Heal (His Command Book 4)

by Piper Scott

  Never.

  What he did, he did with love.

  I want to see you grow, Gabriel. When I give you pain, I don’t do it out of anger, but out of love. I want you to understand the difference. There is so much more potential in you, but if you aren’t corrected and set on the right path, you’ll never know it.

  “Gabriel?” Sir asked again, the question firmer. “Blue or gray?”

  “Blue.” Blue, because Sir had mentioned before how the color brought out his eyes, and Gabriel wanted nothing more than to look good for him. “Thank you, Sir.”

  “You’re welcome.” They exited the bathroom, but they did not head to the living room like Gabriel anticipated. Instead, Cedric brought Gabriel to a door down the hallway that Gabriel had always assumed led to a closet. “Today, I want to offer you the chance to do something out of the ordinary. Are you interested?”

  “Yes.” Gabriel studied the door. There was nothing special about it. The color was plain, and the doorknob was simple and unremarkable. The bottom of the door was chipped, revealing the light-colored wood pulp inside.

  Sir turned the handle and opened the door. Inside was a small, dark, windowless room. It was little bigger than a closet. Dark, blobby shapes in the distance suggested that it was used for storage. Sir pulled a metal ball chain dangling overhead, and a satisfying click-click woke the light the chain was attached to. Gabriel blinked twice to allow his eyes to adjust to the change in lighting, but even when his eyes focused, he wasn’t sure what he was looking at.

  At the very back of the room, positioned on a shelf high enough from the ground that it could be used as a table, was what appeared to be a microwave without a window panel. It was reinforced with matte white plastic siding and had buttons neatly assembled on the right-hand side. Six of those buttons were circular, two were triangular—one pointing up and one pointing down—and two were rectangular and color coded in green and red. Start and stop. Gabriel squinted at it, but no matter how hard he looked, he couldn’t figure it out. If it really was a microwave, shouldn’t there have been nine round buttons?

  “Sir?”

  “It’s okay, Gabriel.” Sir stepped into the room. There were shelves to the left and the right as well, some stacked with linens, others holding boxes marked with post-it notes in Sir’s sensible handwriting. Gabriel supposed it was a storage room, although the ample space at the back and the strange microwave led him to believe the room had other purposes. “I’ve been holding on to all of this for a little too long, and I decided that maybe it was time to see if I could put it to use again.”

  “I’m sorry, Sir.” Gabriel followed Sir into the room. “I’m not sure what this is.”

  “This?” Sir gestured to the not-a-microwave. “This is an autoclave.”

  Gabriel made no comment and did his best to decipher what an autoclave was by examining it in closer detail. The round buttons weren’t numbered—they bore symbols and words.

  Optional cycle. Liquids. Wrapped…

  He had no clue what he was looking at.

  Sir twisted open a lock on the front of the door, then lifted the handle in a deliberate way. The machine gave, and the door opened. Inside, to Gabriel’s surprise, was a round metal compartment with perforated metal shelves. The chamber was round, and reminded him of a tiny washing machine. On the inside, sitting on one of the perforated shelves, were flat plastic coverings that Gabriel only knew from the doctor’s office—the kind that kept a doctor’s tools sterile.

  “Sir?” Gabriel asked again, more uncertain than ever. “What is all of that?”

  Sir turned to look at him, kindness in his eyes. Gabriel took it into himself and breathed out slowly. What might have been panic dulled to nothingness.

  “Once upon a time,” Sir said, “I asked you what you thought of body modification.”

  The conversation in their first car ride together. The memories of Sir, nude, his tattoos vibrant and the shiny barbells through his nipples glinting beneath his bedroom light…

  “When I asked you the first time, you didn’t seem overly interested, but I thought that after our time together, that may have changed.”

  The snakebite piercings beneath Sir’s lip, and the impressive geometric patterns that decorated his arm…

  Sir pulled a stool out from beneath the shelf the autoclave rested on and sat. Gabriel didn’t approach. He assessed the situation and tried to figure out what was going on.

  “When I was younger, the woman I shared my life with was the one who tattooed me. I’ve told you that before.” Sitting on the stool like he was, there was something about Sir that made it hard to look away. The casual nature of his posture was breathtaking, and paired with the way he clasped his hands between his legs, the stunning color of his tattoo sleeve vibrant against his pale skin, he looked so good Gabriel wasn’t sure he wasn’t dreaming. “But she did more than that. While I was with her, she taught me about what body modification is all about—the ins and the outs of the industry, how to pierce skin, and how to lay ink.”

  Gabriel’s gaze swept back to the autoclave and all the carefully laid wrapping inside of it.

  “I thought that I’d make a career out of it—work in her shop and serve beneath her.” Sir glanced down for only a second, but Gabriel’s heart skipped a beat regardless. He saw the hurt inside Sir, and it made him want to push himself into Sir’s arms and do anything he could to make him forget his pain. “I was good at it. For a month or two, I apprenticed beneath her. I performed piercings while she watched from the side, and I observed as she made art from ink and skin. But when she died, that part of me died, too. I inherited her tools, but I couldn’t ever bring myself to use them.”

  “Sir?” Gabriel asked, breathless. A tingling sensation ran down his spine, not unpleasant, but certainly not typical. Anticipation built. If Sir was telling him all this, then…

  “Healing is a complicated process.” Sir threaded his fingers together, his thumbs resting against one another, pointed at the floor. “I don’t think it’s the same for any one person, and I know that for me, it was a long and difficult journey… but I think, six months ago, that journey came to an end.”

  Gabriel’s pulse thudded in his throat, and his body wanted to respond, but his feet were glued to the floor. In times like these, when the tension built in his chest and static-like anticipation raced down his spine, he was used to running. The feeling needed to get out somehow, and Gabriel knew no other way to express himself. Strong, confrontational emotions weren’t encouraged. Garrison had taught him to be pleasant at all times, no matter how he felt inside.

  But this? Here? Now?

  Gabriel refused to run. Anticipation wasn’t always a bad thing, and it didn’t always lead to hurt. It wasn’t fear that made his pulse race, but excitement. He would be a fool to run from that.

  There was a moment where nothing was said. Sir met Gabriel’s gaze, and Gabriel held it. He did not dip his chin. He did not look away.

  “I’m ready to embrace who I was,” Sir admitted. “After she died, I shut off that part of me, like I was wrapping a tourniquet above a wound in the hopes it wouldn’t bleed out. But it’s been a long time now, and I’m not bleeding anymore. I’m ready to take the tourniquet off.”

  The profound tone Sir used struck Gabriel in the chest, and it stirred his anticipation further. Staying still was difficult, and keeping himself collected even harder. The stimulation was too much.

  “Today, I want to offer you a gift.” Sir glanced at the autoclave, then looked back to Gabriel. “You told me you’re not interested in body modification, but those words are cold and clinical, and they’re not what I want to offer you. What I want to share today is a piece of who I am and who I was—a reminder of the power you hold over me, and the way you’ve pieced me back together when I was broken and ignorant of it.”

  The feeling in his chest twisted, and Gabriel tried his best to hold back tears. A facet of Sir he’d never known—a delicate piece of his past that
Sir had hidden away for so long—opened up to him now. Gabriel had always been the broken one—the one who was never enough, who needed to get better. To realize that Sir thought the same negative things of himself dismantled his world in ways he hadn’t anticipated. Affection and pity rose to fill the empty spaces inside.

  “The choice is yours, Gabriel,” Sir told him. “I want to pierce you—to share a piece of myself with you that you will always remember. I want you to remember every time you look in the mirror and see the glint of metal against your skin that not only are you loved, valued, and cherished, but that no matter how worthless you feel, you are important. You took a broken man and made him whole again by being nothing more than yourself. I never want you to forget it.”

  The tears Gabriel had tried so hard to hold off came all at once. He blinked rapidly to try to stop them, but it was no use. They streamed down his cheeks, and he brushed them away clumsily with the back of his hand.

  “All I did was love you, Sir,” Gabriel whispered, already hoarse.

  “Loving me was enough.”

  All his life, Gabriel had run. From obligations. From problems. From family. From home. Crippling emotional vulnerability made him want to find a quiet place he could process his thoughts uninterrupted—somewhere he wouldn’t be hurt.

  But he’d told himself months ago that he was done with running away—so Gabriel ran forward instead.

  Tears in his eyes, overwhelmed by the intensity of his thoughts, he closed the distance between himself and Sir and buried his face against Sir’s chest. Sir’s arms wrapped around him, and he stroked Gabriel’s hair in slow, reassuring, and predictable ways.

  “It’s your choice,” Sir reminded him in a whisper. “It’s my gift to give, but it’s up to you whether you take it or refuse it. I won’t be mad, no matter what you decide. All I want is for you to do what brings you the most joy.”

  The thought that he could feel any happier than when he was with Sir was outrageous. Gabriel pulled back and smiled, meeting Sir’s gaze without fear.

  “I want you to pierce me, Sir,” Gabriel whispered. “I want to remember that you belong to me, just as much as I belong to you.”

  43

  Cedric

  The backing of the sterilization pouch tore away from the transparent window, and Cedric’s gloved hand freed the hollow needle from inside. Gabriel sat beside him on a stool in front of the autoclave, his shoulders relaxed and his cheeks still glossy from tears.

  “Where on your ear would you like to be pierced, Gabriel?” Cedric carefully tore the packaging on the simple jewelry he’d prepared, careful not to contaminate the hollow needle.

  “Anywhere, Sir,” Gabriel whispered back. “I’d like for you to decide.”

  Cedric took a moment to consider Gabriel’s face. The piercing needed to be subtle—a lobe piercing was too loud, and it wouldn’t complement Gabriel’s docile personality. What he chose needed to be understated and overlooked, but radiantly beautiful when it was noticed. The shape of Gabriel’s ear made the choice clear.

  “It’s going to look elegant when it’s healed,” Cedric told him in a low, reassuring voice. He freed one of the sterilizing wipes from its packaging and ran it over Gabriel’s skin to disinfect the area. Gabriel shivered. “When it’s healed, I want it threaded with white gold and capped with a seed pearl.”

  Gabriel’s eyes closed and his lips parted, but he didn’t make a sound.

  “The piercing won’t be overly noticeable,” Cedric explained. He discarded the wipe and assessed the part of Gabriel’s ear he was about to pierce. All the while, he spoke to keep Gabriel’s mind occupied. “It’ll be subtle and gorgeous in an unexpected way.”

  He’d brought out Brittany’s fine-tip surgical marker, but it wasn’t going to be necessary. The piercing was Cedric’s choice, and he trusted his hand. His heart knew where it needed to go.

  “I need you to breathe with me,” Cedric instructed, his tone even. “We’re going to breathe in on a count of three, and then we’re going to breathe out slowly until all the air is out of our lungs. Can you do that for me?”

  “Yes,” Gabriel promised. He’d yet to open his eyes, but his body language read as relaxed. Not only were his shoulders slumped, but his hands were open and loosely capped his knees. He bore no doubt, and trust like that spoke more to Cedric than words.

  “Then let’s breathe in together deeply. One. Two. Three.” Cedric readied the needle. Memories returned. The sunny studio that had once been his every day, and the way Brittany had led his hand, reassuring and sure of herself. What he’d learned from her, he now offered to Gabriel. “And exhale slowly all the way until you empty your lungs…”

  As Gabriel let go of his breath, Cedric pushed the needle through. The movement was seamless, and the positioning was exact. As Gabriel continued to exhale, no more bothered by the pain than the sound of Cedric’s voice, Cedric freed the jewelry from its packaging and threaded it through the hollow needle. In one smooth movement he pulled the needle all the way through, leaving the jewelry in Gabriel’s ear. He held it in place with a gloved finger and capped it, then sat back on his stool to examine his work.

  The tasteful rook piercing, tucked near the fold of Gabriel’s ridge, was beautifully set. When it healed and Cedric swapped out the post for one a little shorter and the head for the pearl he imagined, it would blend in against Gabriel’s fair skin and only sometimes catch the light. It was feminine and uncomplicated, made more unique by the absence of any other piercing.

  On Gabriel, it was magical—a single mark, rich with meaning.

  It was Cedric’s gift to him, and in it, Gabriel’s commitment to their future.

  “You’ll be away from me in the evening, so I’ll have to teach you about aftercare.” Cedric stripped the gloves from his hands and disposed of them. The piercing didn’t bleed, and for a moment, Cedric allowed himself to entertain the notion that it was because it was fated for Gabriel’s ear. He abandoned the stool to stand in front of Gabriel and slid his hands along the outsides of his thighs. Then, he leaned forward so that his lips were near Gabriel’s unpierced ear. “Will you learn it all for me?”

  Excitement swirled in Cedric’s chest, starting between his lungs and racing downward like a tornado descending from the heavens. The chemistry between them ignited in the gale and rushed down Cedric’s arms, raising all the small hairs there along the way.

  Aftercare.

  What would he give to see Gabriel with that faraway look, his body so strung out and yet so relaxed as he released himself to subspace? His bare chest would rise and fall as he struggled to catch his breath, and Cedric would wrap him up tight in his arms and hold him close so he could whisper beautiful things in his ear.

  “Please, Sir.” The arousal in Gabriel’s voice barely broke through the storm going on inside of Cedric. “Please, teach me. I’ll learn. I promise.”

  For six months, he’d guided Gabriel through the hell Garrison had left him stranded in. For six months, they’d touched each other in small, increasingly bold ways that only ever titillated, and never amounted to anything more. Heated make-out sessions on the couch and clothed groping was as far as Gabriel would allow him to go before he made it clear that he wasn’t comfortable with more, and Cedric respected that. Simple pleasure would nurture Gabriel in the ways he needed. If he had to cast his own desires aside for Gabriel’s sake, he would do so.

  Sex would come. Consent had been established. All Cedric was waiting for was a sign that Gabriel’s needs had evolved beyond the innocent.

  And as Gabriel wrapped his arms around Cedric’s neck loosely and let his eyes beg Cedric for more, he got the feeling he didn’t need to wait much longer.

  Cedric’s hands trailed along Gabriel’s thighs to his ass, and he locked his arms around Gabriel’s frame. Gabriel’s arms tightened in anticipation, and when they did, Cedric lifted him from the stool and carried him from the storage room. His bedroom was right across the hall.

&n
bsp; “Never,” Cedric uttered as he nudged the door open with his foot and carried Gabriel through the threshold, “try to clean your piercing with rubbing alcohol. Never.”

  “Never,” Gabriel agreed, the breathy inflection of his reply making it anything but casual.

  Cedric lowered Gabriel to the bed and took hold of his shoulder, pushing Gabriel back as he lifted a knee and climbed up onto the bed over him. “Never touch your piercing during the day. No one is allowed to touch it. Only me. And only I will give you permission each day before you leave me to clean it. You will not lay a finger on what I’ve given you until I tell you that you can.”

  Gabriel’s back met the blankets, and Cedric moved him farther up onto the bed and kissed him, choking out Gabriel’s reply. Whatever words Gabriel had prepared for him manifested as a hum that Cedric swallowed. Their lips locked, and the tornado inside Cedric went wild.

  “Never,” Cedric said, barely separating his lips from Gabriel’s in order to speak. He kissed Gabriel again, long and hard, too attracted to him to hold back. When the kiss broke, he was breathless, and his cock ached for more. “Attempt to change the jewelry I put in. Only I will change it, and only when I see fit to do it.”

  There was no audible response from Gabriel this time around, but his tongue knew how to say yes. They kissed deeply, and as they did, Gabriel traced his tongue along Cedric’s. Cedric accepted it gladly.

  “Never,” Cedric uttered when the kiss broke. His lungs were starved for air, but the burning only fed into the storm and added to its magnificence. “Pick at any scabs that form, or scratch at your injury. Leave your ear alone.”

  “What if Adrian tries to make me take it out?” Gabriel’s eyes were glossed over with lust, different from any other time they’d made out like this.

  Cedric smoothed a hand through his hair and looked down into the ocean-blue eyes that had stolen his heart from the very start. “You tell him that it isn’t his choice to make, and if he tries to argue, then you tell him to come to me.”