by KD Ellis
Teddy flinched and pulled his thumb away from his mouth, not realizing he’d been chewing his nail until it tore painfully. “Ouch.” He shook his hand, which always seemed to help, even though it really did nothing.
The dressing room door opened and AJ slipped in, his thumbs hooked in the waistband of his Spanx. “Hear anything from Shiloh?”
Teddy shook his head. “No. Maybe he got held up after class…or something.”
“Yeah, maybe.” AJ sounded as confident as Teddy, which wasn’t very confident at all.
Teddy tried calling Shiloh one last time before he had to return to the floor, but he got nothing but voicemail.
Chapter Thirty-Two
Ian had left the apartment that evening with far more reluctance than he was used to. He’d never intended on working for the FBI, would likely never have applied if not for his brother’s death, but it hadn’t taken him long after graduation to realize that he loved it. He loved the smell of gunpowder on the range, and he loved the thrill of chasing down a suspect. Most of all, he loved knowing that his actions were putting bad men where they belonged, keeping other people’s little brothers safe. He’d never expected that there would come a day when he’d dread it. But everything in him protested the thought of leaving Teddy behind, sleeping curled up in the center of his bed.
It was a distraction he didn’t need and couldn’t afford. He sat outside the bar where he was meeting Tennyson for a few minutes to get his mind back on the job. It wasn’t just the case at risk if he didn’t have his head in the game. It was people’s lives. Tennyson’s, his…anyone put at risk by the cartel’s operations.
When his head was as clear as it was going to get, he climbed out of the truck and headed into the bar. Tennyson was already waiting, a tumbler of whiskey sitting untouched in front of him.
Ian almost didn’t recognize him. Gone were the bespoke suit and Bemer shoes he wore around the office, replaced by a leather jacket and dusty black motorcycle boots. Typically clean-shaven, his jaw was covered with a layer of scruff and steel-streaked bangs hung over his forehead, shadowing his eyes. A silver ring glinted on his lip.
Ian slid into the stool beside him. Tennyson lifted a hand to the bartender and a few seconds later, a second whiskey was slid in front of him. Tennyson pushed it over to Ian. “Nice work on the De Luca boy,” Tennyson grunted. “Don’t know how you convinced the kid to flip, but with his info, it looks like we might finally have some leverage.”
Ian, halfway through lifting the tumbler to his mouth, slammed it back down on the bar. “He ain’t a kid.”
Tennyson lifted a brow, lips twitching on a grin. “Sorry, Romeo. I forgot you’re barely legal yourself.”
“Shut your mouth, asshole,” Ian growled, but his own lips twitched as well. “You ready for tonight?”
Tennyson had slowly worked his way up from providing part-time security for lower level runners to driving for one of the enforcers. If all went well tonight, he’d be joining DeAza’s personal security team. They’d arrested one of the crew a few weeks prior for possession, rather than wait for a position to open naturally.
Normally, things like this didn’t bother him, but Ian’s gut kept insisting that something was wrong. He’d taken every precaution he could think of. Tennyson was bugged, a small listening device hidden in a pen in his pocket. If they scanned him for it, all he’d have to do was click it and it automatically deactivated for sixty seconds. Ian would be in the van outside, and he’d—or rather, his boss had, since his name wasn’t officially connected to the FBI while undercover— convinced the local police to keep a SWAT team on standby, just in case. They would be only three minutes out.
Three minutes, though, could be the difference between success and failure, life and death.
Tennyson clapped him on the shoulder, dislodging him from the morbid thoughts of everything that could go wrong. “Stop stressing. This isn’t my first rodeo.”
Ian drew in a calming breath that didn’t end up being so calming, but it at least kept him quiet long enough to pretend. He swirled his whiskey around, ice clinking on glass. “Sorry. You got everything you need?”
Tennyson patted the pocket of his jacket. “All ready to go.”
It didn’t take long to outfit the surveillance van and double-check the supplies. Soon enough, the plain black van was parked in the shadowed alley across from the paint-tagged warehouse that DeAza’s crew occupied. Ian made the final few tweaks on the surveillance equipment.
Tennyson’s voice came loud and clear through the bug, his voice tight with what Ian thought were nerves, just as a sleek, black Ducati Diavel peeled too quickly around the corner, neatly cutting off a black sedan from the other direction. “Ten on site.”
Ian glared at the Ducati through the screen. “I should write you a ticket for that stunt.”
Tennyson just subtly lifted a finger in the direction of the nearest hidden camera, then pulled off his helmet and locked it into one of the panniers. The warehouse had four closed bays and a single small door that was propped open by a brick. Tennyson headed for it. He was met before he reached it by a pair of men Ian recognized from the files. DeAza’s guards—or two of them at least. The thinner was a man named Nicolas Garcia-Reyes, who had a series of misdemeanors for drug possession and assault, while the taller was Diego Ayala. Unlike his partner, Diego’s record was clean.
If things went well, it wouldn’t be clean much longer.
As Ian expected, they patted Tennyson down, and there was a tense sixty seconds of silence while he waited for them to scan for bugs. When the sound clicked back on, partway through DeAza laughing about something, Ian relaxed. So far, everything was going to plan.
DeAza seemed in good spirits, joking around with Tennyson and his other men, and Ian found himself tuning out the back-and-forth banter, wondering how Teddy was doing back at Envy. He tuned back in, however, when the sound on the bug went silent. Ian flicked the speaker and was just about to start fiddling with the settings when he realized the silence was real, not a malfunction.
“I’m sorry… You want me to what?” Tennyson asked, his voice low. Ian heard the underlying anger buried beneath faux confusion. Whatever they’d asked, Tennyson had clearly heard them perfectly. Either he was repeating it for Ian, somehow knowing Ian had tuned out, or for emphasis on the recordings. Either way, it couldn’t be good.
“I said if you want me to do something for you, you gotta do something for me. You expect me to pay you, to trust you with my business, then you need to earn that trust.” Julian’s voice was slick. Somehow, he sounded reasonable.
“Sure, what do you need me to do?” Tennyson’s voice was back to a smooth drawl. They’d known there was the possibility that he would have to do something incriminating to get into the cartel’s good books. It had already been cleared through the higher ups that he had some leeway.
“Some people owe me money and it’s time I taught them a lesson,” DeAza said. There was the sound of shuffling as something was passed from one hand to another. “There’s a few fuckers who owe me big. We’re going to make an example out of them and show people what happens when you fuck with La Familia.”
Ice slid down Ian’s spine and wrapped around his chest until he couldn’t breathe. Teddy could be one of them. Ignoring protocol, Ian yanked his cell phone out of his pocket and dialed Teddy’s number.
It rang, and rang, until it hit voicemail. He hung up rather than leave a message, then he dialed again, and again, until he ended the call again with a curse. “Fuck, Teddy.” He started dialing again, this time the number to the bar. It rang for a long dozen seconds until it was finally picked up.
Johnny sounded out of breath. “Envy, can I help you?”
“Johnny, it’s Ian. I need you to put Teddy on—” Ian started.
“Teddy,” Johnny hollered away from the phone. There was a moment of mumbling, then Teddy came on the phone, confused.
“Hello?”
Ian breathed a s
igh of relief. “God, I thought something had happened when you didn’t answer your phone.”
“Sorry, I left it in my locker. What’s wrong? Why would something have happened?” Teddy’s voice rose at the end, fear leeching into the words.
Ian hurried to soothe him. “Nothing’s wrong, baby. I want you to go upstairs and lock the door for me. Don’t let anyone in but me.”
“My shift—” Teddy started.
Ian interrupted, “I’ll talk to Johnny, but I need you to listen to me, okay?”
“Okay…” Teddy’s voice wavered. Clearly, he didn’t like the idea, but Ian would rather lose money at the bar than put Teddy in danger. His superiors had authorized him paying off Teddy’s debt—not that it had mattered, since he would have done it regardless—but they had stipulations. The money was going to come from the bureau, so they could tag it. They wanted to trace it, see where it ended up. It was unlikely it would end up with any of the cartel leaders without being laundered first, but there was always a chance. This branch didn’t seem quite as well-organized as some of the others they’d investigated.
“Love you, baby,” Ian said, just in case he didn’t get a chance to say it later.
“Love you too, Daddy,” Teddy whispered, and Ian could see his boy’s blush in his mind, just from the way he said it.
“Give the phone to Johnny now,” Ian ordered. He explained that Teddy needed to leave then hung up, letting himself focus on Tennyson’s op again.
Chapter Thirty-Three
Teddy hurried upstairs, following Ian’s orders to the letter. He twisted the last deadbolt but still didn’t feel better. He might be safer up here, but Ian wasn’t. Ian was out there, on assignment, and Teddy had no idea what he’d seen or heard that had made him so worried. Thoughts on Ian, Teddy wandered into the kitchen. He opened the fridge and stared blankly at the contents. Should he make something for Ian to eat? Would he be hungry when he got home?
But he didn’t know when Ian was supposed to be back, and he’d feel worse giving Ian cold or over-cooked food than he would to give him nothing. He closed the fridge, eyeing the small pile of dishes from his dinner in the sink. He washed them and tucked them into the draining board, then fidgeted with the knobs on the cabinets. Sighing, he grabbed a towel and started drying each dish by hand.
Eventually, he ran out of things to do in the kitchen, so he dusted the shelves in the living room, cleaned the exercise equipment in the spare bedroom and mopped the bathroom. By the time he heard the muted music in the club below switch off, signaling that it was closing time, Teddy was on his knees in Ian’s closet, organizing it. Unlike some people who had a junk drawer, Ian apparently had a junk closet. Teddy hadn’t paid it much mind when he’d been hanging up his things, except to notice the deplorable lack of color in Ian’s wardrobe.
So far he’d found a half-dozen records, even though Ian had no record player, a pair of shoes with holes right through the toes, one half of a pair of boots, and an empty photo album next to a shoebox stuffed with pictures. Teddy had pried off the lid before immediately closing it when he came face-to-photo with a picture of Lucas. Maybe soon he would be ready to face the past, but not now—not alone in Ian’s closet.
Teddy shifted a stack of textbooks that Ian had, for some reason, decided to hold on to, so he could reach the far back of the closet. It was shadowed and hard to see, and for a moment, Teddy almost ignored the plain black suitcase standing up in the corner, thinking it was empty.
He nearly missed the tufts of blond fur stuck in the teeth of the zipper. It was only when he bumped it, reaching for a plastic bag stuffed with papers beside it, that he noticed. His fingers itched with curiosity. Part of him said he should leave it be, that if Daddy wanted him to see it, he’d have shown it to him, but Ian had already told him a dozen times to make himself at home—that they had no secrets from each other anymore.
His fingers twitched closer, until he was gripping the zipper in his hand and slowly pulling it down. Slowly, the suitcase opened, until a large blond bear tumbled out, a pretty blue ribbon still tied neatly around his neck.
“Mr. Blue,” Teddy murmured as he caught it. Unfolded, it was nearly as large as him, bigger than he remembered. “I can’t believe I forgot about you.” A second later, he corrected, “I can’t believe Ian kept you.” The fur was soft under his fingers, nowhere near as matted as he’d expect from a four-year-old stuffed animal kept locked away in a closet. Did that mean Ian took it out occasionally, maybe while thinking of him? Or was that wishful thinking?
Ignoring the rather large mess he’d made in the closet, he dragged the bear out into the bedroom and onto the center of the bed. He crawled atop the comforter and curled around the stuffed animal, a yawn unexpectedly sliding free. He’d just close his eyes for a second.
* * * *
Teddy woke with a start, his heart pounding in his chest. He’d fallen asleep, and anything could have happened. Had Ian tried to call? Had he remembered to take his phone off silent before leaving the club? Had he even remembered to bring it into the bedroom?
“What’s the matter, Teddy Bear?” a sleepy voice said from the bed beside him, and for a split second, Teddy’s still-sleepy mind questioned when Mr. Blue had learned to speak.
“Ian?” he said when his brain clicked on. He twisted and threw himself into Ian’s arms. “I didn’t mean to fall asleep. I was trying to stay awake for you.” God, he was so not going to cry over this. But despite telling himself that, his bottom lip wobbled, a lump growing in his throat.
“Baby, I’m not mad. I never expected you to stay awake the whole time.” Ian rubbed his back, but that only made the tears well faster.
“I was so worried,” Teddy admitted into Ian’s chest.
“I didn’t mean to worry you, Teddy Bear. I promise I wouldn’t let anything happen to you.”
Teddy straightened, swatting Ian’s shoulder. “Not about me… I was worried about you! Just…anything could have happened and I wouldn’t even know about it.” Teddy’s anger fled as quickly as it had come, his lip quivering again.
Ian’s face softened, “I wasn’t in danger either, baby, promise. I just sit in the van and listen to boring conversations. The only thing I’m in danger of is falling asleep.”
Teddy slumped back down against Ian’s chest, his cheek against his daddy’s bare skin. After a few seconds, he reached out and dragged Mr. Blue across the mattress to their side. “I found Mr. Blue. I figured you got rid of him. Or Mama R. had him in storage somewhere.”
“Of course I kept him. I always planned on giving him back to you, but…” Teddy felt Ian’s shoulder shift in a shrug.
“Yeah,” Teddy acknowledged the unspoken words. But life had happened and everything had gone to shit.
Ian went back to rubbing his back, but soon enough the feeling grew less soothing. Ian’s fingers stroked down his spine, then up his sides, dancing over his ribs and back down, and Teddy shivered, goosebumps swelling. They weren’t the only thing swelling, either. Blood rushed to his cock and it hardened painfully against Ian’s hip.
Ian’s fingers stilled. His voice was husky when he spoke, “Does someone want to play?”
Rather than answer, Teddy ground his dick against Ian’s skin, his panties already wet with arousal.
Ian moved, gripping Teddy’s hips tightly. Teddy whimpered at the loss of friction. “Daddy…” Teddy whined, his cheeks flushing. He still hardly believed that he was allowed this, that Ian wanted him the same way he wanted Ian.
“Is that how good boys ask to play?” Ian said gruffly, his own dick pressing hard into Teddy’s abdomen where it peeked out of his briefs.
Teddy whimpered, trying to move but held in place by strong hands. “Daddy, please can I play with you?”
“You’re such a good boy. How could I say no to you?” Ian loosened his hold, then cupped his ass, urging him into motion, guiding him until they were rutting against each other, his small dick sliding against Daddy’s larger one,
separated only by the fabric of their underthings. The lace scratched against his skin, which only made his arousal draw higher.
“Daddy, please…” Teddy begged, scrabbling at Ian’s shoulders for purchase. It felt too good, but at the same time, it wasn’t enough. “I need…I…”
“Mm-m, you need something, baby? Do you want more? What do you want?” Ian thrust against him, his dick brushing a line across Teddy’s stomach and Teddy whimpering, feeling the wetness from Daddy’s pre-cum. “Do you want Daddy’s hand?” Immediately, Ian slid between them, dipping below the band of his panties to stroke him.
Without warning, Ian bucked, rolling Teddy onto his back, and Daddy was nestled between his spread legs. Teddy gasped, his breath catching in his throat. His hips met air as he thrust.
“Or does my Teddy Bear want Daddy’s mouth?” Ian trailed kisses down Teddy’s chest, pausing only to suck each of his nipples into his mouth. Even though the left had never regained as much sensation as it’d had before his surgery, the feel of Ian’s tongue against his skin still made him shudder, and heat flooded Teddy’s body, little moans and whimpers leaking from his mouth. Slowly, Ian inched Teddy’s panties lower, down over his thighs, past his knees, until they slid free of his ankles, landing somewhere on the floor behind them.
“Daddy,” Teddy gasped, arching his hips upward as Ian moved lower. Ian’s mouth was close, only inches away, only centimeters, only…Daddy’s mouth was on him, sucking him in, and Teddy wanted it, so much…but he wanted something more.
“Daddy, please…I want your cock,” he pleaded, any embarrassment he might have felt showing in the face of his want. He wanted Ian, and he wanted him now, more than he’d ever wanted anyone in his life.
Ian chuckled, the sound a tickle against his skin. “Patience is a virtue, baby.” Teddy’s fingers scrabbled at the bed linens. He was not a patient person, especially not now, not like this.
“Fuck patience,” Teddy whined. Ian’s eyes met his at the same time as the palm of his hand cracked against the side of his hip, the feeling just shy of painful. Teddy gasped, his breath catching in his throat. “Daddy…”