Not so much knitted now, brows racing toward his hairline.“Supposed?”
“Dear ole Dad is up to his eyeballs in debt and not the legal kind.”
Cam drummed a thumb on the back bar near Nic’s hip.He was picking up some of Nic’s habits too.“Someone wants to be sure they get paid,” he correctly surmised.
Nic took a long swallow of his beer, wishing he could burn this mess away in one of his fermenters.Suck the waste down the pipes into the sewers where it belonged.“I don’t want a cent of his money.They can take all of it.”
Cam glanced around.“This place in jeopardy?”
“Not a dime of his went into it but the loan sharks don’t care.They either want to use me as leverage to get Dad to pony up if there’s even any money left or they want me to make up the difference.”
Setting his glass aside, Cam laced his fingers behind his neck and paced the length of the back bar.“Nic, that didn’t look like just threats outside.”
“I know,” he admitted.
“What happens if they eliminate you?”Cam asked, the language technical, distancing.
Kill him, Nic said to himself.Vaughn could do it.Make it look like an accident or a hit.Make it appear connected to one of Nic’s cases.He was a high-profile prosecutor after all.Without any heirs.It was just a matter of forging some documents to turn Nic’s estate over to his father and, in turn, to Vaughn.Except doing so could expose the illegal loans and Vaughn’s shady dealings.A poorly kept Silicon Valley secret but a “secret” nonetheless.
“They’d rather keep it quiet,” Nic answered.“Make their threats so I pay them and make it all go away quietly.”
“I don’t like this plan,” Cam said, and Nic laughed at the familiar words.“You’re a goddamn sitting duck.”
“Now you know how I felt.”
Cam hid his fuming scowl in his beer glass.
Setting his down, Nic reached out and laid his hand on Cam’s side.“And I’m not just a sitting duck.I’m building a case.”
“On your own?”
He shook his head.“With Mel’s help.”
“Mine too now.”
He squeezed his side.“I can’t ask?—”
“You didn’t ask.”Cam drained the rest of his beer, then slammed the glass down, turning to him.“If I want to build something with you, you need to be around for it.”
“Build something?”
“Yeah, Price, build something.”He ran a hand over Nic’s chest, around his neck, and drew him into a lingering kiss.
That taste, his beer on Cam’s lips, was way more addictive than it had any right to be.Nic pulled back, breathless.“This is messier than you signed up for.”
“You were the one concerned about the mess.”
“Because all this shit...”He gestured at the brewery around them, at the parking lot and shattered glass outside, at the picture from Aidan and Jamie’s wedding on the photo wall behind the bar.“Not to mention?—”
Cam kissed him quiet, tugging his bottom lip between his teeth and tugging a moan deep from within Nic’s throat.When Cam let his lip go again, it was to start on his shirt buttons.“Exactly, not to mention,” he said, working the pearl buttons free of their holes, “I want to keep you,this, to ourselves for a while.Build it quiet, like we build a case, and when we’re sure it’s solid, then we present it.”
Nic shucked off his shirt as Cam moved on to his belt and zipper.“I like that case strategy.”
“Learned from the best.”
“You better start getting busy then.”
Cam grinned against his lips.“You set that one up for me.”
