Gideon's eyes darkened as he allowed Cole to pour the amber liquid into his mouth. How on earth he managed to drink that stuff with a straight face was beyond Cole's understanding. Once the glass was empty, Cole set is aside and put his hands on Gideon's shoulders. The large hands on his hips squeezed back.

"To your knowledge, you mother isn't trying to use you to sabotage the rest of your family or something crazy like that, right?" Cole asked.

"No," Gideon said slowly. "In her ideal world, we all work together so that she can fuck off and retire in Italy."

Cole nodded, "So, there is nothing to be nervous about. We'll go. We'll eat. We'll leave."

One of Gideon's fingers tapped against Cole's lower back. His anxiety couldn't be rationalized away. Not when it was the result of a lifetime of hyper vigilance borne out of a history that Cole had only received glimpses of. Gideon didn't want to let him in on what went on during the present as it was.

Maybe once they'd been married longer than a year, or more likely after ten years, he'd finally start opening up about how he grew up. Or maybe he never would. There were combat veterans who never managed to speak about some of the things they went through. And Cole may have had it rough himself, but he was certain that none of his experiences primed him for empathizing with someone who grew up as a Barta.

He wouldn't ever ask, so he'd never know unless Gideon decided to share with him. But that didn't mean h would give up on his goal to overwrite the man's terror that Cole would wake up and realize that the cage door was open, and that he preferred to leave than stay. He hoped that someday, Gideon might not feel like he had to shoulder everything himself in secret to give Cole a charmed life. That they could share their struggles.

And his number one action item in reaching this goal was, of course, distracting Gideon from his overthinking. By keeping it simple. They were ungodly compatible in bed. It was what brought them together originally, albeit with a little bit of a push from Gideon's psycho brother.

"Thank you for the addition to my outfit," Cole purred.

"No problem, baby," Gideon squeezed his sides again, then let his hands fall to the seat. He tilted his head and his entire demeanor changed. He wore a haughty smirk, and the warm affection in his eyes burned into a simmering hunger. "Why don't you give me a little preview?"

"Incentive to be good?" Cole teased, drawing his fingertips up the sides of Gideon's neck to scratch lightly at the base of his skull.

"What incentive?" Gideon snorted. "Don't you let me do whatever I want to you, whether or not I'm good or bad?"

It boggled his mind how Gideon could lose his marbles over Cole witnessing the kind of frightening power he wielded and the bad ways in which he wielded it and then turn around to say a line like that. He must be getting into character. Slipping on his bad boy shoes and turning into the arrogant, sexy criminal type Cole had first met him as.

So, he stepped into his stripper heels to match. "No touching," he warned.

Gideon held his palms up, then threaded his fingers together behind his head. His suit jacket was unbuttoned, and his lifted arms stretched his white button-down shirt across his pecs. Cole trailed his fingers down over the pliant muscle, then back up, before settling his hands on Gideon's shoulders to steady himself as he rolled his hips.

They played this game not infrequently. During one of those private, intimate moments after sex when they were both feeling a little vulnerable and more likely to share, Gideon had admitted that one of the reasons he liked going to strip clubs rather than hiring from escort services had been that he genuinely found erotic dancing to be a huge turn on. Cole had suggested that they install a stripper pole somewhere. This had yet to actually happen, but he was certain Gideon was working on it.

Jessica's face was going to be priceless when she saw it.

Cole leaned back to pop the buttons of his shirt as he undulated his hips, revealing the shockingly bright red lace beneath. Gideon eyed it hungrily, but kept his hands behind his head.

Twenty minutes later, they pulled up to a house in a very nice suburban neighborhood. It was more suburban than Gideon's place, with no woods in sight, but the yards were still about the size of Logan's entire street. There weren't any sprawling mansions, but there were lots of detached four-car garages.

As Barry pulled the car to a stop, Gideon adjusted himself in his pants and ran a hand through his hair. He at least had some product in it, so all it took was a few swipes of his fingers and he once again looked perfectly put together. Cole, on the other hand, could feel the flush in his cheeks from both arousal and some of his more acrobatic moves. He hurried to button his top back up and tuck it into his slacks again before Barry opened the door for them.

Not that Barry would care, probably. There was no way he didn't know what went on in the back of that Limo. Cole wondered if he worked for the family in a purely above-board capacity, or if he was also one of their getaway drivers. Did someone drive Gideon to his meetups down at the port like he was a crime boss out of a movie or did he just drive himself?

Cole smiled sheepishly at Barry as he stepped out of the car, scrutinizing the man's face. Hopefully, he wasn't involved in all that stuff. He had a young family, after all. The Bartas were known for being pretty hands-on, Gideon chief among them, so they probably didn't employ professional chauffeurs to be their getaway drivers.

A hand rested on the small of his back. He glanced over at Gideon with a smile. Being hands-on was one of the things that made him so anxious to keep Cole away from that side of his family. But it was also one of the things that made Cole feel so safe with him. He could take care of stuff, not just get others to do it for him. Gideon returned his smile with a flashy one of his own, teeth white and eyes dark, his expression gone full predator in preparation for crossing his mother's threshold.

They rang the doorbell.

Some kind of custom chime could be heard through the door. Below the knob was a keypad. Cole tilted his head at it, mystified. He wondered if it was more than just a lock. It could also be a part of the security system. Gideon's security could only be controlled by a pad inside the door, not something on the outside, but that didn’t mean they were all like that.

Then the door swung open. It did not reveal a butler or a security guard armed from head to toe or even an adult. Instead, Cole looked down to find a vaguely familiar kid peering up at them. It was a boy who looked about five or six, reaching up to hang onto the doorknob.

"Hello, Uncle Gideon," he said very seriously.

"Hey, Jimmy," Gideon said. "May we come in?”

The kid actually seemed to debate for a hot second before he pulled the door open and let them through.

They hadn't gotten a proper introduction last time, so as soon as the door closed, Cole stuck his hand down and said, "I'm Cole. Your name is Jimmy?"

Jimmy nodded and shook his hand with a surprisingly firm grip for a five-year-old. Or, at least Cole imagined it was. He didn't have much experience with five-year-olds.

"You have a brother, too, right?"

In a show of emotion that finally seemed appropriate for his age, Jimmy rolled his eyes. "Yeah, I guess. And a dog too."

In the hallway behind them, Gideon laughed. Cole glanced back at him in surprise, only to be distracted by the ornate crystal chandelier sending a shower of little rainbows over a spiral staircase leading to the second floor. He gaped up at it.

"Your mom finally let you have a dog?" Gideon asked.

"Mhm." The smug pride was clear in Jimmy's tone. "Henry started asking her to get him an African Grey Parrot, and so she decided a dog wasn't so bad."

"Oh yeah? And how did Henry learn about African Grey Parrots?"

Cole tore his gaze away from the mesmerizing crystal in time to see Jimmy shrug. The smug expression on his face, however, deepened. Apparently, smirking like that was genetic. He looked a bit like a mini Gideon, all dark eyebrows and smug smirks. Although, like his father, he had finer features, and like his mother, he had brown eyes.

Amy came trotting down the hallway toward them with her big brown eyes and a cell phone plastered to one ear. She was not in a suit like the last couple of times Cole had seen her, but instead a ruffled blue blouse and a pair of white slacks. When she reached them, she lowered the phone to her chest and raised a brow at her son.

"Jimmy, go watch your brother. I think he's outside with the dog," she shooed him off with a perfectly manicured hand. Then she smiled blindingly at Cole and Gideon. "Sorry if he was bothering you. There are some appetizers and stuff in the parlor."

She patted Jimmy's shoulder, herding him back down the hallway, presumably towards where she could shove him outside with her other kid and the dog. Cole watched, amused, wondering if he could follow them. Kids and a dog sounded much more appealing than appetizers in the parlor.

As she walked away, she put the phone back to her ear and chattered rapid-fire in legal speak that might as well have been another language.

"Since James's passing, she took over the firm," Gideon said blandly.

James's passing. What a way to put it. Cole swallowed a snort.

"Bet that keeps her busy," he said. "Do you think I could just go hang out with the kids?"

Gideon looked as if he was truly considering it for a moment, but like all moms, his mother must have sensed they were about to abandon ship. She materialized at the end of the hallway almost exactly where Amy had disappeared beneath the giant spiral staircase. Why on earth anyone would feel the need to put a spiral staircase in a long straight hallway was beyond Cole's comprehension.

"You made it!" his mother exclaimed with a deadpan expression. She marched right up to them, martini in one hand and cigarette in the other, like some kind of James Bond character, and gave Cole a once-over. "Son-in-law, you are a difficult man to invite to dinner."

Cole lifted his eyebrows at Gideon. He was most certainly not that. His days since living with Gideon had been spent whiling his time away painting, learning tennis, and letting Gideon tie him down to the bed. His schedule was wide open. Gideon's, on the other hand, was not.

"Don't blame it on him," Gideon said, "I'm the difficult one, and there was no way I'd let him come to dinner without me."

His mother ignored him. "I thought I was going to have to send an official invitation through the mail to contact you."

"Oh, well," Cole floundered a bit. "I'm a pretty private person. Just like Gideon." He patted Gideon's arm. "It's one of the reasons we get along well, I suppose."

"I'll give you one piece of advice then," she lifted her martini imperiously towards him. He took it as a good sign that she lifted her glass rather than pointing with the fingers holding her cigarette. "Have something to distract everyone with. Right now, they are all talking about the kids' new dog. You get what I mean?"

Then she turned and walked back the way she came, her sandals clacking against the marble floor. Cole glanced at Gideon, who shrugged and said, "Talk about your painting, not Logan, for example."

"You don't have to tell me that?" Cole hissed. "She thinks that's advice? That's common sense."