“How bad on a scale from one to ten?” I bury my nose in his hard pecs, against the soft fabric of his worn T-shirt, and inhale his unique scent of tobacco and spicy male sweat.
He just tightens his arms around me.
“You should also talk to a therapist, Kash.” God knows he has a lot to work through—with his family getting shot before his eyes, his uncle sending men to kidnap him and kill him. “It’s helped Nate, you saw it. West agreed to go. Why not you?”
He snorts. “I dunno. Maybe they do package deals for three?”
“I’m serious.”
He’s quiet. We’re almost at the car—the old second-hand car West bought—when he says, “I may.”
“If it’s the cost—”
“It’s not.”
Of course it isn’t, I think dazedly. I keep forgetting he’s the heir to a fortune. He hasn’t signed the papers yet, but he will. And then…
But then he says, “The therapists I was taken to after my family was gone couldn’t help me, and the journal didn’t really help, but… maybe now I’m ready to try again. Because I want to be fine, Syd. To be with you and the guys.”
I draw back to look up into his handsome face. He’s so serious when he says this, so earnest.
God, I love this boy so much.
I love all my boys. They keep breaking and mending my heart. I guess love is like that Japanese tradition where you repair broken pottery by filling the cracks with gold. Love is that gold filling our cracks, keeping us together.
“But when you claim your inheritance…” I hesitate. I don’t know how to say this right. “Will you stay?”
“If you want me to.” Again with that serious expression, as if he hasn’t said the stupidest thing in the world.
“Kash!” I hit my fist on his solid chest. “Are you shitting me? After everything we went through.”
He puts his hand over my fist, pressing it into his chest. Vulnerability peeks through his gray eyes. “Then why do you ask me?”
Touché. “I guess I’m insecure,” I admit, ducking my head. “We’re not rich, and now you’re gonna swim in money. Won’t it be weird?”
“Not if we don’t make it weird. Syd…” He pulls away my fist, unfolds my fingers, presses my hand to his cheek. “I don’t care about money. All I want is right here, with you and the guys. As for the casinos, when I receive my inheritance, then I’ll appoint someone to manage everything. Won’t it be good, not to worry about money for a change? To have enough to pay for a bigger place to live?” He smiles at me. “A bigger bed?”
“See? Greedy already. Doesn’t ours fit your expectations?”
He chuckles, a deep, warm sound. “We’re three grown men. We take up lots of space. Sometimes I’m afraid I’ll squish you.”
“Squish me? I’m not a bug. I’m a woman.”
“I’m well aware of that, trust me.” And his eyes turn that darker shade of gray that says he’s thinking of getting me naked on that bed and get inside me. He’s growing hard where he’s pressed against me, and I moan at the feel of his thickening cock pressed to my stomach. His pulse is racing, the vein in his neck pulsing fast. “Syd… Can we please go home?”
“Always,” I whisper back.
I’m fire, and I burn with everything I feel, good and bad. I grieve, and I love, but I’m not the destroyer I thought I was. I’ve found the elements that contain me, and protect me, the people who accept me as I am and love me.
My boys aren’t scared to be burned. They love the flames. And I love them right back.
He kisses me as we enter the apartment, pressing me to the wall, lifting my hands over my head and pinning my wrists together. His strength excites me, just as much as the feel of his body, the taste of his mouth, the raggedness of his breathing.
The hot length of his cock pressed to my hip, urgent and demanding. His lips are soft, his stubble like fine sandpaper on my chin, his tongue rough, forcing its way into my mouth. He licks and tastes, the roof of my mouth, over my teeth, slides against my tongue, and I’m dangerously close to coming just from that. I whimper, grinding my hips against his body, seeking relief.
He bucks against me, just as desperate, moaning against my lips, shoving me harder against the wall. I’ll have bruises on my back tomorrow, and I don’t care. I need him. I missed him. I want to feel his naked skin on mine, to feel his cock inside me.
But a voice breaks through the haze of agonizing lust.