Free Gay for Pay by Kim Dare Page B

central locking and jerked open the boot. “Get in.”
    “What?”
    “You might be in the business of dragging your family name through the gutter, I’m not. I’m not driving you through the city wearing a scrap of leather and bugger all else. The way my luck’s going, we’ll end up driving past the whole press corps before we’ve gone a block. Get in.”
    Nate looked from him to the boot and back again.
    No sympathy, Smith reminded himself. A short, sharp shock—something just harsh enough to make sure he would think twice about what could happen if he pulled this sort of stupid stunt again—it would do him more good than sympathy in the long run. “Do you want me to pick you up and put you in there?”
    Nate dropped his gaze and got clumsily into the boot.
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    Kim Dare
    9

    Smith looked away, wishing that, in spite of everything, he didn’t still want to admire Nate’s body as he folded himself into the small space. Slamming the boot harder than he intended, he rolled his eyes at himself. One brat in the car was more than enough.
    It might be Nate’s fault he’d had to drive across the country to track him down, but it wasn’t actually his fault he had a crush on his boss’s son. It wasn’t Nate’s fault that a grand total of fifteen different false alarms had gone off through the previous night three nights—
    all courtesy of their new state of the art computerised contraption. It wasn’t Nate’s fault he hadn’t slept more than an a few hours in as many days.
    Smith rubbed at his eyes. Adrenaline could only last so long. Now that Nate was safe, he already felt it draining away. He switched on the hands-free phone and called in his report, along with his intention to sleep before he drove them back in the morning.
    He glanced in the rear view mirror. Sleeping before driving was a smart decision. His reactions felt so sluggish, he might as well have been drunk as exhausted. It was not about the guy in the boot. It wasn’t…
    Smith sighed as he leant his head against the headrest while he waited at the traffic lights. He wanted Nate somewhere safe where he could keep an eye on him. That was more like the truth.
    He wanted to be able to close his eyes for a few hours and know that any of the things that could have happened to Nate in that club weren’t happening. And he wanted to know it because if he opened his eyes Nate would be right there with him.
    It might not be professional, but it was the truth.
    Five minutes and another phone call later, he pulled into another underground car park. Grabbing his coat off the passenger seat, he marched around to the boot and flung it open. Nate blinked up at him, shielding his eyes.
    “Get out.”
    Nate tried to look past him. “Where are we?”
    “A hotel.”
    Disorientated was no more than he deserved, but the guy looked terrified. “It’s just me,” Smith said, and promptly labelled himself a fool for thinking that would reassure Nate, when he obviously had no idea what another man taking him under his protection really meant. “No one’s going to hurt you,” he translated.
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    Kim Dare
    10

    Nate didn’t look convinced. Smith tried to tell himself that the stupid little sod offering himself to a club full of complete bastards without turning a hair, and then being scared of him didn’t burn deep inside him. He was singularly unsuccessful.
    “Do you want to spend the rest of the night in there?”
    Nate shook his head.
    “Get out,” Smith ordered again.
    “May I borrow your coat, please?” Nate asked.
    Smith tossed the coat at him, not sure if he was more angry that Nate didn’t trust him, or that he was half sure his job title was the only thing stopping him from showing Nate how a real dominant acted—right there in the car park.
    The guy actually scrambled around inside the tiny space, trying to put the coat on before he got out. Smith ground his teeth against the instinct to just pull the smaller man out of the car