Some nights, American secret agent Ben Smith just wants to come home to his husband. He misses that English accent and smile and, of course, Simon on his knees. He wants his perfect submissive at his feet, so the world and his mission can fall away.<br><br>Some nights, romance writer Simon Ashley misses his dashing American other half. Tea is nice, but it can’t pin him down in bed and make him beg, reminding him he’s loved and belongs to someone. He wants to forget everything and everyone he’s left behind, and just belong to Ben.<br><br>Tonight they both get what they want when Ben comes home early. tea is very nice ... but so is leather.

Leather and Tea

The knowledge that at any second death might be a step away on that tightrope. Bullets in the air. Aimed at him. Aimed by him. He’d killed when he’d had to. Never uselessly. Never without cause. He knew all their faces. And Simon put arms around him, on the nights he woke up shaking and clammy with sweat.


He’d carried the memory of blue eyes and warm arms with him, getting onto this last plane, letting it whisk him away. He’d known then what he wanted.


He’d called from the plane and heard his director grumble about losing a good agent to domesticity, what was the world coming to, fine, we’ll tell them you’re interested, so go do your job, since it’ll be the last one, now…


Simon nodded and then blinked a few times, rapidly. “Sorry…I’m not crying…”


Chapter 8