Breaking Out

by Samantha Wayland

  A package he ached to unwrap.

  Though, that was also where it got tricky. Whatever was happening between Mati and Reese was new, and therefore, fragile. Their chemistry spoke of long friendship and, whether they had admitted it or not, affection. David had no interest in messing with that. He wasn’t able to offer them more than a fling. He wasn’t in a position to offer anyone more than a fling.

  “Why don’t you lie down. You look exhausted,” David said.

  “Flatterer,” Reese retorted, but he smiled and his eyes darted to the bed longingly.

  God’s truth, David was aching to climb into the bed himself. It looked like a pile of meringue with soft linens and fluffy pillows piled high.

  David took a step back to make sure he didn’t do anything crazy.

  “Go ahead, lie down,” David said again, staving off his desire to hurl himself face-first into the bedding. When Reese didn’t budge, David smirked. “You hoping Mati will drag you into bed herself?”

  Reese huffed, glowered at David, and climbed into the bed.

  David didn’t tuck him in, though he was tempted. He watched Reese settle far to one side.

  “Can I offer you an unsolicited opinion?”

  Reese laughed. “Now you’re asking?”

  David chuckled, too. He had a point.

  “Go ahead,” Reese said.

  “The signals seem clear to me.”

  Reese stopped fussing with the covers and looked at David, his face filled with hope and questions, none of which he had a chance to voice before the bathroom door popped open.

  Then Reese’s eyes nearly bugged out of his head.

  David looked over his shoulder and froze. Because, damn.

  As sleepwear went, Mati’s nightgown wasn’t what anyone would describe as titillating. No satin, no lace. Hell, barely any bare skin. But it was still sexy as hell. A column of dark blue cotton covered her from shoulders to calves and all the way down to her fingertips. It should have been plain, but the fabric was stretchy, clingy, and revealed every curve and dip in her luscious body. The scooped neckline highlighted her collarbones and long neck. The tight fabric emphasized her full breasts and tiny waist.

  David was transfixed by the swell of her hips. The curve of her thighs. Her waist was tiny, more noticeable because her breasts were full and round, straining the cotton tasked with containing them.

  She turned to drop her clothes into her suitcase and David’s breath caught in his lungs.

  A long braid swung down her back, the tip skimming the top of her magnificent backside. Curls tried to escape in every direction, but she’d woven them tightly enough to keep them under control for the span of a nap. David’s fingers twitched with the desire to wrap the long rope around his fist, to unwind it and see how long her hair would be if it hung loose down her back. He could offer to redo the braid for her, to make it neater and less likely to cause her a headache later when she had to brush the knots out, but he held back.

  When she turned toward the bed, Reese’s eyes snapped up to the ceiling. David smiled in sympathy. It was hard not to ogle, particularly as she got closer, stopping beside the bed and mere inches from David.

  Fortunately, Lucia Zapetti hadn’t raised a total pig, so having indulged in his one long look, David’s eyes remained fixed on Mati’s face.

  She glanced at the bed, then up at him. “I feel bad that we found you asleep on Chance’s couch, and now we’ve dragged you into all this. Are you tired?”

  “Exhausted,” David admitted.

  “Will you sleep if we do?”

  David glanced at the door he’d bolted and pictured the keycard-secured elevator. There wasn’t, as far as they knew, an imminent threat, and even if there were, they were reasonably secure. That, plus the safe in the closet where he could store his gun, meant he could relax when they were inside these four walls.

  “Yeah, I’ll probably rest.” The real question was how long would he be able to stay asleep.

  Mati hesitated, glancing between the bed and David.

  For one crazy moment, he thought she was going to invite him to sleep with them, but she climbed onto the mattress without saying anything else.

  David told himself he wasn’t disappointed.

  At least he got the pleasure of watching Reese’s totally-freaking-out-but-trying-to-hide-it face as Mati settled beside him.

  She took off her glasses, snuggled into the pillows, and rolled toward Reese. As soon as she stopped wriggling to get comfortable, her eyes slid shut.

  She was out cold within seconds.

  Reese rolled toward her and laid a hand over hers.

  He looked at David. “Have you ever wanted something so much, for such a long time, you can’t bring yourself to believe it’s something you can actually have?”

  David remembered when he’d finally been done with school, and the tests, and the interviews, and had been waiting to hear if he’d made the force.

  He smiled sadly. “Yeah, I have.”

  Reese was exhausted, but he lay in the bed watching Mati. It had been a long time since he’d slept with anyone so close, and for it to be Mati? In all the years he’d loved her, he’d never let himself imagine what it would be like to have this. To have her hand warm under his, to see her beautiful face trusting and soft with sleep.

  Then there was David. Reese might be clueless about people flirting with him, but David wasn’t subtle. Even crazier than the idea that someone as beautiful as David might want Reese, was how easy it was to flirt back. It was confounding. Not because there was anything wrong with it—but because Reese had gotten to the ripe-old-age of thirty-eight thinking his own sexuality was something he had a handle on.

  Apparently, he’d been wrong.

  Reese was achingly aware of David just a few feet away, stretching out on the couch without having bothered to pull out the bed. Reese closed his eyes and could picture him, his hawkish nose and devilish smile and thick, silky hair.

  When Reese opened his eyes again, images of David and Mati still winding through his brain, he knew at least a couple of hours had passed. The light outside the windows was bright enough that the dark glass couldn’t completely dampen the sun on the trees of the park.

  Reese lay in the middle of the bed, loosely arched around Mati, who was curled up facing him. He closed his eyes, absorbing the warmth trapped under the covers and between their bodies, the soft sounds of her breaths. A hint of her perfume was in the air and he inhaled deeply.

  A low noise halted his slow descent back into sleep. Reese peeled his eyes open again.

  Another noise. A grunt, as if someone were in pain.

  David.

  Reese sat up, trying not to disturb Mati as he propped himself against the headboard. Only the top of David’s head was visible over the arm of the couch, but it was enough to see he was twitching.

  Reese waited, hoping David would settle, but he kept moving. The next noise sounded as if it had been torn from his throat. Terror in a single note.

  Reese slipped from under the comforter and stood. There was enough light coming through the windows to see the distress on David’s face, and how his eyes were moving too quickly beneath his lids.

  Reese wasn’t sure what to do. He wanted to help, but he knew there was a rule about not waking someone from a nightmare.

  David’s entire body thrashed and went still, his head tipping back. His eyes were still closed, but now his lashes were spiked with moisture.

  Reese was beside the couch before reason could remind him it might not be a good idea, his hand on David’s shoulder before caution could take hold.

  One moment David was lying on the couch, the next he was on his feet, his hands clamped around Reese’s upper arms. It only took a second, not even long enough for Reese to be truly frightened, before recognition filled David’s eyes.

  He immediately crushed Reese to his chest.

  “Sorry,” David muttered into Reese’s hair, his big hand cupping the back of
Reese’s head, the other low on his back. “You startled me.” He was absolutely rigid except for the fine tremors in his hands.

  Reese wrapped his arms around David’s waist, absorbing his warmth and hopefully giving some back. “I’m sorry if waking you was the wrong thing to do.”

  David clutched him tighter, almost painfully so, then released him so quickly, Reese staggered to stay on his feet.

  “I’m sorry. Wow. That was…unprofessional,” David said, tugging his shirt down.

  Reese studied David curiously, because this seemed like a strange time to start worrying about that. “Which part?”

  “That,” David said, waving his hand at the couch. “I don’t usually sleep with my clients.”

  Reese arched a brow, his lips twitching.

  David laughed quietly. “You know that’s not what I mean—though for what it’s worth, I’ve never slept with a client. I just meant I usually go home to sleep and someone else takes over protection duty.”

  “If you need to go home—”

  “No.”

  Reese nodded, relieved. “Okay. Good.”

  Now it was David’s turn to look at him curiously. “You know Chance has plenty of qualified people who could step in for me if that’s ever what you want, right?”

  Reese felt a flutter of unease. He stepped forward, closing the gap David had put between them. “I know, but I don’t want them. They’re not you.”

  “Thanks,” David said quietly, running his hand down Reese’s arm.

  Reese traced his gaze over David’s neck and shoulders, dipping to take in his pecs straining his shirt. He could smell a hint of what was maybe cologne, or maybe David’s soap or shampoo. It was musky and light.

  Reese’s gut tightened, a curl of arousal warming him. He wanted to bury his face into the soft slope of muscle and skin where David’s neck met his powerful shoulder.

  Which was still strange, and new, but not alarming. The only cause for alarm was how his pajama pants weren’t going to hide a thing in about thirty seconds if he didn’t put a leash on his wandering eyes and imagination.

  “I’m not going anywhere,” David promised, his low voice making the hairs on the back of Reese’s neck stand on end.

  Reese took a deep, stuttering breath while David’s fingertips doodled a pattern onto the sensitive skin of his inner elbow. He wanted to lean in. To tip his chin that last inch and kiss David.

  “I’m glad it’s you,” Reese said. He wasn’t only speaking of the protection detail.

  David’s dark eyes, almost black in the low light, were captivating.

  Reese had the sudden, ridiculous urge to call Rupert and tell him everything. He wanted someone he trusted and loved to tell him he wasn’t crazy, and that he should take a chance and run with it, celebrate it, because even if change was scary, it was worth it.

  He blinked and looked at Mati, who hadn’t moved an inch. “I guess she’s a sound sleeper.”

  He liked knowing that. He wanted to learn more. About both of them.

  David smiled softly. “I guess so.”

  “I’ll wake her up in another hour so she can sleep tonight.” Then he added, more playfully, “I may need your protection when I do.”

  David ran a hand down Reese’s arm, one more brush of fingers and palm sending a corresponding wave of shivers up his spine.

  “I’ve got you.”

  Mati woke to someone saying her name and gently running a hand over her hair.

  Her eyes fluttered open and she found the vague shapes of Reese and David above her.

  “Good morning,” she said, her voice raspy.

  Reese smiled apologetically. “It’s actually one o’clock in the afternoon.”

  She groaned and sat up. Fuck, that hadn’t been nearly enough sleep. She put on her glasses and looked around the room, noting Reese’s laptop glowing on the table next to a pile of folders.

  “You’ve been working without me,” she accused.

  “God forbid,” Reese agreed, offering her his hand as she dragged herself out of bed.

  She felt a surge of satisfaction when Reese and David’s gazes slid over her.

  She crossed to her suitcase to retrieve a change of clothes while Reese made his way back to the table and his work. He slipped past David, pausing and smiling over his shoulder at David’s gentle, lingering touch to his lower back.

  Okay, that hadn’t been a sleep deprivation-induced fantasy, and she wasn’t imagining whatever was going on there.

  But what does it mean?

  Back in comfortable clothes with her hair corralled into a bun, she set up her laptop next to Reese’s and poked through his folders to see what he was working on.

  He slapped her hand away playfully. “Do your work.”

  She laughed, pulling her own stack of colorful folders out of her bag and hefting them onto the table.

  David blinked at the veritable rainbow spread before them.

  Reese grinned. “Are you amazed by the sheer quantity or the array of colors?”

  “Both.”

  “Let’s see if I can get this right,” Reese began, and Mati made sure he could see her rolling her eyes. He relished any opportunity to tease her about her penchant for what he called extreme organization. He made it sound like a kink or something. “Green folders are for personal matters, finances are red, legal is orange, and research is yellow. Each company gets a dark blue folder and each project a light blue folder, unless they have to be in a binder. But don’t worry! Those are also the correct shade of blue, and in them are color-coded sections following the previously noted system. Oh, as do any flags, stickies, paper clips, and sometimes even highlighter colors.”

  He looked at Mati. “Did I forget anything?”

  “It’s a miracle you still had a penny to your name before I came along,” she said with a sniff.

  “That is absolutely true,” he said so fucking earnestly she couldn’t help but smile at her keyboard.

  “Wow,” David said. He looked about as terrified as Reese had once been.

  “It works,” she muttered, easily pulling out the folder she needed.

  Reese selected a folder from his stack. “That it does,” he agreed.

  They worked side-by-side, as they often did, for a couple of hours. A few minutes in, David got up, made them swear they wouldn’t leave the room or answer the door for anyone, and promised to come back with food. Mati wasn’t sure what she was expecting, maybe a sandwich or some pizza, but he returned within fifteen minutes with huge bowls of pho.

  Mati and Reese set aside their work, and the three of them dug in.

  “Oh, god, this is amazing,” Reese said with a moan after his first bite.

  David smiled. “I’m glad you like it.”

  They chatted while they ate and exclaimed over every new combination of flavors. Reese threatened to lick his bowl when he was done.

  David laughed, plucked the container from Reese’s hands, and cleared the rest of the table.

  Reese stood. “You don’t have to do that. Here, let me—”

  David waved him back into his seat. “It’s fine. I don’t have much to do other than call Chance and check in. I’ll see if he’s learned anything.”

  Reese nodded and grabbed his phone, his face shifting through a series of emotions.

  “Everything okay?” Mati asked.

  David turned from where he’d been straightening up in the kitchen.

  “I have some texts from Hodges.” Mati hoped she imagined Reese was getting paler as his eyes scanned his phone. “He says the police have nothing on the actual break-in, but that he and our private investigators think someone was on the property for a while. Or made multiple visits.”

  Mati took a deep breath and let it out slowly, reminding herself she, and Reese, were perfectly safe in Boston. With David. “How can they tell?”

  “Footprints in the snow. Lots of them, apparently. All over the property, though they’re having a hard time tracking them b
ack to wherever they began because of the fresh snowfall.”

  David came back to the table and put his hand on Reese’s shoulder. “Is that all?”

  “No. It seems possible that the intruder has been poking into various sheds. There’s no sign they got past any locked doors, though. Until the other day, that is…”

  Mati took Reese’s hand.

  “And it’s possible,” Reese added, “that someone climbed a tree?”

  “What?” Mati asked.

  “The big pine behind the house. It seems someone may have climbed it, at least once.”

  Goosebumps rose on Mati’s arms as she imagined some creep trying to get a look into the windows of Reese’s house. She hoped the asshole enjoyed his view of a guest room no one had slept in for months.

  David rubbed Reese’s shoulder. “Anything else?”

  “No, that’s all Hodges sent.”

  Which was more than enough, as far as Mati was concerned.

  “I’m going to call Chance and make sure he knows all this,” David said, looking at them as if asking if they would be okay if he stepped five feet away.

  “He probably does.” Reese waved the phone in the air. “Hodges’ exact quote is, thank you for giving Chance my number. He obviously missed his calling as a proctologist.”

  David chuckled grimly. “I’ll make sure Chance knows that, too.”

  Chance, unfortunately, also had some fresh news.

  “It was definitely an electronic hack to the front door lock. They appear to have had a valid code. That’s all we know so far,” Chance announced over speakerphone.

  “Does Hodges know?” Reese asked.

  “He does. One of my guys just got off the phone with him.”

  “Good. Thank you,” he said.

  After that, the mood was less like an impromptu vacation and more like the exile it actually was. Mati and Reese got work done, but her attention span was shot and Reese didn’t seem to be much better. She decided the best use of her time was to focus on clearing their schedules as much as possible for the next week or two, even while she wondered if that was overkill, or not long enough.

  They ate room service that night, clearing away their laptops and folders and sitting at the table to talk. Mati and Reese told David about their work and how long Mati had been with Reese. He laughed at her stories about how Reese and Hodges confused bickering with affection. He told them about his sister, and his mom, and how he’d been with the Boston Police Department for almost a decade before he’d gone to work for Chance.