been excited too.
But now he snored softly as he sat, hands clasped across his chest.
There was a moment of quiet, and then Danny spoke again.
“Felix, you need to make sure the tech van has a comfortable cot, yes?”
“Indeed,” Felix said, his voice strained. “That’s my number-one priority.”
“Then let’s make sure we have papers and parking permits, etcetera, for Chuck as well,” Danny said. “I know he’s supposed to drive the van and get Josh and Stirling out if anything goes amok, but you know what? He was quite useful last time. I don’t think we should limit his options.”
“That’s mighty kind, sir,” Chuck said with a grin. “I’ll try to do you proud.”
Danny winked at him. “I have no doubts.”
There were a few details to cover after that, but as the meeting drew to a close, Hunter turned to Grace so they could go up to bed and found him sitting next to Josh on the couch, his head on Josh’s shoulder.
He waited a moment, expecting a surge of jealousy to hit him, but instead he remembered how hard Josh had fought to run after Grace that night he’d disappeared into the rain.
“You’re not jealous, are you?” Felix asked, proving once again how he could run a news network and a multinational conglomeration with the force of his will. His knowledge of people was gut-deep and undeniable.
“No, sir,” Hunter said softly. “They’re…. It’s almost like you can see them both as grade school kids every time they get near each other. It doesn’t matter if they’re bitching or sleeping or daring each other to do something stupid. I’ve never seen anything like it.”
Felix nodded. “Dylan has been—always—something of an enigma to us. But the one thing we’ve never doubted is how much he loves Josh.”
Hunter thought of his parents, who would never know of their son’s life, and of his brothers, who had assumed that drinking beer on Friday nights was as good as life got.
“They’re lucky,” he said. “Both of them.”
“I hope so,” Felix told him gruffly. “Josh has a lot of weeks of treatment to go.”
Hunter glanced at them, making sure Grace wasn’t listening. “Why are you letting him go ahead with this?” he asked.
Felix sighed. “When he was little, he wanted brothers and sisters, you know. Lots of them.” A corner of his mouth lifted wistfully. “We told him he’d have to settle for an Uncle Danny, because not many people had one of those. But Uncle Danny was secret—I think he may have told Dylan, but I’m not sure if anyone else knew. And then, when he was ten, Danny….”
“Disappeared,” Hunter said, because Josh had told him that Danny had left—probably to get sober—and that he’d left a hole in the household.
“Yes,” Felix said. “And it was my fault. He needed to live in the sunlight, and I was keeping him in the shadows. But once he came back and Josh had all of you, I think… I think he wanted that family he imagined when he was a child. The big happy one where there were lots of kids to go on adventures with him.”
“So you’re giving it to him,” Hunter said, his heart swelling with understanding.
“It’s all we’ve got,” Felix said, his voice growing thick. He turned away and went to hug Danny from behind as Danny spoke to Chuck. Danny broke off abruptly and turned in Felix’s arms, hugging him tight, and Hunter looked back to where Grace showed no sign of moving.
With a sigh, Hunter squeezed in between Grace and the arm of the couch, and pulled out his phone.
He had a book to read and Grace pressed next to him. There was nothing in particular he had to do for the rest of the night.
Dance 10, Heist 3
GRACE PULLED his breathable microfiber face mask over his head, batting his eyelashes to make sure they cleared. Josh had ordered this thing specially made when they were in high school, after Grace almost got caught stealing that one girl’s hot curlers. The eyeholes and nosehole were translucent microfiber. As long as Grace wore gloves and a turtleneck, anyone catching a fleeting glimpse of him couldn’t even tell his gender.
“How do I look?” he asked Josh, who, contrary to all the coddling people had been trying to give him over the last week, was pacing in front of the readouts in the tech van like a cat.
Josh glanced up, face pale but composed, and nodded. “You look like an asshole who went shopping at