I open my eyes and meet his burning gaze. “Okay?”
His expression is indescribable. Sometimes there aren’t words for things, and this is one of them.
I know he’s not angry with me. It’s more like he met someone from an alien world who he’s desperate to understand but can’t because he doesn’t speak their language.
“I know it doesn’t make sense. I don’t get it either. It’s just how I feel. You could ask me to be the driver of your getaway car, and I’d say yes. You could ask me to lie to the FBI, and I’d say yes. Just please don’t ask me to help you bury a body because digging a big hole sounds really hard, and my arm strength isn’t what it should be.”
He swallows. He shakes his head. It’s obvious he’s struggling.
So I turn to the counter and pick up the fork. I slip the piece of steak off the end and hold it to his lips. “Eat, honey. It will make me happy.”
He opens his mouth and accepts the meat, then stands there looking electrocuted as he chews.
“I like it when you’re obedient.”
“Don’t get used to it.”
“I won’t. Want another piece?”
Staring at my lips, he nods.
I grab the container from the island, then go back and stand in front of him, holding another bite of filet. I lift it to his lips. He opens his mouth and takes it.
We stare at each other in blistering silence until he’s swallowed.
“More?”
He nods.
When I lift the meat to his mouth this time, he puts his hands around my waist and pulls me against him. I give him the steak, watching the pulse throb in the side of his neck. His cock is growing hard against my hip.
I whisper, “You like me feeding you.”
“Yes.”
His voice is husky. His breathing is erratic. His pupils are dilating fast.
He’s a man who does bad things in the dark as if it’s another day at the office, returning home a little tired but composed. But show him some tenderness, and he crumbles like a sandcastle under a crashing wave.
Like my heart is doing, watching him fall apart for me.
I set the container on the counter, turn back to him, slide my hands up his chest, and look into his eyes.
“I think you’re beautiful. All your parts. All your broken pieces. They’re beautiful to me, and so are you. So if I never get the chance to tell you again, I’m telling you now that if you and your monsters ever decide you need a home, you have one in me.”
He doesn’t answer. I didn’t expect him to.
He’s too busy fighting his demons.
I hand feed him the rest of the meat in the container, then we go back upstairs to bed.
Cole
Near morning, it starts to rain.
I lie awake as I have been for hours. Shay slumbers peacefully beside me. I’m on my back. She’s on her side, holding me, one leg flung over mine, an arm across my chest, her head resting on my shoulder.
She knows what I am yet still she sleeps like a baby. Sleeps and holds me like I’m the one who needs protection, not the other way around.
How is it possible?
What does it mean?
She’s not mentally impaired. She’s not in denial. She’s not anything but completely accepting, and it makes not one bit of fucking sense.
Emiliano calls me the wolf.
My employees call me the Grinch.
Axel calls me the Evaporator. Bruv, British jargon for brother, when he’s feeling generous.
Other people call me by other names, none of them flattering, but Shay calls me honey and beautiful and feeds me steak from her fingertips as if I’m an injured animal she brought home to nurse back to health.
It can’t be this easy.
Things like this don’t exist between people like us.
Do they?
I turn my head and look at her, sleeping so soundly. Trusting me. Me, the man who walked in from the night with another man’s screams still echoing in his ears. She looked at me, and she knew, and she did the impossible.
She accepted me.
Again.
With rain pattering against the windows, I rise from bed, careful not to disturb her. Then I go into the closet, pull the burner from the inside pocket of my suit jacket, and call Axel.
As always, he answers after one ring. He might be the only man on earth who sleeps less than I do.
“Hullo, bruv. Everything’s green on my end. You solid?”
“No.”
I exhale and drag a hand through my hair. The most patient man I’ve ever met, he waits in tolerant silence for me to get my shit together.
“I need you to talk some sense into me.”