Chapter 11

ELEVEN

Jamie had just filled the kitchen sink with soapy water when Danny and Mel strode in from the balcony of the Manhattan Beach condo they were borrowing, Aidan on their heels. "As much as I'd like to stay here and watch the waves all night," Mel said, "we've got a plane to catch." She had brought the jet back from wherever bounty duties had taken her, but only for a few hours to catch up with them on the case and pick up her husband.

"Are you going all the way home tonight?" Aidan asked her while Danny disappeared into the master suite to retrieve the briefcase of diamonds out of the safe where Aidan had secured it.

"Overnight in Vegas, then to SFO in the morning. I'm sorry I can't stay and talk to Isabella."

"I think less is more right now," Aidan said. "She said two words to me—‘Get out'—when she arrived. I'll try again in the morning before we meet with the AUSA."

"She hasn't told the PD to boot you from the case yet," Jamie said as he rounded the dining bar. "That's a good sign."

Danny reemerged, briefcase in hand. "Well, once I get these back to Parsons tonight, civil charges will be off the table."

"Every little bit helps," Aidan said.

At the door, Danny hugged his brother, then hugged Jamie too, patting his back with a "Sorry about the game, bro."

The condolences were appreciated but unnecessary. "As I told Aidan, we played the future national champions. I'm just pleased our guys played as hard as they did and kept it close."

Aidan coasted a hand over his back. "I'm sorry I missed it. I heard it was a good game."

"I've got the tape," Jamie said with a wink.

"You need a lift back?" Mel asked him. "I can send the plane tomorrow."

He shook his head. "Those were our last games before exams, so I've got some time off before we start to prep for post-holiday games." He gestured at their surroundings. "And, thanks to Press"—one of his former players who now played in LA—"a place to crash while he's on the road."

"Try to enjoy it a little," Mel said, a hand on his forearm, then repeating the gesture with Aidan but lingering longer. "Don't be too hard on yourself."

"I keep telling him that," Jamie said.

"Make sure he believes it."

"Count on it," Jamie said, kissing her cheek, then locking up behind her and Danny. By the time he returned to the kitchen, Aidan was already elbow-deep in soapy water. "Let me take care of that so you can go to bed."

"Don't tempt me," Aidan said with a weary chuckle that matched the deep lines around his eyes and the raked-through strands of his hair. "And besides, you've had just as little sleep as I have the past few days." They worked in easy silence, Aidan washing, Jamie drying, until Aidan drained the sink and stole the dishtowel from Jamie to dry his own hands. "Thank you," he said. "For calling in the favor with Press, for staying, and for agreeing to talk to Angel tomorrow."

Jamie settled a hand in the small of his back. "Thank you for letting me. There's nowhere else I'd rather be." Then lowered that hand to lightly spank Aidan's ass. "Go light up the fire pit, and I'll bring you coffee. Or whiskey? I grabbed a bottle on the way over."

"Whiskey in my coffee."

"Yes, Irish," Jamie said with a chuckle of his own.

As Aidan shuffled his feet on the way back out to the balcony, Jamie grabbed two pods of decaf and poured two shots of whiskey in Aidan's mug. While he waited for the coffee to brew, Jamie accessed their private server from his phone and opened the Project Angel file from seven years ago. Named then after Aidan's late husband, Gabriel. Jamie had had no idea how relevant it would be again all these years later. He scrolled back through the information on Tom Crane he'd collected. Minimal, and only in connection with either Renaud, the terrorist they'd been tracking, or the work he and Aidan had done. He didn't think the former relevant, Renaud dead and his network dismantled, but it was possible the latter could turn up leads in the present. He initiated a search—Darien White against any of the cases Aidan and Tom had worked—then pocketed the phone and took their cups of coffee out to the balcony.

"Tell me about Tom," he said as he lowered onto the couch beside Aidan. "And not what's in our files but about him. Your friend." He waited until the momentary wobble of Aidan's hand stilled before he handed Aidan his mug. "Anything I can use when I talk to Angel tomorrow." After the small opening that Aidan had told him about, they'd decided to try and create a larger one out of Angel's curiosity about Jamie's stunt driving. But Jamie would need more than just an interest in wheels and how to use them to get the teen talking. Yes, they had cars in common, and certain other things too, including the loss of a parent. But Jamie wanted to know more about that parent beyond what was in his and the Bureau's files on Tom Crane.

More than all that, he sensed Aidan needed to talk about Tom too, about the good parts of their partnership, about the friend who'd been at his side since the Academy. And while it was slow going at first, Aidan seeming to drag the memories out of a locked box buried under a mountain of betrayal, once the stories began to flow and the whiskey loosened his tongue, Aidan was soon regaling him with the trouble the five of them—him, Tom, Gabe, Izzy, and Mel—used to get up to. Including one story about when Isabella was in labor. He and Tom and Gabe had eaten their way through an entire hospital vending machine, a bet Mel had made them so they'd stop pestering Isabella's doctors.

Jamie stretched an arm behind him, laughing. "Mel knew how to handle y'all way back then."

"Always." He leaned into Jamie's side and sipped the last of his Irish coffee. "If she'd been able to haul a fixer- upper and all of Tom's mechanic's tools into the hospital parking lot, she would have."

"Tom worked on cars?"

Aidan nodded. "Mostly restorations that he'd then donate to charities to auction off. I suppose that's where Angel picked it up."

"Same with me and my dad," Jamie said. "I was younger than Angel when he died, but I remember sitting on his workbench, watching him and hoping that one day I'd be tall enough to get under the hood."

Aidan hummed but didn't say more, and when Jamie glanced down a minute later, it was just in time to catch the mug from falling from a half-asleep Aidan's grip. Smiling, Jamie placed both empties on the fire pit ledge, then, hand under Aidan's knees, scooped him off the couch.

Aidan grumbled even as he burrowed into his chest. "This is unnecessary."

"Shut up," Jamie teased. "You like it."

The lack of further protest proved his point and proved Aidan was nearly out until he set Aidan on the bed. His husband's eyes were open and swirling with a mix of love and appreciation that sent Jamie to his knees between Aidan's.

"Thank you for tonight," Aidan said as he softly brushed Jamie's cheek. "I needed that. It felt good to remember the happy times, to remember the kind of man he was before it all went to shit. If I—" He swallowed hard, seeming to lose his words.

"If you what, baby?"

"If I start to shut down again, if I try to push you away, don't let me. "

The Aidan of seven years ago had done exactly that when the connection between them had sizzled bright and hot, too soon after Aidan had lost the first love of his life. Scared, he'd pushed Jamie away, and the Jamie of seven years ago had let him. Neither of them were the same people now. Jamie wouldn't let go, and Aidan could depend on that persistence. "I won't," Jamie said, brushing their lips together. "And I also won't let you use this to convince yourself you wouldn't be a wonderful dad if you want to be."

Aidan lowered his chin, gaze averted. "I screwed up, Jamie. I took my eyes off the ball and missed half the game. If that were to happen with our own kids?—"

"You were put in the penalty box, Aidan. Not by your choice."

Brown eyes peeked up at him through burnished lashes. "You're mixing sports metaphors."

"Because you were using bad ones to start." Aidan's huff of laughter was welcome, as was his upturned face and lowered shoulders. Jamie mimicked his earlier movement, cupping his cheek. "I'm not gonna push, Irish. Not in the middle of all this. But hear me when I tell you one does not reflect on the other, not in this case. You'd be a wonderful father, and when we're done with this case, we'll pick up the topic again."

"Yes, Coach," he said with a sly smile. "You know, if we have kids, we're gonna have to sneak around to have sex like we used to in the early days."

Jamie tilted his head toward the living room they'd just come from. "You wanna go back out there to the balcony?"

Aidan grabbed his shirt and tugged, pulling Jamie onto the bed then rolling over him. "I think I'd rather just take you here." He captured Jamie's lips, the connection between them now, forged by years of love and trust, sizzling brighter and hotter than ever.