Chapter 4
CHAPTER FOUR
LINK
Aguy named Katon showed me into the ginormous house. I got a kick out of taking off my shoes and putting slippers on. Made sense, though. Saved the dirt coming off my shoes into the clean place.
I walked into the room Katon had pointed to and muttered, “Holy shit.” Ryo looked hot in his suits, but he looked smoking in jeans and a plain black tee. “You look delicious,” I told him as I walked up to the huge-arse table.
His cheeks pinked, and he snapped, “Shut up.”
Ruin chuckled, and Wolf smiled as he watched his friend.
I took the seat next to Ryo and gazed at the food in front of us.
“It was just placed down when we heard that you’d arrived,” Ryo told me.
I winked. “All good, baby.”
“Don’t call me that.”
“You got it, snookums.”
Ryo sighed and glowered at Wolf.
“Ruin, good to see you. How’s the brothers?”
“Same, same. How’s life since the last time I saw you?”
Looking to Ryo, I answered, “Great.”
“Let’s eat,” Ryo said.
We dished up our food while Ruin told us a story about his friend, Texas. I kept glancing over at Ryo. I couldn’t get enough of watching him. He moved gracefully even as he ate. I didn’t want to look away. Also, he was damn handsome and cute with the way he made a point of ignoring my stare.
“Link, how did things finish with Ross?” Wolf asked, and I realised Ruin had finished talking and that I’d missed most of his story.
“Yeah, fine. We’ll keep an eye on him. Ruin, you should’ve seen my man—”
“I’m not your man.”
“—at the meeting. He cut off the guy’s fingers because he’d called me a stupid fucker.”
Ruin chuckled. “I heard.”
“I did not do it for you,” Ryo tried to say, but I knew the truth. He so wanted me.
Reaching over, I patted his thigh and felt him tense under my hand. “It’s okay, snook. Like I said, I thought it was hot.”
He rolled his eyes and went on eating while I kept my hand on his thigh. I used the other to pick up my fork.
“Have you spoken to Travis lately?” Ruin asked.
“All the time. The guy misses me too much.” His fault for staying in Ballarat all the damn time.
Ruin snorted. “Sure, he does.”
Ryo placed his hand over mine on his thigh, and I was about to praise the hell out of him, until he picked it up and dropped it on my own thigh.
“You know Travis is only a friend, right?” I asked, worry twisting my gut at the thought I’d upset him with my words.
Jesus. I really had fallen hard into this attraction for the man next to me.
“I know. He’s married to Violet, and they have a daughter, Izzy.
You also have a sister named Trisha who is married to a man named Henry.
They recently had their second child, another son.
They live in America because of Henry’s work.
You prefer your coffee black with one sugar.
You have many employees, but the longest running is Bradshaw, who is your personal guard and computer specialist when you can’t do the work yourself since you have a computer engineering degree.
You also have a degree in business management.
I know a lot of things about you, Lincoln Graham. ”
He’d investigated me.
I mean, of course he had. It would’ve been stupid if they didn’t, for business’s sake.
Still, I liked that Ryo knew things about me.
“You’ll meet my sister one day.”
“No, thank you,” he replied, sipping at his water.
“Also, is it inappropriate to let you know I’m hard from all the information you know about me?”
His cheeks pinked, and he very quickly glanced down, then up and away.
Fucking cute.
Ruin guffawed, while Wolf snorted, and my handsome prince glowered at the wall.
“Very inappropriate,” Ryo finally said. “And at your age, you should know better.”
When he looked back to me, I winked. “You can call me daddy any time you want, snook.”
His blush deepened, as did his scowl. But his friends found me amusing.
Leaning into Ryo, I told him, “I may be nine years older than you, snook, but I bet I’ll keep up in any circumstance.”
Ryo suddenly stood. “I need the bathroom.” He stalked out of there like his jeans were on fire.
“Did I push too much?” I asked, turning to Wolf and Ruin.
“I don’t think so,” Ruin said. He looked to Wolf.
“Are you serious about a relationship with Ryo?”
“Yeah,” I said to Wolf.
“You had better be, Link. If you screw with him, I will end our deal and make sure you pay for hurting him.”
My skin prickled. I hated threats, but I would take this one, since it was for Ryo’s sake.
“I get you wanting to protect him. I’d never intentionally hurt him, and I’ll do everything I can to make sure I don’t.
But shit happens. I can’t look into the future.
Still, you gotta know that I haven’t wanted anyone as much as I do him in a long time, and that’s only after a few times seeing the guy.
I can only image how obsessive I’ll become after dating him for a while and he gives me his everything.
I won’t want to give him up. I’ll want to keep him forever.
He doesn’t know just how possessive I can get. ”
Wolf smirked. “I think he’s gathering it.
” He sobered and quietly said, “However, you also need to consider that what you’re now getting from Ryo in front of others may be all he can offer.
He’s not used to showing the… softer side around other people.
I’m sure he’ll be different behind closed doors, but out in the open, he controls himself. ”
How had he gotten that way?
I wanted to know. I wanted every bit of information I could get on Ryo Sato.
Shrugging, I swallowed my mouthful and said, “I already like Ryo as he is.”
Wolf grinned. “I may like you, Link.”
Smirking, I cocked a brow. “You’re only figuring this out now?”
Ruin clipped. “And he means platonically.”
Chuckling, I rolled my eyes. “I get it, Ruin. You’ve pissed all over Wolf.”
Ruin nodded, looking smug.
“All right, so I keep doing what I’m doing when it comes to Ryo?”
Wolf nodded, and his gaze moved over to the doors. I glanced back to watch Ryo approach.
He took a seat beside me again and picked up his fork.
“Missed your face,” I told him.
His brows pinched. “Doubtful. I was only gone for a moment.”
“Still missed you.” I turned back to Wolf. “You gotta fire your cooks so I can hire them. This shit is the best.” I sawed into the steak and popped the piece into my mouth, moaning around the meat that melted against my tongue.
Thinking of meat and my mouth, I glanced at Ryo, wanting his meat between my lips. I’d pay it the special attention it needed.
“Stop looking at me,” Ryo said with his eyes to his meal.
“I can’t help it. I bet you’d be just as delic—” I chuckled around the spring bean he’d shoved in my mouth.
Wolf pushed his chair back and stood. “This has been lovely, but Josh and I are tired—”
“We are?” Ruin asked, the fork with a pile of food on it raised near his mouth.
Wolf threaded his fingers through Ruin’s hair and gripped. “Yes, pet. Very tired.”
“Right.” He faked a yawn as he placed the fork down on his plate. “But if I wake up in the middle of the night, I can get someone to bring me food?”
Wolf nodded. “Of course.”
“You’re not being subtle at all,” Ryo said while glowering at them. He faced me. “Looks like dinner is done. You may go.”
Grinning, I shook my head. “Thanks for the offer, but I’m gonna finish this awesome food first. You can stay and keep me company.”
His jaw clenched.
“Goodnight,” Wolf called, dragging Ruin toward the door.
“Catch ya,” Ruin said before we heard him say to Wolf, “We’re getting food to the room now, right?”
Wolf sighed just as the door closed after them, so if he said anything in return, I wasn’t sure.
While we ate in silence, a couple of waiters came in and took some trays away, and I smirked around my mouthful, knowing that they were getting the food for Ruin.
“Do you have family?” I asked between my last bites.
“Yes” was all he said.
“Cool. Parents? Siblings? Cousins?”
“All of the above, plus aunts and uncles. I have had nothing to do with them since the day my parents sold me, at eighteen, to the Takahashi family to become their loyal servant. They also wanted me to be their spy. It was pure luck I got placed with Wolf. When he gave me the option to cut my family from my life and to become whoever I wanted to be, it earned him my loyalty. That is why I’ve stayed at his side since. ”
My gut clenched. I despised that for him. “Shit, Ryo. That fuckin’ sucks. But what about your siblings?”
“My two older brothers work for our father and stood beside him when they sold me. My life is better off without any of them in it, and once I informed them that I wouldn’t be supplying them with any type of details about the Takahashi family, they dropped me from their lives.
” He took a gulp of his water. “That was after they tried to have me killed.”
“What the fuck?” I blurted. “Serious?”
He grinned. What would he be grinning about?
“All five attempts failed due to Wolf and I stopping them. Then I figured, when no one else tried for years after, that my family refused to pay another person to fail. Besides, they’re too lazy to try and kill me themselves.”
“Jesus, Ryo. Can I kill them?” Why hadn’t he?
He pushed his plate away and shook his head. “I want nothing to do with them and no one else in my life to bother with them either.”
My heart skipped a beat.
“Am I in your life, baby?”
He looked away, cheeks tinting again. “No.”
He glanced down at the table as I walked my fingers across the wood to tap the back of his hand before I picked it up in mine and drew it slowly to my mouth, then kissed his fingers.
He swallowed thickly.
“I think I already am, and I’ll go at any pace you want to set.” I nipped at his knuckle.
He cleared his throat and slowly removed his hand from mine. “We will see.”
That we would.