Page 206 of Eight of Swords, Part Two

‘No, baby, it’s beautiful. You’re perfect.’

‘Did he… like that?’

‘Sometimes.’

‘Is this how you kissed him?’

‘No.’

Jealousy strikes hard and absurd. ‘No?’

‘I never kissed you like this.’

‘Why not?’

Lachlan’s forehead lowers to his.

Their breath mingles, hot and ragged.

‘Because I hadn’t lost you yet.’

The words go through Kade with exquisite cruelty.

He pulls Lachlan against him fully, finding that their bodies fit together like broken halves of the same stone. ‘You’ll never lose me. Never.’

‘I did.’

‘That was just time and distance. I was here, waiting for you.’ Want and grief, relief and terror, every feeling is heightened until Kade can no longer tell which one is making him dizzy. All of them, everything.

Lachlan fucking Tanner.

‘Baby—’

‘Waiting for my bodyguard.’

Lachlan’s thumb finds his pulse. ‘I love you so much.’

Kade kisses the words from his mouth. ‘I’ll always be here. Promise you’ll be here too, Lachlan.’

Lachlan rubs against Kade in a smooth, torturous rhythm, restricted by cotton but not enough to diminish the pleasure.

‘I’m gonna make you come.’

‘You have to promise too.’ Kade pulls his shirt off, kissing his bare chest when given skin to worship, cannot bring himself to look at the numbers. He would cut it out if he could. Bite it out. ‘Please?’

‘I’ll always be with you, baby. As long as you want me.’

Kade wants to slap him. ‘That’s… fuck, such bullshit.’

‘Let me love you.’

‘If you loved me, you’d stay! Stay and do this with me every day and every night, and teach me everything I forgot, put that love inside me where it belongs. That’s how you love me, Bodyguard. How you love him.’

‘I’ve got you, baby.’

‘No, no you don’t. You…’ Kade is crying, kissing, clinging. ‘Fuck, don’t stop, please don’t stop!’

‘I won’t,’ he whispers, like he gets it, understands completely that Kade wants to cry, wants more than just an orgasm.