His eyes widened almost imperceptibly. “Yes. Yes, I do. Maybe…”
King wandered around in a circle as if orienting himself in a room he knew almost as well as his apartment.
Finally he wandered in the direction of his original entry point from earlier in the night.
The room he’d ducked into. I was an idiot. How hadn’t we put this together yet?
When he came back into the room, he was carrying the crown in his gloved hands. “Did anyone bother to look in the stairwell?”
Suddenly, everyone was in motion. Horvát scrambled to shout instructions to the officers to call in the crown guards, another one of the officers spoke rapidly into his comms unit requesting the curator’s team, and Ziv instinctively moved to Mouse’s side to help protect the painting and our junior agent from the chaos.
From what I could pick up from the shouted Hungarian and everyone’s body language, it was clear they were convinced they’d finally caught the elusive Le Chaton at the scene of the crime.
And his true identity was Elek Kemény.
34
King
I was so far past exhaustion when we got back to the hotel, I was shaking uncontrollably. Falcon and I hadn’t had a single moment alone yet, and wondering how he felt about me now was wearing me thin.
I was terrified I’d ruined everything. The minute I’d seen Elek standing there in the rotunda, I’d regretted everything. He wasn’t worth it, had never been worth it.
Why had I risked what was happening with Falcon in order to get this final revenge on a man who’d already taken so much from me?
Dirk and I were finally alone in the elevator, but neither of us said a word or even looked at each other. The tension between us snapped like tight bands, and I thought it was going to suffocate me. As soon as the doors opened, I lurched out and raced to my room, fumbling my key and nearly dropping it on the floor.
I needed inside. I needed time to myself where no one could would see how fucking broken I felt. Falcon had barely looked at me all night.
When I finally got the door open, I stepped inside and let out a shaky breath before turning to lock the door and nearly banging my nose on Falcon’s chin.
“Sorry!” I croaked before realizing it was the word I needed emblazoned on my forehead. “Sorry. I’m so sorry. I’m so—”
Falcon cut me off with a hard kiss, turning us around and pinning me to the door. His hand came up to clasp the front of my throat and hold me there while he ravaged my mouth and shoved his entire body against my front. His hard cock ground against my flaccid one, perking it right up.
“Don’t fucking apologize to me again,” he growled, nipping sharply at my jaw and then down my neck. “And don’t fucking put yourself in danger like that again. Never again, Kingston. Never again.”
I hiccupped and nodded; it was the best I could do under the onslaught.
One of his hands came down to grab the front of my suit pants and squeeze my dick. I squeaked and then groaned, shamelessly begging for more.
Falcon’s thick thigh forced my legs apart before he ground his hip into my cock and moved his hand up to grab a fistful of my hair. My neck arched back until I was looking at his dark eyes.
“Please take me,” I whispered. “I need you. Please, Dirk.”
His hands were a blur, shucking off my suit coat, yanking at my tie, and damned near ripping every button off my shirt. But finally I was completely naked before him.
“You are mine,” he said in a rough voice. “I don’t know when you’re going to get that through your fucking skull. You don’t work alone anymore, goddammit. You work with me. Do you understand me?”
I nodded again like a bobblehead.
“I can’t help you if you don’t tell me what the fuck is going on. Don’t you get it?” he snapped, rubbing his hands through his hair. “You drive me up the fucking wall.”
Falcon’s eyes narrowed and he spoke again before I had a chance to. “And don’t you dare apologize again.”
I nodded and kept my mouth shut.
“Get on the bed,” he growled. “Hands and knees.”
As I scrambled onto the bed, I heard him move to the bathroom, presumably to find my lube. When he came back, he was still fully dressed.
He tossed the bottle on the bed. “If you want prep, you have about ten seconds to make it happen.”
I grabbed the bottle while he reached for his own belt and began unbuckling. We both knew he’d never ever hurt me. He was angry, but more than that, he was scared. I’d seen it the minute I’d walked back into the rotunda and seen his eyes.
The relief in them had been palpable.