by Rhys Ford
“Dude was kind of the beginning of my life. I mean, before him… he decided to move in, I was going to kill myself.” The rush of those familiar emotions hit him, a putrid stream of loathing and loss. Miki swallowed around the lump in his throat, willing it to be dislodged and washed away, but it remained, choking him. “I didn’t have a plan or anything, I just… didn’t want to live anymore. But then there was him and all of a sudden—well, not all of a sudden, but—eventually, I had someone who needed me.
“I’ve never had anyone who needed me before.” He looked up, thankful to see Quinn’s eyes were bright and clear. Miki wouldn’t have been able to take pity or sorrow, but Quinn’s attention he gladly embraced. “Dude needed me. He didn’t ask, he just was there. Then your damned brother was there and, well… when God gives you a Morgan, you just don’t throw him away.”
“Do you feel guilty that you loved Kane and Dude even though you were mourning Damie?” As gently as Quinn asked, the question was a slap. He must’ve flinched because Quinn stroked the back of Miki’s hand with his thumb. “I wonder about that sometimes.”
“I feel more guilty about starting a new band,” he confessed. “It feels good with Forest and Rafe, but sometimes it is kind of a shock not to see Johnny and Dave behind me. That’s when I feel the most guilt. When we’re playing and for a little bit I forget they are not there. But the playing is different, so I turn around to give them a hard time about changing things up, but… it’s not them. I hate those times when I forget.”
“I think it’s okay to feel like that. I haven’t lost anyone like you have. I know one day I will, but the closest I came to that was Rafe losing himself,” Quinn said. “And I guess in a lot of ways, I got him back. Just not as dramatically as you got back Damie. He was never dead. Just lost.”
“Getting Damie back was a gift, but it’s kind of also a curse.” Miki laughed, his bones still aching from sleeping on cheap mattresses in cramped hotel rooms. “He makes me live. Like, he doesn’t let me do nothing. He’s always pushing me to write or to play. I think that’s why I love him and sometimes hate him. Kane loves me for who I am, but Damien loves me for who I can be. I guess it’s why he feels like a brother. I didn’t understand that until I saw how you guys worked. I mean, I called him my brother because it seemed like the word that fit. I just didn’t realize how well it fit.”
“I would kill for one of my brothers. And my sisters,” Quinn amended quickly. “That’s what today was for you. After this afternoon and the other day, I can see why you always get scared. Why you’d attack someone like that.”
“I was more angry than scared,” Miki admitted. The fear had been fleeting, a brief brush of quicksilver against the red rage filling him, but it had been there. He’d felt helpless and then powerful, wielding a piece of metal eventually dripping with blood. It was the carnage afterward that jolted him, and the deadness he felt inside while the photographer screamed. “Something cracked inside of me, Q. It wasn’t because of this afternoon or me getting hurt. I was so done with life kicking me. I just wanted to kick it back. But I couldn’t stop. I should have been able to, but I couldn’t.”
Quinn cocked his head, his long black hair falling away from his face. “Do you feel like this all the time?”
“Lately? Yeah.” Miki looked down as Quinn’s hands nearly swallowed his up and marveled at how similar they were to Kane’s. “I am never not angry. And I should be happy, right? Because I have everything. I mean everything. I have Damie. I have a band that’s solid and are good friends. And I’ve got Kane—fucking Kane—who made me feel things I never thought I could and loves me despite the fact that I’m an asshole. I just don’t know what to do, because I think that if I don’t fix what’s broken inside of me, he’s going to walk away because it’s too hard—”
“My brother is never going to walk away,” Quinn interrupted. “Did I already say that? He loves you and he’s willing to stand with you, but I’ve got to be telling you, Miki, you’ve got to be willing to stand for yourself first. I’m thinking maybe it is time you find someone to help you get rid of that anger so you can find the happiness you drowned in it.”
BY THE time Kane got the warehouse cleared of cops and family, it was nearly one in the morning. After a brief chat with Captain Book and Lieutenant Casey, he and Kel could start their shift around noon if they needed it, but Kane had high hopes he could hit up the DEA before lunchtime and begin to hunt down Rodney Chin. He’d seen Miki only briefly, when his lover came out of the studio with Quinn and Dude not far behind. The dog had been fed, and then the band’s lawyer snagged Miki and Damien for a quick discussion.
He’d been relieved to hear of the deal made with the DA, but uneasiness over the photographer lingered. The man’s injuries were excessive, or at least the DA thought so. Kane wasn’t so sure, but he also knew he was too close to the situation. He’d wanted to take the photographer apart. Not for the photos, but for scaring Miki.
That’s how Kane knew he was too close to the situation to think straight. He didn’t need his father to tell him the man had been close to beaten unconscious. If it had been anyone else administrating the attack, Kane would have pressed for his arrest. But it was Miki—his Mick—and Kane struggled with knowing what he should have done and with what he wanted to do.
“I want to wrap him in a blanket and put him away someplace safe until this is done,” Kane muttered as he locked the front door. The dog trotted out of the kitchen, licking his lips with a look of contentment on his furry face. Since he’d been fed dinner over an hour before, Kane didn’t want to know what he’d gotten into. “That best have been the bacon Sionn was going to sneak into your dish and not the garbage, dog. Because we do not need any more shit today.”
Dude picked up the beef bone he’d been given earlier, jumped up on the couch with it, and began to gnaw on its end.
“You are the shittiest roommate I have ever had.” Kane studied the terrier. “And that’s saying a lot because I used to share a room with Connor. Well, I hope you get used to shitting in the alleyway for a little while because Sionn’s going to have security guards crawling all over the outside of this place and I’m not going to be having Miki take you out to the grass out front for your constitutionals.”
What was he going to do about Miki?
Their bedroom doors were closed, shutting out the crowd and noise that had been there not more than ten minutes before. They needed to talk, but what he needed more than anything else was to have Miki lying next to him and in his arms so he could reassure himself Miki was okay.
That was exactly what he needed.
Kane only hoped Miki needed it as well… if not more.
A light was on in the bedroom, probably the banker’s lamp by Kane’s side of the bed. He could see a bit of the glow creeping out from under the door, and after taking one last glance at the dog, he slipped into the bedroom, closing the door behind him.
Miki never failed to steal Kane’s heart.
He’d been with pretty men and women before, and he’d had more than a few relationships that ended from an unwillingness to commit by his former partners than anything else. They hadn’t liked his long hours or his sometimes weeks-on-end cases, and a couple who hadn’t liked his closeness with his family. Those were the first ones Kane showed the door. The others simply fell off, not able to adapt to being part of a cop’s life.
Miki didn’t have that problem, despite his dislike for authority. He didn’t care about the odd times Kane was gone, and once he’d said his I love you for the first time, Kane knew Miki was all in. He never had to question his lover’s commitment or his devotion.
Staring at Miki sprawled out across the bed—their bed—Kane was struck by the familiar thump-thump of his heart filling with the love he had for the young man most people had written off.
He was beautiful in a way only untamed things were. There was a freedom of spirit beneath his creamy gold skin and a fierceness in his tumbled emerald-and-citrine
eyes. He was careless with his striking looks, letting his brown hair grow shaggy around his sharp-featured face. Miki’s mouth always drew Kane in, a perfect blend of sardonic consensuality with a full lower lip he loved to suckle on. The sounds he could draw out of that mouth were incredible, as was the responsiveness of Miki’s body when Kane took his time to explore it.
Their love didn’t come without the stain of sadness, a pervasive sticky paper wariness Miki wrapped himself in. As hard as he tried, Kane would never be able to unwrap it fully, stripping Miki of a protective layer he’d hidden behind for years. As grateful as Kane was to be let into Miki’s heart, he longed for one simple thing—to hear Miki’s unfettered laughter and see his face light up from an unguarded smile.
Nothing hurt more than the ripples of suspicion in Miki’s gaze when he looked up from the book he was reading, although it whispered away into an appreciative rake over Kane’s body. He did like the smile he was able to put on Miki’s face, and he liked his lover’s low purr of a growl when he stripped his jeans and shirt off, leaving them on the floor when he padded over to the king-size bed.
It felt hard to be sexy when the bed’s memory foam topping dimpled under his hands and knees, but Kane was more interested in getting to Miki than in putting on a show. As large as the room was, Miki needed the bed shoved up against the wall, preferring to have that firmness behind him as he slept. Kane didn’t mind so much, especially since Miki wasn’t one to get up in the middle of the night, but there was a brief warning flare in Miki’s wide eyes whenever Kane stalked him across the bed. Those were from ghosts Miki couldn’t exorcise but Kane could definitely kiss away.
Or hug. Today it seemed like Miki needed more contact, to be held and spoken to, at least for a few minutes. So Kane did exactly that, pulling Miki into an embrace and dragging him into the pillows, losing Miki’s book somewhere in the blankets.
“That’s going to dig at me,” Miki grumbled, then hissed when Kane dug the book out and tossed it onto the tufted bench at the foot of the bed. “Hey, you’re going to break the spine.”
“I’ll get you a new one,” he muttered, snagging Miki’s earlobe with his teeth. “Why aren’t you reading on one of the five hundred tablets we have in the house?”
“I like books.” Miki nestled down, his bare chest slightly cold from being out of the covers. “I love the way they smell, kind of like creamy vanilla tea. There’s just something about paper and the weight. I like how it feels in my hands because I can feel how much the words weigh. I don’t get that with a reader. That just makes all of the books weigh the same, and they don’t. Some of them are heavier because they have more to say. I want to feel that. So don’t fuck up my book.”
“Duly noted,” Kane acknowledged. He slid his hands down, cupping Miki’s ass and elated to find bare, smooth skin under Miki’s cotton pants. “No underwear? I like no underwear nights.”
“I was going to be naked, but I didn’t know if somebody was going to walk in. There were just so many fucking people in our house.”
“How are you doing? Today has been pretty rough.” The our in our house warmed Kane’s heart as much as Miki’s fingers playing with his belly button. “Did you get to talk to Damie? I know he was worried about you.”
“We did. A little bit.” Miki’s eyes went dark, shuttering away his emotion. “I scared him today. I scared me today, but now he looks at me and it’s different. I… wonder if he’s ever going to feel safe around me again.”
“I don’t think he was scared of you, a ghra.” He was going to have to step carefully around the land mines Miki had surrounded himself with. Nothing resurrected the terrified child hidden inside his lover more than the possibility of losing the love of someone he cared for. “Damie’s worried about you. We all are. Today was an anomaly—”
“No, it’s not,” Miki sliced in. “I’m going to go find someone to talk to about… today… every day.”
Kane went still, suddenly aware of what Miki meant. He said words weighed something, and some words were definitely chunks of steel while others were feathers. The burden of Miki’s words, of what he carried inside of him, was very real and open between them, more than it had ever been before.
“I talked to Quinn about it, and he said there are a couple of people he knows from the university who I’d like. He told me a lot of things about what happens and that I should find somebody I like to talk to. That person is more important than someone who’s going to dish out medication to me.” Miki shifted in Kane’s arms, enough for him to look up. “I mean, I might need something to balance out the chemicals in my head, and I hate the idea of that. I really do. I hate thinking that I have to take something to feel okay. I’m scared I am going to lose even more of me, but if I don’t do something, I feel like there’s not going to be anything of me left.”
“I’ve watched Quinn go through this over the years.” Kane began to stroke at the spot between Miki’s shoulder blades. “And I’ve seen you struggle through physical therapy and medication for your knee. If you want my opinion, I think finding someone to talk to is a good idea. Quinn needed somebody outside of the family to give him perspective without judgment. I think you would do well getting some of that too. The problem with everyone who loves you is we’re all strong-willed and stubborn-headed. We all think we know what’s best for you, but we don’t know what we’re talking about.
“Well, maybe Quinn does,” Kane amended. “But the rest of us are flying by the seat of our pants, and there are traumas in your life we can’t touch, can’t fully understand. There are people out there who spend their lives understanding the kind of evil you had to live through. They may never have dealt with somebody quite like you, though. I think you are too much you to be lost in any medication or therapy, but I would love to see you smile again.”
“Me too,” Miki whispered, sliding his hands over Kane’s chest. “Would you believe me if I told you that even though I’ve been shot across the arm and my hands hurt from the stupid thing I did today in the alleyway, I really want you to make me smile?”
“I would not only believe it,” he murmured through a kiss on Miki’s mouth, “I had every intention of doing so even before I came into our room.”
Chapter Seven
Donal: Just take yer time.
Miki: How much do I put in? Do I fill it up all the way? How the hell do you know?
Donal: It’s like music. Ye’ve got to feel yer way through. Find what works for ye. Eventually ye’ll get yer groove.
Miki: What if I fuck it up?
Donal: Mick. Nothing to worry over. Remember what I taught you.
Miki: Yeah, don’t take this wrong, but this is a fuckton harder than making music. It’s fucking pancakes, Dad. And I’m screwing them up.
—Morgan Kitchen, Easter Sunday Morning
UNTIL KANE entered his life, Miki never viewed his body as anything for pleasure. It had been a receptacle of pain for as long as he could remember. The intrusions into it, each act a forceful and violent domination, ended when he took control of his life, joining Damien on a journey to the stars. Sex then became something performed on him by nameless, faceless men who drifted in and out of his life in five- to ten-minute intervals and felt more like commercial spots in between the television show of his life rather than something to transform his heart and mind.
That is, until Kane.
He’d been found with a shattered body and an even more broken heart, but his cop hadn’t stepped away from the challenge Miki hadn’t realized he’d thrown down. He’d tried shoving Kane back, refusing to let him in, but his blue-eyed Irish man refused to be cowed by the snarl of a tiny dragon. Kane wasn’t a savior. No, but he was definitely a knight of some sort. His armor wasn’t pristine. It was battered and gouged from the wars he fought on the streets. But the heart behind the steel was pure and strong, shining with a light bright enough to chase away even the darkest of Miki’s shadows.
Today of all days, Miki needed his shadows driv
en off.
They always returned, circling him and looking for a way back in, sensitive to any weakness he might show, then slithering in through the cracks in Miki’s guard. It had been an endless dance, something Miki had grown used to, until Kane taught him he didn’t need to be dragged out on that floor and waltz with the shadows until his soul was bloodied.
Kane’s hands calmed him. His mouth invigorated him. And when the air ran sweet with the scent of vanilla lube, the promise of Kane pushing inside of him made Miki believe he could almost fly.
“You are so gorgeous, a ghra,” Kane whispered, his breath ghosting across Miki’s bare belly. “Let me play with you. Let me feel you. I think you need this… need us… more than anything else right now.”
Kane’s fingers were always rough, even though his touch was gentle. He carried the world on his skin, everything from the streets he walked on, the gun he carried, and the flesh of the trees he carved and worked until he could pull the beauty out of it. They were hands that were powerful enough to render a man unconscious, but Miki had also seen them tenderly wipe away a child’s tear. He loved the feel of Kane’s hands on his skin… enjoyed the rasp of his callused palms and fingers down his sides, across his back, and up the insides of his thighs. And he shivered when Kane cupped him, taking the most vulnerable parts of Miki’s body into his palm, then caressed his cock with a feathering touch.
Life taught Miki to be frightened when someone touched him there. With Kane, that reaction—that horrific fear—never came. Instead, he gentled with every stroke of Kane’s fingers, the anticipation of his release building along every stretch of bone beneath his skin.
And he fought to give Kane back every ounce of pleasure he’d been given.