Prologue
Ronan
I ignoredthe sleek German Shepherd running towards me and kept my eyes on the house that sat up the slight hill several hundred yards away. I’d thought the grove of trees would hide my presence, but I’d been wrong because I’d seen the shadow of the man staring in my direction from his bedroom window, minutes before the back door of the house had opened and the dog had darted through it.
I’d been wrong a lot lately.
Wrong in trusting a man who’d sworn his loyalty to my cause, only to throw it away for a lucrative payout that would have taken an innocent man’s life.
Wrong to think my efforts to save a man I’d come to think of as a friend had done anything other than lead him further into the pit of despair he’d so desperately been trying to escape from after suffering an insurmountable loss.
Wrong to think that I could stay away from the young man who was forever tied to my past…a past I wanted nothing more than to forget.
Did it work for you, Ronan?
A simple question from someone who’d reminded me a lot of the man in the house. It had come in response to my insistence that my choice to pursue justice outside the limits of the law had provided me with an alternative outlet for the hatred that consumed me. I hadn’t answered Jonas Davenport when he’d asked me that. It was a question that, even now, I still refused to answer. Because it didn’t matter. It had stopped being about me the first time I ended one life to save another.
I could hear the dog snarling as he neared me but, as soon as he crossed into the trees, the growling ceased and I put out my hand in greeting and he began whining excitedly. He sniffed and licked my hand repeatedly before settling down next to me and leaning against my leg. I let my hand stroke over the dog’s lush coat. I hadn’t seen the animal in several years, but I wasn’t surprised that he remembered me since I’d been the one who’d picked him out of the litter of eight well-bred puppies and watched him grow up alongside the teenage boy I’d gifted him to.
I looked back up at the house and felt my gut clench at the sight of the open door leading from the expansive patio into what I knew was the kitchen. The invitation was clear.
It wasn’t the first time I’d watched the young man from a distance; it wasn’t even the first time I’d stood in these very woods waiting to see a glimpse of him as he passed by a window. Some days I never even saw him.
Being near him was a need I couldn’t explain, but one I’d given up trying to deny. My only consolation was that I’d been strong enough not to act on the desire that had consumed me on that fateful day when I’d stopped seeing him as a boy and started wanting him as a man. One feather light brush of his mouth over mine and he’d become so much more than the little brother of the man I had been planning to spend the rest of my life with.
My only saving grace, the only reason I hadn’t taken what he was offering, was the promise I’d made to protect him. But I’d known as soon as he kissed me that what he needed protection most from was me.
Until now.
I gave the dog a final pat and began walking up the hill. Because it was time to keep my promise…no matter what it cost me.
Chapter 1
Ronan
“How long?”
I heard the words the instant I stepped over the threshold into the dimly lit den, but I didn’t respond. Instead, I let my eyes settle on the young man sitting on the leather couch that was facing a set of glass doors leading to a porch overlooking Puget Sound. His back was to me, so all I saw was the back of his head and his wider-than-I-remembered shoulders.
He’d been easy to find because all I’d had to do was follow the dog through the large house. But it wouldn’t have mattered either way because I knew the place like the back of my hand. Not only had Trace and I spent several of our leaves together here in the year that we’d met, but I’d also made countless trips after his death to check on his younger brother. And even though it had been three years since I’d seen Seth Nichols, I wasn’t ready for this moment. I’d never be ready…
The dog trotted around the couch and I saw Seth’s arms move, presumably to caress the animal. I took my time walking towards the couch in the hopes that I could get control of my churning gut. It was a sensation I fucking hated.
I actually paused just behind the couch so I could get a hold ofmyself and settled my gaze on Seth’s honey blond hair that fell in soft waves just above his ears and nape. I could see the baby fine hairs along the back of his neck and cursed the urge to reach out and feel their softness beneath my fingers. Trace had had the same color hair and one of my favorite things to do as he’d lain on top of me after we’d made love, was to run my fingers through the short strands so I could watch the light play with the different colors that threaded through them.
That brief memory of Trace was quickly tainted by my final memory of him…one where his beautiful hair was soaked in blood while the green of his eyes started to fade, his pupils growing larger, their inky blackness glazing over as his last breath left his body.
The thought of Trace and how he’d been taken from me was enough to obliterate all of my anxiety and replace it with the familiar, bitter cold that settled in every part of my body. I welcomed it like an old friend and then walked around the couch. I’d already read the police report so I knew to expect the bruises, but words on paper weren’t the same as seeing them firsthand.
“How long?” Seth repeated, his eyes still on the horizon even as I stepped up to him and put my fingers under his chin. He stiffened slightly, but didn’t resist when I tilted his face up to examine the black and blue mark on his left cheek, another on his lower jaw and the small gash next to his left eye. His forest green eyes connected with mine for a moment before shifting away as he pulled free of my hold.
In so many ways he looked exactly the same as I remembered him, the damage to his face notwithstanding. But as painfully young as he still appeared to me, there was something missing that I couldn’t quite put my finger on. He’d filled out in the three years since I’d last seen him but he’d never be a large guy. I knew him to be a couple inches shorter than Trace, which meant he was at least three or four inches shorter than me. Fortunately, the few features he shared with Trace, like the eyes and the hair, weren’t strong enough to make it feel like I was looking at a younger version of my dead lover. But that fact only heightened my desire to put my fingers back on his warm skin.
“How long what?” I asked as I stepped away and sat down on the coffee table in front of him. I was both glad and annoyed that he refused to look directly at me. But the thought was short-lived because his eyes shifted to me before he answered.
“How long have you been watching me?”
I debated playing dumb but decided against it. It was beneath me…and him. “Off and on,” I answered. “How did you know?”
