Page 6 of Enemies with Benefits (Finding the Right Brother #1)

Which, of course, fell on deaf ears as he groaned and writhed on the ground.

You’d have thought I’d taken a bat to his kneecaps from the way he was acting, when it was his face that looked rougher than anything else.

Apparently, he hadn't caught himself all that well when he'd gone down, and there was a good chance his nose had been broken in the fall.

I really hoped that wasn't the case because I knew I was already in trouble because of his stubbornness.

The first person on the scene was, amusingly enough, my partner.

Kayden's face was, unsurprisingly, swollen and red, and he looked like he was having a hard time seeing as he walked down the alley toward us.

He stopped a couple of yards away, glaring at the man still groaning on the ground and then up at me.

"Dispatch said to back off," he said wryly.

"Did they?" I asked in what I thought was a perfect facsimile of innocence. "I was a little busy running and getting shot at to hear."

At that, he straightened. “Damn. I heard the shots, but I hoped it was something else."

"Nope," I said, looking down at the gun that lay in the middle of the alley. "Took a few shots at me, it's a shame for him that his aim isn't the best."

"Uh, looks like he got awfully close."

"Not too close."

Kayden approached and grabbed hold of my shirt, and I felt the presence of skin against my shoulder before he pulled back. “ Too close."

"Damn," I muttered. Bad enough that I’d disregarded orders, but I'd come incredibly close to getting injured in the process. "Skin?"

"I don't see any blood, but?—"

"Yeah, I know."

Kayden sighed. “You know, you've been antsy ever since the other night when the captain slapped you on patrol duty on the outskirts."

I rolled my eyes. “I have not."

"Right."

"I'm serious."

"So am I."

"Kay—"

"What? You're the one who's been pretty much vibrating out of their uniform because some idiot teenager managed to give you the slip."

I scowled at him, which probably did nothing to cure him of the belief that I was not still pissed off about the asshole who’d been using the outskirts as his personal race track.

A solo race, but a race all the same as far as I was concerned.

If the asshole had had any sense, they would have stopped when they realized they were busted.

At least that’s what I thought at the time, until I realized that they were going to be a runner.

I'd been hoping for a quiet night, but that one decision on their part had sent my blood pumping, from annoyance and the realization that maybe a quiet night wasn't necessarily what I wanted.

The idea that anyone could get away from me on that stretch of road hadn't entered my thoughts.

Kayden and my superiors might be operating under the belief that it was some punk kid, but I wasn't so sure.

In recent years, most of the teens and young adults who liked to see how heavy their foot could be and get away with it tended to use cars rather than bikes.

Crotch rockets had mostly gone out of style, save for a few here and there, but even those weren't very good.

But this guy? He had been good, real good.

Not once had I thought he was going to lose control of that bike as I'd given chase, there hadn't been the slightest wobble or slide.

That and he was obviously someone who knew the area because he'd used one of the paths that crisscrossed between the roads in that area, which wasn't something that kids nowadays would think to use because of their collective love of cars.

No, I was pretty damn sure he was a full-grown adult who’d gone for a joy ride and decided that common sense wasn't for him.

I'd even have been willing to bet on the idea that it was someone around my age, and maybe a little older.

I had forgotten all about those paths until the asshole had taken one in an attempt to get away.

Well, I'd thought it was an attempt at the time as I'd continued to a cross path wide enough for my squad car, thinking it was a clever way to cut him off before he would get through to the other side.

What I hadn't counted on was the driver’s willingness to risk his bike on paths that had become overgrown since I was a teenager.

He'd cut across to another path and then.

..then I'd lost him completely. Even when I’d tried to be crafty and cut him off, he somehow managed to disappear.

I didn't know if he'd just sat in the woods and waited until I drove back, taken another path that I hadn't anticipated, backtracked along his original path to leave me behind, or some combination of the three.

Whatever he'd done had been enough to lose me and leave me in a sour mood for the rest of the night.

Kayden snorted, waving a finger around my face. "You've got that look on your face like you half-want to test your stun gun on someone."

"Look, I can be irritated about some asshole breaking the law and getting away with it without holding onto it for a day."

"Three days, and yeah, I know that. But what you hate more than anything is the idea that someone got the better of you, that someone beat you at something. I know how much you pride yourself on your driving skills, and that slippery little shit managed to slip right out of your grasp."

See, that was the problem, being partners with someone for years, they had a way of getting into your head and knowing how you ticked, and what things hacked you off.

Basically, being called competitive about something like my damn job was one of those things.

Knowing I had a competitive streak that I had learned to temper rather than control since my teenage years was one of those things that made me tick.

Two things he would know, and from the knowing look in his eyes and the way he barely managed to hold back a smirk, told me he knew.

"Fuck off," I growled in a dazzling display of wit and cleverness.

"See, it's times like this that I wonder about your blood pressure. It wouldn't hurt to get some things off your chest."

"Go to hell."

"C'mon, Jace, if you need a shoulder to cry on, just lean that massive head on these shoulders and let it all out."

"Fuck. Off."

"You're so cute when you're angry."

"I swear to?—"

"Jesus," Lawrence groaned. "I don't know what's worse, the pain or listening to you two flirt."

"We're not flirting," I snapped, instantly hating the idea that any man I got along with, or in this case, bickered with, was somehow my partner in more than just work.

It happened too much in my life, starting with my old man, who apparently thought anything 'soft' was anything that wasn't a hardass, mean son of a bitch.

Capable of anything other than tearing other people down and downing cheap beer until you got even meaner while you complained about how much the world wronged you and how much better you deserved. "It's called having a friend, try it."

"Yeah, plus, Jace isn't really my type. He's lacking a couple of things I need," Kayden said, making an obvious gesture with his chest, though any woman with a chest that size would need a chiropractor. He then gestured to his groin. “And a few things I don't want."

"The fact that you've never ended up in front of the captain for something inappropriate is amazing," I told him with a roll of his eyes.

He reached out and squeezed my chest, jerking his hand back as I slapped at him. "Although, if you did a few more bench presses, you might actually be able to get this engine revved up."

"Put the engine back in the car and then back it up into the garage," I told him with a roll of my eyes.

Being touched by people wasn't something I liked unless I welcomed it, and I especially disliked it when other guys put their hands on me.

Which, of course, put me at the wrong time in history because a lot of guys of my generation seemed far too comfortable touching each other, especially if they could do what had been known as 'gay chicken' when I'd been in high school.

I put up with Kayden because I had no doubts that the man was as straight as they came, and he honestly only did it to get a rise out of me.

Which wasn't much different from the other guys at the precinct either, but it was Kayden.

I'd been partnered with him for around a decade, and I was so used to him and his ridiculousness that, despite my annoyance, I couldn't take him seriously.

He'd been there when my mom had died, and I'd been there when his brother had been diagnosed with cancer.

When I'd broken my leg and been put on medical leave, he'd been the one to show up after a shift and make sure I didn't do anything stupid like let myself rot because I wasn't working or active.

When his last real relationship had crashed and burned after he'd walked in on her with his step-brother, it had been me who made sure he hadn't hunted the bastard down and earned himself a prison sentence, or drank himself to an early grave in the aftermath.

So yeah, if he wanted to occasionally make awkward jokes, even and especially awkward gay jokes, knowing how much I hated them, then I would allow it with little more than a slap or threats of violence, I would never follow through on.

He was my partner on the job and my best friend off the clock, and there were some things you made allowances for when the person was special enough.