Total pages in book: 77
Estimated words: 71212 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 356(@200wpm)___ 285(@250wpm)___ 237(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 71212 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 356(@200wpm)___ 285(@250wpm)___ 237(@300wpm)
I glanced at my phone. Sure enough, his missed call was right there. “Shit, I haven’t really been paying attention to the phone. Got everything you needed?”
“Yeah, and I picked up the donuts you were talking about yesterday.” He opened a bag and pulled out a box of glazed donuts, shining like a first-place trophy in his big hands.
I breathed a sigh of relief and covered my face with a hand, shaking my head. “Gabe, you saved the day. I totally forgot about that.”
He gave me a wink, and I nearly toppled over from the sheer force generated by his butterfly-wing eyelashes. “It sounded like you really needed them.”
“I did. They’re for tonight’s game.”
“Game?” he asked, crossing his arms and leaning back on the kitchen island. Gabriel was an ex-Marine and built exactly like you’d expect from a man whose training involved flipping truck tires and running up mountains with weights strapped to their shoulders. He had ox-like shoulders and a strong chest that looked like it would make the most comfortable pillow in the entire world.
“Yeah, drinking game,” I explained. “We don’t just read books, we also get drunk and read each other.”
He cocked his head. “Read? Each other?”
“Yes. Like playfully insulting each other. Have you never—forget it. Just be ready to get that cowlick of yours called out.”
Gabriel’s eyes opened wide. He put a hand to the back of his head and tried—in vain—to press down the wild swirl of hair. I couldn’t help but smile. Something about him was endearing, even though he seemed genetically closer to a brick wall than a human being. He was all knotted muscles and firm jawline and strong brows and big, shiny lips framed by the shadow of a recently shaved beard, and his—
Snap out of it.
I made myself focus on grabbing the box of glazed donuts. Truth was, Gabriel was exactly my type. Tall and muscular and a little rough around the edges, just enough to make him interesting but not to cut anyone getting too close. This was only his second week living with me, and he was already picking things up for me at the grocery store, something that I doubted was listed under his responsibilities, but he still did it anyway.
But I wasn’t in the position to even think about dating anyone. I had to look inward before I started gawking outward. Besides, he was here to do a job, not to date me. I couldn’t just assume he wanted me as badly as I wanted him, and I wasn’t in the mental state to deal with rejection.
Nope. Not happening.
“Alright, I’m hopping in the shower,” Gabriel said, peeling off his socks and bundling them in his hand. My eyes dropped to his feet for a moment. Sexy, well taken care of, perfect just like h—
Ah fuck, this is gonna be hard, isn’t it…
2
GABRIEL FERNANDEZ
I got into the bathroom, dropped my shorts, and took off my shirt before turning on the shower, making the water steaming hot as I stepped inside.
When my good friend Zane called to tell me about a new job offer he had, I said yes before he even finished explaining. I’d been in a rut. I worked as a private bodyguard, and before that, I did a short stint as a police officer. I was having trouble figuring out what the fuck I wanted to be doing in my life, so Zane’s offer came at the perfect time.
I packed up my bags and moved to New York City, where his agency was headquartered at.
I spent two years training with him alongside the other guys he had brought in for his new “Elite” division. Zane was one of the best detectives in the business. Learning under him gave me the confidence I needed to take on Tristan’s case. I’d already worked a few others before this (saving a famous actor from an unhinged stalker, protecting a senator after he received some horribly homophobic threats), but Tristan’s case felt like it had the highest stakes yet. If I could keep him safe and solve who the hell was behind these killings, then I could be saving more than just one life.
It wasn’t going to be easy, though. Not at all.
I’d already met with local law enforcement and tried to get everything they had on the case, which amounted to a whole stack of nothing. Next, I went to the FBI, an organization that wasn’t exactly well-known for being open and forthcoming with what they had.
It was another dead end. Frustrating but not case-ending. I would just need to start from scratch. So I compiled a list of the victims first and tried to pull a common thread through them: all of them were gay, not all of them were single, some were women and some were men, and each one was found to have died at exactly midnight from being injected with a rare and complicated mix of deadly chemicals. The victims were then placed in the bathtub with the sink faucet left on. An odd touch that appeared to be some kind of calling card from the killer, but why?