One
“Move in with me.”
Four words that should have resulted in amazing sex round two.
Not that Cam had ever uttered those words before, but from what he understood, they usually brought a couple closer, including a celebratory tumble in the sheets. Perfect as he and Nic were already there, naked and sweaty from amazing sex round one.
Nic’s understanding, however, was apparently not the same as Cam’s. He stiffened in his arms one second and scrambled out of bed the next. Levering up, Cam braced a hand on the mattress and watched the giant cypress inked on Nic’s back sway with his mad dash to the bathroom.
“Never known you to run from an argument, Counselor!” Technically, they hadn’t been arguing, but Cam knew the start of one with Nic as well as he knew the other man’s taste. Arguing was what they did best, even better than sex.
“That’s not what I’m doing,” Nic hollered over the running water.
Cam flopped back onto the bed, staring at the ceiling. “Sure as fuck could have fooled me.” A warm wet rag slapped his face, and when Cam pulled it off, it was to the sight of Nic lowering himself onto the bed beside him.
He waited for Cam to finish wiping off, then took the rag and tossed it aside. He stretched an arm over him, planting it in the mattress on the other side of his hip, icy blues staring down at him. “I’m not running.”
“You told me your rental is getting demo’d and you’re getting kicked out, which thank fuck because that place should have been torn down ages ago.” Aside from its proximity to the brewery Nic co-owned, the run-down duplex made no sense for Dominic Price, federal prosecutor and son of a real estate mogul. “Seeing as you’ve been here every night for four months, I made the logical suggestion that you move in.” He flung an arm toward the door. “And then you bolted like the sheets were on fire.”
“I’m leaving for San Diego.”
Shock propelled Cam up to seated again. “You’re what?”
Nic leaned back just in time to avoid a head-on collision. He folded his arms, lean muscles taut as they bisected the myriad of tattoos painting his torso. “The US Attorney down there is taking paternity leave. They need someone to cover.”
“And you volunteered?”
“No, they asked me.”
Cam scooted back against the headboard, letting it hold him up as his world spun faster than he was equipped to handle at this hour.
It was a great opportunity for San Francisco’s best Assistant US Attorney—getting out from under his asshole boss here and taking the reins of an entire operation there. Major problem for Cam, though, who after a year in the Bay Area had only recently begun to feel at home, in no small part due to the man beside him.
Anger and hurt bested professional goodwill. “Bullshit you’re not running.”
Nic inched closer, laying a hand on his thigh. “You’ll be safer if I’m not here.”
“This is about your father,” Cam surmised.
Nic’s diverted gaze confirmed as much. Curtis Price, once a Silicon Valley real estate tycoon, was drowning in debt, and last spring some of his lenders had come after Nic, looking to collect despite the decades’ estrangement between father and son.
Cam covered Nic’s hand with his own. “You said we would do this together.” Nic had promised to let him help with the investigation.
“The case, yes.”
“But not the moving-in part?”
“The case part has to come first.” Nic turned his hand over under Cam’s, lacing their fingers together. “I won’t put you at risk.” He was holding something back. The former SEAL trying to protect him, the FBI agent.
Growling in familiar frustration, Cam tried to yank his hand free. “I can take care of myself.”
Nic held on tight. “Yes, you can, but I won’t paint a bull’s-eye on your back.”
“Think it’s a little late for that. Besides, things have been quiet lately.”
“And I mean to keep it that way,” Nic said. “Us moving in together? Not quiet.”
“I’m not going to stop digging whether you’re here or in San Diego.”
