Chapter 13 Alex
ALEX
Dropping my ass into the chair at the conference table for our morning briefing, I did my best to conceal how I felt seeing Parker and Daniel chatting it up near a couple of computer monitors. Neither of them bothered to look up when we filed in.
Not that I expected any different. Every briefing since the attacks started the same way—me finding them sitting with their heads together, talking about who knew what.
It got to me, watching them huddle up the way they were.
It shouldn’t. I held no claim to the man.
Yes, Daniel and I fucked. That didn’t mean we were a couple.
Besides, I didn’t even do relationships. That was the reason Kelly and I…the reason he and I were no longer friends. We weren’t a couple. We were friends with benefits, at least by my way of thinking.
Now that I think about it, perhaps that was how things were between Daniel and Parker. Maybe they were just friends who fucked. Maybe they were more. Maybe they had an open relationship and screwed around with other people.
My biggest problem came from the fact that I didn’t know what they were.
Daniel said they weren’t together. He claimed he was single.
I wanted some further proof. Yet asking Parker was out of the question.
And there was no one else who would be privy to the information.
Which led me back to Parker and how I could go about asking him about Daniel.
God knows I couldn’t just come out and say, “Are you fucking the guy I’m fucking? ”
Ridiculous.
I was ridiculous.
Plus, none of that was possible. I had to take Daniel at his word or…
“Listen up!” Commander Turner yelled as he walked into the room.
Parker broke off the conversation with Daniel and took his seat at the table with the rest of us, but not before he patted him on the back and gave his shoulder a squeeze.
Not before Daniel smiled at him with that gorgeous, toothy grin of his, both of which had me ready to punch something—namely, Parker Holt’s gorgeous, smug face.
“Agent Lennox, do you have any new Intel for us?”
“Yes, Commander,” Daniel answered, coming to stand next to the commander at the head of the table. “Team Two has been doing reconnaissance in the areas indicated on this map.” Daniel pointed at two different areas on the large map displayed on the wall in front of us.
Dominic Vinetti, Echo Four, piped up with a question plaguing us all, “Any idea if the fuckers who did this to us are in those mountains?”
“Vinetti,” Parker Holt interrupted, looking over his shoulder at Dom, “Give Daniel a chance to finish the briefing.”
Dom sat back in his chair with a huff. Parker waited, staring him down. Finally, Dom nodded and gave Daniel a take-it-away wave with a bit of a shrug—Dom’s way of apologizing.
Daniel stepped forward, putting him closer to Parker as if seeking protection from the man, which set my teeth on edge.
“The entire intelligence community is searching for the people who did this. But it’s like searching for a needle in a haystack.
We will find Osama Bin Laden. It will just take time. ”
Dom nodded with a deep sigh of frustration, as did the rest of us.
Commander Turner cleared his throat. “In the meantime, the US military community will prepare for the inevitable, while taking down those who aided and abetted our enemies.”
Daniel continued, “That’s exactly right. The order to invade is on the way. It could be any day now.”
“And that means we gotta be ready,” Parker said.
No shit, Sherlock.
Given the look Daniel and Parker gave me, my face said the words my mouth didn’t.
The morning air smelled of gunpowder and hot lead, and sounded like the Fourth of July. I closed my eyes, blocking out the insanity around me, and inhaled—slow, deep, and even. Everything faded around me until all I heard were the voices of my teammates. Brothers.
Maybe.
We were still gelling, but it felt good, like we were slowly coming together.
“Some squads are heading to Afghanistan,” Sammy Myles said from where he lay a few feet away. His voice held an edge. The same one that crept up on us all over the last few weeks.
Some squads were heading that way, and others, the ones already deployed, were being redirected. The briefings we’d been privy to pinpointed Taliban and Al Qaeda forces in the mountains of southern Afghanistan. Everyone itched to get in the fight. Myself included.
“We’ll be getting orders soon,” Marcus assured Sammy.
Sammy glanced at me, and I knew what ran through his mind without him saying a word.
He would be in charge of watching my ass and keeping me from doing something stupid—standard procedure for a new guy on their first deployment.
I got it. The new guy posed a risk. We were a liability to the team, and between being left behind to sit and spin, I’d take a babysitter any day.
We continued the live fire exercise with minimal yammering and zero direction from our squadron leader.
Parker and Daniel had stayed holed up in the ops center since the morning of the attacks.
Daniel swore they weren’t together, and I wanted to believe him, but Parker Holt was fucking beautiful, closer in age, and an officer.
He was a much more appropriate match—similar ages, if I had to guess, with similar experience—professionally, personally, sexually.
I closed my eyes, steadied my breathing, trying to reset. That shit shouldn’t matter. It couldn’t matter now. We all had a job to do—a job with lives on the line.
Squeezing the trigger, the sniper rifle slammed into my shoulder. It was off. I knew it. I let bullshit…
“You good, Madison?” Marcus asked, his voice sounded tinny through the fancy headphones issued to me. They supposedly protected your hearing while allowing you to hear everything around you.
Looking through the scope, I groaned at the hole in the target outside the silhouette. Three inches off. Motherfucker. Growling under my breath, I readjusted and fired again.
This time I put the shot where it belonged—the center of the forehead.
“Better, Alex. We might make a sniper of you yet,” Marcus congratulated me.
I held an expert qualification, but Navy sniper school was intense and not included in my advanced training pipeline. Plans had a way of changing quickly, though. We all served how and where the Navy told us to.
“You need backup in your old age, Marcus?”
Parker’s voice cut across the range, calling a halt to the rifle fire.
“Can never have too many shooters.”
“The kid can already shoot. I want to make certain you guys get home in one piece, which means I want another doc on the team.”
Clearing my throat, I pointed out what I felt was obvious, but apparently wasn’t. “Last time I checked, I was a full-fledged adult, so if we could knock off calling me a kid and treating me like one as well, that would be great.”
Laughter followed, and a round of “You got it, new guy” filled the air right before the firing resumed.
Fuck my life.
I turned back to my rifle, rested my face against the stock, and lined up my sight, drew in a deep, measured breath, only for Parker to interrupt me as he dropped to his belly next to me, and he whispered, “He’s a great guy.”
Lifting my cheek from the rifle, I turned my chin just enough so that I could look at him with both eyes and said, “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Bullshit. You know exactly what I’m talking about.”
Glancing around, I picked up my rifle and moved to the table under the shelter behind the firing line.
Parker followed me. Picking up a rifle lying on the table and disassembling it while talking in a low, hushed tone. “You can act like you don’t know what I’m talking about, Pinocchio, but that doesn’t change the truth.”
Whispering as softly as I could, I said, “Do you always pimp out your boyfriends?”
Parker laughed so hard that it tossed his head back, the sound echoing around us. I nervously glanced at the guys on the firing line, but no one even looked our way.
“Are you trying to get all three of us caught?” I asked.
After a few more whoops of laughter and head shakes to go with them, he replied, “No, I’m trying to convince you to get your head out of your ass.”
“Are you saying that you two aren’t…”
A deep exhale preceded his next words. “I’m not confirming nor denying. What I’m saying is the issue you have is a non-issue.”
He walked away. My eyes followed him. What the fuck was he talking about? My issue was a non-issue? Did that mean Daniel told the truth when he claimed he was single?
And why the fuck did I give a shit? I’d walked away from a luxurious lifestyle to be who I wanted to be and rid myself of the abuse and neglect my father’s grief over losing the person he needed most in the world heaped on my doorstep.
I promised myself. I swore I’d never let myself be so dependent on someone that their presence, or lack thereof, altered who I was at the core.
“You done for the day?”
Sammy’s voice pulled me back to reality. Turning, I nodded silently. The monotony of the last couple of weeks wore on me. We’d hit the gym in the morning, grab showers and chow, sit through briefings, then we’d spend some time at the range before doing some training.
“Yep. I’m good.”
“Great. Marcus was right; we will deploy soon. Lucky for us, you’re an expert marksman, so we have very little work to do in that regard.”
I nodded, agreeing with him.
“However, since you’re heading to medic school as soon as we get back from this deployment, walking you through some of the more advanced techniques wouldn’t hurt. You down?”
I nodded again, both excited to learn something new and put out because Parker suggested it.
“You know you can talk, right? It’s allowed.”
Heat danced across my cheekbones, and I knew he noticed it because he smirked. “I know I can talk, but I spent a lot of years being seen and not heard and operating in the shadows. It’s a little tough to make the switch.”
He smacked my shoulder, giving me a slight push. “Let’s get back to the team room. We’ll get the logistics crew to outfit you with a medic kit.”
Hours later, freshly showered and changed into civilian clothes, I walked into the lobby of my apartment building. After being contracted with Parker and what one can only assume was well-intentioned meddling, I half expected to see Daniel waiting for me. He was nowhere to be seen.
A bittersweet sigh emptied my lungs, leaving behind a weird conglomeration of relief and disappointment.
Chastising myself, I pressed the call button, climbed onto the elevator when it arrived, only to stand in front of the columns and rows of buttons, warring with myself as to which I should press—the one for his floor or the one for mine.
The door slid closed before I could decide. To others, I must look like an idiot standing in an elevator, as if I couldn’t remember what fucking floor I lived on.
Get it to-fucking-gether, Alex.
After another deep sigh, I reached forward, my hand hovering over the button for Daniel’s floor. Shaking my head, I lifted my hand to try again, determined to choose a button. Any fucking button at this point.
Only the door slid open with a quick swoosh, and the sexy motherfucker I couldn’t get out of my head, not months ago when we first hooked up, and not since a few weeks ago when we hooked up a second time, stood there.
I stared at him, and then his gaze met mine.
Electricity danced between his blue eyes and my brown ones: his were so fucking gorgeous.
Everything about him was fucking beautiful.
He fit everything about me almost to a tee.
Lust and want surged through me until they merged into this need to bend over for him, until he’d fucked me silly.
He gulped when the door dinged, stepping closer so it could finally close. Neither of us moved.
“Xander.”
I should correct him so he called me Alex like the rest of the team.
Xander was someone I left behind when I walked into the recruiting office.
But I liked how it sounded on his lips. And I’d missed being Xander.
I preferred being Xander. I chose to use Alex in the Navy because Alexander Madison was the straight guy mask I wore for my father and the world.
Xander was a greedy bottom who got cranky when he’d gone too long without getting fucked.
“Daniel.”
He huffed a laugh. As did I, but I hid it behind my hand by dropping my head into my palm and rubbing my forehead.
“You go first,” he offered.
“Did you tell Parker…”
“This isn’t the place for this conversation. Want to order some food?”
Memories of the last time we ordered food slammed into me as if it were a runaway train. My already half-hard cock stiffened in my jeans uncomfortably. This time, I gulped.
“That’s not a good idea,” I whispered.
He must have caught the meaning behind my words, or maybe the memories assaulted him as they did me. Whatever the case, his eyes dropped to my crotch and he…
“Fuck!” My growl turned into a moan as he adjusted himself, drawing my gaze to the tent in his khakis.
The door opened. Parker stood before the opening. His eyes bounced between Daniel and me, then they dropped from our faces to our groins and bounced back and forth a second time. A smirk bloomed on his face. He opened his mouth, but I didn’t think I could stomach whatever came out of his pie hole.
“Get your own fucking elevator,” I said as I punched the button, closing the doors in Parker’s face.
“Xander…”
“Not now.”
“But…”
I pushed Daniel against the elevator wall, my hand pressed over his thundering heart. “Not another word.”
He nodded. His Adam’s apple bobbed in his throat as he licked his lips. Lips I wanted to devour. Not kiss, de-fucking-vour. I wanted to lose myself in him until nothing else mattered in the world.
The elevator dinged. The door opened. Stepping away from Daniel, I shot a quick glance at the control panel before looking back at him as I stabbed the door-close button.
“That was…”
“I know it was your floor. Do you think I’m gonna talk about anything in your apartment when Parker Holt, my fucking team leader, knows where you live?”
He crossed his arms over his chest, gave me a look I couldn’t begin to describe, then shook his head no.
“Good. Now, keep your mouth shut until we get upstairs to my place.”