Gavin didn’t know much about Marcus’s past, but he felt all warm and tingly staring back into his eyes.
Placing the cap back on the bottle, Gavin quickly tidied up his workspace.
“So? How was your day?” Marcus asked, raising an eyebrow at him.
Shrugging his shoulders, Gavin flopped back down, sitting on one of his legs.
“It was fine, I guess. Played pool with Ace, listened to Damian go on about his three-day trip to Vegas, where he discovered the joys of getting pegged. Apparently,Nikolai turned him on to it? Are they a couple or something?”
Marcus chuckled.
“No. Nikolai is the badass Russian who works security at the bar. He’s engaged to his long-time love, Reid. Nikolai is just…sexuallyadventurous, let’s say.”
That made sense. Gavin got the feeling that being a member of the Shadow Vipers opened the door to a pretty adventurous sex life.
Was Marcus the same way? Did he normally spend his nights and weekends balls deep in some floozy or whore?
Suddenly, Gavin wanted to murder every last one of Marcus’s sexual conquests.
What was he doing? He barely knew the man and was already getting jealous of the man’s sexual past? Grow up.
Looking back up at Marcus, he continued.
“Tried to get embarrassing stories about you out of Blade, but the man is surprisingly loyal to you. If he weren’t married to your bro, I would have thought he had a hard-on for you.”
“Did you ask him about the time I beat his face in when I found out he and my brother were screwing? Tossed him out of his motel room in his underwear. Even then, the guy didn’t fight back.”
“Yeah, it’s a nice little cult you got going on at that bar of yours.” Gavin chuckled, leaning back into the plush sofa while he tried not to mentally undress Marcus with his mind.
“You hungry? I can barbecue us up some steaks,” Marcus offered.
Gavin gave him an unimpressed look.
“Oh yeah. You’re not a carnivore.” Gavin nodded in agreement. “Fine, I’ll fire up a steak for me and grill some nice carrots and zucchini for you.” Marcus stood and hiked up his joggers, which were slung low on his hips.
He made his way around the sofa before he leaned down just inches from Gavin’s face and whispered, “Go check inside your room.”
Gavin turned and looked up at him, confused and a tad suspicious.What was the man going on about?
Slowly, he got up from the sofa and walked down the hallway toward his room. Once he reached the door, he turned the knob and slowly peeked inside.
Sitting in the center of his bed was a brown wicker basket.
What the fuck?
Gavin stepped into the room and made his way over to the bed.
And then, his heart stopped.
Swaddled in a dark-blue fuzzy blanket was the cutest little black-and-white border collie he had ever seen. The puppy’s eyes slowly opened, and his nose began to twitch as he sniffed the air around him.
Gavin let out a squeal, then carefully reached into the basket and pulled out the puppy and the blanket at the same time.
“Oh my god! You are so cute!” Gavin squealed, hugging and squishing the little creature into himself.
Rushing from the bedroom, Gavin quickly ran into the kitchen, where Marcus was seasoning a steak at the counter, and slapped a kiss on his cheek.
“Whoa!” Marcus chuckled, appearing caught off guard by the sudden gesture.
