And all I could think was… I hadn’t known Locke was capable of this. Of simple comfort.
I knew him as a proud, controlled man who sometimes pissed me off with his cool, confident demands. As a man whose perma-frown made it damn near impossiblenotto tease and provoke him. But his deep voice muttering nonsense words—rumbling from his chest directly into mine—was more soothing than anything I could remember.
It reminded me of the way my fathers treated each other, never hesitating to show that the other was beloved and cared for.
I began to calm, wondering if I should pull away again and let him sleep without a clinging spider monkey plastered to his front. Instead, I squeezed my eyes closed and let myself daydream that I was in the arms of someone who loved me. That I was something protected and cherished.
Once upon a time, this was something I’d wanted for myself. Then I’d gotten my heart broken in college—twice—and realized I was happiest when I didn’t take things too seriously. Casual sex with no strings was fun and easy. I fucking loved it. Besides, commitment and true love weren’t exactly compatible with being an ESP agent.
If I everdidwant commitment, it wouldn’t come from a straight guy like Locke Maris, who lived in a completely different world than I did, or any other straight guy who didn’t appreciate how good it was to be with another man.
This was simply a moment of weakness.
“Go the fuck to sleep,” he grumbled, tugging my hair a little where his fingers had been running through it.
“Fine, but I’m not moving,” I warned him sleepily. “I’m staying right here in your face.”
He shifted a little, making his lips accidentally brush my forehead. “I will give you a thousand dollars if you shut up and do as I say.”
I snuggled in closer to his warm, reassuring strength. “I will give you a thousand dollars if you suck my cock right now.”
He let out a huff of laughter, his breath moving the hair over my forehead. “Baby, if you had a thousand dollars, maybe we could talk.”
I fell asleep with a grin on my face and words of my own wealth on the tip of my tongue. I didn’t speak them, of course, or believe his offer. But I imagined his hot mouth around my cock anyway. It was enough to set me up for the best dreams possible.
Unfortunately, that wasn’t how dreams worked.
The nightmare began as all my nightmares for the past several weeks had. Murky water against the docks in Hamburg. Overcast skies and too-brisk wind off the water. The now-familiar clank of equipment and shout of the hafenarbeiter as they loaded and off-loaded cargo. The forbidding sense of danger and deceit. The knowledge that something wasn’t right.
What happened in the dream varied, but the sense of foreboding and danger never did. Sometimes my family would be there. Gabe or Becca or one of my dads. Sometimes it would be my grandmother. My boss. One time, it was the young woman who’d sold me a sandwich a few days earlier.
In the dream, they’d been taken. Or murdered. Or shoved into the impossibly deep port waters, never to be seen again.
I startled awake, as I always did—gasping. An aborted scream of agony on my lips. Sweat covering my body.
But this time when it happened, strong male arms banded around me, exacerbating the terror.
I struggled, sucking in as much air as possible so I could cry for help.
“Jesus fuck. Jett.Jett! It’s me, Locke. Stop fighting me. For fuck’s sake.” The sleep-hoarse voice was familiar, and a wave of relief washed over me.
“S-sorry,” I said, choking on an inhaled breath while simultaneously trying to huff out a laugh to assure him I was fine. The result was a coughing fit.
Locke loosened his hold, allowing the chill of the room to hit my warm skin where our chests had been pressed together.
I blew out a breath and started to move toward the far side of the bed, but then I realized Locke had only moved away to grab a bottle of water for me. “Drink this.”
The water was cool and clean. I gulped down several sips before handing it back to him to put back on the table. “Thanks.”
“You want to talk about it?”
“Definitely not.”
“Suit yourself. Go back to sleep, then.”
I stared at the dark shape of him, only faintly visible in the city lights coming around the edge of one curtain. “You’re bossy as fuck. Do you think you run the entire world? Because you sure act like it sometimes.”
He rolled flat on the bed beside me and laughed hollowly. “Feel like it sometimes, too.”
