by RGAlexander
Finally.
Vargas finished with a gasping, “I think he likes me better, Grimes. But you can have a turn now if you want.”
Cal was already slipping off his jacket and unbuttoning his pants when Brady put a hand on his shoulder. “Cal?”
Cal’s cheeks were flushed when he sent Brady a pleading smile. “Would you be too jealous, Brady? You’re the only man I want. I just started playing because you made me wait.” He lowered his voice. “Now I sort of have to do this or he’ll think he’s won.”
Grimes would look so much better with a broken nose.
Get out. Say anything. “Oh yeah, I get it. But I have to take a piss so I was hoping you could start without me. Just don’t finish until I’m back. I’d like to see that.”
Cal nodded, relief and arousal making him amenable. “I want you to see it, so you’ll have to hurry. I promise it’ll be your turn as soon as I’m done. Restrooms are to the right of the elevator, next to the kitchen. Don’t wander—just come right back here when you’re done or Clive might try to steal you.”
Brady smiled and nodded, then turned and walked away without another word, his mind racing to find a way down that elevator to freedom. He was thinking he could trick one of the guards into the bathroom, knock him out and take his key card. It would have to be quiet and quick, and there’d be no room for mistakes, but it wasn’t anything he hadn’t done before.
It would be easier than staying in this club.
He frowned when he got to the elevator. The guards weren’t there. He walked toward the restrooms to buy more time, his gaze skimming the bare walls. Where were those damned armed wrestlers when he needed them?
Brady pushed open the door and found himself flat on his face with a knee in his back before he could react or make a sound.
“Brady?”
The knee disappeared and Ken was there, rolling him over and smiling with those perfect lips. “Are you ready to go yet?”
He stifled his wildly inappropriate laughter as relief temporarily replaced his rage. Ken was there, in a black t-shirt and black pants, ready to save the day. “You’ll never know how ready. I cloned the phone but we need a key card.”
“We don’t, but pick one if you’d like a souvenir.” Ken pointed toward the bathroom stalls and Brady saw five mostly unconscious guards tied up and gagged on the floor, their empty guns and keycards beside them.
“Damn it, Tanaka. I was really looking forward to hitting someone and you had to show off like a damn ninja. How did you get up here? I know Cal canceled your demo.”
Ken’s expression was feral. “Is he the one? I’ll have to thank him for that.” He smiled at Brady. “I wasn’t going to let you have all the fun, Finn. After the call, I came anyway, bypassed the elevator lock and started rounding up these losers. I figured you’d want to leave as soon as possible.”
Brady grabbed Ken and kissed him, nearly lifting him off his feet in the process. When he pulled back Ken’s eyes were worried. “That bad, huh?”
“I can’t talk about it now. We need to leave before Grimes finishes up and comes looking for me. Before Pony Boy sees us.”
“Pony Boy? Let them come. I mean it.” The look in Ken’s golden eyes was deadly. “From what little I’ve seen since I got here? I could take them.”
He motioned confidently toward the pile of disarmed men and Brady was tempted—but something felt off. They bastards hadn’t noticed that all their guards were missing. This wasn’t that big of a place and it wasn’t that crowded, yet no one had sounded an alarm. Just more overconfidence…or something more sinister? “Later.”
They left the restroom together, walking casually toward the elevator. Brady kept a lookout while Ken punched in the code to open the doors. He heard the whoosh and turned, ready to breathe a sigh of relief, when he saw the guard inside.
Without thinking, Brady rushed him, gripped him in a chokehold and cut off his air before he could cry for help. Ken joined him, punched in another code and sent the elevator down. As the doors closed, Brady slammed the guard’s head against the wall just hard enough to give him a headache when he finally regained consciousness.
“You missed one.”
“I was saving him for you.”
Chapter Nine
Would he ever feel completely clean again?
Brady sighed as he felt the water begin to cool. By the time they’d made it home, he was one raw nerve saturated in adrenaline. He’d handed the clone phone to Ken the minute they got outside the club and smashed his own cell against the wall, throwing the pieces in the trash so Cal couldn’t call or track him. Then he’d sat in the passenger seat as Ken drove them home and looked out the window, his mind replaying everything that had happened.
Ken hadn’t said a word when Brady walked directly into the shower and started the water, leaving it so hot it burned as he took off his clothes and the drops hit his bare skin.
He was so…what? Disgusted? Angry? Ashamed of himself for not checking to see if any of those men hooked to the wall wanted to leave too? And Cal. He’d eaten with that man and he just… How could people live like that? It was all so ugly.
When he finally turned off the water, Ken was holding out a towel for him. Brady took it, raking him hungrily with his gaze.
Ken’s hair was damp and loose—he must have showered in the office—and the pajama bottoms he wore were white, sheer and loose.
He looked like an angel.
Brady let go of his towel and reached for his lover, kissing him, worshipping him with his lips and tongue. He walked him back toward the bed and sat him down, dropping to his knees on the floor in front of him.
Ken put his hands in Brady’s hair. “I’m so sorry. I never should have asked—”
Brady looked up abruptly and his expression made Ken go silent. “I need you.”
The man was everything beautiful and right in the world.
He was everything.
“I need you,” Brady repeated, reaching for the tie at Ken’s waistline.
Ken nodded, his wet hair draping damply over his shoulders as he lifted his hips and let Brady slip his pants off. He didn’t resist when Brady spread his legs and moved closer, lowering his mouth onto Ken’s stirring erection.
Yes, he sighed as he took Ken’s cock in, groaning around the flesh as it hardened and filled his mouth. He closed his eyes and savored the taste of him. Clean and spicy. Hot and addicting. His hands moved beneath Ken’s thighs and he kneaded the flesh, loving the hard muscle beneath the smooth, silky skin.
Need you.
Struggling for breath and fighting against his own arousal, Brady pulled back long enough to lift Ken’s legs until his back was on the mattress, then spread them wide. He lay down between them and pressed his own erection into the bed, hungry for Ken. All of him. He opened his mouth over the tight sac at the base of Ken’s shaft. The taste made him linger, and he rolled and teased the heavy balls with his tongue as he stroked Ken’s erection slowly.
“Brady,” Ken moaned softly, threading his hands through Brady’s hair again and again.
He trailed his tongue up Ken’s cock, tracing every ridge and vein, taking his time as he gazed directly, shamelessly, into dark golden eyes. Need you, he thought, licking the pre-cum that had leaked from the tip.
He rocked his hips into the mattress as he wet his finger in his mouth, then sucked Ken again while he lowered his hand between those strong legs and pushed inside the tight hole he loved.
Ken moaned, louder this time, and his legs went over Brady’s shoulders, heels digging into his back. “Yes.”
Brady added another finger, thrusting them both through the tightly flexing muscles in a rhythm that matched the strokes of his tongue on Ken’s cock.
Need you, Ken. Need this.
Love you.
Ken’s body was arching off the bed, writhing as Brady sucked harder and pumped his fingers deeper. Faster.
“Brady, I’m close, baby,” Ken gasped. “Do you w
ant me to come in your mouth?”
Brady moaned, nodding. Fuck, yes. Please, yes. Come in my mouth. I need to have this, taste this. I need to know this is mine.
Ken’s fingers dug into his scalp and his hips started pumping off the bed. Tears slipped from Brady’s eyes as the head of Ken’s cock swelled and hit the back of his throat. Oh and again. Yes. Come.
“Oh God, Brady. Yes. Fuck, I love it. I love…”
The hot burst of cream filled Brady’s mouth and he drank it down hungrily, his hips still pumping against the mattress helplessly. Ken’s taste was as addictive as everything else about him. It tasted like shameless lovemaking and heated passion. It tasted like heaven, so far from where he’d been.
He wanted to stay like this. Stay with Ken.
When Brady finally lifted his head, Ken was watching him with dilated eyes and skin tinged a darker honey with desire.
“Thank you,” Brady said quietly. He got up and stared at Ken’s lean, beautiful body, taking it all in before turning to rifle through his duffel bag for something to wear.
“No, thank you. That was amazing.” Ken sat up and reached out to caress his hip, making him shiver. “I think the least I can do is return the favor. Let me help you with that.”
Brady shook his head, despite the ache of his erection. “Tempting, but not yet. I’m good. That was what I needed.”
Ken stood and took his clothes out of his hands, dropping them on the floor. He slid his fingers through Brady’s and squeezed. “You need more than that. I think we could both use some comfort food with this mission report. And then? Then I’ll need more of you.”
They ended up on the couch wrapped in blankets and each other, sharing a pint of mint chocolate chip ice cream.
“Are you ready to tell me about it?” Ken asked calmly.
“I cloned the phone. Varg—”
“No. I want to know everything, from the beginning. Whatever comes to mind. No rush, Finn. We’re just talking.”
He didn’t want to talk about any of it, not after something that beautiful, but he knew it was necessary. He tried to shut down his emotional reactions and describe every scene, every person and every word spoken in graphic detail. Just a mission report, he told himself. You’ve done this a million times.
But when he finished telling Ken about the people on the racks, he had to stop and ask, “Is that normal? Does that happen at your club?”
Ken had swirled his spoon through the ice cream and sighed. “Kink is, by definition, abnormal. In fact, that’s a point of pride in most BDSM communities. Normal is the thing to avoid.”
“You know what I mean. Have you ever experienced anything like that?”
Ken’s nod was resigned. “I got into it in college, following a man I fell in love with, so at that time bondage and pain play was a purely sexual experience for me. Something I explored with him. He was a hard player, so I dove into the deep end without looking.”
Brady lost his appetite and set his spoon down, but he didn’t say a word. He’d asked for this. He wanted to know.
“When I moved back home, I kept going because of the community. I live most of my life in front of my computer screens, so that connection?” He held up his hand as if reaching for it now. “That connection has always meant everything to me.”
Ken leaned back, his gaze drifting over Brady’s face. “As far as my focus, I had been fascinated with rope work from the start. For me it’s the most intimate type of bondage. It isn’t loud or flashy—it’s intense and beautiful, and in its purest form, the ultimate expression of trust. I traveled to other countries and learned from every expert I could find.” Ken’s laugh was laced with self-mockery. “I don’t like doing something if I can’t be the best. I’m a perfectionist.”
As if Brady didn’t already know that.
“What you saw, Finn? I wish I could tell you something different, but that’s not exclusive to that club or our personal group of villains. Some people actually do crave that level of pain and humiliation. I’ve witnessed scenes more extreme than what you’ve described, and I know for a fact that in that case, it was something they wanted, something they requested during negotiations.”
When Brady scowled, Ken shook his head. “I could go into their reasoning, try to explain it but there’s no point because that isn’t my scene. Even when I was younger and let people play me, I wanted what you… Well, I didn’t enjoy clothespins or mousetraps, we can leave it at that.”
“Does anyone play you now?”
Ken reached out to touch him, a soothing caress. “No. I’m a trainer and mentor now. I do demonstrations, like the one you saw at Burke’s. People can experience sexual arousal and satisfaction in my ropes, and I love helping them if that’s what they need, but I don’t respond in kind. Maybe I’ve been doing it for too long. I need more.”
The way he was looking at Brady made it clear what he was referring to. That and the pictures he’d painted about trust and intimacy in the ropes made Brady shift uncomfortably, still aroused from their earlier embrace. “I didn’t mean to go off topic. There’s a lot I need to tell you.”
After Brady went through his time as a prize bull—during which Ken winced and leaned over to kiss him—he told him about Cal’s initiation into the club. When it started, how they treated him, even his reaction to Brady’s concern. Something in Ken’s expression made him stop.
“What is it?”
“The timing. The assistant to the senator who brought down Burke getting an invite to the dark side at the same time I’d just started compiling Burke’s locked files and sending encrypted copies to my contacts in the agency.”
Brady frowned. “You think this is about Stephen? They talked about him.”
“It isn’t Stephen. Burke was Stephen’s white whale. He wasn’t looking into the others.”
“But Cal isn’t connected to you at all.”
“I helped you with Burke’s blackmail attempt on the senator.” Ken paused. “Cal and I have a shared interest in another Finn as well. You.”
Brady shook his head. “If they knew about you, they wouldn’t have hired you as a rope guy, right?” He shuddered. “Though after seeing their version of rope I’m glad that was canceled.”
Ken set down the ice cream and stood, starting to pace. “That’s the other thing. Cal’s jealousy aside, he knew who I was. That we were living together. If he did, they must have. Why let me think I’m going to be allowed in, with a whole group of big players in town? It doesn’t make sense.”
“Maybe we’re reading too much into this.” The sinking feeling in Brady’s gut when he remembered those confident smiles told him they weren’t. “Maybe it was just a coincidence.”
Ken walked out the door of his loft and Brady followed as he went into his office and sat at one of the monitors, his fingers flying over his keyboard. “I should be able to weed through this Vargas info in a day. Maybe we can find something—”
Beep.
Ken’s fingers froze on the keys. “Vargas just got a new text message.”
Brady put his hands on Ken’s shoulders, needing to touch him. “It’s probably from Cal. Those two were arguing over a guy a few hours ago and my phone is in bits in the trash.”
The message popped up in a window on Ken’s monitor directly from the synced-up clone phone. Brady read it silently, his fingers digging into Ken’s flesh. Then he read it again.
Terry Wahl
346 Alpine Way
Entrance code:019
“Damn it!” Ken slammed his hands on the keyboard and pushed back his chair, causing Brady to move out of the way. He stood, whirling around to stare at all his monitors with two expressions Brady had never seen on his face.
Fear and doubt.
Brady tried to reach for him. “Relax, Tanaka. Come on, man, talk to me.”
“They knew. They knew who I was looking for, what I had, what we were planning. They looked into your eyes knowing this was what was going to happen. They played
us.”
That was Brady’s first instinct. It made sense. “I just don’t know how.”
Ken gestured toward the room around them. “They found a way in. Or one of my agency contacts works for them. All of this needs to be destroyed. Tonight. I’ll have to rebuild everything.”
“What about Terry? The address? It could be real.” Brady took Ken’s hands, holding him. Steadying him.
“It could be a trap,” Ken said, “but then any idiot with a brain cell would know I’d think that. If I called in federal help, that could blow up in my face too. At least until I know who my mole is.”
“Solomon.”
Ken looked at him as if he were insane.
“Chief of Police Solomon Finn the Younger. I don’t think they’d expect a street full of squad cars. He could have that place surrounded in fifteen minutes.”
“Terry could be dead by now. Or in another country. There’s no guarantee he’s there.”
“There’s another option. I’ve met these men. Maybe they decided to cut their losses. That they don’t care enough about keeping him to risk you using your connections and calling in all those favors the government owes you.” Brady dragged Ken along as he walked back to the loft and their clothes. “We have to take the chance. They know now. We’ll never get an opening like this again. Not soon enough.”
“You’re right. Damn it, you’re right. I’ll get dressed. Use one of my burner phones to call your brother. I want to be there in case…”
“We’ll be there.” Brady prayed to God that Terry was too.
***
Solomon stood in Ken’s living room, watching the news and looking stiff and uncomfortable. The uniform looked good on him. His straight, broad shoulders and slender frame gave him an air of authority despite his age—thirty-seven was young to be the Chief of Police, at least according to the forty-year-olds still working the beat. But Younger was a born leader. If only he smiled and went out on dates once in a while.
Still, he was a hero this morning. Last night he’d come in like the Calvary to save the day. Luckily there hadn’t been a standoff—only one confused and frightened man waiting for them behind the door of the empty house. Terry Wahl.
