Page 17

DANTE

R eid stares blankly up at me. One second, two seconds, then his eyes narrow in the way that I know means I'm about to get some serious shit.

“Explain,” Reid says, voice carrying a hint of anger.

“We were recruited by someone we’ve never met to steal back what’s been stolen from the people. Sometimes it’s money, sometimes it’s intellectual property… sometimes we kill people.” I pause and blink down at Reid, waiting for him to catch on. “Do you understand what I’m saying?”

Reid takes a deep breath. “Are you fucking with me?”

“Nope!” Hayden pipes up from the sofa. “We were all recruited. We’ve been doing this for about three years now.”

“Are you paid?”

“We have a stipend,” I explain, desperately needing him to understand. “But we aren’t really paid as much as you’d think. It’s more… something we all want to do. The rent on the house is kindly paid for us by our benefactor.”

“You avenge people for… basically free?” Reid asks in di sbelief, mouth adorably pursed.If this situation wasn’t so precarious, I’d do something insane like try to cuddle him.

“We have our reasons,” Jacob calls from the couch.

Reid’s eyes slowly track over everyone in the room. “You kill people?”

“Bad people,” Jacob corrects, but flinches when it clearly doesn’t appease Reid.

“Excuse me,” Reid says, then slowly stands. He pauses for a moment to look over everyone one last time, before leaving the room. For one awful moment I’m afraid he’s going to leave, but he only climbs up the stairs, shoulders up to his ears, back ramrod straight.

“Oh… you’re in trouble,” Jacob sings.

Parker shoots his twin a glare. “You’re one to talk.”

“What?” Jacob asks in confusion.

Okay, maybe Parker isn’t as oblivious as I thought.

Jacob definitely is though. I leave them be and climb the stairs two at a time to my room, too fucking eager to get to Reid.

He’s standing in the middle of my room, arms wrapped tightly around himself, gazing listlessly at the floor.

When I close the door and lean against it, Reid’s hard gaze bores into mine.

“Was it all a lie?” Reid asks quietly.

Now I’m confused. “What?”

“Am I a mark?”

Oh no. I rush toward him but Reid takes a careful step back. I fall to my knees before him.

“No, Reid. You’ve never been a mark, not to me. You’ve only ever been mine. Just mine. Okay? Please believe me… I’ll do anything. I’ll give you anything .”

Reid’s blue eyes pierce through me. Bruised light blue carnations, that’s the color of his eyes.

So much fucking pain and anger, half directed at me, half directed at himself.

Fucking Reid. The fact that even for a second he thought…

thought that he isn't everything to me after just a few weeks.

Fuck. How do I make him understand? His jaw clenches hard as he turns his head away from me.

All emotion disappears from his face, even the sadness.

I can feel it, the moment he shuts down.

“Reid, don’t do this.” I reach out and pull at his hoodie, tugging him slightly closer to me. “Look at me.”

Reid’s distant gaze falls back on me. “Why do you want me?”

“’Cause you’re mine.”

He yanks out of my grasp and tries to skirt past me, but I’m not allowing it.

I roll to my feet and grab him around the waist, easily tossing him onto the bed.

Reid flails in anger, fists curled tight, but I don’t give a shit.

I fit myself between his thighs, forcing them to splay around my waist. Reid thrashes and kicks to break free, but I grab his wrists to hold them over his head.

“Stop it,” I order, voice firm and low.

Reid stops thrashing but looks up at me with all the power of a thousand angry burning suns.This is the way I like him, all fight and fury, because it makes it so earned when he melts into a mellow puddle of want just for me.

“You’re more annoyed that you might’ve been a mark than the fact I kill people. Absolutely amazing.”

“You kill bad people,” Reid says through his teeth, clearly mocking me.

“Yeah, that’s right, baby. I steal from the rich, from the assholes, and give it back to the rightful owners. Sometimes that means I kill people that deserve it. Am I fucked up? Probably. But you’re just as fucked up as me. Now what do you need? Need me to make you cry?”

Reid’s glare would bring weaker men to ruin. But I like when he fights back and I like when he lets me show him who’s actually in charge here. Because it’s him. He allows me to be in charge because he wants it, because he enjoys it. That’s the real power exchange between us.

His silence tells me more than words ever could. Reid surges up to kiss me, teeth biting my lip so hard he draws blood. I swear and lift my other hand to his throat, pressing hard enough to make him gasp against my mouth.

“I’m not letting you come,” I say against his mouth.

Reid cries out when I firmly press my cock against his hip.

His fingers flex and claw at my hands, but I hold on, uncaring.

I rise up onto my knees, then slowly lift each one until I’m straddling his stomach.

Shoving his shirt up under his arms, I use my one free hand to unbutton my jeans and push them down.

Reid hisses when I slip my cock out, already hard and leaking just from a few seconds of manhandling him.

“Lick.” I lift my hand to his mouth and he immediately obeys. “Good boy.”

Reid’s eyes immediately go glassy at the praise.

He thinks it’s danger he wants, to feel something, but that’s not it at all.

Reid needs me to tell him he’s good while simultaneously making him feel like he’s bad.

I lean over him while working my cock over.

His breath fans across my face with each ragged breath.

His hands flex in my grasp again, but I hold steady.

I wish I was inside him again, pressing his face into the mattress until he can’t even attempt to breathe.

I kiss him again, moaning into his mouth when he shakes underneath me.

Maybe it’s desire, maybe it’s fear, I don’t know anymore.

Calling it desire is so much easier. The head of my cock rubs against his stomach with each snap of my hips into my hand, driving my need higher until my toes curl against the bed.

Reid’s eyes go from glassy and distanced, to sharp and needy. I’ve got him right where I want him.

He leans up slightly to take my mouth in a kiss, different from the last one.

This kiss is soft, at war with the fast shuttling of my hand over my cock.

I need to come. Reid moans into my mouth again, all want and need, and it shocks the orgasm out of me.

I yank away from him to sit up on my knees, then spread my cum all over his stomach, painting him as mine.

“You’re mine, don’t you fucking forget it.”

Reid stares up at me with a mix of anger and all sharp edges. But I wasn’t lying when I said he couldn’t come. I won’t let him. Not now. I tug his sweater down, then lean down to place a gentle, close-mouthed kiss against his still parted lips.

“Now can we go back downstairs to figure this shit out?”

Reid tiredly closes his eyes. “Is my brother safe?”

“We’ll see. But right now my priority is you. Nobody will touch you while you’re mine.”

Reid lets me lift him out of the bed, even lets me wrap an arm around him as I guide him to the bathroom.

I wash my hands, then use a washcloth to wipe the corners of his eyes, and his cheeks.

He stares up at me the entire time, face still carefully devoid of emotion.

It scares me a little bit, how easily he can make himself a blank canvas.

“You okay?” I ask softly.

Reid blinks rapidly a few times as if rebooting back online.

His gaze slowly focuses on me, but instead of replying with words, he tips up on his toes and soundly kisses me.

I keep my eyes open and so does Reid. Somehow that’s more intimate than both of us closing our eyes.

The kiss is just barely a brush of lips, but when he pulls away, his lips tip up slightly at the corners in the approximation of a pleased smile.

“I’m okay now.”

“Yeah?”

Reid blows out a long breath. “Yeah, yeah I’m okay. I really need a cigarette though since you didn’t let me come.”

“No smoking inside,” I say firmly. “Also, you shouldn’t be smoking at all.”

Reid rolls his eyes, but there’s an underlying hint of affection that was never there before. “Let a man have some vices.”

“You like to be choked to an inch of death, that’s a big enough vice.”

Reid flushes bright red, but doesn’t reply.

I love the way his flushes paint his creamy cheeks, it works all the way down his neck to his chest, and it’s so easy to read him when it happens.

I tangle our fingers together and tug Reid behind me back to the living room.

The guys are still sitting on the couch, but now Jacob and Hayden are playing video games while Parker silently reads a well-worn hardcover in the corner.

Parker looks up first, eyebrows raised. “Can we continue now?”

“Yes, I had to sort… something out. All sorted.”

Parker’s eyes flick between me and Reid, but he stays quiet because he’s not a total idiot. Like Jacob.

“We heard everything, you know,”Jacob teases.

“Oh yeah?” Reid asks as he tosses himself in the chair. “What’d you hear?”

“Lots of moaning and oh yeah s,”Hayden chimes in.

Reid snorts. “You didn’t hear shit. Dante is a quiet fuck.”

Jacob’s eyebrows go up. “That’s way more information than I ever needed to know about him.”

“You started it,” Reid teases with a wicked smirk.

I sit on the edge of the chair beside him. His arm brushes against my thigh when he leans a little closer, but I don’t draw attention to it. I have to take the small wins when I can. Now I have to deal with the matter at hand.