Brady turned toward him, looking wrung out, and Eric, not minding the others, ventured close enough to brush his cheek with soft knuckles. “Don’t worry. I’ll be back in a couple hours, tops. You get some sleep, and we can talk more tonight.”
Brady nodded and yawned and wandered in after Ernie. It was on the tip of Eric’s tongue to ask why Brady wouldn’t nap in Ace and Sonny’s room—they seemed perfectly open with all their meager possessions as it was.
But then he thought of how very private the two men were, and of how much Ace seemed to give of himself already.
They had so little, he thought, eyeing the stain on the carpet that nobody wanted to talk about. The least he could do was give them their privacy.
“You good to go home with Ernie?” Jason was asking the ethereally beautiful Cotton. “I have some stuff to do at the base tonight before I take you home for school.”
Cotton, who had pulled out what looked like a college student’s backpack and school books, smiled at him with disappointment in those angel’s eyes, but no recrimination. “I don’t need to go back tomorrow,” he said. “I can hang out for a couple of days to make sure there’s enough of you all left when this is over.” He said it lightly, but there was an undercurrent in his voice that said he really meant it.
“Oh ye of little faith,” Jason returned. “You know, before you nursed me back to health, I was something of a badass.”
Cotton snorted. “Oh, I know it, Colonel Constance. You’re still a badass. But you need to make sure you keepmybadass lead free, if you know what I mean.”
Jason’s snort of amusement wasn’t a match for the tenderness on his face. “I’ll make it a priority, Angel. Go study to pass some tests, okay?”
Cotton’s smile was pleased. “I’m good at it,” he said, as though it surprised him.
Their kiss was so painfully intimate, Eric had to turn away.
IT TURNEDout Ace, Sonny, and Jai reallywereelbows deep in work—and George was writing up invoices and making calls for parts.
But that didn’t mean Ace and Jai didn’t appear vastly relieved to be outside and doing something with their hands as opposed to in the house, thinking of ways to get a phone out of a locked police station.
Burton and Jason hopped in Jason’s cherry red Maserati and spun around the garage, exiting on the hardpan driveway while Eric swung into the auto bay to get Jai’s keys.
The three men glanced up, and an expression crossed Ace’s face that was very clearly a warning. Then he spoke loudly to Jai, clearly for the benefit of a cop that Eric could see waiting at the driveway exit, probably for a ride somewhere else.
“You got that cop’s car fixed up?” he asked. “I want that shit out of my garage.”
“Da—is almost,” Jai said, before spitting. “But he had better pay up.”
Ace growled. “He’s trying to hide the damage to his oil pan from the sheriff. I suspect this’ll be out of pocket, ’cause otherwise they got a place to take their crappy Ford Explorers.”
From the pit came the echo of a long, weighty string of profanity, and Eric grunted.
“I was going to venture into Palm Springs for some groceries,” he said, and Ace caught his eyes and nodded.
“Pizza,” Jai said. “Four giant pies. At least three all meat. Cotton is the only vegan here.”
Eric startled, and then realized that, hey, they all had to eat. “I’ll make the fourth with olives, mushrooms, and artichoke hearts,” he said a little dreamily. “And garlic.”
Jai shrugged, obviously baffled. “If you want to ruin a good pizza, that is your problem.”
Sure enough, another SUV swung just enough off the road to let people pass, and the cop got in. They roared off, and Eric murmured, “He’s gone.”
Ace said, his voice normal now, “You need some green?”
Eric shook his head. “Nope. You and Ernie have been feeding us for two days. Our turn.”
“Fair,” Ace said, and then frowned. “Jai and I were thinking maybe you should switch out his car—we put in some registration for it with your name.”
Eric opened his mouth in shock. “In two hours?”
“They have software and a printer,” George said from the booth. “It’s like being the secretary to James fucking Bond.”
Ace grinned at him. “It was sort of a Christmas present from Burton and Jason,” he said. “I had a guy out in Barstow, but it was a helluva long way to drive when we were giving out vehicles so fast, you know. And we never knew when they were coming back.”
