Cut & Run (43 page)

“You owe me an apology!” the woman’s voice shouted from the cell phone, and Ty dropped the phone again to grip Zane’s hair and pull his head back roughly so he could bite at his neck. “Ty!” the woman shouted.

Zane gasped for a breath, tipping his head back and clenching his hand into Ty’s sides as he felt teeth scrape against his skin. Zane tightened his hold on his own cock, pleasure already lapping through him. It would only get better. The annoyed voice was a tiny buzz he couldn’t be troubled to notice.

All his attention was on Ty’s hands. And Ty’s hands were going ever further, his fingers twisting wickedly inside Zane as he dragged his teeth down Zane’s neck.

Another screaming demand from the woman on the phone caused Ty to pull up short and grab the phone. “Stacey, I’ll call you back,” he grated into the phone before hanging up and tossing it over his shoulder to land precariously on the edge of the bed at their feet. He bent to kiss Zane again, letting himself moan loudly with the contact.

Zane couldn’t stand it anymore. “Ty … please,” he whimpered.

As if to accentuate his point, the phone began to ring and vibrate at the end of the bed. Ty ignored it, instead focusing all his attention on Zane and preparing him for a nice, rough fuck. He kissed him hungrily as the phone hopped around angrily on the tangled bed covers, and he reached for the condom wrapper and ripped it open after pulling his fingers out and sliding the palm of his hand up the length of Zane’s cock teasingly.

Zane choked down a cry as he felt Ty’s hand on him, and he couldn’t stop his hips from snapping up into Ty’s hand. “Fuck,” he breathed. “Fuck, Ty….”

“Not yet,” Ty rasped as he rolled the condom on and reached to tug at the back of Zane’s thigh. The phone finally stopped ringing, and Ty kissed Zane again messily. Seconds later, Ty was pushing slowly into Zane’s body as the landline began to ring.

Zane growled. “Who the fuck is she?” he demanded, keeping his Cut & Run | 261

hands on Ty, smoothing them over hard muscles. “Never mind,” he gasped as Ty moved inside him. “She just wants what I’ve got.” And he purposefully tilted his hips and rocked up to sink Ty deeper inside him.

Ty groaned, the sound close to a whimper as he pressed his lips to Zane’s jaw and pushed harder.

Ty’s voice on the answering machine could be heard from the kitchen, warning not to leave a message because he never returned them anyway, and then a loud beep sounded as Ty pushed up onto his hands and flexed his hips. “Don’t listen,” he told Zane in a tight voice as he began to rock into him.

“Fuck,” Zane breathed. “You think I can pay attention to anything but you?” He struggled to focus on Ty moving inside him; he’d been missing this for four months and now that he had it? He wasn’t going to miss it anymore.

“Come on, fuck me,” he growled, fingers digging into Ty’s shoulders.

Ty obliged with a little growl, one hand going back to Zane’s hair to hold him in place as he began to truly thrust into him. The bed rocked with their movements, the headboard groaning in time, and in the distance an angry female voice shouted into an answering machine. But Zane’s ears were filled with the sound of his own heartbeat and Ty’s panting gasps. He cried out Ty’s name as he started to rock against him, intensifying the effect of the thrusts.

He snaked his hand back between them to pump his cock, and the shock waves multiplied.

“Fuck, yes,” Ty hissed as he buried his face in Zane’s neck and used the muscles of his back and legs to thrust.

The motions made Zane arch his body, the slow, almost languid rocking driving him even more insane than any amount of frenzied pounding could have done. Under it all, he could hear the girl’s voice, but he couldn’t think about that right then. This felt too damn incredible to focus on anything else.

A low groan built in Zane’s chest as he pulled at his cock, Ty’s slow, rhythmic movement building the fire higher but not providing quite enough spark. “Ty…for God’s sake …have I got to beg?” Zane asked helplessly, pulling his knees up to try to get Ty to move faster, thrust harder.

Ty didn’t answer him, instead speeding the rhythm of his thrusts with a grunt of effort.

Zane gasped out encouragement, throwing his head back as he felt the orgasm clenching inside him. He tightened his fist on himself. “Not long…,”

262 | Madeleine Urban & Abigail Roux

he ground out.

“Come on, Garrett,” Ty coaxed in a low, rumbling voice. “Come all over me,” he whispered against Zane’s skin.

Zane’s body started to tighten up, and his hand moved faster on himself. “Ty…,” he hissed. And with another few thrusts, he jerked in place and yelled as he came, the hot liquid smearing between them with each pulse as he cried out each time, nearly delirious with pleasure.

Ty closed his eyes and groaned, thrusting harder and grunting with each push of his hips. “One day,” he ground out with difficulty, “I’m just going to sit in a corner and watch you jerk off,” he promised as his belly rubbed against Zane’s slick knuckles. Just the thought was enough to send him over the edge, and he tried to slow his movements to stave off the orgasm. But the friction from the slow rocking was still too much, and he came with a shout that was loud enough to drown out the final beep of the answering machine.

Zane’s gut jerked again in reaction to Ty’s words. Fuck, Zane would love that, to feel Ty’s eyes on him. He moaned Ty’s name long and low. Ty rocked through the torturous friction and finally collapsed with a small gasp, panting. The cell phone on the end of the bed began to vibrate and sing, dancing itself to the edge of the bed and then falling to the floor with a clatter.

Ty pushed up shakily and kissed Zane breathlessly, pulling out of him carefully and groaning as he did so. Zane clutched at him mindlessly, trying to pull him close again, but Ty rolled onto his side instead, pulling Zane with him. He kissed Zane one more time, almost gently, and then flopped onto his back. The phone ceased its singing somewhere on the floor at the end of the bed, and Ty sighed loudly and closed his eyes in relief.

“I was with her night before last,” he admitted in a low, breathless voice.

Sighing softly, Zane shifted to lie against Ty’s side, settling his cheek on his upper arm. He thought idly about how much more cut Ty seemed to be now. He didn’t look different, but he felt harder somehow. Perhaps Zane had just been too caught up before to notice the changes. He could imagine that Ty had had very little to occupy himself with other than physical endeavors, though. He remembered well what it was like on medical leave, under orders not to do anything mentally “strenuous.” The only thing left to someone as active as Ty was physical.

“Hope it was better than what I did that night,” Zane murmured absently, his mind turning to the gunshot wound that now throbbed angrily.

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Ty turned his head slightly and rested his chin against Zane’s head as he wrapped his arm around him carefully. He didn’t say anything, knowing that everything coming to mind would either really piss Zane off or be a lie.

Zane lay just breathing for a while, and finally he smiled. “Sit in a corner and watch me jerk off?” he drawled. “My, my.”

Ty blushed slightly, though in the early morning light it wasn’t entirely noticeable. “Sounds fun,” he explained shortly.

“Mmmm. I agree,” Zane murmured as he turned his lips to Ty’s skin and stretched out against him. He sighed, the sound muffled against Ty’s shoulder. “What is it about you that makes me want to chuck everything and just fuck you again?” he asked seriously.

Ty blinked in surprise and turned his head slightly. “Must be the Old Spice,” he joked weakly. Zane snorted and shook his head, though he did turn his head to inhale the scent of Ty’s sweaty skin. “I don’t know, then,” Ty murmured more seriously with a tilt to his chin.

Zane went quiet for a long moment, but there wasn’t anything he felt like he could say without sounding like an absolute fool. The nerves were creeping back, and he could feel the shakes threatening. He rolled to his back, lifting both hands to rub at his face before having to curl them into fists because they were shaking visibly. Damn damn damn. He’d hoped he’d have a little longer before the cravings hit. And he couldn’t drink when it was time to get to work. “We need to get going,” he murmured faintly. He winced as it came out sounding totally weak.

Ty lay still for a moment, nonplussed by the sudden change in subject. “Yeah,” he finally agreed with a grunt as he rolled and swung his feet over the edge of the bed. He hefted himself up and shuffled to the bathroom to clean up.

Zane watched Ty walk away with a swirling of confusing emotions.

Fuck, he needed a hit. Flipping his legs out of the bed, Zane headed downstairs, first to the little bathroom under the steps, then to his jacket. He had to get rid of the damn pills or he’d be popping them like crazy—and that would make it so much harder to control himself around Ty. Not to mention royally pissing Ty off.

Ty heard the rustle of the sheets as Zane slipped out, and he stood in front of the bathroom mirror with the damp cloth and waited a few moments before giving into the suspicion and following silently. He took his time getting into his briefs and jeans, hoping he wouldn’t find Zane doing what he thought he was doing. The fact that he was already jonesing was pretty 264 | Madeleine Urban & Abigail Roux

obvious, and Ty knew enough addicts to know that Zane’s stash would be close.

Zane rifled through the jacket and found the tin he carried the pills in.

He didn’t open it, just tapped the tin nervously on the leather sleeve, again trying to make himself get rid of them. He was still there when Ty came up behind him and leaned quietly against the kitchen counter. Zane was so wrapped up in his internal struggle that he didn’t hear Ty, and the tin kept tapping nervously, speeding up, slowing down, speeding up.

Ty watched him silently, frown deepening as Zane continued to visibly struggle with himself.

Zane’s hand shook as it curled around the tin, and he closed his eyes.

He could give it up. He could. It wasn’t his body that wanted the drug. It was his head. He took a deep breath, opened his eyes, and turned, freezing in place when he saw Ty there. Ty met his eyes emotionlessly and then slowly looked down at the tin in his hands.

“Mints?” he asked flatly.

“No.”

Ty’s jaw clenched and then relaxed again. “Bit early for those, hmm?”

Zane debated explaining—for about two seconds. Instead, he reached out and grabbed Ty’s hand. He set the tin in his palm, curled his fingers over it, and then brushed past him, heading upstairs to the bathroom. Ty watched him go, then looked back down at the tin and pursed his lips. With a sigh, he slid it into his back pocket and headed back up to the bedroom to start getting packed.

Zane turned on the cold water in the shower and sank down to sit on the edge of the bathtub, cursing himself. It should be easier than this. He’d quit before, and it had been much more hard-core shit. These poppers were no big deal.

He climbed into the shower. So why did he feel like he had so much more to lose? The craving for the drugs echoed through his head, the urge to find a drink curled in his gut, and the wish for a cigarette set his fingers to twitching. God, he’d fucked himself up. At the time he hadn’t cared anymore.

He’d figured he wouldn’t last long enough for it to be a problem. Body shaking, he leaned against the wall, fighting for control.

Not much more was said between the two of them until they were at the airport waiting for the commercial flight Ty had hastily booked. They sat Cut & Run | 265

in the lounge area of the airport bar and watched CNN, Ty rapping his fingers on the table impatiently.

Zane had been shaky and distracted all morning, nervous and tense as he waited for the other shoe to drop. He was just as twitchy from coming off the drugs as wondering what Ty might do about it. He knew there was nothing he could do to change Ty’s opinion about them, and that was what still bothered him; that he’d damaged Ty’s opinion of
him
. For Ty’s part, he hadn’t even alluded to the pills Zane had handed over.

Finally, after half an hour of delay and being too restless to keep quiet any longer, Ty looked from the television mounted in the corner of the bar to Zane and tilted his head. “Got any preferences as to where we stay in the city?” he asked flatly.

Zane blinked, pulled out of his thoughts. He glanced to Ty and shrugged. “Somewhere … unpredictable. Queens, maybe,” he mused. “Or Chinatown.”

Ty nodded and sipped at his orange juice. “Good idea,” he responded, unable to think of anything further to say to the man.

When Ty went quiet again, Zane fell back into thought, trying to focus on his memories about the case, pushing aside his worries. He wasn’t having much success, though, especially with the seeming party in the bar across the room. He winced when a raucous group clanged bottles together.

God, he didn’t want to be here. He wanted to be back at Ty’s apartment, curled up and warm like early this morning.

Ty sat and watched without emotion. He sighed and looked down at his watch, knee bouncing restlessly. “You can still step away from this case,”

he said to Zane softly.

Zane raised his eyes to meet Ty’s. “The case isn’t the problem. I’m the problem,” he murmured, shifting to set his elbows on his knees.

“You’re
my
problem,” Ty reminded.

“
Your
problem?” Zane asked, frowning a little.

“If you can’t get your shit together, then you’re my problem,” Ty clarified. “We established before this isn’t a job that can be done alone.”

Zane’s face went still and he sat up, averting his eyes toward the windows. “I’ll have it together,” he said gruffly. It wouldn’t be pretty inside, but he’d deal with that when he came to it.

“What are you so afraid of?” Ty asked suddenly.

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Dark eyes going bleak, Zane didn’t know if he could explain the answer to himself, much less to Ty. “I….” He pressed his lips together and tried humor. “Afraid of embarrassing myself?”