Cut & Run 05 - Armed & Dangerous (12 page)

Zane’s lips were pressed together hard. Cameron would have sworn that he was trying not to laugh.
“Secure?” Zane asked with difficulty.
“Unless he decides to rip the shower enclosure out of the wall… yes.”
After hearing what had come out of Julian’s mouth, Cameron wasn’t too sure Ty should be so happy with himself.
Julian’s dry voice drifted out of the bathroom. “You’re an imbecile.”
“But I ain’t handcuffed to a shower.”
“I want to sit with Julian,” Cameron said.
“No,” Zane said in a pleasant voice.
“Why not?” Cameron asked, standing and holding up his handcuffed hands.
“Because we fucking said so,” Ty said. “Get in bed. Do it now.”
Zane shrugged out of his coat and hung it in the closet before picking up his duffel. “You get in bed too,” he told Ty with a jerk of his head toward the second bed. “I’m not sleeping.”
Ty looked at Zane as if he wanted to object, but he kept his mouth shut. He stripped off the T-shirt he’d changed into earlier and toed off his boots. He fell into the bed in just his jeans and burrowed his head under one of the pillows. He reminded Cameron of a very large dog throwing itself to the ground to take a nap.
He wondered how Ty planned to just go to sleep on command after drinking an entire Red Bull, but as he watched, Ty didn’t move, and soon his breathing evened out. Cameron stared at him in disbelief.
“He’s asleep,” he said without thinking.
“Yeah, he does that.”
Zane didn’t seem to be paying either of them much attention; he’d moved to the table in the corner and was pulling a stack of papers out of his messenger bag. He sat in the corner, running his hand through his hair to leave it unruly, fingers playing with his beard as he got to work. He looked a little more relaxed but still dark and dangerous. Rakish, even.
The gun went on the table right next to the papers. Only then did he glance back up at Cameron and raise an eyebrow.
Cameron wondered if it was too late to ask for a bathroom break.

A FTER an hour of writing down notes by hand, Zane caught himself staring across the room at Ty, who was sprawled on the bed nearest the bathroom, head under a pillow, body loose and relaxed. Zane doubted he was; Ty usually knew where he was even asleep. He could only remember one or two occasions when he’d done something while Ty was asleep and hadn’t woken him.

Just being able to see him was reassuring in ways Zane would have avoided exploring in the past, but now he could admit why. He loved his exasperating partner beyond all reason. He saw him as a lifeline he had desperately needed, an inspiration in so many ways.

Several minutes passed before Zane tore his gaze away from Ty’s half-naked body to glance around the room. Cameron was asleep as well, curled up under the blanket in the other bed. He looked young and innocent, though he couldn’t really be, what with spending so much time with a man such as Julian Cross. Zane looked to the bathroom. It had been quiet in there as well. With a sigh, he pushed back from the table to stand and stretch. He had kinks all up and down his back after the flight and the car ride combined with the tension of the situation.

“Come lay down,” Ty murmured in a low, hoarse voice, muffled by the thin pillow. He hadn’t moved. Zane wondered how he did that sometimes, sensed things without seeing them. Zane had never mastered that art, even while being blinded from his injury several weeks ago.

Zane glanced at Cameron before walking over to stand at Ty’s bedside and lifting the pillow off his head. “You should be asleep,” he said as he set his gun on the nightstand.

Zane wasn’t going to pass on a second request, not while all was quiet. He moved around to the foot of the bed and crawled up beside him, settling on his side and scooting up against Ty to lie in the crook of his arm. When he settled his cheek on Ty’s shoulder, he felt a warm calm soak into him as he pressed close to Ty’s exposed skin.

Ty growled and rolled, wrapping Zane up in his arms. “You need rest,” he said. He lowered his voice and moved his lips against Zane’s skin.“And I need you.”

Zane slid his arm up and around Ty’s neck as Ty pulled him close. It was about four a.m., and he’d been awake for almost twentyfour hours. But being this close to Ty after days apart wasn’t conducive to sleep. “Baby,” he whispered against Ty’s throat before pressing his lips to the soft, warm skin.

Ty hummed and ran his hand up and down Zane’s side, tugging at his shirt. He pushed his chin forward and kissed him. Zane sighed against his lips and inhaled Ty’s scent, letting it flood through him. The sandalwood was still there, and Zane would have to remember to ask where it had come from. It was intoxicating, and he was barely hanging on to the thought that one of their prisoners was sleeping not even ten feet away. But one kiss—just one—he had to have it, and he tightened his arm around Ty’s neck to deepen it.

Ty’s hands gripped him hard, and he pushed Zane back just enough to be able to kiss him harder. “Is that kid asleep?” he asked in a quiet rush.

“Zane.” His name was no more than Ty’s breath against his lips. “I don’t care if we should or not.”
“God, I thought we got this out of our systems,” Zane whispered, squeezing his eyes shut for a moment as his gut clenched with desire.
Ty kissed him again, pulling him until their bodies touched all over. “We can be quiet.”
Zane had to smother his laugh in Ty’s neck. “No we can’t,” he muttered with absolute certainty.
Ty pulled back and looked at him with one eyebrow raised. “Not even a little?” he asked with true disappointment.
“A little? You think I’m going to stop at just a little?” Zane shook his head and kissed Ty. He ached for Ty, inside and out, but this just wasn’t the time. A professional hit man was locked up in the bathroom, and another prisoner was in the next bed. It would have been comedic if it didn’t suck so much. “I want you more than anything,” he murmured against Ty’s lips. “And you can’t possibly imagine all the things I’m going to do to you. But for that, we need to be at home.”
“Goddammit.” Ty pulled his head back and sighed.
Zane nodded regretfully. “But for now we have this,” he whispered, burrowing in close.
Ty sighed again and pulled Zane closer, scooting up until he could rest his chin on top of Zane’s head and Zane was snuggled up against his chest. “Go to sleep if I can’t grope you. I’ll stay awake.”
Zane snorted but didn’t twitch a muscle to move. “That’ll be a pretty picture for Cameron to see if he wakes up.”
Ty held his breath for a few moments and then let it out in an irritated rush. “Fine.”
He pulled his hand out from under Zane’s neck and rolled over, and then sat up and rolled his head from side to side. The immediate chill made Zane shiver, and he wrapped his arms around himself, watching Ty. He wished he hadn’t said anything. He didn’t want to sleep. He wanted to be awake, to soak Ty in. He reached out to trail his fingers down Ty’s arm.
Ty turned his arm and let Zane’s fingers glide over his palm. He pushed himself off the bed and stretched, then turned and leaned over Zane, pulling the comforter up over him as he kissed him. “Go to sleep.”
Zane sighed, warmed by Ty’s quiet affection, and reached for his gun. Then he pulled one of the pillows partway under his chest and tucked the hand holding the gun underneath it, a security measure made second nature after his time undercover in the seedy Miami underbelly. Even the past several months sleeping unarmed with Ty hadn’t made the position feel strange. “Don’t kill Cross.”
“No promises,” Ty muttered. He moved away and clicked off the light Zane had been using.
It made the room mostly dark, just the light spilling under the room door to see by, and Zane watched Ty’s silhouette for long minutes before closing his eyes. He’d just rest for a little bit.
He didn’t know how long he slept, but there was gray light coming through the curtains when a noise awakened him.
There was a bang and a rattle like plastic rolling across tile, and then Ty shouted: “Where is it?”
Zane was out of the bed and at the bathroom door, gun in hand, in three seconds flat, pulse racing.
Ty stood in the middle of the bathroom, glaring down at Julian and holding a roll of toilet paper in his hand. Julian sat in the bathtub, handcuffed to the safety rail on the shower enclosure. He was looking at Ty like he thought he had lost his mind. Zane narrowed his eyes as he sized up the scene. He glanced at the wall where the toilet paper should have been, then back at Ty’s hands, before turning a questioning look on Julian.
“Where is it?” Ty said again.
“I have no idea what you’re blathering on about,” Julian said, the epitome of calm. “Agent Garrett, I believe he needs more rest. Or perhaps it’s time for his medication,” he said, mimicking someone drinking.
“Shut up. Where’s what?” Zane asked as he studied Julian and the cuffs. They looked intact.
Ty whirled around to look at him. His entire body was tense. His eyes were a sparkling green, and they flashed angrily. Zane’s breath caught before he could help himself. His partner was stunning when he was like this. “The toilet paper holder,” Ty said in quick bursts of words. He turned back on Julian. “Hand it over or I’ll search for it myself.”
Zane glanced around again, and he caught sight of the two plastic halves of the holder on the floor behind the toilet and next to the sink. He looked back at Julian and had to repress a smile. The man was clever, and an excellent liar. Zane didn’t figure he would have thought of that himself. “You took the spring.”
“I
tried
to take the spring, but it didn’t have one,” Julian told him. He didn’t seem at all perturbed to have been caught.
Ty growled and reached into the tub to grab Julian’s neck and yank him to his feet.
Zane put his hand on Ty’s shoulder. “You can’t just strip him down.”
“Watch me,” Ty said, and he pushed Julian face-first against the shower wall, then stepped into the tub with him.
Julian cleared his throat as he tried to reposition his hands in a way that his wrists weren’t being torqued by the handcuffs, but he didn’t protest the rough treatment.
Zane was torn between the urge to laugh and the more professional need to pull Ty off their prisoner. He also wasn’t fond of watching Ty manhandle anyone like that unless it was him. He realized he was more tired than he’d thought if the sight of Ty searching a criminal had him jealous.
“Grady.”
Ty was already patting Julian down. Quite thoroughly. He glanced back at Zane and jerked his head. He continued the pat down, and Julian moved his head so he could glance over his shoulder at them. He didn’t show any emotion, merely looked at Ty.
“In most countries you’d have to pay for that.”
Zane stifled a sigh and took a step back. It wasn’t exactly kosher, what Ty was doing, but the assignment gave them unusual latitude to deal with such a dangerous asset. And maybe it would help Ty work off some of that extra energy. He turned in the doorway to glance out into the main room. Cameron was sitting up, turned toward the bathroom, peering Zane’s way with a worried look on his face.
Zane heard Ty whuff from within the bathroom, and by the time he looked back, Ty had shoved Julian’s face against the shower wall and was holding him there by the back of his head.
“Watch the elbows.”
“Watch your fingers,” Julian snapped.
“Welcome to TSA training, bitch.”
“Want the other set of cuffs?” Zane asked, hoping to appease his cranky partner. “You could spread his arms out.”
“Will someone please tell me the safe word?” Julian asked.
Zane snorted and leaned against the door, but he was watching Ty carefully. Something about Julian seemed to rub him wrong, and Ty’s short patience was nonexistent with this man.
A moment later Ty reached around and slid his fingers under his belt.
“Agent Garrett, I really must protest,” Julian said, though his voice was still calm.
Yeah, Zane wanted to protest too. Too much of Ty’s bare skin was too close to another man for Zane’s taste.
Julian started to speak again, but his words were choked off as Ty moved his hand further under his belt. Julian did react then, throwing his head to the side and beginning to fight as Ty pulled at the waistband of his pants.
“Ha!” Ty yanked something out of Julian’s pants and held it up. It was a long, thin piece of metal. It had once been a spiral, but it had been straightened out. Julian cursed. Ty put a hand in the center of his back and shoved him against the wall, holding him there as he stepped out of the shower.
“Bravo,” Zane said, shaking his head. He wasn’t sure whom he was congratulating, though.
Ty waved the straightened spring at him and then tossed it into the sink on the other side of the bathroom door.
“Clever bastard,” Julian muttered, sounding almost amused. “Do you have any idea how difficult that was?”
“Is this what the whole trip is going to be like?” Zane asked with a wave of his gun at the spring.
“I would wager so, yes,” Julian said with a nod. “Perhaps if you allowed me—”
“No,” Ty snapped. “Sit down, shut up, stop trying to escape.” He turned to Zane. “Where’s the kid?”
Zane nodded toward the open room.
“Go get him.”
That got Julian’s attention. He straightened, still standing in the bathtub, and he pulled at the handcuffs that looped around the safety bar. “No need to bring him into this.”
“You brought him into this,” Zane said. He took two steps out of the room and waved Cameron over.
“What’s going on?” Cameron asked as he climbed off the bed and moved to join Zane at the door.
Ty stepped to the side so Cameron could see Julian. They hadn’t let Cameron see him at all since locking him in the bathroom, and now Cameron’s brow creased as he took in the scene. Zane knew it was a disturbing image, Julian disheveled, standing in the bathtub cuffed to the shower rail, and Ty bare-chested and fuming.
“Julian? Are you okay?”
Julian smiled at him. “I’m fine, love. Agent Grady just needed a cuddle. And possibly a piece of my spleen.”
Ty held up the piece of metal and tapped it against the sink counter. Cameron looked from it to Julian and back. He didn’t look like he was making the connection.
“When we left you said the only way you’d come along without a fuss was with your boyfriend,” Ty said, but it wasn’t clear which one he was talking to since he was looking at the floor near his feet. “But since you’re making a fuss anyway, I don’t see why we have to hold up our end of the bargain.”
Julian raised his chin and his black eyes flashed, but he didn’t react otherwise. When Zane had first seen Julian’s reaction to Cameron in the apartment, he’d been sure Cameron would be the best way to control him. It was a combination of how the man softened when he looked at his lover but bristled, even the tiniest bit, when there was any threat toward him.
Cameron looked back and forth between them as if he was watching a tennis match. Zane had to admire how he seemed to be holding up under the stress. Many civilians would have fallen apart by now, especially in the face of Ty’s impressive rage. “Julian?” His voice was low and cautious.
Ty shook his head. “Don’t talk to him, talk to me,” he said to Cameron in a low, barely controlled voice that would have scared just about anyone. It almost scared Zane. It did the trick, because Cameron shrank away from him even as he looked at him. Ty pushed away from the sink and stepped toward Cameron, holding up the spring. “He tries one more time to escape, and I promise you, you’ll never see each other again.”
Cameron stared at him, eyes wide and chest heaving as he breathed hard.
“Now, go whisper about that some,” Ty said, voice downright cruel.
Cameron had gone white, and Zane caught a tremble in his hands before he gripped them into fists. But he nodded jerkily. “I’ll talk to him.”
“You do that,” Ty said, and he stepped out of the bathroom. He pulled Zane with him and closed the door behind them.
Zane turned and went along as Ty walked toward the window. If that wasn’t enough to calm Julian down, they’d have to tranquilize him.
They might have to tranquilize Ty too, if what Zane had just seen wasn’t an act of some sort.
Ty paced toward the window and then turned back to Zane, looking troubled and no longer even remotely angry. Zane was impressed by his lover’s ability to turn that on and off so quickly. He’d known Ty was a chameleon based on his performance as an Englishman on that cruise ship job they’d worked, but Zane had never seen Ty turn emotions on and off like that. “I feel like a monster, threatening that kid.”
Zane raised one brow, surprised. “Why?”
Ty looked at him oddly. “Because he hasn’t done anything wrong. Because he’s got stars in his eyes, and he can’t help it that he’s in love with that jackhole.”
“He chose to be here. He had to know what he was getting into. I can’t imagine living with Cross is good for anyone’s health.”
Ty shook his head and looked down at the mangled spring. He spun it around between his fingers. “This guy, man. If he’d been able to retie his shoelaces, I’d have never noticed,” he said in disgust as he tossed the wire into the trash.
Zane shook his head and set his gun on the dresser in front of the TV, in easy reach. “He used his toes to get to it?”
Ty nodded.
“Clever. Like someone else I know.”
Ty glared at him before the expression softened. “Please don’t compare me to the criminal.”
Zane watched him affectionately. “Sorry.”
“Hopefully, Cameron will keep him in line from now on.”
Glancing back at the bathroom door, Zane set his hands on his hips as he considered. “Maybe if we leave them together in there another few hours, we could get some more sleep.”
Ty nodded. “Sleep. We’ll leave them to it.” He grabbed up his shirt from the floor and pulled it over his head, then stepped over to Zane and kissed him. Zane took advantage of the chance, though, and slid his hands under the shirt before Ty even got it pulled all the way down.
“Did you enjoy patting down Cross?” Zane asked before nipping at Ty’s earlobe.
Ty grunted distractedly, not picking up on Zane’s teasing tone. “He got me a good one in the ribs. It’s like he has extra hands.”
Zane moved to slide his hands over Ty’s ribs. “You bested him, though,” he murmured, dragging his arm around Ty’s waist and pulling their bodies flush.
Ty pushed away and looked at him oddly again. He shook his head. “This isn’t a pissing contest, Zane. I just want to get rid of him as quick as we can. Guy makes me nervous.”
“Yeah, I can tell,” Zane said.
“You saying he doesn’t bother you?”
“No. I’d put you up against him any day.” He dropped his chin, rubbing his bearded cheek against Ty’s.
“Are you trying to start something out here?” Ty asked in a warm voice.
“I wish,” Zane muttered, splaying his hand flat along Ty’s shoulder blades and rubbing the warm skin.
Ty kissed his cheek and moved away. “Then cut it out. And shave that damn thing off in the morning, huh?”
Zane huffed, but he allowed Ty to push him away. He wanted to be close, but they couldn’t get distracted. Muttering under his breath, he walked over to the desk and his papers.
Ty went to the bathroom door and leaned against it, sliding to the floor with a soft groan. He was apparently intending to sit there the rest of the morning. After a roll of his eyes, Zane snatched up a pillow and flung it at him.
A moment later, he heard Ty’s soft “Thanks, Zane.”