buzz around the table, and Paul crooked his head at David quizzically.

In response, David grinned and cupped his hand to the side of his cheek and mouthed the word dyke.

Then Paul remembered.  A nasty exposé in Confidential the year before had sent Scott’s career into freefall.  According to the tabloid, her name and number had been found in the top secret address book of a madam who provided a stable of gorgeous blondes to male—and female—stars.

“That doesn’t surprise me,” Parker put in, clearly trying to wrestle back control of the conversation.  “The most glamorous stars are.  Dietrich, Hepburn, Garbo…”

“You think everybody in Hollywood is,” David said.

“I think everybody is, because…” Parker replied, refilling his glass, “everybody is.”

“Victoria Lynn is a goddess” Pat announced.  “I love that woman!  And she’s one of us.”

“Don’t get her started on Victoria Lynn or we’ll be here all night,” Jeannie warned.  Her lower lip pouted.  “I’m totally jealous.”  But Paul noticed the two women were playing footsy all the while under the table.

The maitre d’ brought a note to David, who read it silently, frowned, glanced up at Paul, squinted his eyes meaningfully, then rose and excused himself.  Paul watched as David made his way across the restaurant, past the standing filigreed candelabra, and into the main lobby.  He wondered what he was going to do about David.  He was so adorable, and they had such a great time together, but he was way too young for the deputy district attorney.  Just out of college, and the seven year age difference was a huge gap in maturity and sensibility.  Despite David’s rather conservative Jewish upbringing, he could be impulsive—and indiscreet—and that was dangerous in a lot of ways.  And the political stuff… just this evening on their way to pick up the girls he’d carped about how wrong it was that they had to pretend to be Normals—as David called them—in order to be welcomed in a group in restaurants and nightclubs.

“But you love going out with Jeannie and Pat!” Paul had pointed out.

“That’s not the point!” David had groaned.

Paul took a Marlboro pack from his pocket, lit up, and laid the red-and-white box beside his wine glass.

Pat began to sing melodiously, “You get a lot to like, filter, flavor, flip-top box!” mimicking the commercials on TV.

Parker added his two cents worth, only after making sure the waiter was beyond hearing range. “Oh, my, my.  You do know, Mr. Marlboro Man, Mr. Paragon of Masculinity, Mr. Tall-Dark-and-Handsome, Mr. Future District Attorney, back in the twenties that particular cigarette was originally marketed to women… and nelly queens.  The slogan back then was ‘Mild as May!’”

“It’s poison,” Jeannie said disgustedly.  “Did you read that article in Reader’s Digest?”

“That’s what the filter’s for,” Paul countered, grinning good-naturedly, and tapping an ash into a glass tray at the center of the table.  “It’s to keep all that muck from going into your lungs.”

Parker’s eyebrows rose theatrically.  “You do realize that filter used to have a red band printed around it… to hide lipstick stains?”

“Only you would remember that,” Paul said.  “From experience, no doubt.”

“I know what I know, and once a cigarette for nelly queens, always a cigarette for nelly queens, no matter the packaging.”

Paul noticed David had returned to the dining room, but was hesitating by the door, signaling to him, and he knew by the expression on his face that something was wrong.  Here we go again, he thought.

He put his cigarette pack back in his jacket pocket, and said, “Excuse me.”

“If you’re planning a jaunt across the street to Pershing Square, count me in!” Parker quipped, taking a sip of wine.

Paul crossed the room quickly and found David in a state of agitation.  He’d seen him like this before, and knew what was to come.  He couldn’t help but be a little annoyed.

“I got a message from Billy,” David began excitedly.  “I think it sat at the front desk for about an hour because they weren’t sure where I was seated.  A fellow was arrested at a bar downtown tonight and taken to Lincoln Heights.  I just called the jail…”

Paul glanced at his watch wearily.  It was getting late and it had been a long exhausting day.  All he really wanted to do was go home and climb into bed with David.  He felt that spike of resentment he got every time his boyfriend pressured him to get involved in these situations.  He couldn’t help everybody.  It didn’t look good at the D.A.’s Office: so far nobody had asked any questions, but he never knew when his interference might get noticed and come back to haunt him.  And, anyway, he had only so much influence in cases like this.  “What does he want?  Legal advice?”

“No,” David said.  “He’s dead.”

Purchase the series’ first three novels here: 

https://www.amazon.com/L-AFTER-MIDNIG...

 

 

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