Page 36 of The Hitman’s Final Job

I stand up. “I’m going to grab a shower,” I say, hoping my voice comes out steadier than I feel right now. “Gotta get to the lab.”

Silas stares up at me with that same expression he wore in Warsaw. He understands, but it fucking sucks.

“Sure,” he says.

I go inside, drop my mug in the kitchen sink, and go straight to the bathroom attached to my bedroom.

Those big brown eyes, that beautiful mouth framed with the short beard, the intelligent brain. I don’t think there’s anything about Silas Cross I don’t love.

But if I’m going to survive having him around until after the festival, then I need to stop trying to be so fucking virtuous and do the only thing I can to relieve this ache I have for him.

I step into the shower, and this time I don’t make it cold. I’ve been doing that every night since Silas got here. It hasn’t helped, and I’m done pretending it’s going to.

The water runs hot down my back, and I wrap my hand around my hard cock, letting myself think about what would have happened if I hadn’t stood up from the bench on the porch. If I’d stayed and let our distance close the rest of the way. If I’d let Silas’s mouth find mine.

Those beautiful, fucking-deep brown eyes that look at me like they’ve seen the world and I’m still the only thing they want. My breath catches with every stroke of my hand. I add soap to make it easier, but I know I don’t need it. This isn’t going to take long.

I let myself think about his hands as he worked in my garden, and that damn tank top riding up, exposing his skin. Those shorts that are absolutely normal shorts, not even short shorts, but on him they’re just sinful.

And most of all, I think about what it would be like to let myself be wanted by Silas. Without restraint.

My free hand finds the wall, and I press my forehead against the warm tile.

“Fuck.”

TWELVE

SILAS

I sit on the porch for a few minutes after Vaughn goes inside, looking at the valley and the mountains beyond and telling myself that the sensible, reasonable, adult course of action is to do exactly what Vaughn just did. Walk away and respect the agreement we made on the couch five days ago.

But right now I’m frustrated and angry at the sensible adults that made that agreement, and I’m done being sensible.

Before I can talk myself out of it, I stand up, leaving my empty cup on the floor by the bench. I can pick it up later, but later I may not have the guts to do what I think I’m about to do.

I push open the door to Vaughn’s room, ready to storm into his bathroom and teach him the laws of water conservation. I’ve taken two steps in when I hear a sound from behind the bathroom door.

It’s barely audible over the water, but I can tell what it is. My cock responds like a moth to a flame, and then there it is. My name. I mean, it could be something else, but I’m sure he called out my name.

At this stage, only an earthquake would make me leave, except my eyes land on the one thing, save for a natural disaster, that would have that effect.

A photograph in a frame. Vaughn and Rowan standing outside the main building at Quantico on the day Rowan graduated. Rowan in his suit, squinting in the afternoon sun while Vaughn has his arm proudly around him. It was the photo I took before Rowan insisted on a selfie with the three of us. That one hangs in the hallway of his apartment in Denver.

I take two steps back and close the door quietly, then sag against the wall. My eyes on the ceiling, I breathe for a moment.

What did I almost do? Why did I allow myself to nearly lose control?

Finally, I go to my room—no, Vaughn’s guest room—and go straight to the attached bathroom.

The waistband of my sweats catches on my dick, which has been hard since I heard Vaughn call my name, as I push my pants down and pull my shirt over my head. I move toward the shower and turn it on, not waiting for it to warm up before stepping in and taking care of myself.

I’m not slow—I don’t want to have time to think. I just need to relieve the tension I feel all over my body.

Of all the people in the world, why did my fucking brain have to focus on the one I can’t have?

My strokes become faster, my grip tighter. I resist touching my hole because I don’t want to go down that slippery slope, but the thought of Vaughn filling me up makes me come against the shower door in under a minute, his name on my lips.

Afterward, the water sluices down my back as I stand with both hands flat against the tiles, trying to cool down. When I regain my breath, I wash my hair quickly and get out.