Angel and the Assassin

released a long-
    held breath. A soft sigh escaped him. He nodded but did not speak.
    “I love you because you‟re sweet and loving. I love how affectionate you are,
    how you hold my hand, the way you put your arms around my waist.” He was afraid
    that if he stopped, he would not be able to begin again, so he kept speaking, all in
    one breath. “I love how intelligent you are. The way you trust me so easily makes
    me feel so responsible, like I have to keep you safe and protect you, and I want to do
    that. I want to be worthy of your love and trust.”
    He stopped, not sure what else to say, knowing there was more but unable to
    drag it out of himself. His cheeks burned, but he would not back down from this any
    more than he would back down from a man with a loaded gun in his face. “I want to
    make you into a man. A man I‟ll be proud of and a man you‟ll be proud to be.”
    “Daddy?” Angel whispered, waiting for permission to speak.
    Kael nodded.
    “You said you have to decide what kind of man you want to be and then
    become it. I want to be like you, Daddy, strong and certain like you. I know you‟re a
    good man. I have figured out more or less what you do for a living, and I want to do
    what you do.”
    “There are careers in intelligence that don‟t involve going into dangerous
    situations.” Kael knew Angel was capable of doing the same work and doing it
    extremely well. “I‟ll teach you how to be observant, how to spot a minute change in
    an environment, how to scan your environment for possible threats. You‟re already
    good at it. You have natural talent, and I‟ll help you hone it. I‟ll teach you to defend
    yourself, just in case you need it.” But he had no intention of letting Angel do
    anything dangerous ever again.

    Angel and the Assassin
    185

    Angel raised his slender, undeveloped arms, bent at the elbow, and tightened
    his biceps while looking at Kael‟s heavily muscled, very lean body. “I doubt I‟ll ever
    be as tall as you, but I want muscles like you, Daddy. I want to be strong.”
    “We‟ll start you at the gym very soon,” Kael said.
    Now that he was talking about concrete things that he knew inside out, the
    tension in Kael‟s body drained and he became animated instead of stiff and nervous.
    His mum was right; he made people nervous and gave them the impression he
    would smack them if they irritated him.
    “Daddy, I feel kind of bad that I don‟t feel anything much about killing those
    dudes in Bosnia. They would have killed me, and they were definitely going to kill
    you and Dragana. They weren‟t going to just let me go if they didn‟t get the cash
    they wanted from somebody in exchange for me. That one guy who could speak
    English told me they were going to kill me if they didn‟t get what they wanted.”
    “That‟s true; they would have killed you. When you do a job, you can‟t look
    back. You have the right attitude, boy. I‟m proud of you. Don‟t lose any sleep over
    them.”
    “I won‟t, Daddy.”
    Angel took Kael‟s hand again, playing with the fingers. “Daddy, why is Mr.
    Conran so nervous of you?”
    “Conran‟s a drama queen.” Kael shrugged. “You read the diary; you know what
    I did to him when we were at school together. He had it coming. He made fun of my
    mum. That‟s almost a death wish in my book. Conran‟s problem is he thinks I‟m
    capable of more than I am.” He paused, chewing on his bottom lip for a second. “No,
    that‟s not quite what I meant. I‟m capable of anything, but he thinks I‟d do things
    casually that I wouldn‟t do except in very extreme circumstances, and that‟s good. It
    keeps him and men like him nervous of me.”
    Angel curled up on his side and laid his head in Kael‟s lap, his cheek resting
    against his flaccid cock. He turned his face into the warm, soft flesh, sniffing. “I love
    the smell of you, Daddy. I love the taste of you.”
    Kael stretched out a hand and stroked Angel‟s cheek. “I love the softness of
    your skin, boy, and I love the way you laugh.”
    “I love the way you spank my ass; it feels so intimate and warm. Daddy, tell
    me when you knew you loved me.”
    With Angel‟s face in his groin rather than looking into his eyes, Kael felt more
    able to speak. “I don‟t really know the exact moment. You grew on me, but you
    started the second I met you in the shower. I looked into your beautiful eyes and
    then you pissed yourself and I thought, how can I kill this lovely