Zane grunted in comment as he walked around the edge of the bed. He sat and pulled up his legs, leaning against the headboard and crossing his legs at the ankle. “It"s awfully imprecise. We could have skipped our appointment or been late and it could have been someone else up there.” His voice was steadier now, almost back to normal.
“Which proves two things,” Ty said with a frown. “Whoever did it isn"t in a hurry to kill us—them—whoever they"re trying to kill. And they"re not afraid to hurt innocent bystanders doing it. My bet"s on Armen. Anyone who likes to drink as much as the Italian can"t be sober often enough to plan ahead.”
“Not necessarily. If you"ve got tolerance, alcohol might sharpen your attention, not blunt it.”
The comment brought Ty up short. He"d been joking about Lorenzo Bianchi and his love of wine, an off-handed comment he probably shouldn"t have made. But Zane"s sincere belief in the words he"d just uttered disturbed Ty enough that he wasn"t able to keep the surprise and concern out of his expression. Zane just offered a shrug and a rueful smile.
“Is that really what you think?” Ty asked, unable to help himself.
Zane"s brow creased a little. “Yes. Everyone reacts to alcohol differently, just like drugs, just like injuries. Depends on how you handle it, what you let it do to you. Why?”
Ty realized he was staring at Zane slightly agape, and he quickly pressed his lips together. He shook his head sadly. The reasoning seemed very… self-serving for an alcoholic. He didn"t want to argue with Zane just then, so he nodded and looked away, determined to let the thread of conversation die a natural death. He moved toward the bed, pulling his damp shirt over his head and casting it aside as he sat in the general location of the end of the bed. He examined the scar on his hand. His ring finger was beginning to swell even more. He was never going to get the damn ring off. He might actually need to have it cut off soon.
“I"m sitting here trying to think of a creative way to yell at you for scaring the shit out of me, and nothing"s really coming to mind other than fucking you against the shower wall until we both feel better,” Zane said from behind him, his tone calm and conversational.
Ty nodded distractedly. “I do need a shower,” he commented in a voice to match.
Zane shifted his weight to climb off the bed and moved toward him, reaching out one hand. When he glanced up, Ty was surprised to see the intense look in Zane"s eyes. His fingers brushed over Ty"s skin, but they flinched after a firm rap on the stateroom door.
Ty looked up at Zane and smiled gamely. Zane glanced to the door and back to Ty, clearly considering ignoring it until there was a second knock, louder than the first. Zane huffed and stalked across the room to unbolt the door and open it just enough to look out.
Ty watched tensely, hands loose near the gun he"d stashed under the mattress earlier, and hunched over so he could grab it quickly. He couldn"t see or hear their guest, but he wouldn"t put it past Zane to growl at them to go away so they could proceed to the shower as planned.
“Unless you"re hiding a cart with cold beer and cookies, go away,” Zane growled at whoever was out there.
Ty laughed softly and shook his head. He lay back, leaving the gun safely under the mattress, rolled on the bed, and stretched out on his stomach, surprised by the adrenaline still coursing through him. He hadn"t almost died in a while. He wasn"t handling it well.
Zane exchanged a few more words with the person on the other side of the door before shutting it firmly and shooting the bolt. “We are now top of the treat list,” he said wryly as he walked back to the bed.
“The ship, if not the world, is ours on a platter.”
“Great,” Ty replied without enthusiasm. “What else is on that damned itinerary?”
“Too many other extreme sports for my liking,” Zane muttered as he sat on the edge of the mattress and started rubbing Ty"s neck with one hand.
“What would be the point in disabling Del or Corbin at this stage?” Ty posed as he stared listlessly at the balcony doors.
“Nothing other than removing them from the equation,” Zane answered, twisting a little to use both hands to knead Ty"s shoulders carefully.
“Thank you, Sherlock,” Ty said with a small smile. “I meant why.
Have we stumbled into a business takeover, do you think?”
Zane stayed quiet for a minute as he massaged, his fingers firm on Ty"s skin. “You mean Armen trying to take over.”
“Or Bianchi,” Ty said with a nod.
“I suppose it could be us—the Porters—trying to take over, and one of the others is simply striking first,” Zane suggested as he kept up the massage, moving more to Ty"s shoulders and upper arms.
“You"re much better at that than the last lady,” Ty mumbled distractedly.
The warm hands squeezing and rubbing kept moving in smooth circles and slides. “Porter does seem the type to try a takeover,” Zane mentioned, continuing the conversation as if Ty hadn"t said anything.
“An enterprising thug. Bianchi… well, my first impression isn"t one of aggression. Armen is dangerous.”
“Right.” Ty sighed heavily, closing his eyes and concentrating more on Zane"s hands. He had long fingers on big hands, and he spread them across Ty"s skin expertly as he massaged the muscles bunching with tension. First the fingers would dig in and knead until it was almost painful, but then Zane would let up and start soothing the area with long swipes of the heels of his hands, gently shooing the discomfort away.
Ty realized he was letting Zane divert him from the slightly more important issue they now faced. He raised his head and turned it, resting it again so he was facing Zane. “You"re getting distracted,” he accused.
The corners of Zane"s mouth pulled up slowly, and the smile echoed in his eyes. “Am I, now?” he drawled, dragging his fingertips down Ty"s back.
Ty shivered violently, then rolled and reached up to knock Zane"s hand away. He miscalculated where he was on the circular bed, though, and his shoulder hit the edge of the mattress and he went toppling over the edge with a flail of his arms and an abbreviated yip.
There was silence for a brief moment, and then Zane"s head appeared to look down at him.
“Haven"t you had enough of that for one day?” He didn"t sound particularly amused. Ty sat up, rubbing the back of his head and glaring up at his lover balefully, as if it had been Zane"s doing. “Don"t look at me,” Zane said as he shifted in place, still up on the bed. “This one you did to yourself, dumbass.”
“I hate this bed,” Ty muttered as he sat on the floor dejectedly and examined his abused hands. He couldn"t be bothered to get off the floor.
“Come back up—” Another knock interrupted Zane. He climbed off the bed with a grunt, trudged to the door, and opened it much the same as before.
Only this time he immediately pulled the door further open so the room service cart could be pushed in to their table. The staffer made herself scarce—no telling if she"d heard about the crazy morning—and Zane locked the door behind her.
Ty had to stretch his neck to watch him over the edge of the bed.
Zane busied himself with the tray, smiling down at the plates he uncovered. “Hey, get your Tylenol and come eat,” he said. “Then I have liquid relaxation for you.”
“Garrett, come over here,” Ty requested quietly.
Zane turned his chin to look at him, his brow furrowing slightly, but he walked over to where Ty still sat on the floor and stopped, waiting with a questioning look.
“This floor is surprisingly clean,” Ty told him pointedly as he gestured to the lush carpet at Zane"s feet.
“Should I interpret that as „bring me a sandwich and a beer", or as
„get down here and kiss me"?” Zane asked as he crossed his arms and looked down at his partner.
Ty just smiled wistfully, a part of him wishing he didn"t have to beg Zane to get down there and kiss him. He held out a hand. “Help me up,” he muttered instead. Zane took his hand and pulled him up obligingly. Ty patted him on the arm and moved past him, toward the cart and the array of food and drinks. He"d only just picked up a bottle of beer when they heard another knock on the door.
“Oh, this is just getting ridiculous,” Zane muttered.
Ty shook his head and popped the top on the beer anyway. “I got it,” he said as he waved Zane off and shuffled barefoot to the door. He opened the door wide, assuming that whoever had tried to kill Del was sneakier than a gun to the face in the doorway of his suite.
He was right, but what greeted him was almost as alarming.
Norina Bianchi flung herself into Ty"s arms as soon as he"d opened the door, accompanied by a rush of foreign babble and her smiling husband. After a tight hug, she leaned back, patted both his cheeks, and then hugged him again. She sounded worried, and Ty gathered the pair had learned of his mishap on the rock wall.
“Yes, I"m fine. Come in,” he invited, flustered as he tried to gently extricate himself from the woman"s arms without spilling beer on her.
He heard Zane"s voice from behind them. “Signor Bianchi, please come in. I"m going to guess your lovely wife heard about Del"s grand adventure this morning.”
“Ah, yes,” Bianchi said as he shooed Norina out of the doorway so they could all get inside and shut the door. “Here she comes, flying into the cabin to go on about a big excitement in the sporting center.”
Norina was still talking rapidly to Ty, her beautiful face undergoing a dramatic series of frowns and worried expressions. Ty was pretty good with languages and could upon occasion pick up what someone was saying from knowledge of similar languages or even the meanings of root words he recognized. But trying to decipher any of what she said when she spoke it at Mach 7 was impossible.
He smiled in amusement, suddenly finding the situation incredibly funny. He reached out and took one of her delicate hands in both of his and patted it. “Slowly please,” he requested with a glance at Zane and a wink. “Corbin doesn"t speak the language nearly so well as he pretends.”
“Oh!” Norina exclaimed as she looked at Zane with wide, dark eyes. “I must apologize! In my excitement I forget myself.”
Ty practically sighed in relief. She spoke English. Now he just needed to convince her to continue to do so even when his fake husband wasn"t around.
“No apology needed, Signora,” Zane said pleasantly. “Won"t you come in and sit down? We just ordered refreshments for the afternoon.”
“I told my Norina you would be… comforting each other,”
Bianchi said knowingly. “After such a harrowing experience. But no, she needed to see your Del for herself.”
“They said you had fallen,” she told Ty as she put both hands on his chest and gazed up at him. Ty didn"t know if it was because she was Italian, because she knew he was gay and therefore “safe” to grope, or if she was just the touchy-feely type, but he really wished she"d stop touching him quite so freely.
“It was a minor accident, not nearly as bad as the rumors, I"m sure,” Ty assured her as he plucked her hands off his chest and steered her toward the sitting area and the other two men.
“As you see,” Zane said as he filled glasses from the bar with ice,
“Del is up and about, doing just fine.”
“Yes,” Bianchi commented, looking over the cart from room service. “And you ordered a drink from room service to settle your own heart, no?” he said, indicating the shot of whiskey.
Ty raised one eyebrow at Zane. He"d forgotten about the glass.
He wasn"t fond of whiskey, but he didn"t think Zane knew that.
However, Ty didn"t know if Zane had ordered the shot for Ty or for himself.
Zane waved a nonchalant hand at it as he poured tea. “Would you like some tea? Or there"s beer, and I believe we have a selection of sodas in the bar fridge and a couple bottles of wine besides.”
“We had wine with lunch,” Norina said, stepping back from Ty slightly but moving to hold his arm as they walked to join Bianchi and Zane at the table. “I will have tea, please.”
“Tea. Bah. I will have the beer if it is not American,” Bianchi said as he pulled out a chair, looking ready to make himself at home.
Ty had to hold back a sigh. No more massage for him. But this was why they were here, he told himself, to get information from these people. Not to get laid repeatedly by his partner in a luxury suite. No matter how much that appealed.
Chapter 7
BIANCHI was in high spirits when he joined Zane, Armen, and a few other players in the private lounge. He also carried high spirits—
literally. He had a hinged wooden box, and once he set it down, he pulled out an ornate blue and silver bottle and cradled it in the crook of his arm.
“Gentlemen!” Bianchi greeted expansively. “I come bearing a gift, bought specially with our American friend here in mind.”
Zane looked from Bianchi to the bottle and back, and his stomach turned. “A gift for me?” he asked, forcing pleasant surprise into his voice.
“You have told me how you so enjoy the premium Chivas, yes?
So I have brought you your own bottle of Regal Royal Salute—
although I shall insist you share,” Bianchi said, clearly very pleased with himself.
Zane silently swallowed on the upset welling in his throat, trying hard to deny he was feeling even the slightest bit panicked. Apparently Corbin Porter had a penchant for fine Scotch whiskey, and damn, Chivas Regal Royal Salute? That was fifty-fucking-year-old Scotch, and only a seriously limited number of bottles had even been made.