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I have a little metal peg on the wall that helps me get into my shirts since I almost never bother with my hook. The prosthetic ended up being more cumbersome than anything else, and I gave up trying with it, even after Phoenix designed a bunch of modifications on it.
After I slip my boots on, I twist my hair up—expert at doing it with one hand now—and then I meet Ari as he’s stepping out of his room. He holds up a burner phone in his hand, then jerks his head down the hall in the direction of Phoenix’s office.
We haven’t talked to Kane about this yet, but I know it’s better this way. He was entirely out of sorts the night before, and the last thing I want to do is let him know that someone slipped past our surveillance.
Ari knocks—a little rhythm that tells Phoenix who it is—then enters at the sound of his gruff voice. The lights are all off, the way they usually are when he hasn’t had visitors for a while, so Ari flips them on and walks right over to where Phoenix is sitting at his desk. I let myself indulge in staring since I don’t spend nearly enough time with him.
Phoenix is closed off and fucking gorgeous. He has an almost invisible scar on the right side of his lip that gives him a sneer whenever he speaks, and every time I see him, I want to bite it and lick it and get him gasping and writhing against me.
But now isn’t the time for that.
“What do you two want?” Phoenix demands.
Ari strolls over and kicks Phoenix’s chair back away from the desk, dropping into his lap to kiss him. Phoenix is the only person Ari’s really touchy with, but it’s entirely out of necessity. Long before I came, they’d developed their own language like Morse code tapped on Phoenix’s skin.
They kiss for a long moment, and then Ari pulls back and taps something out on Phoenix’s palm, who holds his other hand out, and Ari slaps the phone down on it. Phoenix shoves the man off his lap, then scoots his chair back to his desk, feeling around for one of his cables before he sticks it into the charging port.
“How long will it take to trace him?” I ask, leaning on the desk. Phoenix does have computer monitors, but unless one of us is using them, he never turns them on, so right now, they’re just black screens.
“It depends. You both know there’s not a lot I can get off a burner. I can probably trace it to CCTV footage, which should at least give us an ID on who bought it.”
We’ve gone on a lot less when it comes to tracking people, so it’s not really discouraging.
“Have you told Kane about this yet?” Phoenix asks.
Ari snorts and taps something out on his shoulder, likely telling him that Kane was in a fucking mood yesterday, so we weren’t telling him shit.
Usually he takes his bad mood out on people who deserve it, but sometimes he just can’t hold it in. And while there are plenty of times I love kneeling and crawling for the man, he’s not easily sated, and we don’t have time for any of us to be out of commission for long.
“Well, let him know I’m on it when you do. That should soften the blow,” Phoenix says.
I study his face to see if it seems like he’s in pain, but when it comes to shit like that, he’s difficult to read. He hides his feelings a little too well, and I know it’s out of self-preservation, but it makes guesswork a pain in the ass.
“Maybe. I’m not even sure he’s here right now,” I say.
Phoenix snorts a laugh and grins up at me. “He is. Unless you somehow grew a new arm so you can jerk me off and finger my ass at the same time.”
Ari huffs a silent laugh, grinning at me like he’s trying to bait me. It doesn’t work, but he should know that it wasn’t going to, considering I’m still sore from his cock earlier.
Phoenix begins to type for a long moment, and then he sits back and scratches his balls like he doesn’t have a care in the world. “So. What was she like?”
I say nothing, feeling oddly guilty. Yes, we were instructed to step in if Alice were ever in danger, but I know I pushed it last night. I cracked and grabbed her wallet for her because the promise of being that close—just for a second—was too tempting to pass up.
The rest had been an accident.
And giving her an order—and watching her obey—had been an indulgence.
“This is the first time you spoke to her, right?” Phoenix presses.
It was, but even Ari hadn’t asked me what she said. He only got a quick glimpse before he escorted her would-be attacker to the truck.
I lick my lips and glance over at Ari, who’s watching me with strange, intense eyes, and I know I’m now the only connection to the woman we’d been forced to obsess over for two years. “She was exactly the way I expected her to be. Nearly pissing her pants but ready to spit in my face for calling her darling.”
Phoenix laughs, and Ari rolls his eyes and lifts his hand. ‘Not surprised.’
I interpret aloud, then shrug. “Neither am I. She finally saw our faces, though, so I need to talk to Kane and see how he wants me to handle the rest.”
Ari taps on Phoenix’s shoulder, and he nods. “Yeah, I should have an ID by tomorrow. I’ll wrangle up an address, and you can send whatever’s left of the body back to them.”
