Lover At Last(171)

“Why didn’t you?” As if this was something the guy had wondered for a while.

In the silence that followed, Qhuinn sifted through memories he had never dwelled on, seeing himself. Seeing his family. Seeing…Blay. “I loved going to your house. I can’t tell you what it meant to me—I remember the first time you invited me over. I was convinced your parents were going to kick me out. I was ready for it. Hell, I dealt with that shit at my own house all the time, so why wouldn’t complete strangers do the same? But your mom…” Qhuinn cleared his throat again. “Your mom sat me down at your kitchen table and fed me.”

“She was mortified that she made you sick. Right afterward, you ran into the bathroom and threw up for an hour.”

“I wasn’t throwing up in there.”

Blay’s head whipped around. “But you said—”

“I was crying.”

As Blay recoiled, Qhuinn shrugged. “Come on, what was I going to say. That I pussied out and wept next to the sink on the floor? I ran the water so no one heard and flushed the toilet every once in a while.”

“I never knew.”

“That was the plan.” Qhuinn glanced over. “That was always the plan. I didn’t want you to know how bad it was at my house, because I didn’t want you to feel sorry for me. I didn’t want you or your parents to feel like you had to take me in. I wanted you to be my friend—and you were. You always have been.”

Blay looked away fast. Then rubbed his face with the hand he didn’t have the cigarette in.

“You guys were what got me through it,” Qhuinn heard himself say. “I lived for the night, because I could go over to your house. It was the only thing that kept me going. You were the only thing, actually. It was…you.”

As Blay’s eyes returned to his own, he had the sense the guy was searching for words.

And God help them both, if it hadn’t been for Saxton, Qhuinn would have dropped the l-word right then and there, even though the timing was stupid.

“You can, you know,” Blay said finally. “Talk to me.”

Qhuinn stamped his feet and bunched up his shoulders, stretching the muscles of his back. “Be careful. I might take you up on that.”

“It would help.” As Qhuinn glanced over again, Blay was the one shaking his head. “I don’t know what I’m saying.”

Bullshit, Qhuinn thought—

Without warning, V emerged from the cabin, lighting up a hand-rolled as he came out. As Qhuinn fell silent, he wasn’t sure whether he was relieved the conversation had been forced to an end or not.

On the exhale, Vishous said, “I need to make sure you understand the consequences.”

Qhuinn nodded. “I already know what you’re going to say.”

Those diamond eyes locked on his own. “Well, let’s just open air it anyway, shall we? I don’t sense any of the Omega in him, but if it comes out, or if I’ve missed something, I’m going to have to take care of him.”

Kill me, brother mine. Kill me.

“You do what you have to.”

“He can’t go into the mansion.”

“Agreed.”

V put out his nonlethal hand. “Swear to it.”

It felt strange to clasp the Brother’s palm and bind his word on the contact—because that was what next of kin had to do in situations like this, and shit knew he hadn’t been next to anything for anybody ever: Even before the disavowal by his family, he’d have been the last person to vouch for the bloodline.

Times had changed though, hadn’t they.

“One other thing.” V tapped the tip of the hand-rolled. “It’s going to be a long, hard recovery for him. And I’m not just talking about the physical shit. You need to prepare yourself.”

What, like they’d had a relationship before this or something? He might share some DNA with the guy, but other than that, Luchas was a stranger. “I know.”

“Okay. Fair enough.”

In the distance, a pair of high-pitched whines cut through the darkness.

“Thank fuck,” Qhuinn bit out as he went back into the cabin.

Over in the corner, next to the drum that had been overturned, his brother was nothing but a pile of jackets, his twisted body covered by the makeshift blankets.

Qhuinn stalked across the floorboards, nodding to John Matthew and Rhage.

Kneeling down next to his brother, he felt like he was in a dreamscape, not reality. “Luchas? Listen, here’s what’s going to happen. They’re going to take you out on a sled. You’re going to our clinic for treatment. Luchas? Can you hear me?”



As the pair of snowmobiles tore up to the cabin, Blay tracked their progress from the porch, watching their headlights get bigger and brighter, the pair of engines dimming into steady purrs as they reached their destination. Oh…this was good: Behind one of them, there was a covered sled, the kind of thing he’d seen on TV during the Olympics when some skier had crashed through the ropes and been evac’d down a mountain.