Chapter 22
Twenty-Two
Nic cleaned himself off and wet a second washcloth for Cam, wringing out the excess water before he grabbed a dry hand towel, killed the bathroom light, and crossed the room back to the bed.
Cam was sprawled on his back, phone held high above his face, avoiding the mess on his torso.
“Any updates?” Nic asked as he wiped Cam clean.
“No change on Harper’s whereabouts. Mom’s condition has improved. Priest may have been premature.”
“That’s good.” Nic glided the washcloth over his cock, and Cam shuddered, bobbling the phone. Nic caught it and set it on the bedside table. “Sensitive?”
“Wonder why?” Cam grinned, and Nic’s world righted the rest of the way with that smile.
He slapped Cam’s hip. “On your side, Boston, so I can finish cleaning up the mess I made.”
Cam shimmied on the sheets. “I don’t know. I kind of like it.”
Chuckling, he gave up and pushed, not giving the agent an option. “Until you wake up in a wet spot.”
“Why must you always be the voice of reason?”
“Um, lawyer.”
Lawyers also asked questions, and as the sky had begun to lighten outside and the outline of Boston harbor appeared out of the dark, a particular topic, a worry, had weaseled its way back into Nic’s brain.
“Why’d you leave Boston?” he asked.
“The job, to be Aidan’s partner, to be in the same place as Jamie. And there was this AUSA who’d caught my eye.”
“Oh, is that right?” He rolled Cam back onto the mattress and tossed the cloths off the bed. He propped himself on his side, one leg thrown over Cam’s, head in his hand. “That the only reason?”
Cam snagged his free hand, tangling their fingers and laying them on his chest. Nic could feel his thundering heartbeat underneath.
And the rumble of Cam’s words. “Bobby almost caught me with a guy. I was out at this place in JP—Jamaica Plain—and Bobby was there late, upgrading their security system. I’m on the dance floor with two guys, hands down the pants of the dude in front of me, riding back on the one behind me, and my brother walks by not ten feet away. ”
A wave of jealousy burned through Nic’s veins, making him see red.
Cam’s hand on his cheek pushed the haze away. “I’ll only be dancing with you from now on.”
“I don’t dance.”
Cam smirked. “We’ll see about that.”
“Dream on, Boston.” Nic kissed his palm, then wound their fingers together again, unable to shake his doubts completely. “But this is your home, Cameron. You’ve got a good partner in Matt and the SAC shares your professional interests. All of your family’s here.”
Cam’s fingers tightened around his. “Don’t you want me in San Francisco?”
Nic listed forward, stealing a kiss. “Of course I do, more than I should. But you’d be safer here.”
Cam glared. “We gonna have this argument again?”
Nic laughed, happy to hear Cam sounding more and more like himself again. “No. We’re not. I just want you to be happy, whatever, wherever that is.”
Cam rolled onto his side, bringing them front to front. “You know what makes me happy?”
He smoothed a hand over Cam’s hip and around to palm his ass, bringing their cocks back into rutting contact. “What’s that, Boston?”
Cam laid a line of kisses over his collarbone.
“Being in the same town as my best friend. Working with the best agent I’ve ever known.
Finding the person who grounds me like no other.
Drinking my man’s beer and then kissing the taste of it off his tongue.
You gonna tell me more about that FBI stout?
” Cam tongued the groove at the base of his neck and Nic shoved him onto his back, rolling on top of him.
“It’s a work in progress, but I think it’s gonna be our best brew yet.” Smiling, he kissed Cam long and leisurely, imagining how good the new beer was going to taste on his boyfriend’s lips.
When they broke for breath, Cam was gazing up at him, a touch forlorn again as he played with the hair at his temples. “Why do you want me?” he asked. “I’m flat broke, especially living there, I pick arguments with you for the fun of it, and our sports allegiances are totally incompatible.”
Nic stared down at the man he loved, who’d bullied his way through three decades of hardened defenses. “You rescue lost people for a living. Is it any wonder you found me?”
“But you’re still hiding parts, aren’t you?”
Damn investigator, too good at his job. “Yes, because they’re not my story to tell. Will that stop you from rescuing me?”
“Me?” he said with a rock of his hips. “Rescue the Navy SEAL?”
Nic framed his face, thumbs brushing his cheeks and soaking in the dark gaze swirling with more love than he’d ever hoped to have again. “I need you to keep holding on to that rope, Cam, even when I try to cut through it with a KA-BAR.”
Cam laid his hands over his and locked his legs around his thighs, caging him in. “I’ll hold on, baby, with everything I got.”
A buzzing sound roused Nic from sleep. Turning his head and seeing his phone lit up on the bedside table, he threw out an arm, silencing it before it could also wake Cam.
The big body half on top of his shifted, but the snores maintained their steady rhythm.
They’d only been out a couple hours; enough for Nic but Cam could use an hour more.
Seeing no messages on Cam’s phone, he slipped carefully out of Cam’s arms and out of the bed, smiling as he pulled the sheet up over Cam.
His phone buzzed again in his hand, and he shot a text back to Mel that he’d call her in five.
It was early there, but she ran according to her own clock most of the time.
Not wanting to put his suit back on, he snagged a pair of Cam’s jeans, just a couple inches short, and—God help him—a BoSox tee, covered it up with Cam’s BC hoodie, shoved his feet in Cam’s boots, and pocketed a room key on the way out the door.
First, he looked up the nearest Dunkin’—Cam seemed to think he needed to eat them as often as possible here, like they hadn’t just opened one up by the airport back home—then once he’d placed a mobile order and started the right direction, he dialed Mel back.
“Price,” she answered, “how are things there?”
“We rescued the vic and confirmed this case is connected to Cam’s sister’s disappearance. But we haven’t found her and the suspect’s still at large.”
“Yet no loss of life. Count that a win.”
This was why he got along with Mel so well. They saw the world in much the same way. “That’s what I told Cam last night.”
“And his mother’s condition?”
“Improving, thankfully.” It’d been a punch to the gut to see the priest at the hospital last night, but the news this morning that she was improving was no doubt why Cam had finally wound down enough to sleep.
“Another win.”
Nic smirked, even though she couldn’t see it. “Since when are you the team optimist?”
“Blame my husband.” There was a smirk in her voice too.
He turned the corner and spotted the orange and pink sign up ahead.
Pleasantries were nice, but she’d called for a reason, and he wanted to get back to Cam sooner rather than later. “You called at five in the morning your time. What’ve you got?”
“A bit of a mixed bag here too.”
“Give me the win first.”
“Now who’s the optimist?” They shared a laugh before she went on and Nic got in line for the walk-up window behind a woman and child. “I just got off the phone with your contact in naval admin. The burner phone was bought at the local Walmart. We traced the purchase to a Nicolette Sare.”
He racked his brain but came up blank. “I have no idea who that is.”
“So far, I’ve just got a North Carolina driver’s license and a social security card. Twenty-seven-year-old unmarried female. I’m in the process of pulling everything on her.”
Nic ran a hand over his scruffy jaw. “That was the good news?”
“Vaughn’s upped the insurance on the mansion and the family office.”
“Fuck!” The woman in front of him spun, green eyes glaring, and Nic mouthed I’m sorry before he darted out of line and around the corner of the building. “I need to set up that meet with Vaughn.”
“Let’s not do anything rash.”
He ignored the warning and continued to pace and plan. “Somewhere neutral, but I don’t know how much longer we’ll be here.”
“I put extra security on both the house and office already,” she said, likewise ignoring him. “What else can I do until you get back?”
The green-eyed woman from the line flashed across his mind, followed by thoughts of the one back home who meant the world to him. “Mary.”
“Your father’s housekeeper?”
She was so much more than that to him, but he didn’t have time to explain. “I talked to her before I left. Told her it might be time to retire.”
“Or I could hire her away.”
That would work too. “Whatever we need to do to get her out of that house.”
“I’ll take care of it. And your father’s assistant?”
“Assuming Vaughn hasn’t realized we turned his own nephew-in-law, I don’t think he’ll risk him.”
“Just in case, I’ll talk to Aidan. See if there’s a reason we might hold him. Otherwise, we’ll keep an eye on him too.”
They double confirmed operational details before hanging up, and Nic stepped back in line, the calm of the hopeful morning shattered.
He needed to bring Cam up to speed on all things Vaughn but had no business being his focus right now.
Between Cam’s mother, an at-large Harper, and the bodies and shrine to Erin found at the farmhouse, Cam had enough on his plate.
Better that Nic focus on helping Cam clear that crowded plate as quickly as possible, then they could get back home and deal with cleaning his. Because they were going to need to before he could truly settle the way he wanted to with Cam, safe and with the future ahead of them.
The mobile order line moved fast, and he was almost back to the hotel, mind whirring on both the case here and matters at home, when he sensed someone following him.
He glanced in the side-view mirror of Jamie’s rented Jeep up ahead and spotted none other than Timothy Harper skulking behind him.
The way Harper was staring down his back, Nic was clearly his target, and judging by the rate at which Harper was gaining on him, Nic had ten seconds at most before Harper made his move.
Ten seconds to decide how to play this. He ignored the heat prickling his skin, the dryness in his mouth, and worked through the scenarios.
The guy looked rough. Not a meth addict like Reid but like a man on the edge whose whole fucked-up, twisted existence was hanging on by a thread.
Nic didn’t doubt that he could outrun him or that he could wait for Harper to get close enough to take him down and into custody.
But would either of those paths lead them closer to finding out what had happened to Erin?
Maybe this was the break they needed. He looked down at the box in his hands—doing what he needed for Cam—and made the decision to keep doing the same.
He played dumb when Harper shoved a pistol into his back a few seconds later. “Don’t make a sound.”
He glanced back at Harper, eyes falsely wide. “What do you want?”
“You know who I am?”
“Timothy Harper.”
“You’re the attorney, right?”
Nic nodded.
“Good. Then you’re who I need.”
Harper nodded toward the box. “Leave the shit. And put your phone in the box.”
Digging his phone out of his pocket, Nic put it in the box, then slid the box on top of the Jeep. Right where Jamie or Cam would see it, and with his phone inside, they’d realize something was amiss.
“Get in the Charger,” Harper said, nudging him with his weapon toward a sedan with fresh tires several spots over.
“What do you need me for?” Nic asked.
Harper shoved him into the passenger seat, then came around to the driver’s side. “I need to know how I can legally get out of this.”
“You can’t.”
Nic didn’t like the cold, callous look in Harper’s eyes one bit. “Then you’re my insurance.”
“For what?”
“To make sure I get out of it another way.”