Will walked back with Patrick to the hotel room. It felt like every part of him was tingling, not just with pleasure from the orgasm but from a continued sense of anticipation. What they’d just done was definitely blurring if not crossing the line in the sand that Patrick had drawn, but Will couldn’t find it in himself to care. Patrick had kissed him back, had grabbed him and hauled him closer, had wrapped his leg around him and thrust up into him, creating that delightful feeling, just on the raw edge of too much pleasure. Patrick had reciprocated. Will hadn’t intended for it to go farther than kissing and maybe some groping, honestly, and he’d been intending to pull away the moment Keene walked away. But then Keene had walked away and Patrick had spread his legs wider, arching up into Will, kissing him over and over again and Jesus bloody Christ, Will was only human. He dared anyone to resist Patrick when he was pliant and desperate against him. He bet even the sodding Queen couldn’t resist Patrick then.

Afterward, though, he half expected Patrick to shove him away. He had kept kissing him, unable to stop, loving the feel of Patrick’s skin in his mouth, but he had been waiting for Patrick to push him off and tell him to cut it out. Patrick hadn’t. Instead, Patrick had let Will kiss him, as deeply and thoroughly as he liked, until Will was shaking with the need to bury himself inside Patrick and never, ever leave.

The walk back was silent. Not just quiet—silent. Patrick seemed to have withdrawn into himself, and Will didn’t know how to stop him. He had a feeling that if he tried to say or do anything right now, it would be pushing his luck too far and Patrick would really lash out, not that he couldn’t deal with whatever Patrick could dish out. He knew that he could handle it,but he didn’t want to put Patrick in a position to lash out.

His mate Rhee, she’d lash out at anything, and it had exhausted her. After a row, she’d be the one crying, even though she’d been the one to start the row in the first place. It was because she was hurting and she just needed an excuse to argue with someone, let off that steam, but in the end it didn’t do her any good.

Rhee had been hurting because of her mum. She’d never known her dad, which was something Will’s whole crew had shared, but her mum had gotten into drugs real bad and overdosed when Rhee was fifteen. They’d all banded together for her, but it was a wound that had never really healed. There was no place for that anger to go. It couldn’t go to her mum, who was dead, or the dealer, who they couldn’t touch, so it had gotten directed at random strangers and friends and people in the pub.

Will didn’t know what was going on in Patrick’s head right now. There was still so much that he didn’t know about Patrick, so much that he knew the man was keeping from him. He could tell though, by the way that Patrick seemed to be retreating into himself, becoming still and solemn, that any attempt to talk to him would just start a row. And, just like with Rhee, it would only serve to get Patrick angry and riled up and upset without actually solving the thing that was making him upset, so Will kept quiet.

They rode up in the elevator together and entered the hotel room. Will itched to reach out and grab Patrick, to reel him in and press a soft kiss to his cheek. He’d been wanting to do that all the time, to lean across the table or over Patrick’s shoulder or wherever and just plant a kiss on his cheek, a gesture of easy affection. Back in the alley, he was almost certain that Patrick would have let him. Now, he wasn’t so sure.

“Anything else for me tonight?” Will asked, just to say something. “I can write you a report on the couple, if you’d like, professor.”

Patrick didn’t even so much as twitch his lips in a smile. Patrick liked to try and hide it but Will saw him hiding his smiles and he knew that he could make Patrick laugh, that Patrick thought he was funny. It was fun to flirt with the baristas and such just to see the color rise to Patrick’s cheeks in indignation.

He’d never so much as look at anyone, male or female or variation thereupon, if Patrick was his for good and true.

But now Patrick didn’t even look like he’d really heard Will. Will tried to ignore the disappointment and went over to look through the files again.

“Keene showed up early,” Patrick said. “Two days early. I’ll have to look into his itinerary and see what that means.”

“How are you going to pull that?”

“I’ll hack into his files, like I did before. It’s easy.”

“You’ll have to teach me how to do that, I’m daft with computers.”

Patrick made a noncommittal humming sound. Will cleared his throat. “Are we…” He felt terrified, suddenly. “We’re all right, yeah? I haven’t—I didn’t muck it all up, did I?”

“What?” Patrick blinked at him for a moment, confused, before his eyes cleared and he understood. “No. No. It’s just that he’s here now, which means we have to be professional. You’ll have to stop coming over to my room. Minimal contact for the next couple of weeks. You have the burner phone I gave you—use it to text me, mine’s a burner as well. No face to face unless we have to. You’ll go to work and do your thing and I’ll make sure that Keene gets steered over to your table.”

“Right.” Will knew this part of the plan. He was supposed to frequent the places that Keene frequented, as well as the coffee shop and other places that had become his usual haunts. He had to let Keene see that he was more well-off than he should be. Patrick would find a way, Will didn’t know how, to get Keene to sit at Will’s table and watch Will deal. Will would then take care of the rest. It would all be on him.

Knowing what was going to happen and what he should do was one thing. Actually doing it, now that it was starting, was quite another. He had a cold ball of nervousness in his stomach that was getting rid of any last post-orgasm high. This could go so wrong in so many ways.

He was committed though, and he was going to do it. He’d do it partly for the thrill, partly for the education and the contacts, partly for the money—and mostly for Patrick. When he’d seen Keene’s face in the flesh, it had been all he could do not to knock the wanker off his feet and hit him ‘til his face was mash. That man had betrayed Patrick, nearly gotten him put in jail, and Will had wanted so badly to make him pay for that. Nobody would ever hurt Patrick if Will could help it. Will was starting to think that he’d follow Patrick to the ends of the earth if Patrick would let him. He craved that self-confidence, that feeling of someone else helping him, having his back and planning and being in control.

Patrick couldn’t see his own face, of course, there was no mirror handy, so he hadn’t seen what he looked like when he’d spotted Keene. Will had seen it though, seen that horrible pale expression, and he never wanted to see Patrick looking like that ever again. It made him want to dash Keene’s face in.

Didn’t make the nerves dissipate, though. Patrick’s friend, Mallory, had a right nice collection of alcohol in her pantry. Maybe he’d have a go at that when he got back to the apartment to steady himself. Tomorrow he’d have to be in character all day every day, in a way he’d never been before. It was scary, to say the least.

Patrick must have sensed something of the fear and anger roiling inside of Will, because he reached over and covered Will’s hand with his own.

“You’re going to do perfectly,” Patrick told him. His voice was softer than it usually was, no longer commanding but reassuring. “You’ve listened to everything that I’ve said this whole time. You’ve got the information, you’ve got the skills. You know what to do. And I’ll be there, even if you can’t see me. I’ll have your back.”

Will nodded, flipping his hand over so that he could squeeze Patrick’s hand. “I don’t—I ain’t never done anything like this, pengting,” he admitted, his voice quiet, almost dying in his throat before he could voice it. He felt, for the first time in years, ashamed of his accent, his background, where he was from, his lack of experience. He’d never pulled off anything like this before. His biggest job had still, at the end of the day, been a smash and grab. He’d charmed his way into getting valuable information but c’mon, a bank had been shot up, yeah? And he’d been the only one to escape.

“A con like, like this, oh my days. This is the big leagues, man, and I don’t want to mess this up. I don’t want to mess it up for you, pengting, you get me? You’re safe.”

“I still only understand about sixty percent of what you say when you talk like that,” Patrick replied, trying for his usual dry, unimpressed tone but only sounding fond instead.

Will smiled, looking down at their intertwined hands. “You love it, bruv, don’t even lie.”

Patrick sighed. “Will. Will, look at me.”

Will looked up. Patrick stared right into his eyes, the bright blue boring into him. “You’re not going to mess this up. You’re not going to fail me. We’re going to pull this off together, and you’re going to be amazing, and the whole criminal world is going to know about this and know that you are the newest hot game in town.”

“Swear down?” Will asked.

“Swear down.” The corner of Patrick’s mouth twitched. “Bring up the Kensington massive, brap,” he said, in a horrible imitation of Will’s chav accent.

Will burst out laughing, squeezing Patrick’s hand again. “That was simply awful, darling, bloody awful,” he drawled in a posh accent. Then he switched to a Southern American accent. “I can do your accents way better than you can do mine.”

“Oh my God.” Patrick started laughing. “Never, ever try and sound Southern again. That was horrifying.”

“I did good though, yeah? American’s easy innit.”

“I never said that you weren’t good at it, I said it was horrifying. There’s a difference.” Patrick squeezed his hand in return, and Will found himself wanting to duck his head down and blush like a kid.

“You think you’re real funny, don’t you?”

Patrick shook his head, eyes going wide. “No, no, I know I’m funny.”

Will laughed. He wanted to see this Patrick all the time, this Patrick that held his hand and teased him. He loved seeing all these different sides of Patrick, the one that was prickly and the one that was soft and pliant and the one that was desperate and this one, gentle and teasing and supportive. He loved all of it.

As if Patrick was reading his thoughts, the hand Will was holding was suddenly retracted, and Patrick stood up, nearly giving Will whiplash as he craned his neck up to look at him.

“You should go on back to the apartment, get some sleep,” Patrick said, calm and commanding once more like they were back in the taxi together. “Text me if you need anything but we should have as little contact as possible until this is over. Definitely nothing face to face.”

Will swallowed. He hated the idea of not seeing Patrick for weeks on end, even though he knew going in that’s what this con would take. However, he hadn’t realized until it was happening how much he’d grown used to Patrick’s presence. Patrick was the only person he had, now. It hurt to say goodbye, however temporarily.

“Can I at least get a kiss goodbye?” Will asked, standing up as well and smiling at Patrick—really smiling, not winking or smirking. He was teasing, but he also wanted Patrick to see that he was being serious.

Patrick’s face shut down, becoming cool and completely devoid of emotion.

“I told you,” he said, “We’re not doing anything while we’re working together.”

“What was that in the alley then?”

“A distraction.”

“Yeah, that’s why you kept at it after Keene had left, and don’t try to say it was all me either. I felt you, you were just as desperate for it as I was.”

Patrick glared at him, outright glared, and Will took an involuntary step back. Patrick looked angry and kind of terrifying. Will could suddenly definitely see Patrick as the kind of guy who was a criminal and friends with mafia bosses.

“What happened in the alley was a mistake where we got a little carried away.”

“A mistake?” Will snorted. “You can’t possibly say that was a mistake. I’m not calling it a mistake.”

“Will—”

“No.” Will shook his head. “If I’m not going to get to see you for almost a month, then I’m saying it now, I like you. Yeah? I like you. And I think you like me too. You can’t let me hold your hand, and kiss you, and say things about protecting me, and then claim that you don’t want anything to happen between us.”

“I never said that—” Patrick pressed his lips together, as if he’d just started to say something that he didn’t want to.

“So you do want something to happen.” Will took a step forward, hunching his shoulders a little. He only had an inch on Patrick, if that, but his larger frame could make him loom over the other guy if he wanted. He didn’t want that. He wanted to seem non-threatening, because he had a suspicion that the slightest excuse would send Patrick lashing out.

“We are in the middle of a con that’s about to get very intense. Our mark is here. There’s no time to discuss this.”

“You don’t think it’s safe for us to be together in the middle of this mess. That’s fine, but Patrick, we’ve spent all day together, had coffee, and eaten dinner out. I want to keep doing that after this con is over.”

“I just said—”

“If we don’t discuss it now, then when?” Will reached out for Patrick, who took a step back, keeping distance.

“There is nothing to discuss,” Patrick said, his voice even and cold.

Will tried to keep himself from clenching his hands into fists. “Patrick—”

“Will. No. There is nothing to discuss. You’re my partner on this con, I’m helping you out and you’re helping me out, and that’s all this is. All right? Sexual attraction notwithstanding, that is all this is and will ever be.”

Will kept himself from punching the wall, but just barely. He had so many things to say and nothing to say all at the same time. “Fine. I don’t know what’s got you shoving me away, but when you figure it out, the offer still stands.”

Patrick didn’t say anything, but then, Will didn’t expect him to. Will showed himself out.

The moment he got back to the apartment, he was going to get completely pissed.