Page 39 of Damián

“Ask me… calmly, if I put my name in the Goblet of Fire, and I promise I will fix this.” I try to bargain with him, but as always, he doesn’t take the bait.

He just shakes his head, smirks, and heads into the conference room.

One day, Law…

One day.

I follow him into the room and see that the rest of the team is already gathered. At the far end of the long Damascus table, Alexios is typing on three different keyboards.

How, and why? Only he knows.

Logan is at the head, reading a bunch of papers and memos.

Tae is practicing these weird, lightning-looking sutures on a pink silicone square with a large gash, and Leif is polishing a twenty-inch combat knife.

Like… where the fuck is he even planning to take that?

Are we fighting dinosaurs?

“There he is! The man of the hour, and with our pizza!” Björn cheers as he spins in his chair, tossing and catching a baseball in the air.

“You guys need to stop being assholes.” I place the pizza boxes on top of the table and sit down. “Poor guy was stuck for more than forty minutes.”

“Forty minutes?! That’s a new record,” Björn claps, impressed.

“No,” Logan scratches his beard, praying for some patience. “No one is betting on delivery drivers. They’re not mice to use and test on.”

“Fine,” Björn, Tae, and Knox begrudgingly agree.

“Alright.” The boss takes a piece of pizza and sits back down. “Now that that’s settled and we got our food, let’s get into it. Damián?”

“Yeah…” I mumble… It’s not that I am unsure of the new plan, but I am one hundred percent regretting it, because I know exactly how these assholes are going to react.

Agggh… fuck it.

“So, we have a change of plans regarding the informant,” I say, and take a pizza.

Alexios looks up from his glowing screens. “What kind of change?”

“We can’t be fuckbuddies, because if I want access to the main house and the ledgers, casual sex won’t cut it. Oliver says we need to be in a committed relationship…. So, we are officially boyfriends,” I say it directly and fast.

As fast as humanly possible, hoping maybe they won’t fully process what I just said. But Björn immediately bursts into a fit of breathless laughter.

There goes my hope.

The idiot laughs so hard he tips backward, tumbling with his chair to the ground with a loud crash.

“Dami needs to pretend to be in love?” Björn says between breaths, still lying on the floor. “This is the greatest day of my life.”

“Shut up, Björn.” I push his chair on the floor with my foot.

Ahhgg… I knew this was going to happen.

“We need to make a contingency plan.”

“No, Alexios. I’m not going to fail the mission just because I need to pretend to be someone’s… you know.”

“You can’t even say the word without recoiling,” Knox points out.