Holding his breath, he inched over a bit farther. And then the train wasn’t swaying but slowing, and Sebastian grappled with air, trying to balance himself as gravity and momentum conspired against him.
As he tumbled off the bunk, there was a flash of motion and he was in Kyle’s powerful grip, landing on top of him as they crashed to the floor. Sebastian sat up, his legs straddling Kyle’s hips. “Sorry. Thank you. I thought you were asleep.”
Kyle’s hands still clutched Sebastian’s arms. “Have to sleep light in my line of work.”
“Oh. Right.”
Kyle loosened his grip and dropped his hands to Sebastian thighs. “You should try to rest.”
“Uh-huh.” Sebastian shifted slightly, and his cock twitched in the confines of his jeans. Straddling Kyle, desire burst to life with a rush of heat.
Their eyes locked for a long moment, and then Sebastian dove at Kyle’s mouth. Their tongues met as Sebastian moaned. When they parted to gulp in air, Sebastian barely recognized his own voice, thick with need. “Fuck me.”
With a low groan, Kyle pushed on Sebastian’s shoulders, keeping him at arm’s length. “Not a good idea.”
“Why?” Sebastian ground down with his hips, rubbing their hardening cocks together.
“Have to stay focused.”
“Because this will make it harder to kill me.”
Something Sebastian couldn’t name flickered across Kyle’s face as the moment of silence stretched out. Then his fingers were in Sebastian’s hair, yanking his head down in a fierce kiss.
They were lost after that, hands roaming and bodies rutting as their mouths met. Sebastian’s head was light with the rush of lust, and he struggled to tug down his jeans, needing more contact. They banged elbows and knees in the narrow space, and Kyle growled with frustration as he sat up, Sebastian still straddling his lap.
They both eyed the bunks, which had little headroom. Kyle reached for his pillow, and after some maneuvering, they knelt on it as Sebastian leaned over the bunk facedown, Kyle behind him. Resting on his elbows, Sebastian shivered in anticipation as Kyle pressed kisses down his spine. The knowledge of who Kyle was and what he did should have terrified him, yet it only seemed to make Sebastian want him more.
Sebastian was certain Kyle wouldn’t hurt him. Maybe it didn’t make any sense—maybe he was a fool—but he trusted him. “Do you have something?” Sebastian asked.
“Of course.” Kyle deftly had Sebastian’s jeans and underwear around his knees in no time. He reached for his duffel, and Sebastian watched over his shoulder as Kyle removed a condom and packet of lube. He wondered just how many men Kyle slept with on his missions.
He suddenly felt very exposed, bent over and naked. Vulnerable. He shivered again, his body tensing as he looked over his shoulder. Kyle’s hands stilled on the zipper of his own jeans. He smoothed a warm palm over Sebastian’s hip. “Okay?”
Sebastian jerked out a nod, and Kyle leaned over and kissed him lightly as he massaged Sebastian’s back. The tension melted away as desire rushed back, flooding Sebastian’s limbs. He broke their kiss. “Yes,” he breathed. “Please.”
He lowered his forehead to the thin mattress as Kyle kissed and sucked his neck, his lips finding sensitive spots Sebastian didn’t even know were there. He heard a tearing sound, and Kyle’s slick finger teased Sebastian’s hole, coaxing him open. A moan escaped Sebastian’s lips as Kyle entered him, pushing his finger past the tight ring of muscle.
Kyle continued kissing Sebastian’s neck and shoulders as he opened him, sliding another finger inside and stretching him until Sebastian pushed back, eager for more. The crinkle of foil seemed very loud in the darkness, and Sebastian’s pulse raced as he spread his knees.
His breath lodged in his throat as the head of Kyle’s cock inched inside him. It burned, and a warm puff of air fluttered across Sebastian’s ear. “Breathe.”
Sebastian forced his lungs into action, shuddering as Kyle filled him slowly. When he could feel Kyle’s hip bones against his ass, Sebastian squeezed his inner muscles, reveling in the incredible sensation of fullness. He’d fantasized about it so many times, and it was more intense than he’d ever imagined to feel another man throbbing inside him.
Kyle seemed to bite back a moan, and when he leaned over, Sebastian could feel Kyle’s heart pounding against his back. “Need to move,” Kyle ground out.
Sebastian squeezed again, ignoring the pain as he pushed back against Kyle. “Fuck me,” Sebastian repeated, and Kyle grasped his hips, sliding halfway out and then back in. As he rocked in and out at a steady pace, each thrust became easier for Sebastian until he was moving with Kyle, spreading his legs even wider.
Sparks of pleasure ignited his body as Kyle rubbed against his prostate, and Sebastian cried out. Their harsh breathing filled the air as they strained together. Kyle twisted his fingers in Sebastian’s hair, turning his head and kissing him, their mouths open as they panted.
Sebastian had gone soft when Kyle entered him, but now his cock leaked, rock hard beneath him. The sparks blazed into flames as Kyle reached around and took hold of him, jerking him roughly.
“God, Kyle. God.”
Kyle groaned low in his throat, speeding up his thrusts, his balls slapping against Sebastian’s ass. He drove into him, and Sebastian could only moan and gasp as the ecstasy built, Kyle’s cock inside him and hand around his shaft working in perfect unison. The wave crashed over Sebastian as he came, splashing his stomach.
Kyle laid his forehead on Sebastian’s back, gripping Sebastian’s hips as he thrust wildly, until he shook and moaned a few moments later as he found his release. Sebastian pressed his cheek to the mattress, Kyle boneless on top of him. They struggled for breath, skin slick with sweat.
When Kyle pulled out, Sebastian winced. Kyle was still resting over him, his lips soft on the back of Sebastian’s neck. When he spoke, it was only a whisper. “I won’t kill you.”
Then he was gone, returning with a small wet towel. He eased Sebastian onto the bottom bunk and washed him clean. As Sebastian tried to formulate a thought, Kyle tossed the towel into the basin and disappeared up the ladder to the top berth. “Go to sleep.”
This time Sebastian drifted off within minutes.
Chapter Eight
As they neared Rome, Kyle finished dressing and watched Sebastian. Fast asleep on the bottom bunk, Sebastian’s lips were slightly parted, his face relaxed. Kyle bit back the ridiculous impulse to smooth down Sebastian’s hair where it stuck up wildly.
A voice reminded him how foolish it was to keep Sebastian with him. In more than nine years in the field, he’d never compromised his mission like this. He’d made mistakes—he winced just thinking about Singapore—but to disobey direct orders and become…attached was unheard of. Certainly for him.
He’d known another operative, Petersen, who’d gotten mixed up with a woman during a mission. She’d seemed an innocent, the assistant of an arms dealer who’d been in the wrong place at the wrong time. Petersen should have brought her in or eliminated her, but instead he’d kept her hidden.
It was Kyle who’d been sent to assess the situation. He’d convinced Petersen to give him their location, but by the time he arrived it was too late. Of all the bodies he’d seen over the years, Petersen’s glassy eyes and mouth open in surprise stayed with him. The woman was KGB, but they’d never been able to track her down.
He gazed at Sebastian again. While it was possible, Kyle didn’t suspect Sebastian of being anything but what he seemed, and his instinct had never been wrong yet. But even though Sebastian wasn’t a spy on his own mission, it didn’t make him any less dangerous.
He was possibly the most dangerous person Kyle had ever met.
Leave. He’d never be able to track you or keep up on his own. He’s not your responsibility. Do the job. Get your head back in the game. Stop breaking the rules. Rules keep you alive.
The train slowed, and Sebastian stirred. He blinked sleepily at Kyle, a smil
e forming on his lips. Kyle turned away sharply, busying himself with his gun, checking the chamber. “Get up,” he barked.
“Sorry.” Sebastian’s voice was small.
Kyle stopped himself from saying it was all right. Sitting up, Sebastian tensed, sucking in a quick breath. “Okay?” Kyle asked before he could tell himself to shut up.
Sebastian nodded and pulled on his T-shirt. After the sex they’d had, Kyle wasn’t surprised Sebastian was sore. It had been incredible; Kyle was in danger of getting hard just thinking about it. Sebastian had been so tight and hot and eager, and Kyle wanted to push him back onto the bunk and have him again. Taste him and drive inside him and—
Shaking his head, Kyle focused on an equipment check, methodically going through the built-in compartments in his duffel that held weapons and various devices he might need on any given mission. He went through his mental checklist, counting bullets and double-checking triggers.
As the train pulled into the station, Kyle led the way through the car to the doors, where they joined the line of people eager to disembark. It was just past nine o’clock, and Kyle could see that Termini station was bustling. It would make for good cover if anyone was meeting their train.
As they made their way briskly through the crowds, Kyle scanned for threats. There were none he could identify. Perhaps Brambani’s incompetent men had gone to intercept the Paris train. As they left the station, blinking in the bright sunlight, Kyle’s phone vibrated in his coat. He steered Sebastian over to the edge of the sidewalk in the shade of the stone building and scanned the message.
“What is it?”
“Floor plans to your father’s office here in Rome.”
“We’re going there?” Sebastian sounded surprised. “But they’ll recognize me. Ben and I had to go to all the Christmas parties here and in Milano.”
Kyle scrolled through the additional information his contact had included. “We’re not going to just walk in.”
“Oh. Then how—”
“You’ll see.”
Shifting slightly, Sebastian lifted his foot and circled his ankle, trying to banish the pins and needles. He didn’t have to see Kyle’s face in the dark closet to know he was glaring. “How much longer?” Sebastian whispered.
“As long as it takes,” Kyle hissed.
A broom handle dug mercilessly into Sebastian’s back. “Couldn’t you find a better place to hide?”
“Support thinks it’s just me. This space is sufficient for one operative.”
“Why didn’t you tell them I’m here?”
Kyle didn’t answer. Sebastian was pressed into his side in the tiny confines of the closet, and along with his extreme discomfort, Sebastian struggled to ignore the heat of Kyle’s body and the desire it stirred in him. After the night before, he wanted more. He wanted…everything.
Sebastian wasn’t sure what he’d expected when he woke up after having sex more incredible than he’d ever imagined. It was much more than he thought it could be after his fumbling with Peter in their dorm room. Sex with Kyle was in a different stratosphere.
He certainly hadn’t expected romance or declarations of eternal love, but…a kiss in the morning would’ve been nice. But in the light of day, the gentle and passionate man had disappeared. Kyle was all business, stone-faced and impatient.
Getting into the office tower itself had been easy; the lobby and entrance bustled with workers. Kyle led the way down several hallways until they’d reached the janitor’s closet. Glancing about, Kyle had slipped a thin metal tool into the lock and pushed Sebastian inside in the blink of an eye.
Now they’d been crammed in the closet for what seemed like an eternity but was probably twenty minutes. “Why can’t you just go into the office and make up a story? You’re good at that.”
“Because the receptionist received a fax yesterday with my picture on it, saying I’m a disgruntled former employee of the Milan office and that security guards will be on duty until further notice. I want to avoid any confrontations. They’re messy. Too many variables.”
“What if we take the stairs from another floor?”
“These floors are all secure. Again, too many variables. Too many people we could encounter.”
Sebastian was about to ask again what the plan was when the light around the cracks of the door vanished and the electricity audibly powered down. Then they were moving, Kyle in the lead as the low emergency lights blinked on. They were at the back of the building, and Kyle stopped when they reached the service elevator, pressing the call button.
“But the power’s out,” Sebastian whispered.
“The service elevator runs on a different power source.”
Sure enough, the doors slid open. The floors ticked by as they traveled up to fifteen. Sebastian wondered what they were going to do when they got there, since it wasn’t as if it would be dark enough to sneak in with the emergency lights on. As they passed fourteen and the elevator slowed, Kyle pressed the emergency stop, and they jolted to a halt.
“Now what?”
Kyle didn’t answer and seemed to be waiting for something. A moment later the fire alarm echoed in the elevator shaft. Kyle glanced at his watch. “Floor should be clear within four minutes. We’ll give them five.”
“Who’s doing this? Turning off the power and making the alarm go off? Who’s ‘support’?”
“Ground support from the Association. Someone in a cubicle in Frankfurt. Maybe Vienna. Doesn’t matter. With today’s technology they could be on the moon and flip the fire alarm.”
As the minutes ticked by, Kyle removed a small, thin metal bar from his duffel. He pulled on one end, and the bar extended and locked into place. He checked his watch again and stood at the ready.
“Don’t you hate it?”
Kyle raised an eyebrow, his eyes on his watch again.
“All the waiting.”
“You get used to it.” He inserted the bar into the tiny space between the elevator door and the side of the car. With a heave, he levered the door opened a few inches and then changed positions so he could push it with his full body weight.
When there was enough room to squeeze through, Kyle disassembled the crowbar and lifted his duffel up onto the floor. The elevator had stopped before fully reaching the fifteenth floor, so Kyle had to boost himself up over his head. Kneeling, he wheeled around and extended his hand to Sebastian.
“Come on.”
The fire alarm still screeched, setting Sebastian’s nerves on edge. “What if it moves?”
“Then I’m about to lose an arm, so get up here.”
Grasping Kyle’s hand, Sebastian was half lifted as he tried to boost himself up. He was shorter than Kyle and struggled to pull himself over the threshold. Kyle hooked his other hand under Sebastian’s armpit and hoisted him up.
Sebastian couldn’t remember the last time he’d been in his father’s Rome office—parties were always held at restaurants or local attractions—but Kyle strode unerringly to Arrigo’s office. It must have been the biggest one on the floor plan.
Kyle shut and locked the door behind them. He quickly peered behind the paintings in the room but found nothing. Gaze narrowed in concentration, he knocked on the walls, ear against the light paint. The alarm still wailed, and Sebastian wished they’d just turn it off.
As Kyle searched for what Sebastian assumed would be a safe, Sebastian glanced around his father’s office, looking back at the door frequently, his heart pounding in time with the bleats of the fire alarm. On the large, polished desk sat a framed photo of Arrigo and Ben, taken on one of their hunting trips. Sebastian missed his brother acutely in that moment. Did I really ever know him?
With a deep breath, he turned away from the desk. Kyle was now on his hands and knees, examining the marble floor. Under one of the large windows, he paused. Sebastian watched as Kyle carefully pried up a piece of marble that covered the safe inset into the recess of the floor.
Kyle tapped something into his watch,
which looked like something James Bond would wear, and a few moments later with a chorus of beeps from throughout the floor, the power came back on. The number pad and display glowed on the face of the safe, which was about two feet square. “Should I try to guess?” Sebastian asked. “He might use some of the same numbers.”
“Let’s see what we have.” Taking out a small brush and container of white powder, Kyle dusted the keyboard. Fingerprints appeared on six of the keys. “That eliminates a few. Do these other numbers look familiar?” Sebastian studied the numbers, imagining them lined up before him. “Here, write them down.” Kyle reached for pen and paper.
“No. I don’t need to. Just wait.”
He rearranged the numbers in different permutations. Then the lightbulb went off, and he jolted with excitement. “It’s a pi sequence.”
“You sure? We only have one chance—a wrong entry will trigger an alarm somewhere, and we’re going to have company very soon as it is.”
“Positive, I…”
“What?”
“It’s just weird. He never liked math. I’d talk about it when I was a kid and he’d tell me I needed to be more like Ben. Play more sports and have more friends. Not be such a secchione.” At Kyle’s confused expression, he added, “Like a nerd. My father never even graduated high school, didn’t think it was much use in the real world. He built an empire, so maybe he’s right.”
“Fathers can be wrong.”
Although Kyle’s tone was flat, Sebastian could sense the emotion behind it. “Like your father was?”
Kyle shook his head, exhaling sharply. “It doesn’t matter. Look, I guess your father had a soft spot for you after all. Or he just thought it would be a good code.” The fire alarm was suddenly silenced. Kyle drew his gun and nodded at the keypad. “Punch it in.”
Breathing deeply, Sebastian put in the sequence. With a beep, the door released, and he sat back on his heels. Kyle pulled out the only item inside—a large manila envelope. After stuffing the envelope in his bag, he closed the safe and shoved the slab of marble flooring back into place. Sebastian followed as Kyle edged the office door open. He listened for a long moment, and then they crept down the corridor.
The Chimera Affair: Gay Romance Page 10
