Page 26 of Mine to Keep
“No!” I scream, rising to my feet and running headlong towards him. But no matter how fast I run, I can’t reach him. I can’t reach Patience.
Hot air from the fire saws in and out of my lungs, but I can’t get any closer to her.
I can’t…I can’t?—
Joyner aims the gun at Patience and shoots, blowing a hole in her chest. I scream as heat sears my face, the fire making my skin feel tight.
The creak of my door opening startles me awake, the hairs on the back of my neck standing on end. I slide my hand undermy pillow, grabbing my gun and flicking the safety off in one smooth motion, aiming at the door.
nine
who am i?
Both Javierand Talon’s hands fly up in the air, their faces etched with fear. It takes a second or two to bring them into focus and remember that I’m sharing a hotel suite with two other people.
Sighing, I flick the safety back on and put the gun away, raising my hands to show they’re now empty. “Sorry. I’m not used to people being around.” Both men stare at me, eyes still wide and hands still in the air. “You can put your hands down now.”
They drop them.
Talon rubs his hands up and down his arms. “Sorry to scare you. Why do you have a gun? And how did you get it into the country?”
“Part of my security job,” I say, pulling the excuse out of thin air. Dammit, now I have to think of a backstory to align with my new fucking job.
“Were you in the military?” Javier asks.
“Something like that.” I scrub my hand down my face, rubbing at my tired eyes. When they don’t move, I slide down to the bottom of the bed to get farther away from my gun to make them more comfortable. “What’s up? Did y’all need something?”
They share a look, then Javier nods. Talon motions towards the bed and I gesture for them to have a seat, which they do. “We wanted to say thank you. For helping us out. We don’t know what we would have done.”
“It’s no problem,” I say around a yawn. “What time is it?”
“A little after nine at night,” Talon says. “Can I ask you something?’
“Shoot,” I say, then chuckle uncomfortably when their faces blanch. “Bad choice of words. Go ahead.”
“Why…why did you come to our room earlier?” He twists his hands in his lap in a nervous gesture.
A flush blooms over my skin as I think about what I saw. Javier on his knees, sucking Talon off. Talon’s blissed-out face as Javier made him fly from using his mouth on him. The way they both were so into it. Fuck, my cock throbs just thinking about it.
Pushing thoughts of what they shared from my mind, I say, “I talked to a friend and had them remove that video.”
“Video?” Javier asks, raising an eyebrow.
“Yeah. The one you showed me of Talon and his asshole boyfriend.”
Talon makes a noise in the back of his throat. “Ex.” Then he sits up straighter, eyes wide. “Wait. You got it removed? How? Wait, what?”
I shrug. “My friend knows computers and the web. She got it all taken down. Even if someone downloaded it to their device.”
Gasping, Talon jogs from the room and comes back with his phone and sits beside me. Shaky fingers fly across the keyboard, first searching his name on a search engine, then going to Cole’s social media page and looking for where he was tagged.
“It’s gone,” he says quietly, looking up at me and Javier with bright eyes. “Oh god, it’sgone!”
He launches himself at me, kissing me full on the lips. I gasp in shock, his pillow-soft lips pressed heavily against mine.
Talon pulls back just as quickly, his eyes still wide. “I’m sorry.”
As if it has a mind of its own, my hand drifts to my lip, still tingling from the brief contact. “It’s all good.”
