12. ronan
ronan
Echo had been in the lounge for twenty-three minutes and still hadn’t relaxed into a single piece of furniture.
She’d taken the chair farthest from the door, tucked into the corner where the wall met the long bank of windows, and angled it just enough that she could see the entrance without turning her head.
Hunter’s desk sat across the room in the same line of sight.
So did the hallway leading deeper into the private rooms, the bar, and most of the sectional Malakai and I usually occupied when Hunter was pretending we weren’t distracting him.
Echo had found the only seat in the room that gave her nearly everything at once, dropped her bag beside it, and opened a textbook across her knees as though the choice had been about finding somewhere quiet to read.
Malakai had spent most of those twenty-three minutes making sure she regretted it.
He’d started on the couch with me. That lasted until Echo pulled a pen from her bag, and then he was across the room asking why she had three different highlighters when every page looked like she’d attacked it with the same yellow one.
Echo told him to get the fuck away from her homework.
Malakai took that as permission to crouch beside the chair and read over her arm instead, close enough that his chest pressed briefly against her shoulder when she tried to turn the book away from him.
She shoved an elbow into his ribs without looking up.
“You know,” Malakai said, reaching around her anyway to tap something on the page, “most people thank me when I offer free tutoring.”
Echo caught his finger before it touched the paper and bent it backward until he laughed. “You haven’t offered tutoring. You’ve been reading over my shoulder and breathing on me for ten fucking minutes. Go bother your boyfriend.”
He glanced at me, apparently considering the suggestion, then settled one forearm across the back of her chair instead. “He’s watching us. I’m making his afternoon interesting.”
I was watching because Malakai had been talking about Echo too much lately.
He had always talked, especially when something caught his interest, but this had changed from telling me about the woman who’d tried to carve up Nichlas into telling me what she’d said after class, what she’d threatened him with in the library, which professor she hated, and how she apparently preferred fries drowned in enough salt to kill a normal person.
Two nights ago, while we were in bed, he’d casually suggested putting her between us as if he were proposing a different restaurant for dinner. He had spent another ten minutes describing exactly how he thought she’d behave there before I put a pillow over his face. I hadn’t told him no.
That was the part I kept circling back to while I watched Echo trap his hand against the chair and continue reading like she hadn’t just threatened to break one of his fingers.
I didn’t trust her. She had been at Aldrich for barely long enough to learn which buildings had the best coffee, and she’d already attacked a man under our protection, fucked Malakai, challenged Hunter to his face, and somehow convinced Malakai that attaching himself to her schedule was a reasonable use of his time.
I knew what she wanted from us right now. Nichlas. Anything beyond that was still buried beneath whatever she decided to show. Malakai apparently didn’t care.
He freed his hand and stole the highlighter from between Echo’s fingers.
She finally looked up from the book, and something about the expression on her face made him grin before she’d even spoken.
“Put it back,” she told him, her voice almost conversational.
“I’m trying very hard to respect Hunter’s no-blood-in-the-lounge rule. ”
Hunter’s pen stopped against the paper on his desk.
It was brief, but I’d been watching him nearly as long as I’d been watching Echo.
His jaw had been tight for most of the afternoon, pulling harder whenever Malakai folded himself into her corner or Echo put her hands on him to move him.
Hunter hadn’t told either of them to stop.
He hadn’t even looked up often enough for Malakai to notice how much attention he was paying, which made it more interesting than if he’d simply been irritated by the noise.
Malakai slid the highlighter behind his ear. “That rule doesn’t exist.”
“It will after I open your throat on his carpet.”
“See, this is why I like you.” He leaned down far enough to put his face beside hers, shamelessly close while Echo’s fingers tightened around the edge of her textbook. “You’re always trying to solve things.”
I pushed myself off the couch before I could think too hard about why that pleased me.
Malakai heard me coming and turned his head, but I caught the front of his sweater before he had room to say anything.
He came easily when I pulled him in, one knee landing between mine at the edge of the couch as my hand slid around the back of his neck.
I kissed him hard enough to wipe the grin off his mouth for half a second, and then it was back against mine because he knew exactly what I was doing when I grabbed him like that.
His hand closed around my jaw, tongue ring catching against my lip as he kissed me deeper, and the familiar weight of him settled into my space without either of us needing to adjust for it.
I looked past him at Echo to find her watching.
The textbook had lowered slightly in her lap, her attention fixed on us with none of the bored dismissal she’d been giving Malakai five minutes earlier.
Her eyes looked darker from across the room.
I knew irritation on her by now, or at least some versions of it.
I’d watched her look at Hunter like she was calculating whether homicide would void their agreement.
I’d watched her look at Malakai like she wanted to bite him simply because he’d opened his mouth. This wasn’t as easy to place.
Malakai shifted closer when I caught his lower lip between my teeth, and Echo’s gaze dropped to his hand where it settled against my neck.
Interesting.
I let the kiss run another few seconds before releasing him. Malakai stayed between my knees, smiling down at me while he rubbed his thumb across my mouth. “You jealous I found a new hobby?”
“No.” I kept my hand at his waist and glanced toward Echo again. She had already lifted the book, although she hadn’t turned a page. “Your hobby looks annoyed.”
Echo didn’t bother pretending she hadn’t heard us.
“Your hobby is trying to finish a fucking assignment while this asshole steals everything within reach. I’ve threatened his throat, his tongue piercing, and several fingers today, and somehow he still thinks sitting on top of me is a reasonable use of his afternoon. ”
Malakai twisted around in my grip and pointed at her with the highlighter he still had tucked behind his ear. “I think we’re past pretending I’m the problem.”
She closed the book over one finger and looked at him for a long moment. “Kai, I knew you were the problem the first time I met you.”
The name caught him. It caught me too, though I kept that to myself.
Most people outside the three of us didn’t use it, and Echo had apparently decided she could because she’d heard Hunter and me do it often enough.
Malakai’s grin widened slowly before he started to turn toward her again, and I tightened my hand on his waist to keep him where he was.
He’d mentioned putting her between us more than once now.
Watching her look at him while he was still half in my lap did nothing to make the idea less appealing.
I could picture it too easily, which was probably why I hadn’t shut him down the first time.
Wanting her there was simple. Trusting her anywhere close to something that belonged to me was another matter entirely.
Hunter closed the folder on his desk hard enough to pull everyone’s attention toward him. “If you three are finished making this room fucking useless, I have work that actually needs doing.”
Echo’s book shut completely this time. Malakai finally moved off me, though he stole my drink on the way back toward her chair and dropped onto its arm like he had every intention of resuming his harassment the second Hunter stopped talking.
Hunter looked at Echo. “You want Nichlas, you work. Someone owes us information and has decided they don’t feel like paying what they promised. You’re going to remind them how this works.”
Echo set the textbook on the table beside her, interest replacing the irritation Malakai had spent the afternoon cultivating. “Fine. Where?”
“Ronan has the details. You leave in twenty minutes.”
Malakai straightened immediately. “I’m coming.”
Hunter didn’t even look at him. “No. You’re staying here.”
Malakai opened his mouth, already offended by the concept, but Hunter’s attention had moved back to his paperwork. Echo glanced from Malakai to me, then reached up and plucked her highlighter from behind his ear.
I watched her tuck it into her bag.
Twenty minutes with Echo away from Nichlas would tell me more than an afternoon in the lounge ever could. And for once, Malakai wouldn’t be there to make the answer harder to see.
Hunter gave me the name, the debt, and the part that mattered before Echo finished shoving her notebook into her bag.
The student was Callum Mercer, third-year finance, Quorum-connected through his mother’s family and stupid enough to think that made him harder to squeeze.
Three weeks ago, he’d traded us access to a private alumni mailing list in exchange for cleaning up a problem involving one of his roommates.
We handled our side. Callum had spent the last five days pretending he could no longer get what he promised because the list had been moved behind another set of permissions.
Hunter didn’t believe him. Neither did I.