Cole opened the door with numb fingers and stepped out of the car onto numb feet. He felt more shaken now than the last time he'd seen Logan, even though then, they'd gotten into a physical altercation. He flexed his hands and looked up at the moon, wishing it was at least cold so that he could blame the numbness and shivering on that. Instead, he was stewing in damp summer humidity.

It took Gideon another minute to join him. Presumably, he had a few more threats to dish out for his own satisfaction. Cole might feel like revenge against a psycho was pointless, but Gideon himself was a psycho. Getting even with the person who hurt what belonged to him brought him immense pleasure. He'd been planning this night for the past few months with nothing short of glee.

The cop car's windows were too tinted to see through, so Cole couldn't watch the expressions on their faces. Hopefully, that meant Gideon felt like he could unleash whatever he'd been so nervous about bringing Cole along to witness. They'd had a huge spat earlier this afternoon about whether Cole could come along. Eventually, he'd irritated his husband enough to admit that it was because he didn't want to scare Cole or whatever.

He seemed to scare himself more than he did Cole. These past months he'd been careful never to come home with blood on his cuffs or anything of the like. It seemed like he'd been able to remain casual to a degree, pretending not to be too invested in their relationship up until Cole fessed up to being blackmailed by James. After that, and after he killed James in front of Cole, all bets were off.

The mere thought of exposing Cole to that darker side of him made him lose his marbles the same way he did whenever Cole had to interact with his family. In his mind, he threw himself into the same lot as the rest of his family. And perhaps that was deserved.

He switched personalities a little bit when he was around his folks. Thinking back on it, before the very first dinner Cole had with the Bartas, Gideon's concern had been that James would up and shoot Cole in the head. Later, at a different family gathering, it was, in fact, Gideon who shot James in the head.

And Cole was fine with him keeping that side of himself neatly separated from their playing house, so long as it didn't involve him.

One of the cops leaning on the car shifted his weight and the other uncrossed his arms. They talked in low tones, completely ignoring Cole. He realized he was still staring at the tinted windows, spacing out. But, instead of experiencing the tangle of rage, fear, and vindication dredged up by finally seeing his personal boogeyman in cuffs, he'd been thinking about Gideon. He wasn't shaking anymore.

With a huff, he turned away and hugged his arms around himself.

It just went to show how irrelevant Logan was in the face of Gideon Barta. He liked to think of himself as someone at Gideon's caliber, but he did not even come close.

When Gideon finally emerged from the car, Cole asked, "Is his lawyer really going to fuck him over?"

"Yes. She already did, and at this point, he won't even get the chance to change lawyers. Even if he does, I'll plant someone to botch his case," Gideon said, all business, while striding toward the stakeout car.

Cole trotted beside him, smiling at how much longer his strides got when he entered mob boss mode. He glanced at the other cop car and said, "That's good since it'll still be difficult to win in court without a witness account. I doubt that kid will testify."

One of the corners of Gideon's lips quirked and Cole rolled his eyes. If he'd learned anything about his husband, it was that he thought a couple steps ahead of every situation, planning out several contingencies, while expecting many failures. For everything that could happen, he expected the worst and planned out his reaction before then.

Seemed like a terrible way to live.

He was probably already going gray and hiding the fact from Cole by dying his hair at work.

But being a worrywart had kept him alive.

And Cole had seen the catastrophic results of his small lapses in judgement. That was how they ended up married, after all.

"Have you ever ended up in the back of a cop car while under arrest?" Cole asked, offhand.

The quirk of Gideon's lip curved into a full-on smirk. As they reached the car, he opened the passenger side door and shot Cole a look. "No."

That look dragged a shiver up Cole's spine. He ducked into the car and fidgeted as Gideon closed him into the car and rounded the hood to the driver's side. He was feeling a little warm. Satisfied burned in his chest now that taking down Logan seemed to have gone well. And that it was all because this man beside him, his husband, was so capable.

His eyes landed on Gideon's hands as they turned the key in the ignition and smoothed over the curve of the steering wheel. His body buzzed. So, the adrenaline from facing Logan hadn't worn off quite yet. When Gideon stretched the seatbelt across his lap, Cole's gaze dropped to the man's lap. His soft shirt settled on his flat, firm abdomen and the fabric of his jeans pulled taught over his thighs.

"Seatbelt," Gideon reminded him.

"I really want to suck you off," Cole blurted.

He glanced up to meet Gideon's startled eyes. The man had been freaking out earlier before they came, having decided Cole would finally want to divorce him if he saw him menacing his ex-pimp. Then he had resigned himself to the fact that he was weak for Cole, and allowed him to come along, likely still expecting Cole to lose his marbles. Now that the deed was over and done with, Cole was back to wanting to have sex in this nondescript stakeout vehicle. No signs of a breakdown on the horizon. Contrary to Gideon's expectations, the worst had not occurred.

"Red sky at night is a sailor's delight," Cole said.

Gideon looked even more bewildered.

"Gideon," Cole shifted to sit at an angle, leaning his head back against the window to give an excellent view of his long neck, "I want you to fuck me. You were so badass and cool, and I want you to bully me a little now."

The steering wheel creaked under Gideon's tightening fingers. Cole glared at it jealously for a moment, then pouted when one of those broad hands dropped to the shifter and put the car into reverse. However, as soon as Gideon turned around to go down the side of the street that wasn't blocked, he said offhand in his sex voice, tone all low and gravely, "Always bothering me when I'm busy. Just take care of it yourself."

Cole gasped, trying to keep the grin off his face. It was hard not to be delighted when Gideon played along. He was playing right into the grand plan of making him realize Cole was okay after the reminder that he was a terrifying crime lord. Number one action item was to derail his overthinking with sex—check! But, for him to play along, he had to pout. So that was what he did.

"Gideon…"

"Take care of it yourself," Gideon repeated. "Go on, baby, put your hand in your pants and get yourself off if you are so desperate."

"But I want you…"

Gideon shot him a look, then flicked his turn signal on and redirected his attention back to the road so he could navigate out of the neighborhood. Cole grumbled and popped the button of his fly. He wasn't hard yet, but it wouldn't take long if he stared across the center console at Gideon's hands on the wheel, imagining them in his pants instead.

"What are you doing?" Gideon asked.

Cole froze, "Um…" He looked down at his soft cock in his palm. Even though they were playing, he flushed with embarrassment at having misunderstood something. Usually, Gideon didn't contradict his own orders, but he did like to play mind games. Cole tried to think back over his instructions.

"We're in public," Gideon told him, even though it was now full dark and they were the only car on this street. "Don't be indecent. I told you to take care of yourself inside your pants."

Cole almost balked out of character. That was just mean. The angle would be awful. There wasn't much room to move. His wrist would ache in no time.

But he had asked Gideon to bully him.

"But…" he still complained.

"You want me to fuck you, but you won't do what I say?" Gideon admonished him without looking over. "Bad kittens don't get treats."

Cole stared sullenly down at his stiff cock. A little bullying and the thing stood straight at attention, and now he had to stuff it back into his pants. He did so, and started working his palm over himself, hand flat because it was more comfortable. He tried to spread his thighs to make more room for the arousal curling low between them, but that tightened the fabric over his groin, so he had to let them fall closed a bit.

He watched the houses go by. Downtown, with its cluster of high rises loomed in the distance, growing closer as they merged onto the freeway. The initial burn of arousal simmered down into something more comfortable, and he slowly felt himself slipping into a bit of a daze. Car rides did tend to lull him to sleep.

"I thought you were horny?" Gideon's amused tone snapped him back to attention. "But you look like you're falling asleep."

Cole glared at him, aggrieved. "It feels better when you do it."

Gideon scoffed, though his eyes glowed as though he were secretly pleased. He wasn't fully in character then. Cole almost wanted to give the game up and beg him to just pull over and bend him into a pretzel in the backseat. Instead, when Gideon ordered him to hold out his hand, he obeyed.

With a quick glance down, Gideon spat on his palm.

Cole's blood fizzled. He stared at the shining glob of spit rapidly cooling on his palm.

"Well," Gideon prompted, "Go on, touch yourself. Maybe that'll make it feel better. Poor baby can't even remember to lube himself up without my help."

Cole ignored him and smeared the saliva all over his length.