“Didn’t realise you needed to be seduced,” Aaron says wryly, quirking an eyebrow at me like he’s curious about this development. “That’s new.”
“You know,” I say. “It’s not very polite to call someone a slag when you’re the one with your hand on their arse.”
Aaron’s mouth tugs into an amused quarter-smile. It shouldn’t look half as attractive on him as it does, Jesus Christ. He tilts my chin up and presses that non-smile to my mouth, fitting us together like a lock sliding into place. His hand on my arse grips harder, bruisingly hard, like he’s trying to leave marks so deep that even my accelerated healing ability won’t be able to dig them out.
Aaron’s hot tongue pushes into my mouth and takes over, staking a claim I’m sure he won’t want to keep the moment this is over. I let him take it anyway, because I’m still a selfish little rich boy at heart.
He tastes like the coffee he doesn’t like and the spearmint toothpaste he used to clean his teeth whilst I was still asleep in his bed. He can’t have showered yet because there’s a musk to him, a day-old dirty smell. It isn’t bad, it’s just very human, almost primal, the way someone only smells in their own home. This close, the warmth and scent of him is overwhelming to my mutated senses. Everything is just more and hot and loud, the roaring in my ears a deafening racket that drums through me at a frantic rhythm, and it’s too fucking much all at once.
Aaron’s holding me so tight, large fingers digging in harshly, and kissing me so fucking hard and rough, but not desperate. It doesn’t feel like he’s scared of losing me or terrified he’ll break me. He’s touching me like it’s an inevitable thing, like kissing me is an unbreakable fact of the universe. In this moment, together, we are gravity.
When he pulls back, I want to snarl in protest. I want to bury my nose in his throat, in his armpit and in the crease of his thick, muscled thigh and just inhale the harsh masculine scent of him. I want it so badly, so unconditionally, that in the next second I’m tearing myself away from him.
Aaron lets me go when I get my hands between us and push on his chest. His eyes are dark with a horrible, tangible lust. More than a want. It’s a craving. It’s the addiction taking hold, the mad, clawing despair before the hit, when the high is just out of reach, but there, rightthere, to be stolen or destroyed. His hands clench into fists again to stop him from reaching, probably for my sake. He resists the pull and I don’t know if I resent him for it.
My chest is heaving where I’m almost hyperventilating. Panic and a consuming, thought thrashing fear chewing through my stomach. I feel ripped open and exposed to him, every vein and bone and strand of DNA pinned to a board like a butterfly under glass. It’s awful and I hate everything about it.
Aaron is breathing hard too, massive chest expanding to look even bigger. He’s staring after me with a resignation on his face that I don’t respect. The muscle in his jaw jumps, his eyes narrowing slightly like he heard that thought loud and clear.
“Rohan,” he says. That’s it. Just my name. It sounds like a whole conversation coming out of his abused, kiss-slick mouth.
I take another step back from him. Then another.
“Tell me where my fucking clothes are, North,” I demand, straightening my spine and glaring at him, because it’s easierto remind myself to be untouchable when I give off that vibe in every physical way possible. I shoot the t-shirt I discarded earlier a reproachful look. “I’m not giving my report to Snow dressed like I belong to you.”
Because I don’t. I can’t. Aaron made that crystal fucking clear already.
Aaron looks like he wants to fight me, to argue and push for some kind of serious discussion. Thank every lucky star in the sky that he takes the cowards way out instead.
“Ok, kid,” he says, exhaling slowly. “Ok.”
Present
Leo
Once I’ve climbed down from the ledge of my mini-mental breakdown over the discovery of my apparently lethal new power, we don’t linger in the mansion. Rohan wants to burn the building down with his dad’s corpse inside it, but Jack talks him out of it, begrudgingly, making it clear that if it weren’t for me, he’d be one hundred percent be on board for setting fire to the mansion. It’s easy to see their sibling resemblance when they’re yearning for some mayhem and disappointed when they don’t get it.
When Rohan first told me that Jack and Dan were his brothers, I wasn’t certain what to think about it. I was even less certain how to tell Jack the truth. I’d meant to do it right after we got home, but then so much carnage happened, and there didn’t seem to be a right moment. Although I think most of that wasjust me putting it off. I knew how Jack would react to the news, and I wasn’t looking forward to that reaction at all.
I wish now that I’d just bitten the bullet and told him because the way he found out was so brutal, and I saw how viciously it affected Jack to realise the man who he’d hated for most of his life was the same man partially response for the creation of that life. I can’t really imagine how messy his emotions must be right now. Not just about his biological father but the revelation about Rohan too.
We find Damon, Rex, and Dan waiting for us a little ways down the road at our agreed meeting point, which is an immense relief, as I was half worried we’d find them dead or kidnapped by OI when it became clear how far ahead Stone was in this game. He seemed unbeatable in that moment, but it turns out detonating someone’s heart kills monsters just as well as anyone else.
Surprise flashes across Dan’s face for a second before it’s wiped away, tucked back behind a sturdy mask of watchful detachment. His eyes snag the longest on Jack, steady and alert, possibly waiting to be tackled to the dirt road for helping a drugged Rohan lead us into a trap.
Damon and Rex don’t even get the chance to ask what happened before Jack is striding up to his brother and shoving at his chest. He pushes him so hard that Dan’s back slams up against the side of the van, denting the metal with his large body. Dan doesn’t retaliate, allowing himself to be pinned by Jack’s forearm shoved up under his chest, cutting into his throat.
“Did you know about this, you prick?” he snarls into Dan’s face.
I’m confused by the question at first since there’s zero doubt in my mind that Dan knew about this whole setup. What remains unclear is whether he was mind-controlled into doing it or not, but right now that probably doesn’t matter.
But Dan seems to understand the real question that Jack is asking, his response brutally caustic. “Happy Father’s Day,Liam Stone.”
Liam Stone. Jesus, fuck. Maybe that was the name Jack was given when he was first born? Before his mother tried to, what, leave? What else can you do when you have an affair with a man like Ian Stone that produces two children, other than take your kids and run like hell?
Jack stares at his twin, jaw clenched so tight the muscles tick, his eyes a frenzied mass of roiling green fire. He yanks Dan away from the van, then slams him back into it with twice the force, further denting the metal. Dan grunts in pain but doesn’t make any move to escape his brother’s vitriol. He just lets it happen, gaze breaking away from Jack’s face to fixate on me instead, his shoulders slumped in a resigned stubbornness that seems to infuriate Jack even more. There’s no overt apology on his face, but I know it’s there, lurking somewhere beneath the surface. Dan isn’t nearly as cold and indifferent as he wants to be.
It seems like a fucking bad idea to get involved, which is exactly why I do it anyway.
