Page 30

Indy

It was an odd time to go bowling.

Loren suggested it, but he wasn’t even enjoying himself, sitting by the ball return wearing loaner shoes that made his feet look comically large.

While he mourned his loss of dignity, Sully was enthused, or maybe relieved, to be somewhere that wasn’t her apartment or the wrecked gallery.

It had only been two days, and the police had cleared the place for insurance adjusters and contractors to make bids for repairs.

She and Whitney were past the point of subtlety.

They sat side by side with their hands clasped in Sully’s lap.

The blond Brit reminded me of Loren more and more.

A little bit stiff, a little bit stuffy, but he looked at Sully with shades of the same quiet devotion Loren showed me every day.

At the end of our lane, Dottie held a swirled red ball with near professional poise.

She had bragged on the ride over that she used to bowl in a league.

Between that, her motorcycle hobby, and her penchant for styling her hair in pin curls, she was quickly becoming one of the most interesting people I knew.

With flawless form, she threw the ball down the lane where it crashed into the pins, leaving only two standing.

Gunnar clapped delightedly, but Dottie scowled.

“A little rusty,” she grumbled while squinting at the overhead television displaying the scoreboard.

The bowling alley wasn’t crowded on a weeknight.

The occasional clatter of balls and pins colliding combined with the faint background noise of people chatting and music coming from the arcade.

Ours was the largest group in the place, and they put us against the far wall.

Our semicircle of chairs set in a recess in the floor surrounding a table covered in pizza boxes and pitchers of beer.

The beer tasted like piss water, but Gunnar was guzzling it like a frat boy.

Beside him, Abigail sipped daintily from one of the cheap plastic cups, frowning at the flavor but too polite to complain.

I’d turned my own drink into more of a game than a beverage, having stuck a straw in it to blow an endless stream of bubbles.

The yellow liquid rose nearer the lip of the cup, shimmering and making sputtering sounds as the bubbles swelled and popped.

When a pair of hands grabbed my waist and pulled me backward, I sucked in a surprised breath, almost inhaling some of the beer.

My ass landed on a familiar lap, and I swiveled around to pin Loren with a grin.

“You’d have been pissed if I spilled this on you.” I waved my cup.

“It stinks.”

He huffed and snaked his arms around my waist, pulling me tightly against him.

Happy chills snuck up my spine as he rested his chin on my shoulder so we could watch as Dottie threw her second ball.

It was novel to get this kind of attention in public.

I’d made a practice of reminding Loren that he didn’t need to be quite so prudish with his affections, but I tried to respect his boundaries.

Boundaries I was certainly pushing now by wiggling my hips across his crotch, earning a pinch on my bare midriff.

“Just getting comfy!” I protested while stifling a giggle.

Loren puffed another breath, blowing warm air past my ear, and I nuzzled my head against his.

Dottie picked up the spare, and we all cheered.

Then Sully passed her beer cup to Whitney before getting up to take her turn.

Tensions were lower than ever, and Loren wasn’t dishing out nearly as many venomous glares.

They said nothing brought people together like a common enemy, and it seemed that had happened here.

It was good. We’d never had many friends.

None, really, besides Sully, and she was new.

Living so long meant leaving a lot of things behind.

People, places… though somehow it was always Brooklyn.

Always Loren and me.

I rubbed my temple against his again, then turned and kissed his cheek.

Still pushing my luck, but he didn’t stop me.

Despite the attack on the Urban Easel, and despite me lacking the powers that could turn the tide in our favor, I felt oddly hopeful.

I’d been clean for thirteen days and counting.

They didn’t give pins for that, but I’d get there.

The number sixty from Hopeful Horizons remained affixed to my duffel bag in the closet at home.

I might put the damn thing on my shirt when I reached that milestone again.

Throw a little party for myself.

Hell, I could have a party with everyone.

A pack of hellhounds and a witch made for interesting company, but I wouldn’t trade any of them.

Sully wasn’t great at bowling.

Laughably bad, in fact, which was only okay because we were laughing with her, not at her.

“I think I need bumpers,” she muttered while her second ball rolled slowly down the gutter.

Mahogany blush stained her cheeks as she wiped her palms on her skirt.

“I’m gonna ask them to put them on my profile. Anyone else?”

Abigail raised her hand timidly, and Sully gave her a thumbs up.

“Got you, girl. Be right back.”

She headed toward the front desk while Loren’s name came up next on the roster.

I hopped up so he could retrieve the glittery blue ball waiting in the return, then I settled into his empty seat.

It made me snicker to see my typically graceful partner tiptoe across the waxed floor as if he expected the shoes to slide out from under him like skates on ice.

I waited until he’d taken his position at the end of our lane to let out a whoop and whistle.

“Knock ‘em dead, hot stuff!”

I could practically see his hackles rise, and I snorted another laugh.

Loren rolled his shoulders, then sent the bowling ball spinning down the lane. Awkward as he’d been walking up there and as carefully as he stood now, he had a nice form. Or maybe just a nice body with legs and arms that felt better than nice when they wrapped around me…

“You’re good for him.

” Whitney’s statement brought my thoughts to a skidding stop.

I glanced over to find him holding Sully’s drink and peering into it.

Probably trying to decide if the stuff was potable.

“You mind telling him that when he gets back?” I jerked my thumb toward where Loren was waiting by the ball return.

“Maybe I’ll be in less trouble for catcalling him.”

Whitney raised his shoulder.

“I don’t think he minds it all that much. Seems he’s more a bother to himself than anything. In contrast, you’re probably quite tolerable.”

“ Tolerable .” My nose crinkled.

“That’s… a compliment I think?”

“It is.”

Loren took his ball from the return and padded slowly to the end of the lane.

He was getting his feet set when Dottie jumped up and darted to his side.

I couldn’t make out their conversation, but the way she flicked her hands at him and bumped the side of her shoe into his, forcibly moving him into a different stance, it seemed the bowling queen had tips to share.

Loren hugged his ball almost defensively as Dottie adjusted his pose.

While she fussed, he glanced back at me, looking exasperated.

I giggled.

With a parting pat on the back, Dottie returned to her seat, and I consulted Whitney again.

“Well, thanks,” I told him.

“Sully seems to find you tolerable.” I wrapped my lips around my straw and blew fresh bubbles into my beer while Whitney smiled.

“She’s a good woman.”

Another laugh escaped me in a hiccup.

“You are effusive tonight,” I teased through a grin.

“What’s the occasion?”

Whitney rested Sully’s drink on his knee as he hunched forward.

His gaze cut aside, green eyes intense in the shadow of his brow.

“Indy, I need to tell you something. I feel like… I want to apologize.”

“What for?”

He sniffed a breath, growing even more serious as he replied, “When I was alive, when I was a soldier, there was a man in my platoon who was… like you. And Loren.”

Loren and I were more different than alike, but I caught his meaning.

“You mean gay?”

Whitney dropped his gaze.

“It was an… aberrant behavior. At least, I thought it was at the time. I reported him for it.”

The sound of bowling pins scattering tempted me to look away, but Whitney’s face was so riddled with remorse that it held my focus.

“What happened to him?” I asked.

Knowing more of my own history had also informed me of the ways of the world throughout time.

I was aware enough of the social climate during the Revolutionary War, Whitney’s era, to guess the answer to my question before Whitney gave it.

“He was court-martialed,” he replied.

“Convicted.”

“And killed.”

I thought he would nod.

That was what Loren did when it was too hard to speak, and I could tell this was hard for Whitney to admit out loud.

“Yes,” he said.

I chewed on my lip, confused by the feelings that crashed together and made my chest ache.

Loren and I had lived during difficult times, keeping our relationship under wraps and using labels like “good friends” or “roommates” to avoid scrutiny.

It was hard, and it hurt, but overall, we’d been fortunate.

We survived it. Others weren’t as lucky.

“Why did you need to tell me that?” I asked, almost wishing he hadn’t.

Whitney sighed. “Because it was wrong. I was wrong to do it and wrong about him. And I’m sorry.”

Last I checked, the bowling alley wasn’t a confessional, and I was no kind of priest. I wasn’t qualified to forgive crimes committed against another man, but it felt important to accept Whitney’s apology anyway, so I nodded.

Loren returned, and he must have sensed something was off because he paused before where I sat and split a glance between Whitney and me.

My smile wavered as I stood and set my beer on the low table beside an open pizza box.

I was still stooped when Loren grabbed me and hefted me into the air.

His arms cinched around my waist as he threw me over his shoulder with my ass up and my legs kicking.

“Lore!” I screeched through a fit of laughter.

He spun around while I grabbed fistfuls of his sweater.

I knew he would never drop me, but the way the room inverted and spun made me dizzy enough that I needed to hold onto something.

“You maniac!” I shouted, breathlessly giggling.

“Put me down!”

He slid me down his chest until I was slowly righted but still pressed against him in a way that made my entire body heat.

My pants were way too tight to hide a boner, so I hurried to wiggle free of him before things got awkward.

Before my feet touched the ground, Loren’s grip tightened.

It became quickly uncomfortable as his forearm sank into my middle and drove out a grunt.

“Baby?” I patted his shoulder like a wrestler tapping out of a fight.

“Not sure you know your own strength…”

He did know, though, and he was always careful.

Always . When his other hand came up and cradled my head, practically crushing it against his pec, I got worried.

“Loren?”

I couldn’t see his face and couldn’t move anything besides my legs, but I glimpsed Whitney in the corner of my vision.

He lurched to his feet, causing Abigail, Dottie, and Gunnar to follow suit.

In a flash, every one of the hounds reached into the open air, pulling weapons from some pocket in space or time.

It was the coolest shit I’d ever seen, then suddenly the most terrifying as I dangled in Loren’s embrace, bloodless and trembling.

“What’s wrong?” I croaked.

Then, I heard the growls.