From Sanctum with Love (Masters and Mercenaries #10)(12)

Jared sobered, sitting back. “I know you did. And as for the membership, I will very likely need it. There are a bunch of books in this series and Pierce Craig is featured heavily in all of them. Given the strength of the box office from Fifty Shades of Grey, there’s no reason this can’t become a big franchise.”

Jesus, Ian was going to kill Serena at some point. “I don’t even know what to say to that.”

There was a negligent shrug from Jared. “I think it’s important to get into character. I’ll be hanging around Sanctum and McKay-Taggart a lot.”

He was curious about a few things. Since he intended for all their interactions to be professional from now on, it was best to get curiosity out of the way up front. “How exactly did you figure out I could be your mentor? I don’t advertise my status. There’s no social media page proclaiming my sexual proclivities.”

“Because you hid them so well when we were kids? Yeah, not so much. I knew you were always interested in this kind of stuff. You kept bondage magazines under your bed. I never told Mom by the way. Was it Ms. Hanford who got you into it?”

He felt himself flush. Only his brother could do this to him. If anyone else had asked, he would have explained quite calmly that his first sexual experiences had been with the woman who lived next door. He’d been seventeen and Alicia Hanford had been twenty-one and fresh out of college. She’d rented the two-bedroom next door. Their mother had insisted they call her Ms. Hanford. It was only polite and she was an adult. Kai had called her hot. She’d been a stunning redhead and yes, she’d been the one to introduce him to D/s. She’d taken him to his first club and shown him that all those cravings he had could be put to proper use in the right setting. She and the rest of the lifestylers had made him feel like he wasn’t some freak for wanting what he’d wanted.

Still wanted.

Only his brother had the power to make him feel like a pervert. “Yes. She was a lovely young lady, but our interests diverged.”

“She was a top, too,” Jared surmised. “She’s still in the scene in Seattle. She’s married to her sub. They seem very happy. She speaks fondly of you.”

“Why the f*ck would you talk to her about me?”

“I do it for the same reason I’ve kept up with you all along. Because you’re my brother. Well, after I had the money to do it, I kept up with you. You might not give a shit what happens to me, but I needed to know you were all right.”

“How can I not know what happens to you? I go to any grocery store and there you are on the cover of every magazine.”

Jared’s face lit up and for a second he was the same kid who’d begged and prayed for a bike at Christmas and cried when he’d gotten one.

Because Kai had told his mother to spend what she would have spent on him on Jared. Because he’d sacrificed for his brother.

“I know. Isn’t it cool?” Jared said with that sunny smile of his. “Not the tabloid crap. That’s all bullshit by the way. I did not almost break up Brad and Angelina in Cannes. I barely spoke to them. But the cover of Men’s Fitness was awesome. I had to do some serious work on my deltoids to make that happen.”

Kai nearly rolled his eyes. He somehow managed to maintain a bit of professionalism. “So did you hire a PI to track me?”

The smile faded. “I have someone give me an update on you from time to time. I think the work you’re doing here is amazing. I talked to Frank Cross and he says it helped him.”

“How the hell do you know Frank?” Frank was an Iraq war vet who had suffered from terrible PTSD and depression after he’d lost an arm to an IED. He’d been in Kai’s program for over a year and then moved back to his family in California.

“He works on the Dart set now. He’s a consultant.”

“That’s a big coincidence.”

“Not really. I offered him the job. I interviewed him because he knew you and then I offered him the job because he was a good man and he deserved good work. He’s consulting on weapons but he’s also learning how to film. We got him a camera set that doesn’t require two hands. You’re not the only one who can help.”

“Apparently.” What was his brother doing? He tried to look at the problem from an intellectual standpoint. It was time to take off his anger hat and remember what he did for a living. “You do understand why you’re doing this.”

“What? The film? Because they are paying me a mega shit ton of money, the script is good, and I’ve honestly been looking for a part that shows off my glutes. I’ve worked hard on them. I’m naked like half this film.”

Yep, his brother was an exhibitionist. “No, I meant stalking me.”

It was Jared’s turn to roll his eyes. “I’m not stalking you. I’m very reasonably checking in on my unreasonable * of a brother.”

“Yes, I’m the *. Of course. Look, this stems back to your childhood. You always got everything you wanted. I’ve walked away. I don’t give in to your demands. Naturally you want to control the one thing you couldn’t. Me. It was also why you slept with my fiancée.”

“Are you serious? I got everything I wanted? Do you think I wanted to get the shit kicked out of me on a daily basis in high school? Do you think I wanted to be orphaned at the age of sixteen?”