Page 81 of Natural-Born Cullers

So much confusion played in his eyes, with it the need to get out and away. “I can’t… I can’t fucking feel it.”

“Hey…stop.”

“I can’t feel anything. Brin—I can’t even hear him anymore since touching you.”

Simon frowned, then pressed in close. It was the first time Light had said his name. “Brin’s gone.” He kissed at his lips. “And you… your head’s still dealing, and your goddamn body, it’s trying to catch up too. You’re back out of sync, nothing more, baby. You’ll find your way back into it. You’ll find your way back into us.”

Light shivered, screwing his eyes shut, but that distance was back in him, and a shake of head came. Then with a look going down as he finished tidying himself up, he came back in. A kiss brushed Simon’s lips a moment later.

“Us fucking tonight…. That wasn’t part of the plan.”

“Why? This your version of seeing me fail?” Simon offered such a gentle smile as he swiped a thumb at Light’s lips. “Because it’ll work every goddamn time,” he said gently.

Light returned the gentle cup of neck, the same gentle stroke of thumb. “Yeah. I know….” He frowned. “So you tell him from me—” Light’s grip shifted, gripping his hair, so bloody roughly. “—you’ll both fail tonight.”

Simon blinked, just the once, then he dropped his touch and stepped back. Numbness crept into his fingers, hands… arms…. Eyes felt heavy. He blinked again, then as his world spun with it, his look rested on his coffee. “You… you…?”

Someone caught him just before he hit the floor, then Light’s soft dark brown eyes with a creeping hint of black came into view.

“We all failed. But Brin… he was the only one who paid the price for it all. I didn’t, but I bloody well should have done.”

Chapter 24

Kill Switched

Sat on the bed, resting back against the headboard, Gray finished flicking through theFinancial Timesas Jan sat up beside him. Cheeks still burning, Jan pulled his laptop over from the unit, and a look came his way off Martin.

“That can wait, right?” Martin said flatly.

Jan shook his head, looking too sick to fight his way out of the bedcovers, let alone into a laptop and work someone’s accounts. “This one’s ur… urgent. I need to get it sent over to Monique to finalise.” Jan looked Martin’s way. “It needs doing.”

Did it? He seemed to be fighting being pulled back into a sleep his body forced him into. It was a faint echo of other times, with drugs in his system that forced him either under Vince or away from Jack, and Gray said nothing, just let him find his peace.

Giving a cough, Jan opened the Cahil account to change something, and his soft tap on laptop only added to the awkward quiet. Gray knew the woman well, but he buried a rough sigh at how Jan caught his look over, then twisted the screen away from him. In his own defence, he kept an eye on the time, not quite ready to settle down over not knowing why Simon had cut the comm when he should have been waiting on intel from the Blood Eagle killer. He should be getting a call in a few moments, or Ray would be heading over to the summerhouse to check in on them. But Jan mistook his look at the time for… curiosity over confidential files, and a narrow of eye kept coming his way. What the hell did Jan think he would do? Taking out little old women who ran a jewellery store wasn’t exactly his MO. Ever. Well, not unless they were using the business to fund terrorism on her trips to… where? Gray flicked a look.

Tenerife.

Oh for God’s sake.

For once, no movie played out on the flatscreen, and Gray rubbed at his eyes, the night settling with the low lights of the bedroom, or trying to at least.

It felt different, and unease bit at his insides over leaving Blood Eagle to Simon. Maybe he just didn’t like handing control over and couldn’t relax because of that. He couldn’t quite put his finger on it, but it had him checking his watch on the sideboard now Jan had denied him access to his laptop.

10:28 p.m. They had another two minutes left before Simon made another call or Ray checked in.

“You… you check the time again,” mumbled Jan, “I’m gonna go magnet on the laptop and your watch and see which one spins faster than the woman’s head fromThe Exorcist.”

Gray snorted, and from over on the white couch, Martin did too. Arm on the armrest, fingers rubbing distractedly under his jaw, he placed a book in his lap, one leg crossed over the other. He looked relaxed, focused on what he was reading, but only partly.

It wasn’t unusual for him to be in here. He’d sit reading in here most nights on his tour for an hour or so when work stumbled into the bedroom. But the fact he sat in the bedroom and hadn’t left yet maybe called out Gray’s unease since Simon’s call. Jan didn’t know Simon had cut the comm, and there was no way Gray would bother him with it. So it was good to have Martin close, but that look of his called him out on the silence. Or maybe Martin’s stay just showed his… concern over the comm going down in the summerhouse as well. He kept everything so close to his chest, he was just too damn hard to figure out.

Jan took off his glasses and rubbed at his eyes before hitting Send on the email. He wore pyjama bottoms, but then so too did Gray with Martin’s stay. Gray preferred naked, but not to the point it compromised Martin’s company. He still wore jeans and a T-shirt, his only comfort in how he came barefooted, his walk through Gray’s halls as much a ghost-like presence as Jack’s lately. But as he tilted his head Gray’s way, Jan wasn’t the only one to pick up on Gray’s unease.

“They’ve got a few minutes left.” He’d give them that. Gray tossed the watch back on the unit, and the newspaper kept it company a moment later.

“Hm? Who?” Jan cocked him a brow, then eased the laptop onto the floor before pushing back the covers and tugging on his housecoat, going full shiver as he headed over to the bar.

“Jan.” That came off Martin again. “If you need something, ask.”

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