Too Damn Hot

Fuck, he’s gorgeous. Concentrate, Travis. That’s what Detective Travis Burkhardt was thinking, but it’s not what he said to the young vineyard worker in the parking lot outside the Queen’s Crown Winery in the plantation country Virginia eastern foothills of the Blue Ridge mountains. What he said was, “I just need to know where you were after 10:00 p.m. last night.”

“Was that when Mr. Fouchet fell off the catwalk in the processing building?” the small, dark, achingly handsome Julio Cortez asked.

“It happened sometime after ten, yes, when a meeting broke up and he told someone he was staying to check the wine vats.”

Fell or was pushed, Burkhardt thought. That wasn’t clear yet, and until it was, he’d have to do as much checking as he could. The winemaker’s skull had been crushed and more like from a blunt instrument than a two-flight fall onto concrete, the medical examiner thought in an initial check.

“I wasn’t here last night. I didn’t come to that meeting.”

“Yes, well, we need to check on where everyone was. Where were you after 10:00 last night until just now?”

“I wasn’t here before now. I don’t want to get someone involved, though. Maybe I should talk to a lawyer first.”

“You shouldn’t need to talk to a lawyer to tell me where you were, Mr. Cortez.”

“You can call me Julio,” the young man said, giving Burkhardt a glorious—and Burkhardt thought, interested—smile that nearly made the detective melt into his shoes fighting just how much he’d like to jump this guy’s bones. This dude is just too damn hot, he was thinking.

“Fine, but you’ll have to tell me sooner or later. You were with someone, weren’t you?”

“Yes, but . . .”

“Was it with a woman or a man?” Burkhardt had already gotten the lowdown on this guy and men. Considering his own interests, it had been the most interesting information he’d heard that day, accentuated by having found that Julio was sex on a stick. There were others he’d already talked to who were happy to say that all of the men who even leaned bi here wanted to get into Julio’s shorts—and that some of them had done so. More than one had offered that the victim, the winemaker, Fouchet, certainly had.

And one of the employees here had said there had been a dustup between Fouchet and his boyfriend, Franklin Stanfield, the owner of the Stanfield Inn. Stanfield probably wasn’t wild that his boyfriend was humping Julio. The detective made a note to check out where Stanfield was the previous night and maybe how he felt about Fouchet not coming home last night. But the fact was that this Julio was sex on overdrive and lots guys wanted to cover him. Burkhardt himself wanted to get into Julio’s shorts and he’d just met the young man. The sexy Cuban was some sort of man magnet. And he seemed to know it.

“I really can’t say. Not without talking to a lawyer, I think. I’m not up on the laws here.”

“You have a lawyer on attainer, do you?” Burkhardt asked.

“No, but I know where I can get one.” I can get one easy enough from Mr. Conner, Julio was thinking. He’s the county prosecutor here. He could make this all go away, but he, of course, won’t want to be dragged into this. He’s the county prosecutor. And he’s married. And he’s who I was with last night. When I’d gotten home from the winery, there’s been a note from Don, the guy I was living with, the chef at the Stanfield Inn, saying he had been given time at a beach house in Nags Head by his boss and telling me to come down there today. I was off anyone’s leash last evening, so I’d gone out to that roadhouse over on the Waynesboro side of the mountain. Mr. Conner had been there. He’s not going to want to alibi me, though. And Don wasn’t home to do it.

They both looked up as a vintage Rolls Royce convertible drove up and parked facing them. Old Man Gordon, the patriarch of a local FFV—First Families of Virginia—family who had recently moved into a cottage on 250, down the road from the ancestral Vermillion plantation. Vermillion was the showcase of the region and had been in the family since before the Revolution. The third of his four daughters had married a rock star and they’d wanted to move into the main house. And they had the money to make a good case that they could manage the upkeep on the estate.

Gordon sat in his car, his eyes boring into Julio. Burkhardt was about to go over and ask the old man what he was doing here—had he heard about the death and knew something to pass on? Was he the one Julio had been with the previous night? That wouldn’t have surprised Burkhardt. He knew the old man was bent that way. There was speculation, though, on whether the old man could still get it up, with or without the help of pills. He guessed that didn’t mean the man couldn’t still manage some form of sexual pleasure with a looker like Julio, though. Burkhardt knew quite a bit about the gay community here. He dipped his toes in that himself, although he mainly went over to Richmond for his needs. A gay detective was at a disadvantage in the close-knit Central Virginia community.

But, shit, he’d really like to get his cock in this honey. Maybe he didn’t want an alibi right now. Maybe he wanted an excuse to meet with Julio again—maybe over a couple of beers. Maybe in his bedroom. He was contemplating how to say this as Julio and Gordon played nice-nice with their eyes, but a cop saved him.

“The ME is finished with the prelim and would like to talk to you before they haul the body away,” the cop, who had come out of the processing room, said as he walked up.

Burkhardt turned to Julio, “You can get that lawyer if you want. We can meet to get your alibi. Lawyer or no lawyer, you’re going to need to provide that information. You OK about meeting off the books to discuss that?”

Julio gave him a look, realizing what the detective really meant—and not just that maybe he could provide the information off the records. The detective wouldn’t be any more interested in bringing the county prosecutor into the case than Conner would be. The detective looked good to him, and if they hooked up maybe Burkhardt would help smooth over the alibi business. “Maybe I could do that,” he answered.

The detective smiled and picked up the thread again. “I just want to rule everyone out right quick if this appears to be more than an accident. I can understand if the guy you were with was someone powerful who should be keeping it in his pants. We know what’s what here in Gordonton, what past for a village on this stretch of route 250 winding up to the mountains to the west. Talk to a lawyer and see what he says about you meeting with me informally—over a beer or something—and slipping me a name. I can see what I can do about keeping it secret and giving you a pass. I’ve got to go see the medical examiner now. Think about it. I’ll get in touch later. Don’t leave town until this is over.”

It was with a great relief that Julio saw the hunky detective turn and walk back into the processing building. He was one sexy, rough-looking dude. Julio wouldn’t mind going under him. He wouldn’t mind that one bit. He broke off from that thought, though, and his gaze went back to Chance Gordon, sitting behind the wheel of his elegant old Rolls. Gordon nodded to him, put the Rolls in reverse, and slowly drove out of the parking lot and onto the winding rural road at the base of the Blue Ridge Mountains and back toward Route 250.

Julio walked over to a beat-up Ford 150 pickup that looked older than the 1960 Rolls Silver Cloud, but wasn’t, got in, and followed Gordon out of the parking lot. As he drove, he took out his cellphone and put a call into the county prosecutor’s office. The next call he made was to Don Fields to let him know Julio wouldn’t be showing up in Nags Head anytime soon.

* * * *

Julio arrived at the cottage on 250 toward Charlottesville that Chance Gordon was moving into before Gordon arrived. Gordon had gone first to the small farm in a back corner of the Vermillion estate to pick up his nephew, Jack Turner. Jack and Julio had agreed to help Gordon assemble bookcases and get the old man’s law books on shelves in the cottage. Gordon had named the place Last Stand, and that pretty much reflected where Gordon was in life now. He was suffering multiple old-age ailments at sixty-two and, with massive debts hanging over Vermillion and four daughters and no son to continue the Gordon line, he was giving up. The fabulously rich movie star, Grant Gillus, had come along to marry one of his daughters and bail the old man out financially, but that had come with the demand to have the big house and for Gordon to vacate.

Jack Turner was black—or appeared so in a strikingly handsome and fit version—but he also was Chance Gordon’s nephew, Gordon’s sister having been knocked up by one of the estate workers, who she subsequently married. They had been allotted a small farm at the back of the estate to hide out, and that’s where Jack lived now. Everyone in the family had ignored them existed except Gordon, who, as a son of his own hadn’t appeared, had increasingly treated Jack as that son. He still, however, kept the young man on the secret side of the family, and Jack was continually on edge with resentment of that while showing up to help Gordon whenever he was called. He both loved and resented his uncle. There was continuing apprehension of whether Jack would inherit his farm when Gordon died, although, sensing death approaching, Gordon had recently told him he would. There were increasing hints that Grant Gillus and his wife might dispute that.

Jack and Julio spent the late afternoon putting together bookcases and loading them with books in the study at Last Stand. The cottage was commodious and conveniently laid out, with one room flowing into the next with wide access between rooms and more than enough rooms for the old man’s needs. The doorways and approaches were designed to accommodate wheelchair access, although it hadn’t come to that in need for Gordon. It was more than adequate for an elderly widower, but it was a big step down from the main house at Vermillion.

The old man’s long-time live-out housekeeper, Sadie, Jack’s aunt on his father’s side, who had transferred down from the big house to cover Gordon’s needs, had made them a supper and laid it out on the table before she departed for the day, as the sun was going down.

The three ate dinner and then settled down in the half-unpacked living room to watch a baseball game on TV, drink beer, and relax. Jack dozed off in a recliner chair and Gordon started fooling around with Julio on a sofa facing the TV. His attention to Julio went more to the young man, loosening the sexy young man’s already loose clothes even more, inserting hands, fondling, kissing until there was no attention left to give baseball.

The master bedroom was conveniently located off the living room, and the two found themselves on the bed, Julio now naked and Gordon mostly so. Gordon was not a fat man, had been hands-on on his estate to the point of having a fit body for a man his age, and he’d been quite a cocksman in his younger days—with both women and men. Julio was indulgent and ever randy. He got along just fine with the old man and he’d been accommodating to whatever Gordon wanted from him.

This evening Gordon wanted sex from him.

Julio lay on his back, in the older man’s embrace, Gordon’s left arm under the back of the younger man and his right hand exploring the young man’s divine body. They kissed and Gordon played with Julio’s nipples and let his hand slowly glide down the beautiful body, lacing his fingers through the young man’s balls and squeezing and distending them, as Julio moaned for him. The fingers went lower, rimming Julio’s hole and then working their way in, stretching and seeking and finding the prostate to worry as Julio’s hips began to rock against the hand, and he gasped and whispered, “Yes, yes, yes,” in between Gordon’s kisses on his lips when the old man buried his face in Julio’s throat and kissed and sucked there.

The hand went to encasing Julio’s cock and Gordon slowly stroked him off—all the way to Julio’s moaning release.

Julio’s hand then came into play, fondling the old man and centering on Gordon’s cock. The old man was built big, but it took a long time these days for him to achieve even a three-quarter’s erection. If he knew in advance that he wanted to be in full erection, he had to resort to pills. He wanted that now and excused himself long enough to pop one. When he returned to the bed, Julio took the time to get him fully hard and then turned on his side away from Gordon, with his butt nestled into the old man’s groin. He put the head of the shaft in place with a hand and jutted his buttocks back, impaling himself enough for the bulb to breach the sphincter.

Embracing the young Cuban closely and sighing and murmuring his gratitude, Gordon took over the fuck, sinking in the well-used young man’s channel easily, stretching and exploring it. He set up a slow rhythm, which Julio matched in rocking his hips back and forward, and they managed a completion, a rare getting it off that Gordon was managing these days.

They sighed and murmured each other into sleep.

Jack hadn’t been asleep all of that time. From time to time, he’d gotten up and come to the bedroom door to check on how they were doing—and what they were doing. He was happy that his uncle was able to get it off and he was envious of him doing so with the sexy young Cuban. That boy was damn hot.

A bit before 2:00 in the morning, Jack heard the shower going in the bathroom off the bedroom and in a few moments Julio came out, dressed.

“I have to work tomorrow,” he said. “Mr. Gordon’s dead to the world. You need a ride back to the farm?”

“That would be nice,” Jack answered.

They rode back to the farm, but Julio didn’t go immediately back to his own place—to Don Fields’s place. Field was in Nags Head. Watching Julio giving it to Chance Gordon had made Jack horny. So, Julio spent the rest of the night at Jack’s farm, on Jack’s bed. He didn’t get much sleep. Jack was a virile, vigorous black bull.

Julio had struggled with Jack to deny access, which is the game Jack wanted, but once he was skewered, he lay back, open and vulnerable, while the black stud’s long, thick cock journeyed into the Cuban’s core. He lay there then, docilely, as the victorious Jack rode him long, hard, and deep. The bed springs of Jack’s bed squealed and the brass headboard rhythmically bounced off the bedroom wall, as the black stud held Julio down on the bed and pounded away on him, fucking the hell out of the sexy little Cuban who was just too damn hot not to totally fuck.

Julio cried out his pain-passion and the delight of getting it from a hung, fit, black stud.

Julio was getting it from a lot of the men here and about.

* * * *

“My goodness, what happened to you, Sir?”

Detective Burkhardt had been called into the county prosecutor’s office the first thing in the morning. And in this region of Virginia, if you were called into the county prosecutor’s office, you showed up. Burkhardt figured he knew why. What he’d found when he got to Gill Conner’s office was a man with a gauze patch applied to the side of his head.

“Those damn kids driving around and popping off rounds at stop signs,” Conner said. “I stopped at my mailbox on 250 yesterday afternoon and got grazed with a bullet. The doc said I was lucky it wasn’t even a millimeter off where it went by.”

“So, that’s why the sheriff’s office was emptied out when I got there just now.”

“That, and I’ve heard there’s been another death. No details on that yet, though. How about that Fouchet case? Ready to clear it as accidental death yet?”

“I haven’t checked with the ME yet today, but something more can’t be ruled out yet,” Burkhardt answered. “The ME said there were signs of a struggle on the catwalk above where he landed. There were bruises and a skull fracture that don’t work out with the fall yet. Is that why you called me in?”

“It’s related, and I’d be just as happy to have this ruled accidental. We have more cases on our plate just now than we can handle. It’s about an alibi for that Hispanic wine worker, Julio Cortez. I understand you’ve been pressing him for one. I have a client—another lawyer—who confirms the young man was with him. I think you can understand that it’s a delicate matter and will take this as confirmation that Cortez was somewhere else and will close that line of inquiry.”

Why you old coot, Burkhardt thought and had to turn away so the prosecutor didn’t see him smile. His suspicion had been right. Julio had been with Gill Conner, who was married and was prominent here. Well, the detective hadn’t been interested in pinning this on the sweet little piece anyway. “Yes, I understand, sir,” is what he actually said. “I’m relieved to not have to track that one down.”

Conner was about to say something else when his phone rang and he picked it up. “Yes, the detective is with me here,” Conner said into the phone. “So, that’s what this is about. Shit. Well, OK, I’ll tell him. I’m sure he’ll be right out there.”

“The call is for me?” Burkhardt asked as Conner clicked off.

“It’s for both of us. Chance Gordon’s housekeeper, Sadie Jackson, found the old man dead in his bed this morning when she showed up to work.”

“I’m not surprised,” Burkhardt said. “With this move and all and his financial problems, I’m not surprised his ticker gave out.”

“Apparently his ticker only gave out because someone shoved a knife in it,” Conner answered. “I’m thinking you’ll head right over to Last Stand. Turned out to be a good name for that place. Sadie told the cops that Jack Turner and Julio Cortez were with the old man last evening when she left.”

“Fuck,” Burkhardt said. Julio wasn’t out of the woods yet, it seemed. But, on the other hand, it gave the detective another opportunity to get upside the sexy Cuban.

“I trust you know that Amanda and her new husband are making noises about doing Jack out of that farm he wants to inherit and time is getting short on the old man’s will holding on deeding the property to him.”

“Yeah, I think everyone around Gordonton is aware of that,” Burkhardt answered.

“I sure as hell hope this has nothing to do with that. I like Jack Turner.”

I’m betting you’re more worried that it has something to do with Julio Cortez, the detective was thinking. But he knew how law enforcement worked in rural Virginia. He said nothing. He just got his tail moving toward Last Stand.

* * * *

Burkhardt found Julio at the Queen’s Crown Winery, out in the vineyard, tending to the vines.

“I guess you know why I’m here. Guess you heard about Chance Gordon,” Burkhardt said as he stood, facing the skittish young Cuban between rows of Chardanay grapes.

“Yes, I heard. That’s bad. I liked the old man.”

“And, as I understood it, he liked you just fine too.”

“We got along,” Julio said, giving the detective a hooded look.

“Way I heard it, he got it all from you. I’m told that you might be about the last person to have seen him alive. His housekeeper said you were at his house last night when she left.”

“I wasn’t the only one. I didn’t do anything. I liked him and had no reason to do anything.”

“You mean he was paying you for the sex.”

Julio paused, but then just sighed and answered. “Yes. Mostly in kindness and dinners. But, yes, he slipped me some cash too. But I would have gone with him anyway. He was an interesting man—and in good condition for his age.”

“He was a physical wreck and about to give up anyway, the way I heard it.”

“He was able perform yesterday,” Julio said, defensively.

“So, yesterday is the last time he had sex with you?”

“Yes.”

“If he wanted to go out enjoying you a bit, that’s fine with me. Jack Turner was there too, wasn’t he?”

“Yes.”

“It was some sort of a threesome then, was it?”

“Jack Turner is kin to Gordon,” Julio said, aghast.

“Is that a no, then?”

“Jack was sleeping in another room when I was with Mr. Gordon in his bedroom.”

“Where were you later, say 3:00 or 4:00 in the morning?” Those times bracketed the period the medical examiner had told Burkhardt the murder probably had occurred.

“I drove Jack Turner home around 2:00,” Julio answered. “And I stayed there for the night,” he reluctantly answered.

“So, the two of you, Jack Turner and you, where shacking up between those hours last night.”

“Yes.”

“You certainly have no trouble putting out for men, do you?” Burkhardt was bold enough to reach out and touch Julio cheek, leaving little doubt that he wouldn’t mind being one of those men.

“I like men,” Julio said, not shirking away from Burkhardt’s touch. “I like you.”

“Noted,” Burkhardt said, taking his hand away. The young man was extraordinarily casual in his promiscuity. He hardly kept it a secret from any of his men that there were other men. Burkhardt thought that it would be extremely hard not to be jealous of the others, and in a small community like this, that could be volatile.

“I’ll have Turner confirm you were with him,” he said, “but it’s interesting that you’ll so quickly tell me what man you were sleeping with when Chance Gordon was murdered, but you won’t tell me who you were with when the winemaker died.”

Julio didn’t answer.

“It’s because you were being fucked by Gill Conner while Fouchet was falling off the scaffolding in that building over there, weren’t you?”

Again, Julio didn’t answer directly, but then he said, “Mr. Conner is an important man here. Mr. Gordon was old and didn’t care what people would think. This will blow away soon, won’t it?”

“Gordon was murdered. In his bed. Stabbed. He was an important man here too, Julio. And not just locally. His family landed here in Virginia with the bunch founding Jamestown. One of his daughters just married a movie star. All four of his daughters were famous models, brought to fame by a fashion photographer who married one of them. One of the others married a viscount in England and is in the British Parliament in her own right. The other one married some sort of European prince. No, Julio, this is going to be in the national headlines. And you’ll be right there if we don’t get you separated out from it. But we can make this go away. We can discuss this more informally somewhere. Let’s go to my apartment and talk about this over a beer.”

They both knew they just as easily could talk it over right here. But Julio was aware of the electricity that had gone between them the two times they had met. He knew why Burkhardt wanted to move this to his apartment in Gordonton above a café.

“I’ll get the beers and then we can talk,” Burkhardt said when they entered the apartment. When he came back from refrigerator, a beer in each hand, though, Julio was already standing in the doorway into the bedroom, unbuckling his belt, unzipping, and letting his pants cascade to the floor.

“I know what you want, Mr. Burkhardt,” he said. “I want it too.”

“I’ll do what I can to keep you out of this,” Burkhardt said. They both knew those two thoughts were not separate.

Julio cast his gaze down toward his feet, a classic signaling of submission. “Thank you,” he whispered. His hands went to the waistband of his briefs and they too fell to the floor.

They fucked on the bed, with Burkhardt lying on his back, and Julio doing most of the work. They both were naked and they both were making good use of their hands. They both had great bodies—entirely different styles but good with each other more so for this reason. The slim, willowy, berry-brown Julio straddled the hips of the solid, muscular cop and rode the detective’s very nice cock into the early afternoon.

No more was said about Julio needing an alibi for anything. That had already been decided in Gill Conner’s office, but there was no reason for Julio to know that his efforts in Burkhardt’s bedroom hadn’t been required.

Burkhardt didn’t think for a moment that Julio was involved in either of these murders or, he told himself, he would not be taking advantage of the young Cuban like this. To the detective, this had all the markings of an insider’s job in this tight-knit community. As much as Julio was being handed around, he was an outsider here—more of a pawn than a player.

That evening Burkhardt went to the Stanfield Inn for dinner. He didn’t usually eat that fancy, but he had a question to ask the inn’s owner and wanted to do it on neutral ground when Stanfield wouldn’t see it coming. He knew that the inn’s owner and his chef had a habit of coming out into the dining room and doing a little schmoozing with the patrons during dinner. It happened this night as well.

Franklin Stanfield stopped by his table, more curious in how the investigations of the deaths of the Queen Crown Winery’s winemaker and of Chance Gordon were going. He, of course, knew both of them well. He had been sleeping with Fouchet, and if they hadn’t broken up so publicly recently he might have been more broken up by the man’s death.

“You didn’t see him that night?” Burkhardt asked, getting at what he’d come here to find out, but hoping Stanfield didn’t hone in on that.

“No. I’ve been in Roanoke at a B&B convention since the afternoon Fouchet died and until just before dinner tonight,” he said. “Many people can verify that,” he added, showing that he knew exactly why Burkhardt was asking and that he was ready with the alibi for both deaths.

And that was that, Burkhardt contemplated, as Stanfield wafted off and the detective watched the chef, Don Fields, roaming the tables and flirting with the dinner patrons. The detective’s eyes narrowed, a lightbulb went on over his head, and he rose and left the inn.

When he got to his car, he called Julio Cortez at home and more demanded than requested that the young Cuban dress and meet him at the Stanfield Inn bar for a drink. As he waited for Julio to appear, he made a couple of more phone calls.

One of the calls was for a cop to go out to Jack Turner’s farm and to stake it out. That cop came back on a bit later to report that the farmhouse was dark. Turner wasn’t there.

“Stay there,” Burkhardt said. “If he returns, make sure you’re on his every move, but don’t panic him.”

Julio showed up at the inn, they had a couple of drinks, and then they went back to Burkhardt’s apartment, to his bedroom, and to his bed, where the detective fucked the shit out of the sweet piece who was just too damn hot to resist. Julio gave it up easily for the detective and not just because the man had him over the barrel on involvement in the two deaths—two deaths so far as well as Burkhardt could see—but also because the detective was hot as hell too.

* * * *

They woke sometime after 2:00 a.m., showered, and had a bit of breakfast before Burkhardt saw Julio to the door down the stairs from his apartment and opening up in the side lot beside the row of buildings with a café under his apartment. A line of trees and dense thicket ran behind the buildings and down to a stream.

Julio had parked his truck on the street. A police cruiser was parked in front of him and he was intercepted and pulled into the cruiser before he could get in his truck.

Burkhardt waited at the open door at the bottom of his stairway. At first the was afraid he was waiting in vein, but then he heard the commotion in the bushes at the back of the building, leading down to the stream. Two policemen emerged from the undergrowth. One of them was holding a gun out by the trigger hole. They held a wriggly man between them. He was handcuffed in back. He glared at Burkhardt.

“If you relied on being in Nags Head for an alibi, Don, you shouldn’t have been working in the kitchen at the Stanfield Inn at the same time—and you certainly shouldn’t have been coming out into the dining room and letting the whole world know you hadn’t left the area.”

Don Field lunged for Burkhardt, growling, “They shouldn’t have messed with Julio. He’s mine. You shouldn’t be messing with him either.” But the two cops had a good hold on him and pulled him back. At Burkhardt’s command they took him to the police cruiser parked in front of Julio’s truck and told a shocked Julio to come back to where the detective was standing.

Burkhardt’s thought in the meantime was that it wasn’t just Fouchet and Gordon who shouldn’t have been fucking Fields’s boyfriend if they wanted to remain alive, but also that it hadn’t been joyriders shooting at stop signs who had nearly tagged Gill Conner at his mailbox. Fields had tried to off him for sleeping with Julio as well. If they were able now to find the bullet that had grazed Conner’s head, chances were good they could match it to the gun that the chef had come to use on Burkhardt tonight. And now me too, the detective thought. The Cuban honey might be too damn hot, in fact. Men who fucked him had had too pay the ultimate price for doing so.

When Julio reached him, Burkhardt explained what had happened and why, including that it all fell in place when he saw that Fields hadn’t gone to Nags Head at all. He’d remained in the area and started popping off the other men Julio was going under.

“And you had me come out to the bar at the inn—”

“So that Fields would see us there together, yes. And that’s why I was so hands on with you there. I wanted him to know we were intimate—that we’d be leaving there to go off and fuck. I wanted him to see me as competition for your favors—just as Fouchet and Chance Gordon had been.” And as Conner and Turner were too, but hopefully with less disastrous results, he thought. “I wanted to flush him out—make him come after me too. And it worked.”

“So, it’s all my fault,” Julio said.

“Your fault for being too damn hot?” Burkhardt said. “I don’t think so. So, what do you want to do now? You want to go on home, or—”

Julio was looking up the staircase. “I don’t think I want to be alone tonight. Can I came back upstairs with you?”

Burkhardt grinned. “Why, of course you can. But one more thing to check first,” he said. He took out his cellphone and made a call. “Thanks, Steve. You can come on in now,” he said, breathing a sigh of relief as they climbed the stairs to his apartment—and his bedroom, and his bed. He was palming Julio’s nice butt cheek as they mounted the stairs and he prepared to mount the Cuban honey again. The cop he’d sent out to Jack’s farm had confirmed that Jack Turner had returned. That was one less victim of Fields that Burkhardt had to mourn just because, like he himself, they couldn’t resist the magnetic heat of Julio Cortez.