Los Angeles Noir - Denise Hamilton [50]
Ron would be furious when he found out Ben had cancelled on his agent, so Ben decided to delay the inevitable as long as possible by entering through the side gate instead of the front door. Ben had spent the last 365 potential working days turning the backyard into a Zen meditation retreat, but he hadn’t done much of anything in it besides sneak the occasional cigarette. Squares of white gravel held rows of faux-bonsai trees and a stone Buddha sat cross-legged in the middle of the yard, a thin stream of water gurgling from a hole in the center of its bald head. Ron’s only contribution to the landscaping had been to repeatedly batter it with his gas-powered leaf blower, before one of the neighbors called to angrily remind him that gas-powered leaf blowers were illegal in the city of West Hollywood. That was Ron—ever successful in all of his business endeavors, he was convinced that this gave him license to remain ever defiant in the face of small rules designed to make other people comfortable.
Maybe I’ll sleep on the sofa, Ben thought. What on earth would he tell Ron if he woke up? Sorry, honey. I jeopardized my relationship with my agent so I could spend the night at Rudy’s. You remember Rudy’s, don’t you, honey? That trashy dance club you and I went to last Friday when we ran out of the things to say to each other at dinner? The one where you got a hard-on for that twinky little porn star they had dancing on the bar? I even pretended to be the progressive gay wife while you slid a five-dollar bill into his sweaty jock strap, remember?
When he closed his hand around the knob, Ben realized that the back door was slightly open. Like most of their friends, they had come to a specific agreement about sex outside of the relationship. Unlike most of their friends, however, they had both agreed not to have any. Suddenly, Ben realized that he had executed the kind of detective work a suspicious wife usually took weeks to plan—he had convinced his lover he would be out of town and had not given any indication that he was returning home early.
A fluid-filled groan came from the direction of the master bedroom, too low to be heard by anyone besides a startled lover hovering on the back steps. Ben was confident that Ron had made the sound, and in his mind’s eye, he saw the nubile young porn star from Rudy’s straddling Ron’s hairy chest, the kid’s hands gripping the headboard in front of him as he jammed his erection down Ron’s throat. Force-feeding was Ron’s favorite position and Ben had assumed it countless times, fearing the day when he would be too heavy for Ron to accommodate him without cursing. From what Ben could remember, the kid had almond-shaped blue eyes, enormous bleached teeth, and a compact body that was still one-quarter teenager. The night Ron tipped the kid so handsomely, Ben had gone online and found out that the kid’s professional name was Mike Ellis and his most recent credits included The Boners and Farewell My Daddy. In terms of output, the kid’s career was outpacing Ben’s two to nothing.
The bedroom door was open. His fingers going numb as he gripped the edge of the doorframe, Ben peered in and saw the lower half of his lover’s body, his back resting against the bed’s footboard, his legs splayed on the carpet in front of him. The white soles of his sneakers stared back at Ben like eyes without irises. Ron’s head and torso were blocked by the towering figure standing in front of him. The exertion of the guy’s thrusts drove his baseball cap back over his mop of shoulder-length hair. Ben couldn’t see the stranger’s hands but he figured they were gripping the back of Ron’s head.
Ben had left the back door open behind him. He stepped out of it, just as silently as he had entered, when Ron let out a sharper, more high-pitched sound that suggested the activities being carried out in the bedroom had