You really think he’s going to shoot you?
No. Mainly cos he hadn’t noticed I was in his way yet.
Then he did and his gaze latched on to the healed slash on my torso, skating lower down my abdomen to where Jake’s posh joggers hung low on my hips.
His nose flared. “I have always been around men. Good and bad. Clothed and naked—especially in military barracks. But I have never seen anyone how I see you.”
A different heat threatened the rising frustration simmering in my blood. It took all my focus not to shove him onto the bed. “I didn’t know you were a real soldier.”
Viktor shrugged. “For a while. My employer rescued me from...” He searched for words. “From a terrible place. In return, I learned the skills he needed in his operation, and the military was the best place to do that.”
“How long did you serve?”
“A few years under an alias. Then I became what I am now—what Sergeant Whitlock would call a mercenary.”
Viktor whole-naming Folk caught me off guard. He saw and a frown flickered across his face. “Is how I met Folk. In Syria, many years ago. You did not know this already?”
Shock barrelled into me. Then genuine hurt. Folk didn’t talk about the wars he’d fought as a marine commando and an SBS operative, for obvious fucking reasons, but this shit? If Viktorwasn’t taking the royal piss, I was going to have words for my old friend.
“Ah. Now you are offended?”
“Fuckoff.”
“You keep saying this. I wonder what would happen if I tried to leave without you.”
“You know what would happen.” I spoke absently, my voice distant, my head elsewhere. In fucking Syria, with one of my oldest friends, and the only bloke on earth who made my heart combust every time he looked at me.
Viktor touched my face. “It was a long time ago.”
“What was?”
“When I met Folk. And it was brief. I did not see him again until he rode with the Crows.”
“I don’t give a fuck about that. Where are you going?”
Viktor blinked, as if he’d forgotten he was going anywhere. He let his hand drop. “To see if I can still do something we may need in the near future.”
“And what’s that? Cos if it’s rowdy gangster shit, I really do need a kip before I’m down for that.”
“It is not rowdy.” Viktor closed the drawer behind him. “You may sit down the whole time and enjoy the view.”
Wariness warred with curiosity. “That could be you base jumping without a parachute while I watch.”
“It is not.”
“Is it so hard to just fucking tell me?”
Viktor leaned in and caressed my cheek with a featherlight kiss. “Come, Asher. Where is the fun in that?”
[ 17 ]
VIKTOR
Jake:Be ready, my brother
The cryptic message I’d deleted burned a hole in my brain. Like the phone I’d stuffed in my pocket, knowing it would now become a third limb until whatever battle Jake waged was over and the next one began.
It was a long way from fun. And according to Ranger’s horror-struck expression, such things were nowhere to be found when we reached our destination either.
