Title: Rumors in the Air
By: angstytimelord
Pairing: Josef Kostan/Mick St. John
Fandom: Moonlight
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: 1,707
Disclaimer: This is entirely a product of my own imagination, and I make no profit from it. I do not own the lovely Josef Kostan or Mick St. John, unfortunately. Please do not sue.***
Mick used his key to let himself into Josef's penthouse, a smile on his lips as he entered the living room. He hadn't seen his boyfriend all day, and he was looking forward to spending a long night making love to Josef and falling asleep with the other man in his arms.
All he'd been able to think about for the entire day -- and last night, when he'd slept in the freezer at his own apartment -- had been the night that he would have with Josef, just the two of them, making love until they both wanted nothing more than to sleep.
As soon as he saw the look on Josef's face when his boyfriend turned from where he was standing at the picture window, Mick knew that his hopes for a quiet night of lovemaking were probably history. Josef looked angry; more than that, he looked disturbed.
"Mick, there's been a .... development." He gestured towards a file folder that lay on the coffee table, a look on his face that was somewhere between annoyance and utter disgust. "Look at that. It's got some pictures in it that you might want to see."
"What is it?" Mick moved towards the coffee table, sitting down on the couch and reaching for the manila folder. "It can't be that bad, or you'd be out there going after somebody. I'd have had a message to meet you at the tar pits in La Brea.'
It was a small attempt at a joke, but it fell flat. Josef didn't laugh, or even smile. "If it was something that I could've taken care of as easily as that, it would already be done. But I think this is something we're going to have a little more trouble with, Mick."
Mick didn't hesitate for another moment; he spread the folder open on the coffee table in front of him, his eyes widening when he saw the pictures that it contained. He lifted two of them up, squinting at them as though they would change into something else if he looked closely enough.
Pictures of himself and Josef. In bed. Not only in bed, but on the beach, kissing, holding hands, obviously involved with each other. There were even a few pictures of the two of them here, in the living room of Josef's penthouse -- naked and embracing.
How had anyone managed to get pictures of them in bed? It was obvious that they had been taken with a very sophisticated telephoto lens -- and also obvious from the angle of the pictures that the view into their bedroom window was far too personal.
The pictures were beautiful, really -- works of art that Mick would feel good about if someone hadn't taken them without permission. This was the first time he'd had his privacy violated in this way, and it felt much more creepy and invasive than he'd thought it would.
The pictures of them in the living room, making love in front of the picture windows -- those were the most invasive ones. They had thought they were safe there, that Josef's penthouse provided them with enough security to feel free to do what they wanted in the sanctity of home.
But apparently, that wasn't true at all, Mick thought wryly, shuffling through the rest of the pictures. Most of them were fairly innocuous; it was only the shots of them naked and making love that could cause a sensation if they were released to the press.
"Somebody sent these to you and threatened to go public with them, didn't they?" Mick asked, looking up at his boyfriend. Josef was pacing back and forth in front of the window, his hands clasped behind his back, a scowl on his handsome features.
"Yeah," he said, the single word clipped and curt. "There have been rumors in the air about me being gay for a long time -- ever since you and I started seeing each other. But they were never substantiated, because I'd made it known that we were friends."
"So now, people know that we're more than friends." Mick shrugged, raising an eyebrow. "I don't see what the problem is, Josef. It's not like there aren't gay people in every facet of the world. It's not going to make your business go to ruin for people to know you're gay, is it?"
Josef shook his head, his scowl deepening. "No. But that's not what bothers me. What's getting to me is that I don't know who took these pictures. I don't know how they managed to get such good shots of us. And they're not photoshopped, Mick. They're not faked."
Mick lifted the pictures of himself and Josef in front of the window, himself buried deep inside his lover, to stare at them again. No, these pictures definitely weren't faked. He knew every inch of Josef's body -- and he was definitely looking at his boyfriend.
"It's going to make things a little uncomfortable for you if you're outed, but that's something we can live through," Mick told Josef, wanting to soothe his boyfriend. "Josef, I can find out who took these. And get rid of them, if you want me to."
Josef turned to him, almost snarling. "No. I'm going to be the one to get rid of this bastard. In my own way. Don't try to stop me on this, Mick. Whoever this is, they've invaded my privacy. They've made me feel like I can't be free to do what I want in my own home."
Mick nodded, taking a deep breath and closing his eyes. Truth be told, he felt violated, too, but obviously not as deeply as Josef did. He would have to tread lightly on this subject -- but he didn't want to stop his lover from carrying out whatever revenge he had planned.
The rumors that had been circulating about Josef's sexuality had probably been the impetus for whoever this person was to take these pictures. It was a shame that this idiot didn't realize just what they'd gotten themselves into by trying to cross Josef Kostan.
They obviously didn't know what Josef was. They thought they could blackmail him, get money out of him -- but if they'd known that he was a vampire, they would have had a much bigger secret to hold over his head. Mick was sure they didn't know.
If they did, and if this was some kind of trap to snare Josef into a much more dangerous situation than it appeared to be on the surface .... Mick could feel all of his paranoia, as well as his protective instincts, coming to the fore.
He put down the pictures, looking soberly up at Josef. "Do you think this could be a trap, trying to pull you into something by using these pictures as bait? If they know you're a vamp, you can't handle this alone, Josef. They could be prepared to deal with you."
"Those rumors in the air about me are what started this," Josef said with a sigh, sitting down on the couch next to Mick. "I don't care if I'm outed to the public. It's not going to hurt my business. I just don't want you caught in the middle of any kind of media frenzy about me."
Mick shook his head head, smiling wryly. "I've been there before, remember? When I played bodyguard to that actress who got herself killed. It's not like I haven't been an object of media scrutiny into my love life before. Only then, it was false. This time, it's true."
Josef's face relaxed into a semblance of a smile. "Yeah, I'd forgotten about that," he admitted, sounding a little less stressed. "It's not that I care whether or not people know that I"m with you, Mick. I'm not ashamed of you. It's that my privacy has been invaded."
"What worries me is the fact that whoever took these pictures might know what we are," Mick said, his tone sober and serious. "We've got to find out how much they know about us before you put them out of the way for good, Josef."
"I'll find out," Josef told him, his voice like steel. Mick almost shivered at his tone; he wouldn't want to tangle with Josef when he was angry enough to sound like that. Whoever the person was who'd taken those pictures, they didn't stand a chance.
"Remember, it's probably not just one person," Mick cautioned, hoping that his boyfriend was going to go about this carefully and not just go after the photographer indiscriminately. "There could very well be others behind him. You have to be careful and watch your back, Josef."
"Don't worry, I will." Josef sighed, shaking his head. "Mick, don't worry so much. I took care of myself for a long time before you were in my life, you know. I'm not going to take any unnecessary risks. I'll find this guy and dispose of him, and hopefully it'll be over."
"And if it's not?" Mick's blue gaze held Josef's, his worry for his boyfriend apparent in his eyes. "I don't want you doing anything crazy, Josef. If there's more than one person behind this, that means there could be more to the situation than meets the eye."
"If that's the case, then we're just going to have to be a lot more careful about what we do in public," Josef sighed, closing his eyes and leaning his head back against the couch cushions. "And I'm going to try to make this place a little more private, too."
Mick nodded, feeling uneasy, but knowing that there wasn't much he could do about it. It seemed as if those rumors in the air about Josef had come full circle, and now that they'd circulated publicly, they were coming back around to snap at their heels.***