FIVE
Wherethehellis he?I paced the living room and used my passcode to unlock my phone and read the text message Kit had sent me earlier.
Need to grab a few things. Will be back around ten for our meeting.
I checked the time on my phone again. Then my watch. Both were the same. It was already five minutes to eleven, and there was no sign of him. I rang his phone again, but the call went straight to voice mail.
“It’s Sullivan,” I said. “You should be home by now. Are you in some kind of trouble? Please call me as soon as you can.”
I ended the call and stalked to his bedroom. The bed was neatly made, and the pillows were fluffed. In the two days since he’d moved in, he’d been making himself at home. He’d made the bed look pretty with several layers of bedding. The duvet on top was unsurprisingly gray and pink with a fluffy black-and-gray cat on it. Several pillows and throws were strategically placed in the center of the bed, and on the floor, he had laid a gray rug with sparkles on it.
I walked to the closet and opened the door. His meager clothes were still in there. He meant to come back, then. Where the hell was he?
My phone rang. Liam.
“Hey, did you track him down?”
“I haven’t been able to trace him. His phone’s off, so no help there. I’m sure he’ll be fine. Give him another hour.”
“I don’t have another hour, Liam. Time is money, and if I call a meeting for ten, I expect him to be here.”
“He’s still getting used to our operation. Don’t go scaring him off when he gets back. You know damn well that we need him more than he needs us.”
“It’s things like this that create situations, Liam. We have to be able to rely on each other, and if he’s not going to abide by the time, then—”
A car drove up and stopped, too close for it to be the neighbor’s. I crossed the room to the window and stared out. Kit hopped out of the cab. Today, the boy was dressed in a catsuit that was transparent except for the V between his thighs. He turned toward the driver, and my stomach flipped. An artificial black cat tail curled up between his ass. When he bent and took out several shopping bags, the tail bobbed up and down on his round ass.
“Sullivan? You still there?”
I cleared my throat. “Yeah, you don’t have to keep searching anymore. He’s here. I need you to work on a tracking device for him.”
“On it. Let me know how it goes.”
I barely registered Liam hanging up. The cab driver had climbed out of the vehicle and was helping with Kit’s bags. The boy beamed a smile at the older man. Was he flirting?
The front door of the house opened. I strolled out of Kit’s bedroom and followed the tingle of his laughter into the hall. Kit was kissing the older man’s leathered cheek. The man’s face was red, but he was smiling at Kit. So it wasn’t just me, then. He had that effect on the people around him.
“Thanks so much, Bentley. I appreciate it.”
“You’re welcome,” the man said, then glanced up and saw me. He backed away. “Have a good day.”
“He’s such a nice man.” Kit closed the door and turned toward me. “Uh-oh, I think someone’s upset.”
“You’re late.”
“I’m sorry. It took longer to get a cab than I’d thought.”
I shoved my hands into my pockets. “You have to learn to respect my time. If you know you’re going to be late, next time, will you call me? I hate waiting, and I’ve been waiting for over an hour.”
“I couldn’t call you because my phone battery died. I got a new one just like you said I should. I didn’t buy a laptop, though, because I wasn’t sure which one to get. Maybe you can help me choose?”
He looked up at me with such an earnest expression on his face I sighed. Being mad at him was useless.
“Fine, we can do that tomorrow.”
He clapped his hands. “Sully, you’re the best. Can you help me bring these to my bedroom? I bought so many things, but don’t worry. I found a thrift shop where I got a good deal on most of these.”
He scooped up a few of the bags and marched toward his bedroom. It would have been petty to leave them in the hall, so I grabbed the remaining bags and trailed after him. When I entered the bedroom, he raised a leg with a strappy heel on the foot. An empty shoebox lay on the floor. How the hell had he gotten them on so quickly?