Solo (7 page)

Solo nodded. “Nice. I like them.”

“Thanks.” Eric thought of the artwork Solo had on his bedroom walls. “I have a bunch I didn’t use. If you’re interested, I could give you some.”

Solo shrugged, but didn’t say no.

Progress, Eric supposed.

* * * *

After a short nap, Solo stretched out on the couch and used Blue’s house phone to call Rowdy.

“Yeah?” Rowdy answered.

“It’s me.” Solo crossed his ankles on the arm of the couch. “Checkin’ in.”

“I was getting ready to head over. You need anything?”

“No.” Solo had gone back and forth with himself on whether or not to tell Rowdy where he was. In the end, he’d decided it would be easier to tell the truth. “I’m at Blue’s.”

“Goddammit, Solo!” Rowdy exploded. “You gotta stop this shit before the club finds out. I can’t keep covering your ass, motherfucker.”

“Tell Switch I’m shacked up with someone licking my wounds. He’ll understand.” Solo knew Switch suspected he wasn’t into pussy, but he’d never come out and asked him about it, and Solo respected the man enough not to offer information that might make it uncomfortable between them.

“What about Roach?” Rowdy asked.

“What about him? Did you talk to him yesterday?” Solo moved and the slick satin of the robe brushed against his cock.
Christ.
He reached down and ran his bandaged palm across his dick. Blue hadn’t been kidding about the robe.

“He never came into the club. I was planning to go look for him when Switch got the call from the hospital,” Rowdy explained. “You want me to do that today or wait?”

Solo stared up at the ceiling. He could tell the pain meds were kicking in because he found it difficult to concentrate on the conversation. He rubbed his dick again, barely biting back a moan.

“You there?” Rowdy asked.

“Yeah. Wait.” Solo sighed. “I wanna look into Roach’s eyes when we talk to him.” After the information Blue had given him earlier, he no longer thought Roach was guilty of selling bad shit, but the fact he was selling shit at all needed to stop. “I’ll call ya tomorrow.”

“Don’t get too comfortable over there,” Rowdy warned. “I like having you at my back. It’d suck if Switch ordered me to take care of you.”

It was a very real possibility. If the club found out Solo was gay, he’d get jumped, and depending on how many brothers were against him, he could end up in the ICU. That was kid stuff compared to what would happen if they found out Solo was fucking a cop. “I hear you loud and clear.”

“Later,” Rowdy said before hanging up.

Yawning, Solo set the phone on the coffee table. He had an idea of where to find Easy Ed, but it would be at least a few days before he could lean on him. If he hadn’t made the deal with Blue, he’d have already found the fucker and plugged him between the eyes, but, no, he’d let his dick make the deal.

Solo shot to a sitting position when he heard footsteps on the front porch. His body rigid, he looked around for his knife.
Fuck.
It had to be in his jeans. The sound of a key fumbling in the lock put him at ease, and he exhaled. Sinking back onto the couch, he watched as a smiling Blue opened the door.

“Hey,” Solo greeted, trying to make his voice sound casual.

“How’re you doing?” Blue set down several plastic shopping bags before sitting on the coffee table next to Solo.

“Just woke up.” Solo nodded toward the phone. “I called Rowdy. Told him I was here.” He tried not to stare at Blue, but goddamn, the cop was fucking sexy. He reached out and rested his hand on Blue’s thigh. “Did you find anything out at the school?”

Blue shook his head. “There’s something going on, that’s for sure, but I couldn’t get anyone to talk.” He tapped his temple. “My spidey sense tells me the kid isn’t as innocent in what happened as he’s pretending. I think I’ll pay him another visit while he’s still in the hospital. Once they get him home, he’ll feel safer. Better to get him talking before that happens.”

Careful of the bandages, Solo rolled to his side and pressed against the back of the sofa, making room for Blue to join him. He didn’t try to analyze the desire to have Blue close; he just went with his gut.

With a wicked grin, Blue pulled off his shoes before stretching out on the deep leather couch. “This is the reason I bought this, so you know.” He leaned in and gifted Solo with a soft kiss.

Staring into those fucking blue eyes, Solo knew he could lose himself in the cop. There was an ease between them like he’d never felt before. “Tell me more about this spidey sense of yours?”

Blue rested his head on the stack of pillows he’d put down for Solo. “Well, from what I’ve been able to piece together, Andy is a privileged asshole with a huge chip on his shoulder. His friends won’t talk about him out of some misguided sense of loyalty, and his enemies seem afraid to talk.”

“You thinking this is more than a stupid kid buying a bad bag of weed?” Solo asked. He’d thought it strange when the victim refused to talk to the police, so it definitely made sense.

“Yeah,” Blue acknowledged. He brushed the back of his hand over the satin robe covering Solo’s cock. “I’m going to run into the station pretty soon and talk to my captain.”

Solo moaned as the slick fabric rubbed against his dick. “How soon?”

Blue grinned. “That depends on how sore you are.”

“Too sore to fuck you the way I want, but my dick wouldn’t mind a suck.” It was the truth. Solo would love to fuck the hell out of Blue but hated to do anything halfway. Maybe he was a pig because in his mind, the next best thing to fucking was getting his cock sucked.

Blue wrapped his hand around Solo’s cock, keeping the satin material between his palm and the sensitive skin of Solo’s hard shaft. It said a hell of a lot that Blue had the power to get Solo so hard even through the haze of pain medicine. “Why don’t we get you in a shallow warm bath first so I can wash your wounds? Once your bandages are changed, I’ll put you in bed, suck you dry then go talk to the captain.”

“Sounds like you’ve got a busy afternoon ahead of you,” Solo said. As much as he wanted a blowjob, it made sense to take care of his back and arms first because as drowsy as he was anyway, once he shot his seed down Blue’s throat, he’d be out for several hours.

Blue leaned in for another kiss, but Solo didn’t let him get away with a quick peck. With a groan, Solo parted Blue’s lips and thrust his tongue inside. He’d never been good with words, so he did his best to show Blue with a kiss how glad he was to have stumbled through his front door.

Throughout the day, Solo began to remember snippets of the previous night. Rowdy had taken him home from the hospital, had even helped him into bed, but the longer Solo laid there, the lonelier he felt. All he could think about was Blue and the need to be with him. There were still stretches of time he didn’t remember, the drive over to Blue’s being one of them, but he couldn’t shake the feeling, the undeniable need of another person. How had he let a cop get so far under his skin? He broke the kiss and stared into a pair of big blue eyes. The truth hit him like a fist. When he looked at Blue, he didn’t see a cop. “What do you see when you look at me?” he asked Blue.

Blue’s expression turned questioning. “What do you mean?”

Feeling stupid, Solo shook his head. “Never mind. Did you get me a phone?”

“Yeah, but I want to get back to that question.” Blue released Solo’s cock. “I’m guessing that the reason you’re asking is because you believe we’re so different.”

“We are,” Solo admitted.

“Why do you care so much about keeping drugs away from the schools?”

“Because my sister, Jessica, overdosed. She was only fifteen, and I was so busy causing and getting into trouble that I didn’t even know she was using.” Solo swallowed. “I wasn’t there to look out for her, so I’m making up for it by trying to keep someone else’s baby sister safe.” He broke eye contact. “Switch, the club’s Prez, was the one who told me she was dead. I’d just gotten out of county and was all kinds of fucked up. Switch found me, cleaned me up, and took me to the morgue to identify her body because my mom was too drunk.” When he felt the sting of tears, he cleared his throat. He wasn’t a fucking girl and refused to act like it. “After Jessica’s funeral, I walked away from my mom and moved into the club until I saved enough to buy the trailer.”

Blue gave Solo an understanding smile. “For me, it was a cop named Martin Lee who lived next door to the last foster family I was with. He had this gold nineteen seventy-two Mustang, you know, the ones with the wide strip of black running down the hood?” His smile grew wider. “Anyway, Mr. Lee used to bring that beautiful baby out of the garage every Saturday and wash it. The family I lived with didn’t give a shit about me, so I’d hang out with Mr. Lee. I suppose he’s the closest thing I have to a father. I’m sure if he’d have been an accountant, I’d have followed in his footsteps, but he was a cop.”

“Is he still alive?” Solo asked.

“Yeah. He’s retired from the force, but I meet him a couple times a month for lunch.” Blue rested his forehead against Solo’s. “I didn’t get a job at the police department because I had some grand plan of wiping out crime in the world. I went to the academy because Mr. Lee pulled some strings and got me in. You may not be able to see it, but I’m a hell of a lot more than my job.”

Solo did see it. Part of the problem was that he often forgot what Blue did for a living. He understood the point Blue was trying to make, but he wouldn’t let himself get sucked into a conversation about feelings. Hell, he’d only just discovered he had them. He decided to change the subject. “Where’d you take that picture?” He pointed to the large black and white photo over the sofa.

“Olympic National Forest in Washington.” Blue stared up at the photograph. “I went a few years ago. I was having a bad time, so I decided to get in my car and drive until I was surrounded by green.” He glanced at Solo. “Yeah, I found it before I reached the park, but the green pulled me in.” A wistful expression graced his handsome face. “I thought about coming home, selling everything and moving up there.”

“So why didn’t you?” Solo asked. He’d never been further north than Utah, which had some pretty country, but not enough to pull up stakes and move.

Blue sat up and swung his legs over the side of the couch. “For the first sixteen years of my life, no one gave a fuck whether I lived or died. Then I met Mr. Lee.” He shrugged. “You don’t just give something like that away.”

Solo stared at Blue’s muscular back. He wanted to tell the man that he cared whether he lived or died, but he couldn’t force the words out of his mouth. Instead, he went with the easiest answer. “Yeah, that’s the way I feel about the club. They may not be blood, but they’re the only family I’ve got.”

* * * *

Eric entered the house and tossed his keys on the bar that separated the living room from the kitchen. He was in a sour mood after talking to his captain, and he hated to admit to Solo how fucked up the situation was. He stopped short when he noticed the sexy man smiling at him from the stove. “Hey.”

“I made dinner. Hope you don’t mind.”

Eric paused in the kitchen doorway, his mood lightening enough to grin. He should go take a shower and try to get his head on straight, but not without a moment with Solo. “Yeah? What’d you make?”

Solo actually winced. “Well, I’m not much of a cook, so I made what I call Biker Chili. Pork and Beans, hamburger and barbeque sauce.” He shrugged. “Not sure you’ll like it, but you had the ingredients in the fridge.”

Although it didn’t sound appetizing, Eric would never tell Solo that. Knowing Solo had been comfortable enough in his house to cook, meant more than the actual meal prepared. “I’ve never had it, but I’ll give it a shot.” He gestured behind him. “Do I have time for a shower?”

“Sure. It’ll keep.” Solo started toward Eric. “Everything okay?”

“Not really, but I need some time to think,” Eric replied. When Solo was close enough to touch, Eric gave into the need and pressed his palms against Solo’s chest. He brushed his fingertips over the dark brown curls, but couldn’t meet Solo’s gaze. “I know in my gut Andy’s dirty, and I think my captain agrees with me, but he told me to drop it, to focus on the dealer who sold Andy the weed in the first place.”

Solo wrapped his bandaged arms around Eric’s waist. “The kid’s dad’s all chummy with the police chief, so why does that surprise you? Haven’t you figured out yet that money and position buy privilege?”

Eric pressed against Solo, needing to hold the bigger man, but afraid of hurting him. He’d only been a detective for six months, and it was the first time he’d been ordered to look the other way. As a patrol officer, he knew the guys in the expensive cars often bought their way out of trouble, but by then he’d already done his part. The situation with Andy Sparks wasn’t the same at all. How could he explain to Solo that in a fifteen minute conversation with his captain, he’d lost some of the faith he’d had in his career. With a sigh, he pulled away from Solo. “I’ll be back.”

Solo let Eric go, but it was obvious he had to fight himself to do it. “It’ll be okay. We’ll focus on whoever dusted the weed with bad shit, and go from there.”

“Yeah,” Eric replied before walking away.

* * * *