The Devil's Brew (Sinners, #2.5) by Rhys Ford
To the San Diego Crewe: Andrea, Felix, and Steve.
This one’s for you guys.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
BECAUSE MY life as a writer never would have started and continued without these people: Penn, Lea, Tamm, and Jenn (The Five), as well as Ree, Lisa, and Ren.
There is a huge kiss and love to my Guinea Pigs and Beta Readers. There is so much I owe you and I can’t even begin to thank you. Love you all. And of course, the San Diego Crewe.
THE DEVIL’S BREW
A kiss in the moonlight
A slip of tongue between my lips
Bitter salt in my mouth,
The taste of sex in my veins
Stronger than sour mash
Harder than liquid steel
Your hands on my skin,
Pouring fire into my veins
—“The Devil’s Brew”
MIKI EYED Damien suspiciously. His best friend was leaning over a glass case, staring down at rows of sparkling watches, and shaking his head at the salesman reaching for a diamond-encrusted timepiece.
“Nah, Sionn’s not like that,” Damien muttered. “Something solid. Not too heavy, but it has to have some weight on it. Good quality. Not flash.”
“Walmart has some Seiko watches, I believe. Perhaps that will be more your style, sir.” The man sniffed.
Miki rolled his eyes and took a step away from the counter. Damie’s entire body stiffened, and he knew that cue well. Stepping away seemed like a damned fucking good idea, and if he’d known the sales guy was going to be an asshole, he’d have brought a tarp with him to spread out over the floor.
“Too bad about the carpet,” Miki muttered to an older woman with a nametag attached to her lapel. Her overly painted mouth dropped open an inch, as if she were about to ask a question, but she stopped when she caught a good look at Miki. Her lips parted again, but the only sound coming out of her mouth was a high-pitched, whistling sigh.
It was soon lost beneath the cut-glass sharpness of Damie’s Brit-tinged snark.
“Look, asshat—” Damie didn’t get a chance to get wound up. The woman was quick; Miki had to give her that. Despite the distance between them and her pencil-high stilettos, she practically flew across the carpet and slid in between Damien and the salesman, a ring on her hand hitting the glass case hard enough to make it chime.
The Giants probably wished they had her to cover second base, because she could move.
“Gary, I’ll take it from here.” The look she gave the man behind the counter was worthy of an Ark of the Covenant opening with damnation hot on the trails of hellfire. Caught in her withering glare, he slunk away, disappearing into the shadows of a service desk near the door. “Let me see if I can’t help you find something, Mr. Mitchell. Perhaps a Rolex?”
The watch perusal lasted too long for Miki’s thin patience, and he rubbed his Converse on the store’s dark blue rug. If he’d known Damien wanted to go to a pricy jewelry store, he wouldn’t have worn his most comfortable—and torn—pair of jeans or Kane’s threadbare Finnegan’s Pub rugby shirt. It was bad enough he’d been dragged through the stacked concrete tiers of the high-end mall. What made everything worse was knowing he didn’t belong.
Because he never really belonged.
Damien didn’t have that problem. He could fit in as easily at the Wet Queens bathhouse as he did among the diamond set, shifting his behavior and language to what he needed it to be. Even dressed in early rocker, something about Damien set people at ease, assuring them he was okay to be any damned place he wanted to be.
Gary had been an aberration. Fucker was lucky the woman stepped in, because Damien didn’t like being shoved aside as if he were trash. Unlike Damie, Miki knew trash was pretty much what he was and tried not to pay attention to his best friend’s ranting to the contrary.
“Don’t stick your dick in or argue with crazy,” Miki reminded himself while his best friend described what type of watch he wanted to buy his lover. Hoping to sneak a peek at a price tag, Miki was horrified to discover nothing in the cases actually listed a price. “Jesus Christ, we’re in a If you have to fucking ask, you can’t afford it joint. What the fucking hell is Damie thinking?”
They were definitely smack dab in the middle of crazy.
“Hey, whatcha looking at?” Damie snuck up behind him and put his chin on Miki’s shoulder, peering down at the case Miki’d been staring at. “Those are tennis bracelets. Really?”
“Who the hell wears shit like this when they play tennis?” Miki rolled his shoulder, dislodging his friend. “And who the fuck do we know that even plays tennis?”
“I can play tennis,” Damie offered up, and Miki huffed his disgust. “What? Nothing wrong with playing a sport.”