Butcher & Blackbird (The Ruinous Love Trilogy, #1)(15)

Three fucking hours.

Besides the fact that she could have won our game in that amount of time, she also could have done all kinds of other things. Been on a date, for one. Maybe she had dinner somewhere other than this hotel with Francis’s frozen peas and unseasoned, overcooked pork chops that I’ll probably crack a tooth on before the week is out.

…Maybe she hooked up with some guy.

A groan rumbles in my throat and I turn over to suffocate myself in the floral pattern of the cheap polyester duvet.

“Rowan you feckin’ eejit,” I snarl into the indifferent mattress. “This game is already blowing up your feckin’ face and it’s day three.”

As if on cue, the sound of music comes from next door.

The volume is low, but I can make out a few of the lyrics through the paper-thin walls, and then the sound of Sloane’s voice as she sings along with the occasional bar of the song.

Though I’m relieved she’s back in one piece, I still drag a pillow over my head and try to muffle the sound, mostly to stop myself from marching over there to demand she tell me what she was up to, even though it’s none of my fucking business and I might not want to know.

The pillow doesn’t work, of course. And not just because it’s as thin as a fucking tissue. It’s probably because I’m straining to listen even though I’m pretending not to.

The song changes and Sloane’s quiet voice disappears.

The absence of her presence stretches on, scratching at my skull. Against my better judgment, I roll off the bed and head to the wall that separates us before leaning forward to press my ear to the faded damask wallpaper.

The music is a little clearer, the volume still low. I hear her mattress creak. And then a gentle buzzing sound.

“Jesus, Mary, and Joseph,” I whisper, dragging my hands down my face. What I would not give to be in that room right now. Sloane’s raspy moan sets my blood on fire. My cock is already rock-fucking-hard.

I’m about to step back from the wall. I really am. I’m starting to lean away when I hear a single word pass her lips.

Rowan.

Or maybe sewin’. Or Cohen. Or Samoan. Can’t really be sure. I’ll just go with Rowan.

My blood is fucking volcanic. My heart thunders. Every cell in my body screams with need. It takes everything in me to start moving away again, but then I hear something strange coming from farther down the wall.

A quiet groan.

I creep toward the source of the sound.

Another groan. A garbled whisper. When I press my ear to the surface, I still catch the faint buzz of Sloane’s toy. But much closer is the distinctive sound of someone wanking off.

I recoil from the wall and note the structure. About two-thirds down, toward where it joins the back of the room, there’s a right angle where the wall comes farther into the living space. So I make my way there, each step careful and silent.

Heel. Toe. Heel. Toe.

I stop at the protrusion of the wall and press my ear next to the brass frame of a portrait painting.

A man’s whisper finds me over the rhythmic sound of a hand pumping an erection. “Yes, baby… just like that…”

Rage floods my veins.

I step back and scan the room for something I can use to destroy the fucking wall before I have to resort to using my bare hands. My gaze lands on the nightstand and sticks there. If inanimate objects had feelings, the brass lamp next to the bed would be shitting itself.

I march over to it and rip it from the plug, gripping its long body like a baseball bat as I turn toward the section of the wall where the pervert is hidden. I’m just about to take my first swing when the eyes of the painting flick open. A real set of human eyes stare back at me and widen with alarm.

“Oh shit,” a man’s voice whispers.

My instant of shock dissolves into fury as the eyes disappear, leaving dark and empty holes behind. “Motherfucker.”

I rush the wall and smash the painting with my weapon, lurching halfway into the tiny, hidden room when the thin canvas gives way with nothing behind it. I don’t even catch sight of the other man—I can only hear him scurry away like the fucking rat he is.

Sloane’s shriek rises above the chaos from the next room over, her string of expletives merging into a cascade of vitriol.

“Rowan Kane you fucking Irish perverted weirdo WHAT THE FUCK are you doing I’m going to FUCK YOU UP—”

“No no no,” I protest, though she doesn’t hear me over the continued string of swears and now crashes of sound. She must be hurtling her belongings at the wall. My imagination instantly takes me right to whatever vibrator she was just using as a heavy thunk slams against the plasterboard. I stumble backward into my room and out to the corridor, the lamp still clutched in my hand as I rush to her room and pound on the door. It swings open before I’ve even finished the third knock.

Sloane is fucking fuming.

“There was a man in the wall,” I blurt out.

“I know,” she snarls as she shoves me with both hands. “His name is Rowan Kane and he has no fucking boundaries because he’s a fucking pervy weirdo—”

“No, I swear—”

“Were you spying on me getting myself off?”

“No,” I protest, but she glares at me as though utterly unconvinced that I’m telling the truth. It doesn’t help my case that she’s wearing a tiny pair of sleep shorts and a spaghetti strap tank top, and she’s probably able to hear the no bra alarm blaring on repeat in my head. “Okay, I heard you but I stepped away from the wall—”