But Blake shook his head, his blue eyes steady and clear. “But I love Andre,” Blake said, his voice firm, leaving no room for doubt, no crack in the door. “I love him completely. And I would never betray him.”
Tyler held his gaze for a long moment. Then, slowly, he nodded. The tension in his shoulders released, and a small, sad, genuine smile touched his lips. “I know,” Tyler said. “He’s a lucky guy, Harlan.”
“I’m the lucky one.”
They finished their beers in a comfortable silence, the air between them finally clear, the ghosts of their childhood laid to rest. When they walked out of the tavern into the bright afternoon sun, Tyler pulled Blake into a brief, hard hug. “Take care of yourself, Blake,” Tyler said, stepping back. “Win Wimbledon next year.”
“I’ll try. Take care of those girls, Ty.”
Blake watched Tyler walk away down the street, his broad shoulders relaxed, his step easy. Then Blake turned and walked back to the hotel, packed his bag, and called a car to take him to the airport.
He was going home.
Andre was waiting in the arrivals hall at Heathrow.
It was six in the morning, the terminal quiet and gray, but Andre was a beacon of warmth in a worn denim jacket, his dark curls messy from sleep. When Blake walked through the sliding doors, Andre didn’t say a word. He just crossed the distance between them and pulled Blake into his arms.
Blake dropped his bag, wrapping his arms around Andre’s waist, burying his face in his neck. He breathed in the smell of him — sleep and coffee and the faint, lingering scent of oil paint — and felt the last, lingering chill of Connecticut finally melt away.
“I have you,” Andre murmured against his hair. “You are home.”
They took a taxi back to South Kensington. The flat was quiet, though downstairs the bakery was already alive — the warm smell of fresh bread rising through the floorboards, Pierre’s muffled voice barking at the morning staff.
Blake dropped his bags in the hallway and followed Andre into the bedroom. The pale morning light was filtering through the bay windows, casting long shadows across the hardwood floor.
Andre turned to him, his dark eyes searching Blake’s face, reading the exhaustion, the emotional rawness, the lingering ache of the past three days. He reached out, his fingers gently tracing the line of Blake’s jaw.
“Come to bed,” Andre said softly.
They undressed each other in silence, the familiar, practiced movements taking on a new, urgent weight. Blake needed this. He needed the physical reality of Andre, the undeniable proof that this life — their life — was real and solid and his.
When they fell onto the mattress, Blake moved over Andre, pressing him down into the sheets. He kissed him fiercely, his mouth open and demanding, his hands gripping Andre’s wrists, pinning them to the bed.
Andre responded instantly, arching up into the kiss, his mouth hot and eager. He tasted of sleep and desire, his body shifting beneath Blake, opening to him, welcoming the weight and the urgency.
“Blake,” Andre gasped as Blake’s mouth moved down his neck, biting gently at the sensitive skin of his collarbone.
“I need you,” Blake whispered, his voice scraped thin, his breath hot against Andre’s skin. “God, Andre, I need you so much.”
“I am here. I am right here.”
Blake’s hands moved down Andre’s body, tracing the hard lines of his chest, the dip of his stomach, the familiar, beautiful architecture of theman he loved. He touched him with a reverence that bordered on desperation, needing to map every inch of him, needing to erase the memory of his father’s cold eyes and the sterile hotel room in Greenwich.
When Blake finally entered him, it was a slow, deep slide that made Andre cry out, his back arching off the mattress, his hands tangling in Blake’s golden hair.
Blake held himself still for a moment, buried deep inside, his forehead resting against Andre’s shoulder, his breathing ragged. He felt the tight, hot grip of Andre’s body around him, the steady, frantic beat of Andre’s heart against his chest.
“Look at me,” Blake whispered.
Andre opened his eyes, dark and heavy with lust, locking onto Blake’s blue gaze.
Blake began to move. Slow at first, then faster, the rhythm building, the friction generating a heat that seemed to burn away everything else. Andre’s hands moved down Blake’s back, his nails digging into the muscle, his hips rising to meet every thrust.
It wasn’t gentle. It was raw and necessary, a physical exorcism of grief and history.
Blake drove into him with a relentless, driving pace, his body slick with sweat, his mind narrowing down to the sound of Andre’s breath, the taste of Andre’s skin, the absolute, undeniable connection between them.
“Yes,” Andre moaned, his head tossing back against the pillow, his eyes slidingshut. “Blake… please…”
