We’ll figure something out, McClane promised. I’m not gonna leave you high and dry.

Riley snorted tiredly. “Yeah,” he grumbled. “I’ve heard that one before.”

He walked into the room with the insidious whispers of a headache nagging in the back of his skull, tossed his bag on the dresser table again, and drew the curtains. Sleep or shower?

Shower, McClane suggested. We smell. You smell. Annoyed pause.

There’s stink.

There was, indeed, and it didn’t help the pulsing in Riley’s head or the ache in his heart. He grunted his assent and staggered back to the door to engage the lock and chain. His hat landed on the TV, his boots in a corner.

He unbuttoned his shirt on autopilot, stuffed it into the laundry bag, pulled out a fresh tee to drop on the chair for the next day. His jeans followed, fresh underwear, fresh socks. There was an organized little heap by the time Riley disappeared into the bathroom. It was a habit he’d shared with Misha, only Misha did his clothes arranging because he was a neat freak. Riley did it out of necessity. He wasn’t a morning person. If his clothes weren’t waiting for him in the right order, he got confused, which made him grumpy

and impatient. He didn’t like being grumpy and impatient. It took energy he didn’t want to spend before his first cup of coffee.

He brushed his teeth, squinting in the harsh neon light until it dimmed to much more comfortable levels. That felt so good he didn’t wonder about it, barely frowned when he looked in the mirror and realized there was a film of something shimmery over his eyes.

“Inbuilt sunglasses?” he muttered, reluctantly impressed. “Cool.”

Night vision, too, McClane purred, the throaty warmth in his voice pooling deep in Riley’s belly. Heat signatures. Telescopic sight. Whatever you want, I got it.

“Man, I could make a killing selling you to Soldier of Fortune.” Riley chuckled, then moaned when tendrils of pulsing heat threaded up through his neck into his skull, soothing his headache. “Oh, that’s good. Don’t stop.”

Go take your shower, McClane told him and kept up the best massage ever while Riley adjusted the water temperature and stepped under the spray.

Riley closed his eyes and stood still, head dipped back to let the warm water sluice away the bar smells lingering on his skin and in his hair. Bit by bit, he unwound, lured into letting go of the remaining anxiety over almost ending a man’s life by the steady murmurs in his mind promising over and over again there’d be no more violence without permission. No spilling of blood without consent. His muscles were kneaded and warmed from within until he was so relaxed his knees threatened to buckle.