by J. R. Ward
God, he missed Blay.
Shaking his head, he randomly reached forward. When his arm came back at him, he’d snagged some sour cream and onion.
Looking at the Lay’s logo, and the close-up of a single chip, all he could think of was the way he and John and Blay used to hang out at Blay’s parents’ house, playing Xbox, drinking beers, dreaming of bigger and better posttrans lives.
Unfortunately, bigger and better had turned out to be only the size and strength of their bodies. Although maybe that was just his POV. John was, after all, happily mated. And Blay was with…
Shit, he couldn’t even say his cousin’s name in his head.
“You good, J-man?” he asked roughly.
John Matthew snagged a Doritos old-school original and nodded. Let’s get drinks.
As they headed deeper into the store, Qhuinn wished they were downtown, fighting in the alleys, going up against either of their two enemies. Too much downtime on these suburban details, and that meant too much dwelling on—
He cut himself off again.
Whatever. Besides, he hated having any contact with the glymera—and that shit was mutual. Unfortunately, members of the aristocracy were gradually moving back to Caldwell, and that meant Wrath had gotten inundated with calls about so-called slayer sightings.
Like the Omega’s undead didn’t have better things to do than stalk around barren fruit trees and frozen swimming pools.
Still, the king wasn’t in a position to tell the dandies to go F themselves. Not since Xcor and his Band of Bastards had put a bullet in that royal throat.
Traitors. Fuckers. With any luck, Vishous was going to prove without a shadow of a doubt where that rifle shot had come from, and then the bunch of them could gut those soldiers, put their heads on stakes, and light the corpses on fire.
As well as find out exactly who on the Council was colluding with the new enemy.
Yup, user-friendly was the name of the game now—so one night a week, each of the teams ended up here in the neighborhood he’d grown up in, knocking on doors and looking under beds.
In museum-like houses that gave him the creeps more than any dark underpass downtown.
A tap on his forearm brought his head around. “Yeah?”
I was going to ask you the same thing.
“Huh?”
You stopped here. And have just been staring at…well, you know.
Qhuinn frowned and glanced at the product display. Then lost all train of thought—as well as most of the blood from his head. “Oh, yeah…ah…” Shit, had someone turned up the heat? “Um.”
Baby bottles. Baby formula. Baby bibs and wet naps and Q-tips. Pacifiers. Bottles. Some kind of contraption—
Oh, God, a breast pump.
Qhuinn did a one-eighty so fast, he got faced by a six-foot-high stack of Pampers, bounced back into the land of NUKs, and finally ricocheted out of infant airspace thanks to an A+D rebound. What ever the hell that shit was.
Baby. Baby. Baby—
Oh, good. He’d made it up to the checkout counter.
Shoving a hand into his biker jacket, Qhuinn pulled his wallet free and reached behind for John’s finger food. “Gimme your stuff.”
As the guy started to argue, mouthing the words because his hands were full, Qhuinn snagged the Mountain Dew and Doritos that were clogging up communication.
“There ya go. While he’s ringing us up, you can yell at me properly.”
And what do you know, John’s hands flew through the positions of ASL in various I-got-this combinations.
“Is he deaf?” the guy behind the cash register asked in a stage whisper. As if someone using American Sign Language was some kind of freak.
“No. Blind.”
“Oh.”
As the man kept staring, Qhuinn wanted to pop him. “You going to help us out here or what?”
“Oh…yeah. Hey, you got a tattoo on your face.” Mr. Observant moved slowly, like the bar codes on those bags were creating some kind of wind resistance under his laser reader. “Did you know that?”
Really. “I wouldn’t know.”
“Are you blind, too?”
No filter on this guy. None. “Yeah, I am.”
“Oh, so that’s why your eyes are all weird.”
“Yeah. That’s right.”
Qhuinn took out a twenty and didn’t wait for change—murder was just a liiiiiittle too tempting. Nodding to John, who was also measuring the dear boy for a shroud, Qhuinn went to walk off.
“What about your change?” the man called out.
“I’m deaf, too. I can’t hear you.”
The guy yelled more loudly, “I’ll just keep it then, yeah?”
“Sounds good,” Qhuinn shouted over his shoulder.
Idiot was stage-five stupid. Straight up.
Stepping through the security bar, Qhuinn thought it was a miracle that humans like that got through the day and night at all. And the motherfucker had managed to get his pants on right and operate a cash register.
Would miracles never cease.
As he pushed his way outside, the cold slapped him around, the wind blowing at his hair, snowflakes getting in his nose—
Qhuinn stopped.
Looked left. Looked right.
“What the…where’s my Hummer?”
In his peripheral vision, John’s hands started flying around like he was wondering the same thing. And then the guy pointed down to the freshly fallen snow…and the deep treads of four monster tires that made a fat circle and headed out of the parking lot.
“Goddamn motherfucking shit!” Qhuinn gritted.
And he thought Mr. Observant was the stupid one?
TWO
Back at the Brotherhood’s mansion, Blaylock sat on the edge of his bed, his naked body flushed, a sheen of sweat across his chest and shoulders. Between his legs his cock was spent, and his hips were loose from all kinds of bump and grind. At the other end of the spectrum, his breath was squeezed, his flesh requiring just a little more oxygen than his lungs could provide.
So naturally he reached for the pack of Dunhill Reds he kept on his side table.
The sounds of his lover showering in the bath across the way, along with the spicy scent of hand-milled soap, were achingly familiar.
Had it been almost a year now?
Taking out one of the cigarettes, he picked up the vintage Van Cleef & Arpels lighter Sax had given him for his birthday. The thing was made of gold and marked with the firm’s trademark Mystery Set rubies, a 1940s lovely that never failed to please the eye—or do the job.
As the flame jumped up, the shower turned off.
Blay leaned into the lick of fire, inhaled, and flicked the top back down. As always, the slightest hint of lighter fluid lingered, the sweetness mingling with the smoke that he exhaled—
Qhuinn hated smoking.
Had never approved of it.
Which, considering the number of outrageous things the guy made a regular habit out of, seemed downright offensive.
Sex with countless strangers in club bathrooms? Threesomes with males and females? Piercings? Tattoos in various places?
And this guy didn’t “approve” of smoking. Like it was a vile habit no one in his right mind would bother with.
In the bathroom, the hair dryer he and Sax shared went on, and Blay could imagine that blond hair he had just grabbed onto and pulled back hard flowing in the artificial breeze, catching the light, shining with highlights that were natural.
Saxton was beautiful, all smooth skin and sinewy body and perfect taste.
God, the clothes in that wardrobe of his. Amazing. Like the Great Gatsby had jumped out of the pages of the novel, gone down to Fifth Avenue, and bought out whole blocks of haute couture.
Qhuinn was never like that. He wore Hanes T-shirts and fatigues or leathers, and still sported the same biker jacket he’d had from just after his transition. No Ferragamos or Ballys for him; New Rocks with soles the size of truck tires. Hair? Bru
shed if it was lucky. Cologne? Gunpowder and orgasms.
Hell, in all the years Blay had known the guy—and it had been since birth practically—he’d never seen Qhuinn in a suit.
One had to wonder if the guy knew that tuxedos could be owned, not just rented.
If Saxton was the picture-perfect aristocrat, Qhuinn was a straight-up thug—
“Here. Tap your ashes in this.”
Blay jerked his head up. Saxton was naked, perfectly coiffed and scented with Cool Water—and holding out the heavy Baccarat ashtray he’d bought as a summer solstice gift. It was also from the forties, and weighed as much as a bowling ball.
Blay complied, taking the thing and balancing it in the palm of his hand. “Are you off to work?”
Like that wasn’t obvious?
“Indeed.”
Saxton turned away and flashed a spectacular ass as he went to the closet. Technically, the guy was supposed to be living next door in one of the vacant guest rooms, but over time his clothes had migrated in here.
He didn’t mind the smoking. Even shared every once in a while after a particularly energetic…exchange, as it were.
“How’s it going?” Blay said on an exhale. “Your secret assignment, that is.”
“Rather well. I’m almost finished.”
“Does that mean you can finally tell me what it’s all been about?”
“You shall find out soon enough.”
As the flapping of a shirt emanated from the walk-in, Blay turned his cigarette around and stared at the glowing tip. Saxton had been working on something top-secret for the king since the fall, and there had been no pillow talk about it—which was probably only one of the many reasons Wrath had made the male his private lawyer. Saxton had all the discretion of a bank vault.
Qhuinn, on the other hand, had never been able to keep a secret. From surprise parties to gossip to embarassing personal details like whether you’d gotten laid together by a cheap whore at—
“Blay?”
“I’m sorry, what?”
Saxton emerged, fully dressed in a tweed Ralph Lauren three-piecer. “I said, I’ll see you at Last Meal.”
“Oh. Is it that late?”
“Yes. It is.”
Guess they’d screwed their way through the first place setting of the day—which was how they’d rolled ever since…
God. He couldn’t even think about what had happened a mere week ago. Couldn’t even put into mental words how he felt about the one thing he’d never worried about coming to pass—right in front of his own eyes.
And he’d thought being rejected by Qhuinn was bad?
Watching the guy have a young with a female—
Shoot, he needed to respond to his lover, didn’t he. “Yes, absolutely. I’ll see you then.”
There was a hesitation, and then Saxton came over and pressed a kiss to Blay’s lips. “You’re off rotation tonight?”
Blay nodded, holding the cigarette out of the way so the male’s beautiful clothes didn’t get burned. “I was going to read the New Yorker and maybe start From the Terrace.”
Saxton smiled, clearly appreciating the appeal of both. “How I envy you. After I’m finished, I’m going to take a few nights off and just relax.”
“Maybe we could go somewhere.”
“Maybe we could.”
The tight expression on that lovely face was quick and sad. Because Saxton knew that they weren’t going anywhere.
And not just because a Sandals all-inclusive was so not in their future.
“Be well,” Saxton said, brushing his knuckle down Blay’s cheek.
Blay nuzzled that hand. “You, too.”
A moment later the door opened and shut…and he was alone. Sitting on the messy bed, in the silence that seemed to crush him from all sides, he smoked his cigarette down to the filter, screwed it out in the ashtray, lit another.
Closing his eyes, he tried to remember the sound of Saxton moaning or the sight of the male’s back arching or the feel of skin on skin.
He could not.
And that was the root of the problem, wasn’t it.
“Let me get this straight,” V drawled over the cell phone connection. “You lost your Hummer.”
Qhuinn wanted to put his head through a plate-glass window. “Yeah. I did. So could you please—”
“How do you lose eight thousand pounds of vehicle?”
“That’s not important—”
“Well, actually, it is if you want me to access the GPS and tell you where to find the damn thing—which is why you’re calling, true? Or do you just think confession without detail is good for the soul or some shit.”
Qhuinn gripped his phone hard. “Ileftthekeysinit.”
“I’m sorry? I didn’t catch that.”
Bullshit. “I left the keys in it.”
“That was a dumb-ass move, son.”
No. Fucking. Kidding. “So can you help me—”
“Just e-mailed you the link. One thing—when you recover the vehicle?”
“Yeah?”
“Check to see if the jackers took a moment to put the seat forward—you know, get comfortable and shit. Because they probably weren’t in a rush, what with having the keys.” The sound of Vishous’s yukking it up was like getting paddled in the nuts with a car fender. “Listen, I gotta go. I need both hands to hold my gut as I laugh my ass off attcha. Later.”
As the call went dead, Qhuinn took a moment to rein in the desire to throw the phone.
Yeah, ’cuz losing that, too, was going to really help the situation.
Going into his Hotmail account, and wondering just how long it was going to take to live this one down, he got a bead on his frickin’ car.
“It’s heading west.” He tilted the phone so John could see. “Let’s do this.”
Dematerializing, Qhuinn was dimly aware that the level of his rage was disproportionate to the problem: As his molecules scattered, he was a lit fuse waiting to connect with some dynamite—and it wasn’t just about him being a dumb-ass, or the missing car, or the fact that he was looking like an idiot to one of the males he respected most in the Brotherhood.
There was so much other shit.
Taking form on a rural road, he checked his phone again and waited for John to show up. When the fighter did, he recalibrated and they went farther west, closing in, cross-referencing the direction…until Qhuinn ghosted onto the precise strip of ice-covered asphalt his fucking Hummer was on.
About a hundred yards ahead of the vehicle.
Whatever SOB was behind the wheel was going sixty miles an hour in the snow, heading for a curve. What a…
Well, calling them stupid was exactly the kind of kettle-black thing the night had devolved into.
Let me shoot the wheels, John signed, like he knew a gun in Qhuinn’s hand was not the best idea.
Before the guy could up-and-out his forty, though, Qhuinn dematerialized…right onto the hood of the SUV.
He landed face-first into the windshield, his ass getting hit with the kind of breeze that turned him into a bug on all that glass. And then it was a case of oh-heeey-gurl-heeeey: Thanks to the glow from the dashboard, he caught the OMG! on the faces of the pair of guys in the front seat…and then his bright idea turned into goat fuck number two of the evening.
Instead of hitting the brakes, the driver wrenched the wheel, like he could maybe avoid what had already landed on the Hummer’s hood. The torque threw Qhuinn free, his body going weightless as he wrenched around in space to keep his eyes on his ride.
Turned out he was the lucky one.
As Hummers were designed and built for things other than aerodynamics and braking facility, the laws of physics grabbed onto all that top-heavy metal and rolled the shit. In the process, and in spite of the snow cover, metal met asphalt, and the high-pitched scream soprano’d out into night—
The thunderous impact of the SUV nailing some kind of solid object the size of a house cut off all that caterwauling. Qhuinn didn
’t pay much attention to the crash, however, because he landed as well, the paved road smacking him on the shoulder and hip, his body doing its own version of greased pig down the snow-packed pavement—
CRACK!
His momentum was stopped short as well, something hard catching him in the head—
Cue a spectacular light show, like someone had lit off a firecracker right in front of his face. Then it was Tweety Bird time, little stars going around his vision as pain in various places started to check in.
Pushing against whatever was closest to him—he wasn’t sure whether it was the ground or a tree or that red-suited fatty, Santa Claus, he eased himself over onto his back. As he flopped flat, the cold went to his head and helped to dull things.
He intended to get up. Check the Hummer. Beat the shit out of whoever had taken advantage of his blond moment. But that was just his brain playing with itself. His body had taken over the wheel and accelerator, and it had no intention of going anywhere the fuck.
Laying as still as he could, and breathing out uneven clouds of frost, time slowed down and then began to morph. For a second, he became confused as to what had put him in this at-the-side-of-the-road condition. The accident he’d caused?
Or…that Honor Guard from before the raids?
Was this back-flat on the asphalt thing a memory of his past or something that was actually happening?
The good news was that sorting out reality gave his brain something to do other than continue to hammer away at the get-moving stuff. The bad news was that the memories from the night his family had disavowed him were more painful than anything he currently felt in his body.
God, it was all so clear, the doggen bringing him the official papers and demanding some blood for a cleansing ritual. Him throwing that duffel bag over his shoulder and walking out of that house for the last time. The road stretching in front of him, empty and dark—
This road, he realized. This actual road was the one he’d gone down on. Or…was down on…whatever. When he’d left his parents’ house, he’d intended to head out west, where he’d heard there was a clan of rogue assholes just like him. Instead, four males had shown up in hooded robes and beaten him to death—literally. He had gone to the door of the Fade, and on it, he had seen a future that he hadn’t believed…until it happened. Was happening—right now. With Layla…