Love and Let Die (Masters and Mercenaries #5)(98)

Ten glanced Charlie’s way, sitting back in his chair and giving her a little wink.

Yes, it was going to be a very long flight.





“What the hell is going on, Sean?” Ian closed the small curtain that separated the cabin from the kitchen.

If Sean was intimidated by his very dark voice, he didn’t show it. It sucked because it was the same voice he used to use on his kid brother to get him to do his damn homework. No one was intimidated by him anymore.

“It’s time to kill Nelson. I’m coming with you.” Sean set down his bag. “Everyone has scattered. Li and Avery are going to our safe house on the East Coast and Jake and Adam are taking Serena, Grace, and Carys to the west. Alex and Eve are headed to Canada.”

Sean was smart enough to not say more. Ian didn’t care that Ten had watched his back on multiple occasions or that Damon Knight had been one of his mentors when he first started working. No one needed to know the locations of his team. No one. Alex and Eve were making their way to Toronto where they would fly to Saint Petersburg on Canadian passports and visas that allowed them to sight-see. They would report back on Denisovitch’s movements.

But he’d meant to keep his brother out of this. “You can’t come with me. You have a kid.”

“And you have a wife. I don’t see what the problem is, brother. Grace has always known that if you went after Nelson, I would go with you.”

“She’s not my wife. Not really.” But the words sounded stubborn and dumb even to him.

His baby brother’s eyes rolled in frustration. “You can keep saying it but I hope like hell you wake up before all this is over. Nothing you say is going to get me off this plane. Adam worked up my visa and I managed to get a bunch of shots. What’s up with that? Can’t Nelson pick a country with less contagions?”

He didn’t have time for Sean’s complaints. “I can have you hauled off this plane.”

“You could try. You might even succeed, but I’ll hop the next flight to India and I’ll be on your doorstep a couple of hours after you get there. Don’t think I can’t find out where you’ve set up shop. Adam might be afraid of you, but Serena craves my enchiladas. Who do you think wins that war, big brother?”

Ian’s fists clenched in frustration. “I don’t want you hurt, Sean.”

“And I don’t want you dead.” He stepped up, leaving very little space between them. “I know you are always going to see me as your snot-nosed kid brother. I know that deep down you’ll think you’re responsible for me until the day you die. And I know that I haven’t done the one thing I should have done for all those years you treated me like a brat kid and bossed me around.”

Fuck, he didn’t want to have it out with his brother. He’d spent the last year and a half trying to make up for choosing Sean over Grace when his brother had asked him to protect the woman he loved. Sean couldn’t know how much the distance bothered him, how much he missed his brother. “What is that, Sean?”

Sean put a hand on his shoulder, his face grave. “Thank you, brother. You didn’t have to take over after Dad left. You could have watched out for yourself but you took over and made sure I had what I needed. Don’t think for a second I don’t know who bought my birthday presents or made sure I had school supplies.”

Ian looked down at the man he’d raised. There was six years between them. It didn’t seem like much now, but when their father walked out on them, Sean had only been ten and then it was a chasm. Their mother had been depressed and barely functional. He’d had to grow up at sixteen. He’d had to take control. He remembered that first night when he sat waiting and hoping that his father would come home. And then he’d gotten up the next morning, begged his mother to get out of bed so she could go to work. She’d stayed in bed for a month. He’d gotten a job working after school until midnight at the local grocery. His childhood had been over. “It’s not a big deal, Sean.”

Sean shook his head. “It’s a big f*cking deal, Ian. I know our relationship has been strained, but I’m done with that. I love you. I admire you. If anything happens to me and Grace, you should know that we’ve left Carys in your care.”

That shocked the f*ck out of him. “I thought you would leave her to Alex and Eve.”

“No. It was never even a thought in our heads. You’re her uncle and I happen to know that you’re damn good at raising a kid. I hope like hell you get your head out of your ass and start raising some with that crazy bitch in there because she is your match, man. Charlie is everything you need.”

Somehow he didn’t mind his brother calling her Charlie. It bugged him when other people did it. Charlie was his name for her, but when Sean called her that it was an acceptance, a brotherly front. But he didn’t want to think about this right now. He wanted to live in the damn moment for once in his life. “I’m not kicking her out.”

“Ian, you can’t honestly believe she’s here to hurt you. What does your gut tell you?”

“My gut was wrong before.”

“No, it wasn’t. You said you knew something was wrong with her. What does your gut say now?”

“My gut isn’t in control. My cock is and my cock doesn’t give a shit. Do you understand, Sean? My cock doesn’t care that she could have slept with Nelson. She could roll out of his bed and into mine and my cock would be ready to go. I don’t care that she might have slept with half the syndicate, that she had her father killed, that she nearly got me and Li killed. I don’t care. I just want to get inside her again. If you told me this had all been a lie, that she was walking me into a trap, I would probably go into it willingly because I don’t know that I can survive losing her again.”