Sage Marlowe Romeo & Julian 3 A Life as a Ghost (MM)(1)

Romeo & Julian 3

A Life as a Ghost

The tragic losses of his home and a dear one take FBI agent Julian

Harris one step closer to a shared life with his consultant and
lover, former art thief Romeo aka Paris Moore. They have just
moved in together and are trying to reestablish a certain normalcy

when Romeo once again shuffles the cards. He surprises Julian by
finally revealing some information about his true identity along

with some unexpected news regarding his position in Julian's
division.

During the nerve-racking hunt for the person that has been pulling
the strings all along, Julian once again comes to realize that when

dealing with Romeo, the only certainty is that all is not as it
seems. But one question is more important than ever—after
leading a life as a ghost for years, will Romeo’s love for Julian be

strong enough to make him settle at last?

Note: This book is written in one point of view.

Genre: Alternative (M/M or F/F), Contemporary
Length: 26,317 words

A LIFE AS A GHOST

Romeo & Julian 3

Sage Marlowe

EROTIC ROMANCE

MANLOVE

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IMPRINT: Erotic Romance ManLove

A LIFE AS A GHOST
Copyright © 2013 by Sage Marlowe
E-book ISBN: 978-1-62242-646-1

First E-book Publication: March 2013

Cover design by Christine Kirchoff
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PUBLISHER
Siren Publishing, Inc.
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Letter to Readers

Dear Readers,

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Marlowe from BookStrand.com or its official distributors, thank you.
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DEDICATION

To my wonderful editor Chad Andrews, who found the plot where

I lost it and once again tirelessly weeded through all my Britishisms.
You made this so much better. Thank you

A LIFE AS A GHOST

Romeo & Julian 3

SAGE MARLOWE

Chapter 1

“Are you sure about this?” Julian stared at the lump of cold, dead

flesh in front of him.

Eyebrows raised and lips curled into his typical half smile, Romeo

turned his head. “Sure. Why not?”

“Just…Oh, I don’t know.”
“Baby, don’t tell me you’ve never had a decent filet mignon in

your life.”

“I have.”
“Where?”
Wrinkling his nose, Julian tried to remember. “Joe’s Steakhouse.

Yes, that must have been the best.”

“Joe’s Steakhouse?” Romeo’s eyebrows were still raised, but the

shine of amusement had vanished, and he looked faintly disgusted.
“Indeed. You never had a decent filet mignon in your life,” he
concluded and shifted his attention back to the meat.

Julian was about to protest, but watching his lover carefully slice

and flatten the meat, he understood. This wasn’t about food. This was
Romeo’s way of providing distraction, of keeping them busy and
giving them something to talk about beyond the obvious.

A Life as a Ghost

“Could you be a darling and chop up those tomatoes?” Romeo’s

usually so faint accent revealed itself on the last word, the distinct
vowel. It had become stronger the day before, during those dreary
hours in the afternoon and evening when Romeo had done his best to
see Julian through the trauma of losing his home and a dear person
along with it.

“Sure. Knife?” Julian asked, playing along.
“Top drawer, to your left. Be careful, it’s really sharp.”
Julian was just about to make the appropriate comment to that

when he realized that, indeed, the knife was sharp. It sliced through
the tomato as if it were butter, leaving it parted neatly. “Wow. You
weren’t lying.”

“Told you, I never lie to you,” Romeo said softly. He’d moved to

stand behind Julian. Leaning in, he breathed a kiss on his neck.

“Charmer,” Julian scolded, but he twisted for a proper kiss.
“Nn-nn. It’s true.”
Julian watched his lover for a moment after he’d pulled back from

the kiss, thinking. “Romeo?”

“Yes?”
“Who are you? Really, I mean? And please don’t give me any of

the ‘I’m your consultant’ blah-blah again, okay?”

“Ah, Jules.” Romeo sighed and shook his head. “You worry too

much, baby.”

“That’s not the answer to my question.”
Romeo turned back to him and stopped right in front of him, head

tilted and lips parted. “No,” he agreed. “No, it’s not. You want to
know who I am?”

“Yes.”
Romeo slid his arms around Julian’s neck and pulled him down

until their foreheads touched. “I’m the man who risks a lot to be with
you.” He kissed Julian with tender determination. “I’m the man who
stands by you, no matter what happens.” He kissed Julian again, more

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Marlowe

urgently this time. “But above all, I’m the man who loves you, Julian.
Don’t ever forget that.”

His lips were soft and inviting, luring Julian on to drop his

questions, just like so many times before. “Are you trying to distract
me?”

Romeo grinned. “Is it working?”
“Hmm, not sure. Kiss me again, and I’ll let you know.”
Romeo was a fantastic kisser. There was no denying that, and

Julian couldn’t help responding to it the way he always did. “Let’s go
to bed,” he whispered.

“Bed?” Romeo’s voice had that husky tinge in it that never failed

to make Julian tingle all over with lust.

“Yeah.”
“What about dinner?”
“Fuck dinner,” Julian growled.
“Huh. Wouldn’t you rather fuck me?”
Julian rolled his eyes. “Lame. But yes. In fact, I would.”
“Wanna do it right here?”
“What, in the kitchen?”
Romeo’s eyes gleamed with excitement. “Yes.”
“Okay. Drop the clothes and hop on the table.”
Romeo smiled but did as he was told, and Julian took the chance

to watch his lover. Romeo was in perfect shape, but he moved
carefully because of his injured shoulder. The dressing on the wound
would need changing soon, Julian noticed. “Does it hurt much?”

Following Julian’s gaze with his own, Romeo shook his head.

“No, not really.

“Good. Lie down.”
Romeo stretched out on his back and watched Julian from

underneath his half-closed lashes. “C’mere.”

There was this rough tinge in his voice that never failed to excite

Julian. He undid his fly and pushed down his pants. His cock was
erect already, waving in front of him like a flagpole leading the way.

A Life as a Ghost

The way to Romeo and between his invitingly spread legs. Romeo
was equally hard. His beautiful, straight dick curved up to his belly,
bobbing and touching the skin where his stomach muscles stood out.
Julian wrapped his hand around the silky, smooth shaft, stroking it
once from base to sensitive tip. Romeo sighed and thrust into his fist.

“Shh, easy.” Julian smiled and repeated the motion then added the

twist around the head he knew Romeo liked. Romeo moaned but
remained still.

“Good boy. I like it when you’re obedient,” Julian whispered.
“Ugh. I know you do.”
“Maybe you should do it more often.” Tightening his grip, Julian

pumped his lover’s cock with several fast, hard yanks until Romeo
arched up and whimpered, and then he let go abruptly. “Obedient
boys get rewards, you know?” Julian whispered and stepped forward.
He took his own cock in hand, gave it the slow, comforting strokes he
longed for, and lined it up with Romeo’s. The sensation of the
swollen flesh alongside his own sent a shudder through him. Silk-
covered steel. What a silly cliché, but so true. He moved his hand
over both shafts, pressing them together tightly, and looked down to
watch the dark-flushed rods slide through his pale fist.

“Enjoy the view?” Romeo asked. There was a soft note of

amusement in his voice, but Julian wasn’t fooled. “Yes. And so do
you.”

Romeo grinned. “True. So you’re not gonna fuck me?”
“Nn-nn. I like a bit of variety every now and then.”
“Oh. Variety, huh?”
“Yes.”
“Would you mind varying your touch a bit to play with my balls?”
“I’ll vary my touch a bit to spank your ass in a minute, brat,”

Julian said in a low growl. He’d made the allusion before, and just as
the last time, there was a spark of excitement in Romeo’s eyes.
“You’d like that, wouldn’t you?”

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Marlowe

Romeo gripped his bottom lip with his teeth, snatching shallow

breaths when Julian rubbed their cocks again, this time with more
determination. It was a tease, and he kept the stimulation going at this
intensity until Romeo panted and tilted his head back before he let up.
Romeo grunted in protest, looked down, and glared at Julian.

“So, would you?” Julian asked again.
“Not sure. Never tried it.”
“Move your leg.”
“Huh?”
“Move your leg. Up, on my shoulder.” Julian slapped the outside

of Romeo’s thigh lightly to encourage him then helped him hook his
ankle over his shoulder. The position required a certain suppleness,
but Romeo had always been very bendable.

Romeo frowned. “Like this?”
“Yes.”
“But why, what—ouch! Oi!”
Julian had applied a nice flat-handed smack to the exposed bit of

Romeo’s ass. The expression on Romeo’s face was priceless. He
looked somewhere between surprised and indignant, but there was
also a definite note of curiosity. Julian slapped him again, a bit harder
this time. It was enough to make his palm sting, and Romeo twitched
away from it, but he couldn’t go far. Another, lighter blow made him
gasp, so Julian did it again, watching Romeo’s face as he started a
rhythm of relatively mild strikes to Romeo’s butt cheek and upper
thigh. Romeo’s beautiful blue eyes were narrowed, but they were dark
with arousal, and the soft whimpers he made whenever another blow
connected didn’t sound like protest.

Julian’s hand stung, but he kept up the spanking. It was new for

both of them, uncharted territory, but it was a promising journey and
one he’d been tempted to take for a while. It was a milder form of the
dark mood that had possessed him the night before, but even in those
exciting moments he understood that both came from the same
source. He wanted to lead and have power over something that was

A Life as a Ghost

almost impossible to control. He wanted to put the reins on Romeo
and have a hold over his fiercely independent lover. Not much of a
surprise there.

What did surprise him was Romeo’s response to it. Usually so in

control and so one step ahead of everyone else, he melted under
Julian’s hands now and gave himself over. And he was still hard, his
cock heavy and throbbing where it rested next to Julian’s.

Julian tightened his grip, and Romeo’s resulting cry echoed his

own. Concentrating on the effect the spanking had on his lover, Julian
hadn’t even realized how much it turned him on. Romeo twitched in
response to another smack, and the jolt against his cock nearly
brought Julian over the edge. He started jerking their cocks with
sudden need, dizzy from excitement.

The spanking was impossible to keep up while he focused on the

motions of his other hand, but Julian made up for it by pressing his
palm to the skin he’d just abused. Romeo’s flesh was nicely warm
under his touch, radiating a heat that equaled the one in Julian’s hand,
and he knew that his lover felt the same sting he did. The burn from
irritated nerve endings was a sweet pleasure-pain that heightened his
arousal and left him tingling all over with lust.

Romeo came first. He screamed, threw his head back, and bucked,

shooting ropes of creamy cum over Julian’s hand and his own
stomach. His cock pulsed next to Julian’s, and its contractions, along
with the sight of Romeo climaxing, were the trigger for Julian’s
orgasm. It burst out of him, from his groin through the tight channel
of his cock, exploding out of him and leaving him weak and
trembling.

He collapsed on top of Romeo, their chests and bellies glued

together with sweat and semen. Romeo’s excited heartbeat thudded
under his ears, a symbol of strength, health, and life, and suddenly,
some of the deep sadness Julian had felt ever since he’d learned of his
housekeeper’s death lifted. He still mourned her loss, but he was no
longer numb with pain. Instead, he wanted to act. He wanted to find

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Marlowe

out what had happened, and should he find that there was a crime
behind all of this, he was determined not to let it go unpunished.
Action was good. Revenge was better.

* * * *

“So…” Romeo said after a while. “Dinner?”
Julian hummed contentedly. “Oh, yes please. I’m starved.”
Chuckling, Romeo stood. He winced as he pulled his pants back

up.

“You okay?” Julian asked.
“Yeah, just…You’re a caveman.”
“Huh? Why are you calling me that?”
“’Cause it’s true.” Romeo smiled and gave Julian a quick kiss in

passing. “You’re a caveman. And not just for the obvious reason.” He
raised his eyebrows and pointed at his ass before he continued. “You
consider a filet steak from Joe’s the best there is. You’re clueless
when it comes to picking the right wine for dinner. Bugger, I guess I
should’ve known you’d even spank your boyfriend on the dinner
table.”

Julian’s heart gave a little jolt in his chest. “Is that true?”
“Well, yes. Of course. Unless you want us to have dinner on the

coffee table.”

“That’s not what I meant.”
“It’s not?”
“No, and you know it.”
Romeo looked up. “I thought that was clear.”
“Hmm. I guess so, but this must be the first time you said it out

loud.”

“What, the B-word?”
“Yes.”
“And you like it. You’re going all possessive on me, aren’t you?”

Romeo grinned and shook his head. “See, caveman.”

A Life as a Ghost

“So what? I may not have the most refined tastes, but at least I

don’t fuss about stuff like the right blend of coffee or which way to
cut up a fucking steak. And I don’t use words like bugger—at least
not in the sense you do.”

“Right. You don’t.”
“You’re from England, aren’t you?”
Romeo had gone to the sink where he washed his hands. He froze

at Julian’s words, clutching the towel. “My mother is—was—English.
Some of her word usage rubbed off on me, I guess.”

“I see. And your father? American?”
Romeo chewed his lip. “French-Italian.”
“Oh. So you’re a European crossbreed, huh?”
“Yeah, I suppose you could say that.”
“Helps with the languages, I assume.”
“It does.”
“Do you speak all of them? Italian, too, I mean. I already know

you speak French.”

Romeo put the towel back on its rack and turned to the food

they’d left on the worktop. He picked up the knife and weighed it in
his hand before he said, “I’m fluent in five languages. The three
obvious ones—English, French and Italian—Spanish, and German. I
also speak Russian, and I can get by in Chinese if I have to.”

“Wow. You really have a talented tongue.”
Romeo made a face. “I just got around a lot as a kid.”
“Yeah, you said so. Swiss boarding school, huh? What was that

like?”

“Boring, mostly.”
“Apart from your art teacher, I assume?”
Romeo picked up his wineglass and took a sip before he

answered. “Yes.”

“This is just a guess, but…I wouldn’t happen to have recently met

this former teacher of yours, would I?”

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Marlowe

Romeo’s back was still turned, and it would have been easy to

miss the hesitation in his motion, but Julian had been watching him
closely. He decided not to let on that Romeo’s body language had just
given away the answer. He was far more interested in hearing what
Romeo was going to say.

Romeo didn’t say anything. He picked up the frying pan, poured

oil into it, and put it on the flame then watched it heat up in silence.

“Is this where you’re not lying to me?” Julian asked after a while.
“Yes,” Romeo said tonelessly. “I didn’t hide that very well, did

I?”

“Well, no. It was obvious that you care for Jacob Goldstein even

before you asked me to keep his name off the records.”

Romeo’s shoulders tensed. “The steaks are almost done. Would

you put the bread and salad on the table, please?”

“Sure.” Julian knew it was pointless to pursue the matter. Romeo

wasn’t going to lie to him. He was willing to believe that, but that
didn’t mean Romeo would tell him everything.

The silence lasted until Julian tried the first bite of his steak. “Oh

my. This is good.” He glanced at it. “It’s also not cooked well.”

Romeo rolled his eyes. “That’s the point of a decent steak. It’s not

supposed to be cooked to the point where it resembles a chunk of
leather. You just have to get top-quality meat then there’s no need to
burn it to charcoal and—” He bit his lip. “Sorry.”

Julian felt as if he was about to choke on the lump of food in his

mouth. He forced himself to swallow it, even though the delicious
beef seemed to have turned into rubber. He washed it down with a big
gulp of wine. “It’s all right.”

“It’s not. I shouldn’t have—”
“I said it’s all right, okay?” Julian snapped.
Romeo raised a hand. “Okay, okay. Want to talk about it?”
“Not really, but I guess I’ll have to sooner or later, so we might as

well get it over with.”

A Life as a Ghost

“Right. I’m aware that the police officer has asked you most of

this, but I have to put you through it again anyway. And I want you to
consider my questions before you answer them, okay?”

“Okay. Just…Do you have anything stronger than this?” Julian

tapped his finger on his glass.

Romeo glanced at him, and then he sighed. “I guess that means

dinner is over.”

“Sorry. The steak is fantastic, but…”
“You can’t eat it. It’s okay. Don’t worry. I’ll just put the plates

away then we can move over to the sofa and I’ll get you a drink.”

“Thank you.”
“No problem. Just try to take it slowly with the booze. I need you

to be able to answer my questions.”

“Okay. I will.”
Romeo looked about to say more, but he just pursed his lips and

got up.

“Go ahead. I’ll be with you in a minute.”
Julian accepted the offer gladly. His good mood had evaporated

like smoke, and he longed for something that would help him drown
the thoughts that were about to crush him. Yes, action was fine, but
there wasn’t much he could do right now.

He settled on the sofa and listened to the clatter of Romeo

cleaning up. The homey sounds were at the same time comforting and
infuriating. He was in someone else’s home while his own was
destroyed. And poor Mrs. Dobbs had been destroyed with it.

“Jules,” Romeo whispered right behind him. Julian jumped. He

hadn’t even heard his lover approach. Again. “Here you are. I hope
you like it.” His eyes held concern as he handed Julian a tumbler with
an amber-colored liquid.

“I’m sure I will as long as there’s alcohol in it,” Julian retorted

and took the glass.

“Oh, there is. It’s—”

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Marlowe

“I’m sure it’s something extravagant, which I don’t stand a hope

to appreciate, but frankly, I don’t care. No offense.”

The corners of Romeo’s mouth tilted up. “None taken. I was about

to tell you that it’s just some cheap cooking brandy, as I don’t usually
indulge in hard liquor, but since you don’t care, I won’t have to
apologize for the poor quality.”

Julian was tempted to ask if it was a joke, but he decided to let it

rest. Romeo had a warped sense of humor, but not even he would joke
in a situation like this. “You don’t drink any hard stuff, but you use
brandy for cooking?” he asked instead.

Romeo looked surprised. “Why, yes. Of course. Brandy and wine,

depending on the dish I’m preparing.”

“Are you saying you actually cook your own food?”
Romeo smiled. “A lot of the time I do.”
Julian let his thoughts roam for a while. “There really isn’t much

you can’t do, huh?”

The smile on Romeo’s face became strained then disappeared

completely. “Comes from having had a lot of time on my hands to
practice.”

Julian perked up at the bitter note in Romeo’s voice. “When did

you have a lot of time on your hands? I was under the impression that
you must have led a busy life to have learned all the things you
know.”

“I have. Led a busy life, I mean. But I didn’t do a lot of the things

that other people do, so I had time to do some of the things other
people don’t do.”

“What things?” Julian asked, but he didn’t need to hear the answer

to understand. “Dating, you mean?”

Romeo winced and took a breath. “Having a relationship,

precisely.”

“What?” Julian gasped in exaggerated surprise. “And here I was

thinking you were perfect dating material.”

A Life as a Ghost

“Not funny.” Romeo made a face. “I’ve dated plenty, but it’s

never lasted.”

“It hasn’t? My, what a surprise. You, the slick, sophisticated

connoisseur with your talented tongue and mysterious life, you—”

“Just quit the snark, okay?” Romeo’s voice was sharp, but his

eyes were hurt. “You might think you have figured me out, but you
have no idea who I really am.”

“Huh. Funny you should say that, seeing as it’s exactly what I

keep telling you. But if it bothers you so much, why don’t you just
change it? It’s in your power. All you have to do is to give me some
answers.”

Huffing, Romeo raised his hands in a rare gesture of impatience.

“I can’t. I can’t, Jules. Not yet, okay?”

“Why? Why not?” Julian snapped, but Romeo just shook his head.
“I just can’t. Trust me on this, Jules,” he said quietly and picked

up the bottle. He refilled the glass, which Julian had drained without
noticing, and then he put down the bottle and took his own glass. “It
will all make sense one day. I promise. But right now, it’s better if
you don’t know. Safer.”

He tipped his glass to Julian’s then knocked back the drink in one,

indicating for Julian to do the same. “Now, about my questions…” He
topped up their glasses once more, and Julian was vaguely astonished
at the speed with which Romeo kept the liquor coming, but that was
exactly what he wanted, wasn’t it?

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Chapter 2

The phone was ringing with astonishing persistence, and it must

have been ringing for quite some time, Julian realized drowsily, but
he had simply assimilated the familiar melody into his dream. It was
still dark, but now that he was beginning to wake up, he recognized
the sound as it reverberated in the silence of the apartment around
him.

“Don’t you want to answer it?” He reached out to touch the warm

body next to him, except there was none. Neither warm nor otherwise.
The other side of the bed was empty and cold.

Not again. The thought shot through Julian’s sleep-befuddled

brain and left an acid trail in its wake. Julian rubbed his temples and
groaned. He hated waking up with a headache. Especially when it
came with a furry tongue and dried-out throat.

He threw back the cool, silken sheets and the heavy quilt and sat

up. Answering the phone was not an option, even though the poor
thing was still begging for his attention with its shrill cries that bore a
faint resemblance to some well-known, classic tune. This was
Romeo’s home, even though they were sharing it officially now.

Julian swung his legs out of bed, pushed to his feet, and waited for

the world to catch up with his motion. Then he shuffled to the
bathroom, which was in a strategically idiotic location at the other end
of the big apartment. He barely turned his head to check the living
area in passing, knowing that it was pointless. Romeo wasn’t in. He
had once again taken off in the middle of the night, at some point after
Julian had drifted off to sleep in his arms. Or maybe holding Romeo
in his own arms. Falling asleep with his lover close to him was one of

A Life as a Ghost

the merits of living together, Julian thought. Waking up with him
would have been nice, too, but the chances were poor.

Of all the times they had gone to bed together, there hadn’t been a

single occasion Julian hadn’t woken in an empty bed. Apparently the
fact that he was living at Romeo’s place now wasn’t going to change
that. He still wasn’t sure why Romeo had invited him to move in after
Julian’s house had been blown up. Was it really because he wanted
him near? Or had he just been under orders from Julian’s boss, Chief
Baxter, to take him to a safe place and keep him there? Romeo’s own
home would have been the obvious choice, the stylish penthouse
apartment at the top floor of an expensive townhouse. So much had
happened in the past thirty hours, and with his head pounding from a
hangover like it was, he had no intention of putting the shattered
fragments of his memories back together.

He shuffled to the kitchen area, remembering the box containing

Band-Aids and various over-the-counter medication that could be
found in any average household. Hopefully it also contained some
decent painkillers.

A noise made him freeze and then perk up. A faint rustle. It was

almost too low to hear, and he wouldn’t have noticed it if he had still
been asleep, but since he was leaning on the kitchen counter at three
in the morning, he did hear it.

Something, or someone, moved in the sleeping area. It was a blind

spot due to the angle the far wall created. Julian wished he hadn’t
been so damn responsible as to lock up his firearm in the small safe in
Romeo’s bookshelf. He remembered Romeo’s and his boss’s warning
not to go anywhere by himself. But I didn’t go anywhere by myself.
He left me here by myself. There was a difference, wasn’t there? A
difference the person who intended to kill him wouldn’t waste another
thought on.

Julian quietly slid a drawer open and sneaked a hand inside. Yes.

It was the one with the sharp kitchen knives. He gingerly ran a
fingertip up the cold steel length of one, careful to stay on the blunt

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Marlowe

side of the blade, until he found the handle and was convinced that he
could pull it out without making too much noise. The knife followed
his tug easily. Julian weighed it in his hand. It wasn’t long, but it
would have to do. At least it was really sharp. It was the one he had
used in the evening to chop vegetables. He tightened his grip around
the handle. He was damned if he let a bloody burglar—or the person
who had assumedly already tried to kill him once—unsettle him that
much. He checked the knife instinctively, reassured by its slender yet
solid shape.

It was a good knife. Somehow it reminded him of Romeo. He,

too, had the deceptively slender and graceful build of a ballet dancer
but possessed an astonishing strength. His well-trained muscles were
like flexible steel when used, and Julian had felt them in use. He
suppressed a shudder at the memory of that moment outside the
interrogation room when he had realized that Romeo was a lot more
dangerous than he had ever assumed him to be.

“Everything all right?”
Julian jumped about a foot. The knife hit the floor with a clatter

that was just about loud enough to be heard over the mad drumming
of his heart. “Where the fuck did you come from?”

Romeo pointed over his shoulder and at the door. “Outside.”
“But…I’ve been watching that door.”
“Oh. Have you?”
“Uh…I don’t know,” Julian admitted. “I have for a while, but

there were noises and…oh, fuck.” He groaned, remembering the
strange sounds and his unreasonable, disproportionate fear. Now, with
Romeo’s soothing solidity next to him, it seemed ridiculous to freak
out like that. He crouched to pick up the knife and gingerly put it back
into its drawer. “What was that noise anyway? You must have heard
it, too.”

“Heard what exactly?”
“Some kind of rustling and shuffling. I think it came from the

bedroom.”

A Life as a Ghost

Faint thought lines appeared on Romeo’s forehead. “That would

probably have been me. I was just in there.”

“In the fucking bedroom? What were you doing in there?”
“Slipping back into bed with my beloved. What did you think?”
Julian’s memory trailed back to the large box of supplies he had

discovered in Romeo’s wardrobe the first night he had spent at the
apartment. Ropes and black clothes, the kind he knew from
experience Romeo preferred to wear on his heists, and worst of all, a
stack of false passports with fake identities about the existence of
which Julian hadn’t had a clue. For a while he had really believed he
had discovered and burned all of Romeo’s many aliases, but he’d
obviously been very wrong.

The temptation to tackle Romeo about all of this was strong, but it

wasn’t the right time. Instead, Julian sighed and rubbed his eyes.

“I…Oh, shit. I guess I am a bit out of it. I’m sorry. Seems this is

all getting to me more than I thought it would.”

Tilting his head to the side, Romeo watched him with a tender

expression in his eyes. “What are you doing up anyway? I thought
you were fast asleep.”

“The phone rang, and I woke up, and you weren’t there, so I just

got up to…Oh, I don’t know.”

Romeo perked up a bit, but his voice remained calm. Unlike

Julian, who jumped at his own shadow these days, he wasn’t one to
lose his serenity easily.

“The phone? Who was it?”
“How would I know? I didn’t answer it.”
“Why not?” If Romeo was pleasantly or honestly surprised, he

didn’t show it. His face was the usual careful blank with the secretive
half smile, but the latter was dimmed by the hint of a frown. It might
be owned to his discomfort at the thought of Julian answering his
phone, or maybe it was simply genuine concern for Julian. Either
way, it was impossible to tell what was going on behind those
mesmerizing blue eyes. As always.

24 Sage

Marlowe

Ignoring the matter of the missed phone call, Romeo tilted his

head to the side and came closer. He reached out and gently pulled
Julian into his arms. They were almost the same height, with Romeo
lacking that decisive last inch which put him at an awkward angle for
Julian to rest his head on his shoulder. It didn’t matter.

What mattered was that Romeo was there, holding him, stroking

him, and nuzzling his ear and neck with cool but sensitive lips. Not
before long, the caresses chased the last of the chill of anxiety from
Julian’s body and woke his dozing desire instead. Julian answered
Romeo’s touches with his own fingers and turned the innocent,
supportive gesture into one of mutual desire.

Twisting in Romeo’s hold, Julian freed his arms and rearranged

their position until one of his hands was cupping Romeo’s face, the
other his ass. It was macho but just the way Julian liked it, and he
knew that Romeo, for all his outward slick superiority, loved it, too.
He enjoyed being taken by someone bigger than him, someone who
was a match for him physically and not afraid to show it. Julian would
have liked to think that he was stronger but doubted that. He didn’t
have to be anyway. He’d figured out that Romeo was happy to
surrender in the bedroom, possibly the only place where he was the
perfect bottom to Julian’s top.

Closing his eyes, Julian tried to concentrate on the kiss and ignore

the taste of nicotine on Romeo’s tongue. Romeo didn’t smoke. Not
unless he was with people who did, or suffering from insomnia, which
he frequently did. Or rather, he just didn’t need much sleep. He
functioned well on just four or five hours’ sleep, unlike Julian who
was brain-dead if he got less than a full night’s rest.

The taste of the cigarettes reminded Julian that Romeo had been

on one of his mysterious middle-of-the-night strolls. What he was up
to on those occasions remained a secret Julian wasn’t sure he even
wanted unveiled. And this was certainly not the moment to start
digging for an answer.

A Life as a Ghost

“Back to bed?” he gasped, breathless as Romeo ground the hard

bulge at his groin into Julian’s hip.

“Nn-nn,” Romeo objected, equally winded, and pulled Julian

along with him. Julian couldn’t help a smile as he realized what
Romeo had in mind.

“The table? Again?” He tried not to show how much the idea

appealed to him. It was another favorite of Romeo’s, sex in every
room, on the floor or just any suitable piece of furniture, and, damn,
the man was bendable.

“Yeah,” Romeo groaned huskily, a sound that sent a shudder of

sheer delight down Julian’s spine. Delving for Romeo’s fly, he peeled
him out of his pants while pushing down his own boxers impatiently.
Romeo hopped on the table but not quite as graciously as he would
have done normally, Julian noticed. His shoulder was apparently still
giving him trouble.

One hand resting at the back of Romeo’s neck, Julian gently

steered him backward into the position he wanted him in. Flat on his
back, his shirt open to expose his glorious chest, legs spread to either
side of Julian’s hips, Romeo was laid out to be taken, and Julian had
every intention of taking him.

“Fuck, you’re beautiful,” he praised and ran his hands over the

perfect parallel lines of Romeo’s rib cage. He tweaked both dark,
pebbled nipples, drawing a delighted cry from Romeo, and then he
trailed his fingers down across the smooth, ribbed plane of Romeo’s
stomach and further on to cup the heavy erection that was straining
toward him. Romeo moaned at the contact, arching his back as best he
could to push into Julian’s hand.

“Easy, sweetheart.” Julian snickered. “You’re gonna have to wait

for me.”

“I will,” Romeo said, peering up at Julian with hungry eyes. “Just

make it fast.”

“Ooh, do you think you’re in a position to give orders?” Julian

teased, although he definitely agreed with the making it fast part.

26 Sage

Marlowe

He slipped the condom on quickly then grappled with the lube.

The small, single-size sachets had the annoying tendency to get as
slippery as a wet eel when opened, and he’d dropped more than one in
a frantic fumble in the dark. This time he managed, which was good.

Moaning with impatience, Romeo hooked one leg around Julian’s

hip and pulled him close, using the leverage to arch his back and
thrust up again in a shallow motion that was likely to look sexier than
it felt for him. No, Romeo wasn’t one to waste time on foreplay,
another feature that made him well compatible with Julian. They both
preferred the heat of the act as such, edging each other on and more
than once turning it into a naughty competition of who had the most
stamina.

More often than not, Romeo would win. His body was made for

sin, a fact that was once again confirmed by the ease with which he
took all of Julian’s hard length. Groaning, Julian sank into the
welcoming heat. Romeo needed only moments to adjust, no more
than the time it took for a passionate kiss. Julian adored those first
seconds, the intense clasp of Romeo’s muscles when they were still so
deliciously tight around his swollen shaft that he wondered how he
would ever be able to move.

Rocking gently, he made room for himself in the velvet-lined

channel. Romeo groaned, tilting his hips to make the angle more
welcoming for Julian and, judging by the increased roughness of his
moans, getting the stimulation right where he liked it best. His insides
relaxed into willing submission, a hot, slick wrapping for Julian’s
cock, and then Romeo hooked his other leg around Julian’s waist,
closing the vice and using the hold to push back against Julian.

He kept this connection throughout, which was good, or Julian’s

hard thrusts would have sent him skittering across the table. As it was,
they clung on to each other, Romeo’s strong legs enveloping Julian’s
hips, Julian’s hands on Romeo’s waist to hold him in place, and their
groins grinding, thrusting, and smashing together. It was passionate,
uninhibited, and more than once near-painful, but it was good. Julian

A Life as a Ghost

came first, shooting his load deep inside Romeo’s writhing, sweat-
covered body, just as Romeo’s inner muscles were beginning to start
their own orgasmic contractions. Julian held himself up for just as
long as it took Romeo to come back down from his climax, and then
he crashed on top of him, resting his head on Romeo’s heaving chest.

“Wow,” Romeo gasped, raising his head to look at Julian. “We’re

getting better at this.”

“Huh?” Already, Julian was feeling sleepy again. Really, getting

up at three in the morning with a hangover was a drag, even if he was
rewarded with indecently hot sex.

“That other time I almost put out my back when I slipped,

remember?”

“Oh, that. Well, I guess you’re getting on a bit, my dear,” Julian

teased, earning himself an indignant stare from Romeo’s blue eyes.
He lifted his head for a quick kiss, and then he straightened up and
pulled back, seeing his own feelings mirrored in the grimace on
Romeo’s face. Pulling out was just never as good as pushing in.

He offered Romeo a hand to help him sit up, but Romeo just

snorted and glared at him, flexing his stomach muscles to sit up.
Julian watched him slide off the table, noticing the wince when
Romeo’s feet hit the floor.

“How’s the shoulder?”
Romeo made a face and slipped into his pants. “Still stings a bit,

but healing, I guess. Which means it’s gonna start itching like the
devil soon.” He sighed. “I hate it when that happens.”

“So this isn’t the first time you’ve been wounded?” Julian asked.

He still felt guilty for having failed to notice Romeo’s injury after it
had first happened. Romeo had gotten it during his latest attempted
break-in. One of the private security guards the museum had hired
had decided to take justice into his own hands and had shot at the
burglar instead of calling the police.

Romeo had been lucky. Very, very lucky. The guard’s aim had

been off, so the bullet had hit Romeo’s shoulder. It had ripped a nasty

28 Sage

Marlowe

enough gash into the fleshy part right beside Romeo’s neck, but an
inch to the left and it would have punctured his throat. Another four
inches higher would have put a hole into his temple. The thought still
made Julian cringe with terror.

“No,” Romeo replied in a low voice. “Not the first time.” He

hadn’t bothered putting his shoes back on, and he shuffled across the
kitchen on bare feet.

Leaning his hip on the worktop, Julian watched him. “What

happened? Another failed break-in?”

“Nn-nn.” Romeo busied himself with wiping the table, his back

turned to Julian.

“Oh, of course. Silly me. I should have guessed. Another one in

your increasingly long list of secrets, right?”

Romeo froze mid-motion, his back a tense line from shoulders to

shapely ass. “Jules, look. I’m sorry. It won’t be like this much longer.
Trust me on this.”

Julian stared at him, frustration burning inside him. “Trust you?

You’re not exactly giving me reason to,” he snapped. “Do you think
I’m stupid? All those times you’re off God-knows-where doing
whatever the fuck it is that you’re doing…Do you really think I didn’t
notice?”

Romeo turned around to him, picking at the corners of the

cleaning cloth with his long, slender fingers. “Of course I don’t. And I
don’t think you’re stupid, either, but you have to understand that I
have my reasons for doing what I’m doing.”

“Oh, I’m sure you do,” Julian shot back acidly. “And you know

what? It’s okay. Forget I even asked. One of these days I might just
stop caring altogether. I’m growing tired of asking, only to be told
that you can’t tell me anyway. If you ever decide I am trustworthy
enough for you to let me into your life, you know where to find me.”
He hadn’t meant to get quite so cross, but really, all those times
Romeo evaded him like a slippery, well, sachet of lube, for lack of
better comparison, were annoying him more than he cared to admit.

A Life as a Ghost

And yes, he’d had about all he could take, and he wasn’t going to
keep quiet about it. Not even if speaking his mind meant another fight
with Romeo.

Romeo, who seemed to have changed his mind about scrubbing

the table clean of sweat and semen stains, tossed the cloth in the basin
and squared his shoulders, hands resting on his hips. There was an
unreadable expression in his eyes as he held Julian’s gaze.

“Fine. You’re pissed off with me. I get it. What do you want?

Back to bed so you get your de-cranking sleep or coffee and some of
those answers you’re so desperate for?” He was still looking at Julian
with that unnerving, unfairly composed calm. Julian’s heart skipped a
beat.

“Answers would be great,” he said warily. “But now? I’m still

half-drunk.”

Romeo didn’t bat an eyelid. “I know.”
“Right. I’m sure you do. Is that why? Did you make me drunk on

purpose so I wouldn’t keep up with your interrogation techniques? Or
will it help me swallow your answers now?”

Romeo’s cool, blue stare softened. “No. I just thought it’s time

you knew what was going on. But that can wait if you’re too…tired.”

“Huh. You don’t really think I’d pass a chance to get some

answers from you, do you? Go make coffee and then meet me on the
sofa. It’s been ages since I’ve had a long night, and I’m totally up for
it.” Julian winked while at the same time stifling a yawn that had
caught him off guard.

Romeo smiled. “Okay. Try not to fall asleep until I’m back. I have

to go and fetch a packet of fresh coffee from the basement.”

“I will.” Julian stifled another yawn. “But you might wanna

hurry.”

Listening to Romeo’s retreating footsteps on the stairs, Julian tried

to keep his word. Really, he did, but for some reason he never heard
Romeo return.

30 Sage

Marlowe

Chapter 3

Julian woke with a jolt and a crick in his neck. It took him a while

to remember where he was. The sofa in Romeo’s apartment. Why the
sofa? He’d meant to wait for Romeo to return, to…right. To be given
some long-awaited answers. Fuck. Fucking fuck. It had been the first
time Romeo had offered to talk, and Julian had conked out before he
had the chance to ask even a single question.

Julian got up and stretched his back. Hoping that the offer was

still on was almost certainly pushing his luck. He went to the bedroom
to check on Romeo. The bed was deserted and, as far as Julian could
tell, in exactly the same state of tangled sheets and piled up pillows he
had left it in. So Romeo wasn’t in. Why didn’t that come as much of a
surprise? Disappointed, Julian turned around and shuffled back to the
kitchen to make himself some coffee with the ultra-fashionable,
highly unreliable machine Romeo adored so much. He claimed it
made the best coffee in the world, right after a certain tiny cafe in
some fucking street somewhere in the middle of Paris. Julian could
never seem to remember either the name of the cafe or that of the
street, even if he had been able to pronounce them. Yes, Romeo loved
his little luxuries.

This morning, at least, it seemed that the pile of glossy metal parts

was in a good mood. Or maybe it just took mercy on Julian. Either
way, with a lot of steaming and hissing, it produced a nice cup full of
hot, deliciously scented coffee. Mug in hand, Julian strolled through
the adjoining living area. It was only half past five, so he had a full
hour to kill until he had to get ready for work. He cast a cautious look
through the big window. Dawn was only just beginning to break, but,

A Life as a Ghost

as far as he could see, the sky was clear. It would be another cold,
crisp February day. The thought of the cool, relatively clean air of the
morning was suddenly extremely tempting, and Julian went to the
glass door that led to the roof garden.

He’d only been out there once, on the day he had arrived at

Romeo’s apartment. Romeo had given him a tour of his home. It was
a beautiful, tastefully furnished and decorated apartment on the top
floor of a rich, elderly widow’s huge town house. The roof garden
was the highlight of the place. It offered a spectacular view over a big
part of the city, in a neighborhood that consisted mostly of the same
type of expensive and classy town houses.

Julian’s hand froze on the doorknob. The door wasn’t locked.

Thoughts shot through his mind, memories of the night before
mingling with images his traumatized brain came up with. The weird
noises he had heard. Romeo saying it had been him in the bedroom,
although Julian was fairly certain that he hadn’t yet been in at the
time. Neither of them had bothered to check that door, had they?
Romeo leaving, his footsteps on the stairs, walking away…Had he
ever come back? Julian didn’t know. He had been so mind-numbingly
tired, conked out almost the moment the door had fallen shut behind
Romeo. His chest tightened with worry. Romeo hadn’t closed the
door, had he? He wouldn’t have if he was just going downstairs to the
storage room in the cellar, and anyway, Julian wouldn’t have heard
him on the stairs if the door had indeed been closed. Especially not
since Romeo had gone barefoot. Which, on the other hand, meant that
it was highly unlikely that Romeo had left the building. At least not
out of his free will. Fuck. Julian rubbed his forehead. He was seeing
things, right? Conjuring up a horrible scenario in which Romeo had
been abducted by an unseen enemy, possibly the one who had planted
the bomb in Julian’s home.

They knew now that it had indeed been a bomb, not the accidental

gas explosion the firefighters had initially taken into consideration.

32 Sage

Marlowe

Ever since he had heard that statement, Julian had been feeling like
someone was watching him.

As an FBI agent, he was used to living with the knowledge that

people might not have his best interest at heart. Running into someone
who pulled a gun at him was a risk he was taking every day, and yet,
knowing that someone was after him and had singled him out as a
target and taken the effort to break into his home to plant a bomb
under his bed, was an entirely different matter. It was personal. And
combined with Romeo being shot at and injured just a few hours
earlier, it was enough to unsettle even a mentally strong person.

His own heartbeat thudded madly in his ears. He pushed the door

open and checked the frame for signs of a forced entry. There were
none, but the relief he should have felt at that discovery failed to find
him. He took a step outside, shivering as the cold morning air hit him.
It smelled of the usual exhausts of the city, but up here on the roof
and before the main wave of traffic hit the roads, it was fresher than
normal and a treat to his tortured lungs. It wasn’t until he sucked in a
deep gulp of this cold air that Julian realized that he’d been holding
his breath. Forcing himself to move, he walked on past the
windscreen that shielded the glass wall of the apartment while
blocking the main part of the roof terrace from view.

He groaned in relief. Stretched out on one of the pale-blue

recliners and looking like he didn’t have a care in the world, Romeo
lounged peacefully, watching Julian’s approach with an amused
expression.

“Good morning sweetheart,” he greeted, grinning. “Did you just

meet a ghost?”

“Not really,” Julian grumbled as he gingerly settled on the recliner

next to Romeo’s. “Just my imagination running havoc, I think.”

The amusement vanished from Romeo’s face and was replaced by

a frown of concern. “Still shaken up by what happened, huh?”

Julian nodded and gave Romeo a thorough once-over, refusing to

admit even to himself that he did it as much to reassure himself that

A Life as a Ghost

his lover was still alive and breathing as to simply enjoy what he saw.
Romeo was always a sight for sore eyes, but disheveled and stubbly in
the morning, he looked more beddable than at any other time. He was
wrapped in a thick blanket, and very much an unusual sight, Mrs.
Puddles, the landlady’s huge, half-Persian fur ball of a cat, lay curled
up on his lap. Even more unusually, Romeo’s fingers were twisted
into her silky, smoke-gray fur, absently rubbing and petting her feline
back.

Indicating the contentedly purring animal, Julian asked, “What did

she do to get into your good books?” It wasn’t much of a secret that
Romeo’s tolerance for pets ended with them crossing his doorstep.

Romeo shrugged. “Nothing really. It’s what cats always do, isn’t

it? But she’s warm, and well, sometimes even the company of a cat
can be nice.”

“Have you been out here all night?” Julian inquired, taking in the

half-full ashtray and the crumpled, empty packet of cigarettes next to
it. The phone was on the table, too, so Romeo must have taken the
time to return that missed call.

Romeo shook his head. “No, just since you fell asleep.” Following

Julian’s gaze, he pulled a face. “I know. I guess you’re not the only
one who’s a bit shaken up.”

“Oh. So you noticed, huh?”
“It was impossible not to. As I said, you looked like you’d seen a

ghost. What was wrong?”

“Oh, I don’t know.” Julian sighed and pulled another of the thick,

woolen blankets around himself. He leaned back, fingers curled
around his miraculously still-warm coffee cup to soak up its heat. “I
saw that the door was open and you were gone, and the obvious
connection didn’t make it.”

“You thought someone had broken in and kidnapped me?” Romeo

asked with wide eyes.

Embarrassed, Julian rubbed his chin. “Pathetic, huh?”

34 Sage

Marlowe

“No.” Romeo’s mouth curved in an affectionate smile. “Kind of

cute, really, the way you worry about me. You don’t have to, though,”
he added earnestly. “I’m a big boy. I can look after myself.”

“Sure. And the bullet wound in your shoulder is proof of that.”
“Shit.” Absently fluffing the cat’s already enormous coat, Romeo

heaved a sigh. “These things happen.”

“No, they don’t. They don’t happen if you stay out of trouble.

They don’t happen if you don’t run around breaking in at night.”

“Don’t you think I don’t know that?” Romeo snapped. “It’s not as

though I can help it, you know. It’s what I have to do to—” Pressing
his lips together, he turned his head and glanced at the building’s far
wall.

“To what?” Julian prompted.
“To get us out of that fucking mess we’re in.”
“To…you want to get us out of this?” Julian asked incredulously.

“Since when is that your responsibility, and anyway, what do you
mean with the mess we are in? I’m the one whose house got blown
up, remember?”

“Yeah. And I’m the one who would have a bullet in his head if I

hadn’t noticed that something was off in time,” Romeo replied
without heat.

“That’s different. That was an overenthusiastic security guard.

Some of these private army guys are like that. They think that having
something to defend and the license to carry a gun gives them the
right to—”

“That wasn’t a security guard playing cowboy. I didn’t see the

shooter, but he was nowhere near where the guards were. He was on
the roof, and he had a sniper rifle.”

Julian felt the blood drain from his face. “A sniper? Are you

sure?”

Romeo nodded. “I might not be a big fan of firearms myself, but I

can tell the difference between a rifle and a pistol. Also, the distance

A Life as a Ghost

was too long, and it was dark. Whoever it was, they must have had
night vision, too.”

“An awful lot of effort to protect a relatively small and

unimportant museum.” The truth was dawning on Julian already, but
he wasn’t sure he was ready to accept it.

“Jules. That wasn’t about defending the museum. It was about

taking me down.”

It only confirmed what Julian had figured out himself, and yet,

hearing it said out loud sent a chill through his bones that had nothing
to do with the cold of the morning. Frightening though it was, that
answer raised a lot more questions.

“Who the fuck are you? And don’t you dare say you can’t tell me,

mister. You promised me answers, and I want them. Why would
someone send a sniper after you? Why so complicated? And why
would someone want you dead at all? You’re an art thief, for Christ’s
sake! You’re a pain in people’s asses, but you’re essentially
harmless.”

Romeo looked about to burst out laughing. “Oh, Jules.” He

grinned. “You’re so cute when you’re mad. I’d go straight back to bed
with you if we didn’t need to talk quite so urgently.”

“Technically you can’t go back to bed with me since we were

never in it together in the first place,” Julian grumbled.

“We were last night,” Romeo reminded gently. “Look, Jules, I

know what’s bugging you. You hate it that I get up in the middle of
the night and leave you. I know that, and I hate it, too.”

“Then why do you do it?”
“Because I have too much to do these days, and some of my work

can only be done at night.”

Julian snorted. “Oh, and what work would that be? The kind

where you get yourself shot at when trying to break into a museum?”

“No.” Exasperation had crept into Romeo’s voice. “The kind

where I’m doing my job going after the guy who’s infiltrated your
division.”

36 Sage

Marlowe

“You’re…My…What?”
“There’s a mole within the FBI, and it appears that he’s in your

division,” Romeo rephrased.

Julian couldn’t believe what he had just heard. A mole? In his

division? “Great,” he snapped. “If he’s in my unit, then why don’t I
know about it?”

A flicker of unease crossed Romeo’s face, and Julian knew the

answer before he heard the words. “Because, up until very recently, a
lot of the people who knew about it believed it to be you.”

“Oh. Wow. That’s nice. Good to know, though.”
Romeo pursed his lips. “I’m sorry. And, for what it’s worth—I

wasn’t one of them.”

“Oh. Thanks. And thanks for not making me ask.”
Holding Julian’s gaze, Romeo dismissed the comment with a

shrug, but there was a faint vertical sorrow line between his eyebrows
as he said, “I love you, Jules. I’ve had faith in you right from the start,
and I’m sorry that it has to be like this between us. I wish I could’ve
told you earlier, but Baxter would’ve hung me up by the balls if I’d
said anything to you. She wasn’t exactly over the moon as it was
when I told her I was going to fill you in.”

“My, my, Romeo,” Julian said and chuckled. Now that he was

past the initial shock and beginning to understand, things looked a lot
brighter all of a sudden. “You must be the first person in years to
antagonize Baxter.”

“So what? She can hardly have me sacked. I’m not on the FBI’s

payroll as it is.”

“You’re not?” Julian asked, observing Romeo’s reaction. He

couldn’t remember when the thought had occurred to him that Romeo
might be an undercover agent. Perhaps it had been that moment three
days earlier when Romeo, furious at Julian for some reason, had for
the first time looked like someone Julian could fear. Or maybe fact
that Chief Baxter had told Romeo to take care of Julian’s safety.
Possibly it had been seeing him with the chief and the easy but

A Life as a Ghost

obviously well-established demeanor they showed in each other’s
presence. Although, then again, if Romeo was an agent he’d certainly
show more respect to her. They’d have drilled that even into someone
like him at the academy.

“No, I’m not,” Romeo confirmed with a knowing smile, and

Julian wondered if Romeo had read some of those secret thoughts.

“Well then, now that the topic of moles is on the table, why don’t

you tell me exactly where you fit into all this? Who are you?”

“You know who I am. I’m an art thief, cat burglar, occasional con

artist, and FBI consultant.”

“Yeah, I know that line. How about something different, huh? The

truth, perhaps?”

“That is the truth, Jules. You’ve just never realized the exact

meaning of it.” Obviously sensing that Julian was too upset to
understand, he explained, “I really am all of the above, but my
relationship with the bureau is a lot closer than you might think. I
started working with them on art-related crimes five years ago. I’m
not technically an agent, but I provide information if and when I come
across it.”

“Oh. While you’re planning—and executing—your heists, you

mean?”

“Kind of. You’ve figured out that I only go after stuff that was

stolen or taken from its rightful owner in some other way, so
technically I’m not committing crimes by getting these things back.”

“Well, you are if you’re breaking into people’s homes or other

buildings to do it.”

“True. The bureau seems to be quite willing to ignore that,

though.”

“Fair enough. So you’re an FBI informer. And your real name is?”
Romeo smiled. “Well, it is kind of ironic, really. You’ve known it

all along. It’s the one you gave to me yourself.”

Julian stared at him, speechless for several long heartbeats.

“You’re kidding.”

38 Sage

Marlowe

“No. It’s the truth. I’ve never lied to you, Jules. I told you that

more than once, but you wouldn’t believe me.”

“Huh. Well, I must admit I didn’t see that one coming. And your

last name? Just asking, ’cause I didn’t give you one.”

Romeo’s smile became strained. “I’ll tell you all of it when this is

over, okay?”

The brief sense of elation Julian had felt at Romeo’s openness

sank. “No, it’s not okay, but I don’t have much choice, do I?” He put
his forehead in wrinkles. “Or maybe I just haven’t found the right way
to ask you yet. Tell me, are you any good at withstanding torture? I’ve
heard someone say waterboarding was rather effective.”

As soon as the words were out, he realized he shouldn’t have said

it. The color had drained from Romeo’s face and a frown wrinkled his
forehead. “Don’t joke about that, Jules.”

“Why, what—?”
“There are things you’d better not know about,” Romeo said, and

the steel cord lines of the muscles in his cheeks told Julian that this
was a trail he indeed had better stop pursuing.

Making a mental note to search for signs of torture on his lover’s

body, Julian changed the topic. “Why didn’t you tell me before? Your
name, I mean.”

Romeo let out a humorless snort. “I shouldn’t even have told you

now. A name like mine is easy to remember, and in the business I’m
in, being remembered is the last thing on earth you want, as I’m sure
you know. And that’s without me doubling as an FBI information
detector.”

“Yes, I know, and I’m glad you told me,” Julian said earnestly.

“At least now I know what name to use when you’re annoying the
hell out of me again.”

“Yeah, well.” Romeo grinned, mischief gleaming in his eyes. “I

hope you can cope with having to call me Romeo from now on.”

Heat climbed into Julian’s cheeks. “There’s nothing wrong with

calling you by your name,” he answered cautiously.

A Life as a Ghost

“No? Hmm. I was under the impression the name wasn’t exactly a

favorite with you.”

“Jeez, well, that was more because I thought…”
“Hey, it’s okay,” Romeo said softly. “I hated the name when I was

a kid.”

“It’s not that bad,” Julian objected. “The name is nice, honestly.

Maybe a little, uh, romantically challenged.”

Romeo raised his eyebrows. “Romantically challenged? Nice way

of putting it.” He sighed as he stopped the mechanical stroking of the
cat’s fur, absently trailing a line from her neck up to her head and
across the crown down to her tiny, black nose.

Eyes squeezed tightly shut, Mrs. Puddles acknowledged the caress

with a meow, twisted her head back, opened her mouth, and stabbed
her needle-sharp fangs into Romeo’s finger.

“You fucking little bitch!” Romeo snarled, sending the cat leaping

across the table. She stopped at a safe distance to smooth over her fur,
watching Romeo out of reproachful, orange eyes and seemingly
unimpressed by the human’s answering blue scowl.

Julian felt a totally inappropriate fit of laughter rise inside him.

The way these two were staring at each other was hilarious. He burst
out laughing at the indignant sideways glare Romeo aimed at him.

“Technically she’s not a bitch, she’s a queen, and you, my dear,

should reconsider your massage technique.” Julian grinned. “It looks
like milady wasn’t satisfied with your services.”

“Oh, fuck off! Both of you,” Romeo grumbled as he inspected the

wound. He put his finger into his mouth to suck off the blood. Not
much chance now for him to turn out a cat lover, Julian mused idly.
Indeed, Romeo didn’t look as though he was going to let the cat near
again anytime soon as he stared at her a moment longer then sighed
and made to get up.

“Well, nice though it is sitting around here chatting to you, we’ve

got somewhere else to be. Baxter wants to see us,” he explained.

Julian frowned. “Was that her on the phone earlier?”

40 Sage

Marlowe

“She just rang a couple of minutes ago.”
So the nightly caller had not been her. Of course it hadn’t been

her. If something happened that required her to call an agent in the
middle of the night, Julian was the one she’d contact. Or wasn’t he?

“Hang on—my boss wants to see us, and she calls you?”
Picking up on the note of irritation that had made it into Julian’s

voice, Romeo smiled and said, “Well, yes. She’ll obviously call me,
darling, seeing as you’re currently residing chez Romeo. Besides, she
only rang my landline after trying your cell and not getting an
answer.”

“Oh. Oh, fuck.” Julian groaned, remembering that his phone had

decided to hand in its notice due to lack of sufficient battery charging.
He’d meant to buy a new charger at some point since the old one had
fallen victim to the fire in his house, but had completely forgotten
about it. Cell phones just weren’t among Julian’s favorite pieces of
technology. Just like computers, he was fine with them as long as they
did what they were supposed to do.

Computers. The thought triggered something in his caffeine-

fueled brain. A scene from several months ago. The morning he had
logged into his work computer and found it wouldn’t boot, and then,
once it did, it had asked him to enter his password—only the
password, without his name. That had already been entered, the way it
would be when he’d return from a coffee break or lunch. That was
probably why he hadn’t given much thought to the incident, other
than it striking him as odd enough to become a memory which he
could still access after all that time.

It probably said a lot about the mental state he’d been in since the

explosion that the entire contents of Romeo’s words hadn’t registered
until now.

“A mole? A fucking mole? In my unit?” Julian cried out, throwing

his hands in the air. “And I was the main suspect? Still am, according
to your words!”

A Life as a Ghost

The only reaction Romeo showed was raising a perfectly shaped

dark eyebrow.

“If you thought it was me, the least you could do is tell me what

I’m supposed to have done,” Julian snapped.

“Easy, baby,” Romeo warned and held up one hand in a soothing

gesture. “Don’t kill off the messenger, okay? I don’t know exactly
what the person has done, but apparently someone has been selling
information. Inside information. And whoever did it must have
accessed files through your computer. That’s why they suspected
you.”

“But I’ve never done anything like that!” Julian objected. “I would

never do anything like that! And even if I did, I’d hardly be so stupid
as to do it via my own workstation.”

“That’s what Baxter said, too.”
“Baxter? Why Baxter?”
“She’s the other one who never believed it to be you. She thinks

quite highly of you. Didn’t you know that?”

“Well, I thought she’s just my boss, and a very professional one at

that. I wouldn’t know what she really thinks of me.” Julian huffed.

“As I said, she thinks you’re one of her best men.”
“Oh, I’m flattered. Well, I guess we had better get ready and go

then,” Julian said sarcastically. “We don’t want to keep my admirer
waiting, do we?”

“Jules.” Romeo expressed the name in a slightly exasperated sigh,

but he didn’t say anything else after that.

They went inside, took quick, separate showers, and dressed. All

in all, it took them less than twenty minutes to get ready and leave the
apartment.

42 Sage

Marlowe

Chapter 4

Chief Baxter wasn’t alone when Julian and Romeo entered her

office some time later. Barnes, one of the junior agents in Julian’s
team, and his confidant in all things concerning Romeo, sat in the
visitor’s chair. Looking up, he welcomed Julian with the usual smile
then his gaze flicked to Romeo. Julian half expected the cheerful
expression to dim, but apparently Barnes had finally accepted Romeo
in his position as consultant.

“That would be all, Agent Barnes. Thank you,” Baxter said and

waited for the agent to leave the room.

“What’s up?” Romeo inquired in a conversational tone.
“Good morning, Special Agent Harris. Mr. Moore.” Chief Baxter

glared at Romeo. “Thank you for joining me. As to your question—
fortunately nothing that would have required your urgent attention,”
she said icily and cast a meaningful glance at the clock on the wall
before she added, “It took you a full two hours to come here after we
spoke on the phone. Is that how you choose to respond when called in
to an important briefing these days?”

Romeo held her accusing stare steadily. “Well, you said it was

important, but not urgent, so I figured it was preferable that I had a
little briefing with Jules first. Bring him up to date, so to speak.”

“Mm-hmm. I see. I take that to mean you have filled him in on

your identity and the reason for your being here?”

Seemingly very much interested in inspecting the flawless crease

in his suit pants, Romeo nodded. “He knows what he needs to know
about my involvement in the investigations. I didn’t have the time to

A Life as a Ghost

inform him of all the details of your problem, but I’m happy to do that
as we go along, or whenever you think it’s necessary.”

“Fine.” She looked at Julian. “What do you know about our

problem, as Mr. Moore so very disrespectfully calls it?”

“Just that there apparently is a mole in my unit. And I have been

under suspicion, but for some reason I’m cleared now.”

“For some reason?” she echoed, a slightly bewildered expression

on her face. “Mr. Moore went to great lengths to find suitable
evidence that you had nothing to do with what you were accused of.”

“Oh.” Frowning, Julian cast Romeo a glance, but, as expected,

Romeo was busy checking his cuff links. His cuff links, for crying out
loud. Julian turned back to Baxter. “Did he?”

“Oh, he did. Remember the day he broke into the archives? It was

his plan to have you stay at the surveillance room along with Agent
Ramirez and—”

“That was a test?”
“I believe you could say so.”
“Oh. Great. So when I gave him away…”
“You passed the test,” Romeo said quietly.
Julian looked at Baxter. She nodded. “Admittedly, Mr. Moore was

the only one who never doubted your integrity. Of course,” she added
with a meaningful glance over the rim of her glasses, “he has
apparently come to know you in a…uh, more intimate way than any
of us. That may have—”

“I’m not biased,” Romeo interrupted her in a very soft, yet firm

tone. “I’m not letting my feelings for Julian get in the way. He just
wasn’t guilty. If he had been, I would have delivered him.”

Julian sat up. “Delivered? Does that mean you’ve been

investigating me?”

Romeo met his angry stare with raised eyebrows and the usual

unruffled detachedness. “Yes.”

“Oh. Uh, well, that’s nice to know. Was that the reason you

wanted to get—”

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“Jules, love.” Romeo’s voice had the same pacifying note in it

he’d used with the chief, and his using the endearment so casually and
so naturally went a long way to keeping Julian’s temper from heating
up any more.

“I’ve never lied to you about my feelings. I love you, and that has

nothing to do with what anyone thinks you’ve done.”

“But how did you know?” Julian asked, ignoring Baxter, who

seemed to be wishing herself to somewhere far, far away from her
office.

“You couldn’t have known that I was innocent. What if I’d really

been guilty? Would you have handed me in and then come to see me
in prison or what?”

“Ah, Jules.” Shaking his head, Romeo let out a soft sigh. “Of

course I would have come to see you in prison, but, as we both told
you repeatedly, I knew you were innocent, so that question has simply
never arisen to me, okay? Do you think you can get that into your
head and move on now?”

Julian bit back his initial reply and straightened up. Romeo was

right. This just wasn’t the place for relationship discussions. “Yes.
Yes, of course. So, Chief, what is the situation with the mole?”

Focusing on him, she cleared her throat and explained, “The

situation is as follows. There is someone within your unit, Special
Agent Harris, who has been stealing and disclosing classified
information for quite some time. We found out about it around two
months ago and started investigating in secret. However, we believe
that the person may have realized that we know about them, or
perhaps it is just a coincidence. Either way, they apparently wanted to
wipe out their traces. We have reason to assume that somewhere in
the FBI archives, in one of the uncountable case files stored there,
there is a vital piece of evidence that, if detected, would allow us to
find out who it is.”

“I see,” Julian said into her pause. “That’s why they made Romeo

break into the archives, right? To destroy the evidence, or to steal it.”

A Life as a Ghost

“Yes. We believe so.”
“Well then, it shouldn’t be all that difficult. We should be able to

figure out who they are from the evidence they wanted destroyed.”
Seeing the frown appear on Romeo’s face, he added uncertainly, “I
assume we know what evidence that was, or don’t we?”

“Unfortunately, we have not yet been able to narrow it down,”

Chief Baxter replied and cast Romeo a glance.

Heaving a sigh, Romeo pushed to his feet and took a few slow

steps. “Which translates as, they haven’t got a fucking clue,” he said,
ignoring Baxter’s glare. “You see, when I went in there, I didn’t know
what I was looking for. The guy who blackmailed me said he was
going to tell me once I was inside.”

“But you were inside,” Julian pointed out.
“Yes.” Romeo nodded. “But the thing is, he told me to destroy

several different files. Completely different files relating to
completely different cases. We’ve been trying to find a common
factor, but so far there seems to be nothing.”

“We assume that the person who sent Mr. Moore into the archives

might have feared we had backup files somewhere or perhaps that
someone would still remember vital parts of a case which would have
allowed us to regain the information.”

“Either that, or he plainly didn’t trust me,” Romeo added.

“Anyway, he said he wanted me to destroy files from five different
cases. When I was in there, he gave me the numbers one after the
other, while I was allegedly destroying the evidence. Of course I only
took notes, but the problem was, that because of this clever little plan
of his, I simply ran out of time. We’d planned to let me get in there,
give me a couple of minutes inside the evidence section so mole guy
would believe I had done what he wanted from me, then have me
killed off by an overeager agent so he wouldn’t have to worry about
me spilling the beans. That was so you would no longer be in danger,
by the way.”

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Marlowe

“That’s what I don’t understand,” Julian said. “Why did you warn

me? If everyone assumed I was the mole, then why did you come to
see me?”

“Ah, Jules.” Romeo smiled. “You haven’t been listening, have

you? I said I never believed it to be you.”

“Yes. But it could have been me,” Julian insisted.
Romeo’s expression turned pensive, and then his smile was back.

“No. Not you.”

“You can’t have known that!”
“Oh, but I did,” Romeo assured him. “If only because you would

never have believed that my feelings for you were strong enough to
allow for blackmailing me by threatening you. In fact, you were the
only one in your department who knew what happened between us
that night in the mountains, and you must have been certain that I’d
used you only to get away. You wouldn’t have believed my feelings
for you to have been genuine, so, if you were the mole, you would
have found a different way to make me do it.”

“Whoa,” Julian sighed. “That is some logic you’re using there,

sweetheart.”

“It’s true, though,” Romeo said, suddenly subdued. “Or isn’t it?”
Julian couldn’t quite keep himself from glancing briefly at the

chief, but she was politely staring out of the window, pretending not
to hear. “Yes,” he admitted. “As usual, you hit the proverbial nail on
the head. So what’s going to happen now?”

Baxter turned toward them. “I would like the two of you to go

back to the archives. Don’t make a show of it, but let slip that you are
looking through some old case files.”

“Do you believe that will unsettle our mole?”
Baxter shrugged. “I certainly hope so. I don’t think they’ll get

nervous enough to make a mistake, but I’d still like to rock their boat
a bit.”

A Life as a Ghost

To Julian’s surprise, Romeo shook his head. “I’m telling you, he’s

not gonna buy it,” he said. “From what we’ve learned about him so
far, he’s pretty cold-blooded.”

“Why he?” Julian asked.
Romeo tilted his head. “Huh?”
“You keep referring to the mole as a ‘he’. What makes you think

we’re dealing with a ‘he’?”

Romeo smiled easily. “It’s most likely to be a guy,” he said.

“Besides, I’m not sworn to political correctness. Anyway, ready to
go?”

“Um, not quite so fast, Mr. Moore,” Baxter stopped him with an

irritated look. It seemed that she had finally had enough of Romeo’s
disrespect and flippant behavior.

“Take the rest of the day off. Both of you.”
Romeo’s eyebrows shot up inquiringly, mirroring the question

Julian knew was on his own face.

“Make it look like you have an urgent trace to follow,” she

instructed. “Let word slip about your super-secret assignment and
then tomorrow, you will go to the archives in the afternoon.”

“Yes, Chief,” Julian confirmed.
Romeo nodded and flashed a smile. “Can we go now?”
Baxter let out a tiny sigh, and her eyes widened in a look that on

any other person would have been an expression of mild exasperation.
“Yes. You may go now.”

“Thank you, Chief.”

* * * *

“What?” Romeo asked half an hour later in the car. Julian hadn’t

even realized that he’d been drifting off, thinking. As usual, Romeo
had given him a little time to mull things over before breaking into his
musings.

48 Sage

Marlowe

“I was just wondering,” he explained, slowing down in front of

Romeo’s home.

“What about?”
“I remember you saying that your nightly adventures had

something to do with the mole and the investigations against him.
What did you do, exactly?”

“Oh, that.” Romeo unclipped his seat belt but didn’t open the

door. “Well, mostly I’ve been, uh, following individual members of
your team around. Either that or I searched their homes for evidence.”

“You broke into the homes of FBI agents?”
“Uh-huh.”
“You were ordered to do so, I assume?”
Romeo cast him an amused glance. “Why yes, of course.”
“Hmm, okay. Did you find anything interesting?”
“Plenty.”
Julian let out a sigh. “Anything that’s given you a clue as to the

identity of our mole?”

Pursing his lips, Romeo stared out of the window. “I have a few

suspicions, but not enough to allow me to point a finger at someone.”

“I see. And I assume you’re not going to tell me who the names

on your list are, right?”

“Jules…” Romeo heaved a sigh. “Whoever it is, it’s likely to be a

person you have been working with for years. Someone you have
come to trust and possibly like. Someone you might have confided in
at some point. Would you really feel any better if you had to doubt
your fellow agents’ integrity?”

“Sometimes I’m doubting my lover’s integrity,” Julian ground out

then bit his tongue. “Sorry.”

“I know. That’s why I don’t want you to worry yet more. You

have enough on your plate.”

“Don’t patronize me. I can cope. And knowing I can’t trust

anyone right now isn’t exactly comforting either.”

“I know, and I’m sorry.” Romeo looked convincingly contrite.

A Life as a Ghost

Julian was tempted to push further, but he knew it wouldn’t lead

anywhere. Romeo would tell him in his own time, just as he always
did. “Did you search my place, too?” Julian asked.

A soft smile appeared on Romeo’s face. “I told you, I know it’s

not you.”

“Yes, but Baxter can’t have known, and if there was an

investigation—”

“Jules, baby,” Romeo interrupted him. He put a hand on Julian’s

thigh and squeezed it gently. “I didn’t search your home. The only
times I’ve had my fingers in your underwear were when it was on
you, not when it was in your drawer.”

“Oh. Okay. Speaking of which—what are we going to do now?

We have a whole day to ourselves, after all.”

A lascivious tinge had crept into Romeo’s smile. “What would

you like to do?”

“Hmm, I’m not sure. How about we go for a walk in the park?

Have lunch in one of those small bistro places. Then we could go to
the movies and make out instead of watching the film. What do you
think?”

The smile on Romeo’s face turned a little forced. “Wow, Jules,

that sounds a lot like a date.”

“So what? We’ve never done any of that. It would be nice to do

some ordinary people stuff for once, don’t you think?”

Sighing, Romeo rubbed his forehead. “It does, but…”
“But what?”
“I’m not sure I’m up for that,” Romeo said, sounding a little

uncertain.

“Not up for what? What part?”
“The whole going-out-on-a-date-like-ordinary-people part. I don’t

think I’ve ever done that,” Romeo admitted quietly.

“Huh? Didn’t you say you’d dated plenty?” Julian asked,

surprised.

“Of course I have dated. Just not that kind.”

50 Sage

Marlowe

“That kind? You mean where you simply hang out and do fun

stuff together?”

“Yes. I’m more a go-to-a-fancy-restaurant-and-then-back-home

guy.”

“Oh. And by go home you don’t mean go home alone, I suppose.”

The notion stung. Of course Julian knew he was far from being the
first man in Romeo’s life, but he really didn’t like the thoughts his
words evoked. Thoughts about his lover with other men. What was
Romeo like when in bed with someone else? And, more importantly,
had he been in bed with someone else recently?

“It’s only been you.” Romeo interrupted his dark thoughts quietly.
“Huh?”
“This past year, ever since we met in the mountains on Christmas

Eve. There’s been no one else since.”

“Why?” Julian blurted out. The question drew a melancholic

smile from Romeo.

“It seemed pointless. I started to fall in love with you that night,

Jules, and believe it or not, I’ve reached a point in my life where I’m
more interested in a serious relationship that involves real feelings
than in a fling with a stranger just to get my rocks off.”

“But that first time, in the mountains, we were strangers,” Julian

pointed out. “And the whole situation was not exactly how you’d
expect to meet, uh, someone you want to be serious with.”

“So what? What does it matter where we met? What matters is

what I feel for you. What we feel for each other.”

“Yes, true,” Julian confirmed, and then, although the words hurt,

he added, “And yet we barely spent time together before you seduced
me. Seduced me and then left me for good.”

“Shit,” Romeo muttered under his breath and looked out the

window for a moment. “I didn’t think you’d have appreciated a phone
call, you know.”

A Life as a Ghost

“Oh, I wouldn’t have. But the real question, the one that I’d like to

hear the answer to more than anything, is what would you have done
if it hadn’t been me that night?”

Romeo raised his eyebrows. “But it was you,” he pointed out.
“I know.” Julian nodded slowly. “But I can’t help wondering what

you would have done if it had been any of the other members of my
team. Say Barnes, for instance. Or Angela. Would you have seduced
them, too?”

“Of course I wouldn’t have!” Romeo snapped. “I did that because

I wanted you, don’t you get that? There I was, stuck in a house in the
fucking mountains with a guy who was everything I’ve always
wanted, but you put me in handcuffs! I knew it was the only chance I
had, and I just couldn’t resist, Jules. I wanted you so much that for a
while I didn’t even care if I’d be sent to prison afterward. But that
aside, do you really believe taking you to bed was my only way out?”

Julian forced himself to hold the inquiring, angry blue stare

levelly. “I don’t know how you would have escaped otherwise.”

“I would have found a way,” Romeo said earnestly. “You know

that. At the bottom of your heart, you know it.”

Yes. Julian knew it. Beyond all the doubts that had been nagging

him on the surface, he had kept telling himself that Romeo had had a
choice and that seducing his captor had not just been a means to an
end. And yet, he had been longing to hear it and had needed this
reassurance from the man himself.

Apparently though, he wasn’t the only one in need of reassurance.

Romeo’s big blue eyes were unusually downcast and haunted as he
said, “So much for me. The question is what was it for you? Why did
you take me to bed that night? In spite of everything, of the situation,
the risk for you if we’d been found out. Why?”

That was the question, really, wasn’t it? It would have been easy

to claim that Romeo had been the ultimate temptation. He was
indecently beautiful, and sex with him was more satisfying in many
ways than anything Julian had ever experienced before, but then

52 Sage

Marlowe

again, he hadn’t known that, had he? He couldn’t have known that
Romeo was a perfect match for him sexually, and he was not so
shallow as to fall for a pretty face and handsome body that easily.

So what had made him risk everything that night?
“I think…” he started slowly and covered Romeo’s hand, which

still rested on his thigh with his own. “I think you were not the only
one who fell in love at first sight that Christmas Eve.”

Seeing Romeo’s face light up with happiness was a moment

Julian would never forget as long as he lived. As was the kiss they
shared. Full of emotions, pleasure, and delight, it was a demonstration
of love as well as a promise.

“Still wanna go to the movies?” Romeo asked as they surfaced an

indefinite time later.

“Nn-nn.” Julian shook his head.
“What do you want?”
“I want you to meet my parents.”
To his credit, Romeo didn’t look like he wanted to simply make a

run for it. He couldn’t quite hide his discomfort, either, but at least he
nodded, even if the patient expression on his face seemed a little
strained.

“Okay?” Julian verified.
“Yes. Let’s go.”

A Life as a Ghost

Chapter 5

Traffic was bad, so it took them almost an hour and a half to get to

the beautiful, quiet, suburban area where Julian’s parents lived. If
Mom Harris had been surprised at hearing from her son so
unexpectedly on a weekday, she hid it well behind a little outcry of
delight and the breathless comments of a perfect mother hen who
wanted to spoil her first and only son rotten.

Julian had really believed that over an hour’s warning would be

enough, but he had misjudged his mother completely. Even ten
minutes after their arrival, she was still bustling about, muttering
incomprehensibilities about how no one was thinking of giving her
advance warnings anymore so she would have the time to prepare
everything. Of course, knowing his mother the way he did, Julian
knew that by preparing, she meant, above all, baking something fresh
and mouthwatering to treat her son and the guest he’d brought to.

He sat on the old but still incredibly comfortable sofa in his

parents’ living room, waiting for his mother to stop puttering about.
Romeo was right at his side, one of his long, slender legs casually
hooked over the other as he observed his surroundings with an
expression of mild amusement.

“Really, dear, you should have let me know you were coming a

little earlier,” Julian’s mother said as she emerged from the kitchen
with a large tray crammed full with brownies.

Julian didn’t need to look to know that Romeo’s gaze shifted to

him and rested on his face for a moment. Without a doubt those blue
eyes were sparkling with naughty amusement, but Julian knew better
than to meet the challenge Romeo put out to him.

54 Sage

Marlowe

“No, Mom,” Julian answered gently. “You just really shouldn’t

put yourself through so much trouble. “

Tutting, she put the tray on the table and waved her hand to swipe

away his comment like an annoying fly. “This is nothing, dear. I’m
just whipping up something quick for you and your friend.” She
seemed momentarily distracted as she glanced at Romeo, and Julian
could relate to the feeling only too well.

Having apparently decided to switch on the charm, his lover

beamed a smile at Julian’s mom. His immaculate teeth and bright-
blue eyes seemed to outshine each other, enhancing his glamorous
exterior. Or maybe the fact that he was so utterly out of place in this
small, ordinary living room which belonged to average-looking,
ordinary people was all that made Julian realize once again how
beautiful Romeo was.

Aware that he was staring, and likely to start drooling soon, he

picked up his cup and watched his mother cast a lingering glance over
her shoulder on the way out in response to the innocent look Romeo
gave her from underneath his ridiculously long, sooty lashes. She was
smitten. Definitely.

And she wasn’t the only one.
“Holy cow!” Hannah, Julian’s younger sister gasped as she

entered the room. She’d nearly dropped the purse she was digging
through and stared at Romeo in obvious, unashamed admiration.

“Please tell me you’re not my brother’s new squeeze!” she added

after a second of stunned silence. Smirking, Romeo pushed to his feet
gracefully.

“I guess that depends on how you define squeeze, but I assume I

qualify. Hello, I’m Paris. You must be Hannah. I’m really pleased to
meet you. Julian has told me so much about you already.”

To Hannah’s credit, neither the easy but sexy smile Romeo gave

her, nor his smooth talk, and not even the touch of his hand could
throw her off track. Her eyes narrowed briefly then disbelief spread
across her features, and she shook her head.

A Life as a Ghost

“Paris?” she repeated, chuckling under her breath. “You’re not

really called Paris, are you? Just so you know, I’ve heard a lot of fake
names, but that one is really off the grid. What’s your last name?
Rome?”

Romeo winced. “Er, well, actually it’s Moore.” He looked like he

could barely bite back his laughter, and Julian, too, had to struggle to
keep even a remotely straight face. “It’s not really a fake. Not all of it,
but let’s keep it simple, okay? My name really is Paris.”

“Fine.” She was still grinning as her gaze flicked from Romeo to

her brother, where it lingered briefly, and then back. “Now tell me,
big bro, where did you find something yummy like him?”

“Quite frankly, uh, I got him for Christmas,” Julian replied

jokingly and wanted to bite off his tongue the next moment. With that
remark he had given the game away. Hannah had been his confidante
in the Christmas Eve fiasco. He watched in discomfort as her eyes
widened just like he had known they would.

“This is him?” She stared at Romeo long and hard, and for a

moment Julian feared that she might just walk up to him and poke
him to verify that he was real, but then Hannah pursed her lips and
nodded slowly.

“Well, he looks the act, I must admit. No wonder you couldn’t

help falling for him. He’s your type right down to those pretty blue
eyes of his.”

Julian cringed as he watched a smile unfold on Romeo’s lips. It

was part playful, part triumphant, and definitely smug.

“Stop grinning,” he grumbled. “I was not just waiting for you to

waltz in so I could pounce on you, you know?”

“Mm-hmm,” Romeo hummed noncommittally. “Really?”
“Yes, really.”
“Okay. So, just to make sure I got that right—that Christmas Eve

in the mountains when you spent hours lounging in an empty house,
you were not waiting for me to turn up and you did not intend to go
after me as soon as I did?”

56 Sage

Marlowe

Glaring at him, Julian refrained from giving an answer. It would

have been pointless anyway because Romeo and Hannah were already
laughing like silly teenagers while casting each other conspiratorial
glances.

“So, anyway, how come you’re visiting Mom on an ordinary

weekday?” Hannah inquired when she had sobered up. “Anything
wrong?”

“No, not at all,” Julian replied, trying to sound casual. “Just, um,

some unexpected time off, and I thought I might as well use it
wisely.”

“So you took your lover to meet your family?” Hannah added

with a smirk.

“Um…Yeah.”
“It’s okay, big bro. I wouldn’t be able to keep him a secret either.

You have to show off a guy like him while you have him.”

Julian looked at her sharply, startled by the acidy tone in her

voice. “What is that supposed to mean?”

“Nothing.” Hannah gave an overly casual shrug. “Just that you

never know how long they’re going to be around.”

“Wha—” Julian started, but Romeo cut him off. Or rather, Julian

chose to fall silent when Romeo leaned forward and fixed Hannah’s
gaze with his cool blue eyes.

“I’m planning to be around for quite some time,” he said quietly

but with unmistakable sincerity. “And I’m not a trophy. I don’t need
to be shown off.”

Hannah held the cold, stony stare for a moment, and then she

sighed theatrically. “Gosh, you’re really every girl’s dream, aren’t
you? You’ve got the looks, you know exactly the right things to say,
and you even sound convincing when you say them. Oh, and of
course, you’re gay. Jeez, what did I do wrong? Why you, Julian? Why
did you have to bag yourself a guy like him?” Rolling her eyes, she let
out another deep sigh, but already a grin was tugging at her mouth.

A Life as a Ghost

“I’m really happy for you guys, though. You look so cute

together, and I bet Mom is over the moon, too, right?”

“Um, not sure. Do you think so?”
“Aw, come on, big bro. She’s already adopted your sweetheart.

You know that as well as I do. She’s smitten and totally delighted that
you have finally caught a nice, stable guy like him.”

“Huh. Right. Nice and stable is just the perfect description for

Paris.” Julian smirked and exchanged a glance with Romeo. “And
who knows, maybe now that I’ve caught him I’ll tie him down, too,
one day.” The brief, barely noticeable widening of Romeo’s eyes told
him that his lover had understood. Life could be good sometimes. For
all the twists and turns and unforeseen undercurrents their relationship
brought with it, one thing was certain. Sex between them was an
amazing experience, and they weren’t done exploring yet.

* * * *

“So, what do you think?” Julian asked when they had finally made

it back to Romeo’s home in the early hours of the evening.

“About what?”
“My crazy bunch of a family.”
“Ah, right. Well, they’re nice.”
“Are they?”
“Yes.”
“But?”
The corners of Romeo’s mouth twitched. “No ‘but’.”
“No?”
“No?”
“Hmm.” Julian watched as Romeo picked up a bottle of wine

from the kitchen counter and uncorked it with his usual easy grace.

“Then how about ‘and’?”
“Jules.” Romeo turned to him, bottle and two glasses in hand.

“What do you want to hear?”

58 Sage

Marlowe

“The truth. I think.”
“Well, I just told you it. Your family is nice.”
“Nice?”
Romeo sighed and filled the wineglasses. “Jules, seriously now.

What do you want me to say? I enjoyed the talk, I loved your mom’s
homemade goodies, and Hannah is gorgeous. Is that it?”

“No,” Julian blurted out.
Romeo frowned. “Then what? What am I supposed to say?”
“I don’t know,” Julian muttered. “I just wonder what it’s like for

you to…you know, to have a family around you.”

Romeo heaved a sigh, and then he swallowed. “Well, what do you

think? It’s nice. I’m happy for you for having such great people in
your life. They all love you to bits. That’s easy to see. And yes, it’s
sad, too. It makes me sad, rather. I used to have a family. Parents who
loved me and all that, but…” He bit his lip and looked away.

“Oh, fuck. I’m sorry, baby.” Julian crossed the short distance

between them. He took the glasses and the bottle from Romeo, set
them on the counter, and pulled Romeo in his arms. “I’m sorry. I
didn’t mean to remind you of all this. I just…oh, I don’t know. I guess
I just wanted to dig deeper. Get a response from you.”

“What do you mean, ‘get a response from me’?” Romeo sniffed.

“You know what happened to them. What more do you want?”

“Look, I’m sorry, okay? I just couldn’t resist.”
“Resist what? Milking me for information again?”
“Romeo, I wasn’t—”
“Yes, you were!” Romeo snapped and pulled away. “Fuck, Julian,

don’t you ever quit? Why do you try to turn every talk into a bloody
interrogation?”

“Maybe because I have so many questions,” Julian retorted.
“Well, how about you don’t ask them every couple of minutes?”
“I’m not that bad!” Julian protested.
A muscle flexed in Romeo’s cheek. “Actually, you are.”

A Life as a Ghost

“Well, great. If I’m such a nuisance then why do you put up with

me?”

Romeo’s expression was set as he met Julian’s gaze. “Because I

love you. Maybe if you stopped doubting everything about me, you’d
understand that.”

“I’m not doubting everything about you!” Julian snapped. “I just

wish I knew who you are, don’t you get that? You met my family.
You’ve seen what a crazy lot they are. They’re mad, but I love them.
What about your family? I know your parents are dead, and I
understand that you’re not keen on talking about them, but…” He
threw his hands in the air. “Oh, I don’t know. I guess I’d just
appreciate the odd piece of personal information about you.”

“Romeo Paris Montague. That’s my full—and real—name. Or

rather, it’s the one I was born with. My parents thought it was funny.
Dad’s last name was Montague. They met during a performance of
Romeo and Juliet. I was conceived in Rome and born in Paris, so they
figured it was the perfect name for me.”

Julian stood frozen to the spot, despite the frantic thudding of his

heart inside his chest. “Well, they do have a point,” he said slowly.
“You’re lucky it wasn’t Berlin and Madrid.”

“Uh, yeah.” Romeo sneered. “I guess I am.”
“So you got around a lot, huh?”
“Yes. They were a ballet dancer and a con artist.”
“Nice. That at least explains the smooth moves. So Daddy taught

you how to cheat, and Mommy the tricks to get away?”

“Not quite. Mum was the con, Dad the dancer. He was also a cat

burglar, and together they pulled off some amazing heists. I’ll tell you
more about that some other time if you want. They traveled together
and went wherever Dad’s assignments took them. I grew up all over
the place. The US, anywhere in Europe, Russia, China—you name it,
chances are I’ve been there.”

“Hence the languages.”
“Yes.”

60 Sage

Marlowe

“And the boarding school?”
Romeo made a face. “They put me up there for three years so I

had a stable environment to study for my final exams.” He chuckled.
“Amazing, isn’t it? They taught me to be a thief but still wanted me to
have a proper education with diploma and all.”

“Diploma, huh? What did you study?”
“Ah, you know—the usual stuff. Languages and politics.”
“And art.”
“And art,” Romeo confirmed with a melancholic smile.
“Well, I’d say they wanted the best for you.”
“Hmm. Yes, probably.”
Julian reached out to cup Romeo’s face with his hand then tilted

his head up to make him meet his eyes. “Thank you. I mean it. Thank
you for telling me.”

“It’s okay,” Romeo answered quietly. “I just hope I won’t regret

it.”

“You won’t. And now let’s go watch TV.”
Romeo’s eyebrows shot up. “Watch TV?”
“Uh-huh. This is out-dating-like-ordinary-people day, remember?

And what better way to get to know each other than to spend an
evening on the sofa watching movies and drinking beer?”

“I don’t drink beer.”
“Well then, I suggest you get used to it. And I hope you like the

sports channel.”

Romeo blinked. “Sports channel?”
“Yes.”
Rolling his eyes, Romeo let out a deep sigh, but Julian didn’t miss

the way one corner of his lover’s mouth lifted in that secretive half
smile of his. It seemed his slick, sophisticated consultant was capable
of appreciating the simple pleasures in life.

A Life as a Ghost

Chapter 6

Julian woke with the strangest sense of déjà vu ever. The

telephone was ringing, and he was just about to tell Romeo to go and
pick it up when he realized that the spot next to him was empty.
Reaching out, he trailed his hand over the crumpled sheet. It was cold
and still a little damp from his lover’s sweat, or maybe their mingled
sweat and semen. Julian made a face. Good thing he hadn’t ended up
in the wet patch.

Yawning, he rubbed his eyes. It was the middle of the night once

again, and Romeo wasn’t in. Nothing new there.

Julian cast a quick glance at the clock and rose. It was just before

six, almost time to get up anyway. He went to the bathroom then to
the kitchen where he made coffee. Cup in hand, he turned around. His
gaze fell on the door to the roof terrace. It was ajar, so apparently
Romeo wasn’t out so much as, well, out on the terrace. Julian stepped
outside. It was another cool and clear morning, and he was ready to
tackle the day. He crossed the open space and peered around the
screen that blocked the sun loungers. Then he froze. The space was
empty. He was alone.

Somewhere inside Romeo’s apartment the telephone rang.
A cold shudder ran down Julian’s spine. A sense of foreboding

that had nothing to do with the fact that his cell phone had started
vibrating at the same time.

“Harris,” he barked as soon as he had accepted the call, with

barely enough time in between to raise the phone to his ear.

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Hearing Chief Baxter’s voice didn’t come as much of a surprise,

but recognizing a tremor of fear instead of the normally so brisk tone
did.

“Agent Harris,” she said and paused.
“Chief?” Julian prompted.
“Is he with you?”
“Romeo, you mean?” Too worried to keep up appearances, Julian

didn’t realize that he’d used his lover’s real name until after he’d said
it. It said a lot about Chief Baxter’s frame of mind that she simply
said, “Yes.”

“I’m afraid he’s not,” Julian informed her, walking back to the

inside of the apartment. He checked the bedroom again, just in case,
although the chances of Romeo having returned in the meantime were
nil, but he needed to make sure anyway. The room was deserted.

“He’s not here,” Julian repeated, hearing the hollowness of

carefully controlled panic in his own voice. “Where did you send
him?”

“I…” Chief Baxter heaved a sigh. “He said he was going to follow

a lead, or rather, check up on a suspicion he had, but he refused to
give me any details. Apparently he thought he had figured out who
our mole is but he didn’t want to tell me in case he was wrong.”

“He knows it? He has figured out who the bastard is but wouldn’t

tell you? Couldn’t you have ordered him to say it?” Julian was close
to yelling as he struggled to balance the phone between shoulder and
chin while pulling up his jeans.

“Easy, Agent Harris,” Baxter reprimanded. “You’re forgetting

that he’s technically not under my order anyway. And from
everything you know about him, do you honestly believe anybody
could make him do something he really doesn’t want to do?

“No,” Julian confirmed with a resigned sigh. He couldn’t put on

his shirt with the phone wedged under his jaw like this, so he’d have
to slip into it on the way down the stairs.

A Life as a Ghost

“No, I don’t. I just wish I knew what was going on. What I can do

to…” He trailed off. Do to what exactly? Save Romeo? That was
what he’d wanted to say, but he didn’t even know if Romeo required
saving. Maybe he just hadn’t found a chance to call and give a status
update. Maybe there was something wrong with his phone. There
always seemed to be something wrong with Julian’s phone when he
needed it the most. Yes. Julian’s phone. But not Romeo’s. Romeo
never had any problems with his equipment because he checked every
item with painstaking thoroughness. No, it was safe to say that a
technical problem was not what was keeping Romeo from checking in
with Baxter.

“How long overdue is he?” Julian inquired curtly and poked the

toes of his left foot into his shoes. He was wondering if he should use
the bathroom before he left but decided against it. He could hardly
take a pee with Chief Baxter on the line, but cutting her off altogether
wasn’t an option either.

“Almost an hour and a half.” Baxter’s voice was tense with

concern now, and suddenly Julian couldn’t imagine how anyone
could have ever called Chief Baxter cold-blooded or unfeeling. She
cared for Romeo, that much was obvious, and talking to Julian about
all the things they were going to have to talk about was clearly not a
prospect she was comfortable with.

“I’ll be there in ten,” Julian said and hung up. It was insane, but he

didn’t care. Insane to hang up on the chief, insane to even try to get to
work in under twenty minutes.

He arrived in fifteen.
Baxter’s brows were knitted together in a frown when Julian

entered her office, and she was rubbing her fingers in that nervous
motion of hers.

“I’m sorry, Agent Harris. So sorry. All this time we thought it was

about you when, really, it was about him.”

Julian’s heart did a painful flip inside his chest. “What was?”
“The threats. The…attacks.”

64 Sage

Marlowe

“So he was right when he said it was a sniper, not a guard who

shot at him that night at the museum, wasn’t he?”

Baxter shook her head. “Yes. We searched everyone and talked to

all of them. We even had forensics reconstruct everything the men
spoke about via their phones and radio. None of them saw Moore or
was even close to his position.”

“But what about my house? That can’t have been about him—or

was it?”

“I’m afraid it was.” She straightened her skirt, fumbling with one

of the neat folds before she continued. “We believe that they knew
about your affair with Moore and chose to plant a bomb in your home
for the simple reason to throw us off track and make it look like you
were involved.”

“Which they succeeded in,” Julian said. Baxter nodded.
“But why him? He’s an art thief. Why would anyone want him

dead?”

The mortified expression on Baxter’s face, along with her silence,

told him a lot more than she would ever have given away in words.

“He’s more than just an art thief and occasional FBI informer,

isn’t he? He—”

Baxter raised a hand in warning. “Agent Harris, there are things

that, quite frankly, exceed your wage level. Mr. Moore is one of them.
Besides, I’d prefer to find him rather than discuss him.”

Julian squirmed. “But if I don’t even know who’s after him, then

how—oh. Oh my. Oh, fuck!” A flash jolted through him as realization
kicked in, leaving him faintly sick and with a pounding, adrenaline-
induced headache. “I believe I know who our mole is.”

* * * *

When Julian arrived at a deserted airfield on the outskirts of the

city two hours later, he walked into a scene that sent a gush of pure
adrenaline through his veins. At the same time he was frozen to the

A Life as a Ghost

spot in shock. Romeo was on the floor, on his knees, hands cuffed
behind his back. Blood trickled from a gash in his bottom lip, and a
large bruise was swelling on his left cheekbone. His right arm was
twisted at an odd angle, and Julian didn’t need more than a fleeting
look to know that it was broken or at least dislocated at the shoulder.
Either way, it wouldn’t be much use to him if he tried to defend
himself. Not that he stood much chance anyway. A man was
positioned behind him, at just the right distance to be safely out of
reach of Romeo’s legs, training a gun at the back of Romeo’s head.
Julian couldn’t make out the details, but in all probability it was not
the service weapon issued to him by the FBI.

“Come closer, Agent Harris,” Barnes said coldly. “I’ve been

expecting you. I knew you couldn’t resist joining our little party. I’ll
just finish with your friend here then I’m all yours.”

“Let him go, Barnes,” Julian said with as much authority as he

could squeeze out of his voice, which didn’t sound like much, but at
least it didn’t shake.

Still, Barnes let out a humorless chuckle. “As if. I’ve waited long

enough to get him. Don’t worry. You’re going to follow him.”

“You don’t seriously believe you’d get the chance to shoot him

and me, do you?” Jerking his right hand a little, Julian brought his
own firearm to Barnes’s attention, but Barnes merely snorted.

“I believe that you’re too scared that my finger will twitch to risk

shooting me,” he said coolly and, admittedly, correctly.

“Shoot the fucker!” Romeo shouted.
Barnes sneered. “Yeah. Try it, and your cock-sucking boyfriend

will be dead even sooner.”

“He’s going to kill me anyway—make sure he doesn’t get away

with it!”

Julian forced himself not to see his lover kneeling in the dust. This

was just a hostage situation. Serious, but manageable. He was trained
to deal with such things.

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Marlowe

“Barnes, if you pull that trigger, you’ll get a bullet in your

shoulder. Don’t believe I’m giving you the easy way out by shooting
you. We know what you’ve done, and you’re going to pay for this.
Committing murder on the way is not going to help your case in the
least, so drop the gun and let him go.”

“For fuck’s sake, Jules!” Romeo howled in frustration. “Quit the

talking and shoot already!”

Something in his voice caught Julian’s attention, and he allowed

himself to shift a small portion of his attention that so far had been
entirely on Barnes to Romeo. Craning his neck, Romeo was watching
him from the corner of his eyes. His expression was set, and Julian
knew that Romeo was well aware of how serious his situation was.
More aware perhaps than Julian, who still refused to let himself think
of the hostage as the man he loved more than anyone he had ever
known, but maybe that was the solution. He knew Romeo, didn’t he?

He knew that that particular glitter in those blue eyes meant that

Romeo had noticed something the others had missed. He had seen it
every time Romeo had easily delivered the solution to a riddle that
had left everybody else mystified, and suddenly, he understood what
Romeo had been trying to tell him. “Shoot already,” he had said. Not
shoot him. Shifting yet a little more attention away from Barnes,
Julian checked Romeo’s body for a signal. The most obvious
was…yes. His hands. The forefinger and thumb of Romeo’s left hand
were curled into the gun shape kids used in play. Romeo’s finger
twitched, and Julian knew he had read him right. The realization
didn’t come as a relief. They would have to get the timing right down
to the fragment of a second, or Romeo was likely to end up dead.

Even if Barnes didn’t get the clean head shot he was aiming for, at

this short a distance, Barnes wouldn’t miss him altogether, and even a
stray bullet could cause a lot of damage. Julian didn’t have time to
dwell on the thought of what could go wrong. Romeo’s forefinger
twitched again, just a flicker, but Julian knew what it meant.

A Life as a Ghost

“For the last time, Barnes. Drop the gun and surrender, or I will

shoot. Don’t fool yourself thinking I wouldn’t do it,” he said gravely,
hoping that Romeo understood as he flexed his own finger and the
gun jumped in his hand, in that one short, lethal jerk that could take
someone’s life. Or physical soundness.

Barnes rolled on the floor in agony. Blood stained his shoulder a

deep red. Forcing himself to focus on him for just a little longer,
Julian bypassed Barnes and gave the hand and the weapon it still
clutched a hearty kick. It sent the gun skittering well out of Barnes’s
reach and extracted another pain-filled yell from him. Even if he
managed to get up, which Julian doubted would happen in the next
ten minutes or so, Barnes wasn’t much of a threat with the bullet in
his shoulder.

Sick with apprehension, Julian took the few leaps he needed to get

to Romeo. In the attempt to dodge Barnes’s bullet, he had ended up a
good three feet away from his former position, a considerable
distance, seeing as he’d covered it from a kneeling position.
Considerable, but maybe not enough. There had been two shots,
Julian was sure of that, but he had failed to see which direction
Barnes’s bullet had taken, and Romeo was facedown and motionless
on the ground.

Crouching at his side, Julian reached out with shaking hands and

gently gripped his shoulder. “Romeo, love. Can you hear me? Can
you move? Are you—”

“If you don’t take that hand away from my shoulder right fucking

now, you’re gonna regret it!” Romeo snapped and pushed up to his
knees in a surprisingly elegant movement, given the fact that he
couldn’t use his arms.

“Oh. Sorry,” Julian said blankly then, realizing that Romeo was

apparently just fine, or at least didn’t have another bullet-caused
injury, he gave up all caution and hugged him tightly. “God, don’t
ever make me do that again!” he groaned into the warm, familiar
curve of Romeo’s neck.

68 Sage

Marlowe

“I’ve no intention to,” Romeo mumbled, sounding much softer

than he had just seconds ago, but already he raised his head and was
pulling out of Julian’s hold again. “Did you kill the bastard?”

“Nn-nn.” Releasing him, Julian stood up and grabbed Romeo by

the lapels of his jacket in an inelegant but effective way to help him to
his feet. “But I doubt that his shoulder will be of much use to him for
a while.”

“Good. He deserves it.”
“What about your arm? Is it—”
“Broken, yeah.” Romeo pulled a face. “He’s got some wicked

moves, gotta give him that.”

“I know.” Julian nodded. “He was top of the class in self-defense

and close combat. You’re lucky that the rest of you is still in one
piece.”

“Huh. Just what I thought. Bastard surprised me with a nice steel

rod,” Romeo grumbled and shuffled off to where Barnes was still
writhing in pain. The blood oozing from his shoulder was forming a
frighteningly large puddle around him.

“Think we should wait for a few minutes until we call backup?”

Romeo said with uncharacteristic coldness. Barnes looked up at him,
an expression of panic on his pale, sweaty face, but Julian knew he
didn’t mean it.

“They should be here any second now,” he whispered, just loud

enough for Romeo to hear. No need to let Barnes know just yet. The
guy deserved to live with the fear of God for just a little longer.

“Gonna take these off me now?” Romeo asked, jerking his wrists

to bring the cuffs around them to Julian’s attention. Julian regarded
him thoughtfully for a moment. “You know, I think I might leave
them on for just a little longer. Seeing you in handcuffs is a sight I
haven’t had in a while, and I really don’t want to spoil the moment
just yet. It’s definitely something I could get used to.”

“You little fucker!” Romeo snarled, eyes narrowed in anger and

disbelief. “Get them off me!”

A Life as a Ghost

“No can do,” Julian said, both amused at Romeo’s sudden fit of

rage and aroused by the scene that started playing in his head. He took
a step closer and dropped his voice to a low, intimate whisper. “I must
say, I like the sight of you cuffed and defenseless a lot. Think of all
the things I could do to you.”

“Like what? Spank me again?” Romeo’s breath hitched as he got

Julian’s drift at last. His eyes were still narrowed, but the fury in them
was replaced by lust. Pure and feral, fired by adrenaline and
endorphins, just like Julian’s. Their kiss was scorching, hard, and
passionate, and yet only a shadow of what their bodies really wanted.

“Get them off now,” Romeo muttered as he broke the kiss

hesitantly. “You don’t want Baxter to find us here with matching
boners, do you?”

“No,” Julian admitted, breathless. “But I’d almost be willing to

risk it if it means that I’d get to fuck you like this.”

“If by ‘like this’ you mean with me handcuffed and at your

mercy,” Romeo said slowly, “then I really hope you have a spare set
at home because I can’t wait for you to tie me to the bed and show me
exactly what it is that you want to do to me.”

70 Sage

Marlowe

Chapter 7

They didn’t get the chance to go home. Instead they were taken to

the hospital where an attentive team of doctors and nurses fixed
Romeo’s broken shoulder in a lengthy surgery and then put him up in
a room to let him sleep off the narcotics he’d been given. Ironically,
Barnes ended up in the room right next to Romeo’s. He was under
heavy surveillance, as well as tied to his bed.

It didn’t come as a surprise when Romeo insisted on being present

during Barnes’s interrogation as soon as he had recovered. While
Julian would have preferred it if his lover had gotten more rest, he
could understand his need for answers, and with Chief Baxter being
inclined to indulge him, Julian didn’t stand a chance to deny him
anyway.

Barnes was awake when they entered his room. He stared at them

with wide eyes but stayed mute while they took chairs and settled
around his bed. Only Romeo remained standing, despite doctor’s
orders. He was bound to be doing his usual thing of moving around
during the conversation that was about to follow.

“So, Agent Barnes,” Baxter started in a stern voice. “You got

yourself into quite a mess there. Care to explain to us what it was all
about, or would you rather do this the old-fashioned way?”

Barnes continued to glare at her but didn’t reply. After a while

Baxter sighed and nodded. “Fine. Need I remind you that cooperating
can only help you in this situation, while not doing so will not do you
any favors? We will get the information we need anyway, Mr. Barnes.
It is your decision whether or not my report will contain a comment
on your willingness to help fix the damage you caused.”

A Life as a Ghost

Barnes chewed his lip in the long silence that followed. Baxter

remained perfectly calm on her seat, and Romeo, standing by the
window, could have been carved in stone. Only Julian was
increasingly twitchy and struggled not to howl in frustration. The man
whom he had trusted for years and who had just hurt his lover was
propped up in bed comfortably, while Julian would have preferred to
see him strung up by the thumbs or something equally pleasant.

“I was blackmailed,” Barnes blurted out. His voice was barely

more than a whisper, but his words hung loud and heavy in the room.

Romeo was the first to recover. “Blackmailed?”
Barnes turned to him. “Yes.” He sighed and rubbed his face. His

shoulders sagged a little. “Threatened. I had to provide him with
information, or he would have made something public. Something
about me that would destroy my career if it ever got out.”

“Well, I guess it’s safe to say that your career is destroyed now

anyway,” Baxter said. “But we’ll leave that part for later. Right now
all I’m interested in is finding out who this mysterious blackmailer
is.”

Barnes shook his head. “I’m sorry. I wish I could help you, but I

don’t know. I’ve been trying to find out something about him, but it
didn’t work. There was nothing. He used disposable phones for
contact and only ever sent me text messages. I never met anyone and
never spoke to anyone.”

Julian got up and started pacing the room, thinking. “Disposable

phones. Plural, right? Where did you get them from?”

“I don’t know. They were just there. Sometimes I’d find one in

my pocket after being out in the street. Sometimes there would be a
new one on the kitchen table when I came home after work.”

“They were in your home?” Baxter sounded alarmed.
“Yes,” Barnes choked out. “Frequently, and there was never even

the least sign of forced entry. Do you understand now why I was
scared? I have a family, Chief. I have a wife and a daughter.”

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“Did they ever threaten to harm your family?” Romeo took over.

He had returned to his former post by the window, arms crossed in
front of his chest.

“No. Not as such,” Barnes admitted. “But someone was in my

home. And some of those times my wife and child were present. I
didn’t need to be told they were in danger after I found a phone on my
pillow, next to my sleeping wife.” His bottom lip quivered as he
looked at Romeo, who had tensed at the words. “I’m sorry about what
I did to you. I regret everything I’ve done, but I just
couldn’t…They’re my family! I have to protect them.” His voice
broke on the last words, and a silent sob rocked him. “I know it
doesn’t count much as an excuse, but I didn’t mean to hurt you.”

Julian took a step to him. “Oh, is that true? You just attempted to

kill him. And threatened to kill me, too. And talking of killing, what
about the sniper shooting during the museum break-in?”

Barnes’s pallid complexion turned even paler. “I had nothing to

do with that!”

Romeo frowned and looked at Julian. “What makes you think he

was behind the sniper shooting?”

Julian shifted, uncomfortable under the accusing stare. It wasn’t

nice to be on this side of Romeo’s interest. “I told him about you and
what you were planning. He was supposed to follow you that night. I
gave him your address and told him to keep an eye on you, but you
got away. At least that is what he said.”

“It’s the truth!” Barnes said. “I lost you, and by the time I made it

to the museum, it was all over. You were gone, and the guards were in
a huff.”

Romeo regarded him coldly. “Interesting.”
“It wasn’t me,” Barnes insisted. “I didn’t shoot at you. It wasn’t

until I met you at that airfield that—”

“You tried to kill me,” Romeo snarled and got a few inches closer

to Barnes. “Tell me, is that what this mysterious blackmailer asked
you to do?”

A Life as a Ghost

Barnes squirmed. “You have to understand! I had to do it.”
“What dirty secret do you have that makes you commit murder

rather than see it dragged into the open?”

“Huh! You don’t think I’d just tell you now, do you? I have a

family. They need me.”

Leaning in, Romeo placed a hand on Barnes’s arm. Barnes

flinched, but Romeo’s expression remained unreadable. “It’s okay. I
know you wanted to protect your loved ones. I understand.”

“You…You understand?”
“Yes. And I think I understand a lot more.”
Barnes swallowed. “Y–you do?”
Romeo let out a quiet chuckle that sent a shudder down Julian’s

spine. He’d never heard a more threatening sound. “Yes. Yes, indeed
I do. And just so we’re clear, you better make sure not to cross my
path again.”

Barnes swallowed. “I won’t.”
“Good.” Romeo straightened up and returned to his place by the

window.

Baxter had watched the scene with a frown and narrowed eyes.

She cleared her throat. “Now, Mr. Barnes, why don’t you tell us
exactly what this mysterious blackmailer asked you to do?”

Barnes heaved a sigh before he answered. “He approached me

with the request for just some basic information at first. Then it
became more, and eventually, he told me he needed a certain file from
the archives. I told him it was impossible, but he just said he had the
solution and that if I couldn’t get it for him the official way, I should
hire someone who could use different methods.”

“So you hired the thief who broke into the archives?”
“Yes.”
“And who picked the thief?”
“He gave me a contact. Just a number I was supposed to call at a

certain time and a line I was to say. After that, he—the thief—got in
touch with me.”

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Julian exchanged a glance with Romeo and looked at Barnes

again. “Okay. If you still have that number, we want to see it. What
file did this guy want?”

“I don’t know. He said he’d tell me just before the break-in, but he

never called, so I assumed there was a change of plan or maybe he’d
gotten wind of the op.”

“You don’t know what he wanted?”
“No. Just that it was a file that was locked away in the archives.”
Julian stared at him. “Is there anything else about this that you

think is important?”

“No, but can I ask one question?” Barnes inquired.
“Yes.”
“How did you find me?”
Julian smiled. “Quite simply. We traced your phone.”
“My phone? But that was switched off, so the GPS tracking can’t

have worked.”

“Sorry.” Julian shook his head. “Apparently it wasn’t off. The

signal came through well, and all we had to do was follow it.”

“But that’s not possible!” Barnes protested. “I know it was off.”
“Actually, you’re right,” Romeo said. “It was off. And it wasn’t

your GPS signal they followed, but the signal of the transmitter I
installed.”

Barnes’s eyes widened. “You bugged my phone?”
“Uh-huh.”
“But…how? When?”
Romeo shrugged and smirked. “Ah, you know…We spent a lot of

time together in the office. You leave your desk to go and get coffee
or make photo copies. You know, moments like that when you’re
careless.”

“So you have suspected him all along, Mr. Moore?” Baxter asked.
“Let’s say I was keeping an eye on him.”
“I see. Well, it seems your instincts were right, and your addition

to the team paid off. Mr. Barnes, unless there is anything else you

A Life as a Ghost

wish to tell us, we will leave you alone now. There are reports to be
written, and I believe Mr. Moore needs a rest just as much as you do.”

Following her gaze, Julian noticed that Romeo indeed looked

exhausted and faintly gray in the face.

“Um, one thing, Chief,” Barnes piped up. “I’d like to give a

written statement. If it helps, I mean. I’ll write down everything and,
uh, confess.”

Baxter raised her eyebrows. “I appreciate the thought, Mr. Barnes.

As I said, cooperating can only help you at this stage.”

Head lowered and gaze fixed on the bed before him, Barnes

nodded. “I know, Chief. I know.”

Julian followed Baxter and Romeo out of the room. He’d been

quiet during the interrogation, not much help, but he’d been thinking.
There was something about all this that struck him as odd, but he
couldn’t seem to place it. Something that didn’t quite add up,
although the solution appeared perfect. Maybe that was it. The case
was too perfect and too smooth, and in Julian’s experience, that meant
that something was fishy.

* * * *

“So what do you think about all this?” Julian asked an hour later,

back at Romeo’s home.

“I’m not really thinking anything right now. I’m just tired.”
“Right. You must be. I’m sorry. Would you like to just go to

bed?”

“Yes. In fact, I would.”
“Okay.” Julian sighed. “We’ll do that then.”
Romeo chewed his lip. “But you don’t want to, right? What’s

up?”

“Nothing, just…I have this feeling that I’m missing something.”
Romeo tensed. “Like what?”

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“I’m not sure. Just something. And I’m not sure if I believe

Barnes either.”

“What part exactly?”
“That he didn’t try to shoot you when you broke into the museum.

I don’t get it. It was the detail that made me believe it was him. I gave
him your address. Hell, I even ordered him to follow you. I know he
said before you’d slipped away, but I just assumed he’d lied to me
about that. It would have been the perfect occasion for him to get rid
of you.”

Romeo heaved a sigh and rolled his eyes. “I still can’t believe you

told him! Fuck, Jules, why? You could have blown my cover! And
indeed, you gave me away to the guy we were chasing all along!”

“Well, it would have helped if someone had bothered telling me

what was going on in my own department!”

“You were under suspicion!” Romeo snapped.
“Yeah, so what? You said yourself that you never thought it was

me. So you could have told me.” Julian swallowed. “You could have
trusted me.”

“What, the way you trusted me when you set one of your agents

up to track me?”

“I’m sorry. I guess that wasn’t the best plan I ever had, was it?”
“No.” Romeo pushed back his hair and made a face. “No,

definitely not one of the best. But what’s done is done, and it all
turned out well. I’m not carrying grudges. I understand why you did
it, and yes, maybe it would have been better if you’d known what was
going on, but Baxter and her boss didn’t want you to know, so there
wasn’t much I could do about it.”

“Apart from telling me.”
“Apart from telling you and acting against a direct order.”
“You’ve never cared much about those before.”
Romeo hesitated for a moment before he said, “Stretching

boundaries when necessary is one thing, Jules. But even I know when
to do as I’m told.”

A Life as a Ghost

“Right. Well, I can only hope that this is one of those occasions

because I’d really like to tell you that it’s time for you to go to bed
now, and I hope you’ll do as you’re told.”

Romeo smirked. “Gonna bring your handcuffs with you?”
Julian shook his head. “Not tonight, no. You’ve been through a lot

today. You’re hurt, and I want you to recover before I…assault you.”

“I liked it, you know,” Romeo said quietly. “A lot.” He tilted his

head up, and Julian gladly gave him the kiss he’d asked for.

“I know,” Julian whispered as he leaned back. “And so did I. I

can’t wait to have you naked and tied up and see how you take to a
proper spanking, but now isn’t the time for that. You—” He broke off
when a sudden lump in his throat choked him. He cleared his voice.
“You could have died today.”

“I know that.” Romeo tilted his head to the side and pulled Julian

down for another gentle kiss. “I could have, but I didn’t. And
tomorrow is another day. Now let’s go to bed, and don’t worry
anymore, love.”

Looking into Romeo’s beautiful blue eyes, Julian realized exactly

how glad he was that Romeo was still alive, and he was tempted to
give in to his lover’s suggestion, but something kept nagging him,
something at the back of his mind. Something Barnes had said. “Yes,
but…I can’t help thinking I’m missing something. What is it?”

Romeo smiled and, wrapping his arms around Julian’s hips, pulled

him close. “Don’t worry about that now, sweetheart. I’m sure it’s
nothing important and you’ll figure it out soon enough.” His kiss was
sweet and demanding at the same time, and his lips gave a promise
that made Julian tingle all over in anticipation. He tried to cling on to
that fleeting thought that seemed to be so close yet escaped whenever
he reached out to grab it. He’d missed something. He knew that, but
Romeo had said it wasn’t important, and anyway, they were safe now,
and tomorrow was another day. They could talk about it later. After
they had satisfied the burning, aching need Romeo inspired in his
loins.

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* * * *

Julian woke to the feel of Romeo’s tight buttocks pressing against

his groin. His lover must have shifted in his sleep, and the friction he
had given Julian’s sleepy cock made it twitch curiously. Romeo was
warm in his arms, that strong, muscular body for once relaxed and
defenseless. Julian put an arm around him and, gently pulling him
closer, buried his face in that curved nest Romeo’s shoulder and neck
created. Inhaling deeply, he breathed in Romeo’s scent, that spicy
mixture of expensive fragrance and underlying masculinity. It seemed
to be going straight to his head, or maybe to his groin, because his
dick started filling a little as if getting ready for more, just in case.
Romeo stirred again, shifting just a little further to his front. The
movement created a little distance between them, and Julian might
have been disappointed, but he recognized the potential this new
position held.

Releasing his hold, he trailed his hand down Romeo’s flank and

around the curve of his hip to the little, hollow spot, right where his
spine dipped in a bit before the swell of his ass continued the line.
Romeo sighed, but the sound was still unmistakably sleepy, and from
the way he snuggled deeper into his pillow, Julian assumed that he
wasn’t willing to wake up just yet.

He brought his hand further to the dent between those hard-

muscled butt cheeks and slipped it under the waistband of Romeo’s
briefs, and then he playfully sneaked his finger along the cleft and all
the way to just behind Romeo’s balls. He couldn’t quite reach them,
but it didn’t matter. His goal was a different one.

Drawing his finger back, he carefully pressed it into that warm,

narrow crevice until he brushed the small patch of puckered skin.
Romeo sighed again, although this time it sounded more like a moan,
really, and opened his legs a little more.

A Life as a Ghost

Julian accepted the invitation and gently rubbed across that sweet

hidden spot a few more times, teasing all those sensitive nerves before
he pushed in. This dry entry wasn’t all that easy, and the angle was
awkward, but just feeling Romeo’s body open up for him even in its
half-asleep state was strangely erotic.

Julian pushed a little deeper, and Romeo’s breath hitched. He

swallowed and tilted his hips just a bit, giving Julian more space to
move. There was no doubt now that he was awake, but he didn’t show
it and just remained lying there, passively offering himself to Julian’s
touch.

Carefully twisting his finger, Julian explored the silky folds of that

warm, soft cavity as far as he could reach. It was just moist enough to
allow him to slide easily on the inside, but the entry was still tight and
still dry. The ring of muscles that sealed it provided a rough friction
as they clamped down on Julian’s finger, but he kept moving anyway,
stretching that sweet little hole gently but persistently.

Romeo groaned. The sound was muffled by his pillow, but it was

one of the noises Romeo would make when arousal kicked in. His
position made it difficult for Julian to get at Romeo’s cock, but he
was fairly certain that it was hard. Hard and straining from his belly,
eager to be touched, and maybe leaking pre-cum already. It gave him
an idea. He withdrew his hand, chuckling when Romeo let out a faint,
protesting whimper, and brought it to his lover’s cock. As expected, it
was hard. The rigid shaft nestled up against his palm, and he pumped
it a few teasing times before he swirled his thumb across the swollen
tip and gathered the beads of sticky liquid.

Careful not to smear it, he brought his hand to its earlier position

between Romeo’s legs, where he spread his precious load across that
still-tight entrance. A needy, half-choked gasp escaped Romeo as his
breath hitched once more, and again, he tilted his hips and spread his
legs to give Julian access to his most private parts.

Sliding more easily on the lube Romeo’s body had provided,

Julian dipped into him again. The intrusion was slick and quick now,

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and Romeo moaned huskily. Julian added a finger, stretching those by
now more welcoming muscles further, and pushed in deeper. The
angle was still awkward, and it must have been near uncomfortable
for Romeo, but he managed to reach that small spot inside his lover’s
body. Romeo yelped when he nudged it, only to instantly hollow his
back in eager invitation.

“Yeah,” he gasped when Julian brushed it again, more firmly this

time. He clearly liked this careful stimulation a lot, and Julian was
only too happy to provide it. He knew Romeo could come from
nothing more than this, but rubbing him to a quick orgasm wasn’t
what Julian had in mind.

Instead, he bided his time, gently stroking in and out of Romeo’s

body, alternating the pressure on that little, sensitive nub inside until
Romeo’s breath was coming in harsh, ragged pants. Pushing back
against Julian, he was rolling his hips now in shallow, rhythmic
movements as he fucked himself on Julian’s fingers.

“Please,” he moaned, tilting his head back to look at Julian from

the corners of his eyes.

“Shh, just a little longer,” Julian soothed and increased the

pressure on Romeo’s gland a bit.

“Nn-nn. Can’t,” Romeo protested, sounding endearingly

unhinged. The arousal vibrating in his voice sent a little jolt of
pleasure to Julian’s own ignored dick.

“Wanna come like this?” Julian whispered into Romeo’s sweaty

neck.

“Uh-huh.”
Stopping the in-and-out movement of his fingers, Julian shifted

the focus of his attentions entirely to the small nub that brought
Romeo so much pleasure. He massaged it gently, alternating pressure
and angle, but never quite ceasing the stimulation. He knew Romeo
liked this, and the soft moans and whimpers that were spilling from
his lover’s mouth in a steady stream now made it easy to give him
exactly what he wanted.

A Life as a Ghost

After what couldn’t have been more than a few minutes, Romeo’s

body started twitching and jerking as the first jolts of his approaching
orgasm gripped him. Soon he was writhing on the bed in shameless
ecstasy, twisting and turning and rocking without rhythm on the
fingers that still penetrated him.

Julian waited patiently for him to go still and then gave him time

to come down. When Romeo’s breathing had slowed to normal, he
carefully withdrew his hand.

“Looks like I tapped into a little hot spot there, huh?” he teased.
“Oh, fuck, yeah!” Romeo confirmed in a husky grunt.
“Good. Now go back to sleep,” Julian ordered softly.
“Don’t you—?”
“Nn-nn. Not now. You can thank me later, preferably with your

mouth around my dick.”

“Oh, okay. I’ll keep that in mind then.” Romeo sounded sleepy,

and, indeed, within seconds his breathing evened out and his body
relaxed into sleep.

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Chapter 8

When he woke up two hours later, Julian knew what he had

missed. He didn’t even need to reach out to know that he was alone in
bed.

His heart ached as he grabbed his phone from the nightstand.
The answer came after the fifth ring. “Baxter.”
“Chief? It’s Agent Harris.”
“Agent Harris? I presume you know what time it is, so what’s

wrong?”

“I need to talk to you. About Romeo.”
She sucked in a breath, just as he had expected. “What is it?”
“Do you know where he is?”
There was a moment’s hesitation, and then she said, “Well, I

would’ve thought he was with you, but apparently he isn’t.”

Julian heaved a sigh. “No. No, he isn’t. Listen, Chief…I know

there is some stuff which is kept from me because I’m not on the right
wage level to have access to that kind of information, but…I think
we’ve missed something. Something vital.” He bit his lip and closed
his eyes. He’d trusted Romeo more than he had ever realized, but now
it seemed that his initial skepticism had been justified.

“What would that be?”
Julian swallowed then cleared his throat. “Why did he pick

Romeo?”

“What?”
“Barnes. He hired Romeo to tamper with the evidence in the

archives. Don’t you think it’s a bit of a strange coincidence that of all
the potential thieves his blackmailer could have told him to get for the

A Life as a Ghost

job, he has to approach the one guy who is actually in contact with the
FBI?”

“You mean…?”
Julian groaned and nodded. “Romeo has been involved in this all

along. The whole thing was a setup to allow him access to the
archives.”

“What?”
“I take it this means you did not know that this was an element of

the master plan, did you?”

“No! Well, obviously I knew that Moore had to get into the

archives, as that was what the blackmailer—Barnes—wanted.”

“Barnes, who, as we know by now, was acting on orders and was

told to hire Romeo for the job.”

“You mean…?”
“Yes. Romeo is the one who pulled Barnes’s strings. That’s why

Barnes didn’t need to tell him what to do when he was in the archives.
Romeo knew what he had to do and couldn’t pretend to be Barnes’s
blackmailer because he was busy breaking in.”

“Find him.” The line clicked and went dead. Julian shuddered

then jumped when the phone in his hand rang again the second he hit
the off button.

“Harris.”
“It’s me.” Romeo’s voice was tense.
“I know.”
“We need to talk.”
“Oh yes, we do.”
Romeo sighed. “Can you meet me in an hour?”
Julian huffed at the cheek of him. “Where?”
“You know where.”
Julian didn’t get the chance to say anything else. The line was cut

again. He stared at the phone a few seconds longer then put it down.
One hour. The abandoned airfield where Barnes had taken Romeo
almost exactly twenty-four hours earlier was only a fifteen-minute

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drive away. Ironic, really, that Barnes had been acting on orders given
by none other than Romeo himself, as Julian now knew, and still
Romeo had gotten hurt. As far as Julian was concerned, the bastard
deserved the pain. He checked his watch. Forty minutes until he
would have to leave. Forty minutes during which he could do some
serious research.

* * * *

By the time Julian stopped his car behind the building that had

once housed small, private aircrafts, but had been left to rot since,
some of his anger had turned into cool determination. So he had been
right along. Romeo had done exactly what Julian had suspected of
him all along. He’d lied and cheated and used his position and
Julian’s weakness for his own purposes. And like the fool he was,
Julian had been only too happy to swallow the sweet lies, despite his
better judgment. Now all that was left for him to do was to do what he
should have done all along. Nail the bastard. Only this time it would
be in a different meaning of the word.

He pulled the lever and opened the door then got out of the car.

The gun was heavy where it rested in his shoulder holster, and the
smaller backup pistol pressed against his ankle. The decision to take
the weapons had been a hard one, but he was no longer taking any
risks. Romeo was dangerous, as Julian knew by now, and he wouldn’t
stop at anything. A faint rustling sound behind him had him tense and
listening up.

“Thank you for coming, Jules.”
“Ah well, you know me. I can never resist a chance to catch a

thief.” Julian turned around slowly. Romeo didn’t look any different
from before, and why would he? People’s intentions didn’t show in
their clothing, and Romeo’s true intentions had never really changed
in all the time Julian had known him, had they?

A Life as a Ghost

Romeo’s lips twitched in a weak smile, but his cool blue eyes

remained dull and guarded.

“What, no witty answer?” Julian grumbled.
“No.”
“Okay. Fine. I guess that means you want to go straight down to

business, right?”

“Kind of.”
“Maybe you could just tell me why you’re here. That would save

us a lot of time,” Julian said coldly. Romeo blinked, and his eyes
remained closed for a fraction longer than usual. Julian took a closer
look. It was cold, and the wind was sharp on the flat piece of land, so
he’d assumed that to be the reason for Romeo’s red-rimmed eyes, but
now he noticed the shine of moisture in them. Then again, the wind
could have exactly that effect, and he was convinced that Romeo was
a good enough actor to squeeze out a few tears if it served his
purposes.

“I’m here to…” Romeo started but bit his lip. His voice sounded

rough. He swallowed a few times and started again. “I thought you’d
want some answers.”

“Oh, that’s very kind of you, but I don’t need you to feed me. I’m

well capable of getting answers on my own.”

“I know,” Romeo said gravely. “I’d just like to make sure that

they’re the right ones.”

Julian sneered. “How very nice of you. It was a brilliant plan. I

have to give you that. If you’d just broken into the archives, there
would have been a major investigation, but since everybody knew you
were in there, no one bothered checking what exactly you did. They
all just assumed that you only collected the files the mysterious
blackmailer told you to tamper with and focused on those while you
could simply take whatever file you were really after. And with your
cunning plan of pretending you got shot on the run, you made sure
that no one could search you after you left the building. Clever,
Romeo—or whatever your name is.”

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“It is my name.”
“Oh, is it? Hmm, right, you said so. Romeo Paris Montague, if I

remember correctly. What a striking name, and such a beautiful story
behind it. So sentimental about your parents having named you after
the cities you were conceived and born in respectively. A nice,
emotional detail, just like the car crash that killed them. Where was
it? South of France?”

Romeo swallowed. He nodded.
“Right. Five years ago,” Julian continued. “And since we’re

talking of interesting details, maybe I should mention that Swiss
boarding school you went to. You’re, what, twenty-eight now? So you
would have been there about ten years ago, right? Please correct me if
I’m wrong, but I think I know where those pieces of the puzzle fit.”

Romeo’s expression had turned as stony as Julian had ever seen it.

There was nothing in his face that would have given him a clue what
Romeo thought, not even the usual almost imperceptible giveaway
signs.

“You see, I had some time to kill while I was waiting for you,”

Julian said. “I used it to check some facts, and I came up with
something very interesting. Care to hear it?”

“Go on.” Romeo’s voice was hollow and just as emotionless as

his expression.

“I managed to track down exactly one man who went to a Swiss

boarding school approximately a decade ago and whose parents died
in a car crash in South France five years ago.”

“Good work.” There was no sarcasm in Romeo’s tone, and no

humor. The void sent a chill down Julian’s spine, and he had to force
himself to continue.

“Thank you. And it all fits. The family that died on that day was

indeed called Montague, and they had a son named Romeo Paris.”

Romeo raised his eyebrows in wordless acknowledgement, and

Julian continued, “The only problem is that their son was with them

A Life as a Ghost

when they died. On a cliff, in the wreckage of a car after a burst tire
sent it spinning off the road.”

Julian paused, watching Romeo closely for a reaction, but there

was none. The man was still frozen to the spot, his face an
emotionless mask. His blue eyes held Julian’s gaze levelly, and once
again, Julian realized that he didn’t have a clue who he was dealing
with. He cleared his throat. “Can you explain that?”

“I could.”
“But?”
“No but. I don’t think I have to. You’re a very smart man, Jules,

and I’m sorry I underestimated you. You’ve come so close to figuring
it all out. I’d hate to spoil your triumph by handing you the last piece
of that puzzle.”

“Oh, how considerate of you,” Julian said. “I noticed you didn’t

deny any of what I just told you.

“Right.”
“Why not?”
“I promised never to lie to you.”
“And yet you said your name was Romeo Paris Montague and

your parents had died in a car crash.”

“Yes.”
Julian sighed. This was confusing. “So, if that part wasn’t a lie,

but the common assumption is that you died, too, then…”

A gleam of excitement sparked in Romeo’s eyes, and he nodded

wordlessly.

Julian took a breath. “I just burned a perfect alias, didn’t I?”
A soft, triumphant smile spread across Romeo’s face. “See, I

knew you’d figure it out on your own.”

“Hmm. I’m not sure I have figured it all out. Where’s the point in

pretending your true identity was an alias?”

“Don’t you get it? The alias is perfect because it looks like an

alias. If ever someone found out about all this, they would assume
exactly what you just did. That a spy had simply taken on the identity

88 Sage

Marlowe

of a poor kid who had died, pretending that the son had survived the
accident that had killed the parents. With the parents out of the way
and no other next of kin, who would have ever been able to tell?”

“I see. The flaw in every fake identity is that there will always be

a trail or a detail that doesn’t quite match. Medical records, people
who know the real person and might recognize them, or rather not
recognize them…”

“Exactly. But pretending that my own identity is a fake is

unassailable.”

“Right. But what about the third body in the car?”
Romeo sighed. “Some poor local guy who was killed just a day

before. Cliff jumping, ironically.”

“Oh. But the others…they really were your parents?”
“Yes.”
“I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay.”
“Not bad, admittedly. But there’s one thing I don’t quite

understand. You couldn’t have done that alone. You must have had
help to arrange it, and besides, why would you turn your own identity
into an alias?”

“Because it’s the safest option.”
“But who are you that—oh. Oh. Oh, fuck.” Julian was aware of

gawping stupidly as the last loose thread made the connection in his
overworked brain. “You work for the government.” Taking in
Romeo’s raised eyebrow, he corrected, “A government. Which one?
England? MI6? Oh shit.” He gasped. “Whoa. I really hadn’t seen that
one coming.”

“I’d rather not comment on what you just said,” Romeo said, and

Julian understood. By making him solve the puzzle on his own,
Romeo had allowed him to find all the answers he wanted without
saying anything to conceal his status. And that, in itself, was another
answer.

A Life as a Ghost

“You’re pretty high up on the list, aren’t you? You must be if not

even Chief Baxter had an inkling.”

“Baxter doesn’t even know my name. Not the real one, anyway.

All she knows is the version of the story where I provide the FBI with
information. That part isn’t a lie either. It’s just not all of the truth.
And just so you know—I’m not on any list, Jules. I’m beyond lists.”

“Oh. That sounds ominous.” Julian winced. “You’re not a hit

man, are you?”

Romeo chuckled. “No. I’m nothing of the kind. I’m just someone

who doesn’t exist. I lead a life as a ghost, so I can move across
borders without causing interference.”

“Political interference, you mean?” Julian translated. Romeo’s

smile was all the answer he needed.

“So when you broke into the FBI archives, you were acting on

some government’s orders?”

“Yes.” Romeo smirked. “I know what you’re thinking, but I can

assure you that Uncle Sam had a big interest in what I did there.”

“Just that it’s so top secret that not even Baxter was allowed to

know about it.”

“No one was allowed to know about it, or do you really believe I

would have set all of this up if I could have just walked in with a
piece of paper in my hand and taken away that file?”

Julian thought about it. “Well, indeed. Why couldn’t you, or

someone higher up, just get that damned file? Agents collect files all
the time.”

“Of course they do. But officially asking and removing a file

leaves a trace. And it wasn’t just a file.”

“You stole evidence?”
“Yes. And my assignment here served another purpose, too, but

that’s something I can’t talk about.”

“Shit, Romeo. This really is way out of my league, isn’t it?”
Romeo nodded wordlessly.

90 Sage

Marlowe

“And poor Barnes was just a pawn in this game. You made him

do all this, right?”

Biting his lip, Romeo gave another tight nod.
“Damn, Romeo! You destroyed this man’s career over this. Was

that really necessary?”

“I’m afraid it was,” Romeo answered hollowly. “I’m not proud of

that part, but if it’s any consolation, Barnes wasn’t as innocent as you
might think he is.”

“Why, what did he do?”
“He cheated to pass his exams.”
“He what?”
“Cheated. He meddled with the papers so he wouldn’t fail.”
“And you can prove that?”
“I could prove it, yes. But I didn’t have to as far as he was

concerned. All I had to do was tell him I knew. You see, his wife
comes from money. Her family is rich, and marrying a guy like
Barnes was a big step down for her on the social ladder. Like all
women in love, she didn’t want to hear that and married him anyway.
Being an FBI agent was the one thing he had going for himself.”

“So if his dirty secret had come out…”
“Yes. He would have lost her.”
“But still, Romeo. He has a family.”
“Look, Jules, I did what I had to do, okay? There’s more at stake

here than the happiness of one family, or even of one couple.”

“So I guess that means you’re not going to stay, are you?” Julian

forced himself to ask after several long, silent minutes.

“That depends on your definition of stay.”
Julian swallowed around the lump in his throat. “Stay as in live

here, in NYC. With me, or at least near me so we can see where all
the craziness of the past couple of weeks will take us.”

Romeo heaved a long, slow sigh. “Ah, Jules. I can’t live here. My

job takes me all over the world, but we already know where all this
craziness has taken us.”

A Life as a Ghost

“Do we?”
“Yes.” Romeo held out his uninjured arm and pulled Julian into a

tight hug. “I love you, Jules. That fact is just as true as anything else,
and it’s not going to change.”

“Yes, but…if you have to go, then what’s going to happen to us?”
Romeo kissed Julian’s neck before he answered. “Just because I

can’t live here doesn’t mean it’s over between us. We’ll just have to
consider it a long-distance relationship. A lot of people have those,
and I, for my part, am willing to give it a try.”

Leaning into the embrace, Julian rested his cheek against

Romeo’s. “Long-distance relationship, huh? Something tells me
you’re not talking of the kind where we meet every two months for a
weekend.”

Romeo made a low snorting sound and tightened his grip around

Julian. “Probably not quite so regularly, but we will meet as often as I
can make it.”

“Great. Shouldn’t you be on sick leave anyway?”
“Not much chance for that in my business. The next assignment is

waiting already.” Romeo made a face. “It’s a bit overdue, actually,
but my boss was willing to give me some leeway. Besides, this case
isn’t over, Jules. Things have happened that require further
investigation. The explosion in your house, the sniper who tried to
take me out at the museum. Those incidences are still unaccounted
for. I’ve been trying to solve that, but I’m running into walls. It would
have made sense if Barnes had tried to kill me off, but he didn’t. I
don’t even know what made him attack me in the end. He had no
reason to, and I couldn’t get him to talk, not with Baxter around. I
believe him when he says he didn’t mean to hurt me, so there must
have been someone else involved, and if I find that someone, my
cover might get blown for good. Right now, neither I nor the powers
that be have a clue who that person is and what they could possibly
want, but the general assumption is that I have a mark on my back.”

92 Sage

Marlowe

Julian felt like he’d been punched in the gut. “Fuck, Romeo! How

can you just drop something like that on me?”

“Well, what was I supposed to say? You’re a big boy, Jules. You

work in law enforcement. You know how these things work.”

“Shit. I investigate cases that involve stolen pieces of art, not

bombs and murder!”

“I know.” Romeo expelled a sigh. “And that’s why I’m leaving.

It’s safer for you if I’m not around you right now.”

“Right. You’re leaving me because it’s safer. Nice.”
“Ah, Jules. Don’t be sad. It’s only for the time being.”
Julian battled down the lump in his throat. “So you say. Is that

why we met on a deserted airfield?”

“I have a plane waiting.”
“Huh. Don’t tell me you can fly a plane, too. There really is

nothing you can’t do, is there?”

Romeo winced. “There is. I can’t stay with you. Shh. Don’t look

at me like that. I’ll come back and let you put handcuffs on me and
spank me and all the other kinky stuff I can’t wait to do with you.”

Julian chuckled despite himself. “Right. So I’m supposed to sit

around and wait for you to come home while you are running around
with a mark on your back doing stuff that is dangerous enough to
cause international conflicts?”

The corners of Romeo’s mouth tilted up. “As a matter of fact, yes.

But that’s nothing to worry about. I may lead a life as a ghost, but
you’re the first ever to have taken hold of a part of me. My heart
belongs to you, Jules. I love you, and I will always find you, because
not doing so is no longer an option.”

THE END

WWW.SAGE-MARLOWE.COM

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Sage is a multi-published author of gay erotic romance and loves

taking romance to the edge. The edge of passion, the edge of pleasure,
the edge of propriety.

Hopelessly in love with books from a very early age on, Sage has

dreamt of writing one for years while working on the day job instead.
It took a very persistent character in the company of a much-adored
Muse to finally get the first novel going. The fact that this gorgeous
guy was gay came as a bit of a surprise, but it explained a lot.

Ever since, Sage has been the willing slave to all the fascinating

guys who just keep queuing up and want their stories told. This has
resulted in several published books and countless manuscripts at
various stages of completion, so there's always something to work
on—preferably at night when the rest of the house is asleep.

Sage's characters often have a dramatic and sometimes traumatic

past and need to battle some demons to be with the one they love. But
don’t worry, they get quite a lot of naughty action along the way to
make it worth their while and there will always be a happy end!

For all titles by Sage Marlowe, please visit

www.bookstrand.com/sage-marlowe

Siren Publishing, Inc.

www.SirenPublishing.com

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