Chapter Twenty-One
They should have taken the last flight out instead of waiting until morning. Jamie would gladly surrender the past hour he’d spent soaking in the oversized tub or the California king bed calling his name, if it meant escaping the suffocating tension between him and Aidan. It couldn’t be cut, not by the condo walls or the blinding light of the gleaming bathroom. His partner’s dark mood surrounded Jamie, as if the summer sea breeze had carried it through the open balcony doors and into his rooms. Under the heavy weight of it, Jamie sank further into the swirling, lukewarm bathwater.
The past thirty-six hours had been hell, but both times on the phone that morning—once with his life in danger, the other Aidan’s—there’d been something there. Something they hadn’t put words to, but had been said all the same. Jamie had begun to hope. Maybe the warning signs had been wrong. Maybe this thing with Aidan could be something more. And then Aidan had shut down, saying exactly fifteen words to him since they’d left the field office.
“We’ll fly out tomorrow morning,” as he’d merged the convertible, top-down, onto the interstate, the roar of rush hour traffic making further conversation impossible.
“Dinner’s in the fridge,” after they’d returned to the condo.
“Be packed and ready at six,” before he’d disappeared into his room with half a bottle of Maker’s.
Since then, not another word or glimpse of Aidan, just the sound of the shower running several hours ago. Jamie had padded around the condo for a while, popping his pain pills and eating two of the sandwiches the concierge had stocked in the refrigerator. Hoping to draw out his partner, he’d loudly ripped into a package of Oreos, played a few games of “Destiny” on the Xbox, and opened the balcony doors to the living area and his bedroom.
Aidan’s door remained closed.
After packing up their scattered files and notepads, the computers, and his suitcase, Jamie had finally succumbed to the lure of the whirlpool tub. The jetted soak was long overdue—sleepless nights, injuries and long days in the Texas sun having worn his body down—but ten shriveled fingers and toes later, he was no closer to relaxed.
He lifted an arm out of the water to remove the washcloth from his eyes when suddenly the light filtering through it vanished. On alert after a week of surprises, he snatched the cloth off his face and grabbed his gun from the soap holder.
“Easy, Whiskey.”
In the light of the full moon streaming through the skylights, Aidan stood with his shoulder against the doorjamb, dressed in tattered jeans and a thin white undershirt. Judging by the curled ends of his hair and the quarter bottle of Maker’s dangling from his fingertips, he’d been drinking outside on the balcony awhile before wandering down to Jamie’s open door.
Placing his gun back in its resting spot, Jamie slapped the button to turn off the whirlpool jets and resumed his reclined position. Legs outstretched, knees barely breaking the water’s surface, he extended an arm. “I’ll take a shot of that.”
Surprise flashed in Aidan’s eyes. “You don’t drink.”
“I do.”
Aidan raised a brow.
“On special occasions. This is one of them.”
A hint of a smile turned up the corners of Aidan’s mouth as he pushed off the door and ambled forward. Passing off the bottle, he toed over the thick woven bathmat and sat, his back against the tub and his arms spread along the marble’s edge.
Jamie nearly drowned in the overwhelming desire to run his fingers through the curls at Aidan’s neck or over the freckled skin that was a shade darker than the marble. He settled for drowning in bourbon instead, taking a healthy swallow from the bottle. Liquid fire hit his tongue, then mellowed into something sweet and smooth. It warmed his insides, calmed him, but the peace was short lived.
Aidan began bouncing one knee and tapping out a matching rhythm with his thumbs. Jamie leaned forward and placed a hand over Aidan’s, stilling its motion. Aidan’s gaze shot to his, a strange mix of guilt and anxiety swirling in their night-darkened depths, and tension rushed back in between them. Before Aidan could catapult off the floor, Jamie retreated, giving him space.
“What’s got you so worked up?”
Aidan gave a short, humorless laugh. “You lived the same horrible day I did, right?”
“The special occasion I mentioned earlier.” He took another swig of the bourbon and passed the bottle back.
Aidan turned it over in his hands. “For some reason, the whiskey’s not doing the trick tonight.” Setting the bottle aside, he rotated and folded his arms on the tub’s edge. The look on his tired, drawn face said he was waiting for Jamie to work out the obvious.
Jamie, however, was not in the mood to translate his doublespeak. “Why not?”
Eyes darkening, Aidan tilted toward him. “What would you do,” he said, voice rough and rumbling, “if you’d already lost the love of your life, only to find a second chance at something—maybe love, you’re not sure yet—and before you can even wrap your head around the idea, that second chance is almost snatched away? Not once but twice.”
Jamie drew unsteady breaths, the full meaning of Aidan’s words sinking in. He’d never imagined Aidan’s feelings were so close to his own. Given the past year’s losses, Aidan had to be hanging on by a razor-thin thread after the accident yesterday and today’s near misses.
“I’m sorry this is so hard,” he whispered.
Aidan held his gaze a moment longer, then picked up the bottle, swallowed the rest of the whiskey in one gulp, and shot to his feet. Jamie feared he was going to leave, but he tossed the empty in the trashcan and crossed to the vanity instead. He palmed the gold and emerald cufflinks Jamie had left there, turning them over several times before setting them back on the vanity. Bracing his hands against the counter, he straightened his arms and hung his head between them. “It is what it is.”
Jamie didn’t think twice, about his actions or his state of dripping undress. Needing to comfort him and fully prepared to drown, he stepped out of the tub and laid his wet hands on Aidan’s back, yearning to soothe this tortured man. “Irish,” he said, imparting the nickname with all the need and longing Aidan’s “Whiskey” had carried last night.
Aidan was on him the next instant. Spinning, he slammed them against the wall at the end of the vanity, trapping Jamie between smooth, cold marble and a hard, hot body. “Fucking hell, Whiskey,” he gritted out between clenched teeth. “What are you doing to me?”
Jamie saw in Aidan’s stormy gaze the battle his heart and mind were waging, but his partner’s taut, vibrating body indicated victory was there for the taking. Jamie entered the war. Splaying his legs, he ducked his head beneath Aidan’s chin, inhaling the combined scents of whiskey and salt, tasting the same heady mixture as he blazed a line of openmouthed kisses up his neck, returning the sensory overload Aidan had bestowed on him last night.
Aidan shivered, his arms tensing where they were braced on either side of Jamie’s head. Gliding his hands down Aidan’s torso, Jamie snuck them under his damp shirt, seeking the warm skin underneath. “I need...”
Aidan’s breath grew shallow. “What do you need?”
So many things. But right then, all he wanted was Aidan on him, in him, connected, gunfire and bombs be damned. “You remember what you said to me last night?” he murmured behind Aidan’s ear, lips dragging over pin-prickled flesh.
“That I needed to feel alive.”
Jamie flattened a hand over Aidan’s chest. His partner’s heart pounded beneath his palm, racing in time with the waking beast in his own chest. “You need that assurance again; so do I.”
Fingers tangled in his wet hair and tugged Jamie away, forcing him to meet Aidan’s desperate, heated gaze. “I can’t promise you anything. I can’t get attached.”
“I’m not looking for promises. I don’t need commitments.” Jamie lowered a hand between them, palming Aidan’s erection through his jeans. “I just need you.”
Whatever had been holding his partner back evaporated.
Aidan’s lips crashed onto his, and Jamie was pulled under, just like he had been on the balcony last night. Moaning, he opened his mouth and Aidan’s tongue darted inside, tangling with his own. Jamie welcomed the invasion. There was nothing like Aidan’s taste—complicated layers of light and dark, just like the man himself.
His legs went weak at the onslaught of sensation and Aidan caught him, sliding hands over his bare behind, fingers leaving bruises as he hauled him up against his straining erection. Aidan’s growl reverberated against his lips and echoed off the marble walls, sending all Jamie’s blood rushing straight to his dick.
In a very Cruz-like move, Aidan had him off the wall and on the floor in the blink of an eye. It was a much gentler descent, his face-up landing cushioned by the plush bathmat at his back. Jamie laughed nonetheless. “There’s a perfectly good bed right out there.” He tilted his head toward the bedroom, even as he worked furiously on undoing Aidan’s fly.
Straddling his hips, Aidan reached both hands behind his head, grabbed the back collar of his shirt, and yanked it off. Unable to resist the temptation of skin, Jamie ran his hands up the hot, taut muscles that had tortured him for the better part of three years, none worse than the past twenty-four hours of remembering the smooth, hard expanse of them.
Smirking, Aidan pushed him back to the floor with this hands and mouth. “And there’s a perfectly good rug right here.”
Jamie grinned against his lips, and Aidan answered with a sharp thrust of his hips, the rough denim wreaking havoc on Jamie’s already frayed control. Craving more, he raced his hands down Aidan’s back and inside the waistband of his boxers. He raked his short nails up the backs of Aidan’s thighs and over his ass, leaving one hand behind to tease his crack and dragging the other forward to grasp his erection. He was so entranced by the feel of Aidan in his hand, by the taste of his lips, by the sensual motion of his hips, that he could have kept going right there until they came.
Two strokes later, though, Aidan wrenched out of the intimate hold and stood. Jamie’s heart crashed into his chest and his stomach plummeted. His gaze darted to Aidan’s, expecting to see guilt and regret painted there, but all he saw was hunger. The same hunger raging inside him.
He shifted to get up. “Bed now?”
A size twelve foot came down on his chest, holding him in place. “What’ve you got against the floor?”
If Aidan wanted to play this game, Jamie was more than happy to give him a run for his money. Wrapping his fingers around Aidan’s ankle, he gave it a slow caress before sliding his hand inside denim and stroking Aidan’s firm calf. “You’re not on it with me anymore.”
Goosebumps rippled under Jamie’s hand and Aidan groaned, his eyes slipping shut as his head fell back. “Ten seconds, Whiskey.” His voice was tortured and full of that Irish brogue Jamie couldn’t get enough of. “Give me ten seconds to get rid of these goddamn pants and grab a condom and lube.”
Jamie swiped his fingers over the back of Aidan’s knee, provoking a full body shudder. “Why didn’t you say so?”
Growling, Aidan didn’t give him time to pull his hand out before dropping his boxers and jeans, leaving Jamie tangled in silk and denim. He tossed them aside as Aidan rifled through his kit on the vanity.
It was closer to fifteen seconds by the time Aidan returned to the floor, kneeling between Jamie’s legs. Repaying the earlier torture, Aidan stroked his cock, long and slow, circling his thumb over the head, before diving lower and cradling his balls. Bending, he teased his nipples with teeth and tongue, and Jamie, out of his mind with frustrated need, let loose a string of curses that would make a sailor blush. He yanked Aidan up by the neck, smashing their lips together once more. Aidan’s free hand climbed his torso, nails digging in where the tattoo was blazoned across his pec.
“I need you, Irish,” Jamie breathed against his lips. Truer words had never been spoken. He’d never wanted anyone this badly in his life. “Now,” he pleaded.
“I want a taste first.”
“A taste?”
He lost Aidan’s mouth, the warm wetness rambling down his neck and his chest. When those kiss-swollen lips closed around his cock, Jamie flailed, scrabbling for purchase on sheets that weren’t there, fingertips slipping instead on cold, hard marble. He finally caught the lip of the tub with one hand, Aidan’s hair with the other, and anchored himself against the building waves.
Now his groans reverberated off the walls, echoing in his ears, an erratic counter rhythm to his galloping heart, as Aidan blissfully tormented him to within an inch of climax. In control where he hadn’t been last night, Aidan was masterful, his tongue doing mind-blowing things to his cock, his fingers teasing everywhere else. By the time Aidan slapped his thigh with a grunted, “Over,” Jamie was primed, hard as a rock, and beyond ready to take him inside.
Front pressed to the bathroom rug, he lifted his ass in invitation as Aidan’s hands skirted down his sides, hot and branding, and Jamie wanted to be owned, completely. Aidan seated his cock against him, steel sliding along his crease as their bodies rutted together, an imitation of things to come.
“Inside, baby,” Jamie begged.
The heat at his back disappeared and he glanced over his shoulder. Aidan sat on his haunches, tearing into the condom and rolling it on.
Jamie licked his lips. “You are the sexiest thing I’ve ever seen.”
Aidan crawled over him, placing one hand on the rug next to his and palming his ass with the other. “You’re not so bad yourself.” He draped himself over his back, impossibly hotter, impossibly slicker. “You want it slow and sweet or fast and hard?”
Even stretched and lubed, the latter option would hurt as it’d been months, but Jamie was too worked up to care. Fast and hard sounded perfect. “Give it to me, Talley.” He lifted his ass higher and rammed back, making his choice clear.
His partner obliged, lining up and thrusting into him. Jamie stifled his cry with his fist, biting into his knuckles until the pain gave way to pleasure, the exquisite clench of taut muscles around Aidan’s cock. Their bodies settled into the intimate embrace, fitting seamlessly together again. They rocked back and forth, their rhythm in sync, just as they had been the past few weeks.
They hadn’t needed to find this; it simply existed.
Jamie reached an arm back to grasp Aidan’s hip, keeping him close and the strokes rough, short and hard. He rocked his hips counter to Aidan’s, building friction as he drove inside him. As their movements quickened, the strokes becoming erratic, Aidan reached around and fisted his cock, pumping in time with their pitching hips.
Stimulated inside and out, surrounded by everything he could want and need, it was seconds before Jamie’s release washed over him. It spiked when Aidan bit the nape of his neck and planted himself deep inside, coming with a muffled growl. Tightening his fingers on Aidan’s side, Jamie held him buried as they splayed out on the floor, panting together, the smell of sweat and man with a hint of the ocean everywhere around them. Jamie didn’t think he’d ever felt anything so right before.
A minute, five, maybe fifteen later—Jamie wasn’t sure—Aidan pulled out and rolled off him. Flopping over, Jamie lay on his back and watched his partner move around the bathroom, pitching the condom, washing up, and pulling on his boxers. It was some view, and by the leer on Aidan’s face, he knew it.
“Bed now.” Aidan held out a hand. “I think we’ve had enough of the bathroom floor for one evening.”
“Now who’s the hater,” Jamie grumbled in mock protest, as Aidan pulled him up. He was barely vertical when Aidan snaked a hand around his neck and brought their mouths together for another searing kiss.
And then he was gone, leaving Jamie alone in the bathroom, dizzy and breathless. Steadying himself with a hand on the vanity, Jamie splashed cold water on his face, cleaned up, and dragged on his boxer briefs. He waited by the bed for Aidan, who returned from the living area with a glass of whiskey and a glass of water. Jamie grabbed the water and downed it on one gulp. Aidan drained the other, took the glass out of Jamie’s hand, and set both tumblers on the bedside table.
Jamie gracelessly fell into bed, a mass of tired, sated limbs, while Aidan shut the balcony doors and turned off lights. A moment later, the bed dipped and he eased in beside him, throwing an arm around his chest and a leg over his thigh. Jamie laid a hand over Aidan’s where it rested on his tattoo.
Warm breath tickled his neck. “No promises, Whiskey. We have fun, we enjoy each other, we keep it casual and quiet,” Aidan whispered, voice low and seductive. He punctuated his proposal with a kiss just below Jamie’s ear, his tongue darting out to tease skin ever so briefly. Jamie’s body shuddered, hard. “Can you do that?”
“Yeah,” he gasped breathlessly. “I can do that.”
Aidan grinned against his neck and relaxed into his side, his breaths evening out in sleep. Jamie struggled to do the same, his body on board with slumber but his mind and heart disobliging. This didn’t feel casual; this didn’t feel unattached. This felt like something a whole lot more. Closing his eyes, his stomach knotted, his chest clenched, and he couldn’t help but wonder if he’d told Aidan a lie.
* * *
Files, check.
Crypto tomes, check.
Personal items, aside from the one in his hand, check.
Jamie folded the last piece of tissue paper around the framed picture of his family and placed it gently inside the open box on his desk. Moving day had turned his little corner of the cave into even more of a disaster area than it usually was—dangling cables, stray pens, towering stacks of boxes. He was amazed how much clutter he’d amassed in three years.
IT had taken his monitors and phone. Building Services would move the boxes after hours. By tomorrow morning, he’d be set up in his new workspace, at the other desk in Aidan’s office. Jamie wasn’t entirely comfortable leaving the cave behind for a glassed-in office on the main floor, but he didn’t want to condemn Aidan to the vampiric Cyber surroundings he so clearly disfavored. Jamie wouldn’t mind the view either—of San Francisco or of his partner.
Smiling, he remembered the view during their last night together in Galveston. Aidan standing over him in the moonlit bathroom—lips swollen, hair tousled, pants undone, his head and eyes rolled back in tortured ecstasy.
Since returning home, they hadn’t seen each other until Aidan dropped by the cave earlier today with the promised flash drive and a new case. He’d been all business but his invite to claim the other desk in his main floor office had been delivered with heated autumn eyes and a devilish smirk that also invited Jamie to claim something else later in private. The unspoken promise was confirmed thirty minutes ago when Aidan texted to ask his choice of champagne and the whereabouts of a liquor store close to his house. Placing the lid on the final box, a thirty-minute commute was all that stood between Jamie and their private celebration.
Or so he thought, until the staccato tap-tap-tap of high heels on linoleum wiped the smile off his face. Jamie recognized the rhythm of those steps. He’d been waiting for this particular rock-studded shoe to drop the entire weekend. Aidan had assured him Cruz signed off on his move and their continued partnership, but Jamie knew it couldn’t be that easy.
His boss glided through the server racks toward him like the deadliest supermodel he’d ever seen. She stopped at the opening of the cave bullpen and lowered her arms in front of her, index finger tapping against a slim manila file folder in her hands. Jamie could guess at its contents.
A call transcript from the morning of the bomb scare—Aidan’s shouted “Jamie” and his hollered “baby.” Security camera shots of them inside the observation room or outside on the condo balcony, wrapped in each other’s arms, bodies and mouths locked together. Accounts from Oscar and Todd as to the heated interactions they’d witnessed last week.
“Give us the room, please.” Cruz waited for the other agents to clear out and lowered herself into a visitor chair. “Sit down, Jamie.”
Startled into action, he moved the box on his desk to the floor, pushed aside the loose cables, and swiped the rest of the detritus into an empty desk drawer.
“SAC Cruz, I can explain,” he started, though he didn’t have a good explanation ready to follow. He’d slept with his partner, his mentor—Cruz’s brother-in-law—and he intended to do it again. Telling her anything different would be a lie.
She held up a hand and nodded at his chair. “Sit down,” she repeated more gently. “After saving my life last week, you’ve earned the right to call me Mel. And don’t say anything else about what may or may not be going on with you and Aidan. I’m walking a razor-thin line of plausible deniability as it is.”
He clamped his mouth shut and took his seat.
Cruz—Mel—crossed one leg over the other and balanced the file folder on her knee. “Do you know why you were assigned to Agent Talley?”
“You wanted him to assess whether I’m ready for fieldwork.”
“I think Galveston proves you’re more than capable in the field.”
“Thank you, but—”
She cut off his would-be confession of relative inexperience. “You have a new assignment, Agent Walker.”
Opening the file, she pulled out a photo and pushed it across the desk. Similar to the one Todd showed them last week, it was a color shot of Renaud standing in a North African or Middle Eastern bazaar. In this photo, however, by his side stood a towering man with dark skin, broad shoulders, and eyes the same shape and color as those of the woman sitting across from Jamie.
His mind reeled, recalling Mel’s demand for backup once Renaud had been connected and Gary’s surprised reaction to the incident Wednesday morning. The former Texas City SAC had nudged Jamie for more details on the drivers of the SUVs. Because Gary hadn’t sent them. They were unknown variables at play in a scenario he thought he’d had under control.
A scenario Mel understood better than any of them.
“The accident Wednesday morning had nothing to do with the attack on the Port, did it?”
“No, I don’t believe it did.”
Jamie’s gut knotted at the myriad implications. “It was connected with Aidan’s accident eight months ago.”
Mel leaned forward. “Neither incidents were accidents.”
If he thought his heart hurt for Aidan before, this was a whole new level of pain. “How much of this does Aidan know?”
“Aidan knows I suspect the crash that killed Gabe and Tom was not an accident. I told him as much when I partnered you two. I told Aidan I was giving him what he needed to solve Gabe and Tom’s murders. I was giving him you.”
“And the flash drive,” Jamie said.
She nodded. “Aidan doesn’t know Gabe had ties to a suspected terrorist. And he doesn’t know my brother may have set a chain of events in motion that resulted in his and Tom’s deaths.”
Jamie tapped his finger on the photo. “So Aidan doesn’t know about this?”
Mel pulled it toward her, gaze riveted on the damning piece of evidence. “No, he doesn’t, and you won’t tell him.”
“I won’t—”
She raised her cold, hard eyes to him, and Jamie’s protest died. He’d seen what she could do to a man, and he didn’t want to make himself a target.
“I received this—” she lifted the photo off the desk “—on the day I was promoted to SAC. It arrived in an envelope with the flash drive, with no return address, postmarked Houston. Right before he died, Hamilton indicated he’d sent me a picture.”
All the pieces clicked into place. “You didn’t owe Gary a favor, did you?”
Sliding back in her chair, Mel placed the photo in her lap and folded her hands over it. “Gary did request you. I granted his request because I suspected Renaud might be involved.” Her eyes flicked down to the picture, then back up. “If I’d known Gary had been flipped, I wouldn’t have risked you or Aidan. That said, we’re one step closer to the truth.”
“Are you sure neither Tom nor Aidan were involved?” It felt like a betrayal to ask such a question, but after the week they’d had, he had to.
“I don’t believe so. But I was wrong about Gary, and about Gabe, so yes, you should look into Tom. As for Aidan, you know his family’s history with the IRA?” He nodded and she carried on. “Given that, he’s the last person I’d suspect of terrorism. And his grief over Tom and Gabe was real, as was the shock on his face when I told him my suspicions about the accident.”
Jamie breathed a little easier. This woman seemed to know Aidan better than anyone, and she was right about his personal history with terrorism. But she’d said it herself; Mel had been wrong, twice so far. He’d still have to investigate Aidan and Tom, and he’d also investigate her. “You want me to look into Gabe’s involvement with Renaud’s organization?” He didn’t let on how deep he intended to dig.
“Yes, and I want you to find out what really happened that night eight months ago.”
He nodded and moved to sit back in his chair.
Mel tilted forward and caught his trailing hand. “More importantly, Jamie, I need you to keep Aidan alive.”
Her eyes weren’t cold and hard anymore. They blazed with loyalty and determination, and Jamie breathed another sigh of relief, assured she was as invested in Aidan Talley’s life as he was coming to be.
“You did a hell of a job this past week,” she said, squeezing his hand. “Can I count on you to keep doing that?”
It was a heavy burden to bear—a man’s past, present and future in his hands—but Jamie wouldn’t trust Aidan’s life to anyone else. Protectiveness surged through him for this man whose fate seemed inexorably tangled with his own.
This time he didn’t lie or question the truth of his answer.
“Yes.”
* * * * *