When Brantley crawled into bed beside him, Reese turned his way, found him in the dark. Their mouths melded together, tongues exploring as the temperature in the room soared. And when Brantley urged him onto his stomach, Reese went willingly, eager to feel him, to be one with him.
“I love bein’ inside you,” Brantley breathed against his neck. “Let me have you, Reese.”
“Always.”
After some preparation, Brantley twined their fingers and pinned him to the mattress, pushing in deep, filling him slowly. Reese relaxed, accepting Brantley inside him, loving how perfect he felt with this man. Complete. Whole. Something he’d never known before. Not until Brantley.
They moved together for long minutes as the pleasure soared to a crescendo.
Brantley nipped his shoulder, his voice nothing more than a rough whisper. “I’m gonna come, Reese. Oh, fuck.” He grunted and groaned, then rocked into him one final time.
When Brantley pulled out, Reese rolled to his back, gripped his cock in his fist, and jerked roughly. Brantley’s hand slid up his thigh, his finger brushing his balls, and Reese lost it. He came with Brantley’s name on his lips.Chapter FourteenMonday, November 23, 2020By the end of the day Monday, Brantley was feeling the pressure and no closer to finding Jody Henderson, or any of the others, despite the effort they’d put in for the past three days.
Brantley and his team had talked to people who knew the victims or came into contact with them due to their routine, going over the case files, which were surprisingly detailed without having much information at all. He was even able to have a sit-down with the FBI’s special agent in charge of the case but hadn’t learned much of anything from her. He got the feeling the feds didn’t play well in the sandbox, and since Brantley’s team was above and beyond law enforcement, at least in the great state of Texas, they seemed overly irritated that he was pushing so hard for a resolution.
Which was why Brantley decided to forgo the FBI and the police department and run his case independent of both. He took what data he could, had JJ weed through it to pull out the pertinent details, then they started knocking on doors. Residences, businesses. They visited every place these women had frequented, never finding any that overlapped between them.
Thanks to a preliminary deadline set based on what Detective Collins had told them, they were running out of time.
Because they’d exhausted their efforts where visiting friends, families, and co-workers were concerned, Brantley decided to send Trey and Baz back to Coyote Ridge. No sense paying a hotel expense when they could sleep in their own beds. Rather than use the jet, they set out mid-afternoon, adding a couple hundred miles to the odometer of the rental car. A text from Baz had confirmed they’d just made it back and he was heading to HQ to look in on JJ, see if she needed anything.
Brantley wasn’t an idiot. He knew Baz had far more interest in his best friend than merely her well-being. Then again, because of that interest, Baz was likely more concerned about her. There was no denying he was glad to know JJ had someone looking out for her. Someone who was not that douchebag Dante Greenwood. Considering that idiot couldn’t look out for his own damn self, he was of no use to JJ. Baz, on the other hand, was proving to be worth his salt.
Now, as Brantley sat on the hotel bed, leaning against the headboard, legs out in front of him, he added a few things to his to-do list for JJ, hoping with Baz and Trey there to help her, she could dig a little deeper into these women’s pasts. At some point, they had crossed paths with the same man. The question was when and where. Once they figured that out, they would be that much closer to finding them.
“I was thinkin’ we could take a couple of hours to relax. Meet up with Z and RT for dinner.”
Brantley looked up, processed Reese’s words. “Your brother?”
“Yeah. He happens to be in town right now. I thought it’d be good to introduce you.”
“You remember I went to high school with him, right?”
“Right.” Reese appeared hesitant, as though Brantley’s statement had been a refusal to go to dinner.
Brantley dropped his feet to the floor, stood. “I’m happy to have dinner with your brother. What about your sister? And your mom? You wanna see them while we’re in town?”
“Thought about it,” Reese said, grabbing his boots to pull them on. “But they’re in Tahoe. Girls’ trip. Skiing and gambling, my mother said.”
“Well, that’s too bad. For us. For them, it sounds like a good time.”
“My mom’s not a big gambler and she hates the cold. If I had to guess, they’re holed up in a cabin, sitting in front of a fire, and enjoying a break from the real world.”
