“Yeah.” The ones he watched die.

His Adam’s apple bobs with a hard swallow. “It doesn’t really sink in for a while. Weeks, sometimes months.”

Is that what this is? Is it finally sinking in? I thought it already had, back in the shop the day I finished Bobby’s tattoo. It would make sense, this utterly wretched sadness taking over. But then there’s that news from Bobby today.

I fill Sebastian in on everything I learned before he got there. He simply listens, his thumb rubbing back and forth over my thigh casually. Affectionately.

“What do you think it means?” Can Sebastian hear the shake in my voice? The twinge of fear?

He sighs, pushing my hair off my face, his gaze drifting along my features. “I think it means your uncle got involved with people you want nothing to do with.”

“I just wish I could remember something useful about that night. I keep hoping I’m just going to be hit with a detail that I somehow overlooked. Something that will help catch them.”

“You can’t put that pressure on yourself. You aren’t responsible for what happened. It had nothing to do with you.”

“But what if they come back? What if—”

He cuts my question off with a deep kiss, surprising me. With a slow roll, I suddenly find myself lying on the mattress, with Sebastian’s arm crooked beneath my neck and his mouth on my neck, his scruff scratching my skin but in the most seductive way—half ticklish, half torturous.

“I won’t let anything happen to you. Just listen to me next time.” His voice is low and gravelly, much like last night. I can feel him growing hard against my thigh.

And I’m overcome with relief that he’s not mad at me anymore. That I haven’t completely screwed everything up with him today, being so mule-headed.

“Because you’re a ninja?” My fingers tug at his soft T-shirt until it bunches in my hands.

I catch the smirk on his face as he lifts himself up enough to pull it over his head, uncovering that body I’ve come to love so much. “No, because I know how to keep people alive.”

“Don’t forget that I’m not paying you.”

His smirk widens into a full smile, watching me as I slide my own shirt up over my head. “Don’t worry, I haven’t.” He’s already zoned in on the front clasp of my bra. He pushes the button and the material springs off.

He’s resting on an elbow now, peering down at my bare upper half, his index finger trailing over my arm. “What do these mean?”

“A lot of things.”

Dark eyes flash to me. “Like what?”

“Like . . .” Do I want to tell him? I’ve been asked that question by many people before, including Amber, and I’ve never given the complete truth to anyone.

He looms over me, waiting.

“Like that one there.” I nod to the one he has his finger on—a classic weight scale with a tiny woman perched on one side, raised high while the empty side hangs low. “It means I’m nobody’s burden. I can take care of myself.”

A flicker of softness catches his eyes. “That’s important to you, isn’t it?”

“Yeah. And this one”—I tap the mask that Ian did for me last year in Ireland—“is my mask, that I like to wear to keep people from seeing how I’m feeling.”

“And this one?” One by one, I describe each and every piece of ink on my arm. It’s been a seven-year process beginning on my eighteenth birthday. Well planned out, each component my own design that I handed to a trusted artist—there are very few of them—to etch into my skin.

Each piece deeply personal to me.

“This one?” Sebastian’s strong, large hands sweep over the beautiful woodland fairy that dances along my rib cage on my right side.

“That’s Iridessa, my fairy godmother. Ned used to tell me that she’d watch over me while I was sleeping. For years, I believed him.” That was one of my first pieces. Ned did it for me.

Sebastian’s long fingers trail along the bramble of ivy and sharp thorns that runs along my pelvis. “And this?”

That anyone who wants past it is going to have to work for it and accept a few wounds. “What do you think it means?” I say instead.

His hand slides past it, down the front of my leggings and into my panties. “That it doesn’t apply to me.”

Completely unabashed by how wet I am right now, I close my eyes and turn toward Sebastian, finding a corner of that thick, strong neck of his to lay my mouth on, tasting just a hint of salt on his skin. I love the taste of Sebastian, I decide, as I fumble over his belt buckle and zipper, quickly unfastening them so I can wrap my fist around him.

I groan in protest when his hand suddenly disappears, but I soon realize it’s only so he can pull my leggings down, over my hips and thighs. I help him, kicking my legs until they work their way down to my boots. They won’t get past those.

“I’m stuck,” I whisper.

“Are you?” He lifts his head to assess the situation, smiling a touch, before his gaze rakes over me and his hand lands between my legs once again.

I reach up to pull his face back to mine, but he’s already on the move, leaving a wet, ticklish trail across my nipples and down the center of my body with his tongue and his scratchy beard, all the way down until my thighs are resting on his shoulders and his hot breath is skating over me. Torturing me.

I lift my pelvis until I feel his mouth against me. He’s smiling, I can tell. I don’t care if he knows how much I want this. I am needy right now.

And with the first swipe of his tongue, I know that this isn’t going to take long at all.

The doorbell rings.

Sebastian pulls away.

“Ignore it,” I growl, reaching to pull his face back down.

He complies, his hands squeezing my thighs tight. I weave my fingers around the back of his head, relaxing as he keeps going.

Until my phone begins to ring. It’s Fez’s ringtone. He’s outside, with the truck.

I forgot about the truck.

“Dammit,” I curse. “Stop. This isn’t going to happen now.” Fez is doing me a huge favor, but he’s not the most patient guy out there. He’ll leave.

Sebastian lays a few kisses on the insides of my thighs and then climbs off the bed, tucking that impressive dick that I pulled out back into his pants. “I’ll be down . . . in a minute.” He leaves me to get dressed and ducks into the bathroom. To pee, to wash me off his face, to jerk off. Probably all three.

And I want to be in there to help him.

Throwing my clothes on, I storm down the stairs and throw open the door, chanting to myself, “Fez is helping me, Fez is helping me, Fez is . . .” so I don’t bite his head off the second I see him like the frustrated bitch I now am.

“Yo! I’m turning gray out here!” Fez exclaims.

“Sorry. Got caught up with something,” I mumble.

“We’re ready. Called up my homies, figured you could use the halp.” True to his word, the cube van is parked outside and open. Joker and Weazy are tossing the trash bags already on the curb in.

“Seriously?” Suddenly, I can deal with Fez’s weird obsession with slang. Three extra sets of hands and this place may be all cleaned up by tonight. “This is huge. I don’t know what to say.” I back up and let all three of them in.