Chapter Seventeen
(11:22 a.m.)
Ash awoke to the scent of sweat, sex, and someone else’s cologne.
The room was dim, curtains drawn, the bed crammed with the heat of three bodies marinated overnight in lust. Pale light filtered through a crack in the blinds, faint as a bruised whisper, casting a gray stripe across the rumpled bed. On his left, Griffin the bartender breathed in soft, rhythmic exhales, mouth parted, dark lashes twitching in sleep. On his right, Hank the bouncer lay sprawled like a felled statue, hand still resting against Ash’s ass.
Ash smiled. For a moment, he just lay there, letting the warmth cling to him, soaking in the faded traces of last night’s fervor and reverence. His skin still buzzed with the residue of it. He remembered the way it had felt being caught between them, every nerve lit up like a streetlamp short-circuiting—Griffin in front, thrusting rough and breathless, while Hank took him from behind with a steady, punishing pace that had turned him inside out. Later, they switched positions and fucked him together before passing out.
Ash had loved every second of it. But it was time to go now.
He peeled himself away with slow, practiced care, untangling arms, legs, sheets. The mattress sighed as he rose. Neither guy stirred. They’d stay under for hours yet after the things they’d done. He’d be long gone when they woke.
Ash went naked to the bathroom, cock bouncing soft and spent, and relieved himself with a satisfied sigh. A twist toward the sink, a splash of cold water over his face. Fingers combedthrough a thatch of unruly curls, trying to tame the dark chaos sticking in every direction. His reflection stared back from the mottled mirror, lips red and swollen, skin lustrous, porcelain-clean. He looked debauched. Ravished. Flawless.
Barefoot, he padded to the living room where his clothes lay in disarray, scattered as petals shed in haste. He rummaged in his jacket pockets and found the toothbrush he always carried for occasions like this, brushing his teeth over the kitchen sink. His body thrummed. Recharged. Reawakened. The last trace of the slammer ache had bled from his bones, replaced by that heady, electric hum that only a night of wild sex could bring.
Clothes were gathered like clues from a crime scene: boots by the radiator, jeans slung over a cracked vinyl chair, shirt flung carelessly across the sofa. He dressed fast, fabric whispering over firm muscles, as much armor as it was aesthetic.
Walking to the bedroom doorway, his gaze drifted to the bed, to two bodies splayed in sated entropy. Griff murmured something inaudible, lips brushing against the pillow. Hank turned over, a heavy, satisfied grunt echoing low in his chest. Ash watched them a beat longer, a smug and golden feeling twisting behind his ribs. With a small, crooked smile, he turned and crossed the hardwood floor in silence.
His phone rested on the counter, black glass blank as a blind eye. A message from Tess waited, asking if he was coming to work tonight. He replied with a thumbs-up emoji, slipped the phone into his pocket, and unlocked the front door without a backward glance. Halfway down the narrow flight of stairs, he lit a cigarette and began to hum, a bluesy tune that curled from his mouth on smoke, as if born from it.
Outside, the world was waiting. Duskhaven stretched in all directions under a sky the color of spent bullets, slick with yesterday’s sins and today’s rain. Fog clung to the streets like regret or a bad habit. The air tasted of rust and smog, of wetstone and mud. Somewhere in the distance, a siren wailed like a warning meant only for him. Or a reminder of a man tough and monumental, the man who managed to resist him.
No. He wouldn’t think abouthim.
His stomach growled as he dragged on his cigarette, last night’s excesses leaving him famished. He figured he’d chase down some bacon and eggs somewhere on the way, maybe coffee hot and thick enough to strip paint.
Across the street, his bike crouched in the murk. Ash put on his gloves on the way over and mounted it in a fluid, practiced motion. The engine snarled to life, hot and eager. With a hellish roar, he cut through the mist like a bullet through gauze.
He had a dame to find.
(12:23 p.m.)
Duskhaven shimmered, even at noon. The city’s pulse beat loudest here, where elegance wore garters and strutted on six-inch stilettos through a haze of perfume and possibility. Velvet-curtained lounges poured jazz onto the sidewalks, while vintage signs buzzed with neon lullabies. Café patios bloomed at alley corners, dotted with mosaic tables and clusters of bohemians sipping and gossiping. A drag queen in a feathered boa twirled by a lamppost as a blind saxophonist riffed nearby, his notes slurring into the wet air. It was all artifice and allure, a stage play New Town never stopped performing.
Ash let the mood wash over him as he threaded his Harley along the streets, his belly full, cigarette clenched between his teeth. The hog purred beneath him, weaving between puddles and buzzing cars. He caught the scent of espresso, hair spray, and decadence, amber and gray.
The prettiness didn’t last long. The further southeast he rode, Old Town edging closer across the river, the more the glamour peeled away. The jazz dimmed; the glitz dulled. In their place:pawn shops with barred windows, grocery stores selling bruised fruit, men leaning in doorways with hollow eyes. Art gave way to decay, velvet curtains to shattered blinds. The buildings began to slouch, squat and brick-stained, frontages cracked like old people’s faces. Paint flaked from once-grand doorways. Posters for missing kids papered the walls, edges flapping in the wind.
By the time Ash reached the outskirts of Bellona, the afternoon dimmed into the color of dirty steel. The air changed too, thick with drizzle, the kind that never quite fell but clung to the skin like damp breath. It stank of sewage and rusted chains. Rainwater dribbled down iron drainpipes, pooling in gutters clogged with cigarette butts and shattered glass. Fog rolled slowly between buildings, smearing the outlines of cranes and warehouses, blurring the distance into dreamlike gray. Somewhere close, a gull screeched—a sharp, cracking sound that echoed like a broken violin.
He passed the old trattorias of Little Italy and crowded fish markets of Devil’s Row, ears open, eyes scanning the shadows where deals were made and souls unraveled. He didn’t drive in a hurry. You didn’t hurry here. You drifted. Floated like bait on a hook. He knew these streets too well. Not just the names or turns or which doors sold what after midnight. The rhythm of these places. The tempo of sleaze. And he knew how to slip inside it.
The Blue Bridge wasn’t far, its grim towers looming above the river like sentinels too tired to guard anything but specters. That was where he’d once slept, curled in the nave of an abandoned church beside junkies who talked to shadows and whores who sighed in their sleep. Back then, he’d survived on charm and instinct, trading looks for shelter, heat for secrets. There were nights he’d sold his body for a blanket, others where he’d gone hungry so a younger kid could eat. No one had come to save him, so he’d learned to save himself. One scraped, smoky breath at a time.
He wasn’t that boy anymore. He’d risen from the gutters, rebuilt himself from lust and cleverness and grit. Beautiful, yes, but that beauty was a weapon now, honed and tempered. Something he could aim. And right now, it was aimed at the truth.
He flicked his cigarette to the curb and revved the engine. If somewhere out here someone knew where Nora was, Ash would find them. No matter how far into the rot he had to sink.
(1:02 p.m.)
The church hadn’t collapsed, though it looked like it might at any moment. Its steeple stood sharp against the bruised sky, a shriveled finger jabbing heavenward in accusation. Gargoyles crouched on the ledges in blind vigil, mute and indifferent. Ash rolled the Harley to the side and killed the engine, boots hitting the wet ground with a low crunch. Moss slicked the stone steps, graffiti clawed over the remnants of stained-glass saints. A rusted chain hung from the doors, but didn’t hold them shut. Nothing stayed shut down here.
He pushed inside. The sanctuary lay hollow and wide, lit only by a broken skylight above the nave. Pigeons nested where angels once wept. Rain tapped softly against broken pews. The air smelled of mold, piss, and old incense—memory’s perfume.
They were still here, the lost ones. Huddled under blankets or cardboard, scattered like dispossessed children in search of paradise. A woman in a leopard-print coat muttered to herself in a pew, clutching a plastic baby doll to her chest. A pair of teens lay curled below the altar rail, one feeding the other from a can of cold beans. A man with a beard like hay was drawing circles in the dust with his finger, whispering something over and over as if in prayer.
