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Chapter Twelve

It had been fun ditching Jaxon.

It had also been lonely as hell and now he was sick of waiting.

It had been easy enough for him to give Wrath a message to pass onto Jaxon.

Now all he had to do was wait near the bomb site for Jaxon to show up and he’d let the man catch him. Waiting there at least gave him something to do. He’d found where someone had placed the backpack bomb beneath a table. Of course, CSI had collected all the evidence, but Hayden knew by the charred patterns the exact center of the blast radius.

Which raised the question of how did the bomber know when to detonate the device? Were they close by waiting for them to arrive? Or, was it just bad timing on their part and the perp had been after Jesse all along?

Jesse’s store was demolished and even if the man could rebuild, he’d still need to knock down the rest of the structure and build anew. That was if Jesse pulled through. He’d gotten into the hospital a couple of days ago and found out that Jesse was still on the ventilator.

He really should call Jaxon and put him out of his misery, but that would mean getting a burner phone. Besides, calling would have ended his game of cat and mouse, and this was too much damned fun.

Of course, this time around, there was no bet going on. This time, he was doing it to show Jaxon that he could handle himself.

A slight sound reached him and he moved to the wall and stepped over the blown-out section and settled his back against the portion that still remained.

He pulled his weapon and turned it toward the stranger who had stepped out from the end of the broken structure. This wasn’t the first time Hayden had caught brief glimpses of the stranger. The guy had been following him for a few days, but this was the first time the man had approached him. Hayden had no idea who he was.

Neither did Wrath. Which was odd because when Hayden had spoken to Wrath a few days ago, the assassin admitted he’d noticed the stranger following him. Yet, as much as they both had tried, neither Hayden nor Wrath had been able to get close to the man now standing in front of him. They only knew this guy was there, and had been, lingering in the shadows.

“You’re good,” the man said.

“So are you.” Hayden tightened his grip around his Sig and pointed the barrel at the guy’s heart.

The man slowly lifted his hands with a cocky smile that Hayden instantly liked.

“I’m one of you.”

“Oh?” Hayden wracked his brain, but for the life of him, he couldn’t remember ever seeing this guy nor had Solomon said a word.

“The personification of darkness and shadow,” the man softly quoted the meaning of Erebus.

The sense of relief was instant, at least Hayden wouldn’t need to kill this guy.

Call him skeptical, but he still wasn’t sure. “Who’s our leader?”

“You talking about Solomon…or Dave?” the man smirked.

Hayden huffed and the man held out a cell phone.

“You’re not supposed to carry that.”

“I’m not.” Humor filtered through the man’s gaze.

“You call,” Hayden said as he shook his head. The guy could be trying to get him to call their boss.

The man nodded and dialed a number Hayden couldn’t see.

“Sir,” the guy said and quickly gave an access code and explained the situation between them before holding out the phone. “He wants to talk with you.”

“Hello?”

“Hayden?”

“Yes, sir.” His spine snapped straight at the sound of the former SecDef’s voice.

“The man in front of you is legit. I’ll talk to Solomon about communicating information better.”

“What’s his na—”

Dave ended the call before he could get the question out and Hayden sighed.

“I’m Hayden.”

“Justice.” The man tipped his head and something familiar about it struck Hayden as he handed back the phone.

“Have we met?”

“No.”

“You seem familiar.”

“I guess I have one of those faces.”

Hayden snorted because the guy wasn’t showing his face. Justice wore the typical Erebus black clothing but instead of a dark hood covering the top half of his face, Justice wore a black beanie pulled down over his face with only the eyes and mouth cut out—even though it was early morning, broad daylight.

“Why have you been following me?”

“Who says I have?”

“So, you’ve been following Wrath?”

“Maybe.”

“What are you looking for?”

“A man called Rip.”

“I’ve never heard of him.”

“He’s one of you.”

“I’ve only been with them just shy of a few months. If he is one of us, you might want to ask Wrath or Solomon.”

Tires squealed into the parking lot of the blown-out deli and Hayden glanced in that direction as Jaxon’s truck came barreling into a space.

When Hayden turned back, Justice was gone. It had been an odd conversation and Hayden wondered who this Rip guy was, but shoved it aside.

His palms went damp when he turned back to Jaxon’s truck and he walked toward the big man getting out of the vehicle.

Was it weird that he wanted to run to him?

He’d finally figured out that the shit going on with him was because he was attracted to Jaxon. He couldn’t say exactly when his attraction began, but it was there.

And he was fucking scared.

He didn’t want to lose their friendship, and the only answer he could come up with was to get some distance between them for the past several days. He had dodged Jaxon at every turn even though the man had once been so close that he’d almost stepped out of the shadows, but fear had held him back.

Why now of all times? Why now did he keep thinking about being in Jaxon’s arms and having the man hold him close like he’d done on the condo’s balcony?

Was that the reason he’d asked the question in the note? Do you want a say in what I do?

Oh, my freaking god, just shoot me now.

What had he been thinking by asking that question? All he could do now was chalk it up as the stupidest thing he’d ever done. Hopefully, Jaxon would just laugh it off because there was no way they’d work beyond friends.

Jaxon would laugh it off, right?

Across the distance he stared, unable to pull his eyes away. Jaxon was not laughing. Their gazes collided and held across the distance.

The man’s eyes were almost a pewter color, darker now than the normal light smoke. Why did they suddenly seem so beautiful?

Well, he might as well face the music. Hayden walked until he was a few feet from Jaxon and then he stopped, unsure. Jaxon didn’t stop and closed the distance with a hand fisted to his shirt.

“You’re driving me nuts.”

Wait…what?

He what?

With a pounding heart, Hayden searched Jaxon’s eyes at the harshly muttered words.

“It’s my mission,” he teased, but the words came out shaky because well, his heart was pounding.

Jaxon’s grip tightened and Hayden found himself drawn closer. His feet shuffled on the pavement and his mouth dried up, he licked his lips and Jaxon’s eyes zeroed in on that.

He was tugged closer until only a foot stood between his chest and Jaxon’s heaving one.

Tipping his head back, Hayden gazed into Jaxon’s eyes, then at his firm mouth that was coming closer.

Oh shit. Was Jaxon going to kiss him?

Jaxon eased the distance between their mouths and just as the kiss was about to land…Hayden turned his head.

The kiss landed on his cheek.

“What are you doing?” Hayden squeaked.

Talk about a no-brainer question, but Hayden thought Jaxon might have lost his brain cells somewhere.

Was this all because of his question? The scene from the balcony a few days ago flared up and of how close Jaxon had come to kissing him there too. It hadn’t all been in his mind.

They couldn’t do this, could they? Or the better question was should they after all these years?

Shit.

Jaxon lightly clamped his teeth along his jaw and Hayden’s breath came out with a strangled gasp at the touch of Jaxon’s mouth on him. Desire shot straight down his abs and into his groin.

Oh fuck, maybe they could?

No, they couldn’t.

Shit. Talk about indecisiveness.

The hand on his shirt held him in that tight grip and Jaxon’s big body almost swallowed him up.

“Jaxon,” he groaned this time. “What are you doing?”

“Isn’t it obvious?” The man softly chuckled against his skin, trailing his mouth from his jaw to his neck and Hayden thought his dick would explode.

Yeah, no, this wasn’t such a good idea now that he thought about it. He wedged his arms up between them and shoved Jaxon away.

Not that the big guy moved that far, but he moved some. Gasping for breath, Hayden yanked and Jaxon finally released his hold.

Stumbling a few feet from the man, they stood there watching each other…well, Jaxon was watching his mouth with eyes filled with so much heat it sent Hayden’s stomach jumping.

“Stop it,” he hissed.

Jaxon’s amused gaze flipped up to hold his. “You asked me if I wanted a say in what you do.”

Hayden crossed his arms over his chest and huffed. “I…I don’t want an answer.” He licked his lips.

“Why not?”

“I…let me think about it.”

The corner of Jaxon’s lip curved. “It does take some time to wrap your head around it, doesn’t it?”

“Wrap my head around what?” he croaked.

“Us.”

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