The Job (Auctioned)

by Cara Dee

  Well, fuck me. I swallowed a bout of nerves and suddenly understood the concept of butterflies in your stomach. This was what that felt like.

  He leaned in and rested his forehead to mine. “I constantly wanna get my arms around you,” he murmured. “When you laugh, it automatically makes me feel better.”

  I smiled unsurely, on the edge of my proverbial seat, and fidgeted with the drawstrings of his PJ bottoms.

  “So you tell me, Case,” he said quietly. “Think I’m in love?”

  A breath gusted out of me in a light laugh, and I shook my head at him. Because of how Boone he was. And to me, that was perfection.

  “It certainly sounds like it.” I cleared my throat and did my best not to respond with just a shit-eating grin.

  “It feels like it too.”

  I swallowed again, then pressed my lips to his and shifted my hands up to his neck. “I’m, uh—I’m good with that. Hella good.”

  “Yeah?” He smiled into the kiss and gripped my hips.

  “Yeah. I told you, I like it when we’re on the same page.” It was crazy how easy it was to tune out the popcorn popping on the stove once I inched back and got trapped in his affectionate gaze. “You want me to say it, don’t you?”

  “Damn right.” He grazed his teeth along my jaw until he reached my ear. “Let me hear the words, baby.”

  I shuddered. “I love you. All right? I love you.”

  He groaned under his breath and kissed me hard, his hands coming up to my neck. He controlled every movement and demanded every bit of my attention with that kiss.

  It wasn’t until I heard little feet padding closer—too close, too fast—that I broke away. Boone wrenched himself away too, but it was too late. When Ace appeared in the doorway, she came to a screeching halt, and her eyes went wide.

  Fuck.

  I coughed and scrubbed a hand over my mouth, and Boone backed off as much as he could in the tiny space. Jesus Christ, my ears hadn’t felt this hot since I was thirteen and Ma caught me smoking weed in the garage.

  “I-I j-just,” Ace stammered and pointed to the stove.

  Right. The stove. The popcorn was done. I cleared my throat and turned off the heat.

  “Sweetie, are you okay?” Boone asked carefully.

  She turned her gobsmacked stare to him instead and blinked. Slowly but surely, her cheeks flushed pink, and she went rigid. As if her mind was done confirming what she’d actually seen.

  “Yes,” she managed to get out. “No. I don’t—I-I don’t know.”

  Her breathing picked up quickly. Sensing that she was gonna get upset, I opened my mouth to suggest we sit down and talk, but before I could get a single word out, she bolted down the hall and closed herself into her room.

  I suppressed a sigh and hurried after her, Boone close behind me. I’d heard the door slam shut but not the lock being turned. Not that it mattered. We’d raised Ace to respect a closed door, partly because her father and I took on jobs where we didn’t respect closed doors, and there might be things—evidence, equipment—that we didn’t want her to see.

  She’d always been equally mindful and curious, and she knew when to stop prodding. We couldn’t thank her for that by plowing down the door now.

  I knocked instead. “Sweet pea, can you let us in? We’d like to talk to you. It’s nothing bad whatsoever. This is a good thing.”

  “It’s a wonderful thing,” Boone tacked on. “I think you’ll be happy once the surprise settles.”

  I pinched my lips together and waited for her response, and all I heard was her muffled crying. It shot a ton of worry through me, but I wanted to believe Boone was right. She was just surprised.

  “I can’t talk right now!” she sobbed. “I’m busy bawling my eyes out!”

  I winced and glanced at Boone. “She’ll be going through puberty in a few years.”

  “Don’t remind me,” he muttered. Then he addressed Ace again. “Can you tell us why you’re crying?”

  “I don’t know why,” she wailed. “Are you dying? Am I dying?” Her cries got louder, and now she could forget about us staying on this side of the door.

  I had fucking limits.

  Boone and I entered her room and found her on the bed, crying into her pillow.

  “No one’s dying, Paisley. Why on earth would you think so?” I carefully sat down on the edge of her bed and placed a hand on her back.

  Boone squatted down by her nightstand.

  She sniffled around a sob, refusing to come up for air. “When Elliott’s parents got divorced, they changed their minds and got back together, and then his mom died of cancer.”

  Oh Christ.

  “Elliott?” Boone mouthed.

  “From school,” I murmured. “But that’s not what’s happening here, Ace. Daddy and I were just stupid. We fought so much because we didn’t understand that we really liked each other.” He owed me a blow job or something for this. In reality, he’d been stupid. I’d been a genius all along—a genius who knew his feelings. “Plus, we grew up as brothers. It made us confused, and it was easier to lash out than talk about it.”

  Ace whimpered into her pillow. “That sounds so dumb.”

  That was one way of putting it.

  “It can’t come as a surprise that we’re dumb sometimes,” he reasoned.

  She sniffled some more, and she finally reemerged from her pillow. Her adorable face was streaked with tears, and her cheeks were red.

  I leaned toward her and brushed some hair away from her face. “We’ve got our shit together now, I promise. All we want is to be a family.”

  She chewed on her lip and wiped her eyes. “You’ll be like boyfriends instead of brothers?”

  I looked to Boone and found no support there. He was staring back at me with hesitation and question etched in his forehead, meaning it was up to me to decide how much we divulged to Ace.

  This was the girl who’d shoplifted her first candy bar at six, the girl who’d looked at Ma weirdly the time she’d spoken baby talk to Ace—we’d never fucking done that—the girl who called her teachers morons for asking stupid questions, and the girl who loved to tag along when her daddies worked. Last family reunion, she’d taught her uncle Darius that it was okay to steal from Big Corp and the government but never from the “little guy.” She’d also asked her uncle Ethan—another cousin of ours, who happened to run a gym—if he could teach her how to throat punch.

  She was a chip off the old block, which both terrified me and caused my chest to swell with pride. One day, Boone and I were going to get what was coming to us. The shit we’d pulled on Ma over the years was gonna come back and bite us in the ass, ’cause unlike our mom, we’d trained our daughter.

  So I reckoned I had my answer. I didn’t need to sugarcoat anything for Ace.

  I scooted a little closer and gathered her hands in mine. “We’ve never been great at following the law,” I started out by saying. A bit of an understatement. “So the odds of us giving a fraction of a fuck about society’s rules aren’t good. Boone and I will always be brothers, but we’re, first and foremost, your parents. Parents who happen to love each other very much.” I paused and took a lot of relief from the minuscule smile she was trying to hide. “Since we’re not actually related, we can be everything to each other.”

  Ace sniffled and wiped away the last of her tears.

  “How does that sound, baby?” Boone asked her.

  She withdrew her hands from mine and squirmed in her seat. “Good, maybe? It’s gonna be weird at first, I think. You’ve been fighting so much.” She started twisting a lock of hair between her fingers, a telltale sign she was thinking hard. “Are we gonna move?”

  I let Boone answer that one.

  “Hopefully.” He reached out and rubbed her knee over her fabulous Blossom PJs. “We need a bigger house, don’t we? With a yard and shit.”

  She was thawing, for sure. “Can we have a pool?”

  “Of course!” Boone said it like any other alte
rnative would’ve been offensive.

  “In a few weeks, they’ll go on sale everywhere,” I added. “We’ll need one big enough for Boone.”

  That earned me a punch in my calf, and that fucking hurt.

  “Asshole,” I gritted.

  “So some things won’t change,” Ace deadpanned.

  No, they wouldn’t, and she would find comfort in that, I was certain of it. Because she was a goofball too, and once she saw that my fights with Boone were no longer serious, she’d join in on the fun.

  “You feelin’ better now, hon?” I grabbed her hand again and kissed her knuckles.

  She nodded and smiled. “But it’s gonna be so weird to see my parents kiss.”

  I exhaled a laugh and yanked her onto my lap so I could give her a big hug. “I bet it’ll be weird to have two parents to make sure you go to bed on time too.”

  She scrunched her nose at that.

  “To answer your question,” Boone said, “yes, we will team up against you.”

  “Oh no!” She giggle-groaned and slapped her hands to her face.

  I smiled and kissed the side of her head.

  We were gonna be great.

  Waking up slowly was my favorite, even more so now when I had Boone in my bed.

  It was too early to get up, too early to worry about Ace rising anytime soon, too early for alarm clocks and speaking.

  In other words, it was the perfect time to just cuddle and feel each other up.

  I pressed a kiss to his neck as he shifted against my morning wood.

  The only minor drawback to living with him was that he ran hotter than the devil, so he liked cranking up the AC to the point where I didn’t wanna poke a single toe outside the covers. On the flipside, he ran hotter than the devil, which turned him into my personal radiator.

  He hummed when I found him rock hard and wrapped my fingers around him. Then he shifted against my cock again and made his intentions very clear.

  I let out a breath and stroked him unhurriedly, refusing to rush things—for now. I wasn’t sure I could be too careful later.

  It turned me on so fucking much to control his movements. I knew how to rub his cock to make him tense up, where to brush my fingers to set off a shiver, and how much to tighten my hold to cause him to exhale and groan.

  I kissed my way down to the spot between his shoulder blades, and I pressed my cock between his ass cheeks. I wanted him to feel me before I got the lube.

  I started stroking him off a little faster.

  “Fuck,” he breathed.

  My mouth watered. Every time I watched the muscles in his back ripple, I wanted to slam my cock into him.

  I was done waiting. With another kiss to his warm skin, I released his cock and twisted my body to reach for the lube.

  It was so damn liberating to be with him. Not just for the obvious reasons, but for how well we read each other. We didn’t need to talk in order to establish trust or set boundaries for certain things. A lifetime together had made us experts at sensing what the other was going through, what the other needed. And right now, his growing impatience was enough. It permeated every movement and every breath.

  Once my cock was coated, I shifted closer and pressed myself between his ass cheeks, and he exhaled and moved with me. My forehead landed in the soft dip between his shoulder blades. He was fucking magnificent, this big beast of a man. With all heart underneath.

  I sucked in a breath as the head of my cock breached the tight ring of muscle. Rather than tensing up, Boone groaned under his breath and pushed back against me, forcing my cock deeper into him. Jesus Christ, we were born to be each other’s ass sluts.

  Desire whipped up a storm within me, making me hungrier and more demanding. He was right. Close wasn’t close enough. Closer wasn’t enough either. I gripped his hip and slipped my other arm under his neck, and I latched on to him like a fucking leech. With a roll of my pelvis, I buried myself all the way in and slid out again. His breathing grew shallow and rapid, and every inhale and exhale spurred me on.

  I knew what kind of fire he was riding on right now. I knew the consuming burn and how the pleasure rolled in slower, inch by inch, fucking with his head, turning him on, making him ravenous.

  He tilted his face into the pillow and moaned.

  I fucked him a little deeper, a little harder, a little faster.

  I heard the slick sounds from us. Both from working my cock in and out of him and his hand stroking his cock. I felt the muscles in his arm ripple, same with the muscles in his back.

  The pain was fading for him.

  I caught his neck in the crease of my arm and reached down to touch his chest, brushing my fingers through his chest hair. I pinched his nipple lightly and abandoned his hip for his cock. I wanted to feel him pulse in my hand. He trembled as I took over, clenching and relaxing, clenching and relaxing.

  His cock was wet with pre-come, and I rubbed it in with firm strokes and cupped my hand over the blunt head.

  He started panting. For a moment, I didn’t even have to move. He pushed into my hand, then back on my cock, chasing every sensation I gave him.

  The buildup was too brief. I went from wanting to prolong this for hours to needing to get off in mere seconds.

  “Boone,” I croaked, out of breath.

  “I’m so fucking close,” he gasped, reaching for something. Whatever it was, he slipped it under him, near his cock. Maybe his boxers—I didn’t fucking care. “Fuck me, little brother. Fuck me hard.”

  I screwed my eyes shut and groaned against his shoulder. Then I let my body take over completely, and I chased my orgasm in hard thrusts that slapped my pelvis against his ass. Every time I buried my cock all the way in, I was overcome with pleasure. He was so goddamn warm, tight, and wet. Wet with lube, wet with come.

  He pushed off the covers and rocked into my hand, and he went rigid all over. My body was sufficiently overheated that the chill blasting us only felt good.

  His orgasm set off mine. I felt his hot release shoot between my fingers, and I just barely managed to tighten my grip on him and stroke him faster before I surrendered to my climax.

  Holy fuck.

  My heart thundered.

  I fucked rope after rope of come deep into his ass.

  He clamped down on me.

  Sex had never been so motherfucking good.

  A steady current of shivers flowed through us, and for several beats, all I heard were our shallow breaths.

  I swallowed against the dryness in my throat.

  “Jesus Christ,” he rasped. He moved something made of fabric over my hand, and I cracked one eye open and lifted my heavy head to look. It was his boxers. Good thinking. Now we didn’t have to get up to change the sheets. “My ass feels raw,” he murmured hoarsely. “How long does it take to recover?”

  I exhaled a laugh and carefully withdrew from him.

  He winced. “I’m serious. From now on, one of us is getting fucked every night.”

  I smiled and yawned and rolled onto my back to stretch out. “We can flip-fuck each other until we can’t walk.”

  “What’s a flip-fuck? You have a lot to teach me.” He discarded his boxers, then returned his heat to me and landed his head on my chest. “But for the sake of my sanity, we’re gonna pretend you learned everything from the internet.”

  I chuckled. “Flip-fuck just means we take turns.”

  He hummed and kissed my chest. “Which you learned from the internet. Right?”

  “Right.” I couldn’t kill the grin on my mug. Fuck, how I loved him.

  Fifteen

  I’d waited long enough. It was time to reintroduce some old traditions.

  Maybe we could bring Ace. Make it a family thing. Or—actually, no. There would be countless family things, but sometimes, I wanted Case to myself.

  I picked up the phone and dialed the number I’d found online.

  “You’ve reached Giordano’s. This is Zoe speaking. How may I help you?”

 
“I’d like to make a reservation,” I said.

  For our first official date—at our place.

  Our early Monday morning in bed was the last peaceful moment we got that week. Boone and I threw ourselves back into work, and it was basically the only thing we did while Ace was in school. We kept going through the photos from AJ’s house, mapping out his life and personality as best as we could, we replayed the audio from his office whenever his car was parked at home, and we sent all our theories and information to Willow.

  The man was insanely careful. Even when we got him on tape, he didn’t say anything incriminating. There were a few dates and locations mentioned, leads for Darius and his crew to follow up on, but nothing that made us jump out of our seats.

  On Wednesday, we dropped off Ace for dinner at Mom’s place so Boone could check out the old brothel outside of town and I could break in to the hospitality guy’s apartment.

  Oliver Hansen led a modest life, despite that he probably earned well enough at the Venetian. His apartment was in a nice complex near Downtown Summerlin, but the security was downright crap. I was in and out of his two-bedroom apartment in under an hour, and I didn’t exactly leave empty-handed.

  I’d transferred a total of forty gigabytes of documents from his home computer, I’d gotten my hands on approximately seventeen passwords that Oliver kept on a damn note in his desk, I’d taken photos of anything interesting in his place, and a handful of $100 poker chips had somehow jumped down into my pockets.

  On my way back to Ma’s place, I called Boone and found out he was on his way back too. I stalled by stopping at a Chevron for gas and a six-pack of Mom’s favorite beer. We hadn’t told Ace not to say anything about Boone and me being together—on purpose—so chances were, we’d need to butter Mom up a bit. At the register, I decided to get her some scratch-offs too. She loved those.