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After dinner, X pulled me into a darkened corner, kissed me nearly senseless, and told me to head up to bed. Sometime during the night, he joined me, waking me with his mouth around my cock. I don’t know how long we stayed awake, but we were both desperate to touch and hold and clasp. I hoped like hell he wasn’t trying to say goodbye.
30
Xavier
The next morning, I got word from Remington that the major players were on the move. His intel said there were six men—Swain’s two remaining associates and four men who were hired muscle. They were flying to St. Croix and would have to approach the island by boat. Our hope was that they thought only Emilio and I were there.
Emilio had fucked with satellite images of the island, making sure no one saw anything other than peaceful water and no signs of movement. If that ruse worked, our enemies wouldn’t know my team had arrived, though God only knew what kind of a trail Lancelot had left.
Lance swore no one could track him, but I seriously doubted that was the case. No way was he a better tracker than my fellow Ranger, Oran, who could find someone with nothing to go on but a guess that his mark was in the area, but Lance was who I had to work with now, and I had to hope he had a fraction of Oran’s talent.
Not knowing exactly when the enemy would approach, we went over our plan one more time before I escorted Emilio to the safe room. I was thankful I had a good reason—he was needed to run surveillance and provide any last-minute intel we might need—to keep him there.
Emilio settled into making the last checks of our comm system and the cameras around the island. We wanted to be sure he had a good line of sight on all the likely places where someone could come ashore.
I stood behind him, watching him work, seeing how quickly he could solve any problem that arose. His skill and confidence turned me on like it always did, maybe more so. I was high on adrenaline, ready to fight, and if I couldn’t exert myself by fighting, there were always other options. I couldn’t help wondering if this was my last chance to be with him.
I wasn’t going to hold anything back in this attack. These men were working with Badger, the man who’d hurt Emilio, who’d made him suffer when all Emilio had wanted was a way to escape his abusive foster family. I wanted Badger and everyone he was working with eliminated. That shit ended now.
I needed to send a message to everyone Swain had ever worked with. New Orleans wasn’t his only other point of contact. I wanted them to know we would come for them. The best way for them to stay alive and keep making money was to get out of the trafficking business and never return.
Every time I’d gone into battle, I’d known I might not make it out. I’d known that if I didn’t, there would be people who would grieve, my sister, other members of my family, Sandra, members of my Ranger unit, my Vigilance team, but there had never been someone I loved the way I loved Emilio.
I might not be ready to say those words to him, but in that moment, knowing I was going up against men who would see killing me as a triumph and a way to increase their power, all I could think about was how I didn’t want to die before I had more time with Emilio. I didn’t want to leave him. I needed to touch him one more time.
“Stand up,” I ordered.
Emilio turned, concern on his face.
“Nothing’s wrong. Keep working. I just want you to do it standing.”
“Why?”
“Don’t question my orders, just obey them.”
He raised his brows, but a hint of a smile curled his lips, and he turned back to face the monitor. “Is this really the time?”
“Yes.”
He did as I asked, and I pushed his chair away more forcibly than I meant to. It rolled and slammed into the wall.
He turned, wide-eyed. “Keep working.”
He did, but he was tense, holding himself stiffly.
I moved up behind him, pressing my body against his, and he shivered. Needing to touch him, to make him feel utterly in my power, I brought my arms under his and pressed my hands flat against his chest, sliding them down across his abdomen to the waistband of his pants—a pair of black cargos Dalton had known to include since it was our standard mission wear.
When I popped the snap, Emilio jumped.
“Focus on what you’re doing. If you don’t, I won’t be able to reward you for being so good, so helpful, so talented.”
He shivered again as I pressed my lips to the side of his neck. I lowered his zipper and pushed his pants—and a delectable pair of silky purple briefs I would love to take more time with later—over his ass and down his thighs. When they dropped to pool at his ankles, I kicked his legs apart. “Spread for me.”
