Accidental Roots The Series Volume 1: an mm romantic suspense box set

by Elle Keaton

  Frankie chose that moment to stalk into the living room. He appeared to be personally affronted that there were strangers in his house, sitting on his couch. The battered orange cat weighed in at about twenty pounds, had a chunk missing out of one ear, and his tail looked like it had been mauled by a hand mixer. After surveying the room full of people (all watching with varying degrees of fascination, wondering what the beast was up to) he padded over the couch and jumped into Marcus’s lap.

  “Awww,” the chorus sounded. Weir groaned. That fucking cat. Marcus seemed pleased by Frankie’s choice, if the ear scratch the cat was receiving was any indication.

  Marcus leaned back to Weir. “Mariah Carey high kick,” he whispered. “In roller skates, while I was performing on amateur night at Escape.” Escape was an all-ages dance club in Everett.

  “What?” What did Mariah Carey have to do with anything?

  “That’s how I broke my ankle, in three places. Had to have emergency surgery. Did you, uh, get bashed?”

  Ohhhh.

  “Nah, hit by a car when I was out running. Fractured femur and collar bone, compound fracture in my arm. I had surgery, too. Got some nifty metal plates.” Weir had made a new friend. Huh.

  “Salty. Hit by a car? You must be the guy Pony and Raven found.”

  Weir swiveled his head around in time to see Sterling wipe the guilty expression from his face. Weir didn’t remember much from the accident scene. Perhaps he and Sterling needed to have a little chat.

  While Sterling went to let the teens out, Weir considered his plan of action. He was pretty sure unless he took drastic measures Sterling was going to be twitchy and pacing until the sun rose. He stretched his arms over his head and got a whiff of himself. Problem solved.

  Seventeen

  When Sterling returned from saying goodbye to Raven’s friends, Weir lurked on the couch, seemingly harmless. The cat disappeared back up the stairs. Sterling had waited for a minute at the front door while the four teens piled into an older-model Ford Taurus and sedately drove off, navigating the small lake that had formed in the street. Weir seemed to have spent those few minutes plotting something.

  Sleep would be impossible. His body and mind were twitchy from stress. He couldn’t halt the terrifying images his brain was providing him, of Raven and Pony being forcibly converted to the “Christian path.”

  “I’m going to drive out to my parents’ house,” he said. They lived in a snooty gated community south of town. This time of night he could be there in fifteen minutes. He had never lived in that house; Stephen and Sybil had built it and moved there after he had been kicked out.

  “No. You’re not.”

  Sterling swung around to stare at Weir. “You going to stop me?”

  “Sterling.” Weir’s voice carried a warning. Or a promise, he wasn’t sure. “It is almost ten p.m. If the kids are right about why Raven and Pony are MIA, there isn’t anything we can do about it tonight. I know you don’t want to hear this, but she is under eighteen and you are not her guardian, right?”

  Sterling nodded.

  “If your parents decided to send her away, our hands are tied.” Sterling opened his mouth, Weir raised his hand to stop him from interrupting. “Our only hope is to get through to one of your parents. Your mom?”

  Sterling nodded again.

  “Okay. In the morning you can deal with her. In the meantime, I pulled in a favor. Hopefully tomorrow we’ll know what cell tower Raven’s phone last pinged off of. It could help.”

  Sterling wasn’t sure how, but sure, any information would be good.

  “Also,” Weir pinned him with his eyes, “how come I didn’t know Raven was first at the scene?”

  Sterling shifted uncomfortably. The feeling of being interrogated was disconcerting. “Adam knows.”

  “Adam knows,” Weir repeated flatly.

  “She was skipping school with Pony. They found you and called me for help. They didn’t know who you were or anything. I was trying to make sure our parents didn’t find out.” And now didn’t he feel like he’d been called into the principal’s office? “Adam said he looked into it, and it wasn’t her car that hit you.”

  “I never thought it was.” Weir shook his head, seeming to brush away a thought. “You need to get some sleep.”

  “I don’t think I can.” He couldn’t stop thinking, worrying.

  “Here’s what’s going to happen. You’re going to take a shower. You stink.”

  “What?”

  “You stink like fear and sweat. Mostly fear. After your shower, you are going to help me take a shower, because I stink, too.” Weir grinned wickedly.

  Seriously? Sterling frowned. Not that he hadn’t enjoyed their encounters at the bar, but still, his sister was missing.

  “I have a broken leg, I’m not dead. Also, twenty-six. I’ve got needs, old man. You go first and I’ll get myself ready.”

  As selfish as it surely was, the images his brain provided him of a hard, wet Weir threatened to short it out in an entirely pleasant/erotic way, shoving worry for Raven to the recesses of his mind—for now.

  Wait. “Old man? Fuck you.”

  “One day you may be so lucky. Get a move on.” Weir shooed him in the direction of the bathroom.

  “We’re not having shower sex when you have broken bones,” he shouted over his shoulder as he did Weir’s bidding. What was wrong with him?

  Sterling tried not to hurry his shower. The warm water cascading over his shoulders and back felt so good he ended up taking at least eight whole minutes, maybe ten. After hastily drying himself off, he wrapped the towel around his waist and returned to the living room and found a mostly naked Weir reclined on the couch.

  The sight of him, battered and semi-bruised, but still beautiful—still alive, and breathing the same air as Sterling—moved him more than he expected. He was feeling emotional from all the shit going on. The resurgent awareness that his sister was missing, possibly alone and frightened, almost stopped him from going to Weir, but he knew the man was right. There was nothing else to do tonight. Tomorrow, first thing, he would confront his mother face-to-face.

  There was something else he wanted to be face-to-face with at the moment. Weir still had the sling on and the soft wrap cast on his leg, but he had managed to cover the almost-healed incision on his thigh with plastic wrap so it wouldn’t get wet. Other than that, he was wonderfully naked. Wonderfully. Naked.

  As he bent over to lift Weir from the couch, his poorly tucked towel loosened, slipping onto the floor.

  “Much better,” Weir commented. “Far too much clothing.”

  Together they limped to the bathroom, where Sterling propped Weir against the wall while he removed the soft cast. He turned the shower on and waited until the temperature was perfect before helping Weir into the spray.

  “Fuck, this feels good. Fuck, fuck, I could come from this alone.” It sounded like the washcloth baths Weir had been giving himself were lacking in quality. Sterling admired Weir’s body. He may have been injured, but that didn’t hide the top physical condition he had been in before the accident. Sinewy runner’s muscles, pale skin but darker than Sterling’s own, a slight dusting of blond hair trickling down from his chest to his groin.

  Tossing caution aside, Sterling climbed into the small shower enclosure along with Weir. They hadn’t thought this through. If Weir lost his balance it would be disastrous. Sterling slipped into place in front of him, chest to chest. Sterling was slightly taller than Weir, a fact he had not realized until that moment. Even injured and disheveled, Weir had an imposing air.

  “Put your arms around my neck. I’ll soap you up.” Said no sane person ever when they were suddenly horny and wanting something really badly. He did manage to soap Weir up, mostly. And himself, again. And fuck. His mission was not helped by the little noises Weir made when Sterling ran the bar of soap down his back to the top of his ass, hinting. The whimpers killed him. Slayed him. Weir’s face was tucked into Sterling’s neck
; the sounds he made reverberated along Sterling’s skin. His neck was an erogenous zone. He had never known. He was beginning to suspect his whole body was an erogenous zone where Weir was concerned.

  Sterling was hard. Weir had a semi. There was no way anything was happening in the shower.

  Someday.

  When Weir was as clean as possible under the very hard circumstances, Sterling turned off the water and grabbed a fresh towel to dry them both off. Weir’s eyelids were half-mast. Sterling wondered what was going on in his head.

  Ten minutes later they had traded the wet sling for a dry one, removed the plastic wrap, and replaced the soft cast. Weir was sprawled across the middle of the bed. Had to be record time. They were still naked, and Sterling had no idea how they were going to do this. Or what they were doing.

  “Hey.” Weir grabbed Sterling’s hand as he fussed over something fussable. “I, uh, probably can’t fuck, but I think we could manage a sixty-nine. Put some pillows behind my back to prop me up on my good side.”

  “Fucking genius.”

  “And federal investigator.”

  “And smartass.” But Sterling quickly went to work with the pillows and blankets. If Weir was offering, he was not refusing.

  Weir’s penis had softened while Sterling figured out logistics. “You sure?”

  “Yes, goddammit!”

  All right then. Positioning himself on his own side facing Weir’s cock, which was making a strong comeback, Sterling pressed his nose into Weir’s groin, inhaling his scent, musk and clean man. One hand on the base of Weir’s erection, the other on his very squeezable ass cheek, he licked down and back up, enjoying the helpless sounds Weir was making, until Weir sucked Sterling’s cock into his hot, wet mouth and Sterling almost came. He hoped the noises he made around Weir’s dick in his mouth were appreciative enough. Jesus Christ, he needed to focus.

  It turned into a game of who could last the longest, or maybe who could make the other come first; Sterling wasn’t sure. He loved the heat of Weir’s mouth on him, kept finding himself drifting mindlessly into the sensation, almost coming before snapping out of it and getting back to business. Weir’s cock was gorgeous, nice and long but not a monster. Sterling’s gag reflex, which he was embarrassed by because he loved sucking cock, seemed to be getting a little better. He still had to have a hand at the base, controlling how far he took it down, but he wasn’t freaking out. He needed more practice.

  There was saliva everywhere. The sharp taste of Weir’s precome on his tongue spurred him to suck harder. The erection in his hand grew impossibly harder; slipping his free hand further around, he ghosted a finger along Weir’s taint to his balls, a light touch intended to tease. Weir stiffened and moaned, trying to keep sucking Sterling’s cock, but lost control, shooting come into Sterling’s waiting mouth. Sterling smiled around Weir’s dick. And we have a winner!

  Sterling was on the edge. He often got off on his partner’s reactions, and tonight was no different. As soon as Weir took his pole back into his mouth, Sterling started to come. He couldn’t stop himself, and he didn’t try; he let the tension of the day flow out of his cock along with a gallon of come.

  Sterling lay there for a minute, gathering the parts of himself that had shattered across the room. So much glitter. He ended up drifting off, his head resting against Weir’s good thigh for maybe a half hour before he collected enough of himself to manage a coherent thought. Finally, when he reached a place where he could probably put one foot in front of the other, he rolled over to heave himself up.

  “Stay?” Weir whispered into the dark.

  He did. Before he made himself comfortable, Sterling gently helped Weir move so he wasn’t lying across the middle of the bed and cleaned both of them up. For the second night in a row, the second time in his life, Sterling stayed the night in bed with another man.

  The next morning he woke to find himself under the covers and wrapped around Weir like English ivy, Weir’s good arm keeping him firmly in place.

  They had fallen asleep naked. Weir’s morning wood was prodding his hip. Sterling slid his hand down Weir’s chest and wrapped his fingers around it, tugging it to full hardness. Weir mmmmed. Sterling had no idea if he was fully awake or not, but he didn’t object to Sterling’s touch. Soon enough, Weir’s hips jerked and warm come spilled over Sterling’s fist. It didn’t take more than two or three pulls on his own hard cock before he added his come to Weir’s.

  Weir gripped the hair at the back of Sterling’s head. Looking up, Sterling was surprised by warm lips pressing against his own. He opened his mouth for Weir’s tongue, inviting him in. Sterling sucked Weir’s tongue into his mouth, licked and bit those plump lips, wanting more, a lot more, than he ever had. Weir groaned and shifted so they were chest to chest. Disregarding the come drying between them, he pressed his mouth harder against Sterling’s, devouring him. The hand that had been in Sterling’s hair had drifted downward; now a finger was sliding with some regularity between his ass cheeks, teasing. Sterling wanted to be teased, devoured, eaten, fucked.

  As if he had read his mind, Weir whispered against Sterling’s mouth, “I want to fuck you so badly. I want…” Before Sterling could form a coherent reply, Weir was kissing him again, rubbing their revived cocks against each other and stroking his fingers as far between Sterling’s ass cheeks as he could. Mindful of Weir’s injuries, Sterling let himself rut against his good side. Together they set a wicked pace, ensuring neither would last. Sterling didn’t try to stop himself this time either. He let the electricity of orgasm flow through him. At the last moment he grabbed the back of Weir’s head, bringing him closer, wanting no space between them. Ripping his mouth away from Weir’s, he buried his face in Weir’s neck, biting and sucking as he came with an unexpected, urgent passion.

  “Now we’ve made a real mess.” Weir’s husky voice rolled over him while he lay in his third orgasmic haze in less than twenty-four hours. Sterling wondered if he meant the drying come on the sheets or whatever was happening between the two of them.

  After a shower that was not nearly as fun as the one the night before, Sterling dressed in his standard black uniform, preparing himself to face the people who had never once in his life had his back; had in fact betrayed him at the most basic level. Stephen and Sybil had never been good parents, not even before they knew he was gay. They were the worst kind of parents because they only wanted to raise a child exactly like themselves.

  Well, neither Sterling nor Raven were the children they wanted. How tragic for them.

  As Weir had pointed out, his mother was the weak point. If they were going to learn anything about Raven’s whereabouts, it would be through her. Grabbing his car keys and wallet, he headed for the door. Better to face the dragon first thing.

  “Wait,” Weir commanded from behind him. “I’m going with you.”

  Sterling almost couldn’t believe his eyes. Weir had showered, too. Now he was dressed in an unbuttoned dark-gray suit, the tailored shirt underneath the jacket also unbuttoned. Still managed to shout “federal investigator.” A little the worse for wear, but fed nonetheless. Nice. A twitch of desire shivered across Sterling’s skin. He had been unaware of having a suit kink until that moment.

  Weir cocked an eyebrow. “You like?”

  Hell fucking yes. He cleared his throat before replying. “Yeah, you look good. Even with that sling ruining the lines.” Sterling stepped forward and buttoned the shirt, which was a darker gray than the suit. He tucked the unused jacket sleeve into a pocket and left the jacket open. Weir had managed to get the rest of himself respectable, even socks. Sterling knelt to tie his leather oxfords.

  “Don’t start anything,” Sterling growled before Weir could say or do anything that sidetracked the morning’s errand.

  Weir chuckled, which was as good as starting something.

  Eighteen

  The Bailey residence was… appalling. One of those fake Southern Antebellum-style mansions, possibly influenced by too many
viewings of Gone with the Wind while drinking, that had no business anywhere close to the Pacific Northwest. Even the property had been infused with a plantation-like air, with a carriage house and a few other matching outbuildings used for god knew what. Weir wondered if there were household help, but quickly decided he didn’t want to know.

  To make matters worse, the Bailey house wasn’t the only one in the area with a nod to false Southern heritage. The gated community had several of the monstrosities. Sterling had the gate code from prior visits to see Raven, so they arrived somewhat stealthily. Sterling’s practical little car chugged up the pretentious driveway where he parked next a gleaming Lexus and a Tesla, both of which looked freshly washed and waxed.

  Sterling came around to help Weir out of the car. As quickly as he was recovering, his right arm was still weak, and his fancy crutch was in the back seat. Dana had said he would be able to run again—maybe not ultramarathons, but long runs for certain. The sense of relief he had felt when she said those words was so strong he almost cried.

  Once out of the car and certain he was stable, he joined Sterling for the journey to the front door. Even though he hadn’t known Sterling for very long, he could tell by the set of his shoulders and the grim line of his mouth that the man was ready for war.

  His first impression that Sterling judged and found the rest of the world lacking had been replaced by the understanding that Sterling held his true self aloof out of self-preservation. Sterling was most comfortable feeling separate from the crowd; it had become his safe place. It made sense that Sterling was a bartender. Bartending allowed for a very controlled sort of interaction with people.

  They were both pretty fucked up, that was the truth. At least Weir had had Ben. Ben was gone now, but in the short time they were a family he had made a big impact on Weir. Ben had been a person who cared, and who did the right thing because that was the way he was built. His actions had always reflected his words. Ben had made sure Weir went to therapy, helped him to understand that what happened to his bio-family was not his fault—even if Weir didn’t always believe that.