Page 314 of Eight of Swords, Part Two

‘YOU CAN’T STOP ME!’

Jules turns his face away, hands in his hair.

The urge to comfort him, hug him, kiss him, whisper that it’ll all be OK while he presses on his wrist… it’s overwhelming.

Lachlan refrains.

Barely.

‘I know he told you to break up with me,’ Jules says. ‘I know because this is exactly what you’d do. You’d make me hate you and not him. You probably even think this kind of pain heals better. But I’m not stupid. I know you and I know my father, better than ever now,’ he adds bitterly.

‘It doesn’t matter. Whatever you need me to apologise for, I will.’

‘I don’t want your fucking apologies.’

‘What do you want?’

‘You.’

The words nearly stop his heart.

‘Jules.’

‘I want you. I want my bodyguard, my boyfriend, my love, my world. I want him back. I need him. I can’t live without—’

‘That’s enough!’

‘You don’t get to decide that anymore!’

‘I decide everything! This is my world to make safe, my domain. Three people have tried to manage this household and they all failed. I make the rules, I decide.’

He expects a harsh response, wants one even.

It would be so much simpler to have Jules hate him, but the boy has a terrible habit of surprising him.

Jules reaches over and takes Lachlan’s hand.

Lachlan instinctively tries to withdraw it.

‘Don’t.’

‘Let me see.’

‘It’s nothing,’ he says honestly, because that’s true. Jules has seen Lachlan get shot and stabbed, has felt the blood.

‘So let me see it, then.’

He lets him.

Gives his hand to the boy he loves, who studies the split skin with unreadable fascination. ‘You’ve been losing time,’ he says.

Every muscle in Lachlan’s body tightens.

‘No, I haven’t.’

‘I know you have.’

Lachlan takes his hand back. ‘What are you talking about?’