Love in the Land of Fire, Brochu, Rebecca [best free novels .txt] 📗

in the chair in front of the place setting. Rafe tries to protest, tries to take his place on his knees beside the chair but Josiah stills him with a firm hand on his shoulder. He makes short work of gathering the laid out plate, going to the kitchen, and returning with a plateful of the food Rafe had prepared. He’d mainly chosen things like the cut cheeses and fruits the other man had prepared, things that could be eaten by hand and weren’t terribly messy.

He puts the food down and then urges Rafe to stand so that he can take his place in the chair. When the submissive once again tries to kneel Josiah stops him and instead maneuvers him around until he’s sitting comfortably in Josiah’s lap. It’s awkward at first because neither of them is small by any stretch of the imagination, but they shift around for a moment and finally find comfortable positions.

Josiah picks up a square of cheese and places it against Rafe’s lips. He waits patiently for Rafe to take it from him, careful of his teeth, and lets himself smile at the sight of his sub eating from his hand. They sit in silence, Josiah alternating between feeding Rafe small bites of food and feeding himself.

It’s not actually perfect. There are still too many things that need to be dealt with, but Josiah thinks that maybe it might be one day. That it has the potential to be the best thing that’s ever happened to him.

4Chapter Eleven

They have three days of blissful peace before it all comes crashing down around them. They have three quiet days that they spend learning bits and pieces about each other, not doing any scenes just getting truly comfortable with one another. It starts when Josiah undocks his p.a.t.c.h and sets about filling out the paperwork that will bind them into a contract. Rafe will have to file a second set as soon as Josiah’s is accepted and processed, but Josiah wants to get things underway as quickly as possible.

He signs off on the documents with a bit of a flourish and then keys in his personal identification code to verify its authenticity and presses send. For a moment things go as planned, the screen showing its customary request that he wait a moment while his file is processed but then it cuts out. The page that’s normally pale beige in color turns dark blue and tiny white text scrolls its way across the top.

Bad idea, Vanguard. It wouldn’t be wise to file that at the moment. Information packet in route and will arrive on an encrypted chip in three…two…one…

Josiah starts when the chime at his front door goes off at the same time the countdown that’s obviously Gar’s doing hits one. He’s on his feet and moving, p.a.t.c.h laying abandoned on the couch, hand reaching out and plucking his pistol off of the side table, which has not been far from him at any time since this all started, and creeping cautiously towards the door. He waits for a moment but the chime doesn’t sound again so he moves forward silently and keys up the visual screen to look outside. The small screen shows him nothing but he’s still cautious, fully aware that peepers, the small cameras that serve as peepholes, are easily fooled.

He flips the lock on the door and then eases it open all of the way with a booted foot, making sure that he’s otherwise hidden from view. Nothing happens. There’s no shuffling on the other side, no one tries to enter, and there’s no sign that anyone’s there at all. Weapon still in hand, Josiah ducks a quick look around the doorframe and sees only a small box, black lacquered and beautifully carved. Feeling vaguely foolish Josiah lowers his weapon and steps over the threshold to bend down and scoop the box up in the palm of his hand before heading back inside.

He flips the lock on the door and walks back to his chair. The still blue screen of his p.a.t.c.h blinks up at him mockingly.

Understandably paranoid, Vanguard, but I told you it was coming. Open it and if there are any questions…well, I’ll find you before you find me…Skirmisher out.

Josiah scowls at the screen that’s now showing his normal personalized menu for a moment and vows silently to try and beat an actual sense of humor into Gar the next time they see each other. He rolls the black box around in his hands for a moment before he makes up his mind. Rafe’s still asleep so he’ll have plenty of time to go over whatever it is that Gar has sent him. He opens the box, pulls out the data chip that’s inside and inserts it into the port on the underside of the arm cuff that acts as the dock for his p.a.t.c.h.

Immediately the screen turns black and then document after document pops up, showing Josiah just how much information Gar has compiled in a relatively short amount of time. His stomach is uneasy because he knows that Gar would have only included things that were important, things that stood out. For there to be so much on that small data chip is actually a bad sign. Still it’s something that has to be done, something he has to do in order to get to the bottom of what’s going on, so he picks up his screen and pulls one of the documents up to full size with a flick of his fingers.

The document turns out to be a death certificate and the name on it causes Josiah to breathe out a low curse.

4Miguel Zweil died almost ten years ago, the apparent cause being suicide, something that Josiah doesn’t believe for a moment. There’d been such affection in Rafe’s eyes