“Oh, fuck, Mason. Fuck.” His dick twitched again and I swallowed down a stream of precum. I hummed and doubled down, and I felt his body start to tremble as he made that sound that let me know he wasalmostthere.
“Are you actually fucking serious?” It took a second to register the words right behind me at the exact moment Elijah cried out and his cum spilled down my throat. It took another second for me to realize that the voice behind me was Chris.
I popped off Elijah’s dick, standing quickly to block him from Chris’s view when I noticed the mortified look on his face. I stayed in front of him as I tucked him back into his pants, but I kind of wanted to laugh. He must have noticed because he said, “What the fuck Mason, it’s not funny.”
I tried to look regretful but probably failed as I turned slowly to face my friend, but I could feel the smirk trying to come out. I hadn’t planned on Chris walking up when he did, but I wasn’t ashamed of what I’d done. I didn’t really like that someone else had seen Elijah’s orgasm face, though, because that wasmyorgasm face. “Hey, Chris. Didn’t expect to see you here.” EvenIcould hear the laughter in my voice.
“Ha, ha,” Chris said dryly. “You told me you were coming here. Did you really think I’d just let you traipse all around the scene of a murder outside your jurisdiction?”
I wrinkled my brow. “I mean, yes?”
“You’re going to get me fired, Mason. And now on top of trying to get me into trouble, you embarrassed your boyfriend but not yourself. You know I could arrest you for public indecency right now. You’re right out in the open.”
I glanced at Elijah’s rosy cheeks, then looked back at Chris. “I’m on private property,” I pointed out.
“Notyourproperty,” Chris shot back.
“Well, it isn’t public property,” I reiterated. “In fact, no one should have been out here to see us, since it’s a crime scene.”
“Despite the fact that it’s not an active crime scene, you are correct on a lot of points. But look who’s here, trespassing while having sex on private property. I’m sure I could do something with all of that. I can assure you that neither myself nor Elijah was thrilled with me showing up when I did, even though you seem pretty proud of yourself and you’re the only one who managed not to blush.”
I shrugged. “I’m just happy I got him off in time.”
“I don’t know if I’d call that in time,” Elijah muttered beside me, avoiding everyone’s eyes.
“Close enough,” I said, trying to grin at him but he stillwasn’t looking at me. “So, what’s up, Chris?”
He shook his head. “What’s up? You texted to tell me you’re visiting an old crime scene that’s still somewhat being watched by the police, without waiting for me, so as soon as I got done with what I was doing, I came up here to try to stop you from doing anything stupid. I told them I wanted to recheck something, so hopefully no one followed me. Since you’re trespassing here. Among, you know, other things.” He looked right at me, a million questions on his face. I couldn’t really explain my actions to him, though. I’d wanted to make it better for Elijah, so I’d tried to.
“Did you go inside?” he asked us.
“Yup,” I replied. “The door was unlocked. Any old body could just walk right in.”
Chris suddenly seemed to forget he’d just walked up on a blow job in the woods. “Did you see anything? Get any feelings?” He stepped toward Elijah, eyes wide. Most people would think Elijah was crazy if they’d never seen proof like I had. Not Chris, though. He seemed hopeful that Elijah would solve the case.
Elijah finally met Chris’s eyes, but his cheeks were still rosy. “I mean, I saw a little bit, but not enough to tell who it was. I think someone knocked on the door and no one was there when he answered it. They went in while he was outside checking around, and he didn’t even see it coming. There were at least two of them, maybe more. They wore masks. I couldn’t tell anything about them. It could have been anyone. I don’t know. I didn’t hear anyone’s voice besides Brandon cursing. They left him on the floor to die, and they broke his phone. I felt his fear at the end, I...” He trailed off and I hugged him again.
Chris’s eyes cleared and he looked at me in understanding. At least I didn’t have to try to explain again why he walked up on what he did. He gave Elijah a sympathetic pat on the back. “I’m sorry, man,” he said. “You’re right, though, they crushed his phone. Looked stepped on.” He looked thoughtful. “There is another question I have for you, though. It’s why I wanted to be here when you guys came. Not a question about your feelings,but a question you might know because you’ve been here. Any way you’d come back inside for a minute?”
Elijah took a shaky breath but said, “Yeah. Okay.”
I had no idea what Chris was going to ask, but I took Elijah’s hand. “Hey,” I said. “I’m right here.” I leaned in to whisper, “And we’re going to pick that back up later tonight, when we’re somewhere you feel safe and comfortable, okay?”
I caught the little shiver before he gave me a little shove with his shoulder. But he said, “Yeah. Okay.”
We followed Chris inside, and Elijah gripped my hand a little tighter as he looked around. It felt strange in here, even to me, different than it felt the first time we’d come in. A little too quiet, even though Chris left the door open. The air felt thick, almost heavy. I wondered if it was just because we’d seen it and knew what to expect, while the element of surprise had us earlier. Chris didn’t seem to notice. He walked through the living room and into the kitchen with us trailing behind him.
“This,” he said, pointing to the back door. “Was this knob always broken? It seems like they came in and left through the front door, so I’m not sure why they’d break the back door too. Especially if they got him to come outside like you said. We haven’t found any unusual prints anywhere, and I’ve been trying to figure out if this is a red herring and it was just already broken.”
Elijah was staring past me, in the direction of the living room, not even glancing back at the knob Chris was focused on. “Um, it was broken... maybe not that bad when I was here, but it never really locked right or wanted to open correctly.” His hand gripped mine slightly tighter. It was barely noticeable, but I noticed. “He always had to mess with it to get it to...” He took the smallest step backward, away from the living room. “To lock.”
Fuck that shit.I looked behind me into the room that was shrouded in shadows. I didn’t see anything, but that didn’t mean Elijah didn’t. I tried to get him to look at me, to clue me in as to what was going on, but his eyes remained trained on that fucking room.
I thought about how my dumb ass hoped Brandon was watching us outside. That was probably really stupid of me. Had I actually summoned something? I could have taken him in real life... probably... but what the hell was I supposed to do against a pissed-off dead asshole who just watched me blow his ex-boyfriend in the front yard?
I wanted to help Chris out with some clever tidbit of information on why the knob was broken, something my years of detective work had earned me other than that Brandon had probably gotten drunk and broken it worse after Elijah had last been here, but nothing came to me. All I could focus on was Elijah focusing on the darkness behind me. Iknewit felt different when I came in. It must be pretty damn strong if I could feel it, because I never had before.
I wanted to yell at Brandon, to tell him to go fuck himself, that he couldn’t hurt Elijah anymore, but I didn’t. I was afraid shit would start flying through the house like in a horror movie. Frankly, I just wanted the hell out of here.
