Gambling On Maybe by Fae Sutherland

Dedication
    For all the boys who are just a little bit "too much."
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    6
    Gambling On Maybe
    by Fae Sutherland
    GAMBLING ON MAYBE
    Sergeant Stephen Miranda had never seen so much glitter in one place before. The clubs all up and down the strip in downtown Phoenix were closing and the sidewalks were rapidly filling with all manner of patrons, from the slightly tipsy to the staggering drunk.
    Normally, that wasn't anything to bring the Phoenix Metro police to the scene, but there'd been a report of a disturbance in front of one of the nightclubs and he'd been on his way home and nearby, so here Stephen was, playing mediator between a six-foot tall, blonde-wigged drag performer and her apparently unfaithful boyfriend.
    The boyfriend was the one sporting a black eye.
    Halfway through trying to figure out whether either one wanted to press charges, the boyfriend said what must have been just the right thing, and Stephen shook his head with a chuckle as the two made up at light speed and left him with no reason to linger.
    He turned, tucking his notepad back into his pocket, to find he had company. In the form of a small, gamin-faced young man leaning against the side of Stephen's patrol car with a smile on his pink-glossed lips that seemed far too worldly for such an otherwise innocent-looking face.
    "Can I help you?" he asked, glancing around briefly before settling his gaze on the young man again. Maybe five-six if Stephen counted the platform-style boots he wore, and he 7
    Gambling On Maybe
    by Fae Sutherland
    couldn't be a day over twenty-one. Was he even legal for any of the clubs down here?
    The imp smiled wider. "I bet you can." Slim fingers waved in the direction the couple had gone in their cab of escape.
    "She was my ride."
    Stephen's brows lifted. "The drag queen?"
    That got him a roll of heavily lined and thickly lashed brown eyes. "She's not a drag queen. She's post-op."
    "Oh. Sorry about that."
    A quick lift of one bare shoulder—bare because the young man's shredded black mesh top didn't seem to feel like covering him completely—or at all, really—was in its job description. "It's okay. Not like she flashed her vajay at you so you'd know."
    Stephen didn't have time to recover from that shockingly bald statement before he was favored with another sparkling bright smile, with just a touch too much something in it.
    "Anyway, she was my DD, designated driver? And you're an officer of the law, right? Do good deeds and all that?"
    Stephen chuckled. "I try."
    "Awesome!" the young man chirped, pushing away from the side of the car. "I live in Scottsdale." He promptly opened the passenger side door and hopped into the patrol car.
    Stephen blinked, brows snapping together as he reached down to stop the door from shutting. "Excuse me, young man—"
    "Zach." A wide, cheeky grin. "But you can call me anything you want."
    "I'm going to have to ask you to get out of the carEZach."
    8
    Gambling On Maybe
    by Fae Sutherland
    Slim legs, as bare as Zach's shoulder, folded under him on the seat, apparently making himself comfortable for the rideEthe one that wasn't happening. "Well, I liquidated all my assets into the economy—code for did too many shots of peppermint Schnapps—so unless you want me to driveE"
    Zach tilted his head to look up at him with a cajoling look aided by alcohol-flushed cheeks and slightly too-bright eyes.
    "Come onEyou ran off my ride, so the least you can do is make sure I get home in one piece."
    Stephen hesitated another few seconds, brows furrowing, before he sighed. Zach must have known what that meant because he beamed. Stephen shook his head with a sigh as he shut the door and came around to the driver's side to climb behind the wheel.
    "You should not just get in people's cars that way, you know."
    Zach laughed, leaning forward to fiddle with the touch screen of Stephen's onboard computer. "Please, you're a cop.
    And you didn't look all disgusted by Shayna, so I figure