Bound for Keeps (Men of Honor) (14 page)

“Did you add this on?”

“No, this was here.”

“Looks like a big dining room or something.” He pointed to the ceiling pattern. “Are you sure this place wasn’t ever an inn?”

“Not that I was ever able to find out—and I tried,” Keith told him. “Are you stalling?”

He was, knew he’d have to fake it a little during this, for self-preservation. He knew Keith would be looking for signs of what he could do…but he was still weak enough that he honestly didn’t have to work very hard on evasion at all.

“Yeah, I’m stalling.” Shane rolled his eyes.

“Might want to lose the attitude,” Keith said casually after he’d flipped Shane onto his back and held him there with a foot on his chest. Shane was breathing—wheezing more accurately—like an eighty-year-old smoker. Everything felt tight, his muscles ached simultaneously from both over- and underuse. But at least his ribs were wrapped tightly enough that they were protected.

They were nearly healed anyway.

“So you and Reed would really consider giving me a job?” Shane asked from his position on the floor.

“Don’t you need one?”

“I need to deal with Guthrie first.” And then the CIA would clear him. And then…

“I know you need to take care of Guthrie. But that can’t be your whole life. Kyle wouldn’t want that.”

Shane wanted to be angry with Keith for bringing up Kyle’s name so freely but in truth he was sick of being angry. Keith and Reed made him feel something other than that emotion.

“Work first, talk later.” Keith asked him more about his training, and Shane lied and said that Kyle had taught him a great deal. “Good, show me.”

Keith looked like a serious brick wall. Kyle told him men like that went down hard, but after Shane tried a few moves on him, it was apparent that didn’t hold true in all situations. And Shane had to hold back. As an operative, he learned a lot of different fighting methods, including the ways a Force Recon Marine would’ve trained. But he’d be giving himself away if he made any moves that belied anything beyond Army Ranger.

He was out of shape as well, which would help with the ruse.

“You didn’t do badly,” Keith told him later. Shane didn’t have the strength to speak, just gave Keith the middle-finger salute.

“Hey, I expected you to be in way worse condition,” Keith offered.

A rare, if not grudging compliment.

He and Keith lay on their backs on the mat, sweaty, tired and flying, much like they’d be after sex. And God, it would be so easy to roll over onto Keith right now and ask for what he wanted.

Too easy. And he never took easy.

He couldn’t remember why, though. Maybe there had never been an explanation. And so to distract himself, he said, “It must be hard for you to let Reed go on jobs without you.”

“Is that the same thing you asked him while I was gone?”

“Yes.”

Keith laughed a little. “He and I are good together on missions, but we’re also a liability to one another. It’s too personal. And it took us a long time to recognize that.”

“I can see that. You know, Reed doesn’t look like an operative at first glance. He should, because once you see him move, you know, but…” Shane couldn’t explain it, but Keith nodded.

“That’s the thing with Reed. They don’t see him coming.”

“I would,” Shane said.

“But you were trained to spot predators.”

Shane considered the truth in that.

“Were you courted for Delta?”

“No.” That was the truth.

“What about Kyle?”

“He liked being a Ranger, but he knew being asked for Delta was major. He just wanted to be the best at what he was, you know? Always training, looking to learn more from everyone. He was the least cocky guy I knew…and somehow, that made him the most cocky.”

Keith grinned like he knew the type. Because he was the damned type, but Shane wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of telling him that.

“What are you thinking about?” Keith asked, rolling onto his side to stare down at Shane.

“Suppose it doesn’t work out?”

“Which part, Shane?”

“Both. Or suppose just the job works but the other…”

“Then you could still work for us—with us—and live someplace else. It’s not an all-inclusive deal. And you might decide you don’t want the job.”

But Shane did. One look at the kinds of things they did and he knew he was all in. They helped people in need and apparently, it wasn’t all about the money. The clients they took, many of them, couldn’t afford to pay.

He hoped he could also be one of the success stories. He liked the fact that they didn’t expect him to sit back and do nothing. And after he showered, he made up a file on Guthrie, culling everything he could from memory and listing it all in one place. Making his case, figuring ways to catch him.

It felt good to do something besides run and hate.

Kyle might want him to find peace, but he’d also know Shane wouldn’t have let his good name go unavenged.

“You smile when you think about him, you know,” Keith said. “It’s a good sign.”

“You think?”

“Took me months before I could think about Bobby and be happy at all. But then I started thinking about how we first got together—how he was frustrating as hell and what a pain in the ass I was to him because of it…”

He shook his head at the memory, and Shane understood what he meant. Kyle had been equally frustrating in the beginning as well. He’d had to chase the man carefully, as he’d been an officer and Shane was a private and it was all so inappropriate. Which made Kyle’s surrender—when he’d finally given in—that much more satisfying.

He told all that to Keith, who said, “So what finally happened?”

“After that barfight and the kiss I told you about—he practically shoved me into my car and for weeks we pretended it didn’t happen. But one night, I just showed up at his place, finally knocked on his door and didn’t give him a chance to say no.”

“You took a big risk.”

Not really, since he wasn’t exactly Army, but Kyle could’ve reported him anyway. But he hadn’t. Instead, the man kissed him back and Shane dragged him to the couch, bent him over and fucked him until he was barely coherent. And then he’d taken him to the bedroom and fucked him more.

From the first time he’d talked to the man, he’d been pretty sure he’d been in love with him. By the end of their first weekend together, he knew he was.

Keith studied him for a while and then said, “Why don’t you tell me everything you know about Guthrie. I don’t want to do a search on him and raise any flags. And he sounds like he’s good.”

Shit. Shane should’ve anticipated this. Keith was alternately relaxing him and then pumping him for intel—and it should’ve been intel that Shane could easily talk about. Instead, he’d need to proceed very carefully, trying to remember the lies and half-truths he’d been taught about Guthrie, the CIA agent he was working undercover with.

“He is. He was a Ranger for twenty years. Took early retirement.”

“You’re sure?”

“Of what?”

“That he was only a Ranger?”

Shane should know better about trying to fool Keith. “As far as I knew, yes.”

Keith seemed satisfied with that.

“I didn’t know much about him—he was in Kyle’s company, not mine.”

“How old would he be?”

“Maybe forty?” he guessed. But in reality, he knew the man was forty-two, knew his birthdate, his address, his bank account number. He knew more about Guthrie than Guthrie did.

Then why are you still running?

That was the one question he still wasn’t able to answer.

Chapter Fifteen

Shane heard the bathroom door open and pretended not to. The glass in the sauna shower was clear, and although they were steamed up, he was pretty sure Keith could see most of him.

He figured he came in for a towel. After last night and the blowjob, the reference to Shane’s dream, Keith acted like he was nothing more than a friend and now, especially after the sparring and talk of first times with Kyle, Shane was hard and more frustrated than he’d been in a long time.

Maybe last night was something Keith regretted, although he didn’t seem like a man who lived with regrets or did things he regretted in the first place.

He’d been so deep inside his own head that he hadn’t heard the shower door open or close, but then Keith was at his back under the spray. Shane tensed at first, because his scars were on full display, especially when Keith circled his wrists with his hands and pushed them forward.

“Hold the tile,” he told Shane who wanted to buck at the commands. He was the one who would normally be giving them, but his body seemed to melt and follow whenever Keith spoke.

Keith ran his hands along Shane’s arms. “You’re going to be sore tomorrow.”

Shane didn’t know if he was talking about the workout—or referencing what would happen now. And what was worse, he was praying it was the latter.

He hadn’t thought about the dynamics of being alone with one man or the other. How did that work?

He guessed he was about to find out, but if you’d asked him a week ago, he would’ve guessed he and Reed would’ve been together first. Keith intimidated him, for some reasons he’d figured out and others he hadn’t.

But oh, how he wanted—wanted to be taken by this man. He rarely bottomed, never gave much thought as to why, since when it was the right top, it was goddamned motherfucking awesome.

“What did I do to you in your dream?” Keith asked.

He closed his eyes, his cheeks heating. “You…I…”

“Relax, Shane.” Keith kissed the back of his neck, rubbed his back until Shane was able to start over.

“I was mouthing off to you at the table.”

“Dreams imitating life,” Keith murmured.

“And then you grabbed me and pushed me down. And you fucked me over the table. And I loved it.”

His voice was hoarse on the last words. Broke a little too, which he didn’t understand. Keith sucked the back of his neck and then turned the shower off, dried them both. And then walked them out to the kitchen, as Shane suspected.

He whimpered a little when they got close to the table and Keith brushed a palm over the smooth surface, as if readying it for him. And then he pointed for Shane to bend over it and Shane knew he’d blush every goddamned time he sat here from now on.

“I can’t.”

“Why?”

“I don’t bottom.”

“Ever?”

“Not for a long time, Keith.”

“But for me, you want to.”

Shane opened his mouth and then closed it, because Keith spoke a truth he hadn’t been able to see, even though it had been right in front of his face.

But then Keith touched his ribs. “We’ll save this for later.”

“I don’t want to save anything.”

“I’m still fucking you, Shane—just not on this surface.” His hand brushed Shane’s still-healing ribs and Shane shivered at the warmth, especially when Keith’s arm wrapped around his waist and led him back toward Shane’s bedroom. Gave him a slight push onto the bed.

Shane gathered the pillow under his head, his hands fisted into its underside as he lay there, vulnerable. He tensed as Keith’s tongue ran along his lower back, but Keith either didn’t notice or didn’t care. Figured it was the latter and willed himself not to pull back.

Excitement and nerves bundles together in his gut as he pushed onto his hands and knees, spread his legs, opening himself to Keith. An offering, something he didn’t do easily.

Keith licked along the crease of his thigh, his ass. He heard himself suck in a harsh breath and then released it with a huff. His entire body simultaneously tightened and subsequently relaxed as the pleasure jolted through him.

He couldn’t remember the last time he’d been rimmed. Couldn’t understand why he’d waited this long.

He was rocking into Keith’s tongue, lowered himself to his elbows, forehead pressed to the mattress. Incoherence took over his brain, his body moved on its own accord, wanting Keith to take him over. Needing him to. This surrender was so personal, and Keith knew it.

All Shane needed to do was accept it and so he did. Keith’s tongue probed the most sensitive, intimate place Shane could imagine. Prone, spread, trembling.

He heard a moan push past his lips as his balls tightened. He felt the precome leak from his cock, knew that he could come easily with just a few tugs.

But Shane had never done things the easy way, so he figured, why start now?

“If you’re thinking, I’m doing something wrong,” Keith whispered.

“You’re doing everything right,” he told the man who slid his body on top of his.

Shane pushed back impatiently, but the big man wouldn’t be rushed, instead ghosted his lips across the back of Shane’s neck, then his shoulders, marking him in far subtler and more effective ways than Shane had him.

He groaned with impatience, his body fighting against the shuddering and ultimately losing.

“That’s it, baby boy. No shame in giving in,” Keith told him, his voice soothing, his hands making everything okay. His cock pressed against Shane’s ass, and he willed himself not to tense up again. He remained like that for long moments, his mind going a hundred miles an hour, and he wanted Keith to go and stop and everything in between.

Keith moved away, his hand resting on Shane’s lower back, pressing him down, holding him there. Grounding him. His breathing eased but his hands were numb from fisting them so hard.

Keith’s finger circled his hole, the warm lube tingling as the finger entered him. He bit back a groan until Keith told him harshly, “I want to goddamned hear your pleasure.”

Two fingers, twisted and Shane couldn’t have held back if he’d wanted to. “Keith!”

“Yeah, that’s it. Who owns you, baby boy?”

Christ. He almost came there and then. Forced himself not to because he knew there would be so much more pleasure if he waited. But that didn’t stop him from whimpering like a fucking baby the second Keith spoke the words.

“I knew you liked that. But what do you like more—being called baby boy or being owned?”

“Both,” he said before he could stop himself, and then he groaned again, because Keith’s knuckle was brushing his prostate and the mind-bending pleasure speared through him.