A loud banging jerked Gabriel from a dead sleep, sending him gasping into an upright position with his gun aimed toward the sound before he could even open his eyes. His heart thudded painfully and he tried to even out his breathing.

“Brianna is on the phone. She’s got something,” Justin said through the bedroom door and then there was only the sound of him thumping down the stairs to the first floor.

Gabriel took a deep breath and lowered the gun. A glance at the clock revealed that it was only four in the morning. He couldn’t have been asleep for more than an hour. After getting off the phone, he’d hidden in the guest room, thinking about what Justin had said. Yes, he had an exit strategy for when it came time to leave the business, but things were damn complicated and in truth, he’d never really expected to live long enough to actually use it.

But living with Justin over the past three weeks had made him want things like a normal life. And in the center of that normal life was Justin’s goofy grin and annoying little quirks that just made everything so much better.

It was dangerous to want things, though. And wanting Justin put him in incredible danger.

Sighing, Gabriel grabbed a pair of sleep pants out of the dresser and pulled them on before finding Justin in the kitchen. The man was brewing a pot of coffee. He stood stiff with his arms folded over his chest, glaring at the coffee maker as it if had somehow pissed him off. Even angry with bulging muscles, there was something adorable with his sleep-tousled hair standing up in all direction and his bleary eyes. He looked warm and snuggly, and Gabriel was sure that if he wrapped his arms around him, he’d feel it too. Of course, there was a good chance that Justin would slug him if Gabriel tried it. The mercenary had every right to be pissed at Gabriel.

“Brianna?” Gabriel asked when he didn’t see Justin’s phone.

“She’s calling back in ten minutes. Told her I needed coffee before she started spouting all her medical nonsense at me.”

Gabriel grunted and slid into one of the breakfast bar chairs as he watched Justin. The man was too stiff. Hurting. And he couldn’t let that continue.

“My life is complicated, Justin,” Gabriel started and then hesitated.

Justin narrowed his eyes and looked at him like he was a fucking idiot.

Gabriel sighed. It was a bad start. Justin’s life was probably complicated as well. “Five years ago, they killed my partner because he was gay. They tortured him and killed him.”

Some of the anger left Justin’s face and he turned to look at Gabriel, but he found that he could no longer hold Justin’s gaze so he stared down at the marble counter.

“Partner in your work…or partner as in—”

“Both actually.” Gabriel swallowed hard. He’d never spoken about Ivan to anyone. “I think he knew they were close. He sent me away for a day to case a target. When I got back, he was dead…but we kept a video camera in our rooms for security. I saw everything they did to him.”

“G…”

Gabriel shook his head to stop any kind words from Justin’s lips. He had to get this out or he never would. “I knew they’d be after me next, so I faked my death, went underground for a year. When I resurfaced, I had a new look, new name. I was out for me. But there are some people who know I’m still alive. Some want me dead for what I know. Other just want me dead because I’m a fag.” He paused, tracing the tip of his finger along a white vein within the marble. “I have an exit strategy, but I never really thought I’d live long enough to implement it. Never thought I’d find a reason to.”

When he finally lifted his eyes to Justin, it was to find that the anger was gone, but it had been replaced with sadness. “I understand.”

“Thank you.”

They stared at each other for several seconds without saying a word. And there was so much more than Gabriel wanted to say to him, but he just didn’t know where to start and he didn’t dare make promises he couldn’t keep. It wasn’t fair to either of them.

Justin’s cellphone ringing broke the moment and he cursed.

“Answer the phone and I’ll finish making the coffee,” Gabriel said, sliding out of his chair. He started to walk past Justin when he was grabbed. His chest slammed against Justin’s bare chest and sweet lips brushed against his jaw, making his sigh.

“Keep thinking about what I said. We don’t have to stick with this life,” Justin whispered. And then he let go of Gabriel and stepped back to answer the phone.

Gabriel stumbled almost dreamlike to the cabinet and pulled down two mugs. He then walked to the refrigerator and pulled out the milk. Justin liked a spoonful of sugar and a heavy splash of cream. He quickly made his own, which was just a light splash of cream and brought both mugs over to the breakfast bar.

“Bri, it’s four in the morning. Tell me this is a good call,” Justin growled. He accepted the mug of coffee from Gabriel with a wink, the playful side of Justin back in play.

“Acute glomerulonephritis!” she shouted back at him in the most joyous voice, like she was wishing them both “Merry Christmas!”

“Oh God, Bri! English!” Justin groaned.

“Acute renal failure.”

“Pretend I didn’t take any biology in high school,” Justin said.”

“Do you know what a fucking kidney is, Justin?” Brianna snapped and Gabriel had to press his lips together to keep from laughing out loud.

“Yes, kidney sounds familiar. I’ve got two of them.”

There was a loud sigh through the phone’s speaker. “Yes, most people have two and you can actually survive just fine on one. Acute renal failure is when they both fail at the same time. Not incredibly common. Usually a person loses just one and the other compensates. But there are diseases and infections that can cause acute renal failure.”

“Or drugs?” Gabriel added.

“Yes! Like this nasty son of a bitch.”

“That’s its scientific name,” Justin said to Gabriel in a stage whisper.

“The job of the kidney is to filter waste chemicals and fluids from the blood and transfer them to the bladder. Acute glomerulonephritis is when the filtration system within the kidney stops working. At that point, chemicals build up in the blood and can kill you. If you catch it fast enough, you can do emergency dialysis.”

“So, why didn’t they do that with the patients to save their lives?”

There was a long pause and then Brianna softly sighed. “It’s hard to say since I don’t have a lot of time to dig on the other patients, but it looks like there’s a critical tipping point with this drug. These people go along fine until they reach a certain dosage when combined with their body weight or possibly it’s being stored in cells that we aren’t seeing. But when it reaches that point, it’s critical. The kidneys go into almost instant meltdown and then take other organs with them like the heart.”

“And you’re sure it was the drug that killed them? Not the cancer they were being treated for.”

“Oh hell yeah. Definitely the drug. Justin, you guys can’t let this shit get approved. There might be something there in the future with this, but not in its current form. They need to study every inch of these poor patients and figure this shit out. The drug is deadly.”

“Bri, sweetie, I need this all written up in proper doctor lingo. We gotta convince the world you’re right,” Justin said, leaning close to where the phone was sitting on the counter.

“Already done. I emailed it to you. I’ve also sent my notes on to the FDA advisory committee and the University of Cincinnati that was helping with the study. That’s a good school and they will not want their name pulled through the mud with this shit.”

“You’re an angel.”

“Not at all, but it’s nice that you think that.”

“Get some sleep, sweetie. You’ve saved a lot of people.”

Justin hung up the phone and threw up his arms like he was signaling for a goal. “We got it!”

“That’s step one,” Gabriel conceded.

“That’s a big step.”

He nodded, grinning at his partner. “True. We just need to figure out who buried that data from the FDA.”

Justin dropped his arms and walked around to stand in front of Gabriel. “That’s tonight. Come on. It’s four in the morning. Let’s get some sleep.”

Gabriel lifted both eyebrows at him. “In the same bed?”

“Crazy idea, I know. But yes.”

“Just sleep?”

Justin reached down and grabbed his hand, twining their fingers together. Gabriel looked down at where their hands were joined. The sight and feel never ceased to make his heart skip a beat. It was something he was sure he would never get accustomed to, but he would really like to give it a try.

Giving his hand a little tug, Justin drew Gabriel back toward the stairs. “If you’re lucky, maybe I’ll wake you up with a nice surprise.”