by Onley James
The door had barely fallen shut before Charlie pounced on him. “Spill it. What’s up with you and the last highlander out there?”
Elijah shrugged, walking to his bed and flopping face-up onto the mattress.
Charlie did the same, causing Elijah to roll towards her. “Come on, spill it. I thought his brother was the gay one. I also thought nobody was sticking their eggplant in your peach.”
Elijah’s face flushed. “Nobody has stuck their anything in my anything. It was one blowjob.”
“You’re not into him?” Charlie asked, her disappointment clear. “Wait, you blew him or he blew you?”
Elijah side-eyed her hard. “Seriously?”
She gave him a wan smile. “You should know me by now. So come on, were you giving or receiving?”
Elijah sighed. “Receiving.”
“And?”
Elijah closed his eyes, body tingling. “It was... amazing. Like, the man could suck a golf ball through a garden hose… but it was also… weird.”
Charlie rolled to her side, propping her head on her hand, practically salivating. “Weird how? Like kinky weird or ‘it puts the lotion in the basket’ weird?”
He rolled his eyes. “Weird like unexpected.”
She frowned a bit at that. “I have like six years of anecdotal evidence that says unexpected blowjobs are a good thing. No? Did you not want it? He didn’t like force himself on you, right?” The quiet menace in her words had him shaking his head.
Elijah wanted to scream in frustration. He had no idea how to explain his neuroses out loud. “Of course not. I wanted it. I wanted him. I do want him. That’s not it. He’s just… he’s just so hard to read. I don’t know who to be around him, and, now that sex is involved, I sort of want to crawl into a hole and hide.”
Charlie snorted, making a face. “Here’s a novel idea… maybe just be yourself?”
He shook his head. “Believe me, nobody wants that.”
“How would you even know? Have you ever bothered to ask him?”
Elijah never asked questions if he didn’t already know the answer, not with his personal life. Not that he had much of a personal life. “No. Every time I’m in the same room with him I get all nervous and act like a total dweeb. It’s not the same when we’re on the phone together.”
“You talk on the phone together? When? Like isn’t he like your twenty-four-seven bodyguard?”
Elijah’s cheeks grew warm. “At night. When I can’t sleep.”
Charlie’s expression morphed into the same face she made when she saw puppies or kittens. “You talk on the phone together from different rooms? Oh, my God. That’s so cute I might vomit up a rainbow.”
“This is why I prefer to talk to Wyatt.”
“Wyatt would demand all the dirty details of your kitchen exploits.”
“Exactly.”
Charlie rolled her eyes this time. “What do you guys talk about on the phone?”
“Everything. Nothing. Just whatever comes to mind.”
“Things you wouldn’t ask him face to face?”
“Maybe? I don’t know what’s wrong with me. When we’re in the same room together, I’m constantly trying to figure out where his head is at, what he wants from me and how to give it to him, but he only seems to have two settings, completely blank or wolf-who-wants-to-swallow-me-whole. I hate not knowing what he’s thinking. I hate not being able to adjust. I know that makes me sound crazy, but it’s self-preservation, Charlie. Being a chameleon is way easier than just putting it all out there.”
Charlie leaned in. “Are you yourself on the phone?”
Elijah nodded. “Yeah.”
“Does he seem uninterested? He hasn’t stopped talking to you. Hasn’t asked Linc to reassign him. Hasn’t stopped answering when you call. Hell, he just blew you in the kitchen.” She stopped short. “Wait. Why did he blow you in the kitchen? What started it?”
“He said he didn’t know how to read me because I was always changing—he used the word recalibrating. He said he wanted me to be happy and that he’d give me anything I wanted if I just told him what it was.” Saying the words out loud made Elijah’s whole body warm. It was the first time Shep’s words seemed to penetrate.
Charlie’s brows shot upward. “That’s… intense. And you said you wanted a blowjob, and he dropped to his knees to deliver? Sounds like you hold all the power in this situation. Seems he’s halfway in love with you already. It’s all very Hollywood.”
“I didn’t ask for a blowjob. It’s complicated. He says he can’t… feel things like normal people. He says… I don’t know. It doesn’t matter. This is crazy. I’m crazy. This will never work. He’s twice my age. He can’t read me, and I can’t read him. I have never had a relationship before, and I guarantee you he hasn’t either. I think he…” he dropped his voice to a whisper. “I think he might be a virgin.”
Charlie’s maniacal laugh died when she saw the look on Elijah’s face. “You can’t be serious. He’s like fifty.”
“He googled how to give a blowjob. He said he doesn’t have emotions like other people. I imagine that makes dating hard.”
Charlie frowned. “What… exactly did he say?”
“He said he experiences emotions like somebody with gloves on. He knows what he’s supposed to feel, but just… doesn’t. Except sometimes he does, and he feels things for me. It’s all super confusing.”
Charlie’s expression sent a shiver down his spine. “What do you know about him? Like what has he told you on your late-night phone calls?”
Elijah stopped to consider their conversations, stomach dropping. “I don’t know. Not a lot. We mostly just talk about me.”
“You know nothing about him? What did he used to do? Where did he go to school? Nothing? Nothing about his family? Nothing?”
“No. Like, why are you acting like that’s a huge deal? You once fucked our Uber driver. Did you ask about his family history?”
“This guy is in charge of keeping you safe and he’s telling you he has no emotions. That’s not raising any red flags for you?”
“This is Hollywood. Everybody here is a fucking narcissist, Charlie. None of us are good at processing our feelings.”
“No, but almost all of us have feelings. Do you know who doesn’t have feelings?”
His brows knitted together. “Casting directors?”
She snorted a surprised laugh. “Well, yes… but I’m talking about psychopaths.”
He rolled his eyes hard. “Okay, I wouldn’t call Shep a psychopath.” When Charlie just blinked at him, his heart skipped. “Wait, are you being serious? You think he’s like some psycho killer or something?”
She flopped back down on her back with an exaggerated sigh. “No. Not really, I guess. But I still think you should do some more research. Or at least ask him to explain what he meant.”
“You want me to ask him if he’s a psychopath?” Elijah asked, deadpan.
“You are exhausting me,” she muttered. “No. I want you to maybe look into his background. Ask about his family. See if he’s willing to talk to you. Ask Linc. I think you have a right to know who’s guarding your body.”
“I should interrogate him about his life after one blowjob? That won’t make me seem needy at all.”
“The man said he’d give you anything you want to make you happy. Tell him knowing about his life will make you happy.” Elijah groaned, wanting to kick his feet like a toddler. “Or don’t and end up chopped up in little pieces in his freezer. It’s up to you,” she quipped. “I have to get going. My mom’s coming into town. I’m going to meet her at LAX and then we’re going for drinks.”
“Tell her hello for me.”
Charlie rolled to her feet and gave a jaunty wave. “I will.”
Elijah didn’t walk her out. He did nothing but lay there thinking about what Charlie said. He knew the adult thing to do would be to ask Shep or even send a message to Linc. Instead, Elijah snagged his phone, firing off a text to Wyatt.
Elijah: What’s Shep’s deal?
When the three dots jumped, implying Wyatt was texting back, Elijah sank his teeth into his bottom lip, his heart pounding.
Wyatt: Be more specific.
Elijah: Like who is he? What’s his backstory? What did he do before he became a celebrity babysitter?
Once more three dots danced, and Elijah’s pulse seemed to sync with their rhythm.
Wyatt: I don’t know if I can tell you stuff like that. It might be, like, classified. I don’t know how that stuff works. Let me ask Linc.
Elijah: No! Don’t ask Linc.
Elijah fired back. But there was no response.
Elijah: Wyatt?
Elijah: Wyatt?!
Wyatt: Linc says you should have asked him if you wanted Shepherd’s credentials but since you didn’t he can tell you that he was Special Forces in the Marines like Linc and Jackson but then he left to work for a private military contractor.
Those words echoed in his head. Shep had said as much in the kitchen just now, but Elijah didn’t know what that meant, even though he’d heard them referenced in movies before.
Elijah: What the fuck is a private military contractor? You can just have private armies? Who has private armies?
Wyatt: Fascist dictators?
Elijah huffed, glaring at his phone.
Elijah: Are you asking me? What did he do for this private military contractor?
Elijah: Wyatt?
The texts stopped, leaving Elijah feeling like a sword dangled over his head.
There was a soft knock at the door and then Shep was taking up the entire entrance, his face once more inscrutable. “If you wanted to know about my background, rabbit, you could have just asked me.”
Elijah sucked in a surprised breath, before firing off one last text to Wyatt.
Elijah: Traitor!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
“What if you lied?” Elijah asked, tossing his phone onto the mattress.
Shep stepped inside, closing the door and crossing to the bed. He didn’t sit, just gazed down at Elijah. “Why would I lie?”
Elijah pulled a face. “Because you’re secretly a bad guy?”
Shep tilted his head. “Do you think I’m a bad guy?”
“I think you’re a stranger, despite what we just did in the kitchen. I think you’re fantastic at hiding who you are. I think you make me feel—” He snapped his mouth shut, realizing he was talking too much.
“Feel what?” he asked, his voice sliding over Elijah like silk.
“Nothing.”
Shep dropped to his knees in front of Elijah, gripping his wrists gently and pulling him into a sitting position. “Tell me what you were going to say and I’ll tell you whatever you want to know. I’ll even give Linc permission to show you my personnel file if you want to fact check me.”
Elijah stiffened, licking his bottom lip. He wasn’t sure he could say it, not with Shep so close.
“I know you want to hide, rabbit, but I won’t let you. Just say it.”
All the blood in Elijah’s brain ran south. “Exposed.” The word fell from his lips without thought.
“I make you feel exposed,” Shep repeated, gazing deep into Elijah’s eyes like he was trying to read the truth in them. “And that scares you?”
Elijah could feel the blood rushing in his ears. Did it? “I don’t know.”
“You don’t look scared.”
Elijah’s heart knocked around inside his chest. “Do you want me to look scared?”
He seemed to contemplate his answer, which probably should scare Elijah, but it didn’t. Shep didn’t. He just intrigued him. He’d never done this before… this dance, this strange ritual of circling each other, feeling each other out like they were both unsure how they fit.
Finally, Shep said, “I told you what I want.” His thumbs caressed the tender skin on the inside of Elijah’s wrists, making it hard to concentrate on his words.
Elijah swallowed hard. “For me to be happy? What does that even mean?”
“I don’t know. If you’re going to keep hiding from me, you’ll need to just speak plainly. Just tell me what I can do to make you happy.”
“Even if it’s something you don’t want to do?”
“That’s the second time you’ve said that. What’s on your mind, rabbit?”
That was an excellent question. Elijah was having a hard time forming cohesive thoughts with Shep’s bulky frame separating his thighs and his rough fingers caressing his arms. “I just want to know who you are… or who you used to be.” It was partially true.
“If telling you about my past will make you happy, I’ll do it. But you have to understand, the things I did… In war, there are rules of engagement, rules that deal with the use of force. Rules that no longer applied once I became a private contractor. I won’t lie about the things I’ve done, but I don’t know if you’ll get any comfort from the truth.”
Elijah felt like his heart was lodged in his throat. He didn’t know how to respond to that. “What did you do for the private army people?”
His gold eyes shimmered as he gazed up at Elijah. “I extracted information from unwilling assets.”
Elijah replayed the statement on repeat for a full thirty seconds. “You tortured people.”
Shep shrugged, lifting his hand to brush Elijah’s hair from his face. It was a disarming move that had Elijah’s dick taking notice once more. “I was occasionally asked to use enhanced interrogation techniques to extract necessary intel from unwilling assets.”
Why wasn’t Elijah more disturbed by this big reveal? Did that make him a bad person? “So, yes?” he asked, breathless.
“Sometimes, yes.”
“But not always? They didn’t just call you in to do horrible things to people?”
“Interrogation isn’t about pain, it’s about pressure. It’s about figuring out what drives them, what they love, what they hate, what they need and applying the right pressure to convince your subject that betraying his country is better than the alternative.”
“What’s the alternative?”
“It’s different for everybody. Some assets remain… untethered for a reason. If you have nothing you care about, you have nothing to lose. They are often the hardest to break. Like you.”
“You think I’m untethered?”
“Yes, I think you keep yourself to yourself, as my father would say. You would have made a wonderful agent.”
Elijah preened a bit. “These untethered agents or assets… you had to torture them?”
Shep nodded. “If you can’t break an asset psychologically, you often have to break them physically.”
“How do you know what they want?”
“You learn to read people.”
“What does that mean?”
“People reveal their true selves all the time. They trained me from a very young age to read people, their micro-expressions, their tells. Which way they shift their eyes, whether they lick their lips, whether they’re sweating or have chills. Once you know what to look for, it’s easier than you think,” Shep said, tracing Elijah’s cheek with his finger.
Elijah steeled himself against the touch, even though he longed to lean in. “But you can’t read me?”
Shep tilted his head. “Sometimes I can. When you let your guard down like right now.”
Elijah swallowed hard. “What am I thinking right now?”
“I’m not a psychic,” Shep said but there was just the barest hint of something in his expression. Amusement, maybe. “Your pupils are dilated. You keep licking your bottom lip. Your breathing is heavy, but not like earlier. This isn’t about sex and you’re not afraid. You’re excited.”
“Should I be afraid?” Elijah asked, mouth bone dry.
Shep smiled then. “No.”
“Have you ever killed somebody?”
Shep nodded. “Yes.”
Elijah’s nostrils flared, his pulse skittering beneath his skin. “For fun?”
Shep frowne
d. “No.”
“So, like… in the military,” Elijah asked.
“Yes.”
Elijah leaned in, so close their lips were almost touching. “Would you ever hurt me?”
“Not intentionally, no.”
“Even if you were mad at me? Even if I said I hated you?”
Shep gripped Elijah’s wrists a little tighter as if to emphasize his words. “I could never hurt you.”
“Would you hurt anybody I love?” he whispered, his mother’s face coming to mind. She was a monster, but she was still his only living family.
“No. Because I’d never hurt you. I’m not a murderer, Elijah. I don’t kill for sport or for fun or some deep dark compulsion. But some people just need killing. Some people aren’t fit to walk among normal humans.”
In a million years Elijah could never have imagined having this conversation. “And you make that call?”
“Me? No. That’s above my paygrade. But if it’s decided that people should be… removed from the chessboard, sometimes I was the one who did it. It wasn’t personal.”
Elijah knew people in the military were often put into situations where they had to kill another person. Hell, Linc saw a therapist for his PTSD, sometimes twice a week. He must have seen some major shit go down for it to mess up somebody as together as he seemed. But Shep didn’t seem messed up. He didn’t seem bothered at all. “Are you a psychopath?” he blurted.
“No.” At Shep’s definitive statement, Elijah let out the breath he’d been holding. Until he said, “I’m a high-functioning sociopath.”
“Like Sherlock Holmes?” Elijah muttered.
“What?”
Elijah flushed. “Nothing.”
Elijah wondered if he’d slipped into a coma. It seemed strange that his movie roles and his real-life mirrored each other so closely. First with Down the Middle and now he was sitting in his bedroom with a self-proclaimed sociopath right before he left to film a movie about a serial killer. A sociopath who used to torture people for money. A sociopath with a body count. A sociopath who just blew him in his kitchen after telling him he’d do anything to make him happy. Jesus. “I don’t really know what being a sociopath means, if I’m being honest.”