Page 36 of Fire and Smoke (Nothing Special #9)

Ramon Vasquez

Vasquez pressed his thumb to the screen and stopped the recording.

He curled his lips slowly.

“Son of a bitch,” he whispered.

What in the hell did I just watch?

It was Lieutenant Leonidis Day. Atlanta’s ass-kissing, brown-nosing, picture-perfect police officer. The moral compass of the entire goddamn division.

The footage was shaky—Vasquez had zoomed in from across the street with his outdated phone—but he’d caught enough.

A man had stepped out of a town car as if he was arriving at the Met Gala, not a late-night hookup. Fancy getup, bald head gleaming, beard trimmed as if he had a full-time stylist.

And Day? Day had melted into the guy’s arms like hot wax.

They’d stood there a long time, hugging, whispering. Then the guy guided him into the car like a gentleman escorting his lover home after a night of discreet luxury.

Vasquez leaned back in the driver’s seat and let out a low chuckle.

“You dirty bastard.”

So that was who Day really was, huh?

All that self-righteous posturing, loyalty and unyielding love-for-my-man, was all bullshit, because there he was, sneaking off with a man who belonged on a cologne billboard.

Vasquez laughed, louder, low and ugly.

He sipped his coffee—that’d never tasted so good—marveling at his good fortune.

He hadn’t been planning to go to Havens, he usually hit the shitty gas station for his nightcap brew. But something told him to treat himself, so he did, and hit the damn jackpot.

He rewound the video.

No kissing on the lips, or hands on the ass. But come on.

A pickup off a dark corner in a chauffeured tinted vehicle. A long, emotional hug. A whispered something against the cheek before they disappeared inside and rode off.

Probably to fuck on some silk sheets at the Four Seasons.

Vasquez sat there for a long moment, the weight of his discovery bouncing around in his head like a new toy.

This…this was leverage. This could shatter Godfrey.

He could drop the footage in an anonymous email to the entire department. Let it bleed out like a good scandal deserved. Wipe that cocky smile right off Day’s face and crack the foundation of God’s world.

But…not yet. This moment needed to matter.

He started his car, tossed the phone onto the seat beside him, and headed back to the precinct with delight thrumming in his blood.

The narcotic’s task force office was empty. Most of the team must have been off-duty or still at Briarcliff doing cleanup from the warrant clusterfuck.

But Godfrey was in there. Alone.

Vasquez stared and plotted like a stalker from behind a half-wall partition.

The big man sat slouched in his chair as if the weight of a city was pressing down on him. He had his elbows on his knees, head buried in his hands, papers and files spread across his desk like a crime scene.

Vasquez tilted his head, mouth twitching in smug amusement.

Poor bastard.

Working himself to the bone while his husband was in the arms of another man.

I hope you’re ready for that desk to keep you warm at night, Lieutenant.

Vasquez tucked his phone back in his pocket.

Not yet. I’m gonna let this fester. I want it to really sting when I finally bite his ass back.

The breakroom lights were low, and he didn’t bother to turn them up. He made a beeline toward the vending machine when he heard him.

A silken voice, as smooth as bourbon going down slow stopped him in his tracks.

“You’re just in time.”

Joshi… Kiran .

All Vasquez could do was stare.

Joshi wore fitted black slacks, and a navy-blue Henley with the sleeves pushed up, showing off his toned forearms.

Two jade, beaded bracelets were on his left wrist and a graphite smartwatch clasped around the right one.

His dark curls were loose, brushing the tops of his cheeks. There was a softness to him tonight, something tender but still well put-together.

It was as if he didn’t have to work to be handsome. It just happened to him. Confidence without arrogance.

He smiled in his direction—bright, real, and inviting—making Vasquez glance over his shoulder.

“Yeah.” Joshi chuckled. “I’m talking to you, Ramon.”

Fuck, fuck, fuck.

His name leaving those full lips shouldn’t sound so good.

Joshi had a voice as sexy as a midnight whisper and accented as if he’d grown up somewhere coastal and warm.

“I was hoping you’d show. I made too much food again.”

Vasquez cocked his head like a confused puppy.

“I’m not about to eat all this alone while you eat an assembly line-made sandwich,” he said, reaching into his bag and pulling out several plastic containers.

“The ham and cheese tastes better than it looks.”

Joshi smiled again. “But I’m sure it won’t taste better than this.”

The scent hit him right in the gut—beef, garlic, and something faintly sweet that made his stomach growl.

“It, um…it does smell pretty good,” Vasquez murmured.

“Then sit. Take a load off.”

He hesitated because this felt like a trap. It had to be.

But Joshi held his eye contact as he waited for him to sit down.

So he did.

Joshi slid his portion towards him and they both began eating in silence.

Vasquez enjoyed the quiet company, it meant he could focus on the simple miracle of having a real meal, not one he pulled through a drive-thru window or dropped into a tray by a vending machine claw.

It was hot, seasoned, made by Joshi’s own hands, and Vasquez savored it from the first bite.

He didn’t realize how fast he’d been eating until the fork scraped the bottom.

He glanced up and his face heated fiercely, unsure how long Joshi had been watching him damn near eat the container as well.

“So, how’s your evening going?”

He finished chewing, then grinned like a wolf who’d caught the scent of blood. “I caught a married guy cheating on his husband tonight.”

Joshi frowned. “That’s too bad. I’m sure there’s no pain that hurts like that.”

“Perhaps. It’s a real high-profile officer too. If I were a petty man—”

“Which you are not , right?” Joshi cut in, a bit of edge to his tone.

Vasquez shrugged.

Joshi cocked his head. “So what’re you gonna do?”

He thought about for a few seconds before he answered, “I was thinking about leaking it. Maybe show those guys what it feels like to be humiliated.”

Joshi narrowed his sharp eyes before he set his fork down.

“You ever think maybe they don’t need to be humiliated?” Joshi asked. “That maybe the couple is already hurting enough. And just maybe the person who tells them should be…I don’t know, compassionate?”

Vasquez opened his mouth, but Joshi wasn’t finished.

“I like a man who’s empathetic. One who doesn’t need to tear someone else down to feel better himself. Pettiness and cruelty are very unattractive qualities to me.”

Joshi hadn’t said it spitefully, and it didn’t sound like a reprimand. Just his truth, and the words landed harder than anything God or his men had ever said to him, because it came from someone he didn’t want to hate him.

They sat in silence for a while as Vasquez digested his food and what he’d just heard.

Then Joshi’s smile was back. “I’m glad you liked the food.”

“Yeah,” Vasquez said, voice low and thoughtful. “Thank you. It was really good.”

“Maybe next time I’ll cook for you at my place.”

His stomach dropped. There was no way he heard that right.

“What’d you say?”

Joshi leaned in, and it was as though the breakroom shrank into the only place in the world.

Vasquez didn’t move. He couldn’t if he’d wanted to.

Joshi’s gaze traveled across his face, not hungrily, but with a kind of intrigued curiosity. A study. As if he were trying to see beneath his surface. Beyond the attitude, the ego, the wall of armor he’d lived behind for so long he wasn’t sure where it ended and he began.

Joshi lifted his hand, slow and deliberate, as though he was about to handle something fragile. His fingers hovered, pausing, waiting—

Then he touched him.

Vasquez flinched—but didn’t jerk away.

Knuckles brushed the stubble of his jaw, a soft drag of skin against rough skin. Unhurried. Gentle. Almost reverent.

His breath caught in his throat as his eyelids slid closed, instinct taking over before his pride could stop it.

He soaked up the contact like scorched earth under rain.

No one touched him like that. No one touched him period.

For a moment, Joshi didn’t move.

His hand lingered there, his body still leaned in close enough that Vasquez could smell the faint traces of sandalwood near his throat and cardamom on his breath. Could feel the heat radiating from him.

Something loosened inside Vasquez’s chest, something old and brittle.

He parted his lips, breath hitching.

He wondered for a moment if he was being played?

No...not Kiran. He seemed too mature for messy bullshit.

Joshi ghosted his thumb along the edge of his jaw. Enough to make Vasquez’s pulse skip as if he’d forgotten these kinds of feelings.

He wanted to lean forward. To collapse into the touch. But fear and rustiness kept him rooted in place.

He clenched his fist—unsure what to do with his hands—until his knuckles whitened.

Joshi inched closer until their lips were inches apart.

Intense fear of being exposed and seen for who he really was froze him in place.

Joshi’s voice was low and intimate, wrapped around the edge of a whisper.

“Think about it.”

It was only three little words. But they packed a big punch.

Joshi held his gaze for a beat longer. Then he smiled. Not cocky, not haughty, but soft and a little sad. As if he knew just how deep his touch had reached.

Joshi straightened, then packed his things into his canvas bag and left.

He sat suspended in time with his mouth open, heart thudding until his phone buzzed in his pocket.

He ignored it.

Then it rang.

“Yeah?” he answered in a hoarse voice.

“Are you still on fuckin’ break?” his sergeant barked. “Get your ass to your post, now!”

Click.

Still in shock, he didn’t move for another twenty minutes.