Under His Protection Page 9

  Camden shook his head, refusing to let the thought of how warm and tantalizing the feel of Elijah’s body was against his take root. Instead, he focused on the loud smack of Emmanuel’s hand on the table.

  Camden took another sip of his coffee and bristled. His taste buds still attempting to acclimate to the heaviness of the half-and-half in his morning beverage, he placed his coffee mug on the table, then folded the paper and focused on Emmanuel.

  “Did you need something, Emmanuel?”

  Elijah’s younger brother had a wide grin drawn across his face, coupled with a twinkling of excitement in his eyes. “Yeah, it’s Sunday. In the Stephenson household, when we’re all together on a Sunday, we play Spades. Why don’t you go on upstairs and get my brother so he can make us breakfast while the rest of us get this game started?”

  Camden took a moment to look around before he leveled his gaze back at Emmanuel. “I see no one else here. Perhaps it’s still a bit too early for cards.”

  Emmanuel leaned back in his chair and shook his head. “Nah.” The casual familiarity of his voice made Camden smile. This man had no clue who Camden was, but inside his brother’s home, he was comfortable and apparently had no intentions of letting Camden’s surprise appearance change that. “I heard Pops come in from his morning walk about twenty minutes ago. By my calculation, he and Mama should be down here in another ten minutes. My wife will follow close behind. My brother is the only holdout. I suspect you’re the reason he’s not lurking the halls at the crack of dawn anymore.”

  Camden lifted a brow and let Emmanuel’s thoughts travel wherever he wanted them to without interruption or clarification from Camden. Too bad the reality was nowhere near as sordid as Emmanuel’s assumptions. If it was, there’d be no way in hell Camden would be up at this ungodly hour reading a paper, just to get out of Elijah’s way. No, he’d be snuggled next to the warm expanse of smooth, strong man he’d left upstairs.

  “Well, since it’s your family tradition, I believe the responsibility falls to you to summon your brother?”

  “You obviously don’t have siblings, Camden. No grown-ass man walks into the bedroom his brother has shared with a lover the night before. E and I are cool, tighter than any two brothers could be. But he ain’t trying to witness the aftermath of me banging all night, and neither am I.” Emmanuel folded his arms across his chest to punctuate his position on the matter. He wasn’t going. Camden let a tiny smile slip through. If only Emmanuel knew he had nothing to fear by walking into Elijah’s room.

  Camden stood and quickly made his way up the stairs. He stopped, his instinct to knock on the door before he walked in. But then he suspected it would look strange for a man who was supposed to be Elijah’s lover to knock before entering the man’s bedroom.

  He opened the door and stepped inside, closing the door behind him quickly. “Elijah, your brother—” Camden turned, not the least bit prepared for the vision before him: Elijah standing at the foot of the bed, naked, with a towel draped over his shoulder.

  The instant dryness in his mouth forced Camden to swallow against the lump sitting at the bottom of his throat. Strong shoulders and arms coupled with perfectly carved muscles on his entire frame made Camden’s fingertips itch with need. The deep hue of smooth skin glistened from whatever moisturizer Elijah had previously applied. Camden closed his fists to keep from reaching out for a touch.

  “My brother what?”

  Camden heard the question, yet his brain couldn’t divert enough of his focus to form an answer. Why would it? When you stumbled upon such astonishing beauty, how could you think about trivial things like connecting words to impart meaning?

  “Camden? You were about to say something about my brother? Is he being an asshole again?”

  Elijah turned around, walking into his closet, gifting Camden with a perfect view of his toned ass before he disappeared inside. Camden used the moment to shake himself free of Elijah’s spell. It was obvious Elijah knew he was a walking wet dream. But knowing and expecting the man you’ve already told you’re not interested in to ogle you like a piece of meat was a different story.

  When Elijah returned, he was thankfully covered in another pair of his favored sweatpants. The soft fabric hid enough of Elijah’s muscular form that Camden could at least form a coherent thought again.

  “No, I mean, well, he is your brother.” Camden’s awkward response seemed to make Elijah smile. “It’s my observation he’s probably made a career out of being an asshole.”

  Elijah pointed a finger at Camden as he said, “Hey, lay off my brother, man.” Camden might have believed he was serious if it wasn’t for the sincere smile pulling at Elijah’s full lips. “What’s Manny up to?”

  “Your brother sent me to fetch you for a game of Spades.”

  “Shit.” Elijah looked at his watch and quickly pulled the T-shirt he held in his hands over his head.

  “I told Emmanuel I didn’t think you’d appreciate being woken this early for a card game.”

  “Early?” The frown creasing Elijah’s brow made concern swell inside Camden. “Dude, it’s never too early for Spades.”

  Elijah walked past Camden, his quick steps bringing him to the door in no time. “You’re really rushing downstairs to play a card game with your family?”

  Elijah ran his fingers quickly through his locs before leveling a look mixed with equal parts frustration and disbelief. “Camden, Spades is not just a card game. Friendships and families have been destroyed by this game. For generations, my family has played this game. It’s a rite of passage. If you can’t play, you can’t be part of the clan.”

  A hearty laugh rose out of Camden’s chest. He was certain Elijah would join him. He had to be joking. It was a card game, a popular one if he remembered correctly from his days in a frat house. But loss of friendship and family? Elijah couldn’t really mean that.

  “Camden.” Elijah’s voice dropped to that “I’m not to be fucked with” tone. If the terse lines around the perimeter of his square jaw were any indication, Elijah was very serious. “We do not play when it comes to Spades.”

  “Really?”

  Elijah nodded. “Really,” he uttered before looking over his shoulder toward the door. “Was Viv up yet? If she sleeps in, maybe I could get in a game or two before she gets up.”

  Lost on Elijah’s train of thought, Camden raised his hand before asking his question. “I know there’s probably a logical explanation why you’re concerned about Vivienne being up, but I don’t understand why you can’t play if she’s awake.”

  “It’s a partners game. She and Manny team up against my parents all the time. The only time I get to play is as a substitute for one. I mean, I play with my boys on the job every now and again. But believe me, there’s nothing like a game of Spades with the Stephensons.”

  Camden’s curiosity was piqued. He’d spent all of yesterday in the presence of Elijah’s family, and he could testify that most things he’d witnessed the Stephensons do was unlike any other family, certainly not Camden’s, anyway. Who else welcomed a total stranger into the fold the way Evelyn had with no proper vetting? Who else would make Camden feel so welcome without testing his worth, what he could bring to the table?

  Uncertain of what he was about to encounter, Camden fell into step behind Elijah as they made their way down the stairs. He might not know what Spades with the Stephensons was like, but the idea of spending time with the Stephensons doing anything brought an unfamiliar excitement Camden didn’t quite understand, and honestly, he had no intention of trying to explore it either. For once, he would not look at the angles of the situation. He was just going to enjoy it.

  Chapter Fifteen

  “YOU sure you wanna do this, brother?”

  Elijah was asking himself that exact question. Only, he refused to let his younger brother know it. Emmanuel was cocky enough that Elijah didn’t need to add to his ego.

  Elijah leveled a concerned glance at Camden sitting across the table from
him. In pure Camden fashion he sat painfully straight in his chair with perfect posture. His shoulders squared, he winked an eye at Elijah and blew him a kiss across the table. He was unconcerned, unbothered in a way that both enticed and frightened Elijah.

  Spades was not a game of chance. It was skill, all skill. It was also highly competitive. Add his family to the mix, and there was a real possibility there would be spilled blood somewhere on his kitchen floor.

  “Camden, are you certain about this? If you can’t play, just back away now.”

  Camden let his gaze move around the expanse of the table, carefully assessing Emmanuel, Vivienne, and then Elijah. The aloofness Elijah found in his eyes made his stomach turn. He didn’t get it. Camden didn’t understand how serious this game was. Which meant one thing, Elijah would have to listen to his already annoying brother brag about his and Vivienne’s impending win.

  Elijah’s chest tightened when he noticed something different about Camden. It wasn’t a noticeable change, something only a person who carefully studied the man up close would recognize. In the depths of those crystal blue eyes, there was certainty.

  Elijah remembered that look. The moment Camden had arrived for their date. As soon as he locked eyes with him, Elijah could see Camden was certain in their connection. He never wavered, never relented. Until the wee hours of the morning, he showed Elijah what it meant to have a lover who could play your body like an instrument. A lover whose talent was amplified because there were no questions, no hesitations, just simple confidence and the unimaginable pleasure it brought.

  Elijah nodded his head and sat back against his chair, calmer than he had been and resigned that Camden had this. He didn’t know why. Nothing about Camden said he’d spent any real time entrenched in this time-honored card game, but Camden’s sense of calm made Elijah feel at ease.

  “Y’all in or you out?” Emmanuel demanded as he shuffled the cards. His lips curved into a smile as he watched Camden’s lips do the same. They were more than in, they came to play.

  “Deal the cards, Manny. We got this.”

  “Oh, so you think you can take Viv and me since the pretty boy showed up? Come on, big brother, let me spank that ass again. Ya man ain’t got no game for us. How many books you got?”

  Elijah looked down at his cards and counted the expected hands he thought he could win. With a king of clubs, an ace of hearts, and the coveted ace of spades, he was certain he had at least four books won.

  “I got four. How many books you got, Cam?”

  He watched Camden study his hand. His confidence in Camden’s playing ability waned just slightly as the man slowly examined his cards.

  “Books?”

  That confused look Camden offered made Elijah’s stomach twist in knots. “Books are the hands won in each play.”

  “Oh, you mean tricks?”

  Relief spread through Elijah. Okay, maybe this was just a case of things being lost in translation.

  “Tricks?” Manny’s response made Elijah cut his eyes at his brother across the table. “That might be the technical term, but when us melanated folk play, we call ’em books.”

  “Ignore him, Camden. How many do you have?”

  “Five.”

  Elijah wasn’t a cautious bidder, but for someone he assumed wasn’t an avid player of Spades, five books in the first hand seemed a little too much.

  “You sure you got five? Maybe you want to take another look before you decide?”

  Camden shook his head. “I’m certain. I can win five tricks.”

  Elijah took a deep breath and tried to calm his nerves. It was only the first hand. They usually played five or six in a set. If Camden fucked up now, Elijah still had time to pull them out later.

  “All right, Vivienne.” Elijah gave a nod to his sister-in-law, who sat with a pencil hovering over the notepad sitting in front her. “Put us down for nine books.” She scribbled their bid next to their names, and then wrote a four next to hers and his brother’s.

  Elijah threw down the ace of hearts. His strategy was to win as many as he could up front and then focus on helping Camden make his bids. When Vivienne threw down the three of hearts, Elijah chewed the inside of his lip as he waited for Camden to throw down a card.

  Elijah had the highest card in the suit. The only trump to that was if someone broke the first spade.

  Just let me have this hand, Camden. You better not cut me.

  Camden put down a four of hearts, followed by Emmanuel’s eight of hearts. The book was Elijah’s.

  Elijah breathed a sigh of relief and his skin prickled as he caught the sultry smile Camden leveled at him. That smile said everything Elijah needed to hear from Camden.

  I’ve got your back. You can depend on me. You can trust me.

  A shiver slid down Elijah’s back. This kind of support from anyone other than his family or his fellow officers was odd. He expected support in those relationships; they were obligatory situations. This felt different, freely offered. And as wrong as Elijah knew it was to accept, the lonely part of him that was always around the group, but never part of it, danced a happy two-step.

  Camden continued to follow Elijah’s lead throughout the game, catching the silent signals he threw without alerting his brother and sister-in-law. The fact that they could communicate without actually speaking, that they for once weren’t getting their signals crossed, made his heart leap with excitement, sobering him in ways Elijah couldn’t explain. It was a card game. Something done to pass the time. And yet, sitting across the table from this man, watching him match Elijah play for play, bound him tighter to Camden than he’d ever been with another human being.

  It was strange, but Elijah didn’t have time to question it. He was too busy winning books and pissing his brother off to care about why having a partner who could read you when no one else could made happiness flutter in the most secret places of his soul.

  “Dammit, Viv.” Emmanuel slammed his hand down against the table, the vibration of his frustration and anger making Elijah smile. “I know you saw that damn queen of diamonds I threw out. How you gonna cut me with an ace of diamonds? What kind of bullshit is that?”

  “Don’t come for me, Manny.” The narrowed slits of his sister-in-law’s eyes made Elijah chuckle. Vivienne was the coolest, calmest person he knew. She’d have to be to deal with his hyper-ass brother. But when she was angry, she could cut you with just a look from across the room. “That was all I had.”

  The nervous way Emmanuel swallowed made Elijah’s chuckle evolve into a loud roll of laughter. The low growl slipping between the flat line of Emmanuel’s lips told Elijah his laughter was making his brother’s obviously bad mood worse.

  Fuck him! It’s no worse than I’ve suffered from his relentless taunting over the years.

  Emmanuel clicked his tongue and waited for Vivienne to start the next hand. When it was his turn to play, he snatched his next card out of his hand and slammed it on the table. Before he could pull his hand back, Camden shook his head at Emmanuel.

  “Excuse me, younger Mr. Stephenson. I think we have a problem here.”

  “The only problem we have is that you and my brother are fucking up my good mood.”

  Camden shook his head and smiled playfully. “Now, Emmanuel, I think we both know you’re not being completely honest. I distinctly remember you throwing out a low spade early to beat Elijah’s ace of clubs. A few hands later, and you’re throwing out a ten of clubs to beat everyone else’s low-ranking cards in the suit. If I remember correctly, isn’t the term for that ‘reneging’?”

  “You calling me a cheater, newbie?”

  Elijah threw a pretzel at his brother, popping Emmanuel in his temple. “No, I am. Turn over your damn books and let’s have a look.”

  Emmanuel paused for a minute, probably trying to think of a way to get out of his current predicament. His hesitation in and of itself was a clue that his brother’s history of cheating when he was losing was repeating itself.

&
nbsp; Emmanuel finally turned his books face up, and they all saw that Camden’s observation was accurate.

  “You’s a cheating-ass bastard, Manny.” Elijah’s statement was met with Emmanuel’s middle finger pointing straight in the air as a reply.

  “You just mad because you can’t play. Stop being a hater, Elijah.”

  They’d been having this same argument since they were kids sitting at the table playing with their parents. And although Emmanuel was still the same annoying little opportunist he was when they were kids, sitting here having this familiar conversation in front of Camden soothed him. As if a missing piece to his usual routine had miraculously appeared.

  This was usually the part where things escalated to one of them flipping tables in the game. But instead of his anger rising, contentment spread through him. He faced Camden, reached over the table, and offered him a hand. When Camden accepted it, Elijah slapped his palm against Camden’s in camaraderie and nodded his head.

  “Good eye.”

  Elijah leaned back in his chair, the muscles in his mouth trying hard to stave off the smile blooming across his lips. It was just a silly game they were playing. How could it make him feel so tethered to the man sitting across from him, smiling openly, making the cold dark spaces of Elijah’s soul feel warmth for the first time in a long while?

  Yeah, it was only a game. Elijah had to remember that none of this was real. However, when his suspicion and disbelief tried to horn their way in on the good time he was having, Elijah’s smile burgeoned until he couldn’t hide it any longer. And if he was completely honest, he had no desire to hide how happy he was in that moment.

  Chapter Sixteen

  ELIJAH turned on the hot water at his double-basin kitchen sink. A few squirts of dish detergent, and the dirty dishes were quickly swallowed by a mountain of suds.

  He was still sailing on his Spades win against his brother, and then later his parents. Never in his history of family tournaments had Elijah fared so well. He glanced to his right and found Camden standing near the table, smiling in Elijah’s direction.