CHAPTER 3 #2
Everett groaned. The sound was low, feral, vibrating directly against Dorian’s parted lips. The captain’s hand tightened in Dorian’s hair, holding him perfectly still as Everett’s tongue swept decisively along the seam of Dorian’s mouth, demanding entry.
The icy, impenetrable walls Dorian had spent his entire life building cracked right down the middle.
The heat pooling in his gut was sudden and devastating.
His knees felt dangerously hollow. A localized, intense friction ignited wherever Everett’s body pressed against his.
Every defensive instinct Dorian possessed screamed at him to push back, to maintain his solitary perimeter, but his traitorous body betrayed him completely.
He didn't push. His fingers curled, clutching fistfuls of Everett’s expensive overcoat.
He opened his mouth, surrendering to the heavy, invasive pressure.
Everett took the offering immediately. The kiss turned wet, slick, and deeply hungry.
The sheer friction of Everett’s stubble dragging against Dorian’s chin sent a sharp, agonizing spike of electricity straight down his spine.
It wasn't a fake kiss meant to fool a bored clerk.
It was a physical claiming, a heavy, suffocating blanket of alpha protection that dragged Dorian out of his trauma and forcefully anchored him to the present second.
Seconds bled out. The rain kept hammering the glass. Dorian was entirely consumed by the heat, the wet slide of the muscle in Everett’s jaw, the suffocating weight of the captain’s body trapping him against the wood.
A sharp, awkward cough echoed from the back of the room.
Agent Sterling Reid.
Everett broke the kiss. He didn't pull away quickly. He dragged his lips slowly across the corner of Dorian’s mouth, a lingering, deeply possessive friction that left Dorian’s skin burning.
Everett’s heavy chest heaved once, his dark eyes entirely dilated, completely black in the dim light of the civil room.
He stared down at Dorian’s swollen, wet lips for a long, heavy beat, his thumb slowly stroking the sensitive skin behind Dorian’s ear.
Then, the captain blinked. The cold, impenetrable executive mask slammed back into place. Everett dropped his hand and stepped back, instantly restoring the freezing, sterile atmosphere of the municipal office.
Dorian stood there, utterly wrecked. His chest rose and fell in ragged, shallow spikes.
His lips stung. The ghost of Everett’s heavy grip still burned a brand into the back of his neck.
He stared at the floor tiles, completely incapable of formulating a coherent thought, his mind struggling to bridge the gap between the rigid, tactical contract they had signed and the raw, violent intimacy he had just endured.
"Sign here, gentlemen," the magistrate said, tapping her pen against the bottom of the embossed paper, entirely unfazed by the display.
Everett moved first. He pulled a heavy silver pen from the inner pocket of his coat, leaning over the podium.
He signed his name with sharp, aggressive strokes.
He didn't look at Dorian. He placed the pen down on the document and stepped back, his posture radiating a terrifying, unapproachable authority.
Dorian approached the paper like it was a live explosive.
He picked up the silver pen. The metal was still warm from Everett’s body heat.
He forced his shaking hand to steady, pressing the nib to the thick paper.
He signed his name next to Everett’s, the ink binding his ruined, desperate life to the captain of the Chicago Inferno.
Sterling was there instantly. The agent practically materialized beside the podium, his face pale, sweat beading on his forehead. He snatched the gold-embossed marriage certificate before the ink had even fully dried.
Snap. Snap.
The heavy brass locks of Sterling’s leather briefcase clicked shut, sealing the lie.
"I have the files," Sterling said, his voice tight, bordering on frantic. "I’m uploading the encrypted scans directly to your father’s legal team now, Everett. They will file the I-130 petition with the federal courthouse in exactly twenty minutes."
"Good," Everett stated, buttoning the top button of his overcoat. He turned toward the double doors leading out into the bleak municipal hallway. He stopped, looking back at Dorian, his dark eyes sweeping over the goalie’s disheveled suit and flushed, completely derailed expression.
"Pull yourself together, Pike," Everett commanded quietly, the tone stripped of all the heat from thirty seconds ago, leaving only the hard, unyielding discipline of a team captain bracing for a brutal third period.
"The legal shield is up. But the federal audit is going to hit us, and they are going to look for any microscopic fracture in this story. "
Dorian forced his jaw to lock. He smoothed his trembling hands down the front of his charcoal suit, fighting to rebuild the ice around his lungs. The ink was dry. The contract was executed. He had just handed his freedom over to a man who possessed the physical capacity to completely dismantle him.
Everett pushed the heavy doors open, stepping out into the shadows of the corridor.
Dorian followed him into the storm.