Page 57 of A Dangerous Game
“I’m not sure if I’ll make you come. I’ll probably read the audience in the moment and make my decision based on what I think will please them all most.”
The boy’s lips twitch. “Right. Gotta please the monsters.”
“Carter…”
“What about the guy that’s coming? The really important one?”
“Vasco?”
“Yeah. What’s going to happen with him?”
“Are you asking if he’ll touch you?”
Carter shrugs. His gaze starts to crawl toward Nathan, but it doesn’t reach his eyes quite yet, lingering somewhere around his ear. “All of it, I guess. What’s the plan with him?”
“We have some information on Miller - the man I told you about that we need to take down to finish this whole thing. Todd Henley got us proof that Miller has been fucking around with Vasco’s underage son. When the party lulls, I’ll invite him into my office for a private drink and a cigar, and I’ll present him with the evidence. Then I’ll offer him an alliance.”
“And you think he’ll go for it?”
“I’m hoping so.”
“Will I be there? In the office?”
“I don’t plan on it. I plan on bringing you back to the bedroom and leaving you there, at least for the meeting, hopefully for the rest of the night. But if he requests your presence, I won’t tell him no.” Nathan gives in to his urge to reach for Carter then, placing a hand on his knee. The boy flinches, but he doesn’t move away. “He won’t touch you, Carter. Not sexually.”
Carter looks down at the hand on his knee. “Should he?”
Nathan sighs. “Carter, we’re not discussing that again. I told you where I stand on sharing you. I - I fuckingcan’t, okay?”
“He’s so important, though…”
“It doesn’t matter.”
“Just... promise me that you’ll do it if he gets upset. If he seems slighted or - or if he demands it or something, just - you have to, okay? I can handle a fucking blowjob, Nate. If it means this is all over. If it means me, and Casey, and all the others are safe, I can give some asshole a blowjob.”
The mere thought is enough to turn Nathan’s stomach, but he knows this boy is too stubborn to drop this. He’ll just be damn careful not to give Vasco any sort of idea that it’s on the table. “Okay. I promise. But it’s a last resort.”
“Very last,” Carter agrees. He finally looks at Nathan then. His blue eyes are watery. “Will Casey be at the party?”
“No. He’s not well enough yet.”
“Good. That’s – that’s good.”
“We do need to prepare you for one thing.” Nathan’s lips quirk. This is possibly the one thing he isn’t fucking dreading about tomorrow. Maybe something he’s even a tad excited about. Well… as excited as someone can be when the particular circumstances are taken into account. “You haven’t been outside since you were taken, have you?”
Carter frowns. “I - well, no. I don’t… not really? Just traveling from the auction house to that car, and the car to the plane, I think? And, well, the plane to this place too, I guess.”
“Good.” Nathan pushes off the bed and grins. “Want to go, then?”
Carter blinks. And blinks. And blinks some more. “Go… outside?”
“Yes. The party tomorrow is outside. Did I not mention that?” Nathan’s grin widens, the man looking impossibly sexy in his happiness. “I thought we should bring you out tonight, so you’re not distracted by it all tomorrow and accidentally misbehave.”
“Bring me out? Like… outside?”
“Yes. Outside. Into nature. Well-” he frowns. It’s about as sexy as his grin, which makes Carter want to, like, punch him right in his stupid sexy mouth. “As much as my compound’s yard can be considered nature, that is. Wedohave a garden.”
Outside. Nature. A garden.