A Matter of Time 07 - Parting Shot (MM) Read online

  The room exploded.

  Jimmy was not having it; I had a bad habit of getting shot.

  Captain Gaines apparently liked me more than I thought. She wasn’t having it either. She actually needed homicide detectives in her homicide department.

  But neither of them had the clout and position that the special agent had. Twenty minutes later, it was just her and another agent in the room with me. My partner and my boss had been excused to the hall to wait.

  “So you’re thinking what?” She queried me. “Bodyguard?”

  “I would think so. Or… do you know what Mr. Wells’s take on gay is?”

  “Better than bodyguard.” She was blunt. “If you and another man went in as a couple, that would put him more at ease. The bodyguard thing would be a harder sell.”

  “Okay. Then let me talk to Evan’s friends. Let’s see if Nick McCall or Max Sutter will step up.”

  Her eyes were locked on mine. “Are you certain about this, Detective?”

  “Who else can do it?”

  She was silent.

  “I mean, do you have an undercover agent to spare?”

  “Honestly, no. Not that I can even get them up to speed in the timeframe we have.”

  “Well, then.”

  “You’ve already been vetted, Detective. If you can get some solid citizen to sign a waiver, we’re good to go.”

  I had my marching orders.

  MAX didn’t pick up, so I left message on his phone, explained that I was going to try Nick next, and stressed the urgency of his returning my call.

  I got my first choice for an undercover partner on the second ring and was deeply relieved. “Mr. McCall.”

  “Just Nick, Detective,” he slurred, his voice thick like he’d been drinking. It was only six, but I guess he’d had a day.

  “I need to speak to you; can I stop by your place?”

  “I’m actually out. Did you want to come by Duck & Cover and pick me up so we could talk?”

  “That would be great.”

  “Yes, it would,” he murmured. “I’ll be waiting.”

  My initial plan was to go home first, shower and change before I went and pitched my idea to Nick McCall, but I needed to talk to him before he did any more drinking.

  I took a cab downtown toward Rush, the street Duck & Cover was on, and the driver dropped me off at the light a block from the restaurant/lounge. The place was new and trendy and loud, without any really good food that I knew of so, because I was hungry, I was disappointed. I needed to eat, but I wanted something good. A big, fat porterhouse sounded like heaven, or some good Italian, but I would have neither, and so walking in, I was grouchy.

  Spotting Nick across the room where he was sitting at a table with three other men and a couple of women, I realized it might be more of a challenge to extricate him then I had first thought.

  When I neared the table, he lifted his head and saw me. The smile I got was nice. “Detective.” He exhaled long and deep when I was looming over him. “It’s really good to see you.”

  I smiled back but realized suddenly what I had found alluring earlier no longer was. Or at least not for me. It was a problem I had been experiencing a lot lately: my complete and utter disinterest in any man who was not Aaron Sutter. I really needed to get the fuck over it.

  “Let me introduce you.”

  So I stood there and met people I didn’t give a crap about, not memorizing names, not even bothering to catalog them. Being as I was a cop, things stuck if I wasn’t careful. Trained to recall details, see faces and memorize them, remember the smallest tidbits of conversation, I had to make sure I focused only on Nick.

  “So can I—”

  “Sit down and have something to drink. We’re celebrating.”

  “What’s the occasion?” I inquired but didn’t move.

  He didn’t answer. Instead, he stood up and faced me. “We can get out of here, Detective. It doesn’t look like you want to talk.”

  “Oh? What does it look like I wanna do?”

  “Get laid.” He grinned and it was sloppy, like he wasn’t in complete control of it. He’d had more than I thought. “I can help you with that.”

  It didn’t matter. We would go back to his place and fuck, and I would explain what I really needed. “Okay, come on. Say g’night to your pals.”

  He wheeled around and gave them all a quick wave before he was facing me again. “Lead on.”

  Outside on the sidewalk, I realized my phone was on death’s door.

  “Hey, I gotta run home and grab my charger really quick.”

  “I will follow you home, Detective.” He leered at me, his eyes making the lap up and down my frame.

  “Okay,” I said, taking hold of his hand and walking toward the curb.

  He squeezed tight. “That’s, uhm, nice.”

  I glanced over my shoulder. “Holding hands?”

  “Yeah.” He shivered. “Most guys—don’t.”

  And I was one of them. I normally didn’t either. Not in public. It was funny he was thinking I was one of the good guys when that was not the case at all.

  In the cab, he didn’t let go of my hand, and at my place, I had the driver wait as I got out.

  “Can I come up with you?” Nick questioned, holding the door open.

  His eyes were blustery, so I relented. On the sidewalk in front of the stoop that led up to the security door of my loft, Nick recaptured my hand, lacing his fingers into mine.

  “I need to talk to you about something important.”

  “Whatever you want.”

  So many people walk around who, from the outside, appear strong and capable and normal. But when you get up close—when you talk to them, listen to them—you realize they’re broken. I had no idea until that moment Nick McCall was the kind of guy who was ready to dive into the deep end with the first person who seemed like they wanted to keep him. It terrified me that he was so fragile. If I took him on this scary undercover adventure with me, he would be mine afterward, and I wasn’t ready to take possession of him. I didn’t want him to belong to me.

  “Hey.” I made my voice gentle, reaching out right before the door closed. The cab wouldn’t have to wait after all. I was putting Nick right back in. “I think maybe you better go home and sleep off whatever you took.”

  His eyes widened. “How did you know I—”

  “I’m a police detective, you know.”

  He was scared as he pulled his hand away from me.

  “I’m not gonna bust you for whatever,” I apprised him. “But promise me you’ll go home and not back out.”

  He coughed. “You don’t want me to come up?”

  “Not tonight,” I said, holding the door for him.

  As he got back in, I leaned over and gave the cabbie two twenties. “Just not back to where you picked us up.”

  I got the head tip from him but nothing from Nick; he ignored me completely. Watching them drive away, I wasn’t quite sure how I felt. What was really screwed up was that the only option left open to me was Max. Hopefully, I could talk him into it.

  “Detective Stiel.”

  I turned to find a vintage Lincoln Town car parked across the street on the opposite curb. There was a man there, leaning against it. It was gorgeous, the car; definitely someone’s baby. It was in mint condition.

  “Yes?” I called over to him, wary because the driver was not small. He was my age, maybe even a little older, but he was massive in comparison. Another huge red flag was using my name and me having no clue who he was.

  “My boss would like a word.”

  “And who’s that?” I didn’t panic or reach for my phone or my gun. I was waiting to see if he was an actual threat or not.

  “Mr. Sutter.” He gave me a trace of warm eyes with crinkling laugh lines around them. “He’s upstairs in your loft.”

  It was the best news I’d heard all night. Max Sutter had come to me. Now that Nick was out, I would need to convince the younger Sutter to help
me. And yes, he’d have to pretend he was sleeping with me, but I was hoping he would be willing to try and pull that off for the greater good and to avenge his old friend.

  “Thank you,” I acknowledged the driver before vaulting up the steps and going inside. I was surprised to see the man get in the Lincoln and pull away.

  Upstairs in my loft, I made sure to announce myself when I walked in, calling for Max as I shut the door behind me and locked it. “Must be nice to be rich,” I snickered, hanging up my topcoat, then the suit jacket underneath, before loosening my tie. “People just let you—Max!”

  He came up from behind and drove me face-first into the living room wall.

  “What the hell are you—”

  “Not Max, you stupid ass.”

  Aaron.

  And Aaron apparently in great need, as evidenced by the hard groin shoved against my ass, the hands tearing at my clothes, and the knee wedged between my thighs.

  “Get off me,” I ordered weakly.

  “Fuck no.”

  He sounded frustrated and mad and, God, it was sexy.

  I flattened my hands on the exposed brick and dropped my head forward, struggling to stay still and not turn and ravage him. He tugged my shirt out of my pants and lifted it, and the T-shirt underneath, up between my shoulder blades.

  “What are you—Aaron,” I croaked out, because his mouth was on my skin, open and wet, sucking, tasting and kissing, and it was all I could do not to beg him for anything and everything all at the same time.

  “I want you,” he said flatly, his front pressed all along my back, arms suddenly tight around my abdomen, lips at the nape of my neck. “And I know you want me.”

  “Oh yes,” I agreed, my cock already painfully hard even before his hands slid down my stomach, dropping lower to my belt buckle. His intent was deliberate, and everything was unzipped and loosened, the whole works shoved to my ankles at once.

  When one strong, long-fingered hand wrapped around my shaft, I jerked back against him, shuddering just from the feel of him, of the possessiveness and dominance. “Hurry.”

  “Who have you slept with since me?”

  It would sound like I had been waiting, but I couldn’t help that. “No one.”

  “No one?” he repeated, stroking my leaking dick with his right hand, the other lifting up under my shirt to my nipple. When he pulled first gently, then harder, rolling my sensitive skin between his fingers, I let my head fall back onto his shoulder. “In four months?”

  “No. Can’t you tell?” I ground out; because just the reaction, the welling lust and need, should have told him I was telling the truth.

  “I can,” he assured me, his teeth tracing down the cord on the side of my neck, making my knees wobble. “And so you know—no one else for me either.”

  I cricked my head to look him in the eye. “That says something, doesn’t it?”

  “It says everything,” he promised, pulling back, letting me go.

  I spun and had my back against the wall I’d clung to, abrading my shirt, not caring that it snagged.

  We stood there, staring at each other.

  “What the fuck was Nick McCall doing in front of your place?”

  “It’s about work.”

  He was furious with me, and it was there on his face, the anger and jealousy.

  “I wasn’t gonna fuck him.”

  “No?” he challenged, advancing on me, brows furrowed, jaw clenched.

  “I put him in the cab. Weren’t you watching?”

  “I was watching,” he said, staring at me with raw, wounded eyes.

  It hurt to see him like that, vulnerable and aching, simmering with rage, all at the same time. I wouldn’t let him stand there alone, and so reached for him.

  He lunged at me, and I realized he was not going to let his rage go, wasn’t going to just melt into my arms, so I twisted my head away. This was not the Aaron I remembered—instead a cold, angry lover.

  The growl that came out of him was full of frustration as he caught my jaw, his teeth grazing my skin. “Duncan!”

  I didn’t look at him, and when he moved to the other side, wanting my mouth, I tipped my head away again.

  “Kiss me!” The demand was aggravated and desperate and sounded like fear to me.

  “I’m not going anywhere,” I soothed him, though still refusing to meet his gaze.

  “Duncan!”

  His voice shook and I saw that I was right. He was terrified.

  “Look at me!”

  When I did, he leaned in and his teeth closed on my bottom lip. He bit down, the guttural snarl not from the gentle man I knew. Our time apart, that had left me feeling unsettled and ungrounded, had done something darker to Aaron, and now he was frantic to reclaim it.

  Everything about him was spoiling for a fight, and it was my place to soothe away the uncertainty in his head that I could hear and see. Wrapping him up tight, I used strength I had never shown him before and crushed him tight to my chest.

  “Duncan!”

  “Stop,” I whispered, bending to kiss him.

  “Let go.”

  “That’s what you really want?”

  With his arms pinned to his sides, all he could do was tip his head up and meet my gaze.

  “Aaron?”

  Eyes rimmed in red were locked on mine.

  “It’s okay,” I gentled him, grinning as I tipped my head to seal my lips down over his.

  He pushed up, his tongue sliding into my mouth, and I met him eagerly, deepening the kiss so I could taste him.

  The first led to another and another, and then he shuddered and I lifted back just enough, my lips still hovering over his. “Let it go.”

  He exhaled softly, and I released his arms, smiling as he coiled them around my neck. “You think you know me so well.”

  “Yeah,” I growled, rubbing down his sides, to the small of his back, and finally grabbed hold of his beautiful, round ass. When I squeezed tight, he arched into my touch. “I do.”

  He nuzzled his face into the side of my neck, and then his tongue ran behind my ear and it was my turn to shiver for him. “I know you too.”

  It wasn’t supposed to happen like that, that fast, that hard. No one fell like that. I didn’t believe in love at first sight, first fuck, or first anything. So why did I feel like Aaron Sutter had just been walking around waiting for me his whole life?

  “Aaron, just let me have—”

  “Shhh,” he quieted me, untangling himself before dropping to his knees.

  “You don’t—fuck.”

  My cock was not small; a lot of guys gagged giving me head, but not Aaron. He opened his throat and took me in, swallowing my length, sucking, laving, his face buried in my groin.

  My fingers threaded through his thick dirty-blond hair—darker than mine, golder. I was pale in comparison to the bronze of his skin, all of me not the rich color he was. The contrasts between us were beautiful, and I noticed and relished them, savoring the feel of his mouth, his skin, and how I controlled him as he sucked my dick.

  He traced over the muscles in my thighs, rising higher until his hands were on my ass, squeezing tight.

  “Aaron,” I huffed, forcing his head back, breaking the suction so I could gaze down into his eyes. “I wanna do this in my bed. I’ve been hoping.” And I had, along with waiting. It was why there had been nobody else. I wasn’t ready to give up on the idea of him and me, no matter what I said out loud.

  “I thought of you too much,” he confessed.

  The weight of passion on him was beautiful to see. His blown pupils, flushed cheeks, swollen red lips, and rasping breath sent a jaw-clenching shiver through me.

  “I don’t wanna do this next to the refrigerator.”

  “I just want you, the where hardly matters.”

  “It matters to me,” I said, hauling him to his feet, hands under his armpits, yanking my pants up and bumping him as I walked by. “Follow me.”

  He did as ordered, and when w
e reached my bedroom, I rounded on him and shoved him back into the wall.

  “What do you want?”

  “What can I have?”

  “Anything,” he promised, his eyes locked on mine.

  “Get the lube,” I directed. Heart pounding, skin hot, I wanted him all over me, because I felt like I was going to fly apart if he wasn’t.

  He was silent, moving where I pointed, going to the nightstand and retrieving the bottle as he yanked at his clothes with one hand.

  The second he was within reach, I grabbed him and pulled him forward, going to work on his shirt, getting the buttons, and undoing them fast.

  He leaned as if he was drunk, rubbed his nose along mine and then under my jaw. His hands were on my hips, fingers following the line of my pelvis, licking my collarbone even as I heard the pop of the cap.

  “No condom.”

  “No,” I agreed. I didn’t plan on there ever being anyone else. And it was stupid romantic bullshit, but I felt it in my heart, and I could barely stand it.

  Slick fingers slid between my cheeks, two at once, no gentle opening but instead the immediate press inside. The familiar burn and the sound that came out of me—pleading, begging—was, but wasn’t, me. It was strange because before the man putting bite marks all over my skin came into my life, I had never sounded like that. I had no idea I would want to submit so often. With the nameless twinks in the bars, I only topped. And when I had been with Nate, I had fought to fuck, not be fucked. But Aaron inside me, moving, filling, stretching, was something I would beg for.

  “What do you want?”

  I scrambled away from him and gasped when his fingers were gone, spun, and braced my hands on the wall, bending forward, the invitation clear.

  “I thought fucking in bed was what you wanted?”

  “It doesn’t matter.”

  “It matters to me,” he said, hand around the back of my neck, guiding me to the bed. “You need to see that I—” He wiped his other hand on his leg, the lube stain glistening. “You’re not simply some trick, and I’m not leaving after.”

  My heart hurt looking at him.

  “Come here,” he said gently, drawing me forward, pulling my shirt and T-shirt up over my head and off.

  “My feet—” I chuckled because they were still caught in my pants.