by Layla Reyne
“Are you on board with this plan?” Chris said as he approached.
“Did you hear me object?”
“I didn’t hear you say much of anything.” Chris rested carefully back against the bike. An exercise in balance, and in restraint, every muscle in his body screaming to press along Hawes’s, to claim another taste of home, but he needed to make his point. Needed to be sure. “I need to know you’re on the same page. That we’re in this together.”
Hawes leaned his head back and stared at the sky. “It would be a tactical error, keeping you out of the loop again.”
“Fuck the tactical reasons.” The frustrated bark in Chris’s voice jerked Hawes’s gaze back to him. “I’m talking about keeping you alive. Because yesterday can’t happen again.”
“You know what I am. I know what you are. Let’s not be naive. Death is always a risk.”
Chris hung his head, curled one hand around a handlebar, and the other around the leather seat, and inhaled deeply.
“I don’t want to lose you either,” Hawes whispered from across the alley, voice as tortured as Chris’s insides. Full of the same storm of emotions Chris was fighting, brought on by realities that couldn’t be denied. Acknowledged, then, but so too had been what was at stake for both of them.
Fuck restraint. Chris pushed off the bike and closed the distance between them. He bent his head and swirled his tongue in the deep groove between Hawes’s neck and shoulder. “Did those other feds know how you like to be kissed, right here?”
Hawes whimpered and threaded a hand through Chris’s hair, holding him there. Chris enjoyed the tugging hold while he nipped at Hawes’s collarbone, then soothed the freckled skin with his tongue. But as he trailed a line of kisses to Hawes’s ear, he grasped Hawes’s wrist, withdrew his hand from his hair, and pinned his arm to the wall. “Did they know how you like to let go?” He rolled his hips, and Hawes rocked back.
“They didn’t know me like this. No one has.” He leaned in for a kiss, and Chris dodged. “Dante, please.”
Chris pressed against him, a rolling wave of need cresting from thighs, to groin, to chest, to the breath across Hawes’s cheek and the hand tangled with his. And at each point of contact, Hawes rolled back with the same need. “Did they know what it’s like to have all this writhing under them?” He kissed down Hawes’s cheekbone and snaked a hand between them to cup Hawes through his slacks. “What a fucking gift all this is?”
A tremble wracked Hawes’s body, and he froze. Chris leaned back far enough to see his face, afraid he’d said or done something wrong. But it wasn’t anger or confusion staring back at him. Instead, Hawes’s eyes were wide and full of chilly sorrow. “I’m no one’s gift. A curse maybe…”
“Wrong.” Chris kissed him hard, blasting heat to chip away at that damnable ice. “And even if you were a curse, I’d have no interest in breaking it.”
“You’re just going to break me.”
“Good, then we’ll be even.”
Hawes laughed, deep and rumbly, breaking the tension, and breaking any hope Chris had of holding back. He crushed his mouth against Hawes’s, and from there it was a race to see who could break the other faster. Pants ripped open, hands dove into boxers, fists wrapped around cocks, stroking each other in the darkness, the cool fog curling around them, hiding them in their own little world of heat and desperation.
It was reckless, sharing this here in a public alley, doing this at all, for both of them, but putting on the brakes was no longer an option. And when Hawes took both of them in hand, exerting control, Chris scrabbled at the wall on either side of Hawes’s head, struggling to hold himself up against the onslaught of pleasure. Gasping between frantic, hungry kisses, he thrust into Hawes’s fist, against his long, hard cock, foot on the gas, speeding them toward orgasm.
When they came together, Chris’s hand covering Hawes’s, clasped around their cocks, the both of them rutting and spilling over their tangled fingers, “Even” was on Hawes’s lips, and a prayer was on Chris’s, a fervent wish that this spell never be broken.
Chapter Fourteen
Chris’s head was still spinning the next morning from the surreal meeting with the Madigans—and the surreal after-encounter with Hawes in the alley. So much so that he would’ve fucked up Mia’s omelet if not for Marco snatching the bag of chopped ham out of his hand.
“She’s a vegetarian this week, remember?” his nephew said.
“Good catch, kid.” He reclaimed the bag and dumped the remaining meat in the other skillet, making Marco a double-stuffed Denver.
Marco laughed. “Thinking you need coffee as much as I do.” He reached for the pot, and Gloria swooped in, batting his hand down.
“The answer is no,” she said.
“Ang is just going to stop and get us venti iced lattes on the way to Marco’s day camp,” Mia said from the table, where she sat with an e-reader propped in front of her. “Her favorite coffee shop is in that neighborhood.”
“But I didn’t serve it to you,” Gloria said. “Your mom’s rules.”
Marco made a Vanna White worthy sweep of the room with his eyes and arms. “I don’t see Mom, do you?”
Chris bumped his hip. “Go sit down, Plato. Not the time to argue.”
Mia rolled her eyes. “He has so lived up to that nickname.”
Laughter broke the tension, but not Chris’s concern, which had been piqued by Marco’s throwaway comment. Where was Celia?
He slid each omelet out of its skillet and onto a plate and carried them over to the table, where he slipped a ten to each of the kids. Marco gave him a fist bump, Mia a smile. He’d take that and the way they happily dug into their food.
He returned to the cutting boards and utensils in the sink and his mother’s knowing grin. “I saw that.”
“Like Mia said, they’re gonna get it anyway. Angelica shouldn’t have to foot the bill. And she made me a box of mistletoe cannoli.”
“And the truth comes out.” Gloria drained her first cup, then refilled it and one for him too. He finished filling the sink with soap and water, then wiped his hands off and accepted the offered brew. She added, “Thanks for helping out this morning.”
He lowered his voice so the kids wouldn’t hear him. “You said your gout was acting up, but you’re moving around just fine, so why am I really here?” She glanced over her shoulder at the kids, confirming Chris’s suspicion. “Where’s Celia?”
Before she could answer, a car horn blew outside, and his niblings clicked into fast-forward, shoving last bites into their mouths and stuffing their scattered daily detritus into bookbags.
“Dishes in the sink,” Gloria said, and they scurried over to drop their plates in the soapy water.
Marco gave them both a hug. Mia gave Gloria’s cheek a kiss and Chris a wave of her e-reader, and then they were gone, the slam of doors and the squeal of Angelica’s tires outside making Chris laugh. Of all the Perris, his cousin had the heaviest foot and the speeding tickets to prove it.
Chris returned to the sink and dipped his hands beneath the suds. “You didn’t answer my question,” he said to his mom as he scrubbed dishes. “Where’s Celia?”
“Right here. And I’m fine.”
He turned his head the opposite direction, toward his sister’s voice, and thanked the saints that his hands—no, his fists—were hidden under the water. His sister was clearly not fine. Her slight frame drowned in the folds of their dad’s old flannel robe, but Chris supposed it gave her some comfort. Some protection against the reality of her black eye, busted lip, and hobbled gait as she slowly crossed the living room toward them.
Mia’s worry from the other night had come to pass.
“I’m gonna fucking kill him.” So much for keeping his anger in check.
“Don’t,” she said, gingerly lowering herself into the chair Mia had vacated. “He’s not worth it. I’d rather you help me get a restraining order.”
About fucking time. “Done.” He grabbed the last di
sh, rinsed it off, and set it in the rack to drip dry. “I know a lawyer. It’s not what she does, but she knows everyone. She’ll make it happen.” He figured this was right up Helena’s alley, in more ways than one. And Kane would be more than happy to enforce said order. “He won’t come near you again, Cee.”
Gloria set a steaming mug in front of her, then claimed the chair beside her. “And you won’t go back to him either.”
Celia looked away from them, swallowing hard. With a clear view of her blackened eye, of the finger bruises on her neck that her hair had hidden, Chris had to wrap a towel around his fists to keep from punching through the wall. “Where is he? So we’ll know where to serve him.”
Celia laughed, tired and bitter. “So you can go beat him up? No, not that I have any idea where he went…after…” She gestured at her face, then cinched the robe tighter around herself.
Fuck, the last thing she needed right now was him in rage mode too. He unwound the cloth, took a deep breath, and sat in the chair across from them. “I know this is tough—”
“What do you know about this?” Celia snapped. Her dark eyes sparked to match, but not with anger, with hurt and regret. “You’re never here.”
Chris raised his hands, palms out. “You’re right. I have been gone too much, but I’m hoping to change that.” Aside from the momentary panic when he’d thought Hawes was dead, his hope and commitment to stay had only solidified over the past week and a half. He wanted—needed—to stay. For whatever this thing was with Hawes and for his family.
But his sister didn’t look happy about that declaration. She cast her gaze aside again and swallowed hard.
“You don’t want me here?” Chris said.
“Of course I want you here.”
“Then what is it?”
She righted her gaze, and there were tears in her dark eyes, one escaping and racing down her bruised cheek. “She looked so much like you.” Her voice wobbled—“It’s my fault”—and broke, Celia with it, as she covered her face and cried into her hands.
Chris’s heart broke too, for all that they’d lost, and for the weight of it that Celia had been carrying, because he’d run from it, hadn’t been around to help her shoulder the load, to tell her she didn’t need to shoulder it at all. This was the damage he’d done.
He rose, circled the table, and knelt by his sister’s side. “Fuck, Cee, I’m sorry,” he said, and when she wouldn’t give him her eyes, he lightly grasped her chin and rotated her gaze to him. “You are the last person I blame for what happened to Ro. If you hadn’t been driving, we would have lost you and Mia too.” He cupped her unbruised cheek. “Please stop blaming yourself.”
She hid her face in his hand. “I keep replaying that day. If I’d done something different, if I’d not taken that shortcut…”
“Stop.” He rose and gently pulled her into a hug. “It’s been ten years, Cee. Stop punishing yourself. Stop letting him punish you.” Because that’s what she’d been doing. Taking the hits because she thought she deserved them. He held her as tightly as her injuries would allow. “Your whole life has been stuck there, honey. Ro wouldn’t want that.”
The damn broke, her sobs coming loud and ragged, and the tension finally, finally, flowed from her body. Chris held his sister like he should have more often the past decade, not the awkward hugs of strangers, but of two people who’d been best friends growing up, who’d always had each other’s backs.
Gloria scooted closer, rubbing her daughter’s back. “Everything changed that day. We lost Ro, but we also lost you.”
Celia drew back, wiping the tears from under her eyes and the wetness from under Chris’s eyes as well. “We lost you too that day,” she said to him. “Ro wouldn’t want that either.”
Everything had changed ten years ago. He’d lost the center of his world, been set adrift, and almost turned the lights out on himself. But Izzy had found him and changed the course of his life. And he’d been punishing himself ever since. Jumping from one undercover assignment to another, pretending to be someone he wasn’t, so he could block out all he’d lost. It had worked when he’d needed it to, but now? Being back here with his family, being with Hawes, a little of the old Christopher and a little of the new Dante were blending together—someone who was the same but not, the reality of himself now, and he was looking for a port to come home to, but the fog made it hard to navigate. Fog from all the years spent thinking himself weak in that moment of darkness, from the mistakes he’d made. Because he also felt responsible for not being there then, and now. And the past three years, he’d thrown himself into the hunt for Izzy’s killer. Another distraction, another act of retribution and self-blame.
Retribution. Self-blame.
Chris froze, the words echoing in his head, shifting his frame of reference as puzzle pieces of a different sort fell into place.
Everything changed that night.
The night of Isabella’s death.
Because Hawes felt responsible.
Or because he was responsible?
Chris was glad he’d taken the Hog to his mom’s place. It had made navigating back home easier. Faster. Less time for him to jump to conclusions without first reexamining the evidence from the night of Izzy’s death. Reconsidering that night that had changed everything from a different perspective. Not from his own, as an outside investigator. Not from his partner’s, as the victim. From Hawes’s. As the what?
Just like Chris’s life had changed the day Ro had died, Hawes’s life, and the trajectory of his organization, had changed the night Isabella died. Chris had witnessed those changes in action, had counted on them in revealing certain information to Hawes, and was working with Hawes to protect them from those who wanted to go back to the old ways.
Under Hawes’s regime, targets had to be vetted and collateral damage eliminated. Lofty morals for an assassin descended from parents who, by all accounts, were efficient killing machines, much like Helena. From a grandmother who wielded words like Holt did his keystrokes. And a grandfather who’d built an empire on fear, much like the Prince of Killers moniker Hawes hated but stoked when needed.
A new regime that had come into being after Izzy’s death.
Why? Izzy asked in Chris’s head. What changed for him that night?
Why did Hawes, like Celia, feel responsible? He wasn’t exactly punishing himself like Chris’s sister, but he’d changed his whole life as a result of that night.
Chris paced the study as he talked it out with his partner. “Because his family was threatened. Infiltrated by the ATF. He didn’t want it to happen again.”
Except that wasn’t right. Genuine surprise and betrayal had flashed across Hawes’s face when Chris had revealed his and Izzy’s true identities. He hadn’t known last week, much less three years ago, that his organization had been so deeply infiltrated by the ATF. That wasn’t the reason.
What’s the other side of that coin?
“He thought you were an innocent.” He turned on his heel to face the collage of crime scene photos and notes. Izzy’s and Zander Rowe’s sheet-covered bodies on the rain-slicked street. The reflection of blue and red lights, evidence markers, and two pistols. “One of his employees, a secretary, who was trying to defend herself, killed by one of his lieutenants.” Hawes cared about the legit organization as much as the illegal one. He’d take it personally, bear the brunt of the responsibility, if one of those employees was unwittingly caught in the crossfire.
What crossfire?
It sure as fuck hadn’t been a domestic disturbance. While evidence at the scene pointed to that easily enough—Izzy’s mangled wrists, the bruises on her face—none of Izzy’s notes indicated Rowe had been abusive. And none of the Madigan siblings would have put up with that sort of behavior had they gotten so much as a whiff of it.
Fuck, how did he make the pieces of this puzzle fit? What was he missing? It was all there. He just had to figure out what tied it all together.
Hands on his head, he rotat
ed slowly around the room, halting in front of the current investigation notes.
The explosives.
“That was your mission. You found something. Is that why Rowe killed you?”
They were connected to all this, and Hawes was doing everything he could to get the organization out of that business. Too much of a risk, too high a cost, he’d said last week. The definition of collateral damage.
No collateral damage.
“That’s what you were.” Not a mole, not caught up in a domestic disturbance. No, as far as Hawes knew, she’d been Rowe’s girlfriend, and that night, she’d been in the wrong place, at the wrong time. “Unacceptable collateral damage.”
Chris rushed the desk full of notes and began pulling sheets of paper and tacking them to the wall in a separate collage. Repositioned crime scene photos to go with them. The things that never quite added up. A Madigan company sedan at the scene, but no hair or fiber from Izzy or Rowe inside it. Tire tracks and skid marks that didn’t match the sedan. That were more likely a van or truck. Like the van loaded with explosives that had tried to kill Hawes after Papa Cal’s funeral. He snatched the bank record showing Amelia’s deposit to Zander Rowe and added it to the story.
“Rowe was a traitor. Diverting a van of explosives. And you found out.” The last report she’d filed—the night she’d died—was that someone else was trying to buy the explosives. She’d found out, and the neo-Nazi who died Tuesday was at the top of her suspects list.
No, the neo-Nazi who was killed. By…
“Hawes. He found out too.”
Which would be unacceptable to the then prince. The potential for collateral damage—to his family, their empire, and his city—would be too high.
What’d he do, Dante?
Ice crept through his veins as the jagged puzzle pieces began to match up, began to fit into a picture that was still blurry, but which some inherent part of him knew he didn’t want to see. Not the picture of home he’d been putting together. A nightmare instead, like the one Hawes suffered—replayed—nightly.
