“No.”
“No one has. Ow!” Luca glared at Honor. “What was that for?”
“You’re bein’ rude,” she said in a loud whisper.
Luca rubbed his arm, frowning as he continued to talk to Carson without looking at him. “If you find anything suspicious, call Brantley. You need his number?”
“No. He’s my cousin. I’ve got it.”
This time, Luca did look up. “Oh, holy shit, Carson. Good to see you, man.”
Carson nodded. “You, too.” He turned his attention to Honor. “You slummin’ it with this guy?”
“Sometimes,” she said sweetly. “Keepin’ it on the DL.”
That might’ve been the case yesterday, but Carson knew their secret was now out. And since the Anderson girls had spent most of their lives pampered and babied, not to mention protected by a horde of male cousins, there was a good chance there would be a riot once that news dispersed.
Carson mimed sealing his lips and locking them. He wasn’t the gossipy type. A trait he’d acquired because he had his own secrets he preferred to remain out of mainstream media.
“You can respond to that number if you’ve got questions,” Luca explained. “It’s mine.”
“Will do.”
Within minutes, Carson was back in his van, heading out of Coyote Ridge. The trip to Manor took about twenty minutes, taking the backroads. Since it was Saturday, traffic was light, but he figured that wouldn’t be the case once he got to town. He did a lot of work in and around Coyote Ridge, and that included Manor, so he was familiar with the somewhat small town. Before he became a master electrician, he’d worked for a company that went out of business when the owner stopped paying his employees. After that, he decided to take the reins of his career and venture out on his own. Now, with his master electrician’s license, he was slowly building a clientele that was primarily based on word of mouth. Business was steady, but that was due to the fact that his biggest client—Alluring Indulgence Resort—was currently in the process of expanding.
Familiar with the area, Carson managed to check off two businesses on the list in an hour, but he spent most of that time talking to business owners in adjacent buildings. Word was spreading that there were people in town looking for a man, and interest was increasing. People were as talkative as they were nosy, which wasn’t boding well for completing his task.
It also didn’t help that his panel van had the name of his company emblazoned on the side, and people were hesitant that he was a salesman. Twice, he had to reassure the owners that he wasn’t there to do electrical work in the area.
As he was coming back to his van after spending ten minutes with an overly chatty old man, Carson saw Slade and Atticus walking out of one of the businesses across the street.
As soon as he saw them, his feet froze on the asphalt. A familiar sensation buzzed in his veins. Arousal consumed him, but it was mixed with something else. Jealousy? If so, it was different from the jealousy that fueled his idiosyncrasies. That particular emotion drove him to watch guys he dated fuck other men. But in those cases, he liked the feeling of being left out.
This, not so much.
This felt different.
But what was he jealous of? Slade? Atticus? Both of them?
Not that it mattered. He wasn’t going to act on whatever it was he was feeling. It was one thing to spend the night between the sheets with one of them, but he never allowed himself to think of having something more. He didn’t deserve more. His kink made it impossible to think about a future with anyone. Slade was the one who’d actually made Carson realize that. Watching Slade fuck other men had become an obsession, and it had ultimately ruined anything he could’ve had with the man.
And Atticus … Carson was doing his best not to draw him into his depravity. Atticus deserved better than that, just as Slade had.
It was a good thing Atticus was leaving for six weeks because Carson feared if he were to stick around, he’d find a way to fuck this up, too. And watching them as they walked side by side, he knew exactly how he would do it.
His thoughts shot from PG to XXX in a flash as Carson imagined Slade and Atticus together, skin to skin … while Carson sat back and watched.
That right there might possibly be the hottest thing Carson would ever witness in his life.
Chapter Nine
12:50P.M.
The tension was building.
JJ could feel it.
Sonny was growing more agitated with every passing minute. For the past half hour, JJ had watched as Molly talked to him. She wasn’t sure whether Molly was simply clueless or if she just didn’t care that whatever she was saying was inciting the man. With Molly, it could go either way. She definitely wasn’t the sharpest tool in the shed.
