Isla rolled her eyes and tapped the papers together. “Would you believe he’s only forty-one?” she said, shaking her head.
Taylor baulked. “Fuckin’ hell, he’s had a hard paper round.”
“Hard life of raping and boozing, more like. I interviewed him in prison not long before he was released. His name came up in connection with the Reuben Atkinson incident in Falkington.”
Taylor went cold, because the name, and the man that wasReuben Atkinsonwas not someone he could think about without the image of Samantha’s dead body flashing through his mind. He shivered.
“Sorry,” Isla said, her grip tightening on the bundle of papers. “Sylvester was cleared, anyway. He was in prison at the time of Atkinson’s attack. Just a rogue DNA hit that came up after we examined his swabs.”
“Right,” Taylor said, running his tongue over his rapidly drying lips. “I’ll just… Yeah.”
His eyes went to the floor as he slipped into the little side room that contained the intoxilyser machine. Johnny was already mid-way into explaining the procedure when Sylvester opened his legs and started rubbing himself over the top of the foil blanket. Taylor frowned, because he could safely say that he’d never seen a beta actthathorny before. Like he was in heat, or rut.
“For fuck’s sake,” he said, pointing to the huge, dusty machine. “Look, pal, you just blow into the fucking tube and the machine tells us how pissed you are. Got it?”
Sylvester sneered. “Yeah, I know howww it fuckin’ works, piggy.”
Johnny sucked his teeth, reaching towards Sylvester and clamping his thumb and forefinger around his jaw. “What he said.” He squeezed Sylvester’s cheeks as Taylor pulled the plastic tube towards him. “Now simmer down and pucker up,sweetheart.”
To absolutely no one’s surprise, Sylvester had been way too drunk to be interviewed, so he and Johnny had thrown him straight into a cell. Now they were in the cloakroom, bagging up their stinking uniforms after scrubbing themselves raw with a hosepipe in the yard.
Taylor pulled a spare shirt out of his locker and yanked it over his head.
“Peace offering,” he said, reaching back into his locker and grabbing the chicken tikka baguette that he’d bought at the petrol station earlier that morning.
He poked Johnny in the cheek with it. Johnny eyed it, frowning as he looked at the bite marks at one end.
“It was the spiciest thing they had,” Taylor continued. “Buuuuut…” Rummaging around in his locker, he pulled out a bottle of hot sauce. “Here,” he said, peeling back the bag and splashing it onto the sandwich.
Johnny huffed, his mouth twitching. “Thanks,” he replied, leaning forwards to take a bite. He chewed before pulling a clean shirt over his head. “So, are you going to tell me where the fuck you’ve been?”
Straight in for the kill.
Taylor nibbled his lip, eyes turning glassy. The locker room really did need some TLC, because the paint was peeling and the carpet had come away from?—
“Taylor,” Johnny said, tapping him across the nose with the baguette. “Stop spacing out. I asked why you didn’t come home.”
Taylor cleared his throat, trying to look at the wall, but was blocked by Johnny getting all up in his face. Eventually he settled on staring at the tiny divot in Johnny’s chin, the one that made him look like a Roman sculpture.
“Because I didn’t want to,” he replied quietly.
Johnny sighed, taking the hot sauce out of Taylor’s hand before placing both it and the sandwich into his locker. He hooked both hands over Taylor’s shoulders. “Why not?” His voice was quiet and cautious.
Taylor shook his head. “Because I didn’t… want… to see what I’d done to you. Fuckin’ hell, dude. It’s embarrassing, okay?”
Johnny licked a fang. His tongue was all pink and wet and kind of looked like he’d been salivating. “How is it embarrassing? You were clearly stressed and I?—”
“Because I fucking bitched you, JP.” He shivered as he said it, because it was a word his dad used to use. “I chewed up your scent gland again. I acted like one of those goddamn alpha-holes that think they can bite omegas just to get what they want. It’s fucking illegal. I bet your wolf was going berserk.” He was whisper-shouting, and he toed the door closed so none of the others could hear.
Johnny’s hand drifted to the marks on his neck. They’d mostly healed but Taylor could still see the indents running down the cord of his throat.
Suddenly, Johnny shoved him into the wall, one hand splayed over his shoulder. “Do I look like I’ve beenbitchedto you, Tay? Does it look like you’ve made me into a dribbling, stuttering mess?”
Taylor tipped his head back against the wall and looked up at the halogen lights.
“Look at me,” Johnny growled, hand flying out to grip his chin.
He pressed a knee between Taylor’s thighs, one hand gripping his hip to stop him from getting away and—no, Taylor wasnotgetting a weird feeling in his balls. He was absolutely,notfinding it difficult not to bury his face in Johnny’s neck again, and he wasnothaving inappropriate fucking thoughts.
