AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Stupid, stupid, stupid. I clenched my jaw, grinding my back teeth, and considered my options. I could tackle him, except yesterday proved I couldn’t take Alessio in a fight. My options were limited, but I wouldn’t make it easy for the bastard.
His lips twitched, like he knew what I was thinking. I straightened as he drew closer, my body tired but ready to take him on. My hands closed into fists.
Except he didn’t break stride. “Andiamo, principe,” he said as he passed me. Let’s go, prince. He didn’t even sound out of breath, the stronzo.
A wise man would probably go the other way. Keep hiding. Wait for the next attack.
But I was tired of hiding and waiting.
If we were running together, he couldn't take me by surprise. Better yet, an opportunity to kill him might present itself. A rock to the back of the head, maybe?
I made a split decision. Turning up the path, I started after him.
* * *
Alessio
When I heard him follow I slowed the tiniest bit. Giulio wasn’t in terrible shape, but he couldn’t keep up with me, not at my normal pace.
I hadn’t expected to find him out here. The hills were usually quiet this time of morning, with not a soul around. It was my favorite time of day, after the sun first peeked into the sky and I could be completely alone. No noise, no traffic. Just me and the ground.
“You are up early,” I said when he was close enough. I knew his routine. He normally rose around eight or eight-thirty.
“Let me guess? You are always up at this time.”
“It is the best part of the day, no?”
“Oh, sure. The rest of your day must be stressful, with all the stalking you need to squeeze in.”
He sounded so cranky that I nearly smiled. He was not a morning person, a fact I learned instantly when I started tracking him. Hard to visit nightclubs for anonymous blow jobs and rise early the next day.
We continued to run, neither of us speaking. I preferred the silence, though I was keenly aware of his presence, of his exhales and heavy steps. He was pretty, even with the dark circles under his eyes. His fashionable running outfit was impractical for this weather. But he was still gorgeous. Maybe more so, because he was flushed and sweaty, and it reminded me of sex.
Specifically of what Giulio would look like during sex.
I knew what he looked like when he came, when the hard edges and anger disappeared, leaving just sensation and bliss. Madre di dio, I still thought of his face mid-orgasm when I jerked off. Did he ever think of me on my knees, my mouth around his cock?
Idiota. Of course not. Giulio had been with plenty of men, so why would I stand out? I’d only been with a dozen or so men in my lifetime, and never openly. Each encounter hurried, frantic. Unsatisfying.
He wheezed beside me. I took pity on him and slowed to a stop, trying not to laugh as he collapsed onto a rock. “You need to breathe from your—”
“Fuck. Off,” he panted.
I held up my palms and stretched my muscles to keep them warm. This wasn’t yet halfway for me, and there was a long way to go. “You can turn back, if you like. No one is forcing you to stay.”
“How are you not even breathing hard?” He squinted up at me. “Are you human?”
The words nicked an old wound, one that has never quite healed. “He’s not normal,” my father used to shout in his drunken rambles. “What is wrong with that boy?”
I’d been a disappointment to him, a man who wished for a loud and boisterous son, someone more like himself. Instead, I was quiet and awkward, more inside my head than not. I could sit for long stretches of time and do nothing, which was what made me the best sniper in the world. But a terrible son.
“I am human,” I told Giulio. “Just in better shape than you.”
He mumbled a string of Italian curses and wiped his face with the sleeve of his shirt.
I was suddenly curious about his former life in Siderno. “Your father, he doesn’t force his men to stay in shape?”
“It’s not the military, Alessio.”
