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“What the fuck?” Soren snapped.
“No! No, baby!” Alexei cooed at his boyfriend. “He’s not my type at all. The prince is just generic hot.”
West rolled his eyes. There was nothing generic hot about Jin Long Wei. The man was walking perfection in every way. From his elegant hair, hypnotic dark eyes, and lithe body to his sweet smile, kind nature, and giving heart. Even this mess he was in now was created because he didn’t want his people to suffer.
Soren huffed and West prayed they could move on.
“All the same, we need to go help West. Pack your bag! We’re going to Gaoxing!” Alexei continued, now that it sounded as if he’d climbed out of the hole he’d dug with Soren.
“No. Wait. I think I can still manage this.” West drew in a breath and held it for a couple of seconds. This situation had him torn. He would feel better having the entire team in Gaoxing to help watch over Jin—not that he knew how they’d manage that if Jin was determined to keep this all a secret. But he liked the idea of keeping Jin to himself. “Besides, everyone is scattered around the globe. They’re getting the vacation time we’ve been trying to snag for months now.”
Soren made a dismissive noise. “How long have you been there? A week? That’s plenty of vacation time for everyone. How much time do people need to vacay? Plus, we both know Kairo is so ready to escape his mother’s clutches. He’ll jump at this.”
That was true.
“But Max and Ed. Max is still recovering from being tortured, and Ed has neglected that gunshot wound. They both need rest,” West argued.
“Eh. Yeah,” Soren conceded. “They can stay back and rest.”
“Will and Charlie have six years to catch up on. They need this time alone.”
Alexei snorted. “If what Ed and Kairo told me about those six years is true, Charlie doesn’t want Will to get full details on those years.”
Yes, Charlie’s lost slut years.
It was better if Will didn’t know the intimate details, though Charlie probably didn’t remember most of them himself.
“All of this is moot if you can get the prince to cancel the contract,” Marilyn broke in, her tone making it clear that she thought they were all morons.
“True. There’s no point in killing the crown prince if you won’t get paid,” Justin agreed.
“The only problem is getting him to cancel the contract,” West muttered. “Is there any way you can hack the system? Cancel the contract without him doing it?”
“No,” Marilyn answered the second he stopped speaking. “The system protects against such things.”
“I could dig into it. Give it a try,” Justin offered.
“And you risk someone discovering it, making yourself a target,” Marilyn countered.
“Don’t,” West said sharply. The last thing he wanted was to put more people in danger. He was the one who’d chosen to jump into this mess. There was no way he was dragging more people into danger. He could handle this on his own. “I’m meeting with Jin later. I think I can convince him to cancel the contract. Then we’ll focus on coming up with another solution for his financial problem. Just keep me apprised of any chatter or if any other assassins express interest in this contract.”
“Got it!” Justin agreed.
“We have your back if you need anything, Westin,” Gabriel murmured. “We are more than happy to fly out to Gaoxing.”
“Thank you.” West’s grip on the steering wheel relaxed for the first time, and he slouched in the seat. There were plenty of jobs he did on his own, but this one was already out of hand. Yes, there was something about it that made him want to keep the others out, a possessiveness of Jin that he refused to look too closely at, but he could breathe easier knowing he wasn’t alone.
“All right, all you people off the line. I want to talk to West alone,” Soren shouted.
“Fine,” Marilyn muttered and ended her call.
Alexei and Justin were talking, but they were muffled, as if Soren had taken the phone off speaker and was walking away from them. A door opened and closed before Soren came onto the line.
“Hey, West. It’s just me now,” Soren said. “I left the crazy pod of assassins in the house. Shoot straight with me, are you good?”
A slow smile spread across West’s lips, and a warmth radiated through his chest at the concern in Soren’s voice. They had never been close. Soren was loud, arrogant, and wild. All things that made him the opposite of West and difficult to work with, but that didn’t mean he didn’t care for the man. He respected the hell out of Soren. It had taken a lot of guts to strike out on his own after the fallout from the CIA debacle.
“I’m good.”
“West? No offense, bud, but you looked like dog shit in Egypt. You needed something low-key when you left town, and this ain’t it,” Soren countered.
