Page 58 of The Hitman's Prince

Or…was it? Had I been holding Jacob and Caspian to a different and unfair standard? Surely not. I’d known Orion since we were both teenagers, the connection between us was stronger and far more twisted than the loose knots I’d started to tie with Jacob and Caspian.

“Can I light you a fire?” Orion asked from the doorway,his right hand still bandaged to cover the stitches Jacob had just given him on the floor of my bathroom.

“Not cold,” I said. “But you can come here and get on your knees for me.”

Heat to rival any fire he’d ever stoked flashed in his eyes and he stepped into my office, coming around behind my desk and sinking down to his knees. Everything about Orion was graceful and gorgeous. Even his betrayals.

“I love when you listen,” I said quietly, reaching forward and cradling his face in the palm of my hand. The stubble on his cheeks wasn’t quite long enough to scratch, and I dragged my hand up and down over the short hairs. “You don’t care for Caspian, do you?”

Orion licked his lips and pulled them between his teeth, like he was trying to keep himself from telling me the truth, which was all the answer I needed.

“What about the priest?” I asked next.

He let his lips loose from the prison of his teeth. “I don’tnotcare for him.”

“You know I still want them both.”

He nodded, leaning hard into my hand.

“I won’t make you be with Caspian if you don’t want to be with him, but I need to know if you’ll still have me if I take him.”

“If I’llhaveyou?” Orion rasped, his entire body surging forward with the question. “That’s like asking me if I’ll have another breath, Vince…Sir.”

Relief rolled through me, and I pulled Orion closer,until his broad shoulders were notched between my legs and his exhales burned hot against my stomach, even through my shirt.

“You’ll have what I allow you then.” I tipped his head back and bent over him, brushing the tips of our noses together. Orion was undoubtedly going to get me killed one of these days. I knew it as much as I knew my own name.

“Yes, Sir.”

“Go find the other two and bring them here. We need to have a talk.”

Orion took the order for the dismissal it was, and finding myself alone again, I tried to connect the dots of the conversation I’d had earlier in the day with Gideon and his traveling troupe of fuck boys. The whole thing was complicated, and every time I thought we’d gotten to the bottom of it, another name emerged, another promise, another threat.

Orion was back far too soon with Caspian and Jacob, the other two looking like they weren’t sure whether it would be their last time in my office or the first or many. Orion lingered closer to Jacob, making his preference known, and I honestly couldn’t blame him for it. Caspian was softer than him, in all ways. Orion’s edges were too rough for a man like that, making Jacob a more suitable match.

I was enough of a match for him on my own. All of us knew it, but I knew as much as I hated my father, his blood ran through my veins. It wasn’t safe for me to keepmy focus on one person for too long. I’d done it already with Orion and very nearly ended up dead. Having the other two didn’t mean I loved him any less. If nothing else, it meant I loved him more.

Because I wouldn’t risk losing him again.

And studying the way the three of them stood together in front of my desk, I knew I didn’t want to lose the other two either.

Call me greedy, but I’d earned the right to take what I wanted.

“This morning I was made aware of the plan Phillip Moore intends to put into action,” I told them, looking Jacob straight in the eye when I mentioned his father. “He intends to depose Gideon North and Fletcher Sinclair. Daren and Luca…Bellamy as well, even though I find him entirely inconsequential.”

I paused, frowning. That was unfair.

Bellamy was Caspian, a necessary kind of glue, even if there were allergies in the group.

“I take that back,” I said. “He’s not inconsequential. Just new.”

Caspian’s cheeks flushed.

“I made an agreement in the fall with Gideon and Fletcher that they’d have my support in building a new order of things on their side of the business. This news from Phillip is, of course, a threat that I have to deal with to keep up my end of the bargain. They can kill themselves for all I care, but those five men are undermy protection.”

“And mine,” Orion said softly.

“On top of that, we have the issue with Vanessa.”