“I"m not worried,” Ty muttered. “We"re supposed to be at the office early so they can go over all our technical shit,” he informed Zane softly, falling back on the topic of work to avoid the subject of ties and getting caught fucking a co-worker. He gave a deep sigh of resignation. “We"re so screwed, Garrett.”
“Why do you say that?” Zane murmured as their legs easily settled together. They were both still sticky and sweaty and so were the sheets, but Zane didn"t care.
Ty shrugged. “It"s one thing to play a part. It"s another to play a real person,” he said with emphasis. “Our marks know the people we"re supposed to be better than we do. And we"ll be flying solo. That backup team will be a last resort. Our only weapons are whatever we can sneak through security on the HMS Sinkytowne.” His nose wrinkled, and he sneered slightly. “It"s like a floating death trap. And my Manchester English is pretty damn rusty.”
Zane wasn"t too sure a high-class cruise liner could be called a death trap, per se, but he got the idea. Ty had probably had enough of boats for one lifetime after being deployed so many times. “McCoy also said these people haven"t ever met, and it"s not that likely they really know that much about each other. The less we try to act like someone else, the better off we"ll be,” Zane said, knowing from past experience that being yourself as much as possible while undercover made it much easier to act your way out of trouble.
“Right,” Ty murmured, humming as his fingers slid across Zane"s.
Zane poked him gently in the ribs. “Is that a „right" as in agreement or a „right" as in humoring me?”
“A little of both,” Ty drawled with a smile.
“I told McCoy that we wouldn"t back down from a challenge.”
Ty turned his head and blinked at him, nonplussed. “Okay,” he said slowly, as if expecting a caveat to the statement.
Zane frowned slightly. “Do you disagree?”
“No,” Ty answered in the same tone. “I"m just saying… we"re screwed.” He gave a laugh. “But hey, I get to work on my tan. And my accent.”
“Where did you pick up a British accent? If I didn"t know better, I"d think French Foreign Legion.”
Ty snorted and laughed. “I would look good in the hat thingy.”
He smiled warmly at Zane, but Zane knew him well enough now to see through the warmth in his eyes to the gears turning behind them. Ty was trying to find the shortest distance between two lies. “We trained with an SAS team. British Special Forces. Special task force preparedness deal. We taught each other more than battle tactics.” He began to laugh again. “Somewhere in the south of England there is a guy with a still in his cellar making Grandpa"s moonshine.”
Zane grinned, almost believing the story. Knowing Ty, it was probably somewhat true. Ty likely had trained with an SAS team and gotten them all drunk on Chester Grady"s moonshine. But Zane also had no doubt that the SAS team was not where Ty had perfected that accent. He decided to let that drop too. It wasn"t really important. “Ah, the power of a little liquor for loosening tongues. In more ways than one.”
“Just trading cultural treasures,” Ty said, tongue-in-cheek.
Zane turned his face into Ty"s bicep as he chuckled. “Did they know what they were getting when you handed around the flask? Or did you just give them the recipe and say good luck?”
“Mm. In retrospect, it"s not a good idea to get an Englishman drunk if he"s not quite unarmed yet.”
“I don"t want to know,” Zane mumbled.
“Probably not,” Ty agreed as he stared up at the ceiling, smiling faintly.
Zane relaxed further against Ty"s body and inhaled. Then he frowned and sniffed again. Ty smelled like… lavender and vanilla.
“Did they bathe you in lotion? Or rub you with cookie dough or something?” Because there was also a whiff of cinnamon, now that he actually tried to figure out the odd scents that definitely weren"t Ty.
Maybe coconut too.
“Kinky,” Ty commented. He held up his hand and smelled his bicep, shaking his head. “It"s from the massage and… whatever it was.”
“Is this that spray-on tan stuff?” Zane asked, curious, as he prodded at Ty"s bare belly and the wide expanse of skin.
“No,” Ty answered in a slightly insulted voice. He swiped at Zane"s hand and rubbed at his belly like it tickled. “I"m always this color, they just… buffed me a little,” he explained, voice shaking with laughter.
“You are not always this color,” Zane objected, sending his wiggling fingers right back to the hollows along Ty"s ribs for a moment. “You weren"t tan up to here.” His palm skimmed up Ty"s inner thigh.
Ty turned and grabbed for Zane"s hand, pushing it back to the mattress and rolling toward him. “Quit it.”
Zane chuckled and evaded Ty"s grasp, sliding his hand instead over Ty"s hip to pull him closer. “No, they did something. It looks weird. You look like—” He shut his mouth with a snap.
Ty raised an eyebrow. “Like what?”
“Ah….” Zane cleared his throat and muttered a soft curse. He was going to get shit for this. “You look like a Ken doll.”
Ty barked a surprised laugh, pressing his mouth against Zane"s shoulder to snicker quietly. He closed his eyes and shook his head finally. “I know,” he moaned as he rolled onto his back and slung his arm over his eyes.
“So, doll, what are you packing for the cruise?” Zane drawled, figuring he might as well play it.
Ty grunted and glanced sideways at Zane with a crooked grin.
“Nothing.”
Zane smirked and deliberately dragged his gaze up and down the long, tanned, nude length of Ty"s body, and he felt fresh interest curl in his belly and thought about how he would expect a man like Corbin Porter to act if the incredible man in bed with him was his and his alone. “Hmmm. I"ll have to lock you up in the cabin then. No way am I sharing this”—he ran his hand familiarly over Ty"s body—“with just anyone. Doll.”
“Oh God, you"re getting into character now, aren"t you?” Ty groaned, laughing as he stretched under Zane"s hand.
Zane groped him a bit before lifting that hand to cover Ty"s left hand and lace their fingers together. The two rings rapped together lightly, reminding him of what was coming. “You"re mine, Del,” Zane drawled, more than a hint of arrogance sharpening his tone as he took the opportunity to look over Ty possessively, not hiding it one bit. And damn if it didn"t feel good. “Just you remember that when you go showing off that fine ass around that ship in those nonexistent swim shorts of yours.” Now he could feel the laugh threatening, caused by his outrageous playacting, and he knew it had to be showing in his eyes.
Ty was watching him, biting his lip against a smile. “He"s that much of an asshole, huh?” he finally asked, his voice wavering with amusement.
“Oh doll, you have no idea,” Zane continued, one eyebrow pointing up officiously as he forced the amusement out of his demeanor, curling up his lip ever so slightly as his dark eyes took on a rapacious glint. He tightened his grip on Ty"s hand, the rings cutting in just a bit, which helped stave off the laughter. He knew he was a damn good actor, but if anyone could see through it, it would be Ty. Might as well test it now.
Ty smiled, barely restraining a laugh before he composed himself with remarkable speed. But he only managed to look at Zane seriously for mere seconds before his lips twitched into another smile and he snorted, trying not to laugh. He slapped his hand over his mouth and struggled to stay quiet. Finally, he regained control and looked at Zane once more with a somber nod.
Zane frowned at him for a long moment before rolling his eyes, because all he wanted to do was laugh too. “You"re right. We"re totally screwed.”
Ty began to laugh softly, the sound low and warm. His thumb slid across the metal of Zane"s wedding ring, and he lifted their hands and looked at the rings, one gold and scuffed from years of constant wear, one bright and silver and new. The laughter ebbed. Ty licked his lips as he examined them, and then he lowered their hands and slowly rolled into Zane, his body languid and pliable once more as he draped over him. It was a subtle but immediate change in his demeanor. Zane knew Ty was a damn good UC, which required a lot of acting. But he hadn"t known Ty had the ability to literally become someone else with just a shift of his body. He was impressed. Very impressed. And a little disturbed.
Ty nudged Zane"s nose with his and then kissed him slowly.
“We"ll be just fine,” he assured Zane in the British accent, his voice pitched just a little higher than normal. He smiled against Zane"s lips.
“You just have to own it. Believe that I"m yours and you"re mine,” he whispered slowly before dragging his teeth along Zane"s bottom lip.
Zane"s chest felt tight, more than it should even with Ty"s weight upon him. His entire body tingled with the words. He let his eyes half close, not wanting to examine the feeling too closely, and exhaled shakily as Ty"s words echoed in his ears.
“Make me believe it, darling,” Ty coaxed in the fake accent, his voice a bare whisper.
Zane closed his arms around Ty to hold him in place and tried to find the mindset he"d been cultivating all day. Corbin Porter was a self-serving, arrogant, possessive bastard who believed life was his way or the highway. It hadn"t taken Zane the whole twenty minutes of listening to him during questioning to figure that one out. What Zane worried about was how Corbin"s predictably selfish hold on Del all too easily translated to Zane"s own silent craving to keep Ty to himself…
and how his very headstrong and independent lover would react to it.
He clenched his fingers into Ty"s warm skin. “You are mine,” he asserted in that sharpened, confident-sounding drawl. “I know it; you know it. And so will anyone else who looks at you.”
“There you go,” Ty murmured approvingly, draping his leg over Zane"s hip and kissing him again languidly, the simple action simultaneously more submissive and seductive than anything Ty had ever done to him before. The effect was intoxicating, and Zane found both his body and his mind responding in just the way he figured Ty intended.
His partner had just reached new levels of manipulative evil, damn him.
When he pulled back, Ty allowed just enough room to pull Zane"s hand up and look at it. “You waiting "til morning to switch them out?”
he asked softly, the accent and assumed seductive identity gone just as suddenly as they had come.
Zane"s gaze flickered to their entwined fingers, and he stared at the rings for a long moment. Then he closed his eyes. Of all the details this case entailed, this was the one thing Zane truly resented. Yes, it was for a job, and a lot of time—years—had passed since Becky died, and it didn"t hurt like it used to, but it still… ached and felt very unfair.
He drew in a painful breath and let it out slowly before reopening his eyes. “Remind me?”
Ty looked down at the ring expressionlessly. Then he met Zane"s eyes and nodded without a word. They both knew there was nothing he could say to make it better, and it was impossible to decipher what Ty was thinking. Ty always avoided the subject of Zane"s wedding ring just as devotedly as Zane did. He gave Zane"s hand one last squeeze and then let go and rolled away, groaning softly as he got to the edge of the bed and sat up.
Zane watched him, silently grateful for how Ty handled his request. The rings were a bigger deal to him than he wanted to admit, and Ty knew that. In fact, Zane was surprised to see that Ty was still wearing his after putting it on this morning after McCoy"s order. “Are you trying to get used to wearing it?” he asked carefully. Ty would know what he was referring to.
Ty turned his head so he was looking at Zane out of the corner of his eye, still sitting on the edge of the bed. “Guess you could say that,”
he answered in a low, gruff voice that made Zane shiver. He looked down at his hand. “I put it on, and I guess my finger"s swollen. Haven"t been able to get it off.”
“Not even with the massage oil?” Zane asked with a frown. Ty just shook his head. Zane grinned slowly. “Try the lube.”
Ty snorted. “If it starts hurting or I get desperate. May as well leave it on "til then.” He was nearly mumbling as he spun the ring around his finger.
Zane wondered, not for the first time, what was going through Ty"s mind as he looked at it.
“Mind if I use your shower?” Ty asked sedately.
“You don"t have to ask,” Zane murmured, watching his back.
Ty stood, groaning again as he stretched. He glanced back at Zane and gave him a slight smile. “Got a little carried away, huh?” he said as he walked toward the door. “You"re so easy,” he added in a pleased voice as he disappeared into the hallway.
Zane snorted as he rolled onto his back and smiled at the ceiling.
Ty Grady was such an egotistical bastard, yet somehow he turned Zane on like no one else ever had. He mused over that, rubbing his ring idly, until he heard the water start in the shower. With a soft grunt, he pushed himself up and out of bed. That egotistical bastard was naked and wet. No way was he letting that pass without taking advantage of it.
Chapter 3
TY LED the way out of the elevator, walking into the tech lab with a shift of his eyes toward his partner. Zane didn"t look much different outwardly. New haircut, new earring, manicure, but he was still himself under the pricey tailored clothes. Ty couldn"t help but feel slightly self-conscious about the changes he had undergone, but he was too good at his job to show that outwardly. He hoped. Luckily, there wasn"t much of anyone at the office at seven in the morning on a Saturday. They planned to board the ship by eleven.