Page 8

S aturday night found Azrael out and about.

There was no way he could stay in Dave’s house, so he made the decision to get the list and get the hell out.

He tapped the bar, and the bartender poured him another lemon drop. It was his second one, and he really did love the taste. The bartender had used a sugar-rimmed martini glass, and Azrael licked the crystals from his lips.

“So, you like my suggestion?” The bartender smiled at him, wiped the bar, and pointed to the drink.

Azrael nodded. He hadn’t a clue what to drink when he got there, so the bartender, whose tag read Danny, had suggested he might like a lemon drop. Thankfully, Azrael’s fake ID worked even though he didn’t even look his age.

But Danny didn’t seem to care. Maybe that was because of the appreciative gleam in the man’s eyes.

When the guy flirted with him, Azrael flirted right back.

It was nice.

It was a far cry from being shoved away like Real had done. But that kiss…omg, their kiss. Just the thought of it made his stomach jump.

“Are you taking a car home?” Danny asked.

“Yeah, I’ll get an Uber. But I don’t know if I can drink a third one,” Azrael said with a laugh.

“Yeah, alcohol can hit you unexpectedly if you’re not used to it.”

The next few hours passed quickly, and the small club filled up . Not one for crowds, Azrael finished his drink, paid the tab in cash, and told Danny goodbye.

Glad that he had stopped at two drinks, he stepped out into the cold night. The January weather had turned. Crystal clear skies had become gray thunder clouds and dumped buckets of rain on the city.

He stood outside the club entrance with the music thumping through the closed door. Hovering beneath the awning that stretched several feet over the door, he pulled his heavy black overcoat around him and lifted his face to take a deep breath.

He was lonely.

He shook himself to keep his mind off of that and on the task he needed to complete.

The door opened, the sound of the music grew, and a few people stumbled outside.

Azrael didn’t look around as they shuffled noisily down the street.

The slight scent of a woodsy cologne wafted through the air. It wasn’t a bad smell, and Azrael wondered briefly about the brand name.

“Hey…looking for a good time?” a masculine voice said from next to him.

A good time? Azrael didn’t even know what that looked like.

Real had been his first kiss beyond those that had been forced on him.

Yeah, and look how that turned out. He tried not to think about that damned kiss and the way he’d wrapped himself around Real, but he couldn’t stop himself.

What he wanted to do was get his dick sucked. Was that too much to ask? Could this stranger give him that?

Possibly, but Azrael couldn’t fathom it. First, the guy was a stranger, and second, he wasn’t the type for casual hookups. And something about doing that with someone he didn’t know really didn’t appeal to him. The guys at work called him old-fashioned, but he didn’t care.

“No thanks,” he murmured, not even turning to see what the guy looked like.

“Come on, I’ll give you a good time,” again the voice coaxed.

“Look, I’m not interested…”

Azrael jerked a short glance at the guy, and his voice faded when he found himself staring at a handgun.

The man kept the gun low so that anyone coming out of the club wouldn’t see it, but it was high enough to mean business and the barrel was pointed right at him.

Azrael didn’t have his weapon on him. There was no way to get past security’s metal detectors with one. That meant this guy had come up from outside.

He had first assumed the guy had come from within the club and hadn’t paid attention. Stupid him, damn it.

“Move,” the stranger said.

When the guy gestured with the gun in his hand, Azrael moved. He wasn’t stupid. Plus, he needed to get the guy alone so he could take care of whatever the fuck this was.

The guy was average looking with shaggy, deep red hair and wire-framed glasses. Nothing to really look at, almost nondescript. It was almost like the guy made it a mission to go unnoticed. Even with red hair, somehow the guy had managed it.

Azrael walked; he wasn’t nervous. Did this guy seriously think he was just some skinny kid who could be taken advantage of?

Obviously…but the asshole was in for a very rude awakening.

“What do you want?” Azrael asked as he stepped out from beneath the awning and walked down the side of the building through the pouring rain. “If you’re looking for sex, you’ve got the wrong guy.”

“Keep moving.”

Now the gun barrel was in his back. He felt it through his heavy overcoat.

The alleyway loomed ahead, but Azrael stepped into it without fear. The rain soaked his hair, face, and coat, but they were only minor irritations.

What he was waiting for were the shadows. He craved them. The darkness outside as well as the darkness that cleaved within his soul. It was in the pitch black that he could become what he’d been created for.

A killer.

He wouldn’t die tonight, but someone was going to.

The sound of the music from inside grew louder as the club door was opened. Voices and laughter swept the area as people spilled from the club’s front door.

Stepping into the alley, Azrael waited until the man followed.

That was when Azrael struck. He dropped low and fast, the man cursed and adjusted, but it was too late.

His first hit landed right in the man’s nose; he was aiming to break it. Pain splintered through his hand, but that wasn’t going to faze him. He had to make it hurt, he had to take this fucker out before the guy could shoot him.

When the gun didn’t go off, Azrael realized that the man probably didn’t want to shoot anybody.

However, rapists had to die.

Slamming his knee into the man’s crotch, Azrael caught him in the junk.

The gun went flying somewhere unknown, skittering across the dark, wet pavement, but at least it was out of the stranger’s grip.

The man was hunched over, and Azrael tried for a throat punch, but he missed when the bigger man stumbled back and away.

“Not so tough now, are you?” Azrael growled.

The laughter and voice grew nearer as clubgoers approached the end of the building where the alley lay.

“You have no idea who you’re fucking with.”

The raspy words brought him to a standstill, and the stranger took the opportunity to step out of the alley and walk closely along with the passing crowd.

As if knowing Azrael wouldn’t follow.

Which was odd.

Who the fuck was this guy?

Along with those hissed words, the whole thing didn’t seem like something random.

“For fuck’s sake,” he muttered under his breath and shook back his soaked hair before he hurried from the alley.

The Uber he had ordered had come and gone, charging his account with a no-show fee, damn it.

It was too late to even attempt retrieving the list when he got back to Dave’s when he climbed through his window an hour later.

He was too fucking tired to even think about messing with the computer. Plus, he did have tomorrow night. Sunday night might just be better when the estate became even more deserted as the weekend wound down.

Stripping, he washed the stench of the club from his body, dressed in pjs, and wrapped his aching hand before he climbed into bed.

The stranger lingered in his mind.

What the hell had the guy wanted? He didn’t look like any assassin he’d met before.

But maybe that was what the guy was. Maybe the man was taking out the competition? It wouldn’t be the first time nor the last.

He should sit out on the roof and try to unwind…but nixed the idea. Being on the roof reminded him of Real.

He remembered the first time he connected with Real on his first night at Dave’s place.

Azrael had taken solace on the roof. It was quiet out there, and it gave the illusion of being on his own in a house full of secret operatives.

Surprise had taken him aback the moment Real stepped out of his bedroom window and onto the roof.

Azrael drank in every inch of the big warrior, and his heart pounded at his instant attraction to the guy.

“Are they looking for me?” Azrael asked.

“Yes,” Real murmured and kept his eyes on the sunset and beach that lay beyond Dave’s Santa Barbara estate.

“Sorry,” he said, but he wasn’t sorry. He wasn’t comfortable around people. In fact, he hated people in general because they were fucking unpredictable. Most of them were out to fuck with him in one way or another.

“Sometimes you just need to be alone. I get it,” Real said.

Azrael’s throat closed up and he wanted to cry. This lone solitary man, who didn’t speak often, knew what he was feeling.

“Yeah,” he said around the tears.

“People worry because they care,” Real said.

“I’m not used to that,” Azrael admitted. It felt strange sharing with a stranger, but for some reason, this guy was different.

Usually, he only shared with Apollo, but something about Real drew him in.

“I know.” The warrior nodded. “It’ll take some time.”

Yes, it would take some time to get over what Solomon had done to him and his brother and several other young adults. Kidnapping them as kids and training them to be assassins or worse, selling them for sex.

“Are you going to kill Solomon?” Azrael had whispered, wiping his sleeve against his nose.

“Yes.”

The resolve in Real’s voice gave him comfort. And he wasn’t sure that Real could get close enough to do the job, but he hoped so.

“Good,” Azrael hissed fiercely, letting the hate and anger at Solomon bleed through.

A sound in the hallway jogged him back to his room, and he gazed up at the slow-turning fan overhead.

He released a heavy sigh, turned over in his bed, and muttered into the quiet of his room.

“Fuck my life.”

Real was so much a part of his life that he couldn’t seem to go a minute without thinking of him.

Visions of the kiss they’d shared suddenly lulled him to sleep.