Private investigator Ian visits his friend unannounced, only to discover the man lying in bed, not asleep but dead. Ian resolves to find out how his friend died and, if he was murdered, to bring the killer to justice. But the details of the case are bizarre: the door of the condo unit is locked and the only other occupant is a bodybuilder, Horst, found sitting on the living room couch, half asleep or drugged. Ian calls 911 and the cops, when video footage showing no one entered or left the condo around the time of death, fixate on Horst as the most likely suspect. Ian is convinced Horst is innocent and offers his services to help the police solve the mystery of his friend’s death. But the situation is complicated, not only by the self-contradictory nature of the physical evidence, but by the fact that Ian increasingly finds himself drawn to Horst. Worse, the lead police detective shows increasing signs of interest in Ian himself. Love and death become strangely intertwined, their resolution not easily discovered. Is Horst as innocent as Ian believes? Can Ian help solve the locked-room mystery?

Bliss

I rubbed oil onto his back, my fingers sliding over his skin, tingling with pleasure. Accompanying this there was an electric current produced by the touch. It was slight but persistent, and it passed into and through my body, coalescing most intensely, as usual, between my legs.


At first, I didn’t press into the skin much. I just spread the oil and worked it into the surface, and savoring the warmth of tactile contact. But when I got to the line of muscle that runs from the ball of the shoulder up to the neck, I began to press. This was an area, I could feel, where the big man kept tension. After one or two audible gasps, he groaned quietly and surrendered to the process, seeming to sinking slightly further into the mattress. At the same time, he let out his breath completely, and seemed to relax into a different state.


Chapter 21