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Roman

Y esterday’s journey had been hellish, but at least it had been punctuated with some conversation .

Roman didn’t know what had happened between Aldous and Bri, but they’d clearly had their first domestic. Bri had been asleep by the time he’d returned to the hotel room, whilst Aldous had been about to go to bed—in the bathroom, of course, because it was the only place with a lock.

Because that was a completely normal, mentally healthy thing to do.

Roman wondered when the last time the floor had been cleaned.

Plus the lock on the door was so flimsy, it could be picked by a sharp cough, but whatever.

Roman had been a gentleman and taken the couch. His legs hung off the end. By several feet, as he’d joked to the happy couple this morning, before realising both of them were in a foul mood.

Unsurprisingly, he hadn’t slept much, instead endlessly thinking about how to track down Bri’s father. His lack of sleep may have been worth it—rather than going straight back to Aldous’s palatial seat, they were making a stop in Mexicali.

The one benefit of Aldous and Bri’s inaugural marital disagreement was that she had joined Roman in the car’s back seat, leaving Aldous alone in the front. Admittedly, Bri may have just been using him as a pillow, but every so often Aldous’s amber gaze would find his in the rear-view mirror—and those jealous glares were worth their weight in gold.

It was late afternoon by the time they rolled into Mexicali. Roman desperately needed to stretch his legs, envious of the times he’d done this journey on his motorbike. He far preferred the freedom of his bike over being cooped up in the car like this. These long, straight roads were made for biking, allowing him to rack up the miles with ease, until speed was nothing but a number on the screen and his cock was as hard as the exhaust pipe.

It wasn’t like he was going to blow his baby batter all over the tarmac any time soon, but he was a grown man straddling an engine. The vibrations would get the better of anyone in his position.

He hoped.

He did have a calendar full of motorbikes on long, straight roads now that he thought about it. Was his subconscious trying to tell him something?

“Have you ever bricked up whilst riding your motorbike?” Roman cut through the tension settled across the car. They were in the final two minutes of the journey, according to the dashboard screen.

In the rear-view mirror, Aldous’s eyes furrowed. He turned around for a split second, his mouth pulled into a revolted grimace. “Are you talking to me?”

“No, I was asking your beloved wife about her penis. Of course I was talking to you, Aldous Statethefuckingobvious .”

Bri sat up. “You’ve had an erection on a motorbike ?”

His eyes swept over her incredulity. “I’ve had women riding on the back who’ve had full on orgasms,” he murmured, his voice low and dusky.

“Seriously?”

There was a particular satisfaction in setting off with a woman on the back, knowing she’d be drenched and ready for him at journey’s end. He leant in towards her. “Maybe your new husband will let me take you out for a spin sometime.”

Bri’s rushed, sensual exhale was drowned out by Aldous’s harsh breaking, sending all of them forward in their seats as the car came to a rasping halt. “Are you finished?” came his gravelly snarl, as the navigation on the dash pinged to let them know they’d arrived.

“I’m not even hard, but you didn’t answer my question.”

The only response he received was Aldous unclipping his seat belt, getting out of the car, and slamming the door behind him.

Roman eyed Bri. “I think that’s a yes.”

He couldn’t stop the filthy smile that flashed across his face. It was definitely a yes.

Sliding from the car, the baking heat slapped him full in the face. The sun blazed overhead, beating down onto the tarmac as he jogged around to open Bri’s door for her with a proffered hand. “Milady.”

“Very gentlemanly,” she replied, gracefully getting out.

Roman glanced around. They were right in the centre of the city. Cars rushed through the busy intersection they’d parked next to, but it was the large three-storey government building they were here for. Putting a protective arm around Bri, he led her towards it. Aldous was already at its entrance, waiting for them with his characteristic frown. “I can behave when I want to.”

“ When I want to being the key part of that sentence.”

“You know me so well. Speaking of behaving,” Roman murmured, “what happened between you and your dearly beloved last night?”

They climbed the steps to the entrance, relieved when the building’s shadow finally fell upon them. The distant scent of food caught his nose. The culprit was a green and red food truck some distance away—burritos, if he had to guess.

Bri gave a noise somewhere between a sigh and a groan. “Don’t worry about it.”

“Come on,” Aldous’s voice was a rasped growl.

As the three of them entered, the icy cool air conditioning washed over their skin.

Roman had been in a few government buildings in Mexico before. Buildings with Spanish colonial architecture, grand facades, elaborate stonework, stone columns, and intricate murals.

This wasn’t one of them.

The interior was as impressive as the exterior—and Roman had seen more impressive multi-storey car parks.

Tired beige walls surrounded them on all sides as they approached the reception desk. Beneath them, the linoleum flooring was speckled with wear and tear, although the staff had endeared to shove as many palms and pothos plants in the space as possible. Roman had to give it to them; they’d done it well, drawing attention to the greenery rather than the chipped and outdated furnishings.

“Afternoon.” Roman smiled at the woman manning the reception desk, his Spanish flowing freely. “We need to look up the ownership records of several properties.”

“Do you have the cadastral key?” she asked, her hands hovering expectantly over her clunky keyboard.

The fuck was a cadastral key? “Er… that would be a no. We have the address though.” A rough one.

The woman shook her head. “We need the cadastral key to look up the records. It’s an identifier attached to each property.” She pulled a stack of papers out of a drawer, picking up a pen and a battered-looking clipboard. “If you fill out this form for every property you need ownership records for, we’ll get that sorted for you.”

He nodded, giving the clock behind the reception desk a quick glance. “How long will that take?”

“At the moment, we’re looking at a 10-day wait.”

Roman blanched. “Is there any way we can get it sooner? Like… today. We can pay.”

Aldous would pay.

And Aldous didn’t understand a word they were saying, so it wasn’t like he could protest either.

“No, but you’re welcome to do the search yourself.” She pointed to the wide double doors to their left with her pen. “The records room is through there.”

Yes. He could see that. It had the word “Registros” written above it. Records.

“There’s an employee in there who can help you search,” she finished. “Her name is Claudia.”

Roman gave back the clipboard. “Thank you—we’ll start searching.” He switched from Spanish to English as he turned to Aldous and Bri. “This way. It’s a 10-day wait if we want them to do it and, as much as I’d like to eat my weight in burritos between now and then, I don’t want to spend that long away from Jasmine. It’s through here.”

He led them into the records room. It was far bigger than he’d first imagined, full of rows and rows of towering shelves that seemed to go on for miles. Folders and files and binders were stacked to the ceiling, a haphazard assortment of paperwork that would take forever to decipher.

“Yeah, now I can see why there’s a 10-day wait,” he quipped. “Apparently there’s an employee in here somewhere. She can help us.”

And thank fuck for that.

Claudia was an angel sent from Valinor itself.

The clerk had single-handedly saved the three of them from being trapped in the records room for all eternity. Admittedly, they still had some searching to do, but Claudia had narrowed down the precise shelf on which the records for that area were stored—having easily deciphered the indecipherable classification system the registry used.

Two hours after arriving, the three of them had commandeered a large table and immediately populated it with stacks of binders stuffed with paperwork. Claudia had also guided them to the correct municipality to search within—San Quintín.

Unfortunately, that municipality happened to be the largest in Baja California.

Their search was hindered by the fact that only one of them spoke fluent Spanish, but they were doing the best they could. Bri and Aldous were searching using the coordinates, leaving the more precise work to him.

He took a lengthy swig of the can of Coca Cola he’d bought from the vending machine. So much better than the stuff in the US. “So,” he sighed, flicking over to the next page in the binder he was going through, the little plastic sleeve crinkling beneath his fingers, “while she’s in the loo, what did you and Bri argue about last night?”

Across the table, Aldous’s eyes locked onto his. “I don’t see how that’s any of your business.”

Roman shrugged, keeping an eye on the closed door to the women’s toilets. Bri hadn’t been in there long, but he kept an eye on the time anyway. “Because I’m your bodyguard. I like her. And I like you.”

“The feeling isn’t mutual.”

Roman clapped his hands together. The sound echoed down the aisles. “I don’t give a shit.”

“I’ve noticed.”

“Now spill the tea. How am I supposed to do all of my bodyguarding if I don’t have all the information?”

Aldous turned the page of his binder, not bothering to look up. “Don’t use your position as an excuse to be nosy.”

Roman held up his hand, listing off his reasons on his fingers. “A couple fighting means that their emotions are heightened. People with heightened emotions make erratic decisions—thus amplifying my workload. By knowing the full details of your conversations, I can anticipate what will and won’t escalate a conflict, as well as de-escalating where I can.”

Aldous shifted back in his seat, letting his head gently fall against the solid wall behind him. “I’m half convinced you’re talking bollocks, half convinced you’re taking this seriously.”

“When I do something, Aldous,” Roman made the word a caress, “I do it properly.”

With a deep breath, Aldous broke their eye contact. “She wants to consummate the marriage. I refuse.”

Now that was interesting.

Roman leant back, scrutinising the man in front of him. Aldous’s aversion to touch was significant, but he’d carried Bri after her seizure, hadn’t he? Although Roman hadn’t seen him touch her since, and he had definitely flinched away from her touch yesterday.

And yet…

At dinner last night, when Bri spoon-fed Roman, the lust on Aldous’s face was so hot it burnt.

Let him taste it , he’d purred.

Beneath the table, Roman had been at half mast, and he had no doubt Aldous had been the same. Those amber eyes didn’t lie. Roman observed people for a living. He investigated his targets, learning their habits, their likes, their dislikes. He knew what made people tick.

By the time he took their life, he knew them better than they knew themselves.

Whenever he’d touched Bri, Aldous’s eyes had always been on them both. But it wasn’t hatred that lay within them, or annoyance, or even jealousy.

It was desire .

“You don’t like to touch.” Roman’s lips curled around the words. “But you do like to watch.”

It was only a hunch, but Aldous didn’t deny it. “My likes and dislikes are of no consequence to you.”

It was difficult to hide his air of triumph. “Are they not?” he countered. “Your wife has been shutting you out all day because you don’t want to consummate the marriage—whereas she does.”

“Again,” Aldous’s voice was almost a snarl. “Of no consequence to you.”

“I disagree.” Roman’s smile was slow. “Your wife wants to feel desired, Aldous. And I happen to harbour a great deal of desire for her.”

His attention flared. “Watch it.”

“That is precisely my point. Perhaps we can come to some sort of… arrangement, in which one of us does the watching .” Movement to the side stole his attention—Bri was leaving the toilets. “And the other does the touching.”

Aldous’s eyes blew wide with arousal, his shoulders heaving as he sucked in a frantic breath.

Roman bit back the urge to touch him. “Either way, let me talk to her. I can mediate between you, if nothing else.” Standing, he addressed Bri just as she came within earshot. “We’re missing a folder. Can you help me look?”

“Sure,” Bri said, still eager to not be in the company of her husband.

Roman led her down the narrow aisle, with paperwork bursting from the shelves on both sides. “It’s just here,” he murmured, feeling Aldous’s intense gaze firing on all cylinders. They hadn’t gone far, and they were certainly in no danger of being overheard—the only other person who’d stepped foot in this room the entire time they’d been here was Claudia, and she’d gone home for the day an hour ago. “Although, I do have a confession.”

Bri’s mouth tipped upside down, her hands resting on the shelves. “Please tell me you haven’t killed anyone.”

“Today? No. But I did want to talk to you. You can stop looking. There’s no folder.” He leant his wrist on the shelf above her, caging her in. “I was talking to Resting Bitch Face over there, and he told me about your… difference of opinion last night.”

“I’m surprised he spoke to you—of all people.” She blinked, side-eyeing Aldous. “No offence.”

“None taken, but I don’t want you to take offence at his refusal to consummate the marriage. His rejection isn’t personal.”

Bri looked down, clearly not believing him. “Feels kinda personal.”

He tipped her chin upwards with a single finger. “Aldous doesn’t like touch, cutie. His own family barely get to touch him. He didn’t even let his cousin’s baby touch him for months. A literal baby. And yet he caught you during your seizure.”

“He did?”

Roman nodded. “He caught you. He cradled you in his arms like you were the most precious thing in the world. He bridal-carried you into the hospital. Do you not remember?”

Bri shook her head.

He braced himself for her to ask him why Aldous was so averse to touch. To his relief, she didn’t. Even Roman couldn’t provide her with a comprehensive answer for that one, but he could take a pretty good fucking guess.

It wasn’t his secret to tell.

“He cares for you, Bri.” Roman’s gaze traced her jawline. “He cares for you… and he’s attracted to you. You should have seen the look on his face when you were in the back seat with me earlier. His jealousy roared louder than the fucking engine.”

Bri looked doubtful.

“I’m serious. Do you not remember the way he watched you feeding me at dinner? He was jealous… and he liked it. ”

Her head tilted to the side, confusion playing in her eyes. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“It means that he doesn’t like to touch, but I think he might like to watch.”

Understanding hit her like a strike of lightning, leaving her wide-eyed and choked of air. “Oh,” she murmured, the single word encompassing a thousand different emotions. “Watch me…”

“Play with yourself,” Roman finished for her. “Or with someone else.”

Embarrassment bloomed on her cheeks, and she shook her head. “I couldn’t do it by myself.” Bri shot her husband a quick look, finding his gaze tightly fixed on the two of them. “I have watc— heard of that kind of porn. Like…” Bri lowered her voice. “Like cuckolding.”

Fuck, this woman was adorable.

And fuck , did he want to corrupt her more than he wanted to take his next breath.

Frankly, Roman didn’t know whether what Aldous wanted could be called cuckolding. In his experience, cuckolding was centred around a husband’s humiliation at his wife fucking another man.

Aldous wasn’t driven by humiliation.

“In a way,” Roman conceded. “His hatred of touch means that watching is how he experiences pleasure.”

Her teeth sunk into her plump bottom lip. “So what does he want me to do? Want us to do?”

Roman blinked, surprised she had included him in this conversation. Not that he was complaining. “You don’t have to do anything you don’t want to.”

Her gaze lowered. Her hands lifted to his torso, sliding up his chest until they rested beneath his collar. “But what if I do want to?”