Page 33 of Wanted
Still, they both needed to prove their worth if they were to stay here and wait for the whole thing with Vladdy to blow over, so he turned his attention to the car. A well-maintained Ford Mustang from the eighties, it was quite the stunner with a metallic purple body and pale leather upholstery. Nothing to sniff at, even though it wasn’t optimized for speed.
“So… what exactly is the problem?” he asked, flinching when the tail of Shane’s Pitbull, Cerberus, smacked the back of his leg. Damn, he hated being surprised like that. Especially by a dog that could either wag its tail at him or bite off half his calf.
Shane sighed and sat in a swing made out of a tire. He lit himself a cigarette. “I don’t know, you’re the expert. It’s making weird noises in the engine, like a raspy growl.”
Cerberus grabbed a discolored tennis ball from the ground and brought it to Shane, huffing with excitement. Shane might have been acting all relaxed as he threw the ball for his pet, but he kept watching Liv, and it didn’t feel like being checked out. Nope, Shane was assessing him. For his usefulness? As a potential threat? Fuck knew, but after Frank and Ezra, Shane was another person on whose good side Liv needed to be.
“This is a really good-looking car. And you said that it makes weird noises when it starts and during acceleration?” he asked, trying to act casual, despite having no doubt whatsoever that the big pittie wasn’t here just to play with its owner. He’d met enough insecure fucks with big dogs to know the animals could become a threat real fast. A very well trained dog could be the perfect addition to anyone’s life, but also a great weapon. Considering the kind of stuff that went on in the junkyard after dark, Liv wouldn’t be surprised if all of Shane’s dogs were trained to kill on command.
Well, other than Eros, a small and strange dog that looked like a Corgi-shaped Husky. That one was so excited to hump Liv’s leg when they’d arrived that Shane had to lock him in the house.
Liv had also seen several young Rottweilers playing in a fenced-off yard and he could imagine them going for the jugular at the snap of Shane’s fingers. The van outside the house advertised dog training services, so Liv figured it had to be Shane’s other job.
Shane reached for the ball when Cerberus fetched, and threw it again, watching the dog speed up before the piece of rubber even flew into the air. “Yeah. I heard it maybe once. It’s my partner’s car.”
Liv cleared his throat, eager for this thread of normalcy. “Oh? What’s his name?
“Ros. He made all the sculptures you’re seeing around us.”
Sculptures. A vintage purple car. Ros clearly had an artistic personality.
Liv left the engine alone for now and squatted to assess the chassis. “When will I get to meet him?”
Shane gave a dark laugh. “I’ll consider it when you’re housetrained.”
Liv rolled his eyes but didn’t let Shane see it, because he and Knox were playing the long game, so there was no point gettingworked up on day one. He took off his hoodie and stayed in a well-fitting T-shirt as he turned his back to Shane and opened the hood of the car. So maybe it was a weird thing to consider, but if looking hot could earn him some brownie points, he was ready to milk it.
“You’re not afraid he’s building them to one day take over the world?”
Shane chuckled, which was a sign that Liv managed to make a chip in his menacing wall of suspicion. “Nah, I’m more afraid one of the big ones falls on a dog, but I’m practical like that, so he can enjoy his fantasy world. Did you two leave any pets behind?”
Liv shook his head. “No. It’s just me and him. Nothing we had was important enough to risk going back. I’m happy our faces aren’t in every news outlet though. Maybe it’ll just quiet down with time.”
“What if it doesn’t? You in the market for new IDs?”
“Wow, you work at the junkyard, train dogs,andforge papers? That’s quite the portfolio for someone your age,” Liv said, going down the friendly compliment route. He needed this guy to like him if he was to stay out of prison and keep an eye on Knox in the long-term.
He had to move to the other side of the car to reach a different part of the engine, and he was pretty sure that when he faced Shane, the guy quickly looked away from his ass. Or Liv was just projecting. This whole gay thing was a minefield, and he was no minesweeper.
“I wish. But no, I just know a guy. He could even get you two a marriage certificate,” Shane said with a smirk as he exhaled smoke from a cigarette.
Liv chuckled, because that was ridiculous.
He and Knox worked so well together over the years, but while this new attraction put a new filter on every single interaction from the past, he was very far from contemplating things likemarriage. Not because they’d only just kissed for the first time—something Shane didn’t need to know—but also because, well, marriage had never been something on Liv’s radar. Not once in his life had he been with a girl who made him feel like pouring all his savings into a piece of jewelry to then drop to one knee and risk his future on another person’s whim. He was free as a bird and there was no one in this world he wanted at his side forever.
But just as those thoughts passed through his mind, seemingly as fleeting as a summer breeze, his own words came back to him with great force. A sentence he’d said so many times.
It’s just gonna be the two of us. Me and you. Knox and Liv.
He’d always meant that, just not… in quitethatway. But for Shane’s benefit, he chuckled. “Let’s not get ahead of ourselves.”
Shane cocked his head and passed Liv a wrench. “Not that sure of him?”
Cerberus joined Liv at the front of the car, wagging his tail and putting his front paws on the bumper, but his cute face could not ease the annoyance in Liv’s heart. Because who was Shane to judge someone else’s relationship? Especially someone whose rings looked more like knuckle dusters than a wedding band.
“I am. This is the person I’ll be swapping illness tidbits with when we’re both old and gray, and who will help me get out of bed when my back gives out. But what’s a marriage certificate if you can’t have the whole shebang, with a party and the best clothes I can afford? Besides, I haven’t proposed yet.”
There. Maybe that could gain Liv even more gay-sympathy.
