But even picturing Folk trying to get me to eat kale pasta couldn’t combat the instant flare in my belly. The shot of heat that had nothing to do with the steam from the bathroom or the blazing sun outside.
I tugged the towel off my head, licking my dry lips.
Viktor stood over me, holding out his hand.
I let him haul me to my feet, taking comfort from the fact that his skinny fucking arms had the strength. Loving the fact that whatever else had happened to both of us since we’d last seen each other, I was still two inches taller than him.Hatingthe fact that I couldn’t think of a single fucking word to say.
Viktor let go of my hand. “I do not understand how you arehere.”
“I can tell you all about it.” I let myself lean closer, breathing him in, before I reined that bullshit in. “I just need you to stop a second and listen.”
“No.”
“No?”
Viktor slowly shook his head, rubbing his temple again. “I would not hear you if you spoke now. I am going to sleep while I can. If you are still here when I wake up, then maybe we will have something to talk about.”
His other hand was still wrapped around mine, but as he backed up, his fingers slipped away.
Letting it happen was another battle, but I won, cos I had to. My job—my life’s fucking work for as long as I was here—was to keep him safe from whatever enemy sought to hurt him. And right now, that enemy was him.
I parked my arse back on the floor and let him drift to his bed, lie down, and pass out in the time it took me to wonder if I should tuck him in.
His breathing was slow, sedated, his body still feeling the effects of the junk long after the high had worn off.
Jakov’s voice haunted me again.
“He does not sleep much, until he does, and then it is my greatest fear that he will not wake up.”
I knew that fear—I’d lived with it before. But I wasn’t naïve enough not to know that this was a hundred times worse than dealing with Folk. Cos I hadn’t dealt with Folk’s addiction.Hehad. He’d come home for help and told us what to do. Cos as far gone as he’d been, he’d known.
More than that, he’dcared.
I wasn’t getting that vibe from Vik, not even close. The apathy was too strong. Deep and bitter enough that Jakov was right to be afraid.
But he’d been right to call on me too. I was a lazy fucker. A drifter. But my commitment to the few things I gave a fuck about was an unscalable wall.
This wasn’t going to kill Vik.
He wasn’t going to die.
Not on my fucking watch.
[ 9 ]
VIKTOR
Waking up from getting high was the worst feeling in the world. An abomination of the worst hangover and the flu, and the most heinous thing about it was that it got worse and worse until I made the biggest mistake of my life all over again.
You are weak.
My first thought as I woke up, fully clothed,inmy unmade bed instead of on it. But for the first time in forever, it did not endure, shoehorned out of my brain by the immediate reality that I was not alone.
Ranger.
Asher.
Surely, he had been a dream. A trip far more wild than the dope I’d smoked deserved. But that I still felt him in every fibre of my aching body drove me upright faster than I had the equilibrium for. Nausea hit me, the kind that usually ripped me from the bed, but even that didn’t hold up against the rabid need to know for sure if Ranger’s inexplicable presence in my house had been real.
