by Lissa Kasey
“It’s between Ollie and me.”
“Not anymore it’s not,” I told him.
“So you’re one of those overprotective boyfriends who dictates who he can and can’t talk to?”
“Only when the person calling is the asshole ex-boyfriend who cheated on him and got it plastered across every gossip rag in the world.” And broke Ollie’s heart and insulted him at every turn, permanently damaging his self-confidence. I left all that unsaid. I knew Ollie wouldn’t want Jacob to know how badly he’d hurt him.
“It wasn’t cheating. We had an open relationship,” Jacob said.
“Did Ollie know that?”
Jacob made a rude noise. “Of course. It’s how men like us live.”
Men like us? What the hell did that mean? I turned on the coffee pot figuring I might as well start my day. “What do you want, Jacob?” I wasn’t going to argue. If he’d really known Ollie at all, he’d have known Ollie was a one-man guy. He threw himself into a relationship like he threw himself into everything in life, feetfirst, flailing, and all in until he was practically drowning, consequences be damned. And while that attitude wasn’t always practical, it was endearing, honest, and in Ollie it worked well. Holding him back was sometimes a problem, but I didn’t have to do it that often. More often I just jumped with him.
“I want Ollie.”
There were so many things I could say to that, but I took the first meaning, intentionally ignoring possible other connotations. “He’s sleeping. It’s quarter after five in the fucking morning.”
“Will you have him call me when he wakes?”
“No. I will, however, tell him you called.” Not like I could delete the info from his phone without him knowing something was up. And that was sort of an asshole boyfriend thing to do even if I really wanted to do it.
Jacob was silent for a minute. The coffee pot gurgled up its final drops, and I pulled out a cup to pour my first taste for the day. Ollie drank tea. I had bought him a special tea brewer that sat right next to the coffee maker. He’d even made me a cup or two that wasn’t horrible. But I tended to enjoy the fruitier, noncaffeinated blends when it came to tea, while he liked chai, green, or Earl Grey, and it was just too early for anything other than coffee.
Finally he said, “What if it’s work related?”
I frowned into the phone. “Model or Haven Investigations? You should know I do most of the work at Haven now. Ollie only does the tech stuff. And somehow I don’t think his fashion designs would work with your current image. He doesn’t do leather.” Or anything overly masculine. Ollie had a bit of a texture fetish. He wore lace and things with weird layers of fabric crafted into flowers because it wasn’t flat. I had to admit pretty much everything he wore felt amazing when I touched him, so he was doing something right. I also knew almost nothing about fashion. He could rattle on for hours about a cut or design, and I’d just nod my head.
Again the silence. What was with Jacob?
“So he won’t be involved at all if I hired you guys?”
“Hired us for what?” I didn’t think there was anything HI could offer Jacob that he couldn’t buy from someplace bigger, more prestigious, exclusive, and more expensive.
Again he said nothing. Was he always so closemouthed? Ollie’s description of him hadn’t led me to believe that was true. I had sort of gotten the impression that Jacob liked to talk about Jacob. But I’d also spent the past few months bodyguarding a couple dozen celebrities who came my way thanks to Ollie’s reputation. They all really seemed to like talking about themselves. So maybe it was just a fame thing that Ollie had never quite picked up on. Most of them never really needed a guard. It was just for show in front of the cameras. Something about keeping relevant, Ollie told me. I didn’t care. It was easy money, which made up for the harder jobs of cheaters and stalking insurance fraud that involved a lot of sneaking around. Those cases never ended well. At least Ollie wasn’t doing them anymore unless I dragged him out to entertain me during a stakeout.
“Why don’t you call the office in a few hours and set up an appointment,” I told Jacob.
“Will Ollie be there?”
I wanted to snarl at him, but kept my head. The Marines had taught me a few things after all. “It depends on the case. Tomas will ask you a handful of questions to determine who you’ll be meeting with.” Though regardless of the answers, the meetings were almost always with me. The only exception was when Ollie had a new background check client coming in to ask questions and discuss contracts. That side of the business was a steady stream of income. Sure, there were cheaper services to be found online. Services that weren’t as thorough, lacked a guarantee, and didn’t have the personalized service Ollie offered. Ollie’s reputation for integrity created and grew that business. Once the contract was established, Tomas actually did a lot of the work. He’d let Ollie’s scripts run all day and created professional letters detailing the information each client wanted. It freed Ollie up to work on his designing and modeling.
Jacob sighed. “You can’t just have him meet with me?”
“Give me a good reason, Jacob.”
“Wanting to see him isn’t good enough?”
“Not by a long shot. We’re exclusive. Ollie and me. There is no open relationship going on between us. We live together. We sleep in the same bed. Do I need to be clearer?”
“I saw pictures of you together at the New Year’s Ball in LA.”
I frowned. Okay. What did that have to do with anything? Ollie had designed dresses for two very up-and-coming actresses. We’d both attended. I’d never had so many people wanting my photograph, but we’d been back page news. More of a best dressed review than any scandalous articles about Ollie and me dating. “So?”
“Why you?” he asked quietly.
Again a comment that could have so many meanings. “How do you want me to take that, Jacob? Think hard, Jacob. A wrong answer is not going to get you any closer to Ollie.”
“I’ll call the office later,” he finally said and hung up without a good-bye. I glanced through the phone to see that he’d called a half-dozen times in the past twelve hours. All of them marked as missed calls. In fact, there was one just before 3:00 a.m., which had likely been what woke me.
Arms wrapped around me from behind, and Ollie rested his chin on my shoulder. He was warm and nude against my back. But I hadn’t dressed either. “You should be sleeping,” I told him, turning my head to kiss the side of his face.
“You weren’t in bed,” he protested.
It was too late for me to go back to bed. Not if I wanted to eat and get to my tat appointment on time. “I gotta jump in the shower. Going to finish up my tat today.” I put my coffee cup down and turned so I could better hold him, and kiss him. He sighed against my lips.
“You taste like coffee,” he grumbled.
“Better than come,” I told him.
A smile touched his lips—probably because he was remembering how many times I’d swallowed him down last night. “I’ll shower with you.”
“Only if we use the new bathroom. Yours is not big enough for hanky-panky.” I’d finished renovation on the second-floor bath. The shower area was huge and mostly open, surrounded by natural stones and many showerheads. There was also a Jacuzzi tub, double sink, and a private commode area. It was about four times the size of the bathroom in Ollie’s room and twice as big as the one attached to my room. The big bathroom was attached to the largest bedroom in the house, but had a separate entrance from the hall. The bedroom was meant to have a sitting room as well, but it’d been closed off since the day Ollie moved in, filled with his brother’s things. Eventually I’d finish renovating that room and move in so I could work on the bedroom and bathroom I currently used. But I needed Ollie to be okay with me using the space first since originally it was going to be Nathan’s.
We still had our separate spaces, though rarely slept apart. Many of my things had migrated to Ollie’s space upstairs, but it was casual, uninten
tional, and nonintrusive. I didn’t want to push him. He wasn’t as fragile as Will and Britney thought he was, but he did need his space. On the rare occasion I went to bed in my room, I often woke with him curled up beside me. Sometimes he just needed to be alone in his head. I got that. He knew to come find me the second he was ready for company.
He snickered. “Hanky-panky. You talk so weird sometimes.”
“I’m old,” I told him, accepting another kiss. Thirty-four to his twenty-three.
“Hmm. Not old.” His right hand caressed my thigh and his left trailed over the scruff on my face. Again with the texture fetish. Loved to touch, and could spend hours running his hands over my skin, scars and all. They weren’t imperfections to him. They were just part of me, and I belonged to him.
I growled and nipped his lower lip. “We should continue this upstairs,” I said.
“You only say that ’cause last time we had sex in the kitchen you slipped on jizz and nearly cracked your head open on the counter.” His grin was huge. “I laughed so hard I thought I was gonna pee.”
I had twisted the shit out of my hip too. But Ollie’s laughter had been infectious that day. We’d ended up on the kitchen floor to finish what we started, which left my back and leg in competition as to which hurt more when we were finished. Afterglow only lasted so long.
“Yep. You’ve discovered my devious plan.” I let him lead me upstairs to feast on him before breakfast. The day was looking up.
Chapter Two
OLLIE STALKED the area around the chair like a caged tiger. Watching him pace actually made the constant burning buzz of the needle over my flesh a little more bearable. We’d been at it over two hours. Ollie had gone to the tea shop three doors down and returned with something warm for each of us. His, the spicy chai he loved, and mine, something fruity that warmed me from the inside out. This was the first time he’d come with me to the tattoo parlor. He’d spent a lot of time looking through pictures and cases of piercing jewelry. There had been a jeweled belly button ring that matched his green eyes, flecked with gold and blue, I’d really liked. He’d never be able to wear it so I considered it for myself. I just liked the idea of having something on me permanently that reminded me of him.
Sean—my inker—commented on Ollie’s flawless skin. “Bet he’d be a great canvas.”
“Never happen,” I told him. “He’s a model. I think it’s even in his contract with his agency that he can’t get any tattoos or piercings.” Not that he ever would. Ollie couldn’t sit still long enough for a friend of Britney’s to do henna over his hands for a holiday party just a few months back. There was no way all that nervous energy could be contained long enough to sit for a real tat. He’d told me once that modeling was movement, not all stillness like they show in the movies. A really good model can flow with the environment, the product, or the clothing to show them in their best light. Since I’d never heard modeling explained that way, it made sense. The only time I’d ever actually seen him model had been for his own tiny fashion shows. The movement made sense. Especially the way his hips moved when he walked down the runway….
“Poor kid. Guess he’ll just have to live vicariously through your art, eh?” Sean was a transplant from somewhere in the middle of nowhere Canada. That’s exactly how he described it. He’d been pro and in San Fran for almost ten years. After searching for an artist who could do what I planned, I was thrilled when he’d stepped up to the plate. His sketches had made me drool. He knew exactly what I wanted. Since he had two full sleeves, a chest and back full of ink, he also knew that I needed to feel the burn of the needle almost as much as I needed the cover of colors over my torn skin. “Words going in last, Kade.”
“Okay,” I assured him. We’d triple-checked the spelling. Names. Four names. Three brothers lost overseas and one right here. Ollie didn’t know. I wasn’t sure how he’d react when he finally saw Nathan’s name etched on my skin. His brother’s death had almost killed him. I was still putting him back together, but the tat was more about what I needed. Nathan had kept me going for a long time with his letters and surprise boxes of gifts. His name on my flesh in memorial was the least I could do.
Ollie still paced. He was wearing heels that clacked on the tile as he moved, and his legs were bare even though it was late February and the temps outside were cold enough that I needed a jacket. Ollie almost never wore pants. Today he wore shorts that stopped before they started. Denim with patches of lace on the seams and around the leg openings. His cashmere sweater was a pale blue and hit him just below the waist. If he raised his arms, the shirt rode up and bared flesh, which of course I had to touch. Only he was too far away right now.
God, he was beautiful.
We hadn’t talked about the call from Jacob, though I knew he’d seen the calls and that I’d answered one of them. He hadn’t commented. We’d had slow sex in the shower, and then I insisted on him eating breakfast. He was back to a reasonable weight despite the pressure of his job. He also wasn’t modeling women’s clothing anymore unless he’d designed it himself. When he’d dropped to a skeletal 130 pounds right before Christmas, I’d put my foot down and we’d had our first major fight.
Ollie didn’t like to be told what to do, but I didn’t want him to drop dead. I won only because he didn’t have enough energy to keep up with all the cases we were working. All he wanted to do was sleep. A well-fed Ollie was actually a more emotionally stable Ollie. He didn’t have the panic attacks as often, or the bouts of horrible depression that would leave him crying in the shower. Those things still happened from time to time, but a 150-pound Ollie was much healthier all-around than a 130-pound one. It helped that I removed all scales from the house and went with him once a month to his nutritionist. Food was not the enemy. Ollie was not fat, no matter what he saw in the mirror or how society trolled him.
He’d gone vegan in the past two months—a suggestion from his nutritionist. Not meant to be long-term. More a reset of all his internal clocks and to balance hormones. He’d leaned up a lot, looking more toned, but healthy and not so thin. His nutritionist said it wasn’t about a lack of calories, but a lack of nutrients. If veganism was what made Ollie’s skin and hair so damn luminous, maybe I should try it. Shoveling food in him was easier now so long as I put vegetables or fruit in front of him. He could nibble for hours on a bowl of raw veggies, but put a cracker with vegan cheese in front of him and he ate two bites before declaring himself done. I did almost all the cooking—not that a lot of Ollie’s food was cooked—but it was a good feeling to provide him something.
“Baby, sit down please. You’re making me dizzy,” I finally said.
He stopped and turned back to me. “Doesn’t it hurt?” His hands were gripped tight into fists, turning the knuckles white. Was he upset? Worried?
“Only a little.”
His mouth thinned into a tight line. There was tension around his eyes. Worried, I decided. He didn’t like to see me in pain. The few times he’d accompanied me to rehab had been brutal and left him shaking with tension by the time I was done. Now I scheduled my appointments when I knew he’d be busy with Britney. As much as I loved having him with me, adding to his anxiety wasn’t worth it.
“Really. It’s not that bad. I’ve done this a lot before. Sort of zone out most of the time.” I pointed to the chair Sean had set up for him before we started on the other side of me. “Sit, please. How about I tell you about my conversation with Jacob this morning?”
His eyes widened, but he dropped down into the chair. “You really spoke to him?”
“Yes. I guess he might stop by the office later today. It sounded like he had a job he wanted to hire us for, but he wouldn’t tell me anything.”
Ollie narrowed his eyes. “Why would he need us?”
“I don’t think he needs us.” Jacob wanted Ollie. He’d made his point clearly enough without actually saying the words. Maybe seeing us together had triggered some possessive instinct in him. He wanted Ollie back now that O
llie was clearly off the market. I wasn’t going to share my opinion. “I’ve been doing a lot of bodyguard work for celebrities lately. Maybe he saw that and thinks it’s cool to hire us now.”
He frowned at me.
“What?” I asked.
“You’re not mad ’cause I still have his number?”
“No.” I paused, then continued with a sigh. “Well, I’m not thrilled about it knowing how he hurt you. But you’re a grown-up. You make the decision on who to keep in your phone and who to talk to.”
He looked away. “Will would have a fit.”
“Will is not your boyfriend.” More a replacement brother at the moment, which wasn’t always a good thing since Will had some heavy-handed opinions of things.
“You’re really not mad?”
I studied his face wondering if I was reading him wrong. “Baby, are you interested in getting back with him?”
Ollie stood up so fast he knocked the chair over. “No!” He stared off into the distance for a minute, thoughts probably screaming a thousand things at him, before finally he bent to pick up the chair and set it back to rights. Thankfully Sean was unfazed, but he’d also taken the needle away from my skin when Ollie had moved. “No,” Ollie said again, quieter this time, like a child who was denying they believed a monster was under their bed.
“You spent a year with him. I get it. It’s okay to feel something.”
“Angry,” Ollie said.
“Confused, hurt,” I corrected. “He’s a jerk, but you were together for a year. You were in love with him, you let him into every aspect of your life, and he broke your heart. If you say I can beat the shit out of him, I’d be thrilled.”