“That was... perfect,” he said, caressing Noah’s cheek as their eyes locked in the darkness of the room.
“You’re perfect.”
“Say it’ll forever be us against the world.”
Noah had never seen Kaj so naked, so vulnerable. He wanted to wrap him in the softest blanket and embrace him until the day they died. Crawling up the bed, he straddled his hips and pressed a kiss to his lips to seal the promise. “Always and forever.”
Ten
Between blow jobs, late-nightskinny-dipping, and other summer activities, a month and a half passed by as if someone had pressed fast-forward.
Then, tragedy lashed their lives.
An explosion.
An industrial fire.
Dozens of injured workers.
Three casualties.
And among them, Nikolaj Larsen—brave firefighter, devoted husband, loving father.
Father.
To say Kaj was devastated was an egregious understatement.
After helping several operators who were harmed inside the oil refinery grounds, part of an installation came crashing down, trapping the firefighters in a pure, roaring hell.
Noah didn’t want to think about it. He couldn’t even try to put himself in their shoes and relive the agony they had to haveendured. How terrifying the thought of not seeing their loved ones ever again must have been, or at least having the chance to bid them farewell.
According to the newspaper and what the chief at the fire station had told the families, one of them died instantly from blunt force trauma. However, Nik and his partner, although they didn’t say so explicitly, had suffered a lot more because of smoke inhalation and third-degree burns affecting over 50 percent of their bodies. They’d been in the hospital for two weeks, fighting to survive in their induced coma state. But neither of them had made it out alive.
And now here they were, getting ready for the funeral.
Noah didn’t know what hurt more, losing a father he never had or seeing Kaj curled up in a ball in his beanbag chair. He was physically there, but mentally? That was another story.
Pain fluttered behind his ribs and thumped in his head. He was numb after days of hearing Mom’s muffled cries through the wall, of seeing the heartbreak Katja and Jesper wore on their faces and how inconsolable Kaj had been. But now, all he felt was a terrible sense of dread, like a dark cloud was approaching. Since the day Nikolaj was disconnected from all the cables that kept him alive, it was like Kaj wasn’t there anymore. He was... vacant.
“Hey…” Noah said.
Hollow eyes looked in his direction. “What are you doing here?” Kaj’s voice was hoarse.
“Katja needed help with something and called my mom.”
“Of course.” Kaj rolled his eyes and huffed.
Noah had just stepped into the room and froze, confused. “What?”
“Mydad just died, and she’s making it all about herself,” he scoffed. “That’s kinda selfish, to put it mildly. Don’t you think?”
“She probably doesn’t know how to do this alone. I don’t know... It’s hard for everyone.”
“Are you taking her side now?”
“I’m not.” Noah raised his palms. “I’m just saying, Mom told me everyone deals with this stuff differently. It’s a process.” He was just babbling at this point, unsure how to make Kaj feel any better.
“Whatever.”
