Now I’ve upgraded to a shower. One tall enough where I don’t need to hunch.
Eyes snapped shut, I fixate on the feeling that I crave. Nerves lit, muscles contracted in searing bands—I quicken my pace. Back-and-forth friction of my hand against my throbbing cock heats up every inch of my body.
Come.
Come, already.
An aroused grunt rakes my throat, straining my neck. Jaw aching as I grit my teeth down.
My mind is blank. Just in the present. Until an image pops up in my head. In strong waves, I’m thrusting my erection between her trembling thighs.
She’s clung to me on a mattress. Her legs trying to find support while I feed into her pleasure. I rock deeper inside her soaked warmth that tightens around my cock. And I watch orgasm after orgasm ripple through her body.
I see her clearly.
Brown wavy hair, frizzed pieces caressing freckled cheeks.
Long lashes that shade glimmering, overcome blue eyes.
“Thatcher ,” she gasps.
Fuck.
Instantly, my eyes break open and I freeze. My hand is immobile on my rock-hard dick, veins pulsing with one desire.
“Get it the fuck together,” I growl under my breath and slam the side of my fist at the tiled wall.
Come on. Don’t go there.
Un-fucking-professional doesn’t even come close to what this is. Every time I jack off, I picture my client. And I don’t have thirty minutes to fuck around. I need a quick release, and if I keep blue-balling myself when I’m on the edge, I’m going to leave myself pent-up and agitated all day.
I have to just ride whatever comes to mind. I’ll do some deadlifts later. Say a few Hail Marys. Try not to feel like shit.
But right now, I go with the moment.
Deeper breath, I kick-start the friction of my hand to cock.
And I try again.
I’m back thrusting.
Into her.
She gasps like she’s melting inside hot euphoria. High-pitched, pleasured noises jolt out of her parted lips. “Thatcher, Thatcher! ” Sweat beads around her perked nipples.
Tears squeeze out of her eyes.
Jane.
I give Jane the sex she deserves. Her orgasm arches her body up into my chest. Practically levitating her off the bed. I hold Jane in a protective grip against my build while her toes curl. I stroke the soft flesh of her inner-thigh. Down to her swelling clit.
Her eyes roll.
I kiss the tender nape of her neck.
Her head lolls back.
I fill her pussy.
I thrust.
And thrust.
And feed this unkempt hunger that I’ve left for dead in reality. Watching and feeling Jane come and come and come and pulse around my hardened need.
In the shower, I hit that peak and jerk forward in a powerful release. Cum washes down the drain. I draw out the climax with a few more strokes, and then a knock bangs the bathroom door.
“Thatcher!” Banks calls.
Christ.
I clean off quickly and crank off the water. It should be around oh-nine-thirty. I’ve been up since dawn, but the famous ones are probably waking up now. Once they leave their townhouse, we automatically go on-duty.
My brother could need to use the bathroom. Or he could be telling me he’s about to head out. Or that I need to go. My radio is on the ledge of the sink.
I step out of the shower, the cramped bathroom only big enough for a toilet, sink, and shower stall.
Banks raps the door more aggressively. “Thatcher!”
Concern kicks my ass into gear. Forgoing the towel, which fell behind the toilet, I trek across the bathroom in a few forceful steps. Wet footprints track the floor.
Buck-ass naked, I open the door, and I instantly sidestep.
Banks barrels into the bathroom.
I shut the door behind us, and my brother aims straight for the toilet. Dropping a knee, he grips the sides of the basin.
He’s nauseous.
He waits and takes a few controlled breaths.
My brows knit together. “Second one in two weeks.” He hasn’t had a migraine all summer, and now it’s a cluster-fucking short timespan.
Banks spits roughly in the toilet. “I must just be lucky like that.” He takes another measured breath.
My wet hair is dripping on my squared shoulders. Beads skidding down the ridges of my muscles, and more water pools at my feet.
I go grab my towel from behind the toilet.
About the same time, my brother eases backwards. “False alarm.” He lets out a heavier breath and slumps against the shower stall. Already dressed for work in a white button-down and black slacks with a radio attached.
His slacks soak in fucking puddles that I tracked, but he’s too spent to give a shit. “I’m supposed to be Oscar Mike in an hour.”
I dry my hair with the towel. “Take today off.”
He rubs his temple and shuts one eye. “I’m the man who fills-in for the men who take off.”
Yeah.
Every time Farrow has to take a med call, he needs a bodyguard to fill his spot protecting Maximoff, and Banks volunteered to be that bodyguard.
Which inadvertently made him a full-time floater on the team. Whenever a 24/7 guard has a family or health emergency, Banks takes over their spot. It’s not a demotion. It’s the hardest job in security. Every day he gets pulled in a dozen different directions.
He says he likes the spontaneity of the position.
But Banks took this role for me.
He said I was gasoline in a bottle. I made a massive mistake when I hit Farrow, and I couldn’t get out of my head. My brother wanted to be under the same roof as me again. Just so I wouldn’t light myself on fire with rage and fucking regret.
“You can still take off, Banks.” I dry water off my chest.
There’d be some reshuffling among the men, but we’d work it out.
Banks rests the back of his head on the shower door. “That means slamming the team with a headache which pretty much matches my headache. I’m not doin’ it.”
I give him a hard look and tie my towel around my waist. “How the fuck do you plan to go on-duty if you can’t even keep both eyes open?”
“Easy. I plan to have both eyes open and alert by then.” He tucks his hair behind his left ear, then right ear and motions to me. “I could use all you’ve got.”
He’s not asking for drugs.
Instinctively, I touch two horn pendants that lie against my sternum, and I feel along my deltoid and unclip the thin gold chain around my neck. Most of the time, I forget that I’m wearing a cornic’. Because I rarely take it off.
“Where are you needed?” I ask since he’s leaving in an hour and he didn’t say who he’s filling in for.
“I’m headed to New York. Tom needs a bodyguard until tonight because…” He lifts a shoulder. “I don’t know what’s up with Ian.” Tom Cobalt’s bodyguard. “I don’t ask. I just go.”
I near him.
He holds out his hand, and I drop the necklace in his palm. He used to have a cornic’. Until he lost it in the Middle East.
But there are two pendants on my chain. “I can get you a new chain and give you the other horn—”
“No.” Banks shoots me a glare like I’m out of my fucking mind. “His cornic’ stays on your chain.”
We don’t mention him a lot—but when he gets brought up, my chest tightens.
I just nod, and I watch my brother clasp the necklace around his neck.
He wants me to do the maliocch’ too. It helped last time I did it. But I’ll need to get oil from the kitchen first.
Before I go, I grab my radio off the sink. “Whose detail did you cover yesterday?”
“Audrey, then Kinney, then back to Audrey.”
That’s a lot. “Three transitions in one day.”
He touches the horns at his sternum. “Semper Gumby, man.”
I almost smile. It means
always flexible. Something from the Marines. It’s my brother to a fucking tee. Missions get fragged, and you’ve got to be ready for new orders. New direction.
Always flexible.
“Oorah,” I say lightly.
But I solidify. More rigid. Remembering something that I meant to tell my brother. But with the Cinderella ad at the fucking forefront—it just sat in the back of my head.
Until now.
“What is it?” Banks asks, studying my posture.
I unwrap the cord around the radio. “I told Jane that we served in the Corps.”
Banks laughs hard. “No you didn’t.”
I look him right in the eyes. Unflinching. “I did.”
His mouth downturns in thought. Not in anger.
Bottom line, Banks and I have been prepared for the whole truth to come out. Not just within the security team or the famous ones.
But the whole world.
Back in February, Security Force Omega gained some fame through a viral Hot Santa video, and we expected the press and public to find out about us being Marines.
Really, all it takes is an online search. But you have to know what you’re looking for.
What ended up happening: no media or fans cared that much about SFO to dig that deep. The most Banks and I get are autographs while we’re on-duty and the occasional paparazzi question about our height and being twins.
We’d built ourselves up for that impact, packed on our Kevlar and waited for the firefight, and it never even hit. I should’ve been relieved, but I think we both landed somewhere between frustration and discontent.
Banks stares back at me. “Did she ask why we keep it a secret?”
“Yeah.” I nod. “I told her the truth: the security team would ask us why we didn’t choose the Navy, and we didn’t want to get into it.”
We didn’t want to unload our pasts on the team and deal with it again, and the real answer to that question surfaces a lot of shit.
Easiest solution was to keep our military service a secret. We never hid who we are. We use military jargon all the time, but no one questions us. They just conclude that our knowledge comes from our dad. Because we were raised by a SEAL.
Which is also true.
Just not the full story.
He rubs his eyes. “So you told her that we served, but you didn’t tell her why . Did you tell her we’re combat vets?”
“No.”
“Did you tell her you were a squad leader?”
“No.”
Banks scratches the scruff on his jaw. “What you’re telling me then is you’ve given her a millimeter, and you made an oath with Jane to be more transparent.” He lifts his shoulders in a tight shrug. “Just go the full hundred yards, Thatcher.”
I want to tell her everything. Banks sees that I want to.
But I compartmentalize a lot, and ripping open taped boxes isn’t natural for me. I turn on my radio. “I’ll think on it.”
He massages his forehead. Above his right eye. Breathing harder through his nose.
“You still want me to do the maliocch’?” I make sure before I go grab oil and matches.
He nods stiffly. “Please.”
8
THATCHER MORETTI
Radio in hand, I exit the bathroom on the second-floor landing.
Left and right bedrooms belong to me and Quinn Oliveira: currently the youngest guy on the team. He’s done a good job his first year on-duty.
Sometimes he can get too worked up. Especially when the girls get antagonized—but hearing a bunch of assholes rail on Jane and not being able to snap back has even been hard for me.
Floorboards creak as I head downstairs; wooden staircase is so narrow I feel like I need to turn sideways to fit. Brick walls squeezing me in on either side.
I’m not complaining.
The three-bedroom, one-bath townhouse may barely be 900 square feet, but it has a washer-dryer, working plumbing, no leaky ceilings or musty odors. Compared to where I grew up, it’s the fucking Ritz.
I reach the bottom stair in the snug living room: a brick fireplace, bare mantel, a leather couch, and a high-top table with some stools. No space for much else. Guys keep it pretty clean, especially since SFO holds some meetings here.
I hear the sound of squeaking floorboards coming from the cramped kitchen. Quinn is probably awake getting chow.
I walk through the archway, mentally listing out what I need: oil, a matchbook, small bowl, a shot glass—unholy fucking shit.
I halt to a dead stop, towel hung low on my waist.
Jane is in my kitchen.
As in Jane Eleanor Cobalt, as in my client, as in the girl I just fantasized fucking not even thirty minutes ago.
I’m going to hell.
She’s immobile, her eyes widening on me. She rarely comes into security’s townhouse; it’s more likely I’d be in hers.
“I, um…” She struggles for words. Fridge is open, a half-gallon of milk in her hand. “I was just…” Intrigue drops her gaze to my unshaved chest and carved muscles, the ridges of my eight-pack, and she mutters a breathy, “Oh my God.”
This isn’t fucking good.
I’m trying not to run my eyes over any part of her body. I’m trying not to place a single adjective against her name. She’s just Jane.
Just my client. Unique in every wa—unfuck this before you fuck it.
“Jane.” My strict voice tenses the air more. It’s my normal tone. “How are you doing?”
“I’m…” She shakes cobwebs out of her head. “I’ve been well, just next door—which you already know…because you’re off-duty.” She stares unblinkingly at me, cheeks beet-red.
I keep holding her gaze, the temperature cranking up. Fuck.
Being off-duty shifts our dynamic into gray territory.
I’m twenty-eight. Not in a co-ed dorm, but this awkward, tension-filled run-in feels made for college. And I need to keep this professional.
I’m in a fucking towel.
Yeah, I’ve also been in a jockstrap in front of her before, but that was different. That was on the tour bus with SFO. Boundaries weren’t this personal. This is just me and her. In a small as fuck kitchen.
I open my mouth to speak, but Jane beats me to it.
“If I would’ve known you were here like this…I wouldn’t have…” She’s tongue-tied. “I’m so, so sorry.”
I step forward.
She startles herself at my movement, and milk slips out of her grasp.
The plastic jug crashes at her feet, and milk spills all over the floorboards, the cap coming loose.
“Merde,” she curses.
We both move into action.
Jane searches drawers for a mapeen , and I set my radio on a counter. Holding the knot of my towel—because I’m not about to flash my client—I crouch and pick up the gallon with my other hand.
She glances quickly towards the spill, then away. “Do you…have, um…?” She shakes her head again and looks back at me.
I catch her gaze.
And we’re caging breath like the air is toxic. Laced with pheromones that try to lure her and me together. To never come up for oxygen again.
With flexed muscles, I point at the cupboard below the sink. “A mapeen is in there.”
She clears her throat. “Right.” Fixing cat-eye sunglasses on her wavy hair, she squats to the cupboard with curiosity twinkling her gaze. “What exactly is a mapeen?”
Now I’m shaking the fucking cobwebs out of my head. “A…” What’s a mapeen in English called? It’s not hitting me fast. I take another beat. “…dish…towel, dish rag.”
Her lips lift. “It’s Italian?” She seems genuinely excited to learn this.
I screw on the cap to the half-gallon. “The only kind I know.” I watch Jane open the cupboard.
Tell her more.
I stand up and add, “You can’t learn it in college. Can’t really write it, can’t read it. It’s just how we’re raised to talk.” I explain ho
w I didn’t even know mapeen wasn’t English until the eighth grade.
“Is it more like a dialect?” She pushes past dish soap to find a blue mapeen.
I place the half-gallon on the counter. “Like a broken dialect, mixed with incomplete Italian, and then passed on from Italian immigrants to their children and then their children. It’s a clusterfuck of a language, but it’s our clusterfuck.”
Jane returns to the spill. Smiling bright. “That’s beautiful.” Sincerity floods her voice and those words. Speaking with so much heart—there’s never any question how much she means what she says.
I rake my hand through my damp hair, and then I reach out to take the mapeen from Jane.
“I have this covered. It’s my mess to clean.” She rolls up the purple frilly sleeves of her 50s-style blouse. “We’re out of milk next door. But I already gathered all my cats for a treat and I felt like I played a horrible trick on them with empty bowls. So I thought I’d borrow a cup here.”
“You can take the rest. There’s still some left.”
Jane squats down in a mint-green tutu, leopard-print leggings underneath, and she mops up the spill. “That’s really sweet of you, but I meant to only take a little and now I’ve left SFO with none—” Her cat-eye sunglasses suddenly fall off her head. Splashing in milk.
I crouch down and pick up her sunglasses.
Our eyes meet for a hot beat before I stand and move to the sink. Washing them off for her under the faucet.
She stares at me, entranced. Like my silent authority is a slow-burning fuck.
My blood heats, muscles on fucking fire.
Cut the tension, Thatcher.
Don’t cut a thing.
My brain is splitting in two directions, and it’s killing me. I hate indecision.
“Take it.” I nod to the half-gallon. “I can get more later.” It’s either going to her six cats or a cereal bowl, and her cats are more important than one of the guys eating Frosted Flakes.
She smiles softly up at me. “Merci.” While I dry her sunglasses on the bath towel I’m wearing, she rises to her feet.
I hold the glasses out to Jane.
Our fingers brush as she reclaims them, and breath knots in my chest. I take the milk-soaked mapeen from her hand, washing and wringing it out in the sink. Constantly glancing back at Jane.
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