Finn shrugged as he started to walkbackward toward the main house.“You know you love me too much toshoot me.Now, I think I will take your suggestion and go make aphone call to my beloved and get him pissed off about something.”With an exaggerated waggle of his eyebrows, he turned and walkedback to the house.
Sam leaned his head back against thetree.He had been coming out here every night to beat the shit outof the heavy bag in an effort to tire himself out completely andallow him to sleep.When that stopped working, he had added anafternoon session.He had never suffered from insomnia before, butit sure as hell was plaguing the shit out of him now.His mind justnever seemed to switch off.
He would have come out here in themornings, too, but Glenn had taken that time slot as his own, anddamned if Sam was about to deprive his friend of that time.Glennhad been the victim of a guy who’d worked for the construction teamon site.He’d made it appear that he and Glenn had indulged in aone-night stand when in fact the guy had pretty much date-rapedGlenn.It had been Glenn’s spotter Maddox who had walked in on thetwo of them the next morning.
Without waiting for an explanation,Maddox had acted like the hotheaded bastard he was and left CTFalmost three months ago.Maddox had left under a cloud ofmisunderstandings, but according to Glenn, he had called and nowknew the truth.
But Maddox didn’t come back, and Samthought that the damage his leaving had done to Glenn might neverbe fixed.Sam knew that neither Glenn nor Maddox had acted on theconnection that had been obvious between the two of them, but hehad always thought they would end up getting together once all ofthem were out.Now he wasn’t so sure.
He grabbed the gloves he’d dropped tothe ground and headed back to the main house.He had attendedenough psych lectures in his time to know that his insomnia mightbe caused by significant life stress.Leaving the military afterhaving almost lost his life on more than one occasion and sufferinga slight case of PTSD might do it.Or it might be the emotionaldiscomfort of that combined with the environmental changes of notbeing shot at on a daily basis.Or hell, it might well be acombination of both.
But what he refused to acknowledge asa potential reason for the insomnia and resurfacing of thosechildhood memories was the reappearance in his life of one darkhaired, green eyed bomb disposal expert and his tall, blond, hotcounty sheriff.
Nope.They had nothing to do with it.All he had to do was get his shit together and get the hell overthem.
It!
It, he had to get the helloverit, notthem.
Shit.
ChapterTwo
“Babe!”
“Kitchen!”Aiden yelledout in answer to Nick’s shouted query.Deefer had signaled Nick’sarrival when he’d driven into the driveway of their rental propertyso Aiden knew his lover was on his way.As always, when Nick walkedinto the room, Aiden was filled with a sense of pride that thistall, hot, alpha as hell man was his.Nick’s eyes warmed when hesaw Aiden standing by the kitchen cabinet and walked straight tohim.Aiden knew what was about to come, and it was the highlight ofhis fucking day.
Without a word, Nick wrapped a handaround Aiden’s nape and pulled him in for a kiss.As with mostthings Nick did, he took control, claiming Aiden’s mouth with hisown and adding just enough pressure to have Aiden melting into theman.Christ, he could kiss!
When Nick pulled back with a groan, hepressed his forehead against Aiden’s, and the two of them took acouple of quick breaths.“Damn, Aiden,” Nick said with a sigh.“Every time I come home and kiss you, it’s like the firsttime.”
Aiden grinned and pulledback slightly.“I know what you mean.Although, Idoremember the firsttime you kissed me.”
Nick grinned back.“Me, too.Iremember the fact that you broke my nose just after it,too.”
“Well, it served youright.You don’t get to yell at me, and call me a fucking idiot andthen get to kiss the hell out of me and expect any otherreaction.”
“In my defense,” Nick saidas he wandered over to the fridge, “you had just scared the fuckout of me, and I thought you and Deefer had just been blown to helland back.”
At the sound of his name, Deefersidled over to Nick and was welcomed with a pat on his head and apiece of cheese Aiden hadn’t yet been able to get Nick to stopfeeding the dog.
“He and I had it all undercontrol, and stop feeding him cheese!It’s spoiling him, and he isstarting to turn his doggy nose up at the ordinary dog food hegets.”
Nick laughed as he handed Aiden one ofthe beers he’d grabbed then moved to lean on the kitchen table.“That dog has faced too many life and death situations in hislifetime and saved more lives in Afghanistan than any one unit Iwould suspect.I think he should be on a steak and caviar diet forthe rest of his life.”
Aiden turned to look at his dog andchose to ignore the hangdog expression on the chocolate lab’s face.“I think he might agree with you.And although I, too, think he isworthy of more than some kind of processed dried meat, it is whatthe vet says is best for him, and I for one want him around for aslong as possible.”But that didn’t mean that Aiden didn’t slip thedog a cut or two of whatever protein he and Nick would be eating.Aiden had lost count of the number of devices that dog had foundduring their time in combat, including his own.
The two of them worked together tofinish getting their dinner ready, before sitting down to eat.Thiswas something that Nick insisted on.Every day possible, the two ofthem were to sit down together for dinner.Not in front of thetelevision, but face to face and talk about their day.For Aiden,coming from a family who only communicated by shouting at eachother before resorting to physical violence, this had been a littleodd at first, but now it was something he looked forwardto.
“How was work?”Aidenasked, and realized this was one of his favorite parts of the day.Sharing the good and bad parts of his day with the man he loved, hedidn’t think it could get better than that.Unless a certain Marinewere sitting with them of course.
Nick sat back with a sigh.“They thinkall those fires are being set by the same person.”
“The ones you were talkingabout a couple of days ago?”Aiden asked.“Do they have anyleads?”
Nick shook his head.“Not a thing.They guy is either too damn good, or just that lucky.He hasn’tused a consistent MO, his accelerants change, the description ofstrangers in the towns don’t match, but they are just too regularand occurring in an almost zigzag across the country for it to becoincidence.I reckon he or she will either come through here, orstrike here at some point.”
Aiden couldn’t stop his heart fromstuttering a little, or that damn tendril of dread from unfurling alittle within him put down his glass.“Has he killedanyone?”
