Wyatt couldn’t breathe. He shook his head, but his mouth wouldn’t work. It was like being punched in the chest all over again. Wyatt turned his head, looking for Linc. Where was Linc?
“I don’t think that’s necessary,” Charlie snapped.
“Please, I insist. Wyatt was in my care plenty of times,” Victor said. Wyatt felt like he was at the bottom of a well, listening to people argue while he drowned.
His grandmother’s voice cut through the fog in his head. “For Christ’s sake, Victor. She said no.” The knot in his chest loosened just a little as a hand found the small of his back. Linc. Linc was right behind him.
“You there. Yes, you. The one built like a mountain,” Violet barked.
Linc was beside him now. “Yes, ma'am.”
“You’re his security detail. Please ensure my grandson and his date get home at once.” Wyatt swayed on his feet, relief flooding over him. “On second thought, perhaps stop at a drive-thru and get some food in his system.”
“Of course, ma'am,” Linc said curtly. “Ms. Hastings, if you would come with me?”
Charlie nodded, flanking Wyatt’s other side. Together, the two of them guided him out of the room and out of the hotel. Wyatt sagged against Charlie as Linc called for the car. Wyatt didn’t remember much after that. Just lying on the seat, his head resting on someone’s lap as they threaded their hands through his sweaty hair.
“I just wasn’t expecting him,” Wyatt said to nobody in particular.
“I know, baby. It's fine. You’re fine,” Charlie assured him from somewhere above.
Somehow, they made it home and up to the penthouse. Wyatt collapsed on the sofa.
“I’ve got it from here. Don’t keep the car waiting,” Linc told Charlie somewhere in the vicinity of the front door. He only half listened as they said their goodbyes.
When Linc scooped Wyatt into his arms, he didn’t fight him. The warmth of the body beneath him and the reassuring thump of Linc’s heartbeat gave Wyatt something to focus on, an anchor to cling to in his sea of panic.
Wyatt wasn’t sure how long they sat there on the couch in the dark, Linc muttering nonsense into his hair like he was reassuring a child after a nightmare. Maybe that wasn’t far off. Victor Osborne was the architect of every one of Wyatt’s nightmares and no matter how much time passed, the man could yank him back down into that blackness any time he wanted.
“You okay?” Linc asked finally.
Wyatt gave a humorless laugh. “Not even a little.”
“That was the man from the conversion camps, wasn’t it?”
Wyatt’s head jerked to Linc. “What did you say?”
“Your father mentioned that you attended camp at Light of God. Your father alluded to it being a conversion camp.”
“Reparative therapy program,” Wyatt muttered. “That’s what they call themselves. ‘Letting God fix what’s broken inside us.’ That’s what Victor used to say. He said God had fixed him and had tasked him with ‘fixing’ us.”
His pulse thudded heavy but slow, Wyatt reciting these things like it was something that happened to somebody else.
“Is that what he called it?”
Wyatt nodded, something twisting deep inside him. Linc wasn’t supposed to be sitting there babying Wyatt. He’d promised Wyatt a night of rimming and at least one mind-blowing orgasm. Victor Osborne was the reason Wyatt panicked anytime somebody tried to touch him. He’d ruined that experience for Wyatt and just when Wyatt was ready to try, he’d appeared out of the blue to rob him once again like some fairy tale villain. It wasn’t fair.
It wasn’t happening.
“I don’t want to talk about Victor,” Wyatt stated.
Linc frowned. “Okay. What do you want?”
“You. The night you promised me. You said if I was a good boy that you’d tie me up and eat me out and give me orgasms.” Wyatt sounded like a bratty child, but he didn’t care. He wanted the night Linc promised. “Wasn’t I good, Daddy?” he asked, turning in Linc’s arms to straddle his thighs.
Linc brushed Wyatt’s hair from his eyes, studying his face like he wasn’t sure Wyatt was ready for whatever followed. Wyatt wasn’t sure either, but he wanted it, anyway. He wanted Linc. “Yes, baby. You were perfect.”
“Then I want my reward.”
