My fingers curled around Zephyr’s shoulder. I didn’t have a reply. Not one I could say with him here, unconscious and vulnerable andmine. Nothing I could admit with Colette watching like a wolf behind her lashes.
I’d told Zephyr we were through and immediately regretted it, but now, staring at the man I’d spent decades pining after, I realized what I’d lacked. Closure. The ability to walk away on my own terms rather than being left standing, staring at a void and wishing someone would fill it. Knowing that, I was almost grateful Stefano had chased me down. He’d given me the chance to say aloud what had lurked in my mind for so long.
“It does matter,” I said, soft at first, then building as I straightened my spine and held Stefano’s gaze. “Hematters.” I indicated Zephyr. “And heisimportant to me.”
Something shifted behind Stefano’s eyes. Not surprise—he was too composed for that. This was closer to sorrow.
“I’m glad,” he said quietly.
It was too graceful, too final. I would have preferred anger. A fight. Something to scratch against. But his acceptance left me fumbling.
“And he’s not…” My throat bobbed. “He’s not whatever Maslow told you he was.”
“Maslow didn’t tell me anything,” Stefano said. “And it wouldn’t have mattered if he had.” He took a small step forward, wings drawing in and expression softening. “I’ve only ever wanted happiness for you, Lucas. If I can’t give it to you, then I’m glad you’ve found it in someone else.”
There it was.
The ending I never got.
I gave a jerky nod, not trusting my voice.
Zephyr stirred faintly, curling a little closer to my chest.
Turning to Colette, Stefano nodded to her like he had across the card table.
“Take care of him, won’t you?” he asked.
Colette bobbed her head, then threaded her arm through the crook of my elbow. “Come,mon ami.” Her nudge spurred me into motion. “Let’s go home.”
Bringing Zephyr back to my suite was bittersweet. He cried while I cut the tie off his wrists, then let me hold him on the ride to the Grecian, rubbing the feeling back into his blood-deprived hands and kissing his curled fingers.
I wasn’t sure what had transpired before my arrival at the poker game, but evidence of cruelty was stamped on Zephyr’s skin. Bruises from rough hands ringed his arms and collared his throat, and his lower lip had a split like it had been bitten, and not by him.
I didn’t wake him to ask about it, fairly certain it was something neither of us would benefit by discussing. Instead, I let him sleep through the drive and the elevator trip to the thirtieth floor, where I returned Colette’s jacket then carried Zephyr into my suite.
I intended to draw a bath and ease him into it. Sit with him there and let the warm water cleanse and soothe us both. But I couldn’t do much with my hands full, so I stopped by my bed to lay him down.
When I set him on the mattress, he cried out like something in him broke. Arms flailed weakly and then caught hold of me—gripping so hard I didn’t think, just wrapped him back up in my embrace. He buried his face against myneck, breath hitching, skin clammy with sweat and his body trembling like some kind of addict.
The apologies started immediately. Slurred nonsense, cut with gasps and hiccupping sobs that spilled out as he writhed against me. His fingers roamed clumsily, sliding down my chest and lower, brushing my belt with shaky insistence. His mouth chased mine, lips grazing my jaw, then my cheek, panting hot and open like he didn’t know how to stop himself.
“Please,” he whimpered, frantic. “Please, one more time, Beck. I need… I can’t—don’t send me back like this. Don’t send me away.”
“I’m not sending you anywhere,” I said, reminding him of what we’d discussed at the Basilica. I went there for him, and we were far from through.
Cupping his face, I tried to steady him, but he wouldn’t still. My jacket hit the floor in a whisper of fabric, shoved off my shoulders by hands that barely worked.
“Zephyr, stop. Baby, come on.” I tried to pull free, but he held on tighter.
“I-I’ll make it good for you,” he sputtered, violet eyes wide. “I’ll be such a good… good boy. I feel nice, don’t I? Wet, and hot, and…” He shifted under me with a shaky grind of his hips. “And don’t you like fucking me?”
His words cracked something open in my chest. Shame. Longing. Fury. None of it at him.
“Zephyr,please…”
Iwas begging now. Not for sex. For mercy—from him, from myself, from whatever power had created a creature like this and allowed him to suffer.
Zephyr stopped wriggling, then tilted his head, expression settling from its previous frenzy. “Do you think my dick is pretty?” he asked.
