Chapter Nine
“This is why I wanted to keep things casual,” Javi groused.
He pulled the carafe from the coffee maker—a top-of-the-line machine with Wi-Fi capability that putting into the corner of his kitchen had been Javi’s version of putting down roots—and topped up his cup.
Steam wreathed his fingers as he poured.
“If there wasn’t an ‘us,’ then Kincaid wouldn’t have come after you. ”
Cloister waited for the crippling jab of insecurity to hit.
It didn’t. He was surprisingly OK with Javi’s regret over formalizing their relationship.
It was probably something to do with the fact that Javi was fresh from the shower, naked except for an expensive black cotton towel slung around his waist. Although Cloister couldn’t pinpoint whether the casual intimacy of the moment undercut the claimed neglect, or if he was just distracted by the beads of water on lean, sharply carved shoulders.
“He came for Bourneville too,” he pointed out as he picked a rasher of crisp, greasy bacon out of the breakfast roll he’d grabbed on his way here. He slipped it to Bon under the table, and she snatched it out of his fingers.
Javi turned around. He leaned back against the counter, the sharp edge of dark-stained oak pressed against his hips, and crossed his arms over his chest. His attempt at a frown made him wince as it creased the skin around his abused nose.
“Great. I ruined the dog’s life, too.”
“That’s not what I meant,” Cloister said.
He left his sandwich on the table as he got up to walk over to Javi, who watched his approach with stubborn, studied reserve.
Cloister stopped in front of him and leaned in, one arm braced on the counter to take his weight.
He reached up and brushed his thumb gently over Javi’s cheekbone as he grimaced sympathy for the bruises.
Despite himself, Javi leaned into the touch, his breath warm against Cloister’s palm.
“It’s the ‘…and your little dog too’ approach,” Cloister explained. “I’ve seen it before. Kincaid’s carpet-bombing your life. Being disposable wouldn’t have protected me. You’d just not have cared as much that he fucked me over.”
The corner of Javi’s mouth twitched.
“And that wouldn’t be a good outcome for me?” he asked, his voice sour with self-deprecation.
Cloister snorted and dropped a quick kiss on Javi’s mouth. Cynicism didn’t have a taste, but it had a feel in the hard twist of lips that resisted softening.
“I hate to break it to you, but who else is going to put you up when you get evicted?”
Javi grabbed a handful of worn T-shirt to pull him back and then stopped. He tilted his head back and narrowed his eyes suspiciously.
“Wait,” he said. “Why am I getting evicted?”
Cloister hooked his fingers into the knot of the damp towel where it was secured over Javi’s hips. A tug loosened it, but Javi caught his wrist before he could dislodge it completely.
“Because, like I said, Kincaid’s coming in hot,” Cloister said, grazing the word and a kiss over Javi’s jaw.
The fine scruff of stubble was rough against his mouth.
“He wants you off-balance, and that means taking out support structures. People, jobs, housing…and you should probably get some walking-around money from the ATM while you still can.”
Cloister had actually kind of enjoyed it when he was a kid.
Rolls of cash in his pocket like he was a gangster and eating takeout by candlelight because the utilities had been cut again.
Plus, whatever LEO was sniffing around always got Cloister excluded from school at some point, so he’d gotten a handful of extra government-sponsored holidays throughout the year.
He’d never been sure why they thought his parents would care—not like the crime lord stepdad and the grief-obsessed mom had ever gone to a PTA meeting.
But he’d not been stupid enough to point that out.
That last thought soured what had almost passed for a happy childhood memory.
Cloister distracted himself from the pang by leaning in to press a warm, open-mouthed kiss on Javi’s neck.
He inhaled skin and warmth and something that was probably sandalwood or sawgrass or whatever it boasted on the expensive toiletries that Javi favored.
If he thought about it too much, it would freak him out that something as simple (to Javi) as over-priced shower gel could ground him. It felt like…permanence.
He shoved aside the loitering “home” that tried to slip in past his guard as an alternative. There were things he didn’t think about too hard, and things he didn’t think at all. A man whose house was on wheels had to be careful of a hair-trigger fight-or-flight response.
The brush of Javi’s fingers along the nape of his neck made him shiver.
“Are you trying to seduce me, Deputy Witte?” Javi asked, his voice warm and rough with a mixture of lust and humor.
Cloister pushed himself back enough to give him a wry look. “Not sure that’s something you should need to ask.”
Javi reached up to cup the side of Cloister’s face in his hand and then slid his fingers back into tangled, needed-cut hair.
“I’ve just never been talked into bed by a man in a thrift store…” Javi paused as he glanced down at today’s T-shirt. He just about managed not to roll his eyes. “…possum T-shirt while talking about how fucked we are.”
Cloister hadn’t really paid that much attention to the T-shirt he’d grabbed that morning. If Javi said it had a possum on it, he’d believe him. As for the rest…
“I can fix the T-shirt easy enough,” Cloister said as he leaned back to strip it over his head. The worn fabric was soft between his hands as he balled it up and tossed it over a nearby chair. “And as for the rest…who said anything about bed?”
He finished the tug on Javi’s towel. The loose knot unraveled, and it fell to the floor with a flumph of damp cotton.
A low, raw sound of want escaped Javi’s throat as he closed the distance between them for a kiss.
His fingers tightened around the back of Cloister’s neck, digging into skin and lean tendons.
It was a kiss that dragged the breath out of both of them, eager and urgent.
Sharp teeth chewed Cloister’s lips apart, and the taste of Javi and mint toothpaste filled his mouth.
Cloister wrapped his arm around Javi’s waist and pushed him back against the counter.
The edge of it dug into Javi’s lean hips, and he shifted his weight backward.
His elbow bumped the coffee cup, making it rattle against the counter, and Cloister impulsively swept his arm along the counter to clear it.
Coffee splashed over his wrist, hot still but not enough to sting, and the cup clattered into the sink. It made a final-sounding crack as it landed.
“I liked that cup,” Javi grumbled between Cloister’s lips, any bite in the complaint dulled by the caress of warm, gun-callused fingers.
“You’ll like this more,” Cloister promised.
He stepped away from the kiss, ignoring Javi’s groan of protest, and slid down onto the floor.
Worn denim stretched along his knees and thighs as he knelt, the discarded towel damp and tangled under his knees.
He licked a kiss over Javi’s stomach, the tight skin a few shades lighter than the rest of his body, as Javi’s fingers twisted in his hair.
“Prove it,” Javi challenged him throatily.
Cloister laughed softly at the man’s need to be in control, even when he was already getting what he wanted, and ran his hands up Javi’s thighs. Moisture beaded around his fingers as he traced the hard, tensed bands of muscle and nudged Javi’s legs apart.
His cock was already halfway to hard, heavy and eager as it lifted over his tight, smoothly waxed balls. Cloister leaned in, and his breath made Javi’s cock twitch and thicken. Before he could do anything, Javi tapped his shoulder.
“Dog’s watching.” Javi pointed, halfway apologetic at this point.
Cloister bit a kiss against Javi’s thigh. “She’s more interested in the sandwich than you,” he said.
Javi used the fistful of hair between his fingers to pull Cloister’s head back. His face was flushed and his eyes dark, lips kissed raw, as he looked down at Cloister.
“You saying I’m not the focus of the room?” he asked as he raised one dark, perfectly shaped brow.
Cloister wasn’t into control. Or at least, not usually. Despite that, his mouth went dry at the veiled reprimand, his skin two sizes too small, prickly and nervy.
“Bourneville,” he said, voice guttural despite his attempt to keep it clear. “Station.”
There was a put-upon sigh from Bon at the command and the tick of her toenails on polished wood as she padded out of the room.
“Good boy,” Javi said. He untangled his fingers from Cloister’s hair and smoothed it back from his face.
Despite, or because of, the prickle of pleasure that crawled down his spine at the praise, Cloister bridled against it.
“Asshole,” he muttered.
Javi smoothed his thumb along Cloister’s cheekbone.
“Oh, we’ll get there,” he said. “Finish what you started first.”
The laugh startled Cloister, warm and rough as it slipped out of his chest. It felt easy, unremarkable. This—them—was clear enough that he didn’t have to excuse, explain, or defuse the flash of humor.
Not that they couldn’t both be shits sometimes, but…it was different.
Cloister reached up to catch Javi’s hand and pull it down. He brushed a kiss over his shower-wrinkled palm and gave the heel a quick, scraped tease of a bite.
“I always do,” he said.
He felt the tendons in Javi’s arm tighten in response. He saw the way Javi’s cock twitched in reaction, his balls tugged up tight and eager between his legs. The long muscles in his thighs clenched, lean and outlined under golden skin.