Page 437 of Eight of Swords, Part Two

Every moment of the last seven years, all that is Kade swims alongside twenty years of Jules, and newness forms where all magic resides, because energy never dies, but it can be transformed.

For Jules forgot.

He lost himself… to necessity and practical matters and survival.

He lost himself to harshness and brutality and blood.

To lose himself.

But he’s found now.

He’s here. Whole. New. Begin again.

He opens his eyes.

It’s Lachlan he sees.

Lachlan.

He remembers how to speak. ‘Bodyguard.’

The world is wet and the man before him is pale and strange, but he’s his, his Lachlan, his bodyguard, his psychopath, his lover, his.

Lachlan’s eyes are wide like the moon. ‘Kade…’

It is, and it isn’t. Just a name.

It could be any name, but it would always be him.

Julian moves to reach up, wants to touch him.

He’s missed him so much it’s hollowed him out, cored his heart completely. His chest hurts but that doesn’t matter.

Everything hurts, but he’s finally home.

Lachlan stares. ‘It’s you, isn’t it?’

Jules smiles.

‘It w-was always me, baby. I just… forgot.’

His eyes sting and his heart is failing and his body is broken.

What life he has left is going to his brother.

Small comfort, he’ll take it.

He’s just so happy to remember.

To remember first seeing Lachlan Tanner and feeling so much he could hardly stand it, worrying he’d die like the other bodyguards did, worrying he’d be cruel the way some of them were and how much of it Julian would need to take responsibility for to protect Mimi.

To remember his slow-growing confusion as Mimi came out of her shell and expressed curiosity about him, eventually liking him, holding his hand.

Loving him.

And knowing the bodyguard loved her too.

To remember how painful it was to feel new things for such a man who held the keys to all his doors.