When the Dead Speak by Bailey Bradford (books to read to increase intelligence txt) 📗

Laine’s laughter brought Sev’s shaft to attention. “That should be, uhm, entertaining, to say the least, but tell him I’ll bring them even if I have to cuff ‘em and drag ‘em in.”

“Entertaining?” Sev felt his forehead scrunch as he thought about what Laine meant. “Do they not get along or something?”

“Or something.” Laine laughed again and murmured something to Rich. “We’ll be there after we finish at my place and get Rich a room. You be careful, all right?”

The way Laine’s voice had went warm and low there at the end had Sev feeling like he’d drunk a bottle of champagne. Light and bubbly, and a little woozy as well.

“I will. You, too.” Sev disconnected the call and peered over his shoulder at Zeke and Brendon. He wasn’t going to turn around until his erection was under control. As hard as he was, that could take a while.

“Here.” Sev tossed the phone to Brendon and, in what he considered a very mature manner, ignored the laughter from the two men. “I think I’ll just go lay down for a while.”

Their laughter echoed down the hall as Sev headed to the guest room, tempting him to laugh at himself, too. Then he thought of Laine, and the police officer who had stalked him, obsessed about him for years, and Sev discovered that he didn’t need to go wait for his hard-on to abate. It withered immediately as fear chased off his good mood.

* * * *

Once Rich had stowed his bags in the hotel room, Laine led the way to Zeke and Brendon’s, Rich behind him in his sporty little car—Laine had warned him that car might get beat to pieces, but Rich insisted on driving himself—and Matt pulling up the rear in his truck behind them both. He wasn’t surprised that they hadn’t found anything new today, other than what they thought was McAlister’s escape route. It could have been a deer trail. Tracking wasn’t one of Laine’s talents, and Rich and Matt didn’t fare any better at it, either. McAlister had either covered his tracks with a skill Laine lacked, or he’d taken a different path away from the house.

A conversation he’d had with Rich after Matt had left the office kept niggling at Laine’s brain. It was a little thing, and didn’t have anything to do with McAlister, but it puzzled Laine nonetheless. He’d wondered about something Rich had said and had finally worked up the nerve to ask him about it. Laine let the conversation replay in his mind, trying to nail just what was bothering him.

“How’d you know?”

Rich had looked up at Laine’s question, seeming puzzled since it came out of nowhere.

“How’d I know…what?”

“You said you knew about me and Conner before he was murdered.” Laine had watched Rich’s cheeks darken, his gaze turning from Laine to stare off in the direction of a clump of scrub. Rich had tucked his hands into the pockets of his slacks and studied the ground, toeing a rock like a nervous kid before finally answering.

“I just did. I saw y’all out once, at a basketball game.” Rich had shook his head. “There wasn’t anything obvious, really, I just knew. And when Conner… Jesus, Laine, I’d have had to be blind to miss the pain in your eyes. I never heard a whisper of a rumor before then, but I knew.” Rich had turned, and Laine had wished he could read the man as well as Rich had read him. “I wish you had told me. You could have, you know.”

The conversation had seemed almost surreal, and it bothered Laine that he felt like he was missing something there. He thought about Rich’s expression, the look in his eyes and felt a flicker of guilt. Rich was trying to tell him something, and Laine wasn’t sure he wanted to hear it.

Or maybe he was letting his imagination run away with him. Laine mulled over it until he pulled into the bumpy drive leading to Zeke’s place. As soon as he saw Sev standing on the porch, sandwiched between the two bigger men, everything else faded into the background. He’d worried that he’d feel awkward with Rich and Matt being around his lover for the first time, worried that he might not be able to keep from reverting to the stoic, private man he had been.

Yet as soon as Laine saw Sev, he knew Sev was the most important thing in his life, and he wouldn’t be able to pretend otherwise, ever. The smile on his lover’s face was enough to do that, and the sweet look in his big, beautiful eyes had Laine’s heart filling to overflowing. Laine got out of his truck and hadn’t taken two steps before he had one sexy, hard man leaping at him, arms wrapped around his neck and lips pressed to Laine’s. Nothing had ever felt so perfect before, and Laine knew he’d fight with everything in him to keep this feeling and this man for the rest of his days.

* * * *

“That was…an experience.” Sev stood on the porch with Laine, Zeke and Brendon having gone back inside after Rich and Matt had left. Saying dinner was an experience was being polite. Rich and Matt had bickered and sniped at each other throughout their meal. Once, Sev had thought they would come to blows when Rich had made a comment about Matt tampering with reports, but Laine had calmly and authoritatively shut both men down. Sev had been sporting a decent hard-on ever since.

Laine’s gaze seemed to be riveted to the tail lights of the departing vehicles. “Yup. Those two remind me of a couple of tomcats thrown together in a pillowcase. Guess they just rub each other the wrong way.” Laine paused, one big hand massaging the small of Sev’s back. “I’ll admit, I was worried about how they’d handle seeing you,