Ward #2
“I’m not,” he said, sniffing the drink, his brow quirking before taking a sip. He set the glass down, staring at it as he swallowed, and continued to stare. After a few seconds, he looked up, not at me, but at Mason. “Well—”
“Damn it all!” Mason barked, slapping the counter. “He did it?”
“This is...exceptional,” Arlo admitted, and I couldn’t tell if it pained him or if he was hurting himself by trying not to laugh at his brother.
“No, this is bullshit!” Mason groaned, turning to me. “You were supposed to lose.”
“Alas, I’m not fond of losing,” I told him with a smirk.
“Clearly,” he said, reaching out, taking the drink from Arlo, and taking a sip. He sighed when he set the glass down. “Damn it all, that is good. Not as sweet as I thought it would be.”
“You can make it sweeter, but this one likes bourbon straight up, and he likes his tea herbal and slightly sweetened, and his coffee is so strong it could curl metal. You don’t want to go sweet with him, you want to go for something that’s got a complex flavor, and perhaps a touch of sweetness, but not defined by it.
That is why I added the chili, just enough to add another layer, but not to overwhelm or burn.
Just a touch,” I explained, and stopped when Arlo and Mason stared at me. “What?”
“Okay, so, you’re not allowed to lie and pretend that you two aren’t sleeping together, which fuck you for hiding the fact that you like dick this whole time,” Mason told Arlo.
“I have never hidden anything from you,” Arlo said with a slight shake of his head. “I just didn’t announce anything to you.”
“In this family, that might as well count as keeping a secret,” Mason said, waving off what Arlo was going to say next. “But how long have you two been...do you...are you just sleeping together, or is there more going on? I’m confused.”
“We’ve known each other for a week, and we’re figuring out where we’re going as we go, get to the real question, Mason,” Arlo said in a tired voice that made me laugh.
If this was how he spoke to his siblings, maybe he wasn’t too off the mark by saying that Will and I were like brothers, because that was the exact tone I used with him on occasion.
“Right, I’m not gonna touch that one with a ten-foot pole because it’s hard enough to get you to explain shit as it is,” Mason said with a laugh, holding up a finger when a customer came to the bar.
“Why has he paid attention to all that? What the hell kind of dick sucking are you doing that you’re able to bespell a man into paying attention to how you like your tea and coffee. ..in a week?”
“That was not your original question,” Arlo said dryly. “And you know I’m not going to answer that.”
“Will you?” Mason said, turning to me.
“If it was about the dick sucking, or anything else, do you really think I’d be stupid enough to say that in front of him when he’s already shown he doesn’t want to talk about that sort of thing?
” I asked with a grin. “Because if it were those things, answering your question honestly would be a quick way to lose access to them.”
“Damn, you’re right, that is how most people operate, isn’t it? I forgot,” Mason said as he walked to the end of the bar to deal with the huffy girl waiting for her drinks.
“He forgot?” I asked Arlo with a raised brow.
“This really is amazing, I wasn’t saying that just to get under Mason’s skin,” Arlo said as he took another drink.
“But yes, he probably has forgotten. He and his partner, Jace, have a long history, a rather complicated one at that. The short and sweet is that they spent most of their lives in middle school absolutely despising one another. Recently, that...changed. They still bicker and argue, but as far too many people have learned against their will, arguing and fighting doesn’t hurt their.
..personal lives together; if anything, it seems to enhance it. ”
“I was always told that’s not a healthy way to have a relationship, even if it sounds hot as hell,” I said as I sat down.
“That’s because Jace and I do more than fight and fuck,” Mason said as he came back. “We also sleep, we eat, we go to work, and sometimes we bicker and fuck.”
“Productive, responsible, and absolutely erotic, I can appreciate it,” I said, raising my glass in salute.
“Someone understands,” Mason said with a wink. “It almost makes up for you beating me at my own game.”
Arlo leaned in. “Mason likes to pretend he and Jace haven’t worked their butts off to learn how to make things work between them.
They might not be all that secretive about their personal lives, but they have a vow of silence when it comes to admitting that they’ve learned to work together and communicate. ”
“Yeah, well, people don’t want to hear that things between Jace and me work because we discuss our feelings and show each other patience,” Mason said with a wrinkled nose. “They want to hear that we fuck each other senseless until he can’t be pissy and I can’t be annoying.”
“There isn’t enough in the world to improve his overall disposition, or prevent you from getting on someone’s nerves,” Arlo said, and I laughed, earning a surprised look from him.
“What? This is the sassiest I’ve ever seen you,” I said with a chuckle. “I like you even more around your family than I thought I did.”
“God, I hope so,” Mason said, staring over my shoulder. “Because you’re about to see more.”
“I’m telling you, it’s a great idea,” a high, excited voice chattered from behind me.
“No, it’s really not,” another voice said. “And if you end up in the ER again, Moira might actually spare us the bill and just kill you outright.”
“She would not,” the first voice said as I turned around to see two men walking toward us.
One was dark to the other’s light, in both coloring and in immediate personality.
The dark-haired one wasn’t really dark, but he didn’t exude sunshine from every orifice like the other.
Yet it was clear that despite their ‘argument’ neither of them was interested in fighting, as both were smiling, one in a big grin, the other in a quieter way.
“This would be Milo and Elijah, or Eli, except for Arlo, who likes to talk like a grammar school teacher,” Mason said, gesturing first to the blond and then to the dark-haired one.
“Oh, the Milo and Eli?” I asked Arlo, who sighed and nodded.
“The?” Milo asked. “Why the?”
“He probably told him about, you know, us,” Eli said with a snort, holding out a hand. “I’m Eli, hi.”
“Ward,” I said, shaking his hand.
“Are you a friend of Mason’s?” Eli asked, glancing between us.
“No, I’m...with Arlo,” I said, gesturing behind me.
Eli blinked and nodded. “I...see. Okay.”
Milo’s eyes went wide, and he stepped forward. “Wait, like, as in, with? Like, Arlo, are you—”
His question was swiftly interrupted as he fell forward, hitting the ground behind my chair and taking out the chair next to me with a huge clatter. The reason became apparent when Eli gently drew his foot back as Milo cursed.
“You’ll have to forgive him; he wasn’t properly house-trained,” Eli told me as Milo rolled over to get back up and tried to launch himself at Eli, who stepped to the side, nimbly avoiding the attempt. “It’s not Marty’s fault, don’t blame her. Some people just can’t be trained.”
Anything else he might have said ended when Milo finally jumped on Eli from behind, wrapping both arms and legs around him and sending them careening off to the side.
There were a couple of shouts of encouragement from the bar area, and I turned back to Arlo and Mason, who seemed completely unfazed by the chaos.
“I’m going to go out on a limb here and say that this is nothing new,” I guessed as I glanced between them.
“Sort of,” Arlo said. “They have yet to break anything.”
There came a crash from behind us.
“Ah, there it is,” Arlo said, sipping his cocktail.
“Milo, Elijah! Take it outside my hotel, or so help me,” a new voice piped up, and the chaos ended abruptly.
“You know what? No, you aren’t getting anything from this hotel until you get your butts down to the laundry room and start folding.
That room better be empty by the end of my shift, or you’re going to do it all over again tomorrow. ”
“What?” Milo complained. “Moira, no! I’m supposed to go out with Marshall and Eli tonight!”
“Then I guess you had better get moving,” she said without an ounce of pity. “Now!”
“C’mon,” Eli said, and while he wasn’t protesting, I didn’t hear any regret in his voice. “You know she means it, let’s get it over with.”
“Ugh.”
“Drama queen,” Mason chuckled. “It’s their own fault for not learning.”
A woman strode up to the bar, her thick heels thumping the carpet as she approached and leaned on it.
She was tall, a little broad in the shoulders and definitely in the hips, but that was by no means a mark against her.
She had short hair, not quite a pixie cut; it was more ordered and layered, but it suited her stronger features.
I didn’t need to know her name to know she was Mason’s sister.
They might have been fraternal twins and different genders, but the similarities, especially when standing less than a foot apart, were impossible to miss.
“You can’t learn when you refuse to change,” she said in annoyance. “They don’t want to learn. Correction: Milo refuses to learn, and Eli lets himself get pulled into Milo’s bullshit. Always has, always will. It’s even worse now they’re together.”
“I recall you saying you were happy for them when they announced their relationship,” Arlo said, and I didn’t have to turn around to know he had that secretive smile.
“Yes, and if I’d known it would make them even more stupid, I might have said otherwise,” Moira said, glancing over and straightening when she saw me. “Oh! I am so sorry, Mr. Reddington. I didn’t realize Arlo was going to bring you straight here after he called.”
“Reddington?” Mason asked, peering at me. “The Governor’s no-account son?”