Chapter 16
CHAPTER
SIXTEEN
Mercer
With my shift at the Dollhouse cut short, I found myself at loose ends.
After helping Colette secure the building, I rode home, but after puttering around in my garage for over an hour, my thoughts remained at the club.
The power would be restored soon enough, and things would return to business as usual, but I couldn’t shake the sense of panic that had gripped me when the building went dark, people started scurrying, and I couldn’t find Darby.
By the time he made it downstairs, he looked shaken, and that shook me too. It stirred instincts that had gone dormant since my time in the service—the protective kind.
Touching him had felt necessary, and it had become an impulse I could no longer quash. It was about more than checking his temperature or pulse. I wanted to feel him. His smooth skin and silky hair. His warmth. The dips and curves of his thighs, hips, and waist…
My cock kicked alive, fueled by a rush of blood heading south.
I stopped where I’d been organizing the drawers of my rolling cabinet and adjusted myself, but the erection was persistent.
Tools were suddenly far less interesting than the slideshow of mental images I’d amassed over my weeks of employment at the Dollhouse.
All Darby.
Always Darby.
Under the stage lights, on his knees, arching, crawling, his eyes like embers in a dying fire.
By the time I realized how far gone I was, my attempt to manage the swelling in my boxers had shifted into something else. Something more deliberate.
My belt buckle clicked as I unfastened it, and my zipper fly rasped down in the quiet of the garage. My hand slid inside and closed around the hot, swollen length of my cock. The contact tore a groan from my throat, and the sound echoed off the concrete floor.
I pumped once, twice—savoring it—but restraint was a lost cause. Weeks of stolen looks and half-starved fantasies poured into the rhythm of my fist. I could almost smell Darby’s perfume, feel the puff of his breath against my neck.
My thumb skimmed the bead of precum at my crown, then smeared it down my length while my hips jerked into my grip, chasing more, chasing him. I wanted his thighs clamped around my waist, his back bowed, his voice breaking as he moaned my name.
This wasn’t the first time I’d touched myself to thoughts of Darby. I’d run this reel a dozen times, maybe more. And still, it never dulled. If anything, it sharpened.
It had become habit to lie in bed in the small hours, wide awake with leftover vigilance I couldn’t shake, grinding it down the only way I knew how—by closing my eyes and fisting over my cock until I came with Darby’s face behind my lids.
My hand worked faster with fresh spurts of precum slicking the glide. Each stroke dragged me closer to the edge, the rhythm building with the pulse in my cock. My jaw clenched, and my breath escaped in harsh bursts, every sound loud in the empty garage.
What would he feel like beneath me? Trembling. Writhing. Mindlessly lost to pleasure while I buried myself in his heat.
“Fuck…” The word tore from me as my pace slowed then sped again.
I braced myself against the workbench as my balls tightened.
I wanted that. Wanted him. Knowing it would be different than anything I’d done before and realizing how desperately I needed that. How willing I was to accept him if he would accept me too.
In seconds, I shattered, and cum spilled over my knuckles and onto the floor. My body strained with the force of it, muscles taut and breath ragged as my release wrung me out.
When it ebbed, I sagged against the workbench with my cock twitching in my hand and my chest heaving. The garage smelled of oil and steel, but all I could sense was Darby, lingering like the ghost of a kiss I hadn’t yet claimed.
I stood a moment longer as the tremors faded and the cum between my fingers became sticky. I grabbed a rag from the workbench and used it to wipe myself down before tucking my cock and balls back into my boxers and zipping my fly.
Lastly, I crouched and mopped the mess from the floor then tossed the rag aside.
In the wake of my orgasm, my body complained. Rest had been an elusive thing since my discharge, but even more so lately. With days spent at the Basilica and nights at the Dollhouse, I was lucky to scrape together three or four hours in between.
It was catching up to me.
I had been given a rare opportunity to get to bed at a decent hour, and I shouldn’t squander it. But first I needed a shower. Water would wash away the sweat, ease the tightness in my muscles, and hopefully settle my head.
Venturing inside, I stripped down and rinsed off then dressed for bed.
But sleep didn’t come easy.
In fact, it didn’t come at all.
I lay there staring at the ceiling and shifting from one side to the other until the sheets tangled around my legs. Every time I shut my eyes, the darkness replayed the same images—Darby’s face, voice, body—and the ache started all over again. There was no reprieve.
I meant what I’d told Darby. I wouldn’t let harm come to the dancers at the club, but sniffing out contract paperwork and playing tattletale to Antonella put me in direct opposition to that promise.
There was only one way forward.
Before dawn, I got on my computer and typed up a letter of resignation then printed and signed it. It would have been more professional to work out a two-week notice, but I was loath to consider what Antonella could do with half a month more of my time. I wouldn’t let her hooks sink any deeper.
Since I was up already, I went in early.
It was a fight not to nod off on the ride down to the Strip, and I was relieved to have incidentally garnered a day off to catch up on some shuteye. But that shred of optimism wasn’t enough to ward off the sense of unease as I walked into the Basilica with the resignation letter in hand.
At this early hour, the gaming floor was almost vacant, and the slot machines slept with their screens dimmed.
Only the occasional flicker of neon reminded me how loud they’d be once awakened.
A handful of chips sat abandoned at a blackjack table, evidence of a game cut short, and the smell of smoke lingered in the carpet.
There had been a time when I thought this place was beautiful. It was one of the nicest casinos in the city, and the pay was more than enough to cover my mortgage plus child support for Molly. But even before my stint at the Dollhouse, my affinity for the luxurious casino had waned.
It felt a bit like a job I had in high school—the only job I had before enlisting—when I decided it would be fun to work at my favorite pizza restaurant.
After four months of eating, seeing, and breathing pizza, I was ready to never touch the stuff again.
I was equally ready to wash my hands of the Basilica and the heavenly beings who inhabited it.
While riding up to Antonella’s penthouse, I began to worry less about what I would say and more about her response. She’d given me an assignment, one I had failed to complete, and the angel wasn’t the type to take bad news well.
The elevator climbed, silent except for the faint whir of its cables. My pulse throbbed as I caught my reflection in the mirrored walls.
I tugged at the belt threaded through my khaki cargos and became painfully aware of how careless I looked.
In a plain tee shirt and scuffed boots, I had no polish or poise to offer this encounter.
Antonella would notice, but I reminded myself that in a few moments, it would no longer matter what she thought of me.
The car stopped, and the doors parted. I stepped out into the cavernous penthouse level and was immediately assaulted by the harsh glow of daylight. My brows shadowed my gaze as I glanced toward the angel’s desk, only to find it immaculate and unoccupied.
She wasn’t here.
Relief escaped me in a sigh as I strode forward, planning to leave the letter for her to discover when she returned. It was a cowardly move, but also a windfall I wouldn’t take for granted.
I’d made it only a handful of steps when I realized I was not, in fact, alone.
A figure stood before the windows, broad-shouldered and still. His wings eclipsed the bulk of his frame, feathers catching the light in flashes of silver. The color matched his hair, a powdery gray that suggested dignity rather than age.
Stefano Rossetti. Antonella’s brother.
If I’d thought it cowardly to drop a letter on Antonella’s desk and flee, it would have been even worse to backpedal into the elevator and vanish without a word to the holy being in the room.
But I couldn’t cross the space unnoticed with Stefano’s stance angled ever so slightly toward me—as though he already knew his privacy had been invaded.
Better to get this over with than have to come back later.
I cleared my throat, a small, dry sound in the cavernous room.
When Stefano turned, his expression betrayed only mild surprise. “Apologies,” he murmured, but the bass in his voice resonated. “I didn’t hear you arrive.”
“I was just leaving something for Miss Rossetti.” I raised the letter in explanation.
He stepped away from the windows, and his pale eyes targeted the paper in my hand. There was nothing overtly menacing in his approach, but the intensity of his gaze pinned me in place. Like a hawk sighting a mouse in the grass.
My muscles seized and feet rooted as he closed the distance between us. Foolishly, I wished he would simply unsee me.
“Mister James, is it?”
“Yes, sir.”
I didn’t know Stefano well. He wasn’t involved in the parts of the Basilica’s business I was privy to.
Mostly, he lurked in the periphery—drifting through the halls, trailing Antonella like a shadow, or idling on the fringes of the gaming floor.
In my months of employment, this conversation had already outlasted any I’d had with him.
He came within arm’s reach, an imposing figure by any measure, blocking the light and casting me in shadow. At six feet tall, it took a lot to make me feel small, but Stefano managed it with ease.
His gaze dropped to the paper I held, then he extended his hand. “May I see?”
As if I could refuse.
I gave it over and endured the pause as Stefano’s eyes moved across the page. His look of scrutiny relaxed into surprise before he breathed a soft, “Oh.”
Clearly, the letter was not what he’d expected.
He hadn’t been in the meeting with Antonella, Maslow, and me, but I knew that he and his sister were close. It was possible—likely, even—that he knew about the assignment I’d been given and understood its ramifications better than I did.
That was the part that gnawed at me: the secrecy. I’d been trained to accept the limits of need-to-know, but recently, I found myself railing against them.
Stefano folded the paper in half and added a sharp crease before giving it back to me.
“Well,” he said, voice measured. “This is regrettable. I’m sorry to see you go.”
I took the letter, more rattled by his civility than I would’ve been by anger. He wouldn’t have noticed if I disappeared, and he certainly wasn’t sorry about it. Unless he, too, had a vested interest in the task I’d left unfinished.
But if he could play at good manners, so could I.
“Thank you, sir,” I replied.
Another halt. A bloated moment of wondering whether I should sidestep him and go to the desk. Drop the letter and run. That was an assignment I could complete.
But I didn’t move as Stefano continued to watch me with that same steady look, every bit a raptor in perch, waiting to dive.
“I assume you have cause,” he said at last.
“I do.”
One of his brows lifted. “Do you mind sharing what it is?”
I tightened my grip on the letter, its folded edge like a blade in my hand. “It isn’t a matter of the Basilica. I’m grateful for the work here, but my…” I hesitated, weighing every word. “Circumstances have changed.”
Stefano turned his head, silver hair gleaming. “Changed how?”
“Respectfully, sir, that’s personal.”
The angel’s wings rustled as he studied me. The curve of his mouth suggested amusement or irritation, but I couldn’t tell which.
“Personal,” he repeated then inclined his head. “I’ll leave it with you, then.”
“I appreciate your understanding.”
When I pivoted toward Antonella’s desk, I half expected Stefano to block my way. Instead, he only watched as I slipped past, my footsteps echoing across the marble.
Placing the letter on the otherwise immaculate surface carried a weight of finality. It looked stark there, brightly white and folded tight, its contents hidden.
I turned again to find Stefano lingering. If he wanted to say something, I wished he would just come out with it.
I gave him the chance while moving slowly toward the elevator. I had just pressed the call button when his voice rang out.
“Mister James?”
With nothing better to do while waiting for the car, I gave him my attention.
“Are you certain there was nothing else?” he asked.
The question removed all doubt.
He knew about the contract. Expected it.
The elevator’s doors glided open in promise of escape. I held the angel’s gaze, searching his face for either concern or command—and finding both carved into the furrow of his brow.
“Quite sure, sir,” I told him. “And there won’t be.”
His wings gave the slightest shiver, but he said nothing more.
Secrecy ran rampant in this place and among these people, but I lacked the patience for it. My training had taught me to confront problems directly, to stitch what bled before it could kill.
That was triage. That was where I' excelled.
But as I exited Antonella’s penthouse suite, I couldn’t shake the feeling that I hadn’t closed a wound, rather I’d opened one, and it was a bleeder.