The Ninth Man by Dorien Grey

of the garage, Gary Miller was even more spectacular than I’d thought. His hair was either blond or prematurely gray—whichever, it was perfect for him—his eyes Mediterranean blue. About six-two, he looked like something Michelangelo might have sculpted on one of his better days. His tan made him appear to have been spray-painted café-au-lait; the fine gold hairs on his arms did everything but sparkle.
    In short: Be still, my beating heart!
    We extricated the bags from the car, and I followed him out of the garage and up a flight of stairs into the long courtyard. Apartment D proved to be on the ground floor, and the complex a series of unconnected buildings joined by a suspended walkway at the second-floor level. It would be relatively easy to come and go on the ground level without being seen.
    Once inside the apartment, Miller flicked on the lights. I followed him into the kitchen, where we deposited the grocery bags on a cobalt-blue ceramic counter. He rummaged quickly through the bags, took out a few perishable things and popped them into the freezer.
    “I can put the rest of this stuff away later. Come on into the living room and sit down.”
    The living room was everything Rholfing’s was not. The key to Miller’s lifestyle was apparently quiet masculinity and innate good taste. The walls were hung with paintings I’d have given an arm for—one, in particular, a nude male study in browns and beiges.
    “Alan did that,” Miller said, noting my interest. I didn’t have to ask who the model had been. “That…” He indicated a portrait of a rather brooding young man as dark as Miller was fair. “…is Alan. I should get rid of it but somehow just can’t bring myself to do it. Alan was very talented. Can I get you a drink? Please sit.”
    I settled onto the chocolate brown corduroy sofa.
    “A drink would be fine. Bourbon and water or bourbon and Seven, if you have it.” Normally, I switched between Old Fashioneds and Manhattans, but I didn’t want to put him to the trouble.
    “Sure thing,” he said, moving to a small wet bar in the dining area just off the living room. “I’m a Manhattan man, myself.”
    I decided it was too late to change my request, so I said nothing.
    While he made the drinks and took a short side trip to the kitchen for ice, I took in the rest of the apartment within eye range. It was the kind of place I wished I lived in. You know how it is—you’re perfectly happy with your own place, but then you see one of those furnished model homes, and…
    “If it’s too weak, let me know.”
    I looked from the full glass about a foot in front of my face to a strong, tanned hand, along a beautifully muscled arm carpeted with tiny golden hairs to a biceps-hugging T-shirt, across a wide expanse of chest over a wisp of chest hair curling over the neck of the shirt, up a bronze-pillar neck and over a matinee-idol chin (cleft included), into a face that was just too fucking beautiful for any one human being to have.
    He smiled, as if at some private joke.
    “I have that effect on some people,” he said, obviously reading my mind. But he was still smiling, and I knew he wasn’t being vain—just truthful.
    “Sorry,” I said, blushing furiously, I’m sure.
    “Hey, don’t be,” he said, sitting halfway down the sofa from me. “My face, as they say, is my fortune. As far as I’m concerned, it’s just a gift from my parents. But without it I’d have to get an honest job.”
    The silence while we sipped our drinks was broken only by the clink of ice against glass, and when I looked again at Miller, he was staring at me, no longer smiling.
    “Now, what about Alan?”
    “I’m not exactly sure,” I admitted. “I’m working on a case that really doesn’t involve Mr. Rogers—”
    “Alan,” he corrected.
    “Alan directly. But I felt he might know some people I’m trying to locate. Now that he’s…uh…dead, I thought perhaps you might be able to help me. How long had you and