WHAT YOU NEED

AN OPPOSITES ATTRACT, HURT/COMFORT GAY ROMANCE

AVRIL ASHTON
 Copyright © 2023 by Avril Ashton
All rights reserved.
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What You Need ©2023 Avril Ashton

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This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used
fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
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 CONTENTS

Playing Catch Up?

Please Read
About What You Need
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Author Note
Books by Av
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About the Author

 PLAYING CATCH UP?

New to Avril Ashton’s dark, dirty, and diverse m/m universe?

*THE BROOKLYN S INNERS is where it all starts. Avril’s very first m/m series is full of “drama,
action, mystery, suspense, and romance.”

J ONESING FOR A COP / MAFIA/ GANGLAND m/m romance? Run This Town series features BDSM, friends
to lovers, age gap, second chance and so much more.

**P REFER MCs who straddle that gray line between hero and villain? Loose Ends series brings you
“stories of angst. Of second chances. And of love.”

***IN search of the ultimate Enemies to Lovers? The Staniel Duet is the dark, angst-ridden read
you’ve been waiting for. It delivers the ultimate “how is this even gonna work?” Spoiler alert…it
does.

*T HIS IS where we first meet Jack

**Ashe is mentioned here
***Daniel Nieto’s story
PLEASE READ
 TRIGGERS WARNINGS

ASHE TANNEN -NOVAK IS a Black trans man. I utilized a sensitivity reader but please keep in mind;
Black men aren’t a monolith. Trans folx aren’t monolithic. One person’s experience is just that; one
person’s experience.
My goal, in my little slice of writing world, is to offer you diverse characters. Always. In no way
can I, as a cis Black woman, claim to know what it means to be a man or a trans man, at that. Please
know that should there be any inaccuracies or inconsistencies, it comes from a place of ignorance and
never from malice.
I am open to listening and learning. As we all should be.

WHAT YOU NEED CONTAINS the following triggers:

Past Domestic Abuse, as recounted by one of the MCs.

Past Suicide Attempt
Brief reference to racial bias
Speech and acts that can be considered harmful to the LGBTQ+ community
Mental Abuse by parents
Mention of the death of a family member (grandparent)
PTSD
 ABOUT WHAT YOU NEED

ONE MAN HIDING from his mistakes. Another running toward safety. They’ll find all they need in
each other.
Jack Wellington has shut himself off from the world. Nursing a broken heart, the DEA agent is
existing on fumes and hiding from the many mistakes he’s made in the name of love. Solitude is all he
wants… until he answers a knock on the door one stormy night and comes face to face with a past he
barely recognizes.
Ashe Tannen-Novak is running from parents trying to control him, a husband hell-bent on keeping
him, and the darkness threatening to consume him. It’s been a decade since the agent with the blue
eyes saved him, but Ashe has never forgotten Jack. He’s the only safety Ashe can think of, but reality
hits hard when he finds his savior just as bruised and emotionally battered.
Neither man is the person the other once knew, but their past binds them just as their present traps
them. Lost and in need of anchor, Jack and Ashe find more than connection; they find acceptance,
comfort, and passion. Now all they have to do is hold on to it.
One of the MCs in What You Need was first introduced in The Brooklyn Sinners, but WYN can
be read as a standalone. This m/m romance features a trans MC and the following tropes/themes:
hurt/comfort, only one bed, forced proximity, Interracial relationship, opposites attract, violent,
and angst.
 My thanks to Ashley Jane for beta reading.

Dedicated to Drew Déry. Your help has been invaluable. I appreciate you.

THANK YOU ♡
 1

HE STILL FELT the sensation of the soil covering his face. Not wet, but soft enough that it stayed where
it landed. On his face. His eyes. His nose and mouth. The scent of it gag-inducing. Back then he’d
been too busy trying not to scream with his mouth open. Doing all he could, thrashing in that grave,
head flipping from side to side to dislodge the clumped earth that fell on him faster and faster.
By the shovel.
They said he spent an hour buried. Said he’d broken off his fingernails while attempting to claw
his way out. Said he was lucky to be alive.
Curled up as Ashe was now inside his linen closet, he didn’t feel so lucky. The darkness scared
him after what he’d been through, but what scared him more than that was the smell. And the sensation
of soil, cold and soft enough to mold all around him, ripped him to ribbons. That scent, though; it
haunted him in his dreams and out.
The linen closet smelled like freshly washed clothes. The powdery detergent scent kept him
grounded, at least enough to close his eyes.
It came in waves, the haunting, but he never ran too far from it. He let it catch up to him, soaking
in the hurt until his skin was all saturated, dripping pain like bathwater in his wake. But he made it
look good, didn’t he? The people around him didn’t worry anymore. They didn’t knock on his door
every hour on the hour to make sure he hadn’t finished what he’d started the day he came home from
the hospital.
The thin slashes on both wrists stopped itching a while back, but he still stroked them with his
thumb. Still picked at the scars with his nails.
“Nobody loves you but me, Ashley.”
Hiccups racked his body, each one painful in his chest as he stared with wide eyes into the
darkness.
“Nobody wants you but me…”
The words resonated now as it did then. He battled them every day, striving to be more than what
the man who almost took his life thought he was worth. Bird in a cage, wings clipped, robbed of the
very things that made him who he was. He wore the pain like a bespoke suit, made it look good, until
it was a part of who he was.
“Not your mother, not your father. I’m the only one who loves you.”
It hadn’t been a reach to believe those words. He’d lived by those words, hung onto those words,
until they lowered him into his grave, shoveling dirt onto his face while he choked on it.
Love, huh?
 He kicked the closet door open and sat with his legs spilling out into the narrow, dimly lit
hallway. The tears, there’d been no use in airing them out. He didn’t cry anymore. Not that he was
numb; he simply didn’t have anything left.
Except the pain. That shit never wore out.
He pressed against the shelves at his back, eyes drifting closed, stroking the card in his hand.
He’d found it in some of his paperwork after being discharged from the hospital the second time.
When he’d tried to end it himself.
Reopening his eyes, he brought the card up to his face. He’d already taken off his contacts for bed
and neglected to at least grab the glasses he kept on the nightstand. But he didn’t need glasses to know
what was written on the card. He’d memorized everything about that white rectangle. He’d had nearly
ten years to stare at it, after all.
The name. The title. The email and phone number.
But it was the message scribbled on the back in blue ink, a strong and careful scrawl—powerful,
even—that he would never forget.
“Ashley, you’re stronger than you think. This too shall pass. Fight. Fight to live. Fight to be
who you’re supposed to be.”
He’d cried at that message. Hunched over the bathroom sink, applying ointment to the slashes he’d
made on his wrists, he’d cried. A stranger made him feel so seen. So raw. So exposed. A stranger
cared about his life.
Jack Wellington was his name, the man who pulled Ashe from that shallow grave almost ten years
ago. He didn’t remember much but he remembered blue eyes. He recalled the impression of gentle
hands and soothing tones. He would never forget the feeling of safety.
Safety he hadn’t known since his grandfather died when Ashe was seventeen. He hadn’t known he
could remember the way that felt, but Jack Wellington gave him safety. He didn’t hurt himself again
once he read the message. He tried to live up to it.
But sometimes…
Sometimes, he fell short. Sometimes he gave in to the familiar pull and ended up in this closet.
Sometimes all he had was a card, smudged from that time he picked it up when he’d been eating
curry, so it had a nice yellow thumbprint on the lower left corner.
FBI Agent Jack Wellington saved Ashe’s life everyday. Did he know that? In his wallet, Ashe kept
his ID, his credit cards, and Jack’s card. It was the first thing he saw when he flipped the worn leather
—his grandfather’s—open.
He stroked the name now. When he’d finally gathered up the courage, he’d tried calling the
number to thank Agent Wellington for what he’d done. He was retired, they told him. Off the grid.
Ashe panicked, until he decided to dig into the trust fund he rarely touched.
Three months and a private investigator later, and he’d found Jack Wellington. Now, he had an
updated phone number and a physical address. He’d been sitting on it for a while, but he would use it.
He wanted to stand on his own two feet in front of Jack Wellington. Look him in the eye and show him
he’d done what Jack asked.
He’d fought.
He’d scraped himself off and lived. Minute by minute, until it turned to day by day.
He was who he was always supposed to be.
Those blue eyes—he wanted to look into them and thank Jack for saving him. That night and every
night since. For allowing him to remember, if only for a split second, what safety felt like.
What safety should be.
“YOU’ RE DOING WHAT ?”
Ashe ignored his sister’s incredulous stare as he shoved clothes into an overnight bag. Tsa sat
cross-legged in the middle of his bed, surrounded by clothes. The only reason she knew what he was
about to do was because she showed up at his place unannounced. He’d have done what he always
did, make moves without his family’s knowledge. He found it made his life way easier than
continuing to allow them the thought that they somehow had a choice in his decision making.
He’d learned that shit the hard way.
Once he finished stuffing clothes into the bag, he released it and straightened. Tsa—pronounced
Tee-Sah—was the youngest of his two siblings. She had it easy as the baby of the family, compared to
Ashe who was the middle child, and their brother, Leslie, or L.J., who was the oldest and the only
boy. At least, the only boy the family would accept. The Tannens were a family of expectations and
lofty aspirations. Ashe remained the disappointment they didn’t mention in mixed company. “I should
be back in a few days.”
“Wait. Wait.” Tsa grabbed his arm, preventing him from turning away. “So, you’re just gonna
show up on this detective’s doorstep?” Her wide eyes, almost translucent brown, were identical to
Ashe’s. They used to be inseparable, until Ashe put voice to the person he truly was inside. He lost
Tsa, just like he lost the rest of the family. They didn’t talk like they used to, didn’t see each other
either, but she was still the only one he was close to.
He answered his sister’s question with a jerk of his head. “Pretty much.”
She gaped at him. “Ashl—Ashe.”
That was the reason he didn’t deal with his family anymore. They stayed dead-naming him. Stayed
assigning him identities and genders that didn’t fit. Then they acted all wounded, wondering why he
didn’t fuck with them. Why he didn’t come around. Why he strode right past his mom and dad that
time he saw them on the street.
“My decisions aren’t up for debate,” he told Tsa firmly, ignoring the brief hurt that flashed across
her features. “I’m not looking for permission. You wouldn’t know about this if you hadn’t shown up
here, T.” Shit. He didn’t want to hurt her. She was still his sister and he loved her. He sank onto the
bed. “I need to get away for a few days, so I figured why not cross this off my to-do list, you know?”
He patted her knee, exposed by the jean cut-offs she wore.
Tsa pursed her lips. “Is this because Mom and Dad tried to have you—”
“Let’s not talk about that. Okay?” His parents’ most recent betrayal had been just one of many.
They kept disappointing him. And he kept wishing he was the child they could be proud of, that they
could love him even though their vision of who he should be had changed.
No dice.
Tsa worried her bottom lip with her teeth. That act, coupled with her brown skin and full lips, had
her looking so much like their mother that Ashe’s chest ached. Tsa belonged. L.J. belonged. Ashe had
always been the odd man out, trying to squeeze his square persona into the round slot his family had
carved out for him at birth. Every decision he made about his life, his folks saw as a personal affront.
As if he sat around thinking up ways to fuck with them.
This last shit they pulled wasn’t even a surprise, but it still shocked him. And wasn’t that a bitch?
“Ashe,” Tsa spoke his name tentatively. “I’m sorry.”
He cocked his head. “For what?”
 “Mom and Dad.” She waved a hand. “What they did. I didn’t—I’m sorry.” She exhaled loudly.
“That’s why I came, to tell you that. L.J.’s sorry too.”
“You’re speaking for L.J. now?”
Tsa’s expression turned reproachful. “If you’d answer when he calls, you’d hear it from him.”
But Ashe didn’t answer his brother. Not since that night he expressed exactly what he thought
about who Ashe was, in a room full of their peers. It was an embarrassment Ashe would never get
over, no matter how many times L.J. apologized via email or voicemail.
“You should go,” he told Tsa. “I’ll hit you with a text when I get where I’m headed.”
“Ashe, are you sure this is a good idea? I mean, you don’t know this guy. It’s been years.”
The concern in her voice was appreciated, but a bit too late in Ashe’s view. “I know what I’m
doing.” He didn’t bother attempting to explain why he had to see Agent Wellington. Why he had to go
now. His gut wouldn’t be a good enough reason for Tsa to back up off him. “Hey.” He patted her knee
again. “Thanks for coming over. I appreciate it, T.”
She cupped his jaw, peering into his face with an expression way too close to their mother’s for
his liking. “I don’t know what you’re going through, Ashe, but I love you. I want to be here for you. If
you let me.”
She was trying, he knew that. It was more than he could say for the rest of them. “Thank you.” He
gave her a smile, a gesture he didn’t really feel, but it made the lines in the middle of her forehead
smooth out, so it was well worth it. “I love you too.” He choked up when speaking those words and
she scrambled closer, wrapping her arms around him. He held her, taking the comfort, soaking it up
since he didn’t know when he’d get it again. Or when next he’d allow himself to accept it. Then he
kissed her cheek and pulled away. “Okay, get out of here so I can finish packing.”
When she left, after getting a promise from him to keep in contact, he sat on his bedroom floor,
stroking that card. He’d waited a long time to find Agent Wellington, but something inside him said
this was the moment. Now was the time. Just as he’d felt when he made the decision to begin his
transition, his gut also told him his life was about to change.
His mouth curved at the thought.
With the way his life was set up nowadays, any change was welcome.
 2

“BIG STORM COMING .”

Jack placed his stuff on the counter, keeping his head down as he pulled cash out of his wallet and
slapped it down next to the beer. And the vodka. And the whiskey. He’d made the thirty-two minute
drive into town because he ran out of whiskey, but figured since he was here and all he’d also stock
up on the other essentials.
“TV says it’s gonna be a bad one.”
He didn’t know why the old guy kept talking to him, or trying to hold his gaze. Jack must have said
five words to him since he’d started coming to the store six months ago. But that didn’t stop the man
from trying. Persistent fuckers got on Jack’s nerves. He grabbed a fistful of beef jerky, the kind with
the cheese paired with it, from the box atop the cluttered counter and placed it on one of the three
cases of Bud Light.
“You all set up there?”
He jerked his head up, allowing a frown to twist his features. The old guy didn’t blanch when
their eyes met. Tough fucker.
“Flashlights and candles and water and all that stuff the TV says you need.” He scratched the
beard so thick Jack had to focus to find his lips between that bush of gray hair. “You all set up there,
son?” His gaze dipped to all the liquor then back to Jack, calmly assessing.
Judging.
As if Jack cared what he thought. He glanced past the man’s head to the small TV behind him,
playing in black and white. The screen kept freezing up, but Jack made out the Breaking News banner.
A severe thunderstorm warning had been issued for residents in the North Georgia mountains.
He was a resident in the North Georgia mountains. Maybe he should take that shit seriously?
Fuck.
He turned away from the counter with a sigh, going back through the small general store and then
grabbing one of the gallon bottles of water. Dude only had four out on the floor in the beverage aisle.
Then he grabbed some candles, a three-pack of lighters, and one of the rotisserie chickens in the
warm display case. He didn’t know how long the chicken had been there.
He didn’t care.
Maybe another bottle of whiskey too? If the storm was bad, who knew how long it would be
before he got another chance to come back into town.
Once he paid for all his shit, he nodded his thanks to the old man—Don, as he’d introduced
himself the first time Jack visited the store—and loaded up his truck. The sun was out, sky patchy
with thick clouds. The store’s parking lot was empty save for his blue F150 and another beat-up old
van he figured belonged to Don. In the six months since Jack had moved up here, he’d probably seen a
handful of people whenever he’d come to Don’s store. He liked it like that.
He drove back home, through the winding roads then the turn off, almost hidden from the main
road by dense brush he’d refused to cut when he’d bought the place. No matter how fucked up he felt,
pride always tightened his chest when his cabin came into view. It had been a rundown, abandoned
shell when he’d found it. After buying the two-room shack and the land that came with it, he’d had it
completely rebuilt. Now, it had a bedroom, a bathroom, and a kitchen slash living room area. He’d
put in all amenities except for internet and phone. The whole point of being out here was to avoid
dealing with people.
People were the worst.
It took him two trips to bring his stuff inside from the truck, and by the time he was done, it was
drizzling and he was sweaty and thirsty. Once inside, he kicked off his boots and sank onto the couch,
whiskey in hand.
This was what many would consider a fall from grace. Jack Wellington, former FBI, decorated
DEA agent, now a hermit, guzzling whiskey, unable to pinpoint the last time he’d taken a proper
shower. Or eaten anything that didn’t come already cooked and wrapped in cellophane.
Sometimes he could blame others for his fall, but most of the time he knew the blame belonged
sorely on his shoulders. So he drank. Until he couldn’t. Until he couldn’t keep his eyes open. Sleep
was a welcome thing for him. He disappeared into that void willingly to escape the voices in his head
that the liquor couldn’t quite eradicate. In sleep, it didn’t hurt so much when the man he’d spent so
many years loving didn’t return his feelings. When that man chose a murderous criminal over him.
In sleep, he avoided the blow that rejection left on the man he’d always thought himself to be. And
in sleep he absolved himself of the choices that rejection had allowed him to make.
Choices that almost left the man he’d loved for so long near death.
His heart thundered in his ear, drowning out anguished cries and bloodcurdling threats. That
thunder got louder and louder. Bigger, shaking Jack so violently he dropped out of his sleep and onto
the floor.
“Fu—”
That wasn’t his heart. That was real thunder reverberating through the cabin, chased by lightning
that streaked electric blue in the darkness. Damn. It was already night. He sat with his knees hugged to
his chest, his back against the couch, only to lurch forward when a pounding rattled the front door.
What the fuck?
Thunder crashed overhead again, smothering all other sound. Then lightning.
Then that pounding on the door.
Someone was definitely outside.
Who the hell was out there in that weather?
He stumbled to his feet with a belch, making a face at the sour taste before picking up his shotgun.
He didn’t give a fuck who was out there. He had a Trespassers Will Be Shot sign up in his yard for a
reason.
He left the interior of the cabin in darkness but swept his hand along the wall until he found the
switch for the light that was positioned outside, just above the cabin’s entrance. He turned on the light
then moved over to the door and yanked it open, pointing the gun at the drenched guy who stood on his
doorstep. “You’re trespassing.”
Dude blinked up at him with brown eyes reminiscent of the liquor that coated Jack’s tongue. He
was African-American, with hair cut to a low fade, and a smooth jaw. Pouring rain dripped off his
chin, soaking the pale blue shirt he wore and sticking it to his muscular chest and wide shoulders. He
wore a black sport coat over that, and it too was soaked along with his dark jeans and tennis shoes.
He held a bag in his hand as he gaped up at Jack.
“Are you hearing impaired?” Rain pelted Jack, aided by the heavy wind, wetting the floor. “Go.”
“J-Jack Wellington? You’re Agent Jack Wellington?”
Didn’t have to sound so goddamn miserable asking his name. “Did Dutch send you?” Dutch ran a
secret group of agents who went after some of the worst criminals. Jack was one of those agents, but
he’d already told Dutch he wouldn’t be doing any jobs for the foreseeable future. If this was one of
his men, Jack would bury his ass in the front yard and send a picture of the freshly dug grave to Dutch.
He’d warned that bastard to leave him alone.
Guy blinked. “No. I—” He wiped at his face. Lost cause, really. The rain was unstoppable. “Can
I come in? I’ll explain.”
Hell no, he couldn’t come in. Jack didn’t want anyone in his place, especially not this stranger
with eyes that—they were familiar, but he couldn’t place them. Thunder rolled again and the heavy
wind had the tall trees that surrounded the cabin swaying. Fingers crossed they didn’t come crashing
down on his head overnight. When he lifted his gaze past his unwanted visitor’s shoulder, he noticed
another vehicle, a black SUV, parked next to his truck. Lightning illuminated the darkness and the flat
tire on the front passenger side of the SUV.
“Shit.” Jack lowered the gun and stepped back. “Come in.”
 3

THERE HAD TO BE A MISTAKE.

Ashe stood just inside the doorway, water dripping off his clothes and soaking the floor. The
inside of the cabin was in darkness, but the harsh yellow light above the doorway illuminated just
enough for him to make out a couch and the bottles on the floor.
What the fuck?
He swung back toward the man smelling like a distillery, holding the gun, but Jack Wellington
spoke first.
“Who are you? What do you want?” he growled. “And talk fast.” He shifted forward, the floors
creaking under him, and Ashe pedaled backward when he brought the gun back up.
“Please. I—” The weapon in Jack’s hand had his tongue all tied up. “The gun,” he whispered.
“Can you—can you put it down.”
“Tell me who you are and why you’re here, looking for me.”
“Is there light?” Ashe licked his dry lips, fingers clenching around the straps of his overnight bag.
Should have left the damn thing in the car. “Can you turn on the light?” He wouldn’t be able to
function if they remained as they were.
A click sounded and light flooded the place. Ashe blinked, meeting blue eyes. He hadn’t
remembered much about Jack, but he could never forget the blue of his eyes and the low and deep
cadence of his voice. So soothing.
Except it wasn’t, not anymore.
Ashe couldn’t say for sure what he’d been expecting, but the man before him, glowering with
what looked like sleep creases on the left side of his face, wasn’t it. Taller than Ashe by a few inches,
Jack was athletically built, with well-defined muscles that flexed when he moved. His hair was dark
blond, eyes narrowed, nose and stubble-darkened jaw sharp. Ashe noted the clenched jaw before
Jack spoke.
“Are you gonna stand there and stare or do I have to make you start talking?”
Ashe had been out of it the one and only time they’d met previously, but still, he didn’t remember
Jack being mean and angry. The private investigator hadn’t told him Jack was a drunk and living like
a hermit up in the mountains. Somebody should have told him that the one man he’d idolized other
than his grandfather would disappoint him, too.
Ashe glanced away. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t—” His voice broke. “I shouldn’t have come.” Maybe
he hadn’t thought this through. He damn sure hadn’t been prepared for the weather, for the sheets of
rain that had him pulling off the highway when it became impossible to see through his windshield.
He’d expected a warm welcome from this person he’d never truly met. He’d expected to sit and
reminisce, to express his gratitude and show the man who’d saved him that he’d done what he’d
asked.
He’d lived, even when he didn’t want to. That he’d shed the skin of the person he’d been
pretending to be and become who he was meant to, because of the man glaring at him with a shotgun
aimed at Ashe’s chest.
“Hey.” Fingers snapped in front of his face. “What the fuck? You show up at my door in the
middle of a storm, asking for me by name? I’m giving you two seconds to tell me who you are. And if
you’re one off Dutch’s men—”
“I don’t know a Dutch!” Ashe yelled, before catching himself. He wiped his hands on his wet
pants and grimaced. “I’m sorry. I thought—” He shook his head with a pained laugh, because who but
him would find himself in this situation? “Doesn’t matter what I thought.” He glanced around. “Can I
sit?”
Jack just stared at him, a quizzical expression on his face, that gun still in his hand, so Ashe edged
toward the couch and when the other man didn’t stop him, he sat, sinking into the sagging cushions.
His clothes were soaked; even his sneakers squeaked with water, so he toed them off, peeling away
the wet socks before sinking his toes into the gray carpet.
“Still waiting,” Jack said. “And this will be the last time I ask, who are you and why are you
here?”
“My name is Ashe.” All the things he’d planned to share with his savior didn’t make it to his lips.
He couldn’t bare himself to the gun-toting drunk with the liquored-up blue eyes. He couldn’t. The
realization brought a sharp twinge of loss to his chest. He’d been holding on to the idea of what Jack
Wellington was, only to find out that shit was all make believe. “It was a mistake coming here.” He
tilted his chin, meeting Jack’s narrowed gaze, hoping the other man didn’t notice the tremulous quality
of his words. “I mistook you for someone else, but as soon as the rain eases up I’ll leave.” He’d
passed a hotel about an hour or so away. He could stay there, maybe take a plane back home.
“Stand,” Jack barked. He heaved the gun over his left shoulder, holding it with one hand as he
approached on bare feet. Standing over Ashe, he appeared bigger than Ashe’s faulty memory allowed.
“What?” He frowned.
“On your feet. Now.”
The order set Ashe’s teeth on edge, but he wasn’t about to anger the man holding a gun. He got to
his feet slowly, stiffening when Jack got into his space and started patting him down with one hand.
“What are you doing?”
“Should have done this before,” Jack muttered to himself. “Fucking slipping.”
“Please.” Ashe cringed away from his touch, shivering. “I don’t—I don’t have any weapons. All I
have is my phone in my pocket. I’m not here to hurt you.”
Jack stepped away with a grunt. “You can’t hurt me. What you can do is cut the bullshit.” He
glanced toward the window. “Storm’s not gonna pass for a while. And you’re not going anywhere on
a flat tire.”
Shit, he’d forgotten about that.
“Start talking.” Jack frowned, eyeing him up and down. “And get those wet clothes off.”
Ashe opened his mouth then closed it again.
“You got any dry clothes in that bag you’re white knuckling?” Jack asked.
Ashe nodded.
“There.” Jerking a thumb behind him, Jack said, “Change in there.” Then he smiled, an
unexpectedly vicious gesture that left Ashe questioning his goddamn sanity. “When you’re done,
we’re talking. You better hope I like what I hear.”
That threat had Ashe snatching up his bag that held an extra set of clothes and beating a quick
retreat to the door Jack pointed at, which turned out to be possibly the world’s smallest bathroom. A
shower, no bathtub and no curtain, a sink with a scuffed and cracked mirror, and a toilet. If Ashe
spread his arms wide, he’d span the entirety of the space. He stripped hurriedly, dropping his wet
clothes onto the black fuzzy bath mat. Thank God he’d made sure to take his weekly T-shot before he
left LA. He kept on his underwear, since that wasn’t wet, and quickly stepped into the one pair of
jeans he had in his bag along with a gray t-shirt. Finished getting dressed, he splashed water on his
face and used the paper towels next to the roll of toilet paper atop the back of the toilet to dry up.
What had he hoped to achieve by coming here?
He’d wanted to thank Jack for saving him, and maybe he could still do that without going too
much in depth. Back home, he’d been so convinced that meeting Jack, talking to him, was what he
needed. The final hurdle that would free him permanently.
He’d expected Jack to save him again, like he’d done all those years ago.
Stupid. Fucking stupid.
That man out there couldn’t save himself, judging by what Ashe had seen so far.
Stupid.
You’re so needy, Ashley. Always fucking needing.
The voice came out of nowhere, familiar words ricocheting like the peals from a church bell.
Ashe swiped shaking fingers across his brow, swallowing around the thickness in his throat that was
suddenly jacking up his breathing.
Needy Ashley. You need somebody to love you. You need somebody to save you.
No! But that denial was a farce when he was here in this cabin after searching and finding a man
he didn’t truly know.
Ashe clung to the edge of the sink with one hand, the other covering his right ear as his knees gave
out and he slammed to the floor with a low cry. They were right. He was a mess. And so damn stupid,
coming here. He couldn’t breathe, couldn’t even stand. What made him think he could do this? He
folded in on himself on the floor of that tiny bathroom, rocking back and forth.
Humming.
Trying to drown out the voice getting louder and louder. The man who taunted and belittled him
used to love him. At least, he’d claimed to love him.
You need me, Ashley. You can’t leave me. Who’ll love you? Somebody needs to save you, and
take care of you, ’cause fuck knows you’re incapable of it.
And here Ashe was, proving that son of a bitch right. His lips trembled and he tugged on the
lower one with his teeth, tasting the salt of his tears. Some kind of a freak he was, melting down in a
stranger’s bathroom.
A bang on the door startled a cry from him.
“Hey.” The door rattled. “Open the door,” Jack called out. “What’s going on in there?”
Open the door. Ashe couldn’t even lift his head up off the cold floor. He whimpered.
“Hey. Ashe? Ashe, right?” Jack hesitated. “You okay in there?”
If he could, Ashe would laugh, but at the question, the tears poured down his face in torrents. And
of course, Jack chose that moment to kick the door in.
“Shit. What the fuck?” He grabbed Ashe’s shoulders, hefting him up to a sitting position. “Hey.
Hey.” Clasping Ashe’s face in his hands, Jack peered at him. “Are you okay? Did you take
something?”
Jack smelled of liquor, yes. But of sweat, too. And like the outdoors, fresh rain on the hot ground.
It was an unmistakable kind of scent and Ashe didn’t hate it. He grasped the front of Jack’s shirt,
vision distorted by his wet eyes. “You saved someone once,” he whispered. “She was dead and you
brought her back.”
Jack blinked. “What?”
“He buried her in a cemetery.” His grip on Jack got tighter as the memories became even more
vivid. “She’d been alive when she went into that grave. She was dead when she came out, in your
arms, and you brought her back.”
Jack’s body went stiff against his and he pulled away slowly, confusion all over his face.
“Jack.” Tears dripped off Ashe’s chin. This close, he was swamped with the sense of security
Jack represented back then, if only for a fleeting moment. It was terrifying, the difference between
memory and reality.
“I—” The other man’s eyes were wide, searching. “How do you know about that?”
“Jack.” Ashe reached for him, but Jack pulled away before they came in contact, and that
rejection, amongst the many Ashe had experienced, resonated the most. Hurt the most.
“Answer the question.” Jack pushed away from him, scrambling to his feet, leaving Ashe there on
the floor. “How do you know about something that happened so long ago?”
Ashe bowed his head and Jack was back on him that quick, his hand fisted in the front of Ashe’s
shirt, pulling tight, snarling. “Who the fuck are you?” He shook Ashe once. “And how do I know your
eyes?”
“My name is Ashe. I used to be that woman in the grave.”
 4

IT WAS THE EYES . So much like the color of the cheap whiskey Jack found in the old dusty store. One
sip always laid him out, put him on his back, vision swirling as he swore he’d spring for the better,
more expensive stuff next time.
Except somehow, he’d keep drinking until the bottle was dry.
Then he’d snatch up the same damn no-name drink on his next store run. Head spinning, tongue
damn near numb, he couldn’t stop drinking it.
Ashe’s brown eyes were wet, glistening, his thousand-mile stare punching holes in Jack’s gut as
he gritted his teeth. The words he’d uttered, dry and desolate, ping-ponged inside Jack’s head.
“I used to be that woman in the grave.”
Been a long time, but the memories were there, just below the surface, waiting to be excavated. A
woman so still in his arms. Cold to his touch. Packed dirt in her passageways. He’d placed her so
carefully on the ground, begging her to breathe as he performed CPR, his fingers numb, nails broken
and bleeding from clawing at the freshly dug grave.
“Jack.”
He blinked hard, peeling his fingers away, releasing his grip to throw himself against the wall.
Ashe. Ashe. The man watching him with the clumped lashes was muscular, as if he spent a good
amount of his time in the gym, with a prominent nose and full, trembling, lips, skin a hypnotizing
shade of medium brown. There was nothing of that woman, except for the eyes.
Jack would call this Ashe a liar. Toss him out under the dark skies spitting thunder and lightning
for attempting such a sick joke.
Except for the eyes.
He remembered when emergency services finally arrived at the cemetery, they’d tried to stop him.
Tried to pronounce her dead. Tried to haul him off her. But he’d fought them off.
One last time. Let me try one last time, he’d begged. He’d never looked up from her face, so
pale, so still, but he’d felt their pity for him, because he couldn’t let her go. Couldn’t accept that this
woman he didn’t know could be gone. He’d ignored them and performed CPR one last time and when
her lashes fluttered open, it’d been all he could do to not collapse onto her battered and broken body.
The pained confusion in her eyes gutted him then.
The pained loss in Ashe’s expression pissed him off.
“You gave me this.” Ashe held out a card that he pulled from the pocket of the wet jeans he’d
taken off.
Jack snatched it from him, squinting at it. His card from his days working out of the Los Angeles
FBI’s field office before he abandoned them to join the DEA and move back to Atlanta. None of his
contact information was the same, of course. He flipped it over, reading the words in his familiar
scrawl out loud. “Ashley, you’re stronger than you think. This too shall pass. Fight. Fight to live.
Fight to be who you’re supposed to be.”
Ashe sat straighter, his back against the toilet, hands all fidgety in his lap. “You helped me.” He
cleared his throat, lifting his chin to meet Jack’s stare head on. “When I had no one, I had your card
and your words. When I didn’t believe in myself, I had you believing in me.”
Christ. It was too early for the kind of heavy shit this guy was talking. Jack licked his lips, hunting
for the taste of liquor that was evaporating faster than any hopes he had for solitude. “Why are you
here? How did you find me?”
“Hired a PI.” Ashe glanced down at his hands, fingers all twisted around each other, then back to
his face. “I needed to get away.”
A laugh barreled its way past Jack’s lips, coming out harsh in the small space. “And you came to
me?” Oh, this was just getting better by the minute, wasn’t it?
The vulnerability that had Ashe’s eyes shining before disappeared and in its place was a fierce
spark that Jack almost admired. “I came to thank you for saving me. I came to tell the man who
believed in me and encouraged me—a stranger—way before I had the strength and courage to believe
in myself, that his efforts weren’t ever in vain.” He swallowed, nostrils flaring, his chest rising and
falling rapidly as his wavering words settled uncomfortably in Jack’s gut.
“I’m nobody’s hero.” God’s honest truth right there.
Ashe grimaced. “Lucky for both of us, I’m not looking for a hero, Jack.” He spoke Jack’s name
like a caress. Shit was…weird. “You’re a door I need closed. I’m here to do that. Step one on my
journey to saving myself.” He leaned toward Jack. “Rest easy, Agent Wellington, I’m not here to drag
you away from your guns and your liquor. Your services aren’t required.”
More than ever Jack needed a drink. “Is that why you’re in a fucking heap on my bathroom floor?”
Ashe simply stared at him under furrowed brows, lips tightly pressed together. “Thank you, Jack,”
he said finally. Softly. “For bringing me back to life, in more ways than one. Your words kept me
going, kept me alive, kept me fighting even on the days I couldn’t make it out of bed. I don’t know if
you understand, Jack, and I don’t care to go deeper than I already have, but I am grateful. Forever
grateful.”
You’re welcome seemed such a shitty and inadequate thing to say after that. He wanted to ask
questions, find out what happened to the woman he’d pulled from that grave. What happened to the
man opposite him with broken shadows in his eyes and false courage in his words?
A rumble of thunder shook the cabin. Ashe jumped with a gasp, arms wrapping around his body.
Jack mourned the bottle of vodka he’d left out in the living room, the one he didn’t get to finish.
“I’m sorry for just showing up.” Ashe was hoarse suddenly, as if he’d spent a good few hours
shouting at the top of his lungs. Jack frowned, flipping the card between his fingers. “I didn’t—didn’t
know a storm was coming. I’m usually better prepared.” He uttered a self-deprecating laugh. “I was
just excited to finally meet you.”
Jesus. “Why was meeting me so important?”
Lightning flashed, an otherworldly electric blue in the depths of Ashe’s eyes. “Sometimes you’re
a ghost with eyes I can’t ignore, calling my dead-name until she appears. And I disappear.” Emotion
roughened his voice and Ashe cleared his throat. “Sometimes the only thing that keeps me from taking
a razor to my wrists—again—are the words on the back of the card.”
Fuck. Me.
 “I had to make sure you were real,” Ashe rasped. “I had to touch you, just once. Tell me, Jack…
are you real?”
That question had layers Jack wasn’t drunk enough to peel back. Not that he was about to on this
cold bathroom floor with a stranger with familiar eyes. “No.”
At that answer, Ashe slouched backward, throat working.
“The man you think I am, he doesn’t exist, Ashe.” That guy had long since burned out, died out.
He’d seen too much. Done way more, none of it good. “Don’t make me responsible for you. That’s the
surest way to be disappointed.”
“Who do I think you are?”
“Some type of savior?” Jack scoffed, shrugging. “You’ve got the wrong one. That shit isn’t real.”
Ashe’s lips twisted. “Jack, you pulled a gun on me, threatened to hurt me, yet the instant I looked
into your eyes tonight all I’ve felt is safe. The idea of what you give me is as real as the fear in your
eyes.”
“Fear?” Head cocked, Jack asked, “What do you think I’m afraid of?”
The saddest smile creased Ashe’s round face. “Memories. Same as me, I’m guessing. Reminders
of a time when you weren’t this person, hiding up in the mountains, liquor coming out of your pores.”
He pursed his lips. “What happened to you, Jack?”
Jack opened his mouth to tell him to mind his own fucked-up business.
Thunder boomed.
The lights went out, plunging them into darkness.
And Ashe started screaming.

“L OOK WHAT YOU MADE ME DO .”

One minute Ashe was good and the next he was in darkness, the taunting words ringing over and
over in his ears. Hands at his throat, choking him as he tried to scream, but he couldn’t hear his own
voice, pleading for his life. He heard those words as he sank into the darkness that enveloped him so
thoroughly.
“Look what you made me do, Ashley.”
He was supposed to fight, but something held him down. He was supposed to be louder, but those
screams…
Those screams, all they did was tear his throat up. Helplessness wasn’t unfamiliar; neither was
the pain. The shame. Fighting back would solve nothing. Long ago he’d learned to take it, accept it so
that it could all end sooner.
“Ashe.”
But he was so tired of being broken. Tired of hunting for the lost pieces of himself while on his
knees with a boot in his back.
“Ashe.”
Tears cascaded down his cheeks, tangible proof of his weakness.
“You want to leave me? The only way out is death.”
Then Ashe was in that grave, clawing, lungs burning, terror an ice bath he couldn’t get out of.
He’d pissed himself when reality set in that he was dying. Chewed his tongue bloody with the fear.
Until everything just floated. Until he couldn’t move, couldn’t hear.
 So heavy. Everything was heavy and he wanted to sleep to escape the pain. To escape the horrors.
A hand settled on his shoulder, shaking him.
Ashe flailed, finding his voice again to scream although he knew nobody would hear.
“Ashe. Goddamn it!”
He jerked, the sobs getting all tangled in his throat, escaping as a hiccup as his wet lashes flew
open.
Oh.
Shit.
“Jack.” He was in Jack’s lap on the floor. The other man’s eyes were panicked, a thin red scratch
decorating his left cheek. Ashe instinctively knew he’d been the one to deliver that mark. He’d lost it
again; after weeks of not having flashbacks, he was losing it left and right in front of this man. “Jack.”
He reached out to touch Jack’s face, but Jack jerked his head away, out of his reach. “I’m so sorry.”
Ashe blinked away the tears from his eyes. “Jack.” It was like he couldn’t stop saying that name. It
grounded him somehow, kept him from falling right back down that deep, dark hole.
He eased out of Jack’s grasp, sitting up and hugging his knees to his chest.
“The lights went out,” Jack told him in a monotone.
Yeah, he remembered that. Except… “They’re back on now.” How long had he been sobbing on
that floor? Fuck, he needed to get his dumb ass back home. This was a mistake. His parents would
love this shit; it would be one more nail in Ashe’s coffin where they were concerned.
“Generator kicked in.” Jack’s jaw ticked when Ashe chanced a glance at him.
He’d really inconvenienced this man, hadn’t he? Showing up on Jack’s doorstep unannounced was
one thing, but this? “I’m so sorry,” he said again. “I’m—” Licking his dry lips, he shrugged.
“Obviously, I have some issues.”
“Don’t we all,” Jack grumbled. “You wanna get out of here? You’re good to move back out
there?” He nodded at the door.
“Yeah.” Ashe hauled himself to his feet and almost crashed right back onto the floor with his
wobbly ass, if Jack hadn’t grabbed his arm.
“Whoa. Easy.”
“I’m okay.” He pulled away from Jack, grabbing onto the sink to keep himself upright. “I’m
good.” He was so far from good, that shit wasn’t even funny. But he’d humiliated himself enough in
Jack’s presence. Head bent, he gulped air into his lungs. “Breathe, breathe,” he whispered to himself.
Behind him, Jack didn’t move. He just stood there silently watching Ashe grapple with calming
himself down. “I’m fine.”
He respected Jack so much for not laughing in his face at that statement.
“I’m sure you think you are.” Jack’s deep voice made the tiny bathroom feel even smaller, the
walls seeming to come at Ashe from all sides. “I just want to know why you’re here, Ashe. And don’t
feed me that regurgitated shit you did before.” He was suddenly at Ashe’s back, a menacing shadow,
but the only thing touching him was Jack’s breath at his ear. “You’re here for more than just to thank
me.”
“I already told you why I’m here.” Ashe’s legs felt steadier, so he turned around slowly. Oh. Jack
was so close, Ashe made out the tiny freckles scattered along the length of his nose. Distance made
his lashes look dark, but up close they were blond. Jack Wellington wasn’t gorgeous or anything like
that. He was just…arresting. In some weird way, Ashe just wanted to stare at him, take him in, make
sure he was really real.
Make sure his parents hadn’t succeeded in their threats and he wasn’t in some facility, medicated
out of his mind and conjuring Jack because he was the safest thing. The safest place.
The only safety.
He wrinkled his nose at the thought. How pathetic was his life that a stranger represented safety to
him?
“Hey.” Jack snapped his fingers in front of Ashe’s face. “You with me?”
Ashe sniffed, narrowing his eyes. “I am. Can I have something to drink? Do you have water or…”
Jack watched him closely, sizing him up, expression making it impossible for Ashe to figure out
his thoughts. Couldn’t be anything good, though. Finally, Jack nodded and stepped back. “Yeah. Come
on.”
Ashe smothered his sigh of relief and followed him out of the stifling bathroom.
“Sit.” Jack motioned to the couch as he strode over to the kitchenette area, which was just as
small as the bathroom.
Ashe sat, mostly because he was tired as hell and his bum knees weren’t acting right. Hands
folded in his lap, he looked on as Jack took a bottle of water from a fridge almost as tall as Ashe’s
knee. Just as Jack handed him the water, a deafening crash came from outside.
Ashe lurched to his feet. “What the—”
Jack dashed over to the window, hands cupping either side of his eyes as his forehead banged
against the glass. “Goddamn it!”
“What?” Ashe knelt on the couch and peered out the window. Outside was pitch black, which
made it difficult to see anything at first, but a flash of lightning remedied that quickly, illuminating
Ashe’s vehicle.
And the huge tree that had apparently landed on it, smashing the windshield.
“Shit.” A flat tire was bad enough, but this?
Jack spun away from the window and grabbed the bottle of liquor that had been languishing on the
floor near the couch. He paced as he drank straight from the bottle to the head as Ashe watched him
with mounting anxiety.
Shit. “I—I can call Triple A,” Ashe said. “I mean, it’s fine. Once the rain eases up, I’ll call them
so they can send somebody out.”
“No cell phone service up here.” Jack didn’t stop pacing. “And do you know why that is?” The
liquid slashed as he brought the bottle to his lips and swallowed.
“Why?” Ashe whispered.
“Because I wanted to be alone!” Jack roared. “Because I don’t want to be bothered. Because I
want to wake up drunk and fall asleep drunk, and not have somebody around giving me shit about it.
Somebody like you with your—with your haunted eyes filled with expectations.”
“Jack.”
“And the way you say my fucking name like that!” Jack ran up on him so quickly, Ashe didn’t have
time to step back or cower or anything. Jack was just…in his face. Chest to chest. “Quit that shit.”
Ashe blinked. He had no idea what Jack meant. “I-I’m—”
“Why are you here, Ashe? Hm?” This close, Ashe could get drunk off Jack’s breath, could taste
the fire in the liquor the other man sipped as though it were water. “Answer that for me,” Jack
murmured, head tilting closer to Ashe’s. “Answer that and I won’t put you outside in that monster of a
storm.”
“You can’t do that.” Ashe gaped at him.
Jack smiled at him, his head cocked, expression indulgent. “You won’t be the first person to tell
me what I can and can’t do. You also won’t be the last one disappointed when I prove ’em wrong.
Answer the question, Ashe.”
He’d chided Ashe for the way he spoke his name, but when Jack used Ashe’s name like that, he
felt present. Seen. Accepted. Which was fucked up, because Jack damn sure didn’t mean it in that
way.
Why was he afraid to tell Jack the truth? What did it matter, if after this moment in time they
would never see each other again? He stared into Jack’s blue eyes, dulled the tiniest bit by the liquor.
“I ran away.”
Jack straightened, his eyes narrowing dangerously.
“I’m hiding from my parents,” Ashe continued, and Jack’s eyes just kept on narrowing until Ashe
could barely see those tempting blues anymore. “They’re trying to get me committed. They think I’m
crazy.”
“Are you?”
Ashe huffed out a laugh. “You should never ask a crazy person if they’re crazy, Jack.”
“I’m not asking a crazy person, I’m asking you.” Jack moved in the barest bit, nose brushing
Ashe’s. “Are you crazy, Ashe?”
 5

THE MAN who stood before Jack as if he hadn’t just screamed bloody murder while fighting against an
enemy only he could see, had a mole just under his right eye and a small, healed scar almost
completely hidden under his left eyebrow. Ashe was like an onion; it had barely been an hour since
he’d destroyed Jack’s stillness with his presence, and already he’d exposed so much.
But Jack needed to know if Ashe was indeed crazy, because his life could only accommodate one
nutjob at a time, and Jack had first rights. So, he asked again, “Are you crazy, Ashe?”
Ashe grinned, nothing real about it, but his slightly crooked teeth captured Jack’s attention for a
moment. She’d been missing her two front teeth, the woman he’d pulled from that grave.
“Maybe I am.” Ashe cocked his head. “Does that make you wanna grab your gun, Jack? I think
nobody would fault you.”
It wasn’t the words that had Jack’s spine straightening. It was the bitter pain, a jarring thread
running throughout Ashe’s every syllable. “Somebody wants you dead?” What the fuck did he care?
Ashe chuckled and sank onto the couch, sitting back with his knees apart as he stared up at Jack.
“Do you have siblings, Jack? Do you know what it means to be the middle child? At least, for me?”
He didn’t give Jack a chance to answer. “You get left out, you get forgotten. You get passed over,
because the oldest has responsibilities and the youngest is the baby. The middle child gets invisibility
disguised as freedom. Sometimes it’s good, you get away with shit. But if you’re me, you go looking
for someone to fill your empty spaces. And you choose the very last person you should, but you stay
despite the red flags, hoping the moment you show them who you truly are, they’ll give you what your
family never could. Acceptance.”
“Ashe.” Maybe it was the liquor, but Jack’s chest burned and he fisted his hands at the urge to rub
it. He mourned the loss of his solitude, hated the man who stole it from him, but Jack wanted to hear
Ashe out. Find out what happened to him. How he ended up in the grave. How he ended up here,
fucking with Jack, yanking instincts he thought he’d drowned with liquor back to the surface.
“I’m not crazy, Jack.” Ashe’s lips twisted, eyes red-rimmed but dry. “But trying to kill yourself
once or twice kinda puts your mental health into question. Know what I mean? Rejecting my parents’
ideas of who I should be in favor of who I know I am also didn’t help.”
“What does that mean?”
Ashe hummed, pinching the bridge of his nose. “It means, I didn’t come here to feed you my sad
story.” He swallowed. “Said it before, but I’m sorry for just showing up. I mean that.”
“You said you ran away.” This man ran from his family and ran to Jack. How fucked was that?
“Yep.” Ashe nodded. He picked up his water and took a sip, gaze holding Jack’s in an intense
grip. “I admire you for doing this, isolating yourself. I imagine sleeping is easier.”
He imagined wrong, but Jack didn’t correct him. “I don’t like people.”
Ashe barked a laugh. “Oh, yeah. People are just the fucking worst.”
That laugh was genuine and Jack stared at him, at the sudden lightness that flooded his eyes for a
moment as if Ashe had forgotten about the invisible load on his back and attempted to take flight.
Only to crash right back to earth.
“Jack.”
Jack blinked, taking a step back. For a second, Ashe sounded like someone else. Like Jack’s ex.
They spoke his name the same: with weighted expectations, until Shane’s turned to disappointment.
Only a matter of time before Ashe followed suit.
Something for Jack to look forward to.
“Jack.”
But he closed his eyes briefly, battling the what-ifs Ashe dropped at his feet. He hadn’t lost all his
senses, otherwise he’d have shoved Ashe out into the wailing storm for speaking Jack’s name the way
only one other man ever had. He reopened his eyes, staring into Ashe’s. “What?”
“Um…” Ashe licked his lips. “Since I’m obviously not going anywhere tonight, is there
somewhere I can sleep? I’m—All those hours on the road are catching up with me.” He smothered a
yawn with the back of his hand. “Sorry.”
He kept saying that. “You can sleep where you’re at.” He jerked his chin to indicate the couch.
“I’ll get you a sheet or something.” Did he have sheets? Were they clean? He turned away, stomping
over to the bedroom he hardly ever entered. He didn’t sleep on the queen-sized bed. What was the
point? He slept right where he drank, on the couch.
He found a couple sheets in one of the drawers and grabbed them, bringing them back to Ashe,
who was now stretched out on the couch, arms up behind his head, eyes closed. He looked
vulnerable.
Alone.
Jack shook out one of the sheets and covered him, leaving the other one on the back of the couch
in case the other man needed it. Then he turned off the light. As he turned to make his way back into
the bedroom he’d never slept in, Ashe called his name.
“Jack?”
It was a kind of low-key torture, every time Ashe said his name. He didn’t turn around, though he
did pause. “Yeah?”
“Can you stay until I fall asleep?” His voice was different, softer but full of fear, almost as if he
was afraid of the impending slumber. “And, can you leave the light on?”
Jack didn’t want to feel the sudden urge he had to protect Ashe. If he opened his mouth, he’d have
declined his guest’s request out of his own self-preservation. So he didn’t speak; instead he turned on
the light, just long enough to rustle up the candles he’d bought as backups for any kind of emergency.
He lit them, all twelve of the tall, skinny, tapered candles, tipping each one over so their wax
could drip before sticking them on strategic surfaces around the cabin. Then he turned off the
overhead light.
Ashe sat up, the sheet falling to his waist as he gazed around with big eyes. “Jack.”
Goddamn it. Jack clenched his jaw. “Lie back down.” Gruff as hell, but he was allowed, wasn’t
he? “Sleep.”
Ashe didn’t seem to mind his barked command, because he settled back onto the couch, both
hands gripping the sheet, bringing it up to his neck. Jack went to him, sinking to the floor next to the
couch, missing his liquor.
“Thank you, Jack,” Ashe muttered, voice leaden with exhaustion. “You save me every time.”
Fuck. Jack simply grunted. He didn’t want to be anybody’s savior, but Ashe didn’t seem to care.
What would the expression on his face be when he realized Jack wasn’t someone he could rely on?
Would it be the same as Shane’s? Jack’s ex’s had been filled with disappointment, with a knowing
that Jack could never be enough, could never be what Shane needed him to be.
He’d never measure up and sooner or later, Ashe would get the memo.
Jack grabbed the spare sheet and stretched out on the floor, covering up. If he was lucky,
tomorrow the road should be passable and they’d be able to get Ashe’s vehicle fixed. Get the other
man on his way and out of Jack’s space.
I ran away.
What kind of life had Ashe escaped from? Nothing good, that was for damn sure. But it didn’t
matter, couldn’t matter to Jack. If he was lucky, they’d both go their separate ways and never see each
other again.
But he wasn’t lucky at all.
Because Ashe came awake screaming his name. “Jack! Jack! Jack!”
Jack lurched upright. “Ashe?”
The other man’s eyes were open, but he wasn’t truly awake, not with the potent fear pouring off
his heaving frame. “Jack!”
Jack scrambled over to him, touching his shoulder gently. “Ashe, it’s okay. I’m here.”
Ashe launched off the couch and into Jack’s arms, knocking him backward. The back of his head
thudded against the floor and he hissed at the sharp pain that lanced through his skull. Ashe climbed
his body, clutching him tightly, sobbing against Jack’s throat.
“It’s okay,” Jack murmured. “You’re safe.” Jesus. He wanted to mean that promise. Wanted it to
be true. “Ashe, you’re safe.” From what, though? The way Ashe cried rattled Jack’s soul. He
wrapped both arms around the other man, who refused to release him, keeping Jack on his back there
on the floor.
Ashe kept sobbing his name and nothing else, warm tears sliding along Jack’s neck. What had this
man been through?
“Ssh.” Jack stroked his back, up and down. Damn, he hadn’t known he still possessed the ability
to give comfort. “Hush.” He rolled them sideways, cupping Ashe’s nape to keep him pressed to his
chest. Pulling one of the cushions off the couch, Jack grunted as he forced it under his head with one
hand. He shifted, trying to get comfortable. “Sleep,” he told Ashe softly. “I’ve got you.”
For tonight.
He could only afford to care for one night.
 6

THE WARMTH WOKE ASHE. So much of it was pouring into him, sweat trickled down the small of his
back. He shifted on whatever hard surface he lay on, lifting his hand to scratch at his nape. At least,
he tried to lift his arm.
Something held him. Tight. Snug.
What—
His breath left him on a hiccup and he blinked his eyes open. He was in darkness, and that
surface?
It was a person.
That tightness?
It was their arms around him, keeping him from moving, from getting away.
No. No. His pulse galloped, chest rising and falling, and he drew deep breaths, trying to think,
trying to figure out—
“Ashe.”
His heart stuttered at the familiar voice. “J-Jack?” Oh shit. Everything came flooding back and he
froze. Why was he on top of Jack? “What happened?” His voice cracked. “Why are you holding me?”
Around him, Jack’s arms flexed and he made a low sound as he rolled to his side, taking Ashe
with him. Not once did his grip ease up. “You, uh…You had a nightmare.” Under Ashe’s chest, Jack’s
voice rumbled in the smoothest, most soothing way. “You jumped into my arms and wouldn’t let me
release you.”
Jesus Christ. Ashe bowed his head, causing his chin to brush Jack’s chest. Shame and
embarrassment heated his neck, climbing to his face and ears. This was turning out to be just the best
of times, wasn’t it? “I’m sorry.” Jesus, it felt as if that was all he’d been doing since he knocked on
Jack’s door. Apologizing. “You can let go, I’m fine now.”
But Jack didn’t and Ashe couldn’t truly say he minded. On their sides on the hard floor, they were
chest to chest, thigh to thigh, bodies pressed so close. It wasn’t a comfortable position. In fact, Ashe’s
back and shoulders ached, but Jack was all warmth. All comfort, even if he might not want any part of
Ashe.
He was a good man.
“You remind me of my grandfather,” Ashe murmured.
Jack’s body jolted when he snorted. “Wow. That’s flattering.”
“No, I mean…” Stupid mouth. He spouted the weirdest shit when he was uncomfortable. “He was
the only one who listened, who didn’t judge. He comforted me even when he didn’t understand.”
 “I’m on the floor of my cabin, holding on to a stranger I can’t seem to say no to,” Jack murmured.
“Oh, there’s a lot of judgment.” But he didn’t sound upset about it, he couldn’t be when he still had his
arms around Ashe. His breath whistled when he breathed, the faint heat licking at Ashe’s forehead.
“What do you see?” he asked. “In your nightmares, what do you see?”
Ashe inhaled sharply. He didn’t like talking about his nightmares; they put him in the most
vulnerable state. But this was Jack. “I see you.” He couldn’t help the apology in his tone. Jack hadn’t
asked for this and here Ashe was, dumping all this crap at his feet, but he’d had nobody else who
knew exactly what he’d been through. Nobody who’d get it. Did Jack get it? “You keep trying to pull
me from that grave, but the ground gives out and I sink deeper.” He paused, inhaling. Exhaling. “You
scream for me and I can’t answer because I have no voice and I have no strength to fight. So I let go. I
let go every time.” He turned his face away. The candles Jack lit earlier were out, but Ashe didn’t
know if Jack could see his face clearly when he peered at him. He didn’t want the other man seeing
the tears in his eyes.
He blinked them away.
Jack touched the small of his back, rubbing him in slow circles. Ashe really should move away,
put some distance between them, but he just wanted to soak all of Jack up, experience as much as he
could for when the time came that he didn’t have this anymore.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered.
“What for?”
Ashe turned back to him, licking his lips, tasting their tremor. “I’ve been holding on to the memory
of you in my head for so long…” He paused, drawing his hand up to tentatively brush a finger to the
base of Jack’s throat. “Now that I’ve touched you, I can’t let you go.” He swallowed. “Do I have to
let you go, Jack?”
“Ashe.” Jack’s chest rose and fell steadily. “I have nothing you want. Trust me.” His voice was
gruff, sad.
Ashe pushed away from him then, rolling away, eyes closing briefly as the cold wormed its way
back into him. Inch by inch, wiping away all of Jack’s warmth. He sat with his knees to his chest,
back against the couch as Jack sat up as well, just a touch away, watching him with cautious blue
eyes.
Even in the shadowed room, Ashe could never not find himself caught in those eyes. They were
like lights from a lighthouse, guiding him to safety. And Jack didn’t think he had anything Ashe could
want. “When I was eighteen, I met someone who didn’t mind me dressing masculine, wearing boots
and hoodies and shit like that. He loved that I wanted to hang with my brother and his friends instead
of with my little sister doing ‘girly-type shit.’” He used air-quotes for that last bit. “He had no
problems letting me fuck him with my strap-on, and he’d boast to his friends about all the shit his
girlfriend did that theirs didn’t. He loved me.”
Jack got to his feet, re-lighting the candles then sitting back down, never once speaking.
Ashe continued, “He loved me, that’s what I thought. Even though the first time I mentioned
wanting to be called Ashe instead of Ashley, he took away all my clothes and left me locked up naked
and alone in the house for an entire weekend.”
Jack stiffened.
“He loved me, I swore he did, but when I told him I’d be using my inheritance to start my
transition, he punched me so hard, he fractured my jaw.”
“Christ.” The word exploded from Jack, making Ashe flinch. The other man scrubbed a hand over
his face in obvious agitation. “Fuck, Ashe. I’m so sorry.” He’d pulled Ashe from a grave, but was
still worked up at hearing about a punch?
Ashe shrugged. “Not your fault. I loved him and I stayed with him, because unlike my parents, his
face didn’t scrunch up in disdain when I entered the room. He didn’t treat me as if I was sick and
simply needed a couple of Xanax and some sleep. As if all I needed were some prayers and a new
dress.” A bitter smile curled his lips. “It’s astounding what the promise of belonging will trick you
into accepting.”
Jack leaned forward, the candles casting arresting shadows on his face and neck. Ashe couldn’t
look away from him. “What happened that night?”
That night. Ashe had lived the past few years deliberately trying to forget that night. “I’d gotten
the first part of my inheritance when I turned twenty-one, and secretly started the process.” He
remembered the fear, the excitement, the anxiety. The loneliness at going through all of it alone. No
one to hold his hand. No one to talk to. “I couldn’t wait anymore.” His eyes burned as he touched his
throat. “I was suffocating, Jack. I was dying and I wanted to live, I wanted to be free, to be Ashe.”
Jack came to him then, grabbing his hand. The weight of him, the warmth of his skin, was the best
anchor, grounding Ashe. Righting him.
And he thought he had nothing Ashe could want.
“He found out.” To this day Ashe had no clue how that happened. “I didn’t lie when he asked
about it.” He should have. If only he’d known what would happen. “He flew into a rage. I didn’t see
the first punch coming and by the time my head stopped spinning and my eyes refocused, I was on the
floor and he was kicking me. Jack…” He linked their fingers, clutching Jack’s hand to his chest as the
memories choked him. “I thought he loved me, but he only wanted Ashley. He didn’t want Ashe. He
didn’t want a man in his life, in his bed, he wanted a woman, and I’d never been that even when my
outside said differently.”
Jack cupped his chin, tugging him closer. “He was a fool,” he bit out, stroking Ashe’s jaw with his
thumb. “You’re amazing.”
Under that thumb, Ashe felt amazing. Locked in place by Jack’s sure gaze, he felt amazing. “He
knocked me out.” He cleared the hoarseness from his voice. “I came to in that grave, with him
shoveling dirt on my face.” Ashe’s ex left and then called the cops, crying to them that he’d just killed
his girlfriend.
“I’d been living in LA for two years, working out of the FBI field office there.” Jack’s voice was
a ripple of sound over Ashe’s battered soul, cooling, calming. “I was helping the local PD on a
separate case when the call came in about you. There’d been some confusion as to which cemetery
you were in.” His eyes flashed. “I was the only one who had it right. I was the only one there.” That
thumb? It trembled against Ashe’s skin.
“You rescued me.” Ashe cupped his face. “Jack, you keep fucking rescuing me.” Was it too much
to touch him? To caress him? Because Ashe did, dragging his knuckles down the side of Jack’s neck.
God, he was everything warm. Ashe repeated the gesture.
Jack’s eyes seemed to darken. He shuddered and his lashes dropped, hiding his expression. They
were practically in each other’s lap, touching, faces so close they could breathe each other in.
Ashe took a covert sniff, inhaling the scent of Jack’s skin. His musk. Oh man. His lower belly
clenched. Oh man.
Jack’s lashes lifted and those blue eyes zeroed in on Ashe, locked on him. “You done sniffing
me?”
Christ. Ashe gulped. “Y-Yeah. You, um…You smell good.”
Jack’s jaw ticked. “I smell like you.” His stare dipped from Ashe’s eyes to his lips then back. “I
need to get up.”
“Okay.” Ashe nodded then realized his hands were all over the other man, preventing him from
moving. “Oh.” He snatched his hands away and scooted backward. “Sorry.”
Jack stood and paused, staring down at him. “Stop apologizing, Ashe. There isn’t a goddamn thing
you should be sorry for.” He strode away with Ashe gaping after him.
This man—Jack fucking Wellington—thought he had nothing Ashe could possibly want, while
Ashe sat on his numb ass wondering how he’d get himself back into Jack’s arms.
Because he wanted back in.
 7

J ACK TURNED ON THE LIGHTS — THANKS to the generator that kicked in automatically—then plugged in
the electric kettle with his back to Ashe, ignoring the fine tremor vibrating his fingers. It was unfair,
the familiarity of Ashe. The solid weight of him. The strength in his voice despite the tears making his
eyes shine like precious stones.
So fucking unfair that Jack wanted to stay on that floor and let Ashe sniff him to his heart’s
content.
“Jack.”
His body jerked, something coming awake and stretching inside every single time Ashe spoke his
name in that way—with a hoarse ache, a wicked tenor Jack could listen to all night.
Christ. He cast his gaze to the microwave he’d purchased at a secondhand store when he’d first
arrived at the cabin. The clock had gotten messed up when the power went out, so Jack quickly reset
it, using his watch to get the accurate time. It now read 12:20 a.m. Ashe had shown up at his door
around 8, not even a proper five hours, and he was already turning Jack inside out.
Fast work.
He schooled his features and turned around. Ashe remained on the floor, staring at him with those
eyes. Goddamn it. How had this happened? Listening to Ashe’s story sparked so much fury in his
belly. He wanted to find that son of a bitch who hurt Ashe and make him suffer. Destroy him.
Dropping the hands he’d folded over his chest, he fisted them at his sides, out of Ashe’s view. “I
didn’t know anything about you except the first name they gave me, but I remember the profound relief
when you finally opened your eyes,” he said softly. “I remember taking a breath only after you’d taken
one. I remember you clung to me so tightly.” Those memories, he hadn’t ever unpacked them and now
they were a garrote at his throat, threatening to take his neck off. “You didn’t want me to let me go.”
He hadn’t wanted to let go either, but he’d had work, responsibilities that couldn’t wait. “But I
couldn’t stay,” he said softly. “That’s why I left the note.”
Ashe stared at him. Jack rocked on the balls of his feet, fighting the desperate thing inside urging
that he go to Ashe. Touch him again. Experience that otherworldly shit again.
“I had to put you aside.” He glanced away. “Because I went undercover for a time and I couldn’t
worry about the beautiful woman I’d pulled from a fucking grave.” He returned his gaze to Ashe, who
sat there unblinking. “Time and distance meant I could forget you. And I did.”
It felt wrong now. Forgetting.
Ashe swallowed. “What else were you supposed to do, Jack? I’d never been your responsibility.”
He scrambled onto his knees, gaze still on Jack. “Should I hate you for leaving me behind?”
 He should. Shane hated Jack for leaving him behind. Work got in the way. Duty over everything
else, no matter who got caught in the fallout. He wasn’t supposed to feel the aftereffects of the
wreckage, but he always did. Every time he chose duty, he cut off a little bit of himself.
The kettle whistled at his back and he focused on that, pouring the boiling water over the honey
and tea bag he’d placed in a chipped mug. He stirred it some then brought the cup to Ashe, who lifted
an eyebrow but took the tea anyway.
“It’s chamomile,” Jack said as he sat beside him. “My mother swears by it. Says it helps her
sleep.” He’d tried it a few times, but he preferred to let liquor be his sleep aid.
Ashe’s lips quirked as he blew into the cup. “Thank you.”
Jack shrugged. “I just hope it helps.”
“Why are you hiding up here, Jack?”
“Your private investigator didn’t tell you that?”
Ashe didn’t flinch away from the harsh question. “I didn’t ask him for your life story. I only
wanted your location.” He took a loud sip of the tea then regarded Jack steadily. Fuck those eyes,
shredding Jack methodically. “Someone hurt you? Is that it?”
“My business is mine,” Jack shot at him. “Mine alone.”
Ashe’s jaw flexed and he put the cup down between them on the floor. “What if I want to make it
mine?”
Fuck. Me. “Ashe—”
“What did they do, this person that sent you running to lick your wounds up in these mountains?
That’s got you swimming in the bottom of a bottle?”
“You don’t know shit!” Jack leaned forward into Ashe’s face, nose to nose. He heard his own
rasping breaths as he glared at Ashe. “Don’t presume to know anything about me.”
“Ah, Jack.” The cup came back into view as Ashe brought it to his lips without looking away. “I
don’t have to presume. Your actions, and that wounded look in your eyes, speak clearly.”
This fucking guy with honey on his breath and fatigue in his eyes… This fucking guy. Jack stared
at him—the flare of his nostrils, the curve of his lips, the way those same lips shined when Ashe slid
his tongue across the bottom one. The sight gripped Jack by the throat, making breathing impossible.
His heart hammered and his lower half burned with the most languid and unexpected heat.
He jerked backward.
“Jack.” Ashe reached for him, grabbing him by the knee.
Jack hissed, eyes slamming shut, and it had nothing to do with Ashe’s nails clawing at him through
his jeans. There was a relief in Ashe’s touch that he didn’t deserve. A relief he shouldn’t want.
“Don’t do that,” he spoke without opening his eyes.
“Don’t touch you?”
He opened his eyes slowly, immediately getting sucked in by Ashe’s gaze. “Yes,” he whispered.
Ashe snatched his hand away. “Because you don’t want my touch?”
Shit. The shame in Ashe’s voice hit Jack in the gut. “Not because I don’t want it,” he rasped.
Before he allowed himself to yank Ashe’s hand back and place it where it’d been, he got to his feet,
holding out a hand. “Come.”
Ashe blinked up at him. “Where?”
“To the bedroom. You’re tired, I can see it.”
Ashe’s lips curved. “Thought you weren’t about to have me sleep in your bed?”
Great, now all Jack wanted was Ashe sleeping in his bed. He shrugged nonchalantly. “If I’m
gonna be holding you all night, we need something more comfortable than the fucking couch.”
 Ashe’s eyebrows shot up. “Holding me all night?”
Shit. “Yeah. Uh.” He scratched the back of his head, glancing away briefly. “You slept—you slept
better when I was holding you, so I figured…” Which was stupid.
Ashe wrapped both hands around the mug and seemed to rock back and forth for a second there.
“And you?” he asked softly. “How did you sleep when you were holding me, Jack?”
Like a man who should know better. Like a man who didn’t give a fuck about the ache in his back,
the cramp in his arms, or the crick in his neck. “Good.” He coughed lightly. “I slept good.”
Ashe searched his face before nodding once. “Okay.” He held out the hand not holding the mug to
Jack, who took it, clasping him tightly and hauling him upright.
And they stood there, not touching, but close enough that Jack could once again experience all
those unfair things like the heat of Ashe’s body and the scent of him—whatever that cologne was that
made Jack want to go hunting for it under Ashe’s clothes, nose first.
It was unfair.
He turned away, but Ashe gripped his chin, forcing Jack to look back and face him.
“Jack, you’re a revelation.”
He had nothing but rapid blinks as Ashe smiled at him, fingertips on his chin.
“Whatever they did, that person who hurt you, you didn’t break,” Ashe whispered. “You’re still
so strong.” Those fingers trailed the curve of Jack’s jaw, teased his earlobe. “Still the same man I
saw when I opened my eyes after coming back from the dead. I know who you are. They don’t, so
fuck ’em.”
This. Fucking. Guy.
 8

“THIS IS STUPID .” Ashe hovered in the bedroom doorway, still fully clothed, in bare feet. He stared
from Jack to the space next to him on the bed.
Honestly, it was stupid as hell. Jack didn’t know what the hell he’d been thinking when he’d
suggested he’d hold Ashe while the other man slept. But he had, so here they were, Jack acting as if
he didn’t want to call this shit off right then and there. But he’d made the offer. Ashe accepted, and
now Jack just had to deal with this torture.
It would be torture.
The only thing left undecided was whether it would be the good or bad kind.
“You don’t have to do this if you don’t want to,” he told Ashe. “I just figured…” He shrugged. He
just figured Ashe needed something and he could give it, provide it. That part of him had been in
hibernation for a long time, only to wake at Ashe’s appearance at his door.
He’d done his best to smother the part of him that didn’t like to see another person in pain. All the
better to get the job done. It’d worked so well for him when it had come to Shane. He’d watched his
ex suffer and done nothing to stop it, not even for a man he’d loved forever, it seemed. But Ashe only
had to speak his name in that haunting tone of his and suddenly Jack was offering up his bed, his arms,
his fucking sanity.
Ashe walked toward the bed with hesitant steps, eyes on Jack. “Can I sleep closest to the door?”
“Yeah,” Jack reassured him quickly then cleared his throat. “Whatever you need.”
Ashe’s mouth curved and he got onto the bed when Jack scooted backward, then he turned, giving
Jack his back as he settled, shifting restlessly. “You found clean sheets, huh?”
“Yeah.” Jack smoothed his palm along the mattress, over the solid gray sheet he’d hurriedly used
to make the bed while Ashe used the bathroom. “Uh, I forgot my sisters bought me this set.”
“Wait.” Ashe glanced over his shoulder. “You have siblings?”
Jack smirked at his wide-eyed stare. “Did your PI not tell you anything about me?”
“I told you already. I literally gave him your name and told him to find you.” Ashe faced forward,
head on the pillow. “What did I need to know your life story for?”
Jack eyed the curve of his neck. His exposed nape. His body heat was like a forest fire, no less
smothering. But somehow, Jack could only think about getting closer, and doing things he’d had no
desire to do for a very long time. Ashe’s presence in his life, in his bed, was pure fucking destruction.
“You want to know my life story now, don’t you?”
Ashe made a soft sound. “I want to know what you want to share.”
Jack couldn’t stop staring at him, the way he held himself there so still. “What if I don’t want to
share anything with you?”
“That’s on you.” Ashe still didn’t look at him and his voice was softer, lower. “But you promised
to hold me, Jack. I’m gonna insist you keep that promise.”
He was more than ready to make good on that promise. Which was why Jack hadn’t done so yet.
“Why?”
He didn’t think Ashe would answer, he remained quiet for so long. Jack held himself as stiffly as
Ashe did, breathing softly, gaze riveted to the back of Ashe’s head. It was the most captivating thing
he’d seen since he’d exiled himself to this cabin.
“Because I want it. And because I need somebody, somewhere, to keep a promise to me. Just
once.” His words were so low, Jack had to lean forward in order to hear him, making the mattress
groan in the process.
“So I can touch you?”
“Yes.”
The shaking started in his stomach and somehow made it to his fingertips. Lying on his left side,
Jack lifted his right hand, hovering it over Ashe’s shoulder. “I can put my hands on you?” he asked
hoarsely.
“Yes.” Ashe’s voice was no better, all thready and shit.
Outside, the driving rain had died down, but the wind still howled. Every now and again lightning
flashed. They’d kept the bedroom light off, but the door open, and the light Jack insisted on leaving on
in the kitchen shined brightly still, enveloping the room in a yellowy spotlight with just enough
shadow.
One minute the bed felt like an ocean, never-ending, but the instant Jack put his hand on Ashe’s
shoulder and felt the other man’s flinch, there suddenly wasn’t enough space.
He surged as close as he could to Ashe’s back without their bodies coming into full contact. “Are
you okay?” he asked at Ashe’s nape.
“Jack.”
“Yeah?”
“Put your arms around me.”
Jack had never had the misfortune of proposing to someone, or having someone ask the same of
him, but those words, Ashe’s request, somehow felt as big as that. As monumental. And Jack had been
running and hiding from big things for a while now.
But it didn’t matter, right?
He was simply doing Ashe a favor. It was no big deal. All he had to do…
All he had to do was get in closer, until his nose bumped the back of Ashe’s head. Jack inhaled
and fuck! Focus. All he had to do was this simple thing, lower his arm around Ashe’s waist. Just.
Like—
Oh, he felt good.
God, he felt good.
Jack swallowed a groan, eyes squeezing shut only to reopen quickly when Ashe touched his hand,
the one resting near his stomach.
Caressing him. “You feel good, Jack.”
How was it that those four words just about slayed him here in this bed? Nothing he could do to
hide the tremors now running through his limbs, except maybe pray. “Go—” He cleared his throat,
swallowing roughly. “Go to sleep.” He wouldn’t be sleeping, not while spooning Ashe, the other
man’s cologne all up in his nose, doing fucked-up things to him while his body heat incinerated Jack’s
common fucking sense.
He would not be sleeping.
But he held Ashe in the curve of his body, trying not to be too obvious about nosing his nape as he
closed his eyes and spoke. “I’m an Army brat,” he said softly. “Born in Germany. I have two older
sisters.”
“You’re the baby,” Ashe breathed.
“I am, but I’m also the only boy. There were expectations.” Some he accepted, most he rebelled
against. “My parents are divorced, but they still live together. Last I checked my dad was doing his
best to scare away my mom’s latest boyfriend.” He couldn’t help a grin at that. His old man was a
character and he’d never been shy about wanting his woman back. “My sisters are both married with
kids and they co-own a bunch of clothing stores all over Atlanta.” He was proud of them, and he
actually liked being an uncle.
“Sounds like you have a great family, Jack.”
“I do, yeah.” He nodded even though Ashe couldn’t see.
“So why are you here in this bed with me?”
Jack blew out a breath. He didn’t like talking about Shane. It showcased all his mistakes, all his
failures, and the fact that he simply hadn’t been enough. “I loved someone. We worked together, did
most everything together.” Except live together. The moment he’d brought that up, he’d lost Shane.
“He went undercover and I was his handler, it’s how we always did it. This time he fell in love with
one of the bad guys.”
“Oh.”
Yeah. Pablo Castillo hadn’t been their target, but that was simply because they could never make
anything stick to his ass. “Shane had requested we take a break before he went under, but I thought…”
“You thought he’d come back to you.”
Jack’s breath hitched when Ashe linked their fingers. “Yeah. I—Except he had a choice, I gave
him a choice, and he chose the killer instead.” Never a good feeling when someone picked a killer, a
gunrunner, instead of you. How bad do you have to be to lose in that contest? “He got hurt, his identity
got compromised, and I wasn’t there to save him. The criminal he loved saved him.” Yet another hit
to the ego. “He came back to work and I asked him to go on another undercover assignment.” This
time he full on buried his face in Ashe’s nape, eyes shut tightly as he dealt with those fucked-up
memories. “He had to act as a meth user while surrounded by the real thing. People dealing and using.
I was supposed to watch out for him, to protect him, and I didn’t.”
“Jack.”
Jack shook his head, tightening his hold on Ashe. “He didn’t check in with me for over a month
and I told no one, alerted no one.” The guilt was unrelenting, even now. “I knew from day one, the
second he didn’t check in at our regularly scheduled time, that something was wrong, but I waited and
I waited and I waited.”
“Why did you?” Ashe glared over his shoulder, eyebrows furrowed.
“Because his man would come in and kill everybody, and I needed to make my case. The job
came before everything, Ashe. Even the man I loved.” He’d never stopped loving Shane. He hadn’t
stopped believing he was the better man. Until the moment he saw Shane in that hospital bed. “I
finally caved and contacted his man.” He remembered the punch Castillo threw when Jack delivered
the news. A punch that knocked him on his ass and almost ended his life. And he remembered that
moment when Shane managed to find a phone. His one call hadn’t been to Jack. “He did what I knew
he would. Killed everybody and saved Shane.” His lips twisted. “I thought I was better than him, you
know. Better than the man who killed people like it was nothing. Who wore violence the way some
people wore fucking bespoke suits. I thought I was better than him, until Shane was in that hospital
bed hooked up to machines because he’d been shot up with so much shit he almost died.”
“I’m so sorry,” Ashe whispered.
“They’re married now. That man I called a criminal? He walked away from everything to be with
Shane. He sacrificed everything for him. And I know for a fact that the only reason he hasn’t killed me
yet is because it would hurt Shane.”
“Is that why you’re up here, you’re hiding from that guy?”
Jack snorted. “No.” He’d never been afraid of Pablo Castillo, though he damn well should know
better. “I’m up here because I needed to figure some things out. All the shit I’ve done throughout the
years, I need to figure out what it all meant. I need to figure out when exactly I stopped being human
and became a machine focused on just the job.” And how it happened that he’d allowed jealousy and
spite to dictate his actions.
“Has it been working?”
Hell no. The silence only echoed back his own flaws and faults, which in turn sent him to the
bottom of a bottle. “Why don’t you try to close your eyes and rest, huh?” He was done talking about
himself.
Ashe sighed and snuggled back into him with a low hum. Jack gritted his teeth at the feel of him
rousing his body. He couldn’t help it, not with the way Ashe fit so perfectly against him. He brought
his left hand up, draping it over Ashe’s head on the pillow, fingers somehow finding their way to
Ashe’s head, scraping his scalp.
Shit.
He was out of control, but Ashe didn’t seem to mind the touching. In fact, his breathing evened out
as Jack’s fingers danced over his scalp. There was something about this man that made it impossible
for Jack to hold on to the standoffish facade he’d been cultivating recently. Something about Ashe and
the way he smelled, the way he felt, the way he spoke that made it difficult for Jack to not want to do
anything to make him smile. In just the span of mere hours he was fucking Jack’s shit all the way up.
He held Ashe as he succumbed to sleep, until Jack’s fingers stilled and his arms went numb. But
Ashe didn’t move, save for his chest, so Jack didn’t either. Even though being so close to Ashe had
him sweating, his body tight and aching for things it would never get. He held Ashe.
Even when the other man started flailing in his sleep, crying out jumbled words Jack couldn’t
understand. He shushed him, rubbed his hip, and murmured against his nape. Twice, Ashe came
awake crying and twice Jack held on to him, lips at his temple, whispering shit he had no business
whispering.
Promising things he had no business promising.
But he whispered. He promised. And he didn’t let Ashe go.
 9

A HUFF of breath on the back of his neck made Ashe stir. Made him shiver. And the instant he roused,
he recognized where he was and the identity of the man holding him. Didn’t stop him from wanting to
squirm away, though, especially when he remembered bits and pieces of the restless sleep.
Jack’s grip on him as he cried.
Jack’s whispers soothing him, urging him back to sleep.
His left side ached from him being in one position too long, but he remained curled up, his back to
Jack, mind searching for a way for him to crawl out from under Jack’s heavy arm without waking him.
The ideal thing would be to get dressed and get the fuck out of here before Jack woke. But that was
fanciful thinking given the condition of his vehicle.
He’d have to call Triple A, and he couldn’t even do that in the cabin with no cell service.
Another huff of breath.
Ashe inhaled. He needed to pee and his belly rumbled since he hadn’t eaten anything in God knew
how long. If this were any other time, he wouldn’t move. He’d stay in the surprisingly comfy bed,
practically mummified in Jack’s arms.
Jack stiffened behind him.
Oh shit.
Ashe held his breath.
The arm around him flexed, but didn’t move.
“Morning.”
Jack’s voice rumbled, shrouded in sleep, vibrating against Ashe’s neck. The hair on his body
stood on end.
“Good morning, Jack.” Ashe didn’t budge, didn’t turn his head even an inch. He kept his gaze on
the bathroom door, his bladder protesting. “Thank you for last night.” Even overtaken as he’d been by
his nightmares, Jack’s presence had been impossible to ignore.
He felt Jack’s shrug. “No big deal.” So easily he dismissed himself. As if anybody else would
invite a strange man to their bed and help ease his nightmares. “Sounds like the storm has passed.”
“Uh…” Outside did seem strangely quiet after all that racket last night. “Yeah.”
“We should get up.” But he didn’t sound as if he wanted to.
And Ashe wanted to, he did, but he didn’t.
“You okay?” Jack’s fingers spread on Ashe’s hip. “You’re not looking at me.”
Ashe huffed. “I don’t know what white-boy potion you’ve been sipping on that’s got you thinking
morning breath doesn’t exist, but um…I’m gonna need to see a toothbrush before I look at you.”
 Jack coughed. “Toothbrushes are under the sink. New,” he said quickly. “Did you know the dollar
store sells, like, a ten-pack for a dollar?”
Apparently that’s what they were doing, discussing toothbrushes while Ashe struggled not to pee
the bed. He eased himself closer to the edge of the bed. “I’m—I have to pee.”
“Oh.” Jack flung himself backward, ripping his warmth away so thoroughly, Ashe had to bite his
lip to silence a sound of protest. “Shit. Sorry. Go.”
Ashe rolled his eyes. “Thank you for the permission, Jack.” He got off the bed and made his way
to the bathroom, making sure to close the door behind him. His lower belly cramped as he sat on the
toilet and went about relieving himself. He’d struggled with dysphoria in the early days when, despite
his top surgery and the physical transformation his body went through, he still had to sit to pee. He’d
tried using STP—Stand-to-Pee—devices, but found even the top-of-the-line ones to be horribly
uncomfortable. Peeing in public had been a nightmare for him because he’d linked his identity as a
man to using the bathroom standing up. In one of the groups he used to belong to, it had been a
dividing topic. Some trans men didn’t link their identity with STP, while others did. For Ashe, it took
a while but he finally understood that some cis-guys–even those identifying as straight–sat to use the
toilet because of health issues or just personal preference.
Now, it wasn’t something he allowed himself to fret about, even in public settings.
When he finished, he wiped and straightened his clothes before washing his hands and brushing
his teeth. Then he washed his face and returned to the bedroom to find the rumpled bed empty.
“Jack?” Ashe went in search of him. The cabin’s front door was open and Ashe gaped when he
stood in the doorway. The front yard was a mess; large tree limbs littered the ground. His SUV was
all fucked up, tires flat, the windshield busted out and yet another massive limb on top of the vehicle.
“Shit.”
Jack appeared, coming from the direction of the main road, the soft ground squishing under his
black work boots as he climbed over the fallen branches. His hair was all ruffled as if he’d been
running his fingers through it, and he’d changed. At least, the t-shirt was different. The jeans were the
same.
“What’s going on?” Ashe asked, as if he didn’t see the wreckage in front of them.
“Road’s closed in both directions for the next few hours according to the workers out there.”
Jerking a thumb in the direction he'd just come from, Jack didn’t look at Ashe as he squeezed past and
into the cabin. “You’re stuck with me for now.”
Ashe turned to him, closing the door softly. “I’m sorry.” More than he could ever say. Jack didn’t
want him in his space, he’d always known that. Ashe didn’t blame him one bit. Who’d want him and
all the shit he came with?
“Are you hungry?” Jack’s glare was directed at the loaf of bread Ashe hadn’t seen before now. “I
can make you something.”
“You can cook?”
Jack jerked his head up at the question. His demeanor from last night was back, aloof, put out,
making Ashe feel as unwelcome as he’d felt the night before. “I’m a grown man who doesn’t like the
idea of starving, so yep. I can cook.” He stuck two slices of bread into a toaster as Ashe stared at
him.
“Listen, I know you don’t want me here.” Ashe closed the distance between them slowly. “If I
could just get cell service I can make a call and be out of here in no time.” Jack had no idea the
resources Ashe had at his disposal.
“You don’t know what the hell I want.” Jack slammed a small frying pan down on the counter.
 “Then tell me,” Ashe snapped. “I don’t read minds, Jack. That’s not my superpower. What the hell
do you want?” He swallowed. “I thought—” Could he even say it, all the things he’d been thinking?
“You thought what?” Jack’s eyes narrowed as he straightened, meeting Ashe’s gaze head on.
“I thought we had some kind of truce.” He licked his lips. Jack’s eyes appeared to get brighter,
becoming a brilliant blue Ashe found himself getting lost in, invisible ropes pulling him closer,
deeper into the middle of that swirl. “I can leave,” he continued. “I can walk to the store down the
road.” And by down the road he meant the general store he’d passed a few miles back when he’d
arrived last night. “One call gets me out of here and out of your life, Jack.” A life he hadn’t meant to
be in this long. “You can go back to guzzling your liquor in peace.” Low, but he couldn’t hold back the
dig.
Jack’s nostrils flared.
Frustration swelled in Ashe’s chest. “Do you want me to leave, Jack?”
“The roads are closed, you can’t leave.”
“But do you want me to?” Ashe almost reached out and touched him, missing the solid weight
he’d gotten used to in such a short time. Missing the warmth Jack emitted like a superhuman force
field. “You haven’t held your tongue since I showed up on your doorstep last night,” he said softly.
“Why start now? Tell me to leave and I’m gone, Jack.” His stomach chose that moment to let out a
hungry rumble.
“You should eat something.” Jack turned away, but Ashe grabbed his wrist.
“Hey.” Was it him? Was he crazy, or had that been a tremor under his fingertips? Was Jack
trembling in his grasp? “Jack.” Fuck, it was too fucking early to be this breathless. “I’ve been where I
wasn’t wanted before. Tell me to get gone and I promise you—” He licked his lips again and Jack’s
gaze, lit with blue flames, dropped to his mouth. “I promise you it’ll be like I was never here.”
The muscles in Jack’s face seemed to spasm. “That would be impossible.” His head lowered, his
cheek almost brushing Ashe’s as he rasped, “There’s no forgetting you.”
The toaster went off, startling Ashe and jerking Jack upright. The other man pivoted, giving Ashe
his back as he spread butter on toast, leaving Ashe with his jaw unhinged and his heart doing things…
Feeling things.
Was it one way, those feelings? Or was Jack experiencing them as well? Ashe would never know,
because he could never make himself ask. That’s how you got your feelings hurt, asking dumb ass
questions. What did it matter in the end? Jack didn’t know his full identity, but no doubt the shit he
already knew was enough to put him off Ashe.
Who wanted to saddle themselves with his mess? He carried around enough garbage to fill a
landfill. And Jack was…Jack was already fucked up on his own.
Still, Ashe wondered.
“Eat.”
He stared down at the plate Jack shoved in front of him. Eggs and toast. Orange juice in a red
plastic cup.
“I’ve got peanut butter, but I didn’t know if you were allergic so…”
“You’re not eating?” He only saw the one plate.
“I’m good.” Jack backed away, motioning. “There’s more, if you want.” He strode past, headed to
the bedroom, then stopped. “Ashe.”
Ashe lifted his head, a forkful of eggs in his mouth. “Yeah?”
Jack’s back was to him, and he didn’t look over his shoulder when he said, “I’m—I don’t want
you gone.” He disappeared into the bedroom. Moments later the shower came on.
Ashe smiled down at his toast.
 10

HE’ D MADE a hell of a lot of fuck ups, but as he stood in the bedroom wearing nothing but a pair of
jeans, water from his shower still dripping from his hair and down his back, Jack figured allowing
Ashe to sleep in his arms had been it.
The one mistake he’d never be able to come back from.
And he’d done some shit in the past.
He glared at the unmade bed. He’d set his mind on today being the day he’d be rid of Ashe. Not
because he didn’t want him around. It was precisely because he’d found himself getting used to
Ashe’s presence that he wanted the other man to leave. It was because it had taken nothing, nothing at
all, to hug him, soothe him through his nightmares.
And coming awake to the press of him? So warm. Not at all alarming. The feel of him, after so
long without being that close to another person?
Shit was crazy.
He yanked on a gray Henley then started pacing the bedroom. He didn’t want to go back out there
and see Ashe. He’d probably beg him to stay.
“I don’t want you gone.”
Stupid fucking—What the hell was that? Of course, he wanted Ashe gone. He needed him gone.
He flexed his fingers then folded them into his palm, making a fist. He’d go out in the yard and start
clearing up the debris from last night’s storm. That way by the time the road crew was done, Ashe
could leave.
But his SUV.
Right. Ashe’s vehicle was out of commission. Jack would have to take him wherever he needed to
go. Even Atlanta. He’d set foot in Atlanta again if it meant getting Ashe out of his life. It didn’t matter
what he wanted, so he ignored the dread coiling around his gut at the thought of not seeing Ashe again.
It had to happen.
“Jack!”
A pounding on the bedroom door had his body jerking. He strode over and yanked the door open.
“What?”
“There’s— Something’s making a whole lotta noise.”
Jack cocked his head then closed his eyes briefly when he heard the loud, consistent beeping.
“Fuck.” He pushed past Ashe and strode over to the couch, where he climbed onto the piece of
furniture and leaned over the back, unplugging the satellite phone from the wall. When he got to his
feet, Ashe gaped at him.
 “You have a phone?”
“Satellite phone.” Ignoring him, Jack stared at the phone number of the missed call on the screen.
His mother. She’d been the one to insist on having some way to keep in contact with him and so far
she’d been the only one to call him on the damn thing. He walked outside to return his mother’s call.
After the slight delay that always came with the Sat phone when connecting calls, she answered on the
first ring.
“Hello?”
He smiled. “Hey, Mom.”
“Jack, thank God!”
Her obvious relief at hearing his voice eased something in his chest. “What’s going on?” he
asked. “Why did you call?”
“I heard there was a bad storm up in the mountains last night. Somebody died,” his mother
whispered. “I wanted to make sure you’re okay.”
“I’m fine. Just some branches down over here and the roads are messed up, but that’s about it.”
He turned with the phone to his ear to find Ashe in the doorway, watching him all hawklike.
His mother heaved a sigh. “Good. Good.” Her tone grew hesitant. “Honey, listen, when are you
coming back home? I miss you. Your family misses you.”
He missed them too. Of course, he did. “I don’t know when I’ll be back, Mom. But don’t worry
about me.”
She laughed. “Spoken like a man who is not a parent.”
“Mom.” She’d better not start with the “when was he giving her grandchildren” bit.
“I didn’t say anything.”
“Uh-huh.”
“But are you okay, though? Do you have food? Are you eating, honey?”
“Yes.” Did the stale chicken from the glass case down at the store count?
“Please take care of yourself, honey. Oh, I saw Shane the other day. He was—”
He glanced away from Ashe’s gaze. “Mom, I don’t—Can we not talk about Shane?” His family
had sorta adopted Shane while the two of them were dating. He’d never truly explained why they’d
broken up, maybe because at the time he had difficulty understanding it himself. He for sure could
never tell them what he’d done, how he’d failed Shane on the undercover mission. They would hate
him.
The way he hated himself.
“Yes, of course.” His mother cleared her throat. “Um, there’s someone here who’d like to talk to
you. Okay?”
He groaned. “Mom.” Who the hell was it? He didn’t want to talk to anybody and she knew that.
“Jack.”
Hell, no. He turned to glare at Ashe’s smashed vehicle. “Fuck you, Dutch.” He spat the words.
Dutch chuckled. “Yeah, I miss you too. Get your ass back to Atlanta. We have shit to—” Jack
heard his mother’s reprimand, before Dutch grudgingly said, “Sorry, we have business to discuss.”
“I don’t work for you anymore, Dutch.” He couldn’t even feel pleasure at his mother chastising
Dutch for cursing. “Stay the hell away from my family.”
“Someone has to watch over them since you abdicated your responsibilities, and Jack…” His
voice dropped to a whisper, “Trust me when I tell you, they need watching over.”
“What the hell does that mean?” He faced the cabin. Ashe remained in the doorway.
Dutch exhaled loudly in his ear. “If you hadn’t disappeared to lick your self-inflicted wounds,
you’d be in the know. I’m not about to discuss it on the phone. Jack, listen. The sooner you get to
Atlanta, the better.”
“I’m not ready to come back to Atlanta.”
“I don’t give a fuck what you want,” Dutch snapped. “Get your ass here, otherwise I’m coming up
there and dragging you back. It’s time.”
He closed his eyes. Dutch didn’t issue empty threats. He’d always known where Jack was though
and never bothered him, so whatever was happening had to be serious. “I don’t like when you try to
order me around,” he told his former boss. “One day you’ll fuck around and end up with my fist in
your face.”
“I welcome that day,” Dutch grumbled. “I expect you tonight. You know the place. Get rid of Ashe
Novak before then.”
Jack stiffened. Dutch knew Ashe? The fuck?
A pause ensued then Jack’s mother was back. “Jack?”
“I’m here.” He rubbed the back of his neck, struggling to gather his thoughts.
“Are you coming back today?”
He stared at Ashe. “Yes.” He’d been less than smart, keeping Ashe around this long. What did he
know about his unwanted visitor? Nothing. About time that changed.
“Okay, hon. I’ll see you soon then? I love you.”
“See you later, Mom. Love you.” He ended the call, sticking the phone in his jeans pocket as he
approached Ashe in the doorway. To his credit, the other man didn’t back up when Jack crowded him.
“Who are you?”
“What?” Ashe’s eyes flared, but Jack caught his apprehension.
“Who are you, really, Ashe Novak?”
“What are you asking me? You know who I am.”
“No.” Jack shook his head. “No, I don’t.” Suddenly, he desperately wanted to know. Who was
Ashe, stealing into Jack’s life, taking up his thoughts and his space? Who was he, ripping away the
solace Jack worked so hard to obtain and forcing him to want things again? Things like touch and
taste. Things he had no right to.
“Jack.” He must have seen something on Jack’s face, because Ashe backed up then, stumbling into
the cabin.
Jack followed him, kicking the door shut without looking, keeping their bodies close. “Who are
you, Ashe? You come into my life, bringing memories I’d long forgotten. Upending my goddamn
peace of mind. Who the fuck are you?”
“No one.” His lips trembled. “I’m no one.”
Jack touched him, on his chin, and Ashe’s tremors seemed to latch onto him, because he found
himself vibrating too. Ashe’s lashes dropped, hiding his eyes, and all Jack wanted right at that
moment was to see his eyes. Stare into them until he found the answers to questions he was too
fucking lost to ask.
“Jack.”
When he whispered Jack’s name like that…
“Someone just spoke your name to me,” Jack said softly. “The last man you want knowing your
name.” His fingers tightened on Ashe’s chin and he leaned in, brushing his cheek against Ashe’s as he
spoke in his ear, “If he knows your name then you’re someone worth knowing.” And that was not a
good thing. Not where Dutch was concerned.
Jack’s belly tightened and he pulled away slowly. Ashe panted in his ear, his hands hesitant as
they touched Jack’s arm and slid up and around his neck in a tentative hug.
Fuck.
He wanted answers, but he also wanted to get closer. For Ashe’s hug to get tighter. For it to choke
him. Suffocate him. He turned his head, lips trailing along Ashe’s jaw, ending at the corner of his
mouth. “Tell me who you are.”
He felt it, when Ashe’s lips parted. He inhaled it, the intoxicating scent of him. He tasted it, his
name when Ashe whimpered.
The guy fucking whimpered.
Jack should step back, think things through, but his tongue wasn’t in Ashe’s mouth and it should
be. It should be all up inside his mouth. So Jack clutched him, pressed into him, and slid his lips over,
covering Ashe’s mouth with his.
His breathing cut off. Ashe’s sharp inhale echoed. His arms around Jack’s neck tightened, urged
him closer still as they stood, suspended in time, mouths connected. Ashe shook in his grip and Jack
sought to soothe him, opening his mouth to calm him.
With words, maybe.
But Ashe’s tongue pushed into him.
Oh fuck. Oh fuck.
It was Jack’s turn to whimper. His turn to vibrate. Ashe retreated and Jack chased him, eyes
closed, hungry for more than that tease. It’d been so long since he felt like this. Since he lost his mind
like this. Ashe fed that tongue to him again, and Jack lost his mind.
That quick, the switch flipped and he was being devoured. Ashe took him over, an instant expert
at pulling Jack’s body taut with every swipe of his agile tongue. He was sweet and hot and wet and he
used Jack’s mouth as if he owned it. Fucked his tongue deep as if he’d done it before.
Jack surrendered, dropping his hands from Ashe’s face to his ass, cupping and lifting him. The
other man’s legs went up, wrapping around Jack’s waist as they staggered, Jack slamming them
against the nearest wall. He swallowed Ashe’s “Oomph.”
He was hard—every inch of him fitted to Jack’s body was hard as Ashe rocked on Jack.
Shit.
Stars floated behind Jack’s eyes. He didn’t know he could feel like this. Didn’t think he’d feel
anything close to this stark ache inside him again. But Ashe did that to him. Ashe made him feel shit
again, and Jack wanted to stop the flow of time. Just to stay in this moment, Ashe’s moans on repeat in
his head, his taste permanent on Jack’s tongue.
He didn’t need anything else but the feel of Ashe plastered against him, grinding on Jack’s jean-
clad erection in obscene and blatant need. He didn’t need to know anything else except the way Ashe
kissed, or tasted, or felt.
Who Ashe was.
How Dutch knew—
Fuck! He tore his mouth away, the wet sound of their interrupted kiss alone making his cock jerk.
Ashe moaned, lashes lifting so fucking slowly. He blinked.
“Jack.” His lips were all wet, but he licked them, made them wetter, and fuck if Jack couldn’t see
those lips wrapped around his dick.
Goddamn. He loosened his hold, released Ashe, and the other man slid down the wall, slapping a
hand out to stay upright. Something like satisfaction sparked in Jack’s chest at the sight. If a kiss could
have Ashe so unsteady, what would it do to him, having Jack’s cock inside him?
Focus! He pinched the bridge of his nose with shaky fingers.
 “Jack.”
“Tell me who you are.” It should have been an order, his tone should have been harder, but the
confusion in Ashe’s voice turned Jack’s words into a plea.
Ashe straightened, facing Jack fully. Lust was all over his face, especially in his eyes, the pupils
all fucked and shit. Jack glanced away.
“I-I don’t know who your friend was on the phone, so I don’t know how he could possibly know
me.” Ashe inhaled then breathed out deeply. “Ashe Tannen-Novak, that’s my name.”
Jack gaped. “Tannen, like the billionaire?” No way.
Ashe’s gaze dropped to the floor. “It’s not—I’m not a billionaire.”
Jack scoffed, crossing his arms. “What are you then?”
Ashe didn’t look at him when he mumbled, “I own the majority stake in an NFL team. And a
basketball team.”
And more than that. Christ! Jack spun away. He didn’t keep up with sports all that much, but he
did know the Tannens owned one of the most lucrative NFL franchises, the LA Flyers, who’d made it
to the Super Bowl over five times, winning twice. Hell, their quarterback Brody Novak was one of
the most popular sports figures ever.
Brody Novak.
Jack turned around slowly. Ashe stood there, shoulders slumped, wringing his hands. “Brody
Novak. That’s the son of a bitch who buried you alive.”
Ashe nodded.
Jack narrowed his eyes. Took a step toward him. “Why do you have the same last name?” Don’t
say it. His entire body was ice freaking cold. Don’t say it.
Ashe’s chin came up then, his bleak stare meeting Jack’s. “He’s my husband.”
 11

IT WAS all kinds of wrong, thinking about Brody with the imprint of Jack’s hands still resonating on
Ashe’s ass. Satisfying, though, to still taste Jack there on his tongue. But all that shit just…it faded
with that look in Jack’s eyes.
Disappointment. Ashe knew what disappointment looked like on the faces of his parents, his
siblings, even Brody. It had never mattered to him. Disappointment in Jack’s blue eyes was worse
than any physical blow.
“Jack.” Put your tongue on mine again. Kiss me again. It’d been too short. Just enough to whet
his appetite. He hadn’t anticipated Jack kissing him, touching him, handling him the way he did.
“You’re married.” Jack said it slowly, carefully, as he took a step back. “To the man who tried to
kill you.”
Ashe moved toward him. “I don’t want to talk about Brody.” Not ever. Especially not when he
was busy trying to figure out ways to kiss Jack again. Fuck, he was really over here obsessing over
the other man’s tongue.
Jack stopped inching away from him and stood with his head cocked, eyes narrowed.
Ashe frowned. “What?”
“Get your shit. We’re going back to Atlanta.”
Ashe swallowed. The Jack who’d answered the door when Ashe first showed up was back.
“Jack.” He sank onto the nearby couch, grabbing Jack’s wrist when he strode past. The other man
halted in his tracks, but he didn’t glance Ashe’s way. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you who I am. I didn’t—I
didn’t expect this.” He never expected to want Jack. He damn sure never expected for Jack to want
him in return. How was he supposed to destroy this fragile fucking bubble with the truth of who he
was? “I’m sorry.” The apology choked him.
Jack yanked his hand away and dropped to his haunches, staring into Ashe’s eyes. “You don’t owe
me an explanation. I’m no one to you.” His nostrils flared, but his eyes were frigid, expression stoic.
“You’re no one to me. You wanted to find me, and you did. You said what you had to, and now I’m
taking you into Atlanta. You’ll go your way and I’ll go mine.”
Ashe blinked. Jack’s words battered all his soft and vulnerable spots. It wasn’t hard for him to
understand why. He’d hurt Jack. “I’m sorry.” The whisper cracked when he touched Jack’s face,
fingertips grazing his cheek.
Jack’s lashes fluttered, hiding his eyes briefly.
It wasn’t true, was it? Ashe owed him. For inviting himself into Jack’s life, interrupting whatever
it was he had going on in this solitary space. For holding Ashe when he slept, soothing him and
chasing away those demons that roamed his nightmares. For that kiss. The kiss that stripped him,
flipped him, still rode him.
“A week before he put me in that grave, Brody took me to Vegas,” Ashe said. “We got drunk and
when he said we should get married, I said yes. I knew I didn’t love him. I knew all the reasons why I
shouldn’t have done it. But I justified the hell out of it. He loved me. He accepted me.” Wishful
thinking, all of it. He’d wanted to be normal, back before he understood normal didn’t make him
happy. Normal wasn’t him.
Jack’s jaw tightened. “Why are you still married?”
Ashe broke their gaze, staring past Jack’s shoulder. “There’s a reason he was never arrested after
what he did to me, why the nine-one-one call was never public.”
“Your name.”
“Yes.” Ashe nodded. “While I was in the hospital, my parents made it all go away. Paid him to
stay away.” A strained laugh made it past his trembling lips. “They didn’t know we’d gotten married.
I hadn’t been speaking to them then and he never shared. By the time I was back on my feet, all
evidence of what happened had been destroyed.”
The fury spreading across Jack’s face was beautiful.
Ashe’s flow of words stopped and he simply stared. Anger made Jack’s blue eyes spark and gave
his features a hard edge that had Ashe’s spine tingling. Color kissed the tip of his nose and
cheekbones.
That was for him. All the gorgeous anger was for him.
“Go on,” Jack urged as he sat on the floor, still facing Ashe.
“He showed up one day.” He had been Ashe’s only visitor at the psychiatric hospital his parents
had checked him into. “To blackmail me. You see…” He shifted closer to Jack. “My grandfather left
everything to me, instead of my father, his own son, or my older brother. Brody wanted what I had. He
was free because I had nothing on him, but he had enough on me.” He pursed his lips. “All the times I
tried to hurt myself after the incident, all my shit. My parents kept that under wraps so the business
wouldn’t be affected. But Brody, he wants my money.” More than that. He wanted Ashe’s life. His
future. His peace of mind.
“I don’t get why you don’t divorce him.”
“He’ll put my mental issues on blast, which could destabilize the company. I can’t let that
happen,” Ashe told him firmly. “My grandfather trusted me at twenty-five with that shit, Jack. Do you
know how much pressure that is, inheriting a billion-dollar company at that age?” Ashe had never
wanted that responsibility, and more than once the weight of it had him literally curled in a fetal
position in a corner. He had a small army put in place to help, but oftentimes it felt as though he was
in all that muck alone.
His grandfather had been the only man he trusted. The first person he came out to, who held him,
comforted him, cried with him. He didn’t understand how the old man could put all that on him. The
well-being of the empire he’d built for decades, the livelihood of thousands—all of it was on Ashe’s
unworthy shoulders.
“So that waste of space gets to profit off the terror he inflicted on you?” Jack asked.
“It’s okay. I’m okay.” In that second, he thought maybe those words might be true.
“That shit is not okay!” The vehemence in Jack’s voice hit Ashe in the face. “How is it? He’s out
there living his life while you can’t even sleep at night? Fuck that.”
“Jack.” Ashe cupped his jaw. He liked touching Jack, he had to admit. Everything about the
former agent appeared cold, until Ashe got him under his fingertips. Then, then he burned. Skin so
hot, he damn near obliterated Ashe’s fingerprints. “Jack.” When those brilliant blues met his gaze,
Ashe smiled. “I’d like to kiss you again, Jack.”
Jack’s lips parted.
“Maybe not right this second,” Ashe said softly. “But I’d like to kiss you again. That first time
was too fucking good to not have a repeat performance.”
That was probably the first time he’d seen a lost expression on Jack’s face. Like he didn’t know
what to say, what to do. Ashe brushed his thumb over Jack’s bottom lip, clocking the other man’s
sharp inhale.
”Do I have your permission, Jack?” He leaned forward until their noses brushed. “To kiss you
again? Taste you again?”
“I—”
There was something intensely satisfying in a speechless Jack Wellington. In knowing he was the
cause. “You’re gonna take me into Atlanta when the roads reopen?”
Jack’s face showed his struggle to keep up with the abrupt subject change. “Yes,” he rasped.
“So let’s go,” Ashe murmured.
“No.” Jack shook his head. “You wanted permission.” The ragged quality of his voice was unreal.
Like thunder that rolled and rumbled only for Ashe. “Yes. Kiss me again. Kiss me any time.”
 12

IT TOOK three hours for the road crew outside to clear the fallen tree limbs that were obstructing
traffic. Three hours and Jack hadn’t said more than five words to Ashe, not after begging.
Pleading.
Kiss me any time.
That quickly he’d forgotten he shouldn’t be anywhere close to Ashe Tannen-Novak. He shouldn’t
want anything to do with the man. He owned a billion-dollar company, for fuck’s sake. And all that
complicated shit with his ex who wasn’t really his ex?
Jack wanted nothing to do with that. Except he wanted to kiss Ashe again. For longer this time.
But Ashe, with his fucked-up life and sorrow-filled eyes, Ashe who kissed like he aimed to swallow
Jack whole, was about a million miles out of his league.
“The guy on the phone, the one who said my name. Who is he?” Ashe asked from the passenger
side of Jack’s truck.
Jack narrowed his eyes at the road ahead of them. He’d hustled Ashe into the vehicle as soon as
they’d been given the all clear from the road crew. The sooner he got to Atlanta, the better for both of
them.
Ashe had used the satellite phone to call Triple A. They’d go by the cabin and take his SUV away
sometime later that day or the next. So the next time Jack came back, there’d be no trace of Ashe, save
for the memories.
“Jack?”
“What?” He glanced over at Ashe and then away.
“The guy on the phone. Who was he, a friend?”
He scoffed. Friend. Dutch was no friend of his. “Colleague.” Sometimes boss, sometimes partner,
when they collaborated on things.
“Then why is it a bad idea that he knows who I am?”
Because Dutch had never met an angle he couldn’t work, a weakness he couldn’t exploit. Not that
Ashe was a weakness. “Just…trust me on this one.”
Ashe didn’t speak, and Jack didn’t have to look at him to know the other man’s gaze was on him.
He felt that stare as if it were a touch. “Okay,” Ashe finally murmured. “Can we stop at the store?” He
leaned forward, pointing to the store coming up on their left. The store Jack visited the night before to
re-up on his liquor. “I need some water.”
He didn’t want to stop, but he did anyway, making the left turn into the store’s loose gravel
parking lot. As always, the place had only one car in the lot.
 Ashe hopped out when Jack stopped then turned back to him before closing the door. “You need
anything?”
“No.”
If Ashe felt any type of way at Jack’s harsh tone, he didn’t show it. He simply closed the door and
walked off, a smile on his face, hands in his pockets. Jack watched him walk away, licking his lips at
the way Ashe moved, at the swagger in his walk. Hell, he didn’t blink until Ashe disappeared inside
the store.
He was a gorgeous man, but Jack had no right to notice that. No right to anything he felt when
remembering their kiss and Ashe’s legs around him, his taste, the feel of him.
“Fuck.” He scrubbed a hand over his face. He should be thinking about why Dutch needed him
back in Atlanta. Whatever it was, it couldn’t be good. Leave it to Dutch to call him up with some
vague shit. He didn’t like dealing with Dutch. Jack could never tell where he stood with him, or
where his loyalties resided. Everyone called Dutch a bastard and coldhearted, to his face, and they
were titles Dutch accepted with ease.
It was as if he didn’t give a fuck.
Knowing him, he’d find a way to use Ashe, especially if he knew how Jack felt—
He squirmed. He didn’t feel anything. Nothing.
Blowing out a breath, he fiddled with the radio, checking the time. Ashe had been gone over
seven minutes. It took that long to buy a bottle of water? Jack rolled his eyes as he exited the truck and
headed into the store.
The old man—Don—wasn’t behind the counter the way he always was whenever Jack came by.
He also didn’t see Ashe. Jack frowned, until he heard a shuffle of footsteps from the back of the store.
He followed the sound.
He spotted Don first. He had his back to Jack, a shotgun slung over his shoulder as he watched
Ashe, who stood in front of the cold drinks, staring down at a bottle of soda in his hand. As Jack
watched, Ashe put the soda back then walked over to another part of the area where cold coffee
drinks were kept. Don stalked Ashe, moving when he moved, stopping when he did, one hand
grasping his gun. Did Ashe know he was even there?
What the hell was this? Cold touched Jack’s gut, especially when Don crept within touching
distance of Ashe.
“Ashe.” Jack rushed over to him, meeting Don’s gaze as he touched Ashe’s shoulder. “You
ready?”
Ashe nodded at him, tension around his eyes and in the press of his lips. He turned, coffee drink in
hand, facing Don. “I’m getting this.” He held it up. “Thank you.” So he knew he was being shadowed
the whole time.
Don looked from Ashe to Jack then back to Ashe with narrowed eyes before lumbering away with
a grunt, still clutching the gun.
“What was that?” Jack murmured.
“Not now.” Ashe turned away and Jack followed him up to the register, where they conducted the
transaction in silence.
Don kept staring at them until they were out of the store.
Inside the vehicle once again, Jack turned to Ashe. “He was following you around with a fucking
shotgun!”
Ashe nodded, a sad smile playing at his lips. “The gun was a first, not gonna lie.”
“Wait. This has happened before?” He gaped.
 “Jack.” Ashe shook his head. “Your privilege is showing.”
What the— He narrowed his eyes.
“This happens all the time to me.” Ashe opened his drink with a pop, taking a long drink before he
said, “I’m a black man. I keep my hands visible at all times. I make sure my hoodie isn’t up. I am
respectful and I don’t make eye contact.” His lips twisted. “That last one is double-edged, because no
eye contact can mean you’re up to no good while making eye contact can come off as a challenge.”
Jack just stared at him because it was true. His privilege, the currency of the color of his skin,
made it so he never had to worry about that.
“You know, before…” Ashe waved a hand. “Before, this was something I knew about of course,
but had never truly experienced until my transition.”
“I’m so sorry.” Jack’s voice cracked. “So sorry.” It was unfair and wrong and in this vehicle,
watching Ashe sip his drink and shrug, he’d never felt more helpless and angry. It hadn’t ever made
sense to him, the intense dislike and distrust of someone simply because of the color of their skin. Not
when there was so much more to dislike people for.
“My money doesn’t matter in times like these, Jack,” Ashe said softly. “Because they don’t see my
bank account. I can’t write a check and buy prejudice away, much as I’d like to. It’s just part of life,
my life, and I’ve accepted it. Doesn’t mean it doesn’t hurt.” Sorrow and frustration bled from his eyes
when he looked at Jack. “Doesn’t mean I don’t feel less than whenever it happens. Insignificant and
unseen.”
Jack grabbed his hand. “You’re none of those things,” he rasped. “You’re strong. Full of courage
and heart, and so fucking brave. I see you, Ashe, and I admire you.”
Ashe linked their fingers. “Thank you, Jack.”
Jack stared at their joined hands. He should start the car and pull off, get them back on the way to
Atlanta. Instead, he tugged away from Ashe’s grip gently. “I’ll be back. I forgot something.”
“Jack—”
He was out of the truck and striding back to the store when Ashe grabbed him from behind,
stopping him in his tracks.
“What the fuck are you doing? Get back in the truck,” Ashe snapped.
Jack spun to face him. “He can’t get away with—”
“Why not?” Ashe glared at him. “This isn’t your fight, it’s mine, and I’m not fighting it. I don’t
need you doing battle for me.”
“You’re more angry at me than you were at him?” Jack cocked his head. “Why?”
“I don’t give a fuck about him. He doesn’t register to me,” Ashe shot back. “He’s just one old
white guy among many who doesn’t realize yet that they’re going extinct.”
And he was supposed to just stand by and do nothing in the meantime? How? “Ashe.”
Ashe touched his face. “This isn’t about you, Jack. It’s about me and I need you to make it about
me, about what I want.”
Jack dipped his head, rubbing his cheek against Ashe’s palm. “What do you want?”
“Two things.” Ashe flashed a quick smile. “One: For you to get back into the truck.”
“And two?”
“Get in the truck first.” Ashe released his face and took his hand, leading him to the vehicle. Jack
got in on the driver’s side first, then Ashe closed him in and went around, getting in beside him. When
Jack lifted an expectant eyebrow at him, Ashe’s lips quirked. “That second thing? A kiss. Kiss me,
Jack.”
Shit. Jack pounced on him.
 13

HE’ D EXPECTED A PECK, maybe. Not Jack’s fingertips pressing deep and bruising into his nape,
practically hauling him over the center console as his tongue did unspeakably obscene shit to Ashe’s
mouth. Though, as Jack sucked on his bottom lip, Ashe had to admit he’d wanted this.
Wanted a replay, a refill, of their first kiss.
Like before, Jack’s taste surrounded him, his urgency rode Ashe’s spine and spurred his actions.
Had him grabbing, tugging, moaning into Jack’s mouth. He tasted too much like things forbidden and
out of reach. This reprieve—Ashe committed everything to memory. The huff of Jack’s breath, the
frantic stroke of his tongue, and the burn of his grip. The way he groaned, so deep and rumbling, that
had Ashe’s pulse skittering, his heart galloping. His skin was on fire, body feeling foreign in the most
pleasurable ways.
He was a gift Ashe wanted to hide under his bed, tucked away in a dark corner so nobody else
could have him, nobody else could witness the power he had to make Ashe forget all the
unpleasantness.
He stroked Jack’s chest, loving the tremor that vibrated under his touch. He broke the kiss, tilted
his head back, and blinked up at Jack, whose features wore the same expression Ashe felt. Dazed
wonder. “Jack.”
Jack cupped his jaw, thumb stroking over his bottom lip, rough enough to twist it sideways. “I like
the way you say my name,” he murmured. “All cracked.”
He cracked Ashe open, but there wasn’t a right time to tell that to the man you met less than
twenty-four hours ago. It felt like more, those hours. Like months. Years, the time they spent in the
cabin. “I—” Ashe’s phone went off, jerking him away from Jack’s hold. “Shit. Sorry.” He’d plugged
his phone in the vehicle charger as soon as they’d gotten on their way and the more they drove, the
better cell service got, so yeah. The pings came back to back to back.
“You gonna get that?”
He didn’t want to crawl back whimpering into the cage. Because it was a cage. His
responsibilities kept him trapped, leashed, and he didn’t want any of it. But Ashe picked up the phone
anyway, ignoring the texts as he called his sister. He pinched the bridge of his nose as he waited for
her to pick up.
“Where the hell have you been?”
“What’s going on, Tsa?”
Tsa sighed loudly. “Silas knows you left town. He’s on the fucking warpath, but silently, ’cause
you know that asshole likes to act as if he doesn’t know what words are.”
 Silas was his keeper. Officially, he was head of Ashe’s security team. Unofficially, he was friend,
movie buddy, the one to open Ashe’s blinds in the mornings, the one to shovel food down his throat
when he couldn’t be bothered himself. Silas was a good guy, but his presence chafed and stifled.
“Does he know where I am?”
“I’m guessing so.” Tsa huffed. “He took the plane even though he knew I called dibs.”
Shit. Fuck. Ashe used his shoulder to hold the phone to his ear as he secured his seatbelt and
glanced at Jack, who’d driven them back onto the road.
“Did you find the guy you went looking for?” Tsa asked. “And why haven’t you been answering
your phone, Ashe? You know how Silas is.”
“Yes, I found the guy I was looking for.” He pulled his bottom lip into his mouth and imagined he
could still taste Jack there. “I’m gonna—I’ll call Silas.”
“Uh-huh. You better do that before he forgets he’s not your daddy and grounds your ass.”
They both chuckled, because Silas would try that. “What about Mom and Dad?”
“I don’t know what they know,” Tsa said. “They’ve been antsier than usual. Which, you know, can
mean anything,” she continued, her voice dropping to a whisper.
Yeah. “Okay. I’m headed into Atlanta, so I’ll call you later. I’m gonna check in with Silas.” He
ended the call and dropped the phone onto his lap. The clock was ticking down to when he’d have to
leave Jack’s side. Funny how he wasn’t looking forward to it.
“Are you okay?” Jack asked.
Ashe nodded without looking at him. “Yeah.”
“Who is Silas?”
He heaved a breath. “My head of security.” He felt Jack’s gaze on him as he stared straight ahead.
“I usually don’t leave the house without him.”
“But this time you left California to come to Georgia by yourself.”
“Yeah. I—” He shook his head. “It was a spur of the moment thing, and I wanted you to myself,”
he finished huskily, chancing a glance at Jack. “Tsa and the PI are the only ones who know about you.
I wanted to keep it that way.”
Jack’s brow furrowed. “You don’t trust your head of security?”
“It’s not about trust.” Ashe swallowed, trying to find words to explain. “What I experienced, what
you and I experienced, it’s for us. Just for us. I wanted to keep it that way.”
“Okay. But now, Silas knows you’re here?”
“Yep, and Tsa said he took the plane, so I have to call him to tell him where I’ll be.”
“You can tell him to meet you at my parents’ place.” Jack shrugged, his focus firmly on the road,
but a sudden heaviness filled the vehicle. “If you want.”
If he wanted. “Sure.” Ashe gripped his phone, lips pressed together. “I’m gonna call—”
“Yeah.”
He licked his lips and dialed Silas, who answered on the first ring.
“Are you out of your fucking mind?”
He didn’t know how Tsa thought Silas didn’t talk. He spent most of their time together scolding
Ashe. “I can explain.”
“I don’t need an explanation, Ashe. I want to know where you are. And just so you know, I’m
doubling your security.”
He rolled his eyes. “You insist on forgetting that I sign your paychecks, Silas. No doubling of
security. I’m in Georgia, which I’m sure you know with that location thing you put on my phone.”
“You like trying me, don’t you?” Silas was never ruffled, never raised his voice and never
showed anger, but he did tug on his tie when he was agitated. Ashe could see him doing that now.
“Tsa says you took the plane, so how soon should I expect you?”
Silas grunted. “Your sister talks too much.”
“Funny, she says you don’t talk at all.” Silas and Tsa hated each other’s guts. He thought she was
spoiled and entitled and she saw him as an arrogant bully. Ashe would bet his inheritance that those
two secretly wanted each other. “I’ll be at…” He paused so Jack could call out an address, and Ashe
repeated it to Silas.
“Who are you with?”
“Don’t worry about who I’m with.” Ashe allowed a hard edge to creep into his voice as he said,
“He’s off limits. I don’t want you using that address to dig into his life and fuck shit up, Silas. That’s
an order, understand?”
Silas sighed in his ear. “When will you understand you don’t get to order me around when it
comes to your safety, Ashe? Especially after this stunt you just pulled.”
Goddamn it! “Silas—”
“See you soon.” He hung up.
“Fuck!”
“So he’s investigating me now?”
“I’m sorry.” He touched Jack’s shoulder when they slowed at a yellow light.
Jack’s lips curled. “I guess that’s par for the course whenever anyone comes close to you, huh?
Billionaires have to protect themselves, right.”
Ashe dropped his hand. He hated damn near everything about this life he’d been born into, but
meeting people—making friends—was impossible when they had to go through background checks
and shit like that. It would be easier to make friends with those in his same circle, but he never could.
They didn’t get him, didn’t understand, and he always felt inferior in ways money and status could
never fix.
He told Jack that now, confessing in a quiet tone. When he was finished, Jack’s knuckles around
the steering wheel got whiter.
“Why don’t you like your life? Why didn’t you want to inherit?”
“It’s claustrophobic, Jack. I’m rarely alone. Everyone expects something. Even when they don’t
have their hand out, they expect something. My grandfather left me the business specifically because
he knew I didn’t want anything to do with it.” He swallowed. “I was gonna leave, you know, take my
inheritance and just disappear.”
“He prevented that.”
“I came out to him. I confided in him. This old Black man from a different era, a different time,
and he accepted me without hesitation.” He choked and Jack smoothed a hand over his knee in
comfort. Ashe stared at that hand. “He found out my dad, his son, was dealing with people he
shouldn’t have, making backward deals, putting the family legacy in jeopardy. In retaliation, he left
me everything. Everything.” He shook his head, wiping his damp eyes. “I remember the crushing
weight on my shoulders the moment I heard the will read. I remember feeling so trapped, Jack, and I
wondered why this man who told me to do whatever I had to in order to live freely would cage me
like he did.”
“I’m sorry.”
“My parents dragged me to court, challenging Grandad’s state of mind, my state of mind.” He
twisted his fingers around each other. “It’s a myth, you know, that a parent’s love is automatic and
without reservation. They crucified me in court, bled me until I had nothing, until people were
pointing and laughing at the freak.”
“Ashe.”
He ignored Jack’s chastisement. “I tried to kill myself after that.” Tears hiccuped in his throat.
“Ended up in the hospital, and they gloated.”
“They’re monsters.” Jack’s hand tightened on his knee.
“Monsters who made me, so…” He shrugged. “They’re my parents, but I don’t trust them. That’s
why I hired Silas and his team. I don’t trust my parents not to do something to me if it means they get
control of the company.”
“Christ!”
“Yeah.” Ashe let out a pained chuckle. “So that’s my life. Be glad you won’t see me after today.”
He looked away. “You get to walk away.” While Ashe got to return to all that darkness after being
blinded by Jack and his dazzling blue eyes. At least this time he had memories, right? Jack’s voice,
his touch, his kiss.
A phone rang and Ashe frowned. That wasn’t his phone. He gaped when Jack yanked a phone
from his pocket and handed it to him.
“Answer that on speaker, please.”
“You actually own a cell phone?”
Jack smiled. “Of course, I do.”
“Huh.” Ashe answered the call then put it on speaker.
“Jack.”
“What do you want, Dutch?”
This Dutch guy didn’t seem put out by Jack’s attitude. “You back yet?”
“No. What’s the rush?”
“I need you at the club. Come straight here.”
Jack grunted. “I need to stop at my folks’. I’ve got company.”
“Mr. Novak is a big boy. He understands sit and stay, doesn’t he? See you both in a bit.” The call
ended.
Ashe stared at the phone in his hand. “Who the fuck was that?”
“You don’t want to know.”
 14

DEALING with Dutch wasn’t on the list of Jack’s favorite things. That guy never called to share good
news. Shit was always dire with Dutch involved. Still, today Jack looked forward to it, if only to put
some distance between him and Ashe in a desperate move to gain some perspective. Jack thought he
had issues, but if this thing was a contest, Ashe had him beat. And glancing at the man next to him as
he pulled into Club Êxtase in downtown Atlanta, Jack battled the unfamiliar urge to try and make
things better for Ashe.
Maybe fix yourself first, yeah?
There was this air around Ashe, of strength, perseverance, that Jack knew the other man didn’t
think he had. One eventful night together didn’t make him an expert on all things Ashe, but Jack
figured he knew more than any other person in Ashe’s life. That knowledge did something for him.
To him.
“Are we going in?”
He jerked his head, releasing his tight grip on the steering wheel. The parking lot of the club
owned by undercover agent Renzo Vega was empty at 12:02 in the afternoon. “Are you okay?” he
asked Ashe. “Do you need something to eat or—” They’d stopped to grab some fast food and take a
bathroom break not too long ago.
Ashe shook his head. “I’m good.”
“Okay. Let’s go.” He hopped out of the vehicle, leading Ashe around back to the service entrance.
The popular club had turned into Dutch’s unofficial headquarters, the place he gathered all the agents
who worked for him from time to time.
“So, what is this place?” Ashe asked.
“Club Êxtase, owned by an undercover agent.” Jack jabbed the bell next to the heavy door with a
finger, tilting his head up toward the hidden cameras somewhere off to the side. “We meet here
sometimes.”
“Who’s we?”
A mechanical click sounded and the door swung open. Jack entered first then motioned for Ashe
to follow him down a dimly lit and echoing hallway. “Agents,” he answered Ashe’s question. “From
FBI, DEA, and a few other agencies. We’re on a special task force put together by Dutch.” He
glanced over his shoulder. “Need-to-know only.”
Ashe made a show of zipping his lips. Jack’s lips twitched. Even with rumpled clothes and tired
eyes, Ashe was…compelling. Jack should not be thinking about kissing him again, because that
indulgence could quickly become a habit and he had just about enough bad habits already.
 But shit.
They arrived at an office and he knocked on the locked door, shoulder brushing Ashe’s as they
stood side to side. A voice on the other side called for him to enter, so he did, Ashe on his heels.
Renzo Vega sat behind a desk, head bent over papers on his desk. “He’s waiting for you.” Your
guest can wait here with me.” His head came up then, a glint in his eye.
Jack frowned at him. He didn’t know much about Vega, who worked undercover as a powerful
criminal and club owner, but what little he did know, he didn’t trust. “He stays with me.” He grabbed
Ashe’s hand without looking, tugging him along as he strode to the waiting elevator that went from
Renzo’s office down to the lower level most knew nothing about.
“Who was that?” Ashe murmured as the elevator doors closed. “He seems…intense.”
Jack snorted. “He’s someone you stay away from.” Ashe made a sound and Jack looked over at
him. “What?”
“Nothing. Just— ” He pursed his lips, glancing down before meeting Jack’s eyes. “This guy. Plus
that Dutch person. Who are these people you deal with, Jack?”
People he wished he hadn’t allowed into his life. But it was too late for that. “I’m sorry you had
to come here. When we’re done, I’ll take you to my parents’ so you can grab a shower and a change of
clothes.” He looked Ashe up and down, pretending like he wasn’t ogling every inch of him.
“Something to eat, too. There’s always food.”
“Don’t apologize to me.” Ashe smiled. “I like getting to know more about you.”
He’d be gone in a matter of hours, back to a world Jack couldn’t comprehend, but already Jack
missed him. Fuck. “I’m glad you came,” he said softly as he stepped forward into Ashe’s space. “I’m
glad I got to know you.”
Ashe’s nostrils flared. “Even though I invaded your space?” he asked huskily. “Even though you
had to comfort me through my nightmares?”
Jack cupped his jaw and bent so their cheeks could brush as he whispered in Ashe’s ear, “I’m
glad you came.” Who’d comfort Ashe through his nightmares after today? The question ping-ponged
through Jack’s skull, and he squeezed his eyes shut, searching out Ashe’s mouth with his to block it
out. Kissing him—
Kissing him came so naturally. The way they fit, suctioned to each other like they were meant to
be together. Ashe was greedy, his little moans urging, begging for more, while Jack barely held
himself back from unleashing the hunger that ripped at his insides with fire-tipped claws. One night. It
was one fucking night, and he already knew that when Ashe tipped his head to the right, he wanted
Jack to slide his tongue deeper. And when his fingertips gripped Jack’s nape, he needed Jack to press
closer, to touch him.
He did. Fuck, he did. With trembling hands sliding up Ashe’s back, cupping the back of his head,
groaning into his mouth, rocking into his body. Hard everywhere.
The both of them.
Hard everywh—
“Hello, Jack.”
He yanked himself away from Ashe, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. Caught up in
Ashe, he hadn’t heard the elevator doors open. Dutch stood there wearing his usual dark suit, his arms
folded, a calculated expression in his cold gray eyes as he glanced from Jack to Ashe and back.
“He can wait in my office,” Dutch told Jack. “Let’s do this.” He turned away.
“Are you okay?” Jack asked Ashe as they exited the elevator.
Ashe nodded. “Uh-huh.” He cleared his throat, his still-heated gaze roaming Jack’s face before
turning away. “That’s Dutch, right? I recognize his voice.”
“Yep.” He didn’t volunteer anything else as he opened an unmarked door and stood back so Ashe
could enter the office. “You can wait in here. I’ll be two doors down.” He pointed. “This shouldn’t
take long.”
Ashe licked his lips. “I’m a big boy, Jack. I’ll be fine.” The remnants of their kiss were still in his
voice, making it raspy, textured. Jack stared at his mouth, wanting back inside.
Shit. He stepped away. “I’ll be back.” He made his way to where he knew Dutch and whoever
else waited, wiping a hand over his mouth again, as if that would wipe Ashe’s taste away. As much as
he’d learned about Ashe, there were still so many things he didn’t know. His body didn’t seem to
mind, though. His head either. He was fascinated by Ashe. Maybe it was good they wouldn’t see each
other after today. He didn’t need any more complications.
The office was crowded by strange and familiar faces alike. Jack didn’t know all of them
personally, but if they were in that room then they were definitely all members of the exclusive—and
elite—crew of agents Dutch had put together. He didn’t know where Dutch got his powerful resources
from, or the power that made him as untouchable as he was. The only thing Jack knew, which was
only rumor, was that Dutch came from CIA. But he’d been eager to join up when Dutch first
approached him about his task force, eager to prove himself. That got old pretty quickly. He didn’t
like dealing with Dutch. That fucker had never met a line he didn’t love to cross. But maybe he didn’t
like Dutch because Jack saw himself becoming too much like him?
“What’s going on?” he asked Dutch. “Why are we all here?”
“Yeah,” somebody else chimed in. “You gonna tell us what’s going on or what?”
Dutch leaned against his desk. “We’ve been compromised.”
“Say again?”
“What does that mean?”
Dutch sighed. “I recently learned about a list circulating.” He lifted his head, making eye contact
with each of them as he said, “A list with all your names, along with other incriminating information,
available for anyone out there to find and access.”
The room erupted.
Jack tried to make sense of what he’d just heard. This operation was top secret. How would
anybody have a list of names?
“I don’t have to tell you just how serious this is,” Dutch said. “Every single criminal we’ve taken
down could know your true identity. All our guys undercover right now could be compromised.”
Jesus Christ. How could that happen?
The door opened at that moment and a short figure stepped inside. Asian features—Chinese,
maybe?—clad in all black.
Jack gaped. “What. The. Fuck?”
“Dutch, you’re gonna need to start explaining this shit.”
“Why is he here?”
“Mr. Ng.” Dutch got to his feet, greeting the newcomer. “Thanks for coming.”
Tek Ng glared at him. “I told you not to call me that.” He gazed around the room slowly. “You
having a party?”
“No.” Dutch sighed and resumed his seat. “I was just explaining to my people the threat we were
facing.”
“Dutch, why are we making nice with criminals?” Jack glared at Tek. He knew all about him, all
about his fucked-up family business.
 “I don’t explain myself to you, Jack.” Dutch didn’t even glance his way. “Remember that.” He
took a breath then stood. “Tek is here to help.”
The fuck? “And just how does he propose to do that? Is he gonna bribe our enemies with the
women he smuggled into the country?” This was what he hated about working with Dutch. He got into
bed with anybody, as long as it furthered his own agenda. Didn’t matter how dirty they were. Tek
Ng’s family legacy was human trafficking, one of the largest operations in the U.S., and instead of
doing what they’d usually do, take him down, Dutch was inviting him into their circle.
“Do I know you?” Tek addressed Jack with a smirk. “I mean, we must know each other the way
you’re riding my dick. I fucked your wife or something?”
That cocky mother— Jack lunged at Tek, but another man grabbed him by the neck and held him in
place.
“Dude, calm your ass down.”
“Thanks, Vince.” Dutch nodded at whoever held Jack in place. “Now, back to what I was saying.
Stavros Konstantinou is the obvious suspect with the list. We think he might put it on the black market.
We need someone to get close to him to find out who that buyer is. Tek is the only one of us in this
room who can get close to Stavros without arousing suspicion.”
Stavros Konstantinou was an international criminal who ran a stable of international hitmen. That
was the least of his fucked-up crimes.
“You fucking that monster?” Vince—Jack recognized him as a federal marshal out of New Jersey
—asked Tek, who shrugged.
“Takes one to know one, right?” He turned to Dutch. “Anything else you need?”
Dutch opened his mouth as the door opened and two more men strode in.
Jack froze.
“Sorry, we’re late. I—” The one who spoke, tall with a head full of black hair and green eyes,
stopped in his tracks, gaze widening. “Jack.” His name was a shock-filled whisper.
“Hello, Shane.” The room and its occupants fell away and Jack saw only Shane. The last time
Jack had seen his ex, they’d been in a hospital room with Shane hooked up to machines because of
Jack’s fuck-up. Shane looked different now. Younger, which was impossible. The sudden force of
how he’d wronged his ex pushed at Jack’s shoulders now, insisting he bow his head. He didn’t.
Because Shane didn’t come alone; he was never alone. He was always flanked by the man he’d
chosen over Jack. The man watching Jack now with narrowed eyes filled with promises he had no
doubt Pablo Castillo would carry out, if not for Shane.
Everybody knew Shane was the only one keeping Castillo legit. Keeping him somewhat leashed.
Not tamed, though. Not with that deadly glint in his eyes as he watched Jack.
Around him, a heated discussion went on, and Jack just found himself eyeing the protective way
Castillo stood next to Shane.
“Are you saying your enemies know who Shane is?” Castillo asked Dutch.
“The names are on a list somewhere. A list we can’t find, but I suspect it might be in the hands of
people we do not want to have it,” Dutch said calmly.
“Oh hell no,” Castillo exploded, but his husband’s hand on his arm calmed him immediately.
Husband. Jack had learned that bit of news from his mother. It had shattered him then, and even
now, he couldn’t deny the twinge in his chest. He’d loved Shane. Knowing he hadn’t been enough? He
hadn’t handled Shane’s rejection well and now, he had nothing but regret and shame.
He tuned back to the conversation as Tek headed for the door. “I’ll let you know when I make
progress.”
 “I don’t like it,” Jack spoke up. “We can’t trust this person to deal with Konstantinou and do what
needs to be done.” He couldn’t be the only one in the room thinking that.
“Shut your ass up, Jack,” Castillo snarled.
“J.P.” Shane chastised his husband.
“Shane and I are leaving,” Castillo said firmly. “I don’t trust none of y’all with protecting my
family.”
They left with Tek and Jack sagged against the wall, locking his knees against going after Shane
and asking how he was doing. Castillo would just love that. But Jack wanted to apologize. Ask for
forgiveness. Not that he deserved it. Could Shane forgive him, though?
When the meeting was over, he walked out of the room and headed to where he’d left Ashe. Inside
the office, he found Ashe on the phone. The other man held up a finger before ending the call and
getting to his feet.
“That was Silas.” His gaze was soft when it landed on Jack’s face, like a caress Jack wanted to
experience. One he didn’t deserve. “Weather’s got them delayed for a bit.”
Jack nodded. “You ready to go?”
“Uh.” Ashe blinked at him. “Sure.”
They left the way they came, only this time the elevator ride was different. Jack stood in one
corner, Ashe in the other, awkward tension thick between them. Seeing Shane had shifted something
inside Jack, reminding him of who he was, what he’d done. And why. This thing with Ashe, he didn’t
know what to do with it or where to put it, especially when Ashe would be leaving. He should be
thinking about the news Dutch just dumped on all their heads. Now more than ever he needed to return
to his cabin. It was better for everyone that he stay away. That he be alone.
Out in the parking lot, a figure stood next to a black SUV with tinted windows that was parked
alongside Jack’s truck, and as he squinted into the sun, he realized the figure was Shane.
“Gimme a sec,” he told Ashe. “Shane!” He jogged over, smiling when Shane swung around to
face him. “Listen, I wanted to say—”
A hand at his throat slammed him into the SUV.
Someone yelled.
“Say what?”
Jack stared up into the barrel of a gun.
“Bet you thought I’d forgotten about your bum ass?” Pablo Castillo snarled above him. “Tell me,
what did you want to say, Jackie Boy?”
 15

ASHE FROZE.
The bald guy with the gun appeared out of nowhere, a hand at Jack’s throat, gun in his face,
carefully curated rage in every line of his body as he stared Jack down. His companion, with black
hair and no gun, didn’t seem alarmed. Hell, it looked as if he rolled his eyes. While Ashe stood there,
still tasting the panicked yell that ripped through him when he saw Jack being attacked.
Who were these men? Who were any of the people Jack associated with? Because they were
beyond scary. Those guys were dark.
“Hey! Let him go. Don’t fucking touch him.” He found his voice, for all the good it did. All three
men ignored him.
“Go on,” the one with the gun barked at Jack. “Tell me what you wanted to tell my husband.”
Oh. Ashe stiffened.
Jack didn’t look at the enraged man holding him. His pleading gaze was on the black haired one.
“Shane.” His voice shuddered. “I’m sorry.”
Just the look on Jack’s face, the emotion in his eyes, and Ashe knew who Shane was. He stepped
away, falling back from a scenario that didn’t include him. Jack had that air about him now, the one he
wore when Ashe had first shown up on his doorstep. Like he didn’t give a fuck. Like consequences
didn’t matter. The gun in his face didn’t matter, not when he stared at Shane like he was the sun and
Jack needed warming up.
This was the man who’d sent Jack running and hiding, lost in the bottom of a bottle, locked up in
that cabin. This was who he loved.
“Stand down, J.P.,” Shane told his husband.
Bald guy—J.P.—didn’t. “I told him what would happen the next time he showed his face,” he
responded conversationally. “You think I’m about to go back on that, Pretty Boy?”
Shane sighed. “I think you’re not about to kill a former federal agent in broad daylight.” He
smoothed a hand over his man’s head. “Back up.”
“You take all my fun away.”
“Yes, I know.”
J.P. lowered the gun, though, and he stepped back, ignoring Jack, who slumped against the
vehicle.
“Who are you?”
Ashe blinked.
J.P. stared at him with his head cocked. “You with this joker?” He waved a hand at Jack then
snarled, “Don’t touch him!” when Shane moved as if to help Jack stand upright. “You put your hands
on him and I will kill him, Shane.”
“Ashe.” Jack coughed. “Go to the truck.”
“No, Ashe. Stay.” J.P. grinned. Ashe didn’t trust the gleam in his eye. The gun and tattoos didn’t
sell the danger of him. It was his eyes. Cold and calculating, they were laser beams locking in on
weaknesses and cataloging every single one. He scared Ashe in a way he couldn’t explain.
This was the criminal Jack told him about. The one Shane chose.
“I’m—” He licked his lips, glancing at Jack, only to find his gaze back on Shane. That was a
revelation, watching Jack so totally lost over someone else. The pain in his chest was a reality check
if ever there was one. “I’m no one,” he told the man with ruthless cunning in his eyes, but J.P.’s gaze
slid from Ashe to Jack and his smile got wider.
“Doubt that.”
“Ashe? Nice to meet you.” Shane walked over with a smile, as if his husband hadn’t just been
seconds away from killing a man at his feet. This world was fucked up, and Ashe thought his was
bad. “I’m Shane, in case Jack neglected to mention it. And that guy”—he jerked a thumb—“is my
husband, Juan Pablo Castillo.” It was the tenderness in his eyes when he said his husband’s name that
told Ashe that Jack was shit out of luck. Shane was a man in love. Jack would be the one walking
away with a broken heart.
And Ashe? What was he walking away with? “Hey.” He shook Shane’s hand, because it was the
right thing to do. Even though jealousy twisted his insides into a knot. Shane was beautiful, his green
eyes sharp and observant as he studied Ashe. They were dressed similarly, he and his husband, in
jeans and hoodies, but standing next to his man, Shane appeared cleaner, safer. Did he know how Jack
felt? He had to since Jack didn’t bother hiding it. Ashe was the only stupid one who’d ignored the
writing on the wall in favor of a couple hungry kisses and a few shared memories.
“How do you know Jack?” Shane asked.
Ashe shrugged. “I don’t.” And that was the truth right there. He didn’t look at Jack when he turned
away, giving those men his back as he made his way to the truck. His nose burned as he pulled on his
seat belt and checked his phone. He had a missed call from Silas, so he quickly dialed him back.
“Silas.” He cleared his throat. “What’s up?”
“We got clearance, so we should be there in a few hours.” Silas paused. “What’s going on?”
“Nothing.” He watched through the rearview mirror as Jack approached the truck. “Why?”
“You don’t sound good.”
Jack opened the driver’s side door and slid inside, starting the vehicle.
“I’m fine,” Ashe told Silas as he stared straight ahead. “I’m just ready to go home.” The sooner
that happened, the sooner he could put Jack behind him.
Silas grunted. “Few more hours. Keep your phone on you at all times, Ashe. And fucking answer
when I call.”
“Yeah, okay.” He hung up and put his head back, closing his eyes.
They drove in silence for a bit, until Jack saw fit to speak. “I’m sorry about that back there.”
Ashe snorted but didn’t open his eyes.
“I wanted to apologize to Shane. Ask for his forgiveness for all the things I…” He paused in his
rambling. “Anyway, I’m sorry you had to see that.”
“Yeah.” He opened his eyes. “Me too, Jack.”
Jack glanced over at him then back to the road. “Ashe—”
“You knew what that guy’s reaction would be if you approached his husband, but you didn’t care,
did you?” Ashe shook his head. Why did he feel so disappointed? So hurt? “What would I have done
if he hadn’t been talked down, if he’d shot you? Would he have turned on me next, because I had the
misfortune of standing at your side, Jack? You didn’t think about that, did you? You didn’t think about
me.” And that, that stung worse than perhaps it should’ve.
“I’m sorry—Hey.” Jack touched his knee. “I’m sorry.”
“Why are you apologizing to me?” Ashe shifted away from him and his hand fell away. “One
night. We spent one night in each other’s company, Jack. It was nothing.” He turned his gaze to his
right, the blurry scenery flying by as he lied. “I’ll go back to my life, you’ll go back to yours, and
we’ll forget about each other. There’s no need to apologize for nearly taking a bullet from the husband
of a man who no longer gives a fuck about you.” Did he sound as bitter as he felt? He had no right to
anything he’d felt from the moment he’d opened his eyes to find himself in Jack’s lap, the other man
holding him on his tiny bathroom floor, to what just happened in that parking lot. No right. But he felt
it anyway, it sat on his chest anyway. It wasn’t Jack’s fault, but Ashe still blamed him. Otherwise he’d
have to accept that he’d done a stupid, stupid thing. He’d have to admit he’d lowered his guard and
allowed Jack to slide right on in.
“What do you want from me?” Jack asked as they pulled into the driveway of a white tri-level
house with navy blue shutters. His parents’ place. “You and I—Ashe, you’re about to leave. Plus,
you’re married and I—”
“Oh, is my being married the problem here?” Ashe tried for a laugh. It didn’t work. “Don’t worry,
Jack. I have my own issues. You can keep yours.” He opened his door and hopped out, heading for the
house.
“Ashe!”
Fuck him.
 16

“THERE’ S NOBODY HOME?” In the middle of the family room, Ashe spun to face Jack, his expression
distant and distrustful. Jack couldn’t say he blamed him.
“Uh, my folks are over at my sister’s place. They’ll be there overnight.”
Ashe’s eyes narrowed. “You sent them away?”
Jack snorted. “Hell no.” If his parents had their way they’d be here, firing questions at Ashe and
giving Jack those puppy eyes they’d perfected when they wanted to know all of his business. “It’s
game night at Charlotte’s place. She’s the oldest.”
Ashe didn’t look like he believed that explanation, but Jack ignored his glare and led him from the
family room to the kitchen. “If you’re hungry, there’s food. Or you can relax until your people get
here. Whatever you want.”
“Point me to the bathroom.” Ashe didn’t hold his gaze for long and Jack found himself missing
that small connection. But he’d been the one to sever it, hadn’t he?
He directed Ashe to the bedroom and its ensuite bathroom on the first floor then made his way
back to the kitchen to make himself a sandwich. He had to admit he was glad his folks weren’t
around. From the moment Ashe showed up at the cabin it had been the two of them, and sharing Ashe
with his parents, if only for a small amount of time, didn’t work for Jack.
He licked mayonnaise off the knife. Ashe didn’t want anything to do with him now and he couldn’t
blame him. The last time Jack saw his ex, Shane had been in that hospital bed hooked up to all kinds
of machines because of Jack. He’d wanted to apologize, to wish Shane well. Beg for forgiveness he
knew he wouldn’t get and didn’t deserve. Castillo pulling a gun on him hadn’t been much of a
surprise. Pablo Castillo was a violent, possessive man. But he loved Shane and he could do what
Jack couldn’t.
Protect him.
Jack was only sorry that Ashe had been there. He didn’t belong anywhere near Jack and the
people he kept around him. People like Dutch who was always working multiple agendas, quick to
toss anyone under the bus if it fit their selfish purposes. After what he did to Shane, Jack fit right in,
but Ashe didn’t. The emptiness that blossomed at the idea of saying goodbye to a man he’d only just
met didn’t stop Jack’s thought that Ashe needed to be far away from his orbit.
Footsteps signaled Ashe’s return seconds before he entered the kitchen and leaned a hip against
the counter.
“You okay?” As Jack stared at him, he clocked the exhaustion on Ashe’s face and the dark circles
forming under his eyes. A shadow of a beard darkened his jawline. Didn’t matter how long Jack
stared, he found no traces of the woman from that fateful night. Save for the eyes. Those beautiful eyes
Jack couldn’t deny.
Ashe blinked at him then away. “You really love him, huh? Your ex?”
Jack heard the conflict in that question and his gut twisted. “Ashe.” He closed the tiny distance
between them. “I loved Shane. I always will.” He’d lived much of his adult life loving only one man.
When Ashe stiffened, Jack sighed. “He made his choice and I respect it.” Now. There’d been a time
when he hadn’t. None of it he remembered fondly. It sucked being the one left behind and he’d said
some things, done some things… “Shane moved on and I’m trying to do the same.”
Ashe’s gaze returned to Jack’s, his brown eyes shimmering like hot fucking liquid. “I’m leaving in
a few hours,” he said hoarsely.
“Yes.” Jack’s tone matched his at the unnecessary reminder.
He bit his bottom lip, drawing Jack’s attention to it. “I shouldn’t have come to you, Jack. I
shouldn’t have knocked on your door.”
He couldn’t imagine not having this time. He couldn’t imagine not knowing there was an Ashe
Tannen-Novak out there in the world, beautiful and brave. Jack touched him, cupping his chin.
“Why?”
“Because I don’t want to leave.” He whispered the words as if he didn’t want Jack to hear them,
as if he didn’t want to speak them at all. “Because I’m jealous of a man who doesn’t even want you, a
man who’s already had you.”
Jack stared at him. “Ashe.” Those words did terrible, unforgivable things to his chest.
Ashe’s eyes flashed and he stepped back, away from Jack’s touch. “I’m gonna…can I take a
shower?”
“Y-Yes.” Jack curled his fingers into his palm, nails digging in. “Whatever you need.”
Ashe’s expression mocked that last part as he grabbed his duffel bag and made his way out of the
kitchen. It wasn’t, was it? It wasn’t whatever Ashe needed, because Jack couldn’t follow through on
that.
Even if he wanted to.
He didn’t know what he wanted.
He’d cut himself off from anything and nearly everyone since the debacle with Shane. There’d
been nobody else in all that time. Just the self-imposed loneliness. He hadn’t so much as touched
another man until he touched Ashe, until he kissed him. His family would like him to move on, bring
somebody around for them to be able to point to as proof that Jack was better now, that he’d gotten
over whatever it was that drove him away from them in the first place.
He hadn’t explained what he’d done, so they had no clue that there was no getting over it. Ashe in
his space was an uninvited reprieve he wished he could accept, but he wasn’t better, not by a long
shot, and Ashe had his own shit to handle. He didn’t deserve to be saddled with Jack’s.
And why the fuck was he even thinking like this?
He scrubbed a hand over his face, sandwich forgotten as he strode off to make sure Ashe had the
supplies he needed for his shower. He made his way down the hall to the bedroom. The door was
closed so he knocked softly. “Ashe?”
“Come in.”
Jack opened the door and blinked. Ashe was shirtless, a picture frame in his hand as he looked up
at Jack.
“This is your bedroom.”
“Y-Yeah.” He was beautiful. A word Jack kept using over and over, but that didn’t make it any
less true. Ashe’s body was jacked, with a sculpted chest and torso tapering to his hips. Though he still
had on his pants, his belt was unbuckled. Jack didn’t miss the scars on either side of Ashe’s chest, a
shade lighter than the deep, captivating brown of his skin.
“You’re staring at my scars.”
Jack held in a snort as he licked his lips. “I’m staring at your whole body, Ashe. Because you’re
gorgeous.”
“This body is what happens when money is no object and you have the highest paid personal
trainers at your disposal.”
His cisgendered bubble meant Jack obviously didn’t have the first clue as to what it meant to be
in Ashe’s shoes, no in-depth or personal knowledge of what the surgeries entailed, but… “Are you
happy with who and what you see in the mirror?”
Ashe glanced from the framed picture of Jack and Shane—time he packed that away—to Jack’s
face. “Yes.”
“Then Ashe—” Jack smiled at him gently. “That’s all that matters.” They held each other’s gaze,
Ashe’s eyes suddenly glassy, until Jack cleared his throat. “I, uh, actually came to make sure you had
everything. Towels and shit.”
“Yeah.” Ashe nodded. “I’m good.”
“Good.” Which meant Jack should leave and stop ogling him. Right? Except he didn’t, couldn’t.
He kept swallowing, because his mouth kept watering as Ashe stood there with no clue what the sight
of him did. Unclothed or not, he fucked with Jack’s control. With his discipline.
He forced a step back.
“You’re leaving.” What did that expression on Ashe’s face mean? Did he not want Jack to go?
Did he want Jack posted up in this doorway imagining the many ways he could put his mouth on him?
“Yes,” he bit out, the word colored in frustration. “Take your shower.” He didn’t think about a
fully naked Ashe, all wet and slippery. Christ. “Get some rest.” He motioned to the bed, his bed, and
also didn’t think about Ashe wrapped up in his sheets.
Lies.
He damn near threw himself out of the bedroom, slamming the door behind him. Goddamn it. He
sagged against the wall, panting. He needed to pull himself together. He adjusted his hard-on, wincing
at the ache before racing back to the kitchen.
Distance was good.
Distance was…torture. Still, he made himself finish eating the sandwich then made one for Ashe.
Then he trudged out to the family room and dropped down onto the couch, rubbing his forehead. There
were a bunch of things he had to deal with, but Ashe eclipsed everything. That shit was not good. The
sooner they parted ways, the sooner Jack could get back to focusing on the news Dutch had dropped
on all their heads.
It’d been a while, but Jack had done his share of undercover work. The criminals he’d brought
down might be behind bars, but he didn’t doubt they’d still have people loyal to them on the outside.
If any of them discovered Jack’s true identity, he was fucked. He had to make sure his family was
safe, which meant getting his ass back to the cabin.
But first, he had to say goodbye to Ashe.
 17

LONG AFTER HE’ D SHOWERED , Ashe found himself in Jack’s bed, though not for the first time.
Although, the first time? With Jack’s arms around him, his breath whistling across his nape? That
time? Way better than this one where Ashe tried to close his eyes and succumb to the exhaustion
beating at him, but all he saw when he lowered his lashes was Jack’s face as he gazed upon Ashe’s
naked chest with fleeting lust that was there one second and gone the next, as if he’d yanked it away,
smothered it.
Ashe was proud of his body. There’d been a time, of course, when he hadn’t been. Back before
he’d gone through all the surgeries and had his female organs removed. Before he’d begun to hit the
gym like it was his church, when he got misgendered all the time. But the very first time he got read as
male in public? Shit. There was no happiness like that kind of happy. No sense of rightness as that.
Knowing that Jack liked what he saw when he looked at him shouldn’t be a big deal.
Turned out it was.
He stretched out on the bed, imagining he could smell Jack. Then he found himself wondering if
Jack had been in this very bed with the man he couldn’t seem to stop loving. Shane. He bit his lip,
dragging his thoughts away from that. What did it matter? Wasn’t as if he and Jack were a thing. They
couldn’t be. Like Jack told him, Ashe was married. In name only, but still…
He didn’t like to think about his ex; it brought Ashe’s mood to lows he couldn’t afford to go. He
had an upcoming meeting with his lawyers to discuss how they’d handle Brody because despite what
he’d confessed to Jack, he didn’t want to be tied to that bastard for the rest of his life. He’d put off a
lot of things to come find Jack, but once he got back home, Ashe had some major shit to deal with.
Nothing he was looking forward to.
Hell, he didn’t want to go back. If there was a chance he could hide away up at that tiny cabin
with Jack, he’d jump at the opportunity. But he couldn’t play the coward forever. He had his parents
to deal with. The company. His doctors needed an answer as to setting a date to go through with the
phalloplasty he’d been putting off. And then there was the issue of his egg storage.
Fuck.
He rolled out of the bed and made his way out of the bedroom. The house was quiet, almost
unnaturally still as he tiptoed down the hallway, past the kitchen, and into the family room where he
came to a stop.
Jack was stretched out on the sofa, eyes closed, arms stretched over his head, exposing his lower
belly, concave with the position. He was barefoot, ankles crossed. Ashe stood in the doorway and
watched him for a bit. The relaxed features, almost innocent in sleep. His lashes fanning his cheeks,
his stern lips. The sight of him warmed Ashe all over. Jack’s mere presence helped him breathe
easier, helped calm his nerves and soothe him.
Wasn’t that a bitch?
Under his gaze, Jack’s lashes fluttered then his eyes snapped open, immediately zeroing in on
Ashe hovering in the doorway. “Hey.”
“Sorry. I uh… didn’t mean to wake you.”
Jack shook his head, sitting up as he shoved fingers through his hair. “I was just resting my eyes.
Come.” He patted the space next to him.
Ashe smiled. It was weird. In this house, Jack had a softer look to him. It wasn’t as if all that
aggression and standoffishness from the cabin wasn’t present. They’d just…receded to the
background. He was more approachable now with sleep in his eyes and his hair tousled, surrounded
by a million photos of his family. He joined Jack on the sofa. “So, my people will be here soon.”
Silas’ text had been waiting for him when he got out of the shower. “I’ll be leaving soon.”
“Right.” Jack glanced away, clearing his throat. “Feels like a lifetime,” he murmured.
Ashe nodded, staring down at the hands he’d clasped in his lap. It did. Thinking about leaving
sucked. He had zero rights to feel the way he did, especially when Jack gave him no indication that it
meant anything. The kisses. The touches. But he felt what he felt.
“Ashe.” Jack touched his chin, gently turning his head so they could stare at each other. “I’m glad
you came,” he said softly. “I could never forget your eyes.”
Ashe swallowed. “You never asked for details.” There were two kinds of people Ashe had
encountered on his journey. There were the kind that wanted all the personal details when they found
out he’d been gendered as female at birth. Every single detail about surgeries and sex and shit they
had no shame in asking. Then there were those who backed all the way off to the point of shutting
down. They wanted no details, nothing, preferring to pretend they didn’t know.
Jack was neither of those and his lips curved now. “Do you want me to give you the third
degree?”
Ashe shrugged, loving that Jack’s fingers remained lightly gripping his chin. He widened his legs
a bit, just enough for his right knee to brush against Jack’s left. “If you have questions…”
“If you want me to know something, then I’m all ears, but Ashe, you’re not a novelty or some shit
locked up in a glass case to be inspected and examined. You’re you.”
He touched Jack’s wrist. “I’m glad I found you, Jack. Thank you for being who you are.”
Jack’s expression turned quizzical. “Who am I?”
Worthy. “One of the few good things in my life.”
Jack’s grip on him dropped off as he slid his hand down, fitting his fingers between Ashe’s. “I’m
glad.” He stared at their hands before bringing his gaze back to Ashe’s. “I’m also sorry.”
“Me too.” Ashe was caught between the ocean-blue of Jack’s eyes and his lips. He didn’t know
where to look. Didn’t think he’d ever look at anything blue again without feeling the sudden loss that
blossomed in his chest. Or kiss someone else without tasting Jack, like liquor on his tongue. “Jack.”
The longing arched between them, sizzling, especially when Jack tightened his fingers around Ashe’s
and his lashes lowered. They didn’t have hours left, only minutes. Mere minutes. “Jack.” He cupped
the other man’s face with his free hand. “Let me kiss—”
“Yes.”
Ashe lunged at him, fingers more than likely pinching his face as he mashed their faces together,
mouths open, tongues immediately mating. Christ. He tasted so good and so eager, tugging Ashe
closer, urging him to straddle his body. He freed their hands and Ashe immediately cradled his face
with both hands, holding him close, losing himself in Jack’s hungry kiss as he stroked Ashe’s back.
They rocked on each other, Jack’s interest very insistent through his jeans, pressing against Ashe’s
ass.
If he’d known he’d find this, he’d have packed a rod. But it didn’t matter now. All that mattered
was the tiny growls Jack made in the back of his throat that had Ashe quivering all over his fucking
lap and gripping his hair, pulling on the soft strands as he deepened the kiss.
Kissing Jack one last time.
He moaned, eyes falling shut as he struggled to memorize all of it. The huff of Jack’s breath and
the flick of his tongue, the drag of his hand, heavy on Ashe’s back, hips lifting and rolling into him as
he caught Ashe’s bottom lip and bit down.
God.
Ashe shuddered, grunting into his mouth, refusing to let go, refusing to open his eyes when gravel
crunched outside the nearby window. Even when a car door slammed and Jack stiffened, Ashe didn’t
release him. He kept their mouths fused until the bell rang.
And the impatient knocking began.
Jack was the one to pull away, to speak with Ashe all on his lips, making them shine. “Looks like
your people are here.” Twin slashes of red brightened his cheekbones and his eyes had darkened.
Ashe couldn’t take his eyes off him. “Looks that way.” The knocking came again. Silas had never
been one to like waiting.
“You should…” Jack licked his lips.
Ash held himself back—barely—from sliding right back inside his mouth. “I should.” He waited
until Jack’s grip on his waist eased a bit then he climbed off, pretending not to notice that hard length
curving the front of Jack’s jeans. He heaved a sigh and went to open the door.
“Are you out of your fucking mind?” Silas greeted him with a scowl.
“Not now, Silas.” Ashe held a hand up. “Save the lecture for later. I’ll grab my bag.” He turned
away, bumping into Jack, who’d come up behind him. “Jack, this is Silas, my babysitter. Silas, this is
Jack. He doesn’t concern you.”
Jack didn’t spare Silas a glance as he searched Ashe’s face. “You’ll be okay?”
“Oh yeah,” he answered flippantly, as if Jack worrying about him wasn’t a thing that softened him
all the way up and made him want to melt into a fucking puddle. “Silas barks more than he bites. It’s
all good.” He sidestepped Jack and made his way back to the bedroom for his bag, scooping up his
phone as well.
When he returned, Silas had retreated to stand, arms crossed, sunglasses covering his eyes, in
front of the black SUV with the darkly tinted windows. Two other men, just as bulky as Silas, dressed
similarly in dark suits, waists bulging with their weapons, waited as well.
“So this is it.” Jack faced him with hands loose at his sides, expression giving nothing away.
Did he want Ashe to stay? To hurry up and get out of his life? Did Ashe just say “later” and peace
out? What was the protocol when you’d only known someone for a day, but had their taste on your
tongue and the knowledge of the curve of their body pressed to yours?
“This is it.” Ashe tried to smile, but when that failed, he brushed his knuckles down Jack’s cheek.
“Goodbye, Jack.”
Jack’s chin dipped. “Take care of yourself, Ashe.”
“I’ll try.” This time the smile was a bit easier in coming. “Take care of yourself, too. Okay?”
A muscle twitched in Jack’s jaw. His eyes broke Ashe’s heart. Too fucking blue and intense and…
He turned, walking away from Jack and out of the house. One of the bodyguards took his bag.
Another strode beside him as he prepared to climb up into the vehicle.
“Ashe!”
He spun to find Jack running toward him. Silas stepped forward with a hand out to stop him.
“Fuck off, Silas,” Ashe barked.
“Damn it, Ashe. We don’t know shit about this guy.”
Ashe ignored Silas as Jack reached him and crowded him, pressing his body against the side of
the SUV. He held up a piece of paper that he shook once then shoved into Ashe’s pants pocket.
“Jack.”
“If you can’t sleep,” he panted, cupping Ashe’s face in both hands. “If you can’t outrun the
nightmares or the memories, call me. If you want to talk or if you don’t, call me.” His chest heaved,
the promise in his eyes holding Ashe trapped. “If you need—whatever you need—call me, Ashe.”
“Ashe, we gotta go.” Silas sounded pissed.
Ashe licked his lips. “You’ll answer your phone for me?”
“Yes.” The hands on his face trembled the tiniest bit. “Yes.”
Ashe touched two fingers to Jack’s lips, giving him a small smile. “Bye, Jack.” He didn’t look
back when he got into the vehicle and took his seat, buckling himself in, but he knew Jack stood there,
watching him.
He didn’t look back when they pulled out of the driveway, but he knew Jack stood there.
Watching.
 18

THE WORLD MOVED the same as it ever did. Everybody walked around like shit wasn’t different, like
nothing had changed, while Ashe wrestled with returning to a life post Jack Wellington. His parents
were their regular fucked-up selves, his siblings the same way.
His nights were spent staring up at his ceiling, because the week-old memory of Jack’s arms
around him didn’t keep the nightmares at bay. His days were routine. Psychiatrist. Gym. Dealing with
business when it was the last thing he wanted. It always left him more drained than the time he put in
at the gym he’d had set up on the roof of his building. Silas ran interference between Ashe’s parents,
who had a whole lot of questions about where he’d been, what he’d done.
He didn’t have the energy to wade into battle with them. Not now. The true battle was about to
come once they learned about his latest business move.
“Conference call in five,” Silas reminded him.
They sat on the floor in Ashe’s living room, Ashe in gym shorts and a gray t-shirt while Silas
remained as he always was, in a dark suit, not a wrinkle in sight even after eight at night. Composed
as usual. He’d taken off his dark sunglasses at least, per Ashe’s request. He liked Silas’ eyes; they
were a mosaic of gray, green, brown, and blue that always required a double take. They lacked
warmth, though. And maybe it’d been that coldness Ashe had spotted that made him hire Silas off his
photograph alone, though he did have a damn impressive resume to back that up. That resume did not
include any babysitting or personal assistant experience, but here they were.
Silas was the only person he trusted.
“Thanks.” Ashe didn’t budge. The conference call wasn’t something he was looking forward to at
all, but it had to be done. His grandfather had left him with this thing, this burden, an albatross around
his neck, and he wanted it off. So he was doing anything he could to make that happen. He anticipated
another long and drawn out fight ahead, but he couldn’t be bothered to muster up more than a shrug.
It was what it was.
“I know you haven’t been sleeping,” Silas said. “You need more of those pills?”
“No.” He didn’t need the fucking pills. Sleep hit differently when you didn’t have a Jack next to
you, holding you, soothing you. He had that number, scribbled on a torn piece of gas station receipt. A
whole week, and every night, Ashe punched those numbers into his phone and hovered his finger over
the call button. He could never quite make himself do it.
He’d come too far for this shit.
Come too far to suddenly be needing Jack. Even though he did. But he could hold out, until the
rawness of missing Jack scabbed over. Until the memory of his touch faded to the dark corners of his
mind, hidden by time. Until he had something better, more delicious, to wipe the taste of Jack’s kiss
off his taste buds.
Silas’ phone pinged and he stared at it then turned to Ashe. “Fawn is downstairs.”
Ashe blinked. “What? Why? It’s not even—” He shook his head. “It’s that time, isn’t it?”
“Yep.” Silas got up then helped him to his feet. “I’ll get her situated. You handle the business.”
“Right.” Ashe made his way to his office. He couldn’t believe he’d forgotten all about Fawn.
They’d met in a support group, one of the few times Ashe had dragged himself away from the safety
of his condo. They were alike, he and Fawn, except where Ashe was trying to be the man he always
knew he was, Fawn had been transitioning to female. Ashe had walked out of that group after twenty
minutes, but Fawn followed him. They’d fallen into a sort of arrangement.
Sex with no complications.
Twice a month.
And she was here when Ashe only had Jack on his brain and ached to have him on his body.
He pushed all of that to the back of his mind as he sat at his desk, laptop in front of him as he
waited for the others to join the conference call. Once they were all there, he got directly to the point.
“I’ve brought someone in to run the day-to-day operations of the company.” He waited until the
gasps and chatter died down before expanding. “Grandfather’s will stipulated only that I had to
remain as the owner of the company, not that I had to run it. So, the new woman in charge will do just
that. She’ll bring in whatever new staff she needs, fire who she doesn’t, and she has my full support.
She’ll be in touch soon.”
“Your novice is showing,” his father, Leslie, spoke up. “This isn’t how things are done.”
Ashe smiled. “This is how I do things, Father. And since this is my company, my way—and that of
the person I hired—is the only way that matters.” He’d had this move in the works for a long time,
investigating, bargaining, he and his lawyers doing anything that needed to be done to close the deal.
He’d done his due diligence and the woman he’d chosen was a powerhouse more than capable of
holding shit down. He didn’t tell them all that though. His parents wouldn’t care. They wanted to be
the ones at the helm.
To their credit, his siblings didn’t bother commenting, leaving it up to their parents, who never
disappointed.
“Your grandfather is rolling in his grave,” his mother spat from where she was seated next to her
husband. Colleen Tannen was always coiffed, face devoid of lines—of life—due to her excessive use
of plastic surgery. Today’s wig was styled in a bob and she was dressed in white, always white. He’d
never seen her in any other color. All the jewels at her throat, ears, and wrists made her husband, who
wore only an open-necked white shirt under a navy sport coat, look like the gardener or one of the
help on their estate up in the Hollywood Hills. The only thing that made him appear to belong at her
side was the Patek Philippe watch on his wrist. He’d gifted himself that the day his father died.
One of the many reasons Ashe disliked that man.
“Grandfather gave the company to me, so something tells me he’d be cool with whatever I do. I
could burn it to the ground and he’d still be two-stepping in heaven because at least you and your
husband wouldn’t have it.” Ashe flicked his gaze to his siblings. Tsa was glued to her phone and his
brother, L.J., just sat back with a small smile playing at his lips. “You two have anything to add?”
L.J. shook his head. “I’m good.”
“Tsa? Tsa?” Ashe barked.
“Huh?” She jerked her head up. “What?”
“Do you have anything to add to this little discussion?” Ashe lifted an eyebrow.
 “Oh. No. Can I go now? I’ve got a—thing.”
Right. “Yeah.” Ashe waved her away. “We’re done here.”
“No, we’re not,” his father snarled. “Ashley, our lawyers will have a field day with you. You
think you have the right to put a stranger in to run my own father’s company?”
Ashe pinched the bridge of his nose with suddenly shaking fingers. He should have been braced
for it, the battering that hearing that name gave to his psyche. It showed all the ways they didn’t see
him, didn’t respect him. From people who hadn’t given literal life to him, that name hurt, but from his
parents, it was tantamount to a punch to the gut. Except maybe, that physical blow would somehow
hurt less. “My name is Ashe, and I’m not afraid of your lawyers, Father. You should know that by
now.” He pushed his chair back and stood. “We’re done.”
He shut his laptop down then dropped right back into the chair, hands clasped tightly to help with
the shaking. His eyes watered so he bowed his head, forcing himself to breathe. Just one conversation
with his parents and he was reduced to this. Under the desk, his legs wouldn’t stop trembling. Did it
even matter if the people on the street read him as male, called him by the name on his driver’s
license, if his own family—his own flesh and blood—refused to acknowledge him?
In the beginning it’d been easy to excuse them. They’d gone for years calling him by one name,
after all. But as time went on, and as the battle for the company heated up, they’d used that name as a
weapon.
With mass effect.
“Fawn is in the blue bedroom.” Silas came through the door. “I’m gonna—” His words stopped
when Ashe lifted his head. “What happened?”
Ashe wiped his cheek with a scoff. “What usually happens whenever I deal with those people.”
Silas stepped forward, but Ashe held up a hand. “I need a minute. Make sure Fawn is comfortable,
please? I’ll be there shortly.”
Silas watched him silently before jerking a nod and backing out of the room.
Ashe sat back, pulling his phone from his shorts. The torn piece of paper, too. He kept it on him,
shoving it into pocket after pocket as he changed clothes. He didn’t need the paper, the number was
already in his phone, but he couldn’t bring himself to part with it. Now, he placed it on the desk and
smoothed it out, stroking a thumb over it. There was an intimacy that paper brought…
Or maybe that was all wishful thinking.
He searched and found the number saved simply under “Jack” in his phone. And he tapped call
while his legs shook and his belly did things.
The phone rang.
And rang.
He smoothed a hand over his mouth, holding it there a moment as if to smother the cry tearing at
him. He shouldn’t have made himself come to need Jack so much. The emptiness inside mocked him
for believing he could have anything more from Jack than what he’d gotten. The ringing echoed,
jarring.
“Yeah.”
Christ. He jumped, that familiar grumpy voice so unexpected. He covered his eyes. “Jack.”
Music. Jack’s inhale was music. “Ashe. Fuck.” The relief in his voice eased all the pressure
pushing down on Ashe’s chest. “Are you okay?”
No. Because this phone call was solidifying shit by the second. Ashe swallowed all the ache
crammed in his throat. “Yes.”
“You called.” Jack paused. “What do you need, Ashe?”
 “There’s a woman in a bedroom down the hall, waiting for me…” His voice shook. “And I’m
here on the phone with you. I need you, Jack.”
Heaviness filled the silence left empty by the questions he knew Jack had but didn’t ask.
“How?”
“What?”
“How do you need me, Ashe?” The words came out covered in rust, sucking Ashe in.
He closed his eyes, head falling back as he clutched the phone to his ear. The list was a mile long
of all the things he needed from Jack. Wasn’t that selfish as fuck? Felt as if all he did was take. What
did the other man get in return? “What do you get in return?”
“You,” Jack answered immediately. “I get you, so tell me…how do you need me, Ashe?”
“Here. I need you here.” Was it too bold? Did it sound too much like a command and not a plea?
Did he even have any right to ask for this when—
“I’m on my way.”
He blinked. “Are you for real?”
“Very real.” That rumble in Jack’s voice was the sexist thing. “And Ashe?”
“Y-Yeah?”
“The woman. Get rid of her.”
Whoa. Goose bumps flooded his skin. Ashe’s mouth opened and closed. “Okay.” He cleared his
throat, hoping his arousal didn’t ring through when he said, “I can, uh, send the plane for you.”
“I’ll be waiting.”
 19

ASHE DIDN ’ T KICK Fawn out. He did explain, in as few words as possible, that they had a slight
change of plans. So she remained in the blue bedroom and he had the chef make them dinner. They
shared a meal where he pretended not to notice her contemplative gaze on his face. She wanted to
know why they weren’t getting down to business as usual.
He wasn’t ready to share.
Silas hadn’t said much when Ashe told him Jack would be coming. His head of security had
simply given him that steely eyed stare of disapproval. Fuck him. Silas didn’t approve of any damn
thing.
He had hours to wait. Hours. The jet had to go to Atlanta to get Jack then bring him back. But
Ashe felt so much like a kid on Christmas morning—hyped, anxious to open his presents. Christmas
with his grandparents, though. Not with his mother and father, who never gave a shit.
“So, what’s up?” Fawn sat across from him, arms folded as she sat back. She was a big and
beautiful woman with almond-shaped eyes and skin a deep reddish-brown. “You gonna talk to me?”
She didn’t get mad. Or at least, he hadn’t ever witnessed it. She just got a sulking hurt look on her
face that he always found himself rushing to erase. This time was no different.
“Um…” He gazed down at his empty plate briefly then back at her. “So, I met someone. He’s
coming here.” Jack was his. His secret. One of the only things he had just for himself and he’d wanted
to keep him just like that for as long as possible, but Fawn wasn’t just anybody.
Her eyes went wide at his news and her mouth opened.
Not a frequent thing, Fawn speechless, so he chuckled.
“You met someone?” She lurched forward, grabbing his hand across the table. When he nodded,
she squealed. “Oh my God! Who? When? Do I know him?” She halted her barrage of questions to
draw back slowly while side-eyeing him. “What’s wrong with him? Why don’t you want me to know
about him?”
“Nothing’s wrong with him. He’s…” His face heated and he glanced away from her narrowed
eyes.
“He’s what?”
“Perfect. He’s perfect.”
“Awww.” She clapped her hands and he flinched. “You’re blushing. You’re fucking blushing.”
Yeah, he was. She was really one of a scant few who knew what it meant for him to be here. He’d
only ever been with Fawn as Ashe. There’d been no one else, definitely not a cis white guy who Ashe
would bet his unwanted wealth had never been with somebody like him.
 Damaged.
Scarred, inside and out.
Fucked up.
And the baggage he came with?
But somehow Jack wanted him. Dude was getting on a plane for him. Ashe squirmed in his chair,
fighting a smile. “It’s new. We haven’t—” He waved a hand, but she knew what he meant. “Not yet.”
Fawn’s smile crashed and burned. “But he knows, right? Because, honey, they out here killing us.”
“He knows.” He reached for her this time, lacing their fingers. As much as he lived with the
downside of what it meant to be a Black man in America, Fawn being who she was represented
something altogether different. Trans women of color were disproportionately affected by the uptick
in fatal violence in the transgender community. Sexism, racism, homophobia, and transphobia all
contributed to their lack of employment, housing, and healthcare, leaving them that much more
vulnerable.
Fawn hadn’t grown up the way he had. She didn’t have the opportunities he’d had, and she’d been
kicked out of her home by the age of sixteen. Unlike her, he’d had his grandfather looking out for him
and protecting him, while Fawn had to take to the streets, all alone. Now, thankfully, she had a good
job that provided the security she needed to be her best self.
And she had him.
He kissed the inside of her left wrist, inhaling her perfume. “His name is Jack.”
“He white?”
He nodded with a chuckle. “Blue eyes and everything.”
“Honey.” She flicked her hip-length hair over her shoulder. “Those white boys be the freakiest,
swear to God.”
“He knew me…before.” And that was all he was gonna say about that. She knew some of what
he’d been through, but it wasn’t worth rehashing.
Her gaze turned solemn. “That’s good, right?”
“Very good.” But it could be bad, too.
Fawn sighed. “Okay, so we won’t be burning up the sheets, but we’re good, right?”
“So good.”
Her lips twitched. “And he’s coming here?”
“He’s in Atlanta, so I sent the jet.”
“Oh, now that sounds serious.” She searched his face and he caught her worry for him. “Do you
know what you’re doing?”
Not really, no. Right now he was just going with the flow that kept pushing him toward Jack. “It’s
early, like I said. Don’t know what it is yet, but…” He shrugged. “I’m open.” Something he hadn’t
been in years, not since the man he’d found himself married to.
And nope, he wasn’t going to think about that. The time would come soon enough when he’d have
to think about his ex, but now wasn’t it.
“Come on.” He rose and Fawn followed suit. “Let’s go outside.”
Outside was really the roof of his building, where he had a panoramic view of downtown LA.
He’d bought the building when he’d been released from the institution his parents had stuck him in. It
was his first big purchase that had almost ensured they’d put him right back in a straitjacket. He lived
at the very top of the thirty-story building, renting out the rest to some of the wealthiest individuals
and businesses in LA.
Up on the roof, he could sit and stare. Attempt to clear his head.
 He and Fawn sat side by side on one of the outdoor rattan love seats—she sipped red wine while
he chugged water—staring down at the traffic along Avenue of the Stars. On the other side of the roof,
on a lower ledge, was his very own pool. They accessed it by the stairs, or via the lower level of his
condo. The upper level was the helipad for the helicopter he didn’t own.
He sighed.
Sometimes, it felt excessive. Too much. This life could be overwhelming, and he wondered now
if Jack would think that. While Ashe wasn’t personally the billionaire Jack accused him of being, he
was wealthy in a way he knew a man like Jack had never been exposed to.
It couldn’t be a dealbreaker, though. Not if Jack was willing to come to him. On his private plane,
no less.
“Hey.” Fawn’s fingers slid over his where they rested on his knee. “What’s going on in your
head?”
He huffed. “Just trying to look at this life with an objective eye, wondering if Jack would feel out
of place. If it’s too much.”
“Look.” She shifted, body twisting to face him squarely. “Not gonna lie, I’ve known you and been
around all this for a while, and I still feel out of place the moment I enter the building.”
He dropped his head.
“But…” She lifted his chin with a finger, smiling into his eyes. He loved her smile, loved the
huge-ass gap in the middle of her two top front teeth. Fawn smiled with her whole body. “If he knows
even the littlest bit about you, he’ll know that none of it matters, because you don’t give a fuck about
it.”
“Well, I do give a tiny bit of a fuck.” The money meant he could keep the clinics he funded open.
The schools he’d founded. He didn’t give one fuck about the business his grandfather had forced on
him, but he cared about the charities he’d been able to create and help because of it.
Fawn tapped his nose in a reprimand. “You know what I mean, don’t play cute. Your Jack should
be able to look beyond the glamour and glitter to see what truly matters to you, and if he doesn’t?”
She tossed her hair and sipped her wine. “Well then, fuck that guy.”
That startled a laugh out of him and he hugged her close. “Thank you.”
“I got your back, kid. You and we against the world.”
“For real.” He kissed her temple. “My Jack?” he repeated.
“I said what I said.”
Okay then. They settled into a comfortable silence, until Ashe’s phone buzzed in his pocket. He
fetched it out with his free hand.
Jack.
He released Fawn and got to his feet, ignoring her stare as he took the call. “Jack.”
Fawn’s eyes widened.
“So, I’m on your plane.”
Man, his voice just…It fucked with Ashe’s stability. He cleared his throat. “Yeah?”
“Yeah.” Something rustled in his ear. “I had forgotten who you are. Your wealth.”
He bit his lip, stomach dropping. “Does—Does it make you want to change your mind?”
“Do you want me to change my mind?’
“No,” he said quickly. Fawn got to her feet, watching him protectively, hands on her hips. “I want
you to come see me.”
“Five hours.” Jack’s voice dropped about a hundred octaves, until it was just the roughest rumble,
a sensual abrasion against Ashe’s skin. “Five hours, give or take, and I’ll be where you are.”
 It was some kind of threat, putting him on notice. He nodded stupidly. “Yes.” As he watched her,
Fawn used the thumb and forefinger of her left hand to form a small circle then used the index of her
right to poke the circle while flicking out her tongue, snakelike, at him. He flashed her his middle
finger.
“Just to make sure there aren’t any misunderstandings,” Jack rasped, “we will be fucking.”
Ashe reached out blindly to grab onto something. Anything. Because Jack had liquified his fucking
legs. His hand closed around Fawn’s right boob and she batted his hand with a knowing glare.
“Ashe.”
“Y-Yes. Yeah.”
“Yes to the fucking?”
“Yes,” he supplied hoarsely. “To that, yes.” Christ, could he sound like more of an idiot?
“I like the way you say yes.”
He squeezed his eyes at the mirth in Jack’s voice.
“See you in five hours, Ashe.”
“Yes.” Shit! The call ended on Jack’s chuckle.
Fawn stood in front of him, hands flailing. “Danger! Your ass is in danger, honey.”
He blinked, shoving the phone into his pocket. “Dunno what you’re talking about.” He averted his
chin as she eyed him up and down.
“Uh-huh. Uh-huh. Right. Like Blue-Eyed Jack didn’t have you wide open just now?”
“Are you staying the night?” he asked instead.
“I don’t know.” She crossed her arms, giving him her back as she pouted. “You gonna ignore my
questions all night?”
“I saw Silas staring at your ass earlier.” He sent up a silent plea for forgiveness he knew Silas
wouldn’t give.
“Really?” She swung around to face him quickly, twirling a lock of hair around her finger. Her
eyes were brimming with hope when she asked, “You think he’s ready for me? ’Cause you know I
been trying to get on that ride for the longest.”
Oh, he knew. Fawn might be the only person he knew who could make Silas blush. “I mean, can
anyone be truly ready for Miss Fawn, though?”
“All right now. Tell it!” She did a full-on body roll then grabbed him, dropping a kiss on his lips.
“Don’t think I don’t know your ass is tryna gas me up to distract me, but I’m still gonna shoot my
shot.” She tiptoed away on bare feet, tugging on her tight black dress, as he chuckled.
“Get it, girl.”
He took his seat again, seeing nothing. Hearing only Jack’s confident rumble.
No misunderstandings.
He had a mere few hours to prepare for what it meant, having Jack Wellington in his house. In his
bed.
And for sure, inside him.
 20

ASHE DIDN ’ T SLEEP . Even after Fawn gave up trying to get Silas to lose his cool and took her ass to
bed, Ashe stayed up. He split his attention between the clock on his phone and the text updates Silas
sent about the jet’s arrival.
Anticipation ate away at him, had him weak in his bed as if he’d come down with a sudden case
of the flu. Butterflies in his stomach, shaky limbs, and sweaty palms—Jack did that shit to him. All
he’d given Ashe so far were kisses, drugging, soul-wrenching kisses, but they were so much more
than that.
Jack saw him.
Ashe wanted to be good for him.
He took a shower, prepping himself like he’d never done for Fawn. His thing with Fawn was
casual, friends taking comfort in each other. Deeper feelings weren’t involved.
But with Jack?
Ashe’s everything was involved. The realization scared him even as it exhilarated him. He
couldn’t be what and who Jack was used to. The reality of that would arrive soon enough. The idea of
acceptance was a good one, a noble one. But the act of accepting was altogether different. There
hadn’t been a long line of lovers in his bed post-transition, so Ashe hadn’t been in this unfamiliar spot
for a long time.
He remained in it; he had fear and uncertainty, but was excited, too. And he had need, so much of
it he didn’t get how he managed to function. He sat in his feelings on his bed, phone next to him, eyes
closed as the sound machine on his nightstand pumped sounds of heavy, unending rainfall throughout
the room. He stayed like that until a knock came on his door.
His eyes flew open. “Yeah?”
The knob turned and Silas poked his head in. “He’s being escorted up now.”
Ashe’s heart did that thing he’d seen salmon do on a nature show, leaping high. He bolted upright,
swinging his legs off the bed as he turned off the sound machine. When he got to his feet, he found
Silas hadn’t moved. The other man watched him with a deceptively blank gaze. “What?”
“You’re sure about this?”
Silas was the only person who worked for him who could get away with questioning him like this.
Ashe didn’t get upset; he understood where Silas was coming from. “I am,” he said firmly. “Don’t ask
again.”
Silas’ lips curved into a tease of a smile and he dipped his head, stepping back for Ashe to step
past him. Even when they were here, in a secure space, Silas still played his role, leading the way
through the penthouse until they were in the living room area. Ashe stood next to him, staring at the
closed elevator doors, shifting from foot to foot. He’d been nervous before, waiting, but now he
couldn’t describe the amalgamation of emotions riding him.
He didn’t get a chance to try either, because the heavy wood double doors that camouflaged the
elevator opened silently.
And Jack was there, within arms’ reach, flanked on both sides by two of the bodyguards. He’d
been staring off to the side, but the moment the doors opened his gaze snapped forward, zeroing in on
Ashe. His eyes were brilliant blue flames that immediately swept over Ashe in a breath-snatching
rush of fire.
While the men with him wore suits, Jack wore a steel-gray t-shirt with dull blue words Ashe
couldn’t make out, faded jeans, and dusty black boots. He held a black duffel bag over his right
shoulder, his knuckles turning white as he stepped out of the elevator and approached Ashe.
His nostrils flared as he stared Ashe down.
“Silas.” Ashe didn’t look away from Jack. Not that he could. His voice didn’t even try not to
embarrass him, going all low and trembly when he told Silas, “I don’t want to be disturbed.” Jack’s
gaze got somehow hotter, which was fucking insane. “Not unless the building’s on fire.”
The bodyguards in the elevator took that as their cue to get the hell out of dodge. Ashe didn’t turn
to look, but he felt Silas’ quiet retreat. His head of security would keep himself out of sight, but he’d
remain close. That was what Ashe paid him for after all, so he couldn’t be mad.
He focused on the man before him. “Jack.”
The duffel bag hit the floor and somehow Ashe was in Jack’s arms. Mouth on his. Fingers in his
hair, pulling, yanking. Shit. The initial taste of him hit Ashe like a sledgehammer and he would have
cried out from the force of it, if Jack wasn’t gripping his face with both hands, swallowing him down
like Ashe was a bottle of the liquor he’d been guzzling back at the cabin. Hands on his ass lifted him
and he went, swinging his legs around Jack’s waist, clinging to him, grinding against him. When he
pressed against Jack, the other man’s kiss got frantic, his fingers pinching Ashe’s cheeks.
Marking.
They couldn’t get carried away. There was a bunch of shit they had to talk about before they got to
where he wanted them, which was tangled up in his sheets. He reluctantly pulled away, breaking the
kiss.
Jack made an unhappy sound.
“Jack.”
The other man’s lashes lifted and he met Ashe’s gaze with unfocused eyes as he licked his lips.
“Fucking love the way you say my name,” his voice rumbled. “Missed it, too.” He slid a hand down
and around to stroke down Ashe’s back. “Missed it before you even left me.”
Jack Wellington, scrambling Ashe’s brain cells one word at a time. Ashe swallowed. “Thank you
for coming.” He should get off the man and stand on his own two legs, but with the way Jack’s hold
on him tightened, it appeared he didn’t mind having Ashe all up on him.
He brushed a thumb over Ashe’s bottom lip. “Lots of things I want your mouth to do,” he said
gravelly. “Thanking me for giving us what we both want isn’t one of them.”
Fuck. Ashe kissed him again, groaning into his mouth, shuddering. He tasted so good, taking Ashe
back to their time at the cabin. Just the two of them. He wanted that time back. Wanted to go back and
relive it, like this. Jack on him. Him on Jack. Tongue fucking each other until whimpers were their
only means of communication.
God, but they had to talk. If only he could keep his tongue out of Jack’s mouth long enough to do
that. He retreated again, this time with a mournful groan. Jack fisted his t-shirt though, holding him
there, panting against his lips, eyes narrowed to flints of that blue fire.
“Tell me,” he commanded hoarsely.
Ashe blinked. “Hmm?”
“What do you need me to know? Tell me.”
Right. Right. He tried to move away, but Jack didn’t release him. Instead he shuffled over,
dropping onto a nearby chaise, hauling Ashe into his lap, catching his chin, making sure their gazes
met and held.
“What do you like? What do you need?” Jack asked. “What’s off limits?”
Words kinda dampened things a bit, Ashe couldn’t lie. “I’m vers, but tonight I want you,” he said
softly. “I want to feel you.”
Jack’s gaze remained steady. “Then you will.”
He could get used to the way Jack Wellington thrilled him. “I’m different,” he told Jack. Firmly.
Securely. There’d been a time when he hadn’t been as sure of his body, but today he was, and he
wasn’t offering up apologies for not looking a certain way. For not possessing certain body parts cis
men had. He was happy with who he saw in the mirror and he wanted to make sure Jack understood.
“I have scars, as you already know. My chest…the sensation is different, I’m not as sensitive there as
before, but I still love having my nipples played with.”
Jack’s breathing seemed to kick up a notch and when he shifted, Ashe felt his erection, hard and
thick and so welcomed against his ass. Jack released Ashe to grip the hem of his t-shirt and waited
until Ashe lifted his arms before pulling the article of clothing off and tossing it aside. He licked his
lips, gaze dropping to Ashe’s chest. “I like your body,” he rasped. He flattened a hand at the base of
Ashe’s throat then dragged it downward. “Love it, actually.”
Ashe moaned and tipped his head backward, hips making small circles as he rubbed against
Jack’s cock. “My dick’s not as big as a cis male’s would be, but I love having it sucked, stroked, and
jerked just the same. I can’t fuck you with it, but I’ve got other dicks for that.”
Jack’s hand moved around to his back, working under the waistband of his shorts and smoothing
over his ass.
Ashe faced forward, pushing back into his touch. “Do you bottom, Jack?”
Seemed impossible, but Jack’s eyes somehow got bluer when he said, “Yes.”
“I’d like to fuck you, Jack.”
“Yes.”
Ashe smiled at the eagerness in the other man’s rusty voice, but right now, he wanted Jack. “I love
being penetrated,” he told Jack. “My front hole or my ass, I like getting fucked in either one.”
Jack cupped the back of his head, kissing his lips, tongue sliding between and inside before
retreating as he kissed his way across Ashe’s jaw and down his neck. Ashe squirmed on him,
flattening both hands on Jack’s chest.
“Is there anything I shouldn’t do?” Jack asked quietly. “Anything I shouldn’t say? I want to make
this good for you.”
“It’s already good.” He meant that shit. Just their kisses and Jack’s touches were better than full-
blown sex with anybody else. “Jack, you don’t understand. It’s already so good. Anything you do that
brings me pleasure is good for both of us,” Ashe reassured him. “And obviously no feminine words.”
But he didn’t think he had to fear that from Jack. Ashe clasped Jack’s face in both hands and brushed
Jack’s nose with his. “Feels like I’ve been waiting forever for this. Don’t make me wait anymore,
Jack.” He lifted off him and stood, holding out a hand. “Come to my bedroom.”
 Jack took his hand, linked their fingers, and allowed Ashe to lead him out of the room and into his
bedroom. Once the door closed, they were in each other’s arms.
Kisses never felt so good. Never tasted so intoxicating. Jack was like his liquored namesake,
going to Ashe’s head, leaving him dizzy. Fumbling. Yanking off their clothes, they stalled only to pant
into each other’s mouths, warm breaths blending, tingling. Finally naked, Jack faced him, skin golden
tanned, cock hard and ready, the blush tip cut and slick, pre-cum beaded there, waiting for him. Ashe
swiped a finger over it, brought it to his mouth on Jack’s sharp inhale, and sucked.
He tasted delicious.
Ashe touched him again, licking his palm then stroking Jack’s cock. He was hard and soft at the
same time. Warm and mouthwatering.
Jack rose on his tiptoes with every stroke, watching him with flared nostrils, lips red and
swollen, and those eyes…
They kept Ashe captive as he stood there with only his underwear on. Jack kissed him again, just
as hungry and desperate as the very first time, hands around him, fingertips pressed tightly into his
back, lips stripping as they went down his throat, tongue sliding over him there before Jack continued
on, head dipping to brush his lips over Ashe’s chest.
His tongue slid over his nipples, first one then the other.
Ashe cupped the back of his head, cradling him really, pushing his chest forward so Jack could
get the idea. So that he wouldn’t stop. He was heat and slickness, hands falling to grab Ashe’s ass and
haul him in close so he could grind against Jack’s thigh.
Teeth on his nipples. Soft pressure at first. Then harder. Sharper. Biting.
“Oh God!” Pleasure burst through Ashe, bright and blinding. “J-Jack.”
Jack hummed for him, lowering his body, mouth dragging down Ashe’s torso. Tongue leaving a
line of saliva as he went down and down, until he was on his haunches, his head buried in Ashe’s
crotch, mouthing Ashe through his underwear.
Fuck. Him. Ashe clutched his head, bucking against his face, shaking uncontrollably. “Jack. Fuck.”
It was the sight of him like that. As if it wasn’t a big deal at all to do what he was doing. To accept
Ashe like he was. The sight of him on his knees—right didn’t cover it.
And when Jack lifted his head and met Ashe’s gaze, lust and need darkening his eyes?
Ashe started thinking of ways to keep him there, keep Jack on his knees, his face in Ashe’s crotch.
“Take it off me.” It wasn’t an ask or a beg. It was a command, and Jack’s pupils dilated, fingers
trembling against Ashe’s skin as he peeled his underwear down.
Ashe kept one hand on Jack’s head as he stepped out of the underwear, hissing, stumbling when
Jack put his mouth on him. “Fuck!” He threw his head back, but that didn’t last long because he had to
see it, had to watch Jack suck him. And he did, tongue flicking over Ashe with his eyes closed,
making sounds in the back of his throat as though Ashe was the best thing he’d ever had on his taste
buds. “Jack,” he breathed. Goddamn, he was perfection.
He had Ashe wet, limbs shaking, body flush, struggling to stay on his feet as he clamped down on
Jack’s neck, fucking into him, hips slamming forward as he used Jack’s mouth.
“Jack, J-Jack. Touch me.” His words stumbled over themselves as he tried to make sense. “Put
your fingers inside me. M-My front hole.” Before he finished begging, Jack’s finger was sliding over
his wetness, pushing into him, degree by degree, until he was last-knuckle deep.
Pleasure froze Ashe, yanked the breath from his lungs as Jack finger-fucked him while licking his
cock. When Jack released him and tipped his head, cheeks red, face wet, and thrust in another finger,
Ashe’s legs buckled. Jack pulled his fingers away and Ashe grabbed his hand.
 “Don’t stop. Please. Please.”
Jack smiled, indulgent and predatory at the same damn time. “Not stopping.” He straightened and
scooped Ashe’s trembling ass up, climbing the five steps that led up to the bed and dumping him onto
it on his back.
Jack climbed on, kissing his way down Ashe’s writhing body again, fingers stroking. Ashe arched
into him, hips coming off the bed, circling. There wasn’t a hesitancy anywhere in Jack’s movements.
He touched Ashe as if he’d been doing it for years. As if he knew him front and back, inside and out.
It was the sexiest thing.
Until he took Ashe into his mouth again, pushed those thick digits into his soaked front hole again.
“Shit. Shit.” Ashe dug his fingers into Jack’s shoulder—for damn sure he’d be leaving scratches
behind—as he cried out. “Yes. Please.” That dissolved into a choked sob. “Fuck me.” Jack’s fingers
kept multiplying inside him, taking him closer and closer to the point of pain. “So good. So fucking
good.” Through the blood rushing in his ears, he heard Jack’s grunts, his luscious voice saying shit
that Ashe couldn’t decipher, shit that had his legs widening and his back arching as he blindly reached
out. “Inside me. Jack. Jack, please.”
Jack moved away then, only to climb him, fingers still stroking Ashe’s dick, lips at his ear. “How
do you want me?” he rasped. His breath smelled like Ashe, so he turned his head, capturing his lips,
sliding his tongue over Jack’s chin before delving inside.
Fuck, he tasted like the both of them and that just fucked Ashe’s head up more.
“Ashe,” Jack grated out.
“Mmm.” He lifted both legs, wrapping them around Jack’s trim waist, grinding into Jack’s hip
when he moved his hand. All that pleasure had him crazed, tearing at Jack, yanking him down to slurp
all over his face while he fucked himself on Jack. Their bodies aligned, both of them wet and sticky
as they slid over each other. He reached down, grabbing Jack’s flexing ass, holding him steady as he
humped him.
“Front hole or ass.” Jack grabbed Ashe’s hips with trembling fingers to halt his movements.
“Fucking choose before I come all over your bed and you.”
The words just got Ashe even thirstier. “F-Front first. Then my ass.” He swallowed. “Condoms
are over there.” He jerked a thumb over to his bedside drawer without looking away from the storm
of arousal in Jack’s eyes. “Lube, too.”
Jack left him just long enough to retrieve the supplies then he was back, condom on, lube on
fingers that he speared into Ashe, getting him nice and ready. As if he hadn’t been for a long time.
“You.” He caught Jack’s face in his hands, peering into his eyes. “I want you.”
At his words, the fierce desperation on Jack’s face, in his eyes, softened to something tender.
“You have me.” He pulled out his fingers, lined himself up with Ashe’s front hole, and pushed in
gently. “You have—” His breath cut off and his eyes went wide. “Fuck! Oh fuucck, Ashe.”
Ashe held on to him, fighting to keep his eyes open when all he wanted was to lose himself in this
moment. The rawness of it. Jack was barely inside him, just his crown, but already Ashe felt the
reverberations of his entrance. The discomfort. He held himself still, breathing, trying to at least
trying, in order to push past the pain.
“Ashe.” Jack flexed his hips, pushing in some more. “I can’t—” He looked shocked. Hungry, too.
“Fuck, baby, you feel so fucking good. I can’t—” He pressed forward and Ashe’s body eased up for
him, allowing him entry.
With every inch Jack sank into him, it became easier to ride it, easier to forget the brief twinges of
discomfort because pleasure was there for the taking. And Ashe took it. He lifted his hips, allowing
his legs to fall away and spread wide.
Jack choked above him as he reared back and thrust forward. “Ashe. Goddamn. This shit, it’s so
good.”
It was more than that. It was better than anything Ashe had ever experienced. Jack fucked him
slowly, with deep strokes, filling him up. There wasn’t an inch of Ashe that Jack didn’t touch. Not an
inch of his body that didn’t throb and tingle for Jack. He possessed Ashe, tongue frantically licking
into his mouth, cock slamming into him, his movements coming faster now, his fingertips digging into
Ashe’s skin.
Ashe gave himself up and Jack took. Everything.
Jack put his hands under Ashe’s ass, lifting him higher so he could sink deeper, pound harder.
Between them Ashe stroked himself with thumb and forefinger, sobbing out his want into Jack’s
mouth. The other man swallowed him down, hips rolling, dick driving Ashe higher and higher. The
bed rocked with their fucking, their mixed scents flavoring the air.
He’d imagined all kinds of things when he’d thought of this, of them.
Nothing compared to the reality.
Jack’s scent filled his lungs, had his entire body throbbing. Ashe grabbed a fistful of Jack’s hair
and held him still, devouring his mouth, grunting with each thrust. Jack banged him closer and closer
to orgasm and he didn’t want to go, didn’t want this thing to end even for a second.
“You gonna come for me?” Jack nipped his earlobe.
Ashe shivered, sliding a hand down his spine. “Jack.”
“Come for me, Ashe.” Jack switched up his angle, hitting deep, hitting places that had Ashe’s eyes
watering, his nose burning.
“Jack!” He clung to the other man, eyes squeezed shut. Jack had taken him so high, now that the
heat swirled in his middle and curled his toes, Ashe found himself hesitant to let go, afraid of the fall.
Jack knocked his hand away and took over jerking Ashe’s dick. “Your hole’s so fucking tight, I
can barely move,” he growled. “But I want to know what it feels like when you come around me.
Show me.” His finger moved lower, over Ashe’s ass, circling his hole, the pad of one digit pushing
in. “Come.” That finger sank into Ashe and he yelled out, legs reaching for the ceiling, body lurching
off the bed.
Cock in his front hole, finger in his ass, Jack’s breath on his neck and teeth in his skin.
He came sobbing, shaking, and Jack grunted.
“Shit, baby, shit!” He fucked Ashe through the orgasm, thrusts punishing, teeth rattling. Until Ashe
was limp. Spent. Then he pulled out, flipped Ashe onto his stomach, and buried his face in his ass.
“Oh shit.” Ashe clawed at the bed, his thirsty ass finding enough strength to get up on his hands
and knees and push back onto Jack’s tongue. Fingers and tongue fucked him hard and fast, then Jack
was back, pushing into his tender front hole.
Slamming deep.
The sound of the slap of their naked skin was like music, drowning out Ashe’s thundering
heartbeat. He tipped his ass higher for Jack, face buried in the pillows, pleasure like fire riding his
spine. He burned, undulating under the force of Jack’s pounding, taking it all with his teeth in his
bottom lip.
And when Jack buried his face in Ashe’s nape and froze, his dick jerking inside Ashe, heat teasing
his sensitive flesh through the condom, Ashe came again.
 21

HE’ D MEANT to stay away. He’d meant to forget Ashe Tannen-Novak. Until he found himself back at
the cabin, up late night after night, his phone silent, and a bottle of the same damn liquor within arms’
reach. He never did put the bottle to his lips, but if he had, this time it would have been because of
Ashe.
Missing him.
Wanting him.
Wondering who was holding him through his nightmares.
Jack never slept, but without any contact information he couldn’t reach out to Ashe. He couldn’t
check to make sure he was okay. Instead of worrying about the list of names out there for any criminal
to find, he was worrying about Ashe, regretting the kisses they’d shared only because he’d never have
more.
The call came when he was on his back on the cabin floor, staring up at the ceiling, debating what
he’d have to do in exchange for asking Dutch for a favor. For Ashe’s information he’d put himself in
Dutch’s debt. Except he didn’t have to, because Ashe called him with pain and need in his voice, and
it didn’t matter why Jack had tried for distance in the first place. The amount of time they’d known
each other. The baggage they both carried.
It. Didn’t. matter.
They were here in this bed, in a bedroom almost the size of his parents’ entire home. Their bodies
were slick with sweat, but Ashe didn’t seem to mind. Not with his head on Jack’s naked chest, a hand
stroking over his torso.
The sex.
Shit, the sex.
He still hadn’t stopped quaking, hadn’t stopped feeling the sensation of Ashe surrounding him
with the most insane heat and tightness. And he still didn’t know how all of it hadn’t been over in two
seconds flat, because the moment he’d entered Ashe he’d lost his mind.
Ashe hummed low in his throat, his breath washing over Jack’s left nipple, making him shiver. He
wrapped an arm around Ashe, leaning down to kiss the top of his head.
“Are you okay?” They hadn’t exchanged more than two words between them in the aftermath. Jack
had gotten up from the bed only to dispose of the condom and wash his hands in a bathroom that he
could only gape at.
Ashe lifted his head, meeting Jack’s gaze with a smile playing at the corner of his lips. “I mean,
you damn near fucked my soul from my body, Jack, but uh, yeah.” He nodded. “I’m okay.”
 Grinning, Jack brushed his knuckles over the other man’s jaw. “Just okay?”
“More.” Ashe turned his head slightly, kissing the back of Jack’s hand. “So much more.”
Yeah. More. He hugged Ashe to him, and the younger man settled against him with a contented
sigh. “Have you been sleeping?”
Ashe snorted. “Been too busy for sleep.”
“Why?” He listened as Ashe told him all the moves he’d made to distance himself from the
business. To Jack, that should’ve been something Ashe did from the very beginning, but at least he’d
taken the steps now.
“So, my parents are upset, of course. Then I had—” Ashe broke off abruptly.
“What?”
“I had my lawyers contact…um, contact Brody’s people.”
The last thing Jack wanted was to hear that son of a bitch’s name, especially when he was in bed
with Ashe, but he held his tongue and listened.
“I want to be rid of him, Jack. I had them tell him whatever he wanted I’d give, as long as he gave
me the divorce.”
That sounded like a recipe for disaster right there. “What did he say?”
Ashe shrugged. “Haven’t heard back yet.” He pulled away and sat up, staring down at Jack. “How
long are you staying?”
“Ready to get rid of me?”
Ashe shook his head, expression serious. “Jack, you’re like, the only thing I have just for me. The
only thing I don’t have to work at. The only good thing. And if I thought for a second you were open to
it, I’d have you forever at my side.”
It was scary how much Jack wanted the same damn thing. He sat up as well, pulling the blanket up
around his hips and grabbing Ashe’s hand, lacing their fingers. “Remember the stop we made in
Atlanta, when we went to the club? The meeting I had with Dutch?”
Ashe’s mouth twisted. “How could I forget?”
Right. Jack pressed his lips together at the reminder of what went down with Shane and Castillo.
“I learned there’s a list of names that could be out there”—he waved a hand—“possibly on the black
market. A list of names of the agents in that secret task force I told you about.”
Ashe’s brow furrowed. “What does that mean?”
“My name is on that list, and it’s out there for any criminal to purchase.”
Ashe’s grip on him turned painful. “Your undercover work.”
“Yeah.” Jack nodded. “My identity could be compromised, and all the criminals I put away will
be wanting payback.” He watched Ashe swallow, watched his eyes widen and grow dark with fear.
Not for himself, though.
Fear for Jack.
“You’re staying with me.”
“Ashe—”
“No. My security is top-notch. Silas’ team is all former Navy Seals and shit.” Ashe’s words came
fast and furiously. “You’ll stay with me. Nobody will find you. They can’t—”
Jack leaned over, stopping his word flow with a kiss. Ashe opened for him with a low sound.
Man, his taste, though. The way he kissed, too. Like he was trying to swallow Jack whole. Jack
cupped his face, thumb swiping over his jaw, his earlobe. Ashe tumbled backward, taking Jack with
him. They humped, Ashe’s legs widening, lifting to wrap around Jack’s waist.
Goddamn, he was mesmerizing. From the scratch of the hair on his legs to the strength he exerted,
trapping Jack between his thighs, to the fingers in Jack’s hair and the tongue stripping him down. Jack
had things to say, some kinda rebuttal to what Ashe was offering, but that floated to the back of his
mind, out of reach…
Because Ashe arched his back, whimpering.
Jack traced a hand down the other man’s side before fitting it under his ass, gripping and then
hiking him up, opening him so they could fit against each other just right. Ashe groaned into his mouth
as he bucked into Jack.
Quivering.
“Jack,” he breathed.
“Here.” Jack nipped his jaw, licking his way down his throat. “I’m here.”
Fingers sank into his ass cheeks, and Ashe worked against him, pressing into Jack’s hipbone,
rubbing furiously against him. Jack’s cock throbbed a painful beat, but he ignored it as he stared down
at Ashe. Jack was entranced by the way Ashe moved, chasing his pleasure, his eyes heavy-lidded and
lips parted. His fingers were painful where they dug into Jack’s flesh.
But all that mattered was Ashe and making sure he got what he wanted.
Jack dipped his head, tracing the scar on the right side of Ashe’s chest with the tip of his stiffened
tongue before taking a nipple between his teeth.
Ashe cried out, hips slamming into him. “Jack. Oh shit! Please—”
“Get yours,” Jack growled out. Goddamn, he could barely speak. Watching Ashe had taken him to
the edge and he hadn’t even realized…“Get yours, baby.”
Ashe came with a choked shout and the vision he made, brown skin glowing with his climax, that
shit had Jack biting the inside of his cheek and throwing his head back as he took himself in hand.
Two strokes and he was coming too, cum spitting out onto Ashe’s groin and inner thigh. As Ashe’s
body vibrated with aftershocks, Jack cleaned him up with his tongue then went back up his body,
kissing him, giving him a taste of them.
“I didn’t plan on that when I kissed you,” Jack confessed in a ragged whisper.
“Mmm.” Ashe kissed his nose. “I’m not complaining.” He opened one eye. “You complaining?”
“Fuck no.” Jack gathered him up in his arms and rolled them so they were on their sides, facing
each other. “I don’t want to bring any more shit to your doorstep,” he said softly. “My mess, that’s not
for you, babe. Those criminals I dealt with, they’re beyond hardcore. I’m talking cartels and
mercenaries and people who traffic in bodies and blood.” Ashe remained silent. “I can’t expose you
to that. You have enough to deal with without me around making things more difficult than they need to
be.” Ashe simply watched him thoughtfully. “Ashe.”
“Why did you come to me?” Ashe finally asked.
Jack frowned. “What do you mean?”
“Exactly what I asked: why did you come?”
“Because I missed you. Because the thought of someone else holding you while you battled your
nightmares made my chest feel as if it were caving in.” He blew out a shaky breath and continued
hoarsely, “Because your kiss is the best thing I’ve ever tasted. Because I like the way I feel when you
look at me.”
“How do you feel when I look at you?”
“Worthy.” The word cracked, and he swallowed. “I feel worthy. After all the things I’ve done, all
the ways I’ve fucked up, when you look at me, I don’t feel quite as broken.” Or unwanted. Unseen.
Ashe smiled, his eyes a little bit shimmery. “Jack.” He caught his bottom lip between his teeth
when it trembled. “You just described what I feel, how I’ve felt, from the moment you reluctantly
allowed me to enter your cabin.”
Jack chuckled through the tightness in his throat. He drew closer to Ashe, putting his face in his
shoulder, dragging his nose up and down the length of his neck. Ashe tilted his head, giving him all the
access. He smelled like Jack. Like sex. Like the most potent mix of both of them. “I want to be with
you.”
“Then be with me,” Ashe murmured. “There’s no safer place than here.”
“Babe.”
Ashe pulled back, grabbing Jack’s face with both hands. His brown eyes were serious, full of
begging, wanting, when he repeated, “Be with me.”
There was a mile-long list of reasons why the answer should be no. But Ashe, he was Jack’s. His
to take. And he’d already known once he’d exited that elevator earlier, once he’d seen Ashe’s eyes
glow for him, there was no way he could ever willingly put distance between them again.
“Yes.”
 22

THEY SLEPT until the sun was high in the sky, Jack’s arms locked around Ashe. It wasn’t an uneventful
rest, not with Jack being in an unfamiliar bed and Ashe twitching in his sleep, emitting mournful
sounds.
It broke Jack’s heart, the horror Ashe had seen. The shit he went through with the people who
were supposed to love and take care of him. Jack didn’t have much. The shit he’d done, the whole
Shane shit-show, had depleted him of much of who he’d been, but everything he had left, he vowed to
give to the man in his arms.
He pressed a kiss to the top of Ashe’s head, smoothing his palm over his nape when Ashe stirred.
His head lifted off Jack’s chest, lashes fluttering when he grunted.
Jack grinned.
“Jack,” Ashe breathed out, one eye open, tongue flicking out to lick his lips.
“Good…” Jack glanced over to the digital clock on the nightstand. “Afternoon.” He loosened his
grip and Ashe rolled off him, settling onto his back and scrubbing a hand over his face.
“Shit. I’m never in bed this late.”
With the way he slept, Jack wondered if Ashe spent any significant time in bed at all. “You were
exhausted.” He grabbed Ashe’s hand, tugging it down so their gazes could meet. “Not to brag, but
somebody told me I almost fucked their soul out of their body. So…” He shrugged.
Ashe grunted, eyes—already hazy from sleep—softening when he smiled. “You can brag.” He got
onto his hands and knees and leaned over Jack, burying his face in Jack’s throat. “I know you don’t
want to hear it,” he murmured, “but thank you for being here.”
Jack tugged him down until Ashe was once again lying on top of him, widening his thighs so Ashe
could settle between them, sliding a hand down his back to caress his ass. “I’m glad I’m here,” he
whispered back, kissing along Ashe’s jaw. “Wish I’d come sooner.” He brought his lips to Ashe’s,
but the other man reared back.
“I’ve got sleep breath!”
Jack chuckled, grasping his chin and then bringing him right back. “Nothing comes between me
and your tongue, babe. Besides, so do I, so we’re good.” He took Ashe’s mouth, coaxing him open,
sliding in with a moan.
Ashe whimpered, nails brutal on Jack’s skin.
There was no artifice between them, no secrets, not in this moment. This wasn’t about lust, either.
Jack just wanted to be close, closer than his death grip on Ashe’s ass cheek, closer than their chests
and groins pressed together. He wanted to always be connected to the other man beyond a look and
the touches. He had Ashe’s bites on his neck and throat, his fingerprints tattooed on his shoulders and
back, and Jack wanted more than that.
If he’d had a heart left after everything he’d done, he’d put it in Ashe’s back pocket when he’d
watched him leave Atlanta. Which would explain how alive Jack had felt the moment their eyes made
contact when he’d first arrived. It was like coming home, and every kiss, every touch, reinforced the
realization that he wasn’t supposed to be anywhere else.
“So you’re really gonna spend all day in bed when I’m—”
Jack rolled Ashe under him, blocking his naked body from view as he glared over his shoulder at
the person stupid enough to barge in without knocking.
She stood just inside the door, gazing up at them with her eyes bulging, mouth agape. And she
was…stunning. Curves in abundance, skin a rich and arresting brown, sleek black hair hanging past
her tailbone, dressed in orange pants with a matching blazer that hung open exposing her white,
skintight top, and nude colored heels. The blazer’s sleeves were tugged up to her elbows and she
crossed her arms as she eyed them gleefully.
“Fawn.” Ashe poked his head up, pushing against Jack gently until he shifted aside so Ashe could
sit up. “Meet Jack. Jack, this is Fawn, who was just apologizing for entering my bedroom without
knocking.”
She shifted her eyes from gaping at Jack over to Ashe. “Say what now?”
“Fawn.”
“Oh. Right.” She pursed her lips and returned to scrutinizing Jack. “Nice to meet you, Jack.” She
winked. “My apologies for bursting in and interrupting your…” She waved a hand. “This.”
He nodded shortly, but didn’t speak. The sight of anyone else in Ashe’s bedroom didn’t sit well
with him. He didn’t give a fuck who it was.
She lifted her chin. “Nothing to say?”
“Get the fuck out, woman,” Ashe barked. “Damn.”
She huffed, but Jack caught the curve of her smile as she turned away. “Ashe, you didn’t tell me he
was mute,” she yelled as she slipped out the door.
Ashe flopped back onto the pillows. “Sorry about that. She doesn’t do boundaries.”
Oh, that was gonna be a problem. “She’s the woman you told me about.” Jealousy had twisted his
gut inside out when Ashe told him, “There’s a woman in a bedroom down the hall, waiting for
me…” He’d fisted his hands, bringing his knuckle to his mouth and biting down. Ashe and someone
else, just the idea of it cut way too deep for him to survive.
“Yeah.” Ashe nodded. “Fawn and I are—” He sighed. “We’re friends. I care for her very much.”
“Friends who fuck.” A friend who apparently stays over. And was comfortable barging into his
bedroom whenever she felt like it.
“I know what it looks like.” Ashe sat up, grabbing Jack’s hands. “But she knows, as of last night,
that the sex part of our friendship is over.”
This was Ashe’s life and as much as Jack hated it, he had to deal. He already knew Ashe didn’t
have many people in his life he liked and trusted, so if Fawn was one of those people, Jack would put
aside the fact that she was also familiar with the sounds Ashe made when in the throes of pleasure.
He didn’t like it.
But that was the possessive fucker in him rearing its head after being dormant for so long. He
ruthlessly tried to smother it as he nodded. “Cool.”
Ashe searched his gaze before smiling. “Cool. You hungry? I’ll have Chef make us something.”
He picked up his phone just as a knock sounded on the door. He tapped an app on his phone’s home
screen and as Jack watched, a camera feed popped up, showing Silas standing outside the bedroom
door. “Yes, Silas?”
Silas’ head turned toward the camera. “Rathbun wants a word.”
“Shit.” Ashe glanced around. “Uh, give me ten and I’ll be right out.” He closed out the app and
went about dressing in the same clothes he’d been wearing before Jack stripped them off him.
“What’s up?” Jack asked.
“That’s the lawyer I had reach out to my—to Brody.” He pulled his t-shirt over his head. “He
most likely has an update.”
At that, Jack got off the bed and put on his own jeans. “You need me to come with?”
Ashe shook his head with a smile. “Nah, it’s probably a video call in my office.” He turned away,
heading to the bathroom. “Tell you what, you can go ahead to the kitchen and request whatever you
want to eat from Chef. Have him make enough for us to share.”
Jack joined him in the ridiculously large bathroom that was split into two separate rooms. One
was for the toilet and another for the shower, a gorgeous floor-to-ceiling glass enclosed spectacular
with marble surfaces and stainless steel fittings—shower heads coming at you from all sides—that
matched the sink. That shit even had a couple built-in benches in there. The shower was situated in
the middle of the floor, but a humongous free-standing bathtub was off to the side, an eye-catching
eighty-four inch gleaming wood structure that Ashe shared had been commissioned and handcrafted.
Jack had never wanted to indulge in a bath so badly. Every time he stepped into the bathroom, he
eye-fucked that tub.
Together he and Ashe brushed their teeth and washed their faces. Back in the bedroom, he finished
dressing then followed Ashe out of the bedroom. Silas waited for them outside the door, his face
looking as if it was carved from immovable rock. Something told Jack that Silas wasn’t a fan of his
appearance in Ashe’s life, but he didn’t care. As long as Silas did his job and protected Ashe, he’d
accept the man’s silent judgment.
“Video call?” Ashe asked Silas, who nodded. “Okay. Uh, can you point Jack in the direction of
the kitchen?” He turned to Jack. “Let me handle this and I’ll be right with you.”
“Do your thing.” Jack cupped his nape and kissed his brow that was already furrowed with stress.
“I’ll be here.” It was the right thing to say, judging by the way Ashe smiled. Jack stroked his brow
with a thumb, until Silas cleared his throat.
Ashe jumped. “Right. Go on.” He waved a hand. “Get some grub.” He turned in the opposite
direction and Jack watched him go.
Ugh. That ass.
“Follow me,” Silas said.
Jack followed as Silas led him down a short corridor and then a flight of stairs. He’d expected
Silas to at least try and put him in his place, warn him off Ashe, but the other man kept to himself and
didn’t speak at all. Voices reached him before Silas stopped in front of what had to be their
destination and stood back, waving him ahead.
Jack lifted an eyebrow. “I don’t get the talk? No warnings or threats about what would happen if I
hurt Ashe?”
Silas didn’t blink and his blank expression didn’t change. “You’re a smart man. You know how
this goes.”
Jack nodded solemnly. “I do know. And I would die before I hurt him.” He strode into the kitchen
then came to an abrupt stop. Jeez. He wasn’t a man who spent much time in the kitchen, but much like
Ashe’s bathroom, he wanted to live in this goddamn kitchen. The color scheme was white—as was
much of what he’d seen of the entire penthouse—with dark wide-plank hardwood floors and an
elevated ceiling. There was extensive white marble throughout, including the large island surface and
backsplash. It also had white cabinetry, glass-faced cupboards, a large French door refrigerator, and
two ovens.
A man stood at the stove, cooking something that smelled amazing, while Fawn sat in one of the
six stools at the island, stools that matched the wood floors.
Damn. He cleared his throat and Fawn glanced up from her phone, lips curving into a smile.
“Jack!” She patted the stool to her right. “Come. Sit.”
He did just that as the man—Chef—turned from the stove with a curious stare.
“Chef, this is Jack. He’s Ashe’s guest,” Fawn gushed.
Jack nodded at the man, who did the same.
“Mr. Jack. What would you like to eat?”
“Uh, whatever you’ve got going smells good.”
“I asked for crepes,” Fawn offered.
“Okay.” Jack shrugged. “Let’s do that. Ashe will have some, too. Thank you.”
Chef turned back to the stove as another woman popped out of nowhere with a pitcher of orange
juice and a bowl of fruit that she placed in front of Jack. “Would you like anything else, sir? Coffee?
Tea?”
“That’s Hermela.” Fawn nudged him.
“Coffee, please,” he told Hermela. “Thank you.” It was awkward, this treatment. He had no
problem being waited on at a restaurant but this was…weird.
“You get used to it.” Fawn read his mind. “And the staff is good people.”
He poured himself a glass of orange juice. “Thanks.”
Fawn snorted. “You say thanks a lot, Jack.”
Damn right, he did. “My mother wouldn’t have it any other way.”
As Hermela appeared again out of thin air, pouring coffee into a cup she placed in front of him,
Ashe walked into the kitchen, his gaze zeroing in on Jack. Jack cocked his head.
“What’s wrong?” He slid off his stool as Ashe reached him. Ashe shook his head, gaze sliding
away, but Jack cupped his chin. “Ashe, talk to me.” He caught the fear lurking in his lover’s eyes, the
fine tremor of his lips, and went on alert.
“He wants to meet.”
Jack frowned.
“Brody.” He trembled in Jack’s arms. “It’s been years, Jack, but he won’t give me the divorce
unless I agree to meet with him one on one.”
 23

“GIVE US THE ROOM.” Ashe stepped away from Jack’s embrace as quickly as he’d burrowed into it.
He swallowed, but he couldn’t find anything to soothe the sandpaper quality of his throat. A violent
tremor made its way through his body, bringing memories soaked with terror and darkness.
Not that the memories had left. Jack’s presence sorta squeezed them off somewhere in a corner
that Ashe hadn’t found energy to focus on, too busy feeling things that made his pulse stammer and his
heart race.
Good things.
But one conversation with his lawyer and he was back in that place any mention of Brody put him
in. He didn’t see Fawn and the rest of the staff leave, but he felt their absence, a quiet that was
suddenly filled with his breath rattling. Jack took him in his arms again, and Ashe put his head to the
other man’s chest, listening to his heartbeat.
“Talk to me,” Jack begged.
Ashe closed his eyes briefly, letting out a shuddering sigh, before lifting his head to take in Jack’s
worried frown. This was supposed to be something good for the both of them. This time together was
supposed to be perfect. Brody had the worst kind of timing. And Ashe knew it was fucked up, letting
that man affect him like this after all this time. But he could never forget. He would never forget what
Brody was capable of.
“Ashe.”
He blinked at Jack’s growl. “Uh. Um. Rathbun says Brody won’t even look at the papers I had him
draft up unless I agree to meet with him.” His voice shook, and he dipped his head in shame. He was
trying so damn hard to be more than his experiences, but it wasn’t easy. Especially when shit like this
happened.
“Why?” Jack’s eyes narrowed. “What does he need from you?”
“I don’t know,” Ashe snapped. He pulled away from Jack, pacing the length of the kitchen while
rubbing the back of his neck. “I don’t know what he wants.”
“But you must have a clue,” Jack insisted. “After all this time—Wait, is this the first time you’ve
asked for a divorce?”
“No.” Ashe didn’t look at him. “But it is the first time that I’ve agreed to give him whatever he
wanted.”
A beat of silence.
“And he asks for this,” Jack spoke softly as if to himself. “When does he want this meeting to
happen?”
 Ashe faced him then, shoulders slumped. “Two hours.”
Shock and anger splashed color onto Jack’s neck and cheekbones. “Hell no!”
Ashe had the same reaction. Two hours of preparation to face that monster after not being in the
same room with him for years? A hundred years wouldn’t be enough time to put space between him
and Brody. Ashe wanted to be free of him, though. He wanted to take a hammer to the invisible
shackles Brody had so expertly placed on him.
He just didn’t know how or where to start.
Or maybe Brody had just given him an option.
His heart thumped in his chest, his breaths coming choppier as he allowed his mind to entertain it.
His fingers clenched and unclenched over and over again, as if on their own accord, and he couldn’t
stand still.
But moving was…laborious.
His chest hurt with a pressure, a tightening, that scared him. He hunched over the counter, head
bowed. “I’m tired of being this person, Jack,” he muttered, so low he didn’t know if Jack even heard
him. Still, he kept talking. “Just the mention of him and I’m this,” he spat in disgust. “A mess. I’m
tired.” His eyes burned, tears blinding him, and he brushed them away angrily as he jerked his head
up.
Jack reached him in two strides, sliding a hand around his shoulder, tucking him into a one-armed
hug. “You can’t allow that bastard to take more from you than he already has, Ashe. You’re stronger
than this. Than him.”
“I’m not,” he cried, fisting Jack’s t-shirt. “I’m not strong. I want him gone from my life. From my
dreams. I need him out.” Jack wrapped both arms around him, the only thing keeping Ashe from
running away when all he wanted was to hide. “I have to meet him.”
Jack stiffened. “Fuck no, that’s not happening.”
But it needed to. Ashe had been running and hiding from this thing for so goddamn long, maybe it
was time he faced it head on. Time to stop being a coward. Jack thought he was strong; he didn’t feel
it, but maybe he could pretend. Just for however long it took to look into Brody’s eyes.
“I’ll take Silas with me, and—”
Jack reared back as if Ashe had sucker punched him, his arms falling away, taking his comfort
from Ashe. “I don’t give a fuck about Silas!” His features were contorted in a mask of rage as he
stabbed a finger in the direction of the door. “He wasn’t the one to pull you from a fucking grave,
Ashe. He wasn’t the one to make sure you were breathing.” His chest heaved, eyes red, words
slamming into Ashe with the force of a runaway semi. “I saw what that bastard did to you back then
firsthand…” He clutched Ashe’s face in both hands as he gazed down at him. “I see what he does to
you now, and I can’t accept that meeting him face-to-face is the answer. I can’t.” His grip trembled
and that, coupled with the worry on his face, almost had Ashe reconsidering.
Almost.
He wanted nothing to do with Brody, didn’t even want to be in the same city as him. The mere
thought of being close to him had Ashe’s skin crawling, but he couldn’t keep putting this off. Not
anymore. He had to do this if he wanted to be whole. It was a first step to being the kind of man he
could be proud of. If he wanted to be happy, if he wanted to see where this thing with Jack could go,
he needed to be rid of Brody. He hadn’t been ready before, hadn’t had anything or anyone around him
to make him want to get up and fight.
He had that now.
Funny how Jack didn’t want him to do it, but it was partly because of Jack that he absolutely had
to. No matter how much it terrified him.
“I’m doing it,” he whispered.
Jack’s hold got painful, but Ashe melted into it, grabbing and holding onto him in return. Grip just
as tight, his face buried in Jack’s neck. Between the two of them, he didn’t know who trembled more.
Whose heart beat faster. Jack was scared for him, and the realization clogged Ashe’s already fucked-
up throat.
“I’m coming with you,” Jack rasped.
Ashe shook his head. “Silas will have his team—”
“I don’t care.” Tilting his head back, Jack grasped Ashe’s chin. His blue eyes were fierce,
piercing, the emotion in them hooking on the tender, vulnerable places inside Ashe. “If I can’t stop
you from going, if I can’t get you to change your mind then I. Am. Coming.”
Ashe nodded against the hammering of Jack’s heart. Truth was, he wanted his lover there. Jack’s
presence eased the heaviness, lifted the dark clouds that had become a part of Ashe’s every day. Jack
was his shield. And Ashe wanted to be selfish.
He let Jack lead them back to the bedroom and coax him back into the bed, where they held each
other in silence. Ashe didn’t want to talk about it, he didn’t want to bring Brody in there with them.
Even though he was.
He always would be, unless and until Ashe got rid of him for good. Today would be his first step
in doing just that. Still, he lay curled up against Jack, his head on the other man’s chest.
Just counting his heartbeats.
He’d anticipated them spending so much time in this bed, but not like this. He’d looked forward to
being in Jack’s arms. Never like this, though. And this moment, it was all on him. Jack’s disapproval
was noted, and he respected his lover for speaking his mind, but for also understanding that ultimately
this was Ashe’s decision.
He’d made it, he just had to live with it.
They stayed in the bed until Silas knocked to let him know it was time to start heading out. Silas
had been the one to make the arrangements with Rathbun, who coordinated with Brody’s team. They
were meeting in a restaurant half an hour away. Brody wanted Ashe to himself, one on one, but Ashe
insisted on having Silas inside with him. He would never let his guard down around Brody.
The tension was palpable between him and Jack as they got dressed and headed out, surrounded
by Silas and his team. Ashe had kissed Fawn goodbye upstairs, pretending he didn’t see the bright
fear in her eyes. She knew enough to know this wasn’t an easy thing for him, but like Jack, she got it.
Silas hated it. He didn’t tell Ashe that, but the tightness of his jaw gave him away.
In the back of the SUV, Jack gripped his hand without looking at him, lacing their fingers together.
“You don’t have to do this,” he said hoarsely. “And you don’t have to stay.”
“Jack.”
“No, just—just listen.” Jack flicked his gaze over to Silas in the front passenger seat before
shifting to face Ashe. “If it gets to be too much, I don’t give a fuck what Brody wants, you get the hell
outta there, Ashe. Promise me.”
“I promise.”
Jack dragged in a deep breath, eyes closing briefly before he hauled Ashe into his arms, cupping
the back of his neck, pressing kisses to his temple. “I don’t want you to do this,” he rasped.
Ashe nodded. “I know.” He didn’t want to do it, either.
“He can’t hurt you anymore,” Jack continued. “I won’t let him. Silas won’t let him. Know that.
Tell me you know that.”
 “Jack, I do.” Ashe cupped his jaw. “I know that.”
“Then tell me you understand that no matter what he says, what he does, you’ve already beaten
him. You’ve already survived him. He can’t do shit to you anymore.” Jack’s eyes flashed. “Don’t let
him get to you.”
He was gonna try real hard, and he told Jack that. His lover distracted him so well that he wasn’t
aware they’d arrived until they pulled off the road and down a dark, narrow alley.
Ashe sat up, taking deep breaths. Jack rubbed his knuckles.
Silas and the security team got out, and Silas motioned for Ashe to wait. Two of the bodyguards
stayed behind, guarding the vehicle as Silas knocked on what appeared to be the back entrance to the
restaurant. Ashe dug his fingers into Jack’s thigh, peering out. The door opened and Silas stepped in,
along with two other members of his team.
All this because Ashe had the absolute worst taste in men.
His legs shook as he waited, barely breathing. He could call an end to this. Tell Silas he’d
changed his mind. He could listen to the cold fear trailing down his spine and walk away. He spent so
many years terrified of Brody, afraid to do anything to really push him into losing his temper the way
he’d done that fateful night. He wanted that fear gone.
He didn’t fool himself into thinking that all that shit would poof and evaporate once he met with
Brody, but it was a start.
And that was all Ashe wanted.
A start.
Someone knocked on his window and he jumped. His door opened, and Silas met his gaze.
“He’s in there,” he said shortly. “He’s alone. The restaurant is empty, just a skeleton staff if you
two want to eat.”
“They won’t be eating,” Jack spoke up.
Silas didn’t take his gaze off Ashe, who patted Jack’s knee.
“We won’t be eating, Silas.”
Silas nodded. “Ready?”
“One moment.” Ashe turned to Jack. “You’ll be here when I’m done?”
“Of course.” Jack’s brow furrowed. “Where else would I be?”
He’d already known the answer, he just…Ashe just wanted to hear it. He leaned forward,
brushing his lips over Jack’s. “Thank you,” he whispered. “Thank you for being here.” He pulled
away, started to climb out of the vehicle, but Jack grabbed his wrist. Ashe looked over his shoulder.
“You’re stronger than him,” he said. “Remember that.”
Ashe smiled, a brittle thing that hurt his face. And his heart. “I will.” He got out and Silas closed
the door. Ashe stood next to his head of security for a moment, reminding himself to breathe. He was
cold now. Shaking.
“I don’t think this is a good idea,” Silas told him in a low voice.
“Thank you, Silas. Your opinion is duly noted.” Ashe lifted his chin, despite its wobble. Took a
step. He had no clue how death row prisoners felt, taking that final walk to the electric chair, but it
couldn’t be much different than this heaviness in his limbs. The pit in his stomach, growing ever
wider. The absolute white-hot fear of what waited on the other side.
Silas opened the door for him, preceding him into the dimly lit restaurant. Ashe took it all in.
Soft music.
Candles.
A romantic setting.
 And the man waiting for him, standing next to a table with pretty flowers and a bucket of
champagne. Straight white teeth flashed for him. Dirty blond hair cut short, showing off the angles of
his handsome face. Brown eyes, a handful of freckles around his sharp nose. Thin lips. He was
dressed in a plain white shirt under a dark sport coat, with matching slacks and shoes.
He was clean; everything about Brody Novak projected clean and wholesome.
Ashe stopped moving.
Brody’s smile brought deep dimples out to play.
A smile that had Ashe fisting his hands, fingernails gouging away at the inside of his palms. He
wanted to turn around and run back out the door, hide from the cheeriness on Brody’s features, from
the look in his eyes that said he knew exactly what the sight of him did to Ashe. That he knew the
effort it took for Ashe to remain standing there.
Because he didn’t run. Wouldn’t.
Never again.
“Brody.” His voice was a reedy sound that Brody definitely caught.
His smile grew wider. “Ashe, I’ve missed you.”
 24

“COME.” Brody waved Ashe on with that Stepford smile still firmly in place as his gaze flicked to a
point over Ashe’s shoulder. “You brought a bodyguard, huh?” He narrowed his eyes, bringing his
unwanted attention back to Ashe. “Do you think all of that is necessary?”
Ashe took a breath, held it, then exhaled slowly through slightly parted lips. His skin crawled, but
he managed to meet Brody’s gaze. “It is necessary.”
That smile got wider. “Well then, he can stay back there. Come.” He motioned to Ashe again. “Sit
with me. I’ve missed you.”
“So you said.” Five steps brought them inches apart, and when Brody reached for him, Ashe
flinched backward, staggering into the table. His heart jumped up into his throat, his pulse pounding.
He pulled out the chair at his side without taking his gaze off Brody’s face and dropped into it. He
didn’t miss the displeasure at that gesture. Brody didn’t like to be thwarted, and apparently he’d come
into this meeting with specific ideas about how it would all go down.
Ashe’s mouth had gone dry, and it was only Silas, a presence he couldn’t see but definitely felt,
that kept him where he was. Silas wouldn’t let anything happen to him. He knew that.
Brody retook his seat, contemplating Ashe with eyes that seemed to miss nothing. “Are you
hungry?” He reached for the champagne. “Let’s make a toast to—”
“I’m not interested in a toast, Brody.” Ashe folded his hands in front of him on the table. “You
said you wanted to talk.”
Brody stilled, the relaxed aura around him giving way to sudden tension that instantly put Ashe on
notice. Brody didn’t normally telegraph his shit. One minute he could be laughing and joking with
you, and the next his hands were around your throat, strangling you to death. “Yes,” he spoke slowly.
“I want to talk. I mean, we haven’t seen each other in so long.” He poured the expensive champagne
into two flutes and pushed one over to Ashe. “That alone deserves a toast, doesn’t it?”
Ashe ignored the drink. “I want a divorce.” Brody’s features tightened. “I don’t understand why
you won’t sign the papers. Do you want the league and your teammates to know you’re married to a
man?”
Brody cocked his head, expression betraying mild curiosity. “Is that what you are, a man?
Because I didn’t marry a man. The names on our marriage license are Brody Novak and Ashley
Tannen.” He sipped his champagne calmly while Ashe seethed. “You can tell the league whatever you
want to, I have nothing to hide.”
“You have everything to hide,” Ashe snapped.
“No.” Brody’s expression was all smug innocence. “I really don’t. Your folks made sure of that.”
 Yes, Ashe’s parents had buried Brody’s crimes. Paid to have the evidence destroyed, his shit
covered up. While Ashe had been in the hospital, fighting for his life, his parents had been protecting
themselves, and Brody in the process. There was nothing he could do about Brody’s abuse, or his
attempt to bury Ashe alive. Even if he did have proof of what happened, it wasn’t something he
wanted to relive.
“Why?” He leaned forward as much as he dared, elbows on the table. “I don’t want you, you
don’t want me, so why not cut all ties between us?”
Brody touched a hand to his chest, face twisted into mock sadness. “You don’t want me? Damn.
After all we shared, Ashe? All the things we’ve been through?”
“You tried to kill me!” The words burst from Ashe’s throat, landing between them like a live
grenade. “You buried me alive.” His voice shook. Hell, his entire body had the table rocking as the
memories rose unbidden. The phantom taste of dirt in his mouth, the feel of it on his skin. The breaths
he couldn’t take, the burn in his lungs. They all swirled through him now and he fisted his hands to
keep from launching himself over the table and pummeling Brody to death with just his fists.
“Obviously not one of my finer moments.” Brody’s gaze turned inward. “You remember that gun
we kept in the wall safe? Turned out it didn’t have bullets. None anywhere in the house.” He shook
his head with a soft laugh. “How did we have a gun, but no bullets? Such a stupid fucking oversight.”
Ashe gaped at him.
“You see…” His lips curved and his stare sent chills coursing down Ashe’s spine. “You trying to
leave me has always been a no-no, Ashe. When I had you on the floor, bleeding, that gun pointed at
your temple—”
Ashe dry heaved.
“I knew that was the best thing for both of us. Except nothing happened when I pulled the trigger.”
He made a disgusted sound in the back of his throat. “Fucked my plans up, let me tell you.”
Ashe couldn’t see him over the tears in his eyes. Brody’s words got muffled over the blood
roaring in Ashe’s ears. He hadn’t known that part about the gun. Hadn’t known the many layers of evil
wrapped around the man opposite him. He’d passed out with Brody’s hands around his throat and
then woken up when that first shovelful of dirt landed on his face. He’d loved this man once. Gave
him his heart. His body. His reward was this.
“You don’t get a divorce, because you don’t get to leave me.”
“But you get to try to kill me?” Ashe shot back.
“If you try to leave me?” Brody’s eyes glittered. “Yes.”
My God. “You’re a monster.” Ashe’s words shook. “A monster.”
Brody’s jaw tightened. “Watch yourself,” he said softly, sliding a finger along the narrow neck of
the champagne bottle. “Can your bodyguard reach me before I smash this bottle and use it to slice
your throat?”
Ashe’s heart thundered, fear a sickening bitter taste at the back of his throat. “He’d kill you,” he
croaked out.
“Ah.” Brody grinned. “But you’d also be dead.” He nodded. “I’m cool with that.”
He shouldn’t have agreed to this meeting. This had been a waste of time. Ashe dropped his gaze
to his trembling hands, lacing his fingers. All he managed to do was draw the covers back on the
nightmares he’d put to bed.
And resurrect new ones.
Brody loved seeing him like this, Ashe could tell. He loved knowing he had power over Ashe,
control. There was something like glee in the depths of his soulless eyes. Anticipation sharpened his
features every time their eyes met, as if he were waiting for Ashe to crumble.
Truth be told, Ashe didn’t know how it was that he managed to sit upright. He didn’t know how he
formed words or thoughts, how he managed to pull air in and out of his lungs. He felt as useless now
as he’d been then. That moment when dignity had failed him, when all he could scrounge up were
pleas for his life. When he’d begged and bargained.
To live.
He’d wanted to live.
One man had decided he shouldn’t. And all these years later, Brody was still the one deciding
while Ashe sat there in silence.
Useless.
He wanted to be like Silas, or maybe Jack. They thought him strong. Brave. But he wasn’t. Brody
knew he wasn’t. Brody saw past the facade to the coward underneath. The one whose gaze slid over
to the champagne bottle he could never grab and smash over the other man’s head.
Oh, he could think about it. Imagine it while his fingers curled into his palm, nails biting, painful.
But he couldn’t.
Because he was useless. Why else would he sit there calmly while the man he hated so very much
talked about putting a gun to his head while he’d been strangled to unconsciousness? All these years
later and their roles remained the same. Ashe could’ve sworn he’d changed. He thought he had, but
this moment proved he hadn’t.
He would always be victim to Brody’s brute.
Always be begging to live, to leave, and Brody would never let him go. There was no freedom,
not unless one of them died. And Ashe didn’t want to die. He wanted to be alive to be with Jack, to
experience the way it felt to be with someone who loved him like he loved them.
Fingers settled under his chin, pulling him from the pit he’d descended into. Ashe blinked up into
Brody’s eyes, lips trembling, body stone-cold. Brody’s touch wasn’t painful, but it hurt, and Ashe
sank his teeth into the inside of his cheek to keep from screaming.
In his head, he was already on the floor, curled into a ball.
“Call off your lawyers.” Brody’s eyes sparkled with triumph, with the knowledge that he’d won.
He always did. “Whenever you’re ready, I’m willing to take you back.” He stood and with a wink,
walked away.
Just like that, he disappeared while Ashe remained in his seat. Because he couldn’t move. His
legs wouldn’t cooperate. His body had locked down and he didn’t know—he didn’t know what to do.
There was a pounding in his ears, a rushing like water, crashing over his head.
He couldn’t breathe.
Couldn’t—
He tried to stand, but his legs gave out and he crumbled to the floor. The scent of moist dirt hit his
nostrils, and he choked.
Coughed.
Somebody called his name. Touched his shoulder.
But the darkness swallowed him whole; hard, cold dirt at his back, over his head, in his mouth.
He didn’t want to die. Didn’t want to go. But he was helpless, so fucking helpless, and all he could
do was cover his head with his hands, pull his knees up to his chest…
And scream.
 25

J ACK STAYED inside the SUV once Ashe left, but he never took his eyes off that door Ashe entered. He
sat with his heart thudding, body stiff with worry. Ashe had walked into that restaurant with his head
high and proud, but was he prepared for what it would do to him, seeing that bastard again?
Jack hadn’t been the one tortured and terrorized, but his breaths were all shallow and stilted as he
berated himself silently for not doing more to talk Ashe out of this. But his lover was a grown man.
He had autonomy. Ashe had to be the one to make those decisions. He was the only one who could
possibly know what he could and couldn’t handle.
Jack couldn’t handle this, though.
The waiting. Worrying.
Last time he’d experienced anything close to this had been the time he’d gotten Shane
compromised and subsequently shot up with drugs during that undercover stint that went all the way
left. While he’d been in the hospital worrying over Shane, he’d been wallowing in the guilt, too.
Knowing it was all his fault.
He’d had no hand in this, Ashe’s insistence on meeting with Brody, but Jack still could’ve done
more. He could have gone in there with Ashe, given him support. Show that son of a bitch that Ashe
wasn’t alone. He had Jack.
And Jack had him.
With that thought, he opened the vehicle and got out. As he turned to one of the silent bodyguards
standing against the SUV with his meaty arms folded, the restaurant door burst open. Jack turned and
his heart lurched into his throat.
Silas had Ashe in his arms, and Jack’s lover was curled into a ball, his face buried in his
bodyguard’s chest, arms clinging to him.
“Ashe.” Jack croaked out his name, taking a step forward. What the fuck happened? He lifted his
gaze to Silas, whose expression was thunderous. “What happened? Ashe?”
Silas stepped past him, placing Ashe gingerly onto the back seat after one of the others jerked the
door open. Seated, Ashe swayed to the side and slumped over, haunted eyes red, open but unblinking.
His face was streaked with tears.
Jack grabbed Silas by the shoulder. “What the fuck happened?” he snarled.
“Brody happened.” Silas’ gaze remained on Ashe, softening to something like regret. “This was
never a good idea.”
And now was not the time to start casting blame. Jack balled his fists. “Did that bastard touch
him? Hurt him? Why—”
 “He didn’t have to do anything but exist.” Silas glanced at him then. “But I think we both know
that.”
Fuck. Jack scrambled into the vehicle, stroking Ashe’s arm as he settled beside him and carefully
pulled him upright and into his side. “Ashe, it’s Jack. Look at me, baby. Look at me.” But he didn’t.
He stared, unmoving, giving no reaction at all as Jack touched his face, pressing kisses to his
forehead. “I’m sorry.” He gathered Ashe into his arms, rocking him. “I’m so fucking sorry.” He felt so
useless; he didn’t know what to do, what to say to reach Ashe wherever he’d retreated to inside his
head. Jack couldn’t let him stay there; he’d crawl in behind Ashe if he had to. He refused to allow
Brody to turn Ashe back into a victim. “Where is Brody?” he asked Silas over Ashe’s head. “Where
did he go?”
“He left.” Silas climbed into the front passenger side, as the driver got in and they pulled out of
the dark alley. “Like I said, Brody’s mere presence did this.” He told Jack about Ashe dropping to the
floor and screaming. “He should not have agreed to this.” His disapproval came through loud and
clear.
But they both knew… “We couldn’t have stopped him.” Jack inhaled deeply. “Tell me what to do.
How do I bring him back?” Because there was nothing scarier than this, a non-responsive Ashe in his
lap. Jack wanted to see the life return to his lover’s eyes. He wanted Ashe’s smile. The beauty of his
gaze and his touch. Jack couldn’t live without them.
“I’ve already called the doctor. She’ll meet us at the penthouse, but I already know what she’ll
say. Unfortunately, there’s nothing to do.” Silas sighed, shaking his head. “We wait.”
“For how long?” Jack didn’t flinch at the panic in his voice. His arms trembled as he held onto
Ashe, afraid to let him go.
“For however long it takes for him to feel safe again.” Silas met his gaze in the rearview mirror.
“It’s happened a few times since I started working for him.”
Jack didn’t give a fuck about what happened before. This was unacceptable to him. Brody Novak
needed to be handled. Keeping Ashe locked to his chest with one hand, he retrieved his phone from
his pocket and dialed Dutch.
“Jack, how’s LA?”
He hadn’t told anyone he’d be traveling to LA, but in typical Dutch fashion, the other man
probably knew the minute Jack confirmed with Ashe. Most times Jack resented the hell out of what
and who Dutch represented. Today, not so much. “Brody Novak. I need a current location. Now.”
One of the very few things Jack liked about Dutch—maybe the only thing—was that he didn’t ask
questions. If he cared one bit about why Jack needed Ashe’s ex’s location, Dutch gave zero hints of it.
“Give me five minutes,” he said.
“Make sure you have a cleanup crew in the vicinity as well. And I’ll need cover after.” He trusted
Dutch to make it so that there’ll be no questions asked as to what happened.
“Done.”
Jack disconnected the call and shoved the phone back into his pocket.
“What are you doing?” Silas asked.
What should have been done a long time ago. Jack sank back into his seat, both arms wrapped
around Ashe once again. “Did you run a background check on me?” he asked Silas.
“I did.” Silas didn’t sound or look apologetic. Not that Jack cared.
“What did you find?”
“It’s what I didn’t find that concerns me.”
Jack gave him a cold smile. “Brody needs to be handled once and for all. It’s unacceptable he’s
been allowed to fucking breathe for so long. Don’t worry about what you didn’t find. Just be glad that
call wasn’t about you.”
The silent driver shot a wary glance at Silas, whose lips curled into a small smile. Jack’s words
didn’t seem to bother him one bit. Brave man. Jack didn’t like to think back to the couple years he did
wet work for Dutch. It was right after shit with Shane played out and Jack needed to embrace his
rage, his guilt, his shortcomings. Dutch used him, because that was what the fucker was good at, and
even though Jack knew what was happening, he’d allowed it. He’d loved the outlet Dutch gave him.
Until it became too much and he quit cold turkey to go hide up in the North Georgia mountains and
live off alcohol and fucked-up memories. He’d promised himself he wouldn’t go there again, but that
was before Ashe.
That was before he’d met this man with so much strength and vulnerability despite his demons.
Ashe was the bravest person Jack knew, and he was a better man than Jack could ever hope to be.
Being close to him, getting to experience what it felt like to be under his spell, made Jack feel as
though Ashe’s light could one day brighten the darkness in him.
Call him selfish, but no one was allowed to fucking dim Ashe’s glow.
When they arrived at Ashe’s building minutes later, Jack carried him in his arms as they rode the
elevator that would take them directly up to Ashe’s floor. All the bodyguards around them moved in
solemn silence, as if they’d all seen this before and simply accepted it.
Fawn was waiting when the elevator opened into the penthouse and she gasped, clasping a
trembling hand over her mouth. Her eyes brimmed with tears as she stepped forward. “Ashe?” she
whispered. When he didn’t rouse, she blinked up at Jack, tears sliding down her expertly made-up
face. “What did Brody do to him?”
Jack tensed, jaw clenching at the sound of that man’s name. “I’m gonna take him to the bedroom
and put him to bed.” He didn’t wait for a response, and he didn’t look behind him when footsteps
followed him up the stairs and down the hallway into Ashe’s bedroom. Jack put him down on the bed,
his head against the pillows, and smoothed a hand over his forehead, kissing his brow.
The pulse at the base of Ashe’s throat beat wildly, and his fingers twitched, but Jack didn’t get any
other reaction.
“The doctor’s here,” Silas said from behind him.
Jack stepped back but remained next to the bed as a short, dark-skinned woman with bright red
glasses and sleek hair pulled into a ponytail tended to Ashe. She looked as if she were dressed for a
cocktail party with a short, lacy black dress and red heels as she checked Ashe’s pulse then peered
into his eyes with a penlight.
“Is he okay?” Jack demanded. “What’s wrong with him?”
She didn’t answer, simply letting out a loud hum as she went about doing her thing. Jack pursed
his lips and checked his phone to see that Dutch had come through with what he’d requested. It was an
itch in the middle of his shoulder blades, that urge to get the hell out there and deal with Brody. Every
second he was still sucking down air was a second of remembering for Ashe, of pain.
Wiping Brody off the board would give Ashe a fresh start at healing.
And Jack would do anything for Ashe.
He focused as the doctor finished examining Ashe and explained that he was physically fine, that
what was happening was all in his head, and they simply had to make him comfortable and wait for
him to come out of it. She gave them a timeframe to call her if there wasn’t any progress then left with
Silas, who escorted her out.
Jack ignored Fawn—who’d climbed onto the bed and was spooning Ashe—and sat at the edge of
the bed, cupping Ashe’s cheek. “Don’t let him win,” he begged softly. “Don’t let him take you away
from the people who love you, who care for you. Come back to us.” He picked up Ashe’s left hand
and kissed the knuckles. “Please.”
Of course, he got no response. He took a deep breath and straightened, meeting Fawn’s
heartbroken gaze. She could afford to feel that, but Jack couldn’t. Not yet. Not until he did what
needed to be done. “Take care of him.”
“Wait, what?” Fawn sat up, pushing her hair off her shoulder. “Where are you going?”
“Got something to do,” he answered her, but directed the words to Ashe. “I’ll be back soon. Call
me if anything changes. Please.” From her expression, Fawn didn’t understand and he wasn’t about to
explain. Despite how difficult it was, how wrong it felt, he turned away and left the room.
Silas waited for him outside in the hallway.
“I’ll be back,” Jack told him. “Take care of him.”
He was grateful Silas didn’t point out he’d been doing just that before Jack was ever in the
picture. “You need men?”
Jack shook his head. “I need a vehicle. That’s about it.”
Silas regarded him for a moment then nodded. “Follow me.”
 26

S ILAS REMAINED AT HIS SIDE, putting his second-in-command in charge of the penthouse, as he joined
Jack, riding shotgun in a black Bentley. If he had time, Jack would remember to marvel at the fact that
he got to drive a motherfucking bulletproof Bentley through the streets of LA.
If he had time, he’d use it to question why Silas joined him. Did he not trust Jack to do what
needed to be done? Did he think Jack needed backup? Supervision?
If he had time, Jack would ask the man next to him those questions. But he didn’t have time. He
focused on where he was going, and why, not even taking in the winding tree-lined streets with
multimillion-dollar houses. This was where the rich and famous lived.
Movie stars. Moguls. Athletes.
Silas spoke up only to direct him to where he needed to go, a house hidden behind an eight-feet
tall iron fence covered with clinging vines so thick, it was difficult to make out the entrance to the
property. Especially at night.
Jack parked opposite the house and grabbed his phone, calling Dutch. As if he’d been sitting by,
waiting for Jack to ring him up, Dutch answered midway through the first ring.
“Yes.”
“Are your people close by the address?”
“They’re good to go.”
“I just drove through the neighborhood.” Next to him Silas shifted, but Jack ignored him as he told
Dutch, “I want all security feeds scrubbed as of ten minutes ago.”
Dutch chuckled. “Jack, you know this, whatever it is you’re doing, isn’t part of an official
mission, right?”
He should have known. Jack rolled his eyes. “Just spit out whatever bullshit you’re about to say.”
Unperturbed, Dutch tsked in his ear. “My favors don’t come without a price tag, Jack. You know
this.”
Of course he did. He’d just chosen not to give it his energy. “Fine.” He pinched the bridge of his
nose and closed his eyes briefly. “What do you want? And make that shit brief.”
“You do what you need to. I’ll handle it. Just know…” He paused, as if for dramatic effect.
Fucking Dutch. “You owe me.”
“Yeah. Add it to my tab.” Jack ended the call and dropped the phone onto his lap before turning to
Silas. “You coming or staying?”
Silas didn’t do more than blink, but Jack got the feeling he’d gravely insulted the other man.
“Okay, then.”
 Clad in all black, having changed clothes before they left Ashe’s place, they didn’t bother hiding
their presence as they made their way to Brody’s front gate and climbed over. With Dutch handling the
security feeds, they didn’t have to cover their faces, though they did move stealthily. Brody didn’t use
bodyguards unless he was out in public, though the neighborhood was covered in private security, and
from the information Jack got from Dutch earlier, the football player had a state-of-the-art security
system installed in his mini-mansion.
Dutch wouldn’t be Dutch if he didn’t also have the code.
At the front door, Jack punched the digits into a keypad and smiled when the system was unarmed
with an audible click and blinking green lights.
Just like that, they were in.
One step inside and the lights came on.
Nice.
For somebody who made bank, Brody’s house was alarmingly empty and depressingly beige—
from the walls to the carpet to the one goddamn couch positioned in a room almost as large as the
auditorium at Jack’s former high school.
He checked Dutch’s text for the layout of the house then motioned for Silas to follow him down
the hall, up an extravagant staircase, and down another lengthy corridor to what appeared to be the
master suite.
Jack pushed the door open.
A bedside lamp showed Brody sprawled facedown on the bed—the ornate frame also fucking
beige—wearing only black boxers and matching socks. His phone was next to him on the mattress,
along with a stack of paper. His snores reached Jack’s ears and for some reason, it had his blood
boiling. He’d been careful, so far, to keep his emotions in check. Moving clinically.
But hearing that bastard snore as if he was content, with no care in the world, while Ashe was at
that very moment being torn apart from the inside by memories?
Fuck that.
Jack stalked over and snatched up the phone, tossing it to Silas. He still wasn’t sure why Ashe’s
bodyguard had come with him. But point in Silas’ favor that he seemed to be giving Jack his space
and not getting in his way.
Removing his gun from the ankle holster, Jack smacked the butt of it to the back of the sleeping
man’s head. The fucker came awake with a grunt, a hand slowly reaching up to touch the spot already
dripping blood.
“Wha—” He rolled onto his back, eyes blinking up into Jack’s face. They widened. “Who the fu
—” He swung a fist that didn’t land.
Jack smashed the gun into his face. “You don’t get to speak.” He hit him again. And again. Until
his face was bloodied. “Ashe isn’t without support,” Jack told him after taking a pause to critically
eye his handiwork. “I know you thought you’d gotten away with what you did to him, but I’m here to
tell you, you got that shit way wrong.” He grabbed Brody by the throat with his gloved hand and
dragged him from the bed, dumping him onto the floor.
“You can’t do this to me.” Blood mixed with drool slid down the idiot’s chin and dripped onto his
naked chest. A couple of his teeth had definitely been knocked loose. “Do you know who I am?”
Jack got down onto his haunches and smiled in his face. “I know who you are.” Another blow
with the gun had Brody splayed backward onto his beige-as-fuck carpet. “And I brought something for
you.” He pulled the ziplock bag from his jacket pocket and held it up. It was filled with sand. “It’s not
the same as the night you put Ashe in that grave, but it will have to do, yeah?” He flicked a gaze to
Silas, who came over, expression wearing that consistent blankness. Silas held Brody down, knees in
his shoulders, both hands at his throat to stop his struggling.
Oh, he struggled, legs kicking out until Jack sat on them and pinched Brody’s mouth open. Then he
poured the sand down his throat.
“This is what you did,” he said softly while Brody’s eyes watered and he made gut-wrenching
sounds. Choking. He tried clawing at Jack, at Silas, but that did nothing to alleviate his obvious
suffering. “You put Ashe in that grave and you buried him alive.” Tremors began, originating in Jack’s
chest, and spreading. Even his words were unsteady, but he spoke them so Brody knew why he was
dying. “I dug him up. I had to shove my fingers down his throat to clear the dirt from his passageways.
I had to breathe for him before he could breathe for himself. Because of you.”
Brody’s mouth filled, sand spilling over, but Jack kept pouring the sand until the bag was empty.
Until the body underneath him bucked and writhed, Brody’s features—red from blood and exertion—
twisted as he tried for air. Silas slapped a large hand over his nose, ensuring he didn’t breathe at all.
Jack scooped the falling sand into Brody’s gaping mouth then covered it with his hand.
“Feels like your throat is on fire, yeah? Your lungs? Like flames are devouring you from the
inside? You deserve way more than what you’re getting tonight,” Jack told him. “But I’m not wasting
my time on you when Ashe needs me. I want you to understand…” He leaned down, lips almost
touching Silas’ hand over Brody’s nose. “You’re dying, and it’s because of Ashe. This is for him,
because of him. He deserves to be free of you.” Jack shrugged. “I’m giving him that.”
Brody’s body jerked. It kept jerking, and Jack didn’t take his eyes away. Not when Brody’s legs
twitched frantically, when his hands raked against the carpet until the nails were broken and bloodied.
Not when he stilled.
And then life drained away from him.
Jack blew out a breath then.
Silas moved away, sitting back and staring at Jack.
“What?”
“You love Ashe.”
Jack tipped his head left then right, the tendons cracking in his neck. He didn’t answer that—not
that he had an answer—because his phone rang. He peeled off his gloves, dropping them onto the
dead man’s chest before retrieving his phone.
Dutch again. “What?”
“All security feeds in the area have been handled. My guys are outside. Let them in when you’re
ready.”
“Thanks.” He offered that up grudgingly, but Dutch simply snorted and hung up. Jack climbed off
Brody’s body and walked away, headed back downstairs, and let the five-man crew in through the
front door, guiding them back into the bedroom where Silas waited, as composed as ever, despite the
tiny splatter of blood that got on his face when Jack was hitting Brody.
Jack instructed Silas to hand over Brody’s phone to one of the men then motioned for Silas to step
outside. “Let’s go.”
Silas frowned. “And that?” He motioned toward the operation going on inside the bedroom.
“Will be handled.” Jack shrugged. “They don’t need supervision.” When Silas didn’t budge, Jack
narrowed his eyes. “Is this your first time aiding and abetting a man’s death?”
“No,” the other man answered curtly. It was a response that didn’t invite follow-up questions. Not
that Jack had any.
“This is your first time with me, so trust me when I tell you, we’ll only be in the way.” He jerked
his chin when the muted sound of a gunshot echoed. Silas didn’t flinch. “This is what they do. They’re
gonna stage the scene to tell a story that doesn’t include us or lead back to us. Now.” He turned away.
“Let’s go. I want to get back to Ashe.”
“You’re not who I thought you were.” Silas’ voice came from behind him.
Jack didn’t look back at him.”Who did you think I was?”
“Not this.” There was a hesitant respect in those two words. “The resources you have at your
disposal—”
“Are never without a price.” One he knew Dutch would call in at the worst possible fucking time.
He was devious like that. But Jack couldn’t make himself care right then.
They left the way they’d come, taking another silent drive back. Silas didn’t ask questions and
Jack didn’t offer up explanations. He didn’t like killing as a general rule. He’d always thought
himself better than those men out there ruled by emotion, by instinct, too powerful to be controlled.
And he thought about how he’d viewed Pablo Castillo, when Shane had gotten hurt in that undercover
operation that Jack fucked up so badly. When Castillo swept in and razed the fucking earth for Shane,
wiping everybody away until there was nothing left.
Jack had hated him for it.
Thought him a monster because of it.
Tonight, he understood a little bit more of what it meant, seeing the one you cared about hurt and
wanting to do anything necessary to fix it. To make sure whoever the culprit was never got to breathe
again.
Tonight he found out he and Castillo had more in common than their love for Shane.
Back at the penthouse, Jack made his way directly to Ashe’s bedroom.
They were sleeping, Ashe and Fawn, both on their sides facing each other, her arms around him,
his face buried in her throat. Jack had been jealous of their closeness before, but staring at them now,
he was glad Ashe had Fawn. Glad he found some kind of comfort.
When he closed the door behind him, Fawn jerked awake, gaze roaming until she spied him. She
looked him up and down, a silent question.
Jack nodded, just once.
And her eyes closed, her lips trembled, and when her lashes lifted, she nodded back.
He made his way to the bathroom where he grabbed a quick shower, washing Brody away. If only
it could be that easy to wash him from Ashe’s mind. When Jack got back into the bedroom, shorts on,
a towel around his neck, hair dripping, Fawn’s eyes widened comically. She pulled away from Ashe
gently and rolled off the bed. On her feet, she smoothed a hand over her hair then motioned to the bed.
“All yours,” she whispered.
She left before he could thank her, but Jack didn’t hesitate. He dropped the towel and dimmed the
lights then got into the bed. He inhaled deeply when Ashe let out a whimper and rolled into him.
A leg over his hip.
An arm around his waist.
Face in his chest, breath tickling his skin.
Jack kissed the top of his head and closed his eyes, melting into Ashe’s warmth. He stroked a
hand over his head. What he’d done tonight, what he’d continue to do for Ashe, was all worth it as
long as he had this.
 27

F EATHERLIGHT , ticklish kisses to his collarbone had Jack’s lashes fluttering. He grunted, legs shifting
—or attempting to. There was somebody on top of him, rocking, grinding, lips dipping to graze his
naked chest. His dick liked that a whole lot, jerking inside his shorts.
Jack cracked an eye open. Bright sunlight lit up the bedroom. Ashe’s bent head came into view
and suddenly Jack was wide awake. “Ashe!” He grasped the other man’s head with both hands,
halting his descent. Yeah, he was hard as hell, skin tingling from Ashe’s kisses and touches, but he had
to make sure… “Are you okay?” He half sat up, peering into Ashe’s bright eyes. “We should call the
doctor.”
“No.” Ashe shook away from his grasp to cup Jack’s crotch.
He shuddered, swallowing a moan. “Ashe. You were unconscious.” He released a shaky breath
when Ashe yanked on the waist of his shorts, pressing a kiss to Jack’s exposed hip bone. “Shit.” That
felt so fucking good. He coughed. “You need to get checked by the doctor.”
“I’m fine,” Ashe mumbled against his skin. His tongue flicked out, leaving a wet trail sizzling on
Jack’s skin.
He bucked, hands back on Ashe’s head, holding him steady, but lifting his ass off the bed to push
closer into him. His body was a fucking traitor. He needed to make sure Ashe was okay, but his dick
was already wet, his ass clenching as his stomach tightened. “You should—” Hell, he couldn’t collect
his thoughts. “We should—”
“You should lie back and let me put this tongue on you.”
Shit. Jack opened his mouth to utter another half-hearted protest, but Ashe chose that moment to
pull his shorts down further, exposing his dick to the air.
And his hungry gaze.
Jack stared down at him, pulse hammering when Ashe’s tongue slid over his bottom lip. Shit. He
was beautiful at any old time, but between Jack’s thighs, need bleeding from his eyes, tongue peeking
out like he couldn’t wait to lick Jack from head to toe? Ashe was something else. And Jack wanted
him. Wanted to feel him, reassure himself that Ashe was as fine as he claimed.
So he settled back onto the pillows, allowing Ashe to yank the shorts down his legs and toss them
aside. Then his mouth was on Jack. Hot and wet.
“Fuck!” He jackknifed off the bed, clasping Ashe to him, thrusting into his mouth. “Ashe.” He
didn’t know what to say, where to put his hands. Whether to close his eyes or keep them open to
watch Ashe work his throat deeper around Jack’s length. Between Ashe’s greedy slurps and his grip,
slipping, sliding, along Jack’s dick, he found himself crying out, legs splayed wide, heels digging into
the mattress. “Ashe.”
Ashe hummed around him.
“Aah!” Jack slammed up into him, fingers digging into his shoulder. In the back of his mind, he
worried he was hurting Ashe, but the other man didn’t appear to have that same worry. He cupped
Jack’s balls, rolling them around in his palm. Jack groaned. Goddamn. A wet finger trailed down his
length and kept going, circling his hole.
He clenched, tilting forward, pressing back against that finger in hopes it’d become more forceful
and dip inside. But Ashe didn’t. He just kept circling Jack’s entrance, the softest caress, while his
mouth drew him closer and closer to orgasm. “Ashe.”
Ashe lifted his head, releasing Jack’s cock with a wet sound. His serious expression didn’t match
the promising fire in his eyes when their gazes met. “Can I have you, Jack?” That finger tapped at him.
“Can I take you?”
“Fu—Yes. Please.” He spread wider and Ashe’s head dipped. He buried his face in Jack’s ass,
tongue swiping, pushing against his hole, wetting him until he was dripping.
Slick fingers pushed into him, burning, stretching, surging forward with a deep stroke that had
Jack’s eyes slamming shut in bliss. It had been forever since he’d been under somebody else’s hands
like this, writhing, begging. Shane had been the last man he’d allowed to own him this completely.
But Shane was long gone. He didn’t belong in this bed, in Jack’s head.
He reopened his eyes, focusing on Ashe, on his eyes glistening as he removed his fingers and
knelt between Jack’s legs. Apparently, he’d strapped up before waking Jack. He hadn’t even noticed,
so caught up in Ashe’s thirsty kisses and hungry touch. The dick between Ashe’s legs, secured by a
black harness, was the same color as the rest of him, a gorgeous brown.
Jack licked his lips, dropping a hand down to stroke himself as Ashe put a condom over the
thickly veined shaft then lubed up. It was so goddamn hot, watching Ashe prepare himself to fuck
Jack. He slid his legs restlessly along the sheets, teeth biting into his bottom lip, back arched.
Waiting.
Ashe stroked himself, and Jack swore he felt that touch on his own dick. He jerked himself, not
too hard, else he’d be coming all over the place. “Ashe.” He begged, and Ashe grinned.
He picked up Jack’s right leg and draped it over his shoulder then he was there, knuckles brushing
Jack’s ass as he positioned himself, bringing his tip to Jack’s hole and circling his hips. Sliding up
and down his crack then bumping against where Jack needed him most.
“Ungh.” Jack threw his head back. “Don’t tease. Ashe, don’t t-tease.”
Ashe probed his hole then dipped inside.
“Ah God!” Jack fisted the sheets, yanking when Ashe pressed in. He was fucking thick, and it’d
been so long, so Jack felt everything. His nerves came alive, saliva flooding his mouth, moisture
dampening his eyes. Ashe paused, giving Jack time to adjust. Jack wanted a moment to breathe
through the burn of being penetrated, but he also wanted Ashe all the way inside him so he panted,
jerking a nod to encourage Ash to move.
Fuck, when he moved.
When Ashe moved, Jack lost his mind. His breath. His senses centered on the heat coiling in his
gut and the raw fullness in his ass. Ashe delved into him as if he knew exactly where he was going, as
if he’d been there before. And Jack couldn’t lie, he loved it, the way Ashe possessed him so slow and
sexily, pulling back a little bit then thrusting forward deeper.
And deeper.
Every thrust dragged a grunt from Jack’s dry throat. Every thrust tightened his stomach muscles,
had them contracting when Ashe bottomed out.
“Jack.” Ashe’s voice trembled, eyes liquid, wild with lust and awe. “Jack.”
Jack lowered his aching leg and reached for him, both arms wrapping around Ashe’s shoulders,
urging him downward until Ashe was flush against his chest. “Fuck me,” he murmured against Ashe’s
lips.
Ashe slammed into him.
“Ungh. Ungh.” Jack kissed him, tongue thrusting into Ashe’s mouth, in part to smother his own
grunts and because he wanted to be connected. Everywhere. In any possible way they could be.
Ashe trembled above him, hips snapping, fucking deeper and deeper into Jack, hitting his spot,
battering him over and over. He clung to Ashe, mouth on him, sucking on his tongue, both hands fisting
his ass, greedily shoving him forward, back inside whenever Ashe retreated.
It still hurt, but the red-hot pleasure nullified the pain Jack knew he’d be feeling for a while after
this. He brought a finger to his mouth, sucking on it before bringing it to Ashe’s back hole and
pressing in.
Ashe’s breath hitched. “Fu-Fuck, Jack.” His movements stuttered.
“Don’t stop.” Jack sank his finger deeper. “Don’t stop.”
“Can’t—Can’t hold it much—” Ashe shoved a shaking hand between their bodies and fisted
Jack’s dick. His palm was fire, strokes hard and rough. “Come. Please. Please. Jack. Oh God.” He
rammed in, over and over.
Jack’s brain short-circuited and he stiffened, orgasm roiling through him. Cum erupted between
them when he came, all over Ashe, all over himself. His spasms managed to knock Ashe out of him,
and the other man collapsed onto his side, mouth open, as he tore at the harness, gasping for air.
Undulating as if possessed.
Jack pounced on him, rolling him onto his back and shoving both legs up to his chest. He removed
the harness and went down on Ashe, taking his dick into his mouth, swiping fingers through his cum
on Ashe’s lower belly then sliding those cum-soaked fingers into Ashe’s front hole.
Muscles clamped down around him, tightening impossibly, massaging.
“Fuck!” Ashe gripped his hair, yanking painfully. His legs lowered, knees pressing on either side
of Jack’s head, trapping him. “Oh God! Oh God!”
Jack finger-fucked him, tongue flicking over his hard flesh, sucking him into his mouth. He was
soaked down there, tasting so good. Jack just wanted to drink him dry. Ashe humped his face, sobbing
above him, thighs quivering, inner muscles pulsing up a frenzy.
Jack lifted away just long enough to bark, “Come.” Then he was back, sucking Ashe’s dick all the
way into his mouth, jamming his fingers in and twisting, scissoring.
Ashe jerked, screamed.
Jack felt it, his release, tasted it too, and he grunted, hips rocking as he humped the bed.
Goddamn. Ashe coming on his face like that, around his fingers, was something else. He didn’t want
to move. How soon could he get Ashe to repeat that?
Ashe flopped back onto the bed, breath loud in the sudden stillness. Jack remained between his
legs, turning his head to press kisses to Ashe’s inner thigh. He swallowed a couple times and cleared
his throat, before he was able to lift his head and peer up at Ashe. “Are you okay?”
Ashe had an arm thrown over his face, sweat glistening on his skin. At Jack’s question, he
lowered his hand and patted Jack’s head. A weak act. “Y-Yeah. So good.” He grinned down at Jack,
happiness right there alongside the hunger that still clung to him. “So good, Jack.”
“Good.” Jack kissed his knee then pulled himself upright. “I’m gonna make Silas call the doctor.”
 Ashe’s brow furrowed. “For what? Obviously I’m fine.”
“You weren’t fine last night.” The light in Ashe’s eyes instantly dimmed at the mention of what
happened last night, but Jack ignored it. “Humor me. Please.” He took both of Ashe’s hands in his.
“Let the doctor check you out. You had me fucking worried.”
Ashe stared at him for a couple beats then nodded. “Fine.” He sighed. “Fine.”
After a quick shared shower where Jack somehow managed to come, again, from Ashe’s fingers
up his ass, they called over the doctor, who once again declared that Ashe was okay.
At least, physically.
Mentally was something different obviously, and Ashe had orders to check in with his psychiatrist
ASAP. Jack was gonna make sure that happened, but first he and Ashe needed to have a talk. Jack
hadn’t checked his phone yet, so he didn’t know how Dutch and his crew handled the Brody situation,
but Ashe needed a heads-up.
“Hey.” He grabbed Ashe’s hand as he came back into the bedroom from walking the doctor out. “I
need to tell you—”
Ashe’s phone cut him off. “Shit, sorry.” Ashe grabbed it from the bed. “It’s my sister. Let me get
rid of her then we’ll talk.” He put the phone to his ear, moving away. “Tsa, let me—” He stiffened.
“What?”
Yeah, something told Jack he wouldn’t be the one to tell Ashe that he was finally free of his ex.
“Are you sure?” Ashe’s voice rose and he spun to face Jack. “That’s not…” He stopped, gaze
locking on Jack’s. “Tsa, listen. Listen. I’m gonna call you back. I have to go.” He ended the call and
tossed the phone onto the bed. “Brody was found this morning in his home,” he relayed in a monotone.
“Dead from a self-inflicted gunshot wound.”
“Ah.” Jack waited for the obvious questions brewing on Ashe’s face.
“I know that man.” Ashe approached slowly, watching Jack with a different kind of intensity in his
eyes. “There is no way that fucker would ever kill himself.” He stopped when they were nose to nose
and grabbed Jack’s jaw. “What did you do, Jack?” he whispered.
Jack shrugged. “What had to be done.”
Ashe’s hand dropped away and he stumbled backward. “What?”
 28

“YOU WERE COMATOSE ON THAT BED ”—J ACK jerked a thumb in the direction of the bed behind him
—“just from being in his presence for barely half an hour. He needed to fucking die and I will not
apologize for getting rid of him.”
“I should have been there with you.”
“Ashe.” Jack’s expression softened and he cupped Ashe’s chin. “Baby, no.”
Ashe scowled. “Why, because I’m too good for that? Because I’m too naive, too innocent?”
“Because it’s not something you want on your conscience.” He grabbed Ashe’s hand and tugged
him toward the bed, waiting until Ashe sat before joining him. “You were limp in Silas’ arms when he
exited that restaurant.” His gaze dropped to where he’d linked fingers with Ashe. “And instantly it
took me back to you unconscious in my arms that night, to me breathing air into your lungs, performing
CPR while begging you not to die, to live. I didn’t even know you then, but I was desperate to do
anything to help you, to heal you.”
Ashe swallowed. He hadn’t given much thought to what that night might have done to Jack, how it
might have scarred him. He hadn’t been the only one changed from that night. Jack was too, and of
course, Ashe had been so caught up in himself he hadn’t fully seen or acknowledged it. “God, Jack.”
“When would it end?” Jack continued. “That guy was holding you hostage. Your mind, your body,
your fucking future, Ashe. He still owned you, if any kind of time in his presence could do what it did
to you. It’d gone on long enough.”
That was true. Ashe glanced away. He’d tried to pretend that Brody didn’t still have a hold on
him, but all that was pure lies. The meeting last night had driven the point home that Brody had no
plans to let him go, to leave him alone. Emotions swelled in Ashe’s chest, and he wanted to scream
and yell. Sob, too. Instead he just curled his fingers around Jack’s tighter. “But—Why does it say
gunshot wound? You shot him? Wouldn’t they know?” He’d watched enough Law and Order to know
forensics and DNA was a thing.
Jack shook his head, lips twisting. “Dutch covered it all up. Whatever the autopsy says, just know
he’s behind it. I made sure nothing would ever lead back to you. With Dutch involved, the truth will
never come out.”
Well, thank God for that.
“And I also made sure Brody understood what was happening and why, and your name…” Jack
put his forehead against Ashe’s. “Your name was the last thing he heard.”
The sob escaped Ashe then, bursting forth with such force, his body shook. Jack wrapped both
arms around him, a hand moving up and down his back in an attempt to soothe. He didn’t know why
he cried. The pressure inside him was a ball of anger and rage and relief.
“He’s gone,” Jack murmured in his ear. “You can start truly healing, Ashe. He’s no longer
breathing the same air as you. He can’t speak your name. He can’t touch you.”
Ashe had never dared to hope for a world where he was free of Brody. Ashe had accepted him as
his cross to bear. And here Jack was, telling him differently. More importantly, showing him
differently.
And he was grateful. Stunned, too.
Jack did that thing for him. Killed for him.
Saving Ashe once again.
But was that all they were about, though? Jack pulling up to save Ashe over and over again? Did
Jack even see him as someone who could take care of himself? Ashe didn’t dare ask; there was no
preparing for an unfavorable answer.
“Hey.” Jack rubbed his back, and Ashe realized he’d gone still in the other man’s arms. “Talk to
me.” He pulled backward, narrowed eyes peering into Ashe’s face. “Are you alright? It’s okay if
you’re not.”
Ashe didn’t know what he was. Emotions bombarded him, made him want to curl into a fetal
position, covering his face and his head, allowing it to take control, to rip him open.
“Ashe?”
“Yeah. I—” A knock on the bedroom door cut him off and he eased out of Jack’s embrace. “Yeah,
come in,” he called, welcoming the interruption.
The door opened and Fawn poked her head through, her eyes lighting up when she spotted Ashe.
“You’re up!” She entered, a purple and teal Ankara print dressing gown belted at her waist, matching
colored fuzzy slippers, with heels, on her feet. “How are you feeling?” She pressed a palm to his
forehead. “Boring-ass Silas tried to tell me to leave you alone. Can you believe that boy? Ain’t
nobody paying attention to his tight ass.”
Jack’s lips twitched.
“You hungry? Did you feed him yet?’ That question Fawn tossed at Jack without even looking at
him. “I can have Chef make something.”
“I’m not hungry.” Ashe waved away her concerns.
“You should eat something,” Jack told him. He stood. “I’ll go tell Chef to rustle up something.”
He held Ashe’s gaze for a moment then left quietly.
“Honey.” Fawn framed Ashe’s face in both hands. “Are you okay? You had us all worried there,
especially Blue Eyes.”
Ashe grabbed her wrist, pulling her down next to him on the bed. “He killed Brody. Jack killed
Brody.” Oh fuck. Saying those words aloud sent a jolt through his body.
“Hmm?” Fawn cocked her head. “Okay?”
He blinked at her. “You’re not surprised.”
“I was there when they came in last night, he and Silas—”
“Wait—” Ashe held up a hand. “Silas was involved in this?”
Fawn shrugged. “All I know is, good riddance.”
“But I—I should have been there.”
Fawn frowned. “To do what, Ashe? Listen, I don’t know who that man is that you’ve got in your
bed, but I do know that if he wants to kill for you, you let him.”
“I just…” He heaved a sigh. “He’s always saving me, though. What kind of relationship is this if
all he does is go around slaying my dragons without giving me the chance to battle them myself?”
 “You tried battling Brody,” Fawn reminded him. “You ended up out like a light. Let Jack handle
the things you can’t. Isn’t that what a relationship is about?”
Ashe wouldn’t know. He’d never been in a healthy relationship, or witnessed one up close.
“Look.” Fawn shifted and their knees knocked together. “We don’t do things like that, you and me.
Maybe Jack does. Maybe Silas does. But not us. This situation is different though, and honestly, you
should’ve been hired a hitman to take that fucker out. All that money you got?” She gave him a
pointed stare. “But you have a man who’s willing to do that for you, Ashe. Think about it, about what
a gesture like that means. And whatever the hell you do, don’t fuck this up for us.”
He lifted an eyebrow. “Us?”
“Well, yeah.” She grinned. “We’re a pair, you and me. Jack gets us both.”
The man of the hour came through the door at that moment. “Chef’s making food.” Jack paused.
“Also, your parents are downstairs demanding to be let up.”
Christ.
 29

THEY BROUGHT DOCTOR CASEY.

Ashe shook his head, a bitter laugh tumbling from his lips as he watched his mother, father, and
their psychiatrist-on-retainer file into his office. He sat behind his desk, Jack standing next to him,
Silas posted at the door, arms folded, expression that hard, blank stare of his. Ashe didn’t want to
deal with the shit his parents no doubt brought with them, but it was best to handle them expeditiously.
Get them out of his space.
“We heard about Brody.” Colleen didn’t waste time. She sat first, taking one of the three seats
Ashe had Silas put there for them.
Ashe had made them wait for twenty minutes before coming out of his bedroom. They definitely
weren’t amused, but that was what they got for showing up uninvited, where nobody welcomed them.
“We are sorry for your loss.” Doctor Casey watched him with cagey eyes. “How are you holding
up? It must be so difficult, losing someone like that.”
Ashe never liked Doctor Casey, and he never respected him. He’d been the psychiatrist his
parents found for him when Ashe first told them who he was inside. Doctor Casey prescribed him
antipsychotics and sent him home. Dude was a fucking joke, but Ashe’s parents loved him, and kept
him in their pockets, because he said the things they wanted to hear.
“A phase.”
“You’ll outgrow it.”
“Just take the medication and you’ll feel right again.”
Fuck that guy. “What do you want?” he demanded of the two people responsible for his birth.
His father leaned forward. “You lost your husband. We want to make sure our child is okay.” Jack
snorted, and Leslie Senior tossed an irritated glance at him. “Who is this person?” He jerked a thumb
in Jack’s direction. “It’s bad enough we have to be monitored when we come to see you, and we can’t
have a private conversation without this one hovering.” He glared at Silas over his shoulder before
turning back to Jack. “We require privacy. Get out.”
“He stays.” Ashe sat back. “But feel free to leave if this setup isn’t to your liking.”
“Your parents and I are concerned about your state of mind,” Doctor Casey spoke up quickly.
“You’ve suffered a terrible loss.” He was a white man in his seventies now, with a total of about
twenty strands of gray hair on his head that he refused to get rid of, instead choosing to slick those
meager strands down. Ashe stared at the doctor’s pink scalp, dotted with dark spots. He used to be so
afraid of this man, of his insistence that all Ashe needed was to take unnecessary meds and ignore
what he felt, what he knew to be true.
 Now, the doctor, clad in a yellow and green Hawaiian shirt and khaki shorts, was a pitiful sight.
Ashe wouldn’t wish his parents on his worst enemy.
“I suffered worse than this when Brody buried me alive,” Ashe told the doctor calmly. “You
didn’t show up then to ask about my state of mind.” The good doc flushed red. “Tell me, how much
are they paying you?”
“Stop this,” his mother hissed. She inhaled and darted a glance toward the stoic Jack before
smoothing her skirt over her knees. “It’s not a shame to be sad that your husband died. You loved
Brody.”
Ashe barked a laugh. “I stopped giving a fuck about Brody the first time he hit me, and that was
years before he tried to kill me.” Her eyes flared at his course language. He leaned forward toward
her, elbows on the table. “You loved him, Mother. You cared more about him than you ever did about
your own child. Why, though?” He’d never asked that question before, and she reared back as if he’d
physically struck her.
“Brody is a good man.” She made a sign of the cross. “If you’d have just given him a chance—”
“Brody was a monster,” Jack snapped. “I was the one who pulled Ashe out of that grave. I was the
one who dug the dirt out of his nostrils and gave him CPR until he breathed again.” His fists were
clenched, his rage radiating outward, washing over Ashe. Surprisingly, it calmed Ashe, that rage,
filling his chest with so much warmth.
His parents and the doctor turned their attention to Jack then, sizing him up.
“Why is this man here?” his father asked.
Ashe shrugged. “I want him here, Father. He’s welcome anytime. You three are not.”
“I didn’t raise you to be this rude.” Colleen sniffed.
“You didn’t raise me at all,” Ashe told her sharply. “You have two minutes to tell me what you
want then I’m having you thrown out.” A hand settled on his nape, offering comfort, and he arched into
it as he said, “Clock starts now.”
Colleen sputtered and her husband’s eyes narrowed.
“Your parents are simply concerned about you, Ashley.”
Ashe jumped to his feet. “Out. You three. Get the hell out.” He wasn’t about to sit there and have
them disrespect him in his own goddamn house. Fuck that shit. “Silas.”
Silas gave him a sharp nod and strode over, putting a hand on the doctor’s shoulder.
“You’re behaving irrationally,” the doctor said. “You need to be checked out by a professional.”
Ashe scoffed. “A professional like you? Yeah, I’ll pass.”
“You can’t be acting like this and still be allowed to run the company,” his father blurted out.
“Obviously, Brody’s death has affected you—”
Ashe held up a hand to Silas. The picture was becoming so much clearer. “That’s why you’re
here,” he murmured to his parents. “That’s why you brought your lapdog. You’re looking for
something, anything, to take to court to claim I’m unfit.” He sank into his chair with a laugh. “You are
unbelievable.” And how was it that they still managed to surprise him all these years later?
“We were right,” his mother said. “Look at how you’re acting. You need to be back at Stonecrest.
They were good to you in there.”
“They told me I was crazy in there!” Ashe yelled. Remembering the horrors of that place had him
shaking. “They pumped me full of drugs I didn’t need in there until I didn’t know my own name. Until
I was drooling on myself and needed to wear diapers. In there!” Shame turned his voice thin. Jack
smoothed a hand over his head, fingers gently pressing into the back of his neck, calming and
centering him. Ashe took a deep breath. These people who called themselves his parents were
fucking lunatics.
“Come on.” Silas grasped Doctor Casey by his shoulders. “Time to go.”
“No, I changed my mind. They’re staying.” Ashe wasn’t done with them yet.
“Ashe.” Jack crouched beside him, cupping his face. “What are you doing?” His blue eyes were
dark with sorrow, tinged with anger Ashe knew Jack was feeling on his behalf. There was a strain to
his features, to his shoulders, as if he were holding himself back from doing something. He didn’t
have to do anything, though. Ashe patted his cheek.
He had this. Maybe for the first time ever, he had this. And maybe it was because of what Jack
had been so willing to do for him. Jack was prepared to go there for him, do anything, so why hadn’t
Ashe been prepared to do the same for himself? To protect himself?
Silas opened his mouth to speak then stilled, tilting his head, which likely meant somebody was
talking to him through his earpiece. After a second or so, he addressed Ashe. “Your siblings are
downstairs.”
Look at that, a family affair. Ashe nodded. “Send them up.” He returned his gaze to Jack’s. “Trust
me,” Ashe told him softly.
“I do.”
“Good.” He brushed his lips over Jack’s, ignoring his parents’ sounds of outrage. “I like having
you beside me.”
Jack’s eyes went all soft and shiny. “No other place I’d rather be.”
Was it love, the tingling that swamped Ashe’s body? The escalation of his breath and rigorous
beating of his heart? The rightness of this, of them, the others around them be damned? If it was love,
Ashe welcomed it. He looked forward to exploring it. He kissed Jack again, and then the other man
pulled away, getting to his feet and standing there at Ashe’s side.
Colleen’s gaze went from Ashe to Jack and back. “What do you know about this man? You can’t
possibly—”
“Save your breath, Mother.” He rolled his eyes at her gasp, smiling when his brother and sister
were ushered into the room by one of the guards. “Ah, gang’s all here then.” He rubbed his hands
together. “Shall we begin?”
L.J. furrowed his brow. “What is this? What’s going on?” Dressed in a navy blue suit, he was a
carbon copy of their father.
“Ashe.” Tsa approached him quickly. “We heard about Brody.”
Ashe cocked his head. “And is that why you’re here? Worried about how I’d be dealing with the
news that the man who beat me and tried to kill me finally did us all a favor and offed himself?”
Tsa blinked. “No. I—I just wanted to check up on you.”
“Hmm.” He turned to his brother. “And you, why are you here?”
“I was worried about you.”
“Why? This is one of the most freeing moments of my life,” Ashe told him. “None of you gave me
that when I told you about Brody, about what he’d done. You guys loved him more than you ever
cared about me.” He blew out a breath and eyed his siblings. “Your parents—yes, yours, because I
refuse to claim them—are here to get any ammunition they can to take to court in order to have me
committed again. They’ll do anything to get the company. But let me make sure I make this clear, you
will never get the company,” he told his parents.
His father glowered, and his mother grasped her pearls.
“I will dismantle it and sell it off, piece by piece, before I let it fall into your greedy hands.
Silas.” When Silas met his gaze, awaiting his next words, Ashe told him, “Bring me the recording.” If
Silas was surprised by the order he didn’t show it; instead he disappeared out the door, returning a
few minutes later with a thumb drive that he handed over to Ashe.
Staring down at the tiny thing, Ashe spoke, “When I hired Silas, his first task was to find a copy of
the 911 recording from the night Brody buried me alive.”
The room froze.
“I wanted to hear it for myself, Brody’s words.” Lifting his head, he stared at his parents. “You
thought you’d had it erased. But whoever you bribed made sure to keep a copy, maybe to come back
for more money some day.”
His father’s jaw hardened. “We did what had to be done.”
“We will not apologize for it,” his mother piped up.
“I don’t want any apologies from you. Your words mean nothing to me.” He pressed his lips
together. “They’re gonna give Brody a hero’s funeral, celebrate his life, and I’m telling you right now,
I’m not about to let that happen.” He’d held on to the recording, doing nothing with it because of his
shame and embarrassment. Plus, he’d been fearful of any fallout landing on the company. But maybe
he just hadn’t been ready. Hadn’t been strong enough then to do what needed to be done.
“Ashe.” From that tone, Jack knew what was coming next and he clearly didn’t approve.
“I know.” Ashe gazed up at him, begging for Jack to understand. “But I need to do it. This is my
way.”
Jack’s Adam’s apple shifted when he swallowed. “Be sure.”
“I am.” When Jack’s chin lifted in a subtle acknowledgement, Ashe turned back to the silent room.
“The recording will be made public.”
“No!” His mother dropped like a stone back into her chair.
“Are you out of your mind?” his father roared.
“Ash—Ashe,” Doctor Casey stammered. “You’re not thinking clearly right now. Your mind—”
Jack strode over and slammed his fist into the doctor’s jaw, and the older man crumbled to the
floor.
Ashe’s lips quirked, and he slid a hand up and down Jack’s arm when he returned to his side.
“Like I was saying, the truth of who Brody was and what he did to me will be made public, sometime
later today, along with a statement from my lawyers detailing how and why charges weren’t brought
against him.” He looked at his parents, at their shocked expressions. “You two should put your
lawyers on standby, because after today everyone will know what you did to your own child. How
you protected that monster, and how you committed crimes to make sure everything was covered up.”
His brother scrubbed a hand over his jaw. “Ashe, why are you doing this?”
Ashe ignored him. “Tsa, I suggest you lay low, yeah?”
“How can you do this?” Colleen demanded. “We are your parents.”
“No, you aren’t. Not anymore. You will be served with restraining orders preventing you from
coming near me, the people I love, or my company. If you violate those orders, I will treat you the
same way you treated me, and have you locked up. I suggest you don’t try me.” He blew out a breath,
bringing his gaze to the unconscious doctor on the floor. “My lawyers will also be making sure that
this one loses his license.” It was time he took his life back from the people attempting to hold it
hostage. He hadn’t been ready before, but he was ready now.
Jack put a hand on his shoulder, signaling his support. Ashe covered it with his own, and told
Silas, “Get them out, and get my lawyers on the phone.” He didn’t pay his parents any mind as they
issued threats on their way out.
“Ashe.” L.J. approached his desk and stared down at him. Despite the black glasses he wore, he
looked so much like the man who’d contributed to their births. Acted like him too, way too much for
Ashe’s peace of mind. “I’m sorry for what you went through.” He did look sorry, but unfortunately the
sentiment was a little too late.
“You know, L.J., when I needed those words, when I needed my big brother, you turned away
from me. You told me you wished I’d died…”
Jack growled.
Shame bowed L.J.’s head. “I didn’t mean it. I’m sorry.”
“Sounded like you meant it to me.” Ashe shrugged. “I’ve learned to love the people who love me,
to embrace the people who embrace me, and it isn’t lost on me that those people aren’t even my
family by blood.” He jerked his chin. “You know your way out.”
“Ashe.” Tsa walked around the desk, her arms open.
Ashe got up and went to her, receiving the hug, giving her one back. Then he pulled away to stare
into her eyes. “Take care of yourself, Tsa.”
She nodded, eyes big and bright, full of sadness. “You too.” Her voice broke. “I’m sorry for all of
it.” She released him and turned away, ignoring Silas, who fell in step behind her.
Two guards appeared, and they lifted the doctor off the floor and carried him out.
And then it was just Ashe and Jack.
Arms slid around his waist from behind, Jack’s chin resting on his nape. “Talk to me,” Jack
murmured.
“Take me back.” Ashe twisted in his arms until they were face-to-face. “Take me back to the
cabin.”
 30

THE FALLOUT from the recording Ashe leaked was swift and overwhelming. For Jack. And for Ashe
too, though Jack didn’t think his lover even realized it. Once it was out, it took longer than they’d
anticipated to be able to leave LA, and Jack had a firsthand view of the increasing severity of Ashe’s
nightmares. The screams woke him up like clockwork in the middle of the night, and he’d come
awake to find Ashe clinging to him, still asleep as he sobbed and begged for his life.
Jack would hold him tight, promise him he was safe, and rock him until he tumbled back into
sleep.
And in the mornings, Ashe gave him no indications that he remembered any of it.
When Ashe had first broached the topic of going back to Georgia, back to the cabin, Jack hadn’t
been in favor of it. The situation with the list containing the names of all of Dutch’s operatives—Jack
being one—was still unresolved. Jack didn’t know what he’d be going back to, and there was no way
he’d agree to take Ashe into that.
But with things all fucked up the way they were, with Ashe in the middle of the madness? Jack
couldn’t stay in LA. Ashe couldn’t stay in LA. He needed a change of scenery. A place where the
press weren’t camped out in front of his place, waiting for him to show his face. The story of Ashe
and Brody was all over the twenty-four hour news channels and sports networks. Investigations had
been opened up regarding how the 911 tapes had gotten buried, and Ashe’s parents were also in the
hot seat.
None of it was good for Ashe.
Jack had feared this would happen, that it would be too much, but he would never be one of the
people in Ashe’s life convinced he knew more than Ashe did. He would support Ashe in whatever
decisions he made that affected him.
End of discussion.
It took two weeks, and Jack reaching out to Dutch again, before they were finally able to leave
LA. After a tearful goodbye between Ashe and Fawn, who would remain at the condo—at Ashe’s
insistence and over Silas’ objections—they were set to go.
On the roof of the building, Ashe got into the helicopter waiting for them while Silas called Jack
to the side with a motion of his chin.
“What’s up?” There’d been a major argument when Ashe told Silas his plans to leave. Silas
wanted to join them, but Ashe said no. Then Silas suggested taking a couple of the other bodyguards
with them. Ashe vetoed that too. Silas was not happy.
“I know I don’t need to say it—”
 “Then don’t,” Jack told him.
“But I will,” Silas kept right on speaking. “I care for that man. Protect him with your life.”
Jack bristled. “You’re really saying that to me, after what went down?” After what happened with
Brody? Didn’t Silas already know that protecting Ashe was a given? Fuck, Jack had already killed
for him, and he’d do it again in a heartbeat.
Silas nodded. “Yes, I’m saying it.” His jaw tightened. “When your heart’s involved, certain shit
can fall by the wayside, and—”
“Let me stop you right there.” Jack held up a hand. “There is no one—nothing—as important to
me as Ashe. Get that shit clear. I will do anything for him, you already know that.” He glanced over to
the waiting chopper where Ashe sat patiently waiting, and projected his voice higher over the whap
whap of the helicopter blades. “I will do whatever is necessary to protect Ashe. Believe that.”
He walked away then, getting on the chopper and then taking his seat next to Ashe. The noise
reduced considerably once they were inside the luxury helicopter. Jack had flown on helicopters
before but this one was a game changer. Ashe has told him some of the features before, but damn.
Where in a regular helicopter you had to wear headsets with microphones in order to hear the person
seated next to you, Ashe’s wealth afforded them luxuries like reduced noise levels—which meant they
could converse headset free—and lower levels of vibration. They also had the option to control
things like the temperature, lights, and electrochromic window features.
Ashe grasped Jack’s hand once they were airborne. “Are you okay?”
Jack nodded. “Yeah, Silas and I were just setting some things straight.”
“He’s still mad, isn’t he?”
“He cares about you.” Jack hugged Ashe, tugging him into his side. “He wants you to be safe.”
And Jack couldn’t be mad about that. Ashe didn’t have nearly enough people in his life who were
there for him, for his happiness, his peace of mind. Jack definitely understood where Silas was
coming from.
He kept his arm around Ashe until they got to the next leg of their journey, a private plane Dutch
had sent for them. They couldn’t travel using Ashe’s plane since the press would be able to find it
easily. Having people like Dutch who Jack could call on in an emergency was a good thing, though of
course, it came with strings attached.
Always would.
Dutch had made it so he was indispensable, and that no matter what, Jack and his fellow
operatives would always be running back to him for some shit. It was fucked up.
And genius.
But Jack couldn’t focus on what would or could happen whenever Dutch decided to call in his
markers. He’d deal with that when the time came. For now, all his attention went to Ashe, who’d
fallen asleep once they’d boarded the plane and gotten comfortable.
Jack tugged him until Ashe was curled up in his lap, and he just kept stroking Ashe’s head, his
neck, his ear. He was also tired, but he didn’t succumb to it. He had to remain alert.
The past few nights, he had foregone sleep and spent his time in Ashe’s bed just lying there and
watching him. Watching his eyeballs roll behind closed eyelids, watching his features contort into
tight, panic-stricken lines. Helpless to do anything meaningful to ease him. He didn’t know how Ashe
could go through all of that at night, and then forget it all when the sun came up.
Still, every single morning, Ashe rolled over and smiled at him across the pillow, his eyes all
hazy with sleep and happiness, and Jack experienced the oddest mix of relief and remorse.
Relief that the nightmares didn’t follow Ashe into daylight, ruining the happiness on his face and
in his step. Remorse that Jack couldn’t take it all away. That he couldn’t remove it, kill it, like he’d
killed Brody.
Hopefully, by the time Ashe returned to LA, it would all be behind him. He’d seen his doctors and
psychiatrists before leaving, and he would remain in contact with them remotely. Jack just wanted him
to have some peace of mind.
He nodded off, coming to when Ashe stirred in his lap. Jack blinked down at him as Ashe
stretched and sat up. Jack smiled. “Good sleep?”
Ashe chuckled. “Yep, but I’m hungry now.”
Jack cupped his jaw. “Can you wait until we get to my parents’ house?”
Ashe’s eyes rounded. “You didn’t tell me we were going to your parents’ house!” His gaze darted
around. “I’m not—” He wrung his hands. “I don’t—”
“What’s going on in your head?” Jack lifted an eyebrow. “Tell me.”
“I mean…” Ashe shrugged. “I don’t have a good track record when it comes to parents.”
Jack snorted. “That’s because your parents are fucking vile. It has nothing to do with you.” He
pinched Ashe’s chin and tugged on him gently until he lifted his gaze, locking on Jack’s. “That shit is
not on you, Ashe.”
“I know.” Ashe sighed.
“Good. Now…” Jack pulled him back into his arms. “My family wants to meet you, but if you
think it’s too much, too fast, if you need a breather before we do that then it’s okay. It’s whatever you
want.” And he meant that. Whatever kept Ashe smiling, Jack would do.
“I have already been all up and through their house,” Ashe mused as he snuggled closer.
“You have.” Jack bit back a smile.
“And they’re your people.” Ashe tipped his head back, meeting Jack’s gaze. “I want to meet your
people because they gave me you.”
Damn. “Babe.” Jack bent, dropping a kiss onto his lips. He didn’t know how or why his luck had
changed, why Ashe had appeared in his life when Jack needed him most, but he would forever be
grateful. “They will love you.” Because they’d be able to see that Ashe was the best thing that ever
happened to Jack. They’d see Ashe’s goodness, his pure heart, and realize just how lucky Jack was to
have him.
The pilot’s voice echoed through the plane, indicating their approach and descent, so Jack
released Ashe so he could buckle up. Then they were taxiing down the runway. Jack peered out the
window to his right, frowning when he spotted a bunch of black SUVs waiting.
Fuck!
If the press had found them…
“What’s wrong?”
He jerked his head around. “There’s a bunch of SUVs out there,” he said apologetically. “It might
be the press.”
Ashe sank back in his seat.
The plane came to a stop then, so Jack unbuckled his seat belt and sank to the floor, getting down
on his knees and taking Ashe’s hand in his. “I’m sorry, I didn’t expect—” The sound of the plane door
opening cut off his words and he glanced over his shoulder, reaching for the gun at his waist when a
figure climbed aboard.
“Welcome home, Jack.”
He froze at the familiar voice and when the newcomer fully came into view, Jack shot to his feet,
gun pointed at Dutch’s forehead. “Dutch, what the fuck are you doing here?”
Dutch glanced over Jack’s shoulder and smiled.
 31

ASHE HAD BEEN PREPARING himself to deal with the press once they got off the plane. He’d been
swallowing and swallowing, attempting to dislodge the lump in his throat. He’d been a nobody in LA,
just another person in a city full of wealth and privilege. No one paid any attention to him, until he got
linked to Brody in a spectacularly public and scandalous way. The sports world had been rocked
with the news of their Golden Boy being revealed as a violent abuser who’d been secretly married to
someone who identified as male.
He didn’t regret leaking that recording, but Ashe had underestimated its shock value along with
his own reaction to having his face and story every-damn-where. Going from relative privacy to
being a talking point on the Sunday morning shows felt like he was back cowering under Brody’s
fists. He did his best to hide it from Jack, but he didn’t know if he succeeded.
He’d been looking forward to getting away, to hiding at the cabin like Jack had been doing for so
long. But here they were on the tarmac, Jack pointing a gun at Dutch’s head.
The sight of the gun had Ashe’s pulse tripping as he shot to his feet on unsteady legs, but it was
Dutch’s eyes that had cold wrapping around Ashe’s spine. There was something about those gray eyes
that zeroed in on Ashe and stayed. As if he knew all of Ashe’s secrets.
“Dutch, what the fuck are you doing here?” Jack demanded.
Dutch’s lips quirked. His expression taunted Ashe, as if they had more than Jack in common. He
scared Ashe, this Dutch. He had, from the first barely-there glimpse Ashe had gotten of him when
Jack had taken him to the club. This Dutch had resources and a reach that extended beyond Ashe’s
money. Jack dealt with him but had no love for him. That little tidbit put Ashe even more on edge.
The gun to his head didn’t bother Dutch; in fact, he didn’t pay Jack any attention. No, he remained
laser focused on Ashe. “I’m here to have a discussion with your—” His gaze slid from Ashe to Jack
as he cocked his head. “What is he to you?”
“I will shoot you,” Jack snarled.
Dutch simply nodded. “Yes, I know.” He turned back to Ashe. “We haven’t been formally
introduced, but I am glad to see you doing well.” The way he spoke, it was like they actually knew
each other.
Ashe blinked at him. “Do we—Do we know each other?”
“Jack, put the gun down. You’re scaring your…Ashe.” Dutch didn’t answer Ashe’s question,
instead he spoke to Jack as if he were an unruly child. That had Ashe’s eyes narrowing. “The three of
us need to have a long overdue conversation.” Striding past Jack, Dutch sat opposite Ashe, taking the
seat Jack had just vacated. “Sit.” He motioned with a hand, and Ashe didn’t think twice before
following the command.
Jack joined them, taking the seat at Ashe’s right elbow, glaring at Dutch the whole time. “What do
you want?” He sounded resigned and more than a little angry.
“Information about your whereabouts has been such a tightly kept secret,” Dutch told Ashe as he
sat back, legs stretched out in front of him, hands clasped. It was the posture of a man who had zero
cares. “Would be a shame if that was no longer the case.”
Jack growled. “I will shoot you were the fuck you sit, Dutch. Don’t play with me.”
But it took Ashe a couple seconds to receive Dutch’s words as they were meant.
A threat.
He was threatening to tell the press where Ashe was. Why? He glanced at Jack, at the murderous
expression on his face, then turned back to Dutch. “What do you want?” He and Jack were supposed
to be colleagues. He’d helped Jack, sent the plane for them, only to do this?
“From you?” Dutch lifted an eyebrow at Ashe’s question. “Nothing.”
Ashe frowned. “Then what—”
“Me.” Jack sighed. “He wants something from me.”
Dutch grinned, his gray eyes crinkling. “Something has come up,” he told Jack. “I need you on it.”
“No.” Jack got to his feet and stood over Dutch, glowering, while the other man gazed up at him
with the most condescending smile on his face. “Not only no, but fuck no, Dutch. And I dare you…”
Jack bent, pushing his face into Dutch’s. “I dare you to do anything that hurts Ashe. I will personally
bury you.” The violence emanating from Jack’s words and stance crowded the small space they
occupied, choking Ashe.
He turned his gaze toward the window, staring out at the black SUVs lined up out there. Waiting
for them? For Dutch? Who was he that he could threaten Ashe? That he could help Jack do the things
he did back in LA and cover it up so flawlessly? That they could concoct a story and sell it to the
media and it be bulletproof? He’d aided in their escape only to trap them.
Why?
“Tell him what you want from him.” Ashe managed to speak despite the panic clogging his throat.
It was so difficult to meet Dutch’s eyes, but he did it. “Tell him.”
“I like him,” Dutch told Jack. “He’s not as hotheaded as you.”
“You haven’t seen me hotheaded,” Jack tossed back at him, but at least he retook his seat, one
hand reaching out to touch Ashe’s knee. Stroking him as if to soothe. There was no chance of the panic
receding, not with Dutch still there with that cruel gleam in his eye, but Ashe loved Jack’s touch
anyway.
“One of our people has been radio silent for far too long,” Dutch spoke calmly. “I need you to go
in and check on him, extract him if it’s necessary.”
“You want me to go undercover?”
At those words, Ashe forgot what breathing meant. “Undercover?” Did he sound as scared as he
felt? He grabbed Jack’s arm. “What?”
“You know the players,” Dutch said to Jack. “This should be easy.”
“The answer is no,” Jack told him firmly. “I’m not working for you, and if this is you calling in
your markers, then I’m going to have to disappoint.”
The calm expression Dutch had been wearing evaporated, and in its place was a hard mask that
sent the hair on Ashe’s nape standing on end. “I was hoping for a different response.”
Jack bared his teeth. “You should’ve known better.”
Ashe’s gaze ping-ponged between the two of them. There were layers to their exchange that he
didn’t understand, not that he wanted to. This was enough for him, their animosity, their barely
leashed violence. It had his numb fingers tapping on his knee, a lame distraction.
Dutch inhaled sharply, pressing a finger to his temple. “Do you know why I like you, Jack? It’s
because of the way you like to pretend. You pretend you don’t get high off the work, but you do. You
pretend you’re not fucked up, but you are. And you pretend you have a choice in this when you don’t.”
He winked and stood, brushing imaginary lint off his left shoulder. “I’ll allow your pretense until the
end of the day, then I expect you to meet me at the club to get the details of the op. If you don’t,
well…” He glanced at Ashe again. “You know my moves, so feel free to predict how I’ll retaliate.”
He strode away, ducking out of the plane and making his way to the waiting SUVs.
A hand on Ashe’s shoulder drew his attention and he turned to Jack.
“Are you okay?” Jack’s worried gaze searched his face. “Ashe?”
The trembling started then. Jack hauled Ashe into his arms, pressing kisses to his temple.
“I’m sorry about that. Dutch is fucked up for threatening to tell the press—”
“No.” Ashe pushed away from his chest, shaking his head.
“Shit, I’m sorry.” Jack cupped his face. “I didn’t expect him to come here and do that.” Violence
flashed in his blue eyes. “I’ll deal with him.”
“I don’t care about the press,” Ashe told him. “That’s not why I’m—” He sighed. “He wants you
to go undercover.”
“I’m not. I won’t,” Jack promised vehemently. He sounded sure, but Ashe had seen Dutch’s eyes.
They were the eyes of a man who always got what he wanted. Something told him that no matter how
much Jack protested, his will was no match for Dutch.
That man would take Jack from Ashe, would find a way to send him undercover.
And the thought of Jack in danger? That shit scared Ashe more than Brody ever did.
 32

IT WAS déjà vu for Ashe, walking back into Jack’s family’s house and finding it empty. His father had
texted Jack to let him know they were out but would be back at the house in another hour or so. That
little bit of sharing had been part of the handful of words Jack uttered once they’d gotten off the plane
and boarded a waiting SUV.
Ashe didn’t mind the quiet this time around. It allowed him space to arrange his thoughts, and if he
wanted to, he could have thanked Dutch for being the perfect distraction. He’d wiped away all of
Ashe’s morose thoughts about Brody and what he’d run from.
No, Dutch had all of Ashe’s attention. So much so that he didn’t take Jack up on the nonverbal
invitation to join him in the shower. He’d have loved to unpack his shit just long enough to get naked
and wet with Jack, but see, Ashe had been conditioned to recognize a threat when one stared at him
with ice-cold eyes.
Dutch was a threat.
He waited until Jack disappeared into his bathroom and turned on the shower before sending a
quick text to the phone the other man had dropped onto his bed. “I’ll be back soon. Don’t worry.” He
already knew that last part wasn’t gonna placate Jack, but fuck it. He left the house, closing the door
softly and making his way out onto the street then down to the corner, where he quickly googled the
location of that club.
Then he called himself an Uber.
Maybe it was Brody being dead. Maybe it was leaving LA. Maybe it was Jack. Whatever it was
that made Ashe feel bold enough, strong enough, to go face-to-face with Dutch, it didn’t matter. It was
happening.
He’d made the decision so quickly, acted without a second thought, that by the time the driver
pulled up at the club’s main entrance, Ashe blinked in surprise. He lurched forward, grabbing on to
the front passenger-side headrest, fingers digging into the thick leather.
“This is the place, right?” the female driver asked.
He lifted his head, meeting her gaze in the rearview. “Yes.” He nodded. “This is it.” He forced
out a smile. “Thank you.” He got out, hands finding the comfort of his pockets as he stared at the red
Kia Forte’s taillights. Once the car disappeared, he took a deep breath and turned, gazing up at the
club.
His back pocket—where he’d shoved his phone—vibrated. An incoming call. Three guesses as to
who that might be. He ignored it and walked around to the back. The last time, Jack had entered via a
back entrance, so Ashe skirted the building, searching for that same door with the cameras above it.
 At 9:08 in the morning, the parking lot was empty. Didn’t appear that anyone was inside the
building either. But this was where Dutch hid out, wasn’t it? This was where he’d holed up after
threatening them so expertly back on that plane, right?
He found the door and approached, hands still in his pockets as he stared up into the cameras
without bothering to speak. If they were monitoring it, and he’d bet all his money that they were, then
they’d see him.
So he waited.
All the while, his back pocket vibrated. Jack’s calls. Then came the audible pings. Jack leaving
message after message.
It occurred to Ashe on that plane, when he saw the cold calculation in Dutch’s eyes and the raw
violence written all over Jack’s face, that his man needed someone to fight for him, too. The saving
couldn’t all be on Jack’s shoulders. It wasn’t as if Ashe knew for sure that Jack needed saving. He
just knew that he wasn’t going to allow Dutch to fuck up what he’d waited years to find. Thing was,
he didn’t know how he’d do that yet.
A loud click startled him and he jerked, gaze swinging left and right before he realized that sound
was the door unlocking. He dipped his head down to hide his expression as he swallowed.
You got this.
He blew out a breath and lifted his head, squaring his shoulders.
Then he pushed the door open and stepped inside.
Armed men, dressed from head to toe in black, waited for him, all three immediately surrounding
him as the door slammed shut behind him. Ashe gulped at the sight of their weapons, assault rifles
they cradled so casually, and stopped in his tracks. But one of them waved him on.
Another deep breath.
And he followed the men who moved so silently that if he wasn’t watching them walk with his
own two eyes, he’d have doubted they moved at all. They didn’t make a fucking sound.
He was here now. For Jack, he’d deal with whatever lay beyond those white, never-ending
corridors. They were mazelike, those corridors. Felt as if they were walking in circles, or maybe just
pacing up and down the same goddamn corridor?
But then they stopped and one of the men tapped on the wall—a smooth, white wall that
immediately disappeared to reveal a door. A heavy door that looked like it guarded a bunker. That
same door opened with a beep and there was Dutch, white shirt sleeves rolled up to his elbows, the
top few buttons undone, black slacks creased. His expression was as smooth as Fawn’s legs, but
Ashe got the very distinct and uncomfortable impression that Dutch was not surprised to see him.
Dutch jerked his chin at his armed goons and they left without even a displacement of air. Shit
was creepy as fuck.
They faced each other, he and Dutch, silence as thick as the door that had sealed them inside this
sparse office with a low snick. Ashe cast about for something to say. “This is where you hide out.”
Dutch’s lips twitched. “Hide?” He lifted an eyebrow.
“What would you call it? You’re surrounded by armed goons, locked up inside this bunker.”
Dutch closed the tiny distance until they stood so close Ashe could see all the shadows lurking in
the deep dark of his cloudy gaze. “Does Jack know where you’ve run off to?”
This fucker. “Does Jack work for you?” Ashe countered.
“You are out of your depth,” Dutch murmured almost kindly.
Ashe stifled a smile. This wouldn’t be half as bad as he’d imagined. “Not really. I knew a man
like you, once. I married him, was only able to escape him when Jack killed him for me.” He got a
reaction, a tightening of the area around Dutch’s eyes. “You helped Jack with that, I heard. Bet you
probably feel good about that. You feel good in thinking you rid the world of someone who didn’t
deserve to breathe the same air as the rest of us.” The fear he’d been holding on to, he released it
then. The anger. The rage. He released it, a breath that loosened the clenching muscles in his chest.
He’d never gotten the chance to confront Brody, but he wasn’t lying…
Something about Dutch brought to mind everything he’d endured at Brody’s hands. Maybe it was
the casual cruelty in his eyes. The way he tossed out threats like they were compliments. Maybe it
was just in the way he watched Ashe, as if he was sifting through the best ways to crush him.
“Jack gave you his answer,” Ashe told him when Dutch continued to watch him silently. “He’s not
going undercover. Accept his decision.”
Gray eyes laughed at him, though Dutch’s expression remained blank. “Are you done? Do you feel
better now?” He cocked his head.
His patronizing tone grated, but Ashe dug deep, fisting his hands against showing any weakness.
They were sharks, Dutch and Brody; they could scent blood in the water from miles away. “Stay away
from him,” Ashe said softly. “From us. I won’t let you take him from me.”
“Or?” The one-word taunt had Ashe’s hackles rising.
“You’re not the only one with resources, Dutch.”
Something flashed in those gray eyes, and it could’ve been anger. Might have even been pity. But
it was gone too fast for Ashe to decipher it. “I make it possible for people like you—people with
resources—” Disgust ripped off the word. “—to keep those resources. I’ll say it again, you are out of
your depth, and I’m gonna drop you a life jacket before you drown in your own shit.” Dutch turned
away abruptly and walked over to a bar at the far corner of the room where he poured himself a shot
glass of amber-colored liquid. He leaned against the bar, staring down at the drink in his hand. “How
long had you been searching for Jack?”
Ashe blinked. “Uh…” What did that have to do with what they were discussing? “A long time?”
“Two years, six months, one week, and four days.”
“What?” How would he even know that with such specificity? “How do you know?” Uttering the
question soured the pit of Ashe’s stomach, and his toes curled inside his shoes. He didn’t know why.
Just that the answers, the answers… He probably shouldn’t want to hear them.
“I hid Jack.” Dutch looked up at him then, eyes glittering. “He wanted to disappear, so I
accommodated him, made it happen without him knowing, while he stayed up in the mountains licking
his wounds and nursing his broken heart. I kept him hidden,” he said slowly, carefully. “Because Jack
is an asset to me. Jack is important and I protect what’s important to me.”
Ashe narrowed his gaze. “What does that—You’re not making any sense.”
“I made sure he couldn’t be found,” Dutch explained. “Up until the moment I wanted your PI to
find him. Until the moment I wanted you to find him.”
Ashe shook his head, struggling to comprehend.
“You see, Ashe…” Dutch swirled the drink in his hand then brought it to his mouth, taking a sip.
He licked his lips then held Ashe’s gaze. “Nothing happens without my say so, especially not one of
my most prized assets falling in love.”
“You—”
“You had to find him, and he had to care for you. Because now, he’ll do anything to protect you.
Including coming out of hiding and going undercover. Especially now that his identity, but most
importantly the identity of the man he cares about, might be compromised.”
His words were like a shower of ice cascading over Ashe’s head. He trembled, shock and fear
roiling in his gut. “You did this?” He couldn’t— It didn’t make sense. Was too far-fetched. He took in
Dutch’s expression, so cold and hard, and shrank backward until he was up against the door.
“I gave him to you. And when he murdered your ex by beating him to a pulp and shoving sand
down his throat, I covered that shit up. I bribed and I blackmailed to ensure those details would
never, ever see the light of day. To protect him. And you.” He paused. “So, the way I see it, you owe
me.”
Ashe blinked at him.
“Like I said, you are out of your depth,” Dutch told him just before he brought the liquor up to his
lips again. “And you are also wrong.” He winked above the rim of the glass. “Your dead ex had
nothing on me.”
 33

MAYBE DUTCH WAS RIGHT . Maybe he was worse than Brody had ever been. Maybe Ashe was truly out
of his depth. But looking at the man opposite him, who stared him down as if daring him to say
something, Ashe didn’t feel it.
He didn’t feel out of his depth. This was where he was supposed to be. It shook him that Dutch
had been the sole reason he ever found Jack at all. It did something to his insides, made it all trembly,
thinking of what he’d have missed, if his PI hadn’t finally called with that scrap of information.
Now, he was learning just how close he came to never having Jack. And Dutch, Dutch could hurt
them still. He could take Jack away, force him back into a world he didn’t want to revisit.
Ashe swallowed, keeping his gaze on Dutch, squaring his shoulders. “You sound proud of
yourself, Dutch. This how you get your kicks, interfering in other people’s lives?”
Dutch simply lifted an eyebrow. “If I hadn’t interfered, you wouldn’t have your precious Jack
now, would you?”
“You’d like to think so.” Ashe folded his arms. “But I would have found him,” he said with all the
surety in the world. “He and I, we are connected in a way you couldn’t possibly understand. I would
have never stopped looking for him.” His voice rose. “Never.” Jack was his lifeline. His anchor.
“There is nothing I won’t do for him.”
“Good.” Dutch nodded and put down his glass then rubbed his hands together. “Now, let me spell
this out so there are no misunderstandings…I want Jack on that mission. You’re going to convince him
to do it.”
Ashe regarded him with a low sigh. The ease with which Dutch spouted his bullshit, the
steadiness in his tone that suggested he was used to this, the shadows in his eyes that would have
probably triggered Ashe any other time. It was all too familiar. Brody was out of his life. His parents,
too. He’d figured breaths would come easier—and they did—until Dutch turned up on that plane with
his threats. “No.” He pushed away from the door, stepping forward. “It’s not going to happen,” he
said calmly.
Dutch cocked his head as if he was having trouble hearing and understanding Ashe’s words.
“No?”
Ashe smiled then. There wasn’t much in the way of expression on Dutch’s face, but his eyes had
deepened from a foggy gray to an all-out thunderstorm. Could this be the first time somebody told him
no? “Jack isn’t going undercover, at least not for you,” Ashe said. “He doesn’t want to, and I for
fucking sure will not convince him to do shit for you. So it’s a no.”
Dutch’s jaw tightened. “You make it seem like I gave you a choice.”
 “And you make it seem as if I give a fuck about you or your weak attempts to bully me.” This
confidence he’d found suddenly was intoxicating, and Ashe grasped it with both hands. His insides
were still trembly, a fine tremor working its way through his limbs. He should have had this back
when he’d been face-to-face with Brody. He should have had it when dealing with his parents. He’d
lost his confidence years ago, beaten down physically and emotionally by the people who were
supposed to love and uplift him.
He had it now, though, and he didn’t plan to lose it again. Confidence and fear worked hand in
hand, but he was learning that embracing the fear yet still moving, acting, speaking with confidence
had him standing taller. Dutch was a formidable man and much more dangerous than Brody could
have ever hoped to be. Ashe understood that now. But Jack had slayed his dragon for him.
He’d be damned if he wouldn’t do the same for the man he loved.
Dutch grinned at him, the gesture dark and twisted. “You don’t want to tangle with me, Ashe.”
“I know who you are.” Ashe cleared his throat. “And you don’t scare me. When it comes to Jack,
I will tangle with anyone. Anytime.” Because Jack was his. He tipped his head to the side. “Is this the
first time anyone has told you no, Dutch? The first time anyone has stood up to you?” He didn’t wait
for a response. “How does it feel then?”
“Bit of a shock, I’d say,” an amused voice said.
Both Ashe and Dutch stiffened as a man stepped into the room from another entrance Ashe hadn’t
even seen. Dutch scowled at the newcomer, who was a tall and slender individual with dark skin and
black hair brushed away from his face. They were dressed similarly, shirt and slacks, but this man
had a different air about him.
A warmth to Dutch’s cold.
A soft to his hard.
“What the fuck are you doing?” Dutch growled at the other guy, who simply shrugged and
approached Ashe with a hand held out.
“Heard we had a visitor.” He smiled, teeth bright against his skin. He was light to Dutch’s dark.
“Varun Patel. This one and I are colleagues.” He jerked a thumb in Dutch’s direction.
Ashe shook his hand. “Ashe.”
Varun’s eyes widened. “Jack’s Ashe?” His voice rose as high as his hairline and he spun to glare
at Dutch, who’d sunk into a nearby chair. “Are you out of your fucking mind?”
Ashe gaped.
“This doesn’t concern you, Patel. Fuck off.” Dutch’s blank expression was back, but to Ashe it
appeared to be cracking, hints of emotions flashing like neon lights. The way his eyes were suddenly
hooded. The flaring of his nostrils. The way he gripped the arms of his chair with white knuckles.
Ashe watched the two of them, taking in the way Dutch’s gaze seemed incapable of meeting
Varun’s, and the disappointment on Varun’s face. Something simmered in the air, thick and unspoken.
He rubbed his arms, stepping back. His movement caught Varun’s attention, and he turned back to
Ashe.
“I’m sorry.”
“What?” Ashe’s eyes bugged. “For what?” Why was this stranger apologizing to him?
“For whatever he did.” Varun sighed. “For whatever he said.”
Ashe shook his head. “That’s not your place.” There was no need for him to apologize for Dutch
when the man in question only glowered at them from across the room.
“I know, but I’m sorry anyway.” Varun turned to Dutch. “Jack is not going undercover, so
whatever plan you had to force his hand, scrap it.” He had lowered his voice when speaking to Ashe,
but he raised it to address Dutch.
Dutch jumped to his feet, the sudden move sending his chair tumbling backward.
Ashe flinched.
Varun didn’t move, nor did he take his gaze from Ashe. “Does Jack know you’re here?”
Ashe shook his head numbly.
“You should get back to him then.” Varun smiled sadly. “He’s a good man, Ashe.” For a moment,
he thought Varun was talking about Dutch, until he continued, “I’m glad he found you.”
“Me too.” They weren’t talking about the same thing, though. Dutch may have orchestrated some
shit, but all that did was push up their reunion timetable. Jack had found Ashe in that grave, he’d
brought him back to life. And Ashe was here, standing up to Dutch, because of it.
“You should go,” Varun said again.
Unbidden, Ashe’s gaze shot over the man’s shoulder to land on Dutch, who stood there, hands
fisted, glowering at Varun’s back. It had been a one-eighty—Dutch all locked up, boss and in charge,
right up until Varun appeared. Now Dutch was unraveling while Ashe watched.
“Don’t worry about him,” Varun murmured. “I’ll handle him.”
Yes, maybe he could. Maybe he would.
And maybe it’d be a show Ashe would pay to see.
 34

“ASHE!” Jack grabbed him in the doorway, yanking him into his arms. “What the hell?” He tugged
Ashe’s head back to glare into his eyes. “Where did you go?” Before Ashe could respond, Jack
hugged him again, cupping his nape, tucking Ashe’s face into the crook of his neck.
He’d lost his fucking mind, finishing his shower and then stepping into the bedroom to find it
empty, a text from Ashe telling him not to worry. How was he supposed to accomplish that when he
didn’t know where Ashe had disappeared to? Or why?
“I’m sorry,” Ashe mumbled. “I didn’t mean to worry you.”
Except he had. And for what? Jack pulled back, allowing Ashe to step into the house before
closing the door and turning to him. “Where were you?” What was so important he couldn’t wait for
Jack to finish showering? “Do you know all the crazy shit I imagined while you were out there”—he
pointed to the door—“refusing to answer your phone?”
Ashe’s gaze dropped. “I didn’t—I didn’t think about that.” He lifted his head, throat working.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered. “I should have handled it better.”
Jack narrowed his eyes. “What was so important?”
“I uh… I had to see Dutch.”
Jack did a double take. “You had to—” He couldn’t have heard that right. “You had to see
Dutch?” His voice went up a few octaves. What the fuck? “You’re not making sense.”
“I know.” Ashe walked over to him, touching his arm. “What he said on the plane, trying to get
you to go back to work for him—”
“I’m not going undercover.” Jack frowned. “I told you that.” He tried to imagine how that meeting
could have gone, Ashe confronting Dutch. “You don’t have anything to worry about.”
“But I do. We do,” Ashe insisted. “He wasn’t going to accept your decision. He would have done
something, anything, to force your hand.”
Sounded like Dutch alright, but it was nothing Jack hadn’t dealt with before. He was prepared for
whatever shit Dutch wanted to pull. “What did you think you could do about it?” He folded his arms,
holding Ashe’s gaze. “Not a trick question, Ashe. Enlighten me. Tell me why you thought you could
essentially ambush and antagonize the last man you should.” Jack had learned through trial and error
over the years how to deal with Dutch. Ashe didn’t know all the nuances. He didn’t know that Dutch
was untouchable, that if he decided to become a problem for them, they’d have a hell of a hard time
shaking him. Jack wasn’t afraid of Dutch, but he wasn’t ready to be on his hit list, either. And Ashe
didn’t deserve any of it.
“He reminds me of Brody.” Ashe pressed his lips together, gaze vulnerable. “The way he issues
orders and acts like everyone should just bow and scrape to him, that’s some Brody-type shit.”
“All the more reason why you shouldn’t be anywhere near him. Dutch is dangerous.” Way more
than Brody could have ever been. Way more than Ashe could possibly comprehend.
Ashe scowled. “I’m done being scared, Jack. And I’m done hiding. You dealt with Brody for me.”
Jack blinked as everything came into focus. “And you figured you’d solve my Dutch problem.”
Shit, just like that his anger drained away. He knew how it felt, wanting to protect the person you
cared about. Wanting to make sure nothing and no one could hurt them. Putting yourself up as that
buffer between them and the world. He knew, because he felt that way for Ashe. That fierce
possessiveness, the instinctual need to protect.
“I’m not in your life just to be rescued,” Ashe told him sternly. “I can and will do some
motherfucking saving of my own.”
That proclamation startled a laugh from Jack, and he grabbed Ashe by the face with both hands,
hauling him against his chest. “Fuck.” He slammed his mouth down on Ashe’s. He had no clue, did
he? None. “You save me everyday.” Shit. He’d been sequestered on a goddamn mountain, wasting
away, until Ashe barged his way in. He’d done what Dutch, Jack’s parents, and his siblings couldn’t.
Ashe made him look forward.
To days and weeks and months. To years. A future.
He made Jack want. Him. His love. His time. His attention. His kisses. His touch. After what he’d
lost, what he’d done, there’d been only loneliness. Only his regrets and his guilt keeping him
company, keeping him cold, but Ashe burned the chill away.
“Ashe.” Jack cradled the other man’s head in his hands, holding his gaze. “I love you.” It was
right, this moment. All they’d been through. The man in his arms—Jack loved him like he hadn’t
loved anyone in a long long time, and it made his heart soar, made his breath catch. His fingers
trembled slightly as he repeated it, “I love you.”
Ashe’s face crumpled. His eyes turned red instantly, the wonder in their depths shimmering at
Jack. “I love you, too.” Then he was in Jack’s arms, sobbing into his mouth as they kissed.
Jack should be finding out what happened with Dutch. What the two of them talked about. But it
could wait, couldn’t it? This right here was way more important.
Jack lifted him, and Ashe’s legs wrapped around his waist as they staggered down the hallway
into the back bedroom. Not once did they break the kiss, and Jack didn’t ease his grip until he kicked
the bedroom door shut behind them and dumped Ashe onto the bed.
Ashe reached for him, a hand around his neck, bringing Jack down onto him, taking his mouth
again. Tongue sliding in, licking him until they were wrapped around each other, hands tearing at
clothes.
Tongues fucking.
Teeth biting.
When they were naked, Jack broke free long enough to grab the tube of lube stashed in the back of
the top drawer in the nightstand. They glided over each other, skin to skin, in each other’s mouths,
fingers dipping, clinging, nails scouring. He found himself on his back, Ashe rising above him, eyes
glittering, teeth in his bottom lip as he slicked up his fingers and pushed them inside Jack.
One at a time.
Until he was stuffed with three digits, knees pulled up to his chest, groans reverberating
throughout the room. Fingers inside him, Ashe slid downward, biting his nipples, licking his way
down Jack’s body, sucking his cock into his mouth.
Jack arched for him, lower body lifting off the bed, begging for more but hating the thought of
leaving Ashe’s mouth. He whimpered when Ashe released his cock then cried out when his mouth
slid lower, sucking on his balls, tongue gliding over his fingers-stuffed hole.
Ah shit.
Blood roared in his ears, tremors rocking him. His limbs quivered and burned, neck and back
aching from his awkward position trying to sit on Ashe’s tongue. Just as his toes curled into the
mattress, Ashe pulled away, removing his fingers.
His hole spasmed, clenching around nothing. “Fuck!” Jack grabbed for him blindly. “Ashe!
Drawer,” he managed to blurt out. “Check the bottom drawer.”
A strained chuckle reached his ears along with the sound of a drawer opening and closing. He
cracked his eyes open in time to watch Ashe dip between his legs again. Something slick and hard
pressed at his hole, pushed inside, and Jack groaned.
His black silicone dildo. It’d been awhile since it’d seen any action.
As he watched, Ashe winked at him then continued fucking him. Jack opened wider for him,
spreading his legs, lifting his ass. Fuck. The dildo was a fat one, ribbed too, and goddamn, it sent his
sensitive body into overdrive.
He cried out with each thrust, rising to meet them, falling when Ashe pulled back. Ashe fucked
him hard and fast, and Jack moved for him, with him, fisting his cock, pulling on his dick in time with
each thrust.
Until his eyes crossed.
“Ashe!” The heat had been swirling in his balls since the beginning, but it spread quickly,
decimating his control, coarsening his cries. And through it all, Ashe pounded into him, nuzzling the
inside of his thighs, murmuring shit Jack couldn’t make out over his own cries.
But then Ashe twisted on the downstroke, and that, coupled with Jack’s hands on his own dick,
tripped him up, stuttered his heartbeat, and sent him flying.
He came writhing, shouting at the ceiling, and before his cum stopped pouring, Ashe was on him,
climbing up his body, sitting on his face.
Aw, shit. Jack got to work, taking Ashe’s dick into his mouth, two fingers—slick with his cum—
shoved into Ashe’s clenching front hole, another jammed in the back. He sucked and licked, lapping
up all Ashe’s wetness, eyes and hips rolling at the taste.
“Mmmppff. Ughhh.” Ashe rode his face furiously, yanking on his hair, cursing his name, bathing
his face in deliciously sticky shit. “God! Jack, oh fuck. Oh fuck!” He froze, thighs clamping down on
either side of Jack’s head, trapping him as he came with a gush of moisture that had Jack groaning, his
spent cock jerking.
Ashe’s grip on him disappeared and he collapsed backward onto Jack, his face pressed into
Jack’s right thigh. Their pants echoed in the silence.
Until a door slammed. “Jack? You here, honey?”
Ashe scrambled upright and off Jack, wide gaze swinging to him. “Is that your mother?” His voice
was shrill.
Jack nodded. “Yep.”
 35

J ACK’ S FAMILY was the nicest, most normal people Ashe had ever met in his life. At first, he’d had a
bit of difficulty looking any of them in the eye on the off chance that they might have heard him and
Jack fucking. Nobody mentioned it, though, and they didn't show it in their actions either. They
brought food when they came, so much of it that even though everyone had eaten, an hour later they
still had yet to make any significant dent in the spread laid out on the kitchen table.
They’d greeted him as if they’d known him forever. He met Jack’s parents, Marianne and Robert,
and his two sisters. Charlotte was the oldest sister, and Marnie was the middle child. They smiled
and talked with their hands, loud and teasing. Jack and his two siblings all had their father’s blue
eyes. Jack had his old man’s build, too, and the arrogant way he carried himself. But he had his
mother’s hair.
If Ashe could have chosen what his ideal parent would be like, it would be Marianne. She hugged
with her whole body and her smile made Ashe’s chest ache. Even her little gestures, like engaging
Ashe in conversation as they sat around the table, leaning toward him, gently touching his hand, all of
it had him missing the things he’d never had.
In the living room, he sat on the couch next to Jack and zoned out while the family talked around
him. Being in their presence showed him what he’d lacked growing up, what he could have had, if
he’d been blessed with parents who gave a fuck about him. The love Jack’s family had for him was
palpable. It was also evident that even though Robert and Marianne weren’t together, they still loved
each other deeply and were genuine friends.
How did that work? He couldn’t see his own parents divorcing then remaining amicable in the
aftermath.
There was so much warmth around him now, he allowed his eyes to drift shut, his head dropping
onto Jack’s shoulder as he basked in it. How could Jack not have wanted to be around all this love all
the time? How could he have isolated himself up at the cabin when he had this, here?
A broken heart.
How much did Jack have to have loved his ex to willingly stay away from his family like he had?
Did he love Ashe like that? Could he love Ashe like that?
An arm slid around his shoulders, and he lifted his lashes to find Jack peering at him with his
brow furrowed.
“Are you okay?”
Ashe nodded, glancing around. The conversation had lulled a bit and now everyone was looking
at him and Jack with the most adorable expressions on their faces. “Yes.” He cleared his throat. “Just
a little tired, sorry.”
“We should get on the road then.”
“Oh, Jack.” Marianne frowned. “Can’t you two stay, at least until tomorrow?” She glanced at
Ashe, worry in her eyes, a sad smile on her lips. “I miss you, and I want to get to know Ashe a little
better.”
They’d shown zero recognition when Jack had introduced him earlier, and after what had been
unleashed with the releasing of the Brody 911 tapes, Ashe found that shit to be priceless. Anonymity
was highly underrated. He wanted to get to know Jack’s family, too. He wanted to hear all the
embarrassing tales that would have Jack’s ears, cheeks, and throat flaring red. He wanted to know
more about the people Jack loved, because Ashe loved Jack.
But he wanted time alone with Jack more, and they wouldn’t have it if they stayed. It wasn’t about
privacy for them to have sex. It was just about Ashe being himself, real and raw, and so fucking
vulnerable, with the man he loved. No one else should see that side of him.
No one but Jack.
“You’ll get more time with Ashe, Mom,” Jack promised his mother before meeting Ashe’s gaze.
“But I want to get him up to the cabin. We both need it.”
He could read Ashe, his Jack. Knew what he needed. That was love, wasn’t it? Knowing what
your lover needed and doing your best to provide it? Right now he needed what he and Jack had back
at the cabin.
Ashe smiled at the room. “We’ll be back before you know it.” He released Jack and reached for
Marianne’s hand, giving her a reassuring squeeze. “I’m looking forward to getting to know you guys,
too.” That seemed to ease her worries a bit, because the fine lines on her forehead smoothed out.
It took another hour before they finally set off for the cabin after getting smothered in hugs from
everyone, Jack’s mother making them promise to check in regularly. Once they were on the road, Jack
behind the wheel, Ashe heaved a sigh and put his head back on the headrest.
“You look serious over there.” Jack slid a hand over Ashe’s thigh nearest him. “Something on
your mind?”
Ashe shook his head. “Not really. Just…I like your family.” He glanced over to find Jack grinning
widely.
“They like you, too.” His gaze flicked from the road to Ashe and back. “You notice my mom
didn’t want to let you go once she hugged you?” He chuckled. “If my mom likes you, then you’re part
of her tribe for life.”
Ashe bit his lip, staring straight ahead when he asked, “Did she feel that way about your ex?”
Jack nodded. “Yeah, she did.”
A heavy silence fell then and Ashe cursed himself for being the one to bring up the topic in the
first place. “Sorry,” he muttered.
“Ashe.” Jack grasped his hand, bringing it to his lips and pressing a kiss to his knuckles as they
rolled up to a red light. “Don’t apologize. Say what’s on your mind, ask whatever you want. I’m not
hiding anything from you.” He paused then blew out a loud breath. “I loved Shane. Loved him hard.
And it bruised my ego something fierce when he chose a criminal over me. I think that’s what made it
hard to accept, which in turn had me doing stupid and messed-up shit. I will always care for Shane.”
He shrugged. “That’s just fact. But I love you. I’m in love with you. That’s also fact, and if you need
me to tell you that twenty times a day, then I’m good with that. I will do whatever makes you happy.”
Ashe knew that. He knew that, but sometimes the self-doubt crept in. “The only thing you have to
do is love me,” he said softly. “That’s what I want.” Brody had set a pretty low bar, anybody would
be a step up from him, but Jack wasn’t just anybody. He’d been helping Ashe, comforting him, saving
him, years after that one night, and he’d never known it. Ashe wanted to give it back, that comfort.
That care. That safety.
He wanted to be worthy of Jack.
They stopped only once for gas and before long they were turning onto the long, blink-and-you-
miss-it path that led to the cabin. When Jack finally pulled up in front of the place and parked, Ashe
sighed.
“Ashe.” Jack unbuckled his seat belt and leaned over, cupping his cheek, gaze searching.
“I actually missed this place.” Ashe grinned, turning to stare at the little building, dwarfed on all
sides by sky-tall trees. “When I knocked on your door that rainy night, I didn’t expect this.” He
motioned between the two of them. “I just wanted to see you. Thank you.” Instead he’d gotten so much
more.
Jack tugged him into his arms, taking his mouth in a soft kiss. “I’m glad you came,” he whispered
when he broke away, breath washing over Ashe’s nose, thumb stroking his jaw. “I’m glad you looked
for me. I’m glad you didn’t give up and kept searching until you found me.”
Here it was. The chance to tell Jack that Dutch was the one behind Ashe finding him at all, but
Ashe couldn’t do it. It didn’t matter how he found Jack, only that he had. So he wrapped his arms
around Jack and initiated the kiss this time, deepening it until they were both squirming.
Then he pulled back.
“Take me inside,” he said hoarsely.
Jack grinned, and Ashe reached up, tracing his lips with a finger. “Wait here.” Jack kissed his
finger then flashed a wink before releasing Ashe and getting out. Ashe watched him round the vehicle
and approach his door, opening it with a smile, eyes full of heat and promise.
So different than that first time when he’d been holding a gun on Ashe, glowering at him.
“Come here.” Jack beckoned, opening his arms, and Ashe went to him, falling into his arms.
Letting Jack catch him.
 36

“WHAT DO YOU WANT NEXT ?” Jack asked in Ashe’s ear. They were on the couch spooning, with Ashe
as the little spoon, candlelight the only thing illuminating the small space. By some silent agreement,
they’d settled onto the couch immediately upon arriving at the cabin and hadn’t moved since.
Outside had gotten dark, judging by the lack of sunlight filtering through the lone window. They’d
have to get up and eat something, and eventually move to the bedroom, but Jack was comfortable
exactly where he was, with Ashe in his arms.
Ashe stirred with a low hum, pushing back onto Jack as he answered the question. “I mean…” He
shrugged. “We could take this to the bed?”
Jack pressed a kiss to his ear with a chuckle. “I meant now that you’re out of LA, and not
suffocated by your parents and the dead douche, but I can work with the other thing.”
Ashe turned stiffly on the too-small couch—Jack would have to invest in a bigger and more
comfortable one soon—until he was on his back, left arm swinging down to the floor, the right
pressed to his lower belly where his black t-shirt had ridden up. He gazed up at Jack with sleepy
eyes. “The future? You’re talking about my future?”
“Or ours.” Jack nodded. “What do you want? What are the things that you’ve been hesitant to think
about?” They would have to discuss some pretty big shit soon, like the long distance thing. But
whatever Ashe wanted, Jack would find a way to make it happen.
Ashe’s gaze turned inward, his jaw tightening slightly. “I haven’t given much thought to it. Dealing
with my parents, trying to remove Brody from my life, all my other shit.” His gaze sharpened then
turned sad. “I haven’t had time to think about it.”
Jack picked up the other man’s hand, the one lying across his stomach, and laced their fingers
together, squeezing him gently. “Do you want to do some thinking now?” He lifted an eyebrow.
“Because I’d like to do some as well.” Much like Ashe, he hadn’t given much thought to his future, to
what came next beyond waking up, getting drunk, and falling asleep, only to repeat the process. But
with Ashe in his life, he’d come to hope for shit.
Want it. Need it.
“Okay.” Ashe sat up, and Jack released his hand, repositioning them until Ashe sat with his legs
draped across Jack’s lap. He pursed his lips. “I don’t want anything to do with the family company.”
Made sense. “You’ve already taken steps to distance yourself from that, haven’t you?”
Ashe nodded. “And I want to keep it that way. I might even consider selling it one day,” he mused
aloud.
There was a marked difference in the way Ashe’s eyes glimmered when he talked about the
business now than when they’d first talked about the company his grandfather left him. That first time,
the weight of it had been in his eyes, in his voice, and visible in the set of his shoulders. “If that’s
what you want then I’m with you.” Jack smoothed a hand over Ashe’s left leg.
“I want to be free.” The words seemed to stumble their way out of Ashe’s mouth as he continued.
“Free to do whatever I want, without my parents breathing down my neck waiting for me to fuck shit
up.” He reached out for Jack, fisting the hem of his shirt and tugging playfully. “I want to be with
you.”
Felt like ages since he’d been fit for any kind of relationship lasting beyond one night, but there’d
been a time when Jack had thrived on it. Having someone. Being that someone. He’d taken cues from
his father on how to be a good mate, how to respect your partner, how to love them and make them
feel cherished. He’d had two serious relationships before Ashe. One had lasted from his senior year
of high school all throughout college. They’d ended it amicably. The second had been Shane. He’d
given all of himself in both instances and came out the other end unrecognizable.
They’d seen each other at their lowest points, he and Ashe. Rock bottom. So the only place to go
was up, and Jack wanted that more than anything. “I want that, too.” He cleared his throat. “The
distance thing is a non-issue. I’m coming with you back to LA, whenever you’re ready to leave.”
“I want to stay here.” Ashe pressed his lips together as Jack stared at him.
“What?” He sat up straighter. “Here, in the cabin?”
“Uh…Yeah?” The light in Ashe’s eyes dimmed and he glanced away. “I mean—I just, it’s not a
big deal if—”
“No.” Jack grabbed his hand. “I mean, yes.” Shit. “Just—” He shook his head with a small laugh.
“Tell me what you mean.”
He watched Ashe swallow. “This cabin is peace to me.” Ashe shrugged, expression almost
bashful. “When we walked in earlier? That shit felt so good, Jack. It made me realize that I love it
here. I don’t know if it’s just the cabin or if it’s also because you’re here, but I like the way I felt
when I walked through that door.” He pointed to the door in question. “So, I would like to stay here.”
He lifted his chin, holding Jack’s gaze. “With you.”
He had Jack searching for words. This cabin was Ashe’s idea of peace? Ashe, who could afford
to be wherever he wanted, was choosing to stay in this old, cramped cabin with Jack? “You would
walk away from everything in LA?”
“Most of it is material things.” Ashe sniffed. “Things I never wanted in the first place. The
relationships I care about, like Fawn and Silas—maybe even my siblings—will be fine no matter my
physical location.” He paused and cocked his head. “Is it too soon? Too big a step? Because I can
wait for—”
“No.” Jack lurched forward, putting two fingers over Ashe’s lips, halting his flow of words. “It’s
not too soon, not for us.” He shook his head. “And it’s not too big, not after what went down in LA.”
There wasn’t a need to spell out the whole killing Brody deal. “I was ready—I am ready—to move to
LA for you.” He cupped Ashe’s chin. “For us. Because I want to be wherever you are.” In fact, it had
been a surprisingly easy decision to make and it wasn’t as if he hadn’t lived in LA before.
Ashe smiled at him, eyes glittering in the candlelight. “I want us to stay here,” he whispered.
“Then we will,” Jack whispered back. Simple as that.
Ashe pulled away and scrambled onto his lap, straddling him. Jack wrapped both arms around
him, hands splayed along the length of his spine. Forehead pressed to Jack’s, their noses bumping,
Ashe smoothed a hand down the back of Jack’s head and cupped his nape. “I love you, Jack.”
Jack grinned. “I love you, too.” It felt different, way different, this time around. He didn’t
remember this love thing feeling so hot in his chest, warming his entire body and vibrating in his
limbs. Maybe he’d been waiting for Ashe to make him feel light again, to feel like himself again. Or
maybe it’d just been time. But Ashe’s appearance in his life had been the catalyst and Jack would
forever be grateful.
Ashe liked to say that Jack saved him, but in truth he saved Jack, too.
 37

HE’ D BEEN WAITING to hear from Dutch, but Jack hadn’t expected him to reach out the morning after
he and Ashe arrived at the cabin. The buzzing of his satellite phone roused him from sleep and he
quickly extricated himself from a sleeping Ashe’s embrace, taking the phone with him as he tiptoed
out of the room, closing the door softly behind him.
“Yeah.”
“Hello, Jack.”
Jack clenched his jaw. He would never be okay with dealing with Dutch and now more than ever,
Jack wanted less to do with him. “What do you want?” he snapped as he walked outside barefoot,
wearing only black boxer briefs. The sun was up, the sky blue and cloudless, but the cool air washed
over his exposed skin, tightening his nipples and drawing immediate goose bumps. The ground was
wet with dew and he grimaced.
“I hope you don’t think it’s gonna be that easy to get me off your back,” Dutch responded, tone
mocking.
Jack rolled his eyes. “Do you miss me already, Dutch? Sounds like you miss me.”
“How is Ashe?”
“None of your concern.”
Dutch snorted in his ear. “That’s where you’re wrong. It’s because of me that you have Ashe. I
made it possible for his PI to find you, for Ashe to find you.”
Jack stiffened, spinning around to stare back at the cabin. “You did what?”
“He didn’t tell you.” Dutch chuckled. “You didn’t want to be found or bothered, so I made sure
you stayed hidden up there in that cabin of yours. At first, Ashe’s guy wasn’t having any luck finding
you, but I finally gave him a few nudges in the right direction.”
Jack swallowed. “Why?” As if he didn’t already know how Dutch operated. He didn’t do shit
without some sinister motive.
“Nothing is free in this world, Jack. You know that. Ashe knows that. You’re finally out of that
funk you descended into when Shane broke your heart and that’s because of Ashe, who you wouldn’t
have if it wasn’t for me.” Dutch inhaled. “I’m owed compensation for that. Don’t you think?”
Jack shook his head, scowling even though Dutch couldn’t see. “You’re owed a bullet to the
fucking chest for interfering in my life,” he growled into the phone. “Let that be the last time you make
that mistake, otherwise the next time you won’t have the opportunity to brag about it.”
Dutch tsked. “That’s a whole lot of unnecessary words to thank me. Especially after the most
recent favor I did for you in LA. That was not an easy fix, Jack.”
 He’d known asking Dutch for help would come back and bite him in the ass. “I’m not one of your
lackeys, Dutch. I don’t work for you, and you don’t scare me.” Jack pressed his lips together as Ashe
appeared in the open doorway, wearing gray-blue boxers and a black tank that rode up when he
stretched and yawned, scratching at his belly. “Don’t call my phone, and don’t even think about me or
Ashe.” Jack’s grip tightened around the phone at his ear. “That’s my one and only warning.” He ended
the call with a curse as Ashe walked over to him, a frown on his sleep-creased face.
“What’s going on?”
Jack slung an arm around his shoulders and started toward the cabin. “That was Dutch being
Dutch.” Ashe stiffened slightly against him, giving credence to Dutch’s claim that Ashe knew about
the strings he’d pulled. “You hungry?” He didn’t wait for an answer, leading Ashe back inside and
pointing to the couch. “Sit and I’ll make us something to eat.”
Ashe sat meekly, but Jack made out the sudden worry in his eyes. Fucking Dutch. He really was
the worst, but Jack refused to have him be an issue in his relationship.
“What—” Ashe licked his lips. “What did Dutch want?”
Jack opened the fridge, grabbing the eggs, butter, and milk and then placing them onto the counter.
“To tell me that he’s the reason we’re together.”
Ashe jumped to his feet, fear lurking in his eyes. “I’m sorry. I should have told you what he said,
what he did, but I didn’t want—”
“Ashe.” Jack reached for him, yanking him into his chest, folding his arms around the other man.
“Fuck Dutch. Seriously. He has nothing to do with us. Nothing.” He cupped the back of Ashe’s head
and tipped his head back. “Dutch would like to think he’s the reason we’re here right now, but this is
all you. It’s all me. It’s all us. Dutch wishes he had that kind of power.”
Ashe clung to him, blinking up at him with those gorgeous eyes. “He made it sound as if we
wouldn’t have each other if he hadn’t intervened.”
“And you believe him?” Jack searched his eyes. “Would you have stopped looking for me?”
“No,” Ashe answered immediately, with such fierce conviction that Jack had no choice but to
believe every word. “Never. It was a compulsion.” He touched a hand to Jack’s naked chest, bringing
it to rest over his heart, the organ that belonged to him. “I couldn’t stop even if I’d wanted to.”
Jack smiled. “I’m glad.” He touched his lips to Ashe’s, an innocent caress that turned into
something more when Ashe’s luscious lips parted for him, inviting him to come in and play. Jack
dipped inside, deepening the kiss, while Ashe’s nails dug into his upper arms and his body sagged
into Jack’s. Ashe moaned when their tongues touched, and a sound of approval rumbled in Jack’s
chest.
There was nothing more special than Ashe in his arms, all warm and pliant, moaning for more.
Dutch wanted this, he wanted what Jack had with Ashe. He’d seen it for the briefest moment when
Dutch had accosted them on the plane. Nothing could tell Jack that Dutch wasn’t jealous.
Jack broke the kiss, both hands cradling the back of Ashe’s head. When his man blinked up at him,
Jack pressed a kiss to both eyes then one to Ashe’s forehead. Ashe’s arms circled his waist and his
sigh, so filled with happiness and contentment, had Jack’s heart beating triple-time. He loved
knowing he was the reason for Ashe’s happiness because Ashe was the reason for his.
“Dutch doesn’t belong in here with us,” he murmured against Ashe’s forehead. “This is our space,
and only the things and the people we love belong in here.” When Ashe nodded with shining eyes and
a curve of his lips, Jack couldn’t stop himself from taking those lips again. Until Ashe’s stomach
rumbled. Reluctantly he broke away. “I’m making us breakfast.” Before he got too distracted and had
Ashe for breakfast right there. He pointed to the satellite phone he’d placed on the counter. “Why
don’t you check in with Silas and Fawn, or whoever?”
Ashe picked up the phone with a grateful smile, pecking Jack’s cheek before disappearing into the
bedroom. Jack went about making them omelettes while Ashe’s laughing voice rose from the next
room as he spoke to Fawn. Jack couldn’t stop his own smile, until he remembered Dutch. He waited
until Ashe returned, finished with his call, before wiping his hands on a towel and taking the satellite
phone, dialing a number from memory.
Holding the phone to his ear with his shoulder, he poured two glasses of orange juice, nodding
when Ashe signaled he would be right back. Jack watched his lover leave the room as the person on
the other end of the phone answered.
“Hello?”
“Patel, it’s Jack.”
“Jack!” Varun Patel’s smile came through in his voice. “What’s up? Oh! I met your Ashe. Good
for you.”
“That leash you have on Dutch, I’m going to need you to shorten it.” Jack didn’t beat around the
bush. “I’m done fucking around with him.” Patel’s brief silence had him narrowing his eyes at the
omelette as he plated it. “Patel.”
“This is Dutch we’re talking about.” Patel sighed. “No one can control him.”
But that wasn’t true and they both knew it. “I don’t want him near Ashe.” And Jack was pretty
sure that even now Dutch was cooking up some fucked-up scheme. “That is not up for negotiation,
Patel. Ashe is off-limits. Make sure Dutch knows that.” Otherwise Jack would have to deliver the
message personally.
Patel sighed again. “I’ll do my best.”
He’d better do more than that.
“How are you?” Patel asked. “How is Ashe? I like him, by the way.”
“Ashe and I are good,” Jack said as Ashe returned. “I gotta go, Patel, but think about what I
asked.”
“I will,” Patel said quickly. “But listen, you should know that list issue has been handled. All
threats contained.”
Jack’s brow shot up. He’d been so focused on Ashe that everything else had basically slipped to
the back burner. “Really? How?”
“One thing we can say about Dutch…he always does what needs to be done.” Jack heard the
shrug in Patel’s voice when he said, “I don’t know the minute details, but just know you’re good.”
That was a weight lifted off his shoulders. Jack took a deep breath then let it out. “Thanks, Patel.”
He ended the call and turned to Ashe. “How is Fawn? She and Silas kill each other yet?”
Ashe grinned. “Pretty sure they’re fucking.”
Jack burst out laughing. Yeah, he’d seen that one coming a mile away. “Come on, let’s eat.”
Ashe waited until they were seated before he asked, “What did you ask Varun?”
“To tighten his leash on Dutch.” Jack forked a piece of omelette into his mouth and chewed.
Ashe lifted an eyebrow and sipped his juice. “I saw them interact when I was in Dutch’s office
and I got the distinct impression that Varun is the only person Dutch doesn’t hate.”
“Yeah.” Jack nodded. “Those two have a complicated history.” That he didn’t really care to
know. “He also told me that the issue with the list has been taken care of.”
Ashe’s eyes widened in obvious relief. “So we don’t don’t have to worry about any bad guys
coming looking for you?”
“No.”
 “Thank fuck,” Ashe breathed.
Jack’s sentiments exactly. “What do you want to do when we’re done eating?”
Ashe eyed him, fork halfway to his mouth, eyes so full of love and lust that Jack couldn’t help but
squirm. “Go back to bed and stay there for the rest of the day?”
Hell, yes. Jack swallowed. “I think we can make that happen.”
 38

ASHE STEPPED out of the shower and grabbed the towel off the nearby rack, using it to dry his skin. He
was tender from all the ways he and Jack had used each other the previous night. Entering their
bedroom, he allowed his gaze to stray to the clock on the bedside table. Jack had left for the general
store a short while ago—they needed some last-minute supplies for the pizza Jack wanted to make for
dinner—and Ashe expected him back any minute.
He grinned to himself as he got dressed.
It’d been a month, but they’d made great strides in turning the cabin into a home representing the
both of them. There’d been a bit of a struggle in the very beginning with Jack coming to grips with the
fact that Ashe wanted to also put money into fixing up the cabin. His lover had acquiesced when Ashe
reminded him that they were partners building a life together and that whatever was his was also
Jack’s.
And vice versa.
Since leaving LA after the Brody scandal broke, he hadn’t heard anything from his parents. Not
that he wanted to. Silas and Fawn knew not to bring them up whenever he checked in with them. As
far as his siblings, both of them had called him in the days following his leaving LA, but he hadn’t
been in the frame of mind to deal with them. The calls stopped.
He would reach out, but only when it was convenient for him. For the longest time, he’d been so
hurt that he wasn’t as close with his siblings as the three of them had been in the past, but that wasn’t
his fault. He’d made countless overtures over the years to mend the rift and they’d never reciprocated.
Right now, he’d earned the right to be selfish. He’d earned the right to be surrounded by only
happiness and positivity.
And Jack.
Thus far, their time together had felt like a honeymoon of sorts, with them learning each other and
to get used to actually being who they were as individuals and as a couple. Jack had even taken to
helping Ashe with his testosterone shots, insisting on being the one to inject him. Ashe didn’t mind
one bit; it was amazing to do things like that with a partner instead of going through it alone the way
he’d done for most of his journey.
Fully dressed in sweats and one of Jack’s old t-shirts with the DEA logo on it, Ashe wiped his
head then returned the towel to the bathroom, hanging it up on the rack. Then he made his way out into
the living room. It was almost lunchtime, so he would make them something since he hadn’t seen Jack
eat anything before he left. Then maybe they’d go out and take a walk. It was gorgeous outside and the
temperature was supposed to be perfect for—
 He stopped short.
A man sat at the table. Their round kitchen table with the two chairs. A man sat there, staring at
Ashe. Dressed in black, dark eyes like chips of ice while his expression remained impassive.
“Who—” Ashe’s heart thumped in his chest. Oh shit. Oh shit. He glanced to the side where he
knew Jack kept his gun. He took a step backward.
The man got to his feet gracefully, fluidly. He was skinny, cheekbones prominent, with salt and
pepper scruff on his jaw. A dark scar—reminiscent of rope burns—ringed his throat. “I would prefer
not to chase you.”
Ashe flinched. The intruder’s voice was raw and chilling as if it’d been altered in some way.
Maybe by those scars on his throat. Either way, it sent cold shivers racing up and down his spine and
had his brain yelling at him to run. “P-Please.” The words sounded garbled to Ashe’s ears. “What do
you want?” The man didn’t look like just your average bum or robber off the street. He’d sat at the
table with a purpose. If he’d been there to take anything, he would have already done so.
“I would like for you to sit, Ashe.”
The breath left Ashe on a gasp. He knew Ashe’s name. “Who are you?” His body refused to
budge. “What do you want? My—My partner is an FBI agent, he—”
The intruder curled his lips. “Sí. I’m intimately familiar with Agent Wellington.” Something flared
in his eyes. Violence. There one minute, gone the next. “Please.” He gestured to the table. “Sit.”
Ashe shook his head numbly, swallowing. “I don’t—I don’t think I should.”
Those cold eyes bored into him. “You should.”
The implied threat didn’t go unnoticed and still, Ashe couldn’t move. Who was this man? He just
stood there staring at Ashe with his hands at his sides, watching, waiting. With no visible weapons,
he shouldn’t be threatening, but he was. His eyes. His voice. The words he didn’t speak. They were
all threatening.
He knew Jack. Could he be someone Jack had put away at some point? There had been an issue
with the list of agent names being made public, but Jack said Dutch had handled it, and that they didn’t
have to worry.
“Ashe.”
Ashe ignored the trembling in his limbs. “Please. Don’t hurt me.” He didn’t think he’d ever be in
this situation again, at someone else’s mercy, begging someone not to hurt him. His lips trembled as
his eyes burned with frustrated tears.
“Sit. I’d like to share a story with you. And then I will leave.”
Ashe didn’t believe that for a moment. Who would break into someone’s house just to tell them a
story?
“We were in bed when they came for us,” the man began without waiting for Ashe. “They wanted
me. I was their target but mi esposa became collateral damage.”
Ashe blinked.
“Her life was taken while we lay next to each other. While I watched.”
Ashe covered his mouth with a shaking hand and stumbled to the table, dropping into the chair
opposite the man, who also lowered himself into a chair. His eyes never left Ashe’s.
“Tell me, Ashe Tannen, do you believe in vengeance?”
Ashe barely heard the question, too busy rifling through memories in his head. Memories of Jack
being unable to sleep because of his own nightmares. Ashe beseeching his lover to share with him
and Jack spilling a story of the cartel boss he and his team, at Dutch’s direction, tried to eliminate. An
untouchable cartel boss, whose wife was killed the night a hitman was dispatched by Dutch and other
higher-ups. The cartel boss had escaped the garrote at his neck and evaded death, Jack had told Ashe,
disappearing underground. For years they’d not heard a peep.
Ashe was a human-shaped block of ice, frozen solid, because he knew without a doubt that the
man opposite him, the one staring at him as if Ashe fascinated him, was that cartel boss. “You—
You’re Daniel Nieto,” he whispered.
The other man’s face didn’t smile, but Ashe imagined his eyes did. Or maybe he was just crazy.
“He has told you of me.”
“I’m so sorry,” Ashe blurted out. He’d lost his wife, had watched her die. How do you come back
from that? “I’m sorry for what you had to endure.”
“It is not you who should be giving me those words.” He leaned back in the chair.
“Please don’t hurt him.” The words just burst out of Ashe. “Please.” Tears rolled down his face
but he ignored them. “It’s not fair, I know, but please…don’t hurt him.”
Daniel Nieto didn’t move a muscle as he watched Ashe.
“I love him.” But Daniel had also loved his wife, hadn’t he? “I’ll give you whatever you want. If
you came here for a life…” He licked his lips and straightened his shoulders. “You can take mine.”
He didn’t know what part of him those words were coming from but they were coming. He fisted his
hands atop the table and leaned forward. “Jack was doing his job, but that’s no justification for what
you lost. I know that.” He wiped his face with the back of his hand. “I believe in vengeance,” he told
the other man with a sniff. “I believe in retribution, but I was never brave enough to take it from the
man who abused me and buried me alive. Jack did it for me, so it’s my turn.” He nodded. “It’s my turn
to do for him. Or to give for him.” His heart ached. Jack had given him so much: freedom, love,
understanding, patience, and companionship. All the things Ashe had longed for, he’d gotten it from
Jack.
He loved that man and he would do whatever it took to ensure Jack was safe and protected. Jack
would do no less for Ashe. Decision made, he gulped in some deep breaths. He didn’t allow himself
to think about what was about to happen, what he was doing. He liked to think he’d made Jack as
happy as Jack had made him. Jack would be devastated, but he would be alive.
That was all Ashe wanted.
“Sí.” Nieto’s lips twitch. “It is a pity about your dead husband, no? What can be better than
avenging the one you love?”
He knew the truth about what happened to Brody? What else did this man know? Ashe couldn’t let
him hurt Jack. “My life for your wife’s,” he told Daniel Nieto. “Jack gets to live.”
“He does.” Nieto dipped his chin. “He gets to live because I need him alive.”
Ashe blinked. What did that mean?
“Death is…final. An end. And I am nowhere near done.”
What the fuck did that mean? Ashe swallowed the words about to jump off his tongue in a yell.
“I will keep your Jack alive.”
Ashe breathed out heavily.
“And you as well.”
His lips parted.
“And in return, you will owe me—”
“Of course, yes.” Thank god. He could do this. “Whatever you need, however much you need, I
—”
Nieto lifted a hand. “Not money.” His gaze mocked Ashe’s assumption. “It will never be money.”
Fuck, right. The guy was a cartel boss, he was probably loaded down with dirty money. The
tendrils of dread that had been curled around Ashe’s spine tightened, because what exactly did it
entail, owing the head of a Mexican cartel?
Daniel Nieto waited for several of Ashe’s pounding heartbeats before he got to his feet, stared
down at Ashe, and said, “If I wanted Jack Wellington dead, I would have done it when he got into his
truck and drove away.”
Ashe’s eyes bulged. He’d been there the entire time?
“I came to see you, Ashe. And you did not disappoint.”
Ashe shook his head with narrowed eyes. “What—what does that mean?”
“It means, you gave me exactly what I wanted. Love turns everyone into a negotiator,” he said,
voice almost nostalgic. And just like that he walked out of the cabin while Ashe gaped after him.
Ashe couldn’t move, rolling the conversation around over and over in his head. He’d played into
Daniel Nieto’s hands. The cartel leader had known Ashe would do and say anything and he’d used
that against Ashe to secure a favor. A favor for one of the most feared and wanted men.
He buried his face in his hands and that was how Jack found him mere minutes later.
“Ashe?” Gentle hands settled on his shoulder. “What’s wrong?”
He lifted wet eyes to meet Jack’s worried blue gaze. “He was here.” Now that Nieto was gone,
Ashe found himself panting, struggling to hold on to his breath, to form the words. “Daniel Nieto was
here.”
Jack went deathly pale, looking as if he’d passed out on his feet. “What?” He grabbed Ashe by the
shoulder and hauled him up and into his arms as he glanced about. “What?”
Clinging to Jack, his lifeline, Ashe shared in halting words. He didn’t tell Jack that he’d
bargained his life for Jack’s. That would only serve to upset his lover and Ashe didn’t want that. Not
now.
“He just left?” Jack sounded incredulous. “Just like that?”
“He wanted a favor in exchange for your life. Once he had that secured, he left.” He buried his
face in Jack’s neck, feeling his lover’s tremors.
“Fuck,” Jack cursed. “Fuck. We’re getting out of here. Now.”
Ashe pulled back to blink wet lashes at him. “What? I told you, he left.”
Jack cradled Ashe’s face in his hands. “But he found us. He knows where we were. He knows
who you are. We can’t stay here.”
He sat on the couch while Jack hurriedly packed their bags and then grabbed the car keys. “Jack. I
don’t think he’s coming back.” Not unless he wanted to cash in that favor. Maybe it was the naiveté in
Ashe, but he didn’t think Nieto would hurt them. He got what he came for and scared the fuck out of
Ashe in the process.
“I’m not taking chances.” Inside the pickup, Jack buckled Ashe in and then cupped his cheek. “I’m
not taking chances, not with you.”
“Okay.” Ashe nodded. Jack was frightened, as was Ashe. Maybe a change of scenery was needed.
They would return to their cabin because this was their place, their home, but right now Jack wanted
this from him and Ashe would give it. Hell, he needed it too.
“I’ll protect you,” Jack vowed hoarsely as he settled in the driver’s seat. He twisted in his seat,
pressing his forehead to Ashe’s. “Always.”
Ashe stroked his jaw. “I know,” he said softly. “And I’ll protect you, Jack. We’re in this thing
together.”
Always.
 39

HE HAD a man in his bed. Yes, he could claim Jack’s bed as his now.
A man nuzzling his neck and bucking against him, pressing his morning wood into Ashe’s ass as he
came awake. Ashe kept his eyes closed, but pushed back the slightest bit to let Jack know he felt him,
he wanted him.
It took no time at all for Jack to slick them up, his movements quick and sure despite just waking
up. Then he was back, hauling Ashe against his chest, mouthing his nape, panting into his ear as he
entered him. All slick from the previous night’s activities, Ashe welcomed him inside with a low
moan, clutching Jack’s hand where it rested on his lower belly then urging that hand lower to touch
him, finger his front hole while he thrust in and out of the back.
Ashe took him with a smile on his face, his eyes closed.
Jack made love to him this morning, all tender and beautiful, with helpless grunts echoing in their
bedroom. Every glide of his thickness made Ashe arch, opening him wider, and he dug his fingers into
the back of Jack’s arm, teeth in his bottom lip, left leg thrown over Jack’s.
The bed rocked when they rocked, squeaked when Ashe whimpered as Jack grazed his nape with
his teeth, angling his thrusts just so. Ashe trembled, rocking back on him, taking him, taking everything
Jack wanted to give. Ashe had already given the other man everything, his body and his soul.
His heart.
His cries shot up an octave when Jack shoved three slick fingers into his front hole, ramming them
in and out in time with his thrusts that picked up speed and turned rougher. Their bodies slapped
together and Jack ground into him, his pubic hair scraping against Ashe’s ass. Then Jack pulled his
fingers out of Ashe and brought them up, smearing their wetness over Ashe’s lips, then sinking them
into his mouth when Ashe opened for him.
He moaned, shuddering, slamming backward then bent forward, forcing Jack to grab onto him to
keep him there, his hold trembling where he clung onto Ashe for dear life. Ashe sucked on the digits
in his mouth hungrily, shoving a hand down his body to take his dick in hand and jerk himself off with
loud grunts.
“Ashe.” The first word either of them had spoken since waking up. Just his name, and Ashe knew
what the other man wanted. Knew what his lover needed. “Love you.”
“Nnngh.” He clenched around Jack, who swore savagely against his skin. “Love you too. Please.”
That’s what he meant to say, but the words came out all garbled around Jack’s fingers. Didn’t matter,
though. Just as he knew Jack, Jack knew him. He was already there, and Jack’s tongue in his ear sent
him hurtling into his release with a sharp cry.
 Ashe bucked, thighs shaking, biting down on Jack’s digits.
His lover didn’t even wince. Maybe he didn’t feel it over his own climax. He removed his fingers
from Ashe’s mouth, grunts echoing as he slammed forward then froze, his dick throbbing as he
emptied himself inside Ashe.
Ashe’s eyes popped open then, a smile on his face as the morning sun lit up the bedroom and the
wind rustled the sheer curtains at the window they’d left open overnight. They’d come a long way, he
and Jack. Almost a year of living together in their isolated little cabin and Ashe didn’t have a single
regret. The home had gotten a major upgrade and there were still some things to be completed, but
they were happy with the way things turned out.
In the aftermath of their morning sex, they settled back into their favorite position, Ashe rolling
onto his back, chest still heaving, and Jack snuggling up to his side, his head on Ashe’s sweat-
dampened chest, an arm thrown around Ashe’s waist. He stroked Jack’s shoulders, traced the length
of his neck and the curve of his jaw, and crept his fingers up to sink into Jack’s thick hair.
They’d spent a month in Arizona after Daniel Nieto showed up at the cabin, Jack taking all
necessary precautions–with the help of Dutch, who’d have thought–to keep them safe. Then a postcard
had come in the mail, blank except for the aggressively masculine scrawl addressing Jack: “Agent
Wellington, take your man home. You are both safe. Your Ashe has seen to that.” Then Ashe had to
explain to Jack about the bargain he’d tried to make, his life for Jack’s. He’d never seen Jack so torn
between anger and fear. But in the end, Jack understood, though he’d held Ashe extra tight and made
him promise never to do anything like that again. A week later, they returned to their cabin.
“You up?” He nudged Jack. The other man made a noncommittal sound and Ashe chuckled. “You
better not fall back asleep on me.”
Jack groaned and turned his head, pressing a kiss to the middle of Ashe’s chest. “Why can’t we
stay in bed all day?”
“Because we have a plane waiting to take us to LA.” Ashe peered down at his lover. “You know
Silas isn’t going to give us another pass. If we don’t show up this time, I fully expect him to come
knocking the door down to check up on me.” He’d planned to go back to LA to handle some business
three weeks ago, but changed his mind. It was nothing urgent, but Silas had gotten all suspicious when
Ashe called to tell him he’d canceled his plans.
His head of security needed something to do with himself since Fawn fucked him and left him.
Ashe didn’t know the details, just that his friend had done a number on Silas.
As if reading Ashe’s mind, Jack flung himself off Ashe with a huff, throwing an arm over his eyes
as he sank back against the pillows. “We need to get Fawn and Silas back together so he can stop
worrying about you.”
“Agreed.” Ashe tugged on his lover’s hair. “And the best way to do that is to get up, get dressed,
and head out to catch that plane.” He grinned and sat up, swinging his legs over the side of the bed.
“Plus, I promised your mother I’d bring her back a souvenir.”
“You’re going to LA, not to Paris,” Jack grumbled. “She doesn’t need a damn trinket.”
“Uh-huh.” Ashe stood and faced Jack with narrowed eyes, ignoring the cum trickling down the
inside and back of his thighs. They’d gotten tested and were now condom free, and he had to say, he
liked it. A lot. “I’ll let her know your thoughts on the matter.”
Jack lurched upright with a gasp, eyes wide. “You wouldn’t.”
“Totally would.” He flashed a grin, and Jack put both hands over his chest in a show of fake hurt.
Ashe doubled over laughing.
Jack was such a Mama’s Boy, but in the most adorable way. He had a healthy fear and respect for
his parents that made Ashe ache every time he witnessed it.
They’d found it convenient to buy a condo in Atlanta, close to Jack’s family, to stay whenever they
visited or if Fawn or anyone else wanted to visit Ashe. The cabin was their comfort zone, their space,
and they preferred not to have others invade it, no matter how well-intentioned.
Once every couple of months, Ashe made the trip to LA. Though he’d walked away from the bulk
of the responsibilities that came with the company, there were still some things he couldn’t delegate
and that he had to be present for. So he handled them, more often than not with Jack at his side. His
relationship with his parents was non-existent—thank God for that—but he was closer than ever with
his sister, and his brother was trying. That was all Ashe could hope for. He had Jack, Fawn, and
Silas. He had Jack’s family too. They’d welcomed him fully into their midst and he appreciated the
love they showed him. Love you’d have thought he’d get from his own parents, but whatever Colleen
and Leslie hadn’t given him, he got from Jack’s parents and siblings.
He was beyond grateful for them.
Still, life wasn’t perfect. Ashe’s nightmares hadn’t miraculously gone away with Brody’s death.
Sometimes, he swore he was trapped and he could feel the wet soil at his back and on his face,
suffocating him. But Jack was there every time, bringing him back when the nightmare tried to drag
him too far away. Ashe also spoke with his therapist back in LA over the phone a few times a week,
but he was also actively looking to find someone local that he could actually sit and talk with face-to-
face.
Jack had his own issues. There were times when he wanted to be alone. When he got quiet,
especially after a job. Yes, Jack went back to work with Dutch though he no longer did undercover
work or anything that would take him away from Ashe for more than a day or two at the most. In those
moments, Ashe gave him his privacy while ensuring that his lover knew he was only a word away. A
touch. He listened when Jack wanted to talk about why he didn’t think he deserved to be happy or
loved after what he did to his ex. And Ashe made sure to give Jack even more love in those moments.
He and Jack, they were like every other human being. Flawed. And it was those flaws that made
them so right for each other.
No matter what happened, they had each other.
“Let’s do this then.” Jack stood and stretched, and Ashe licked his lips, taking a few long moments
to admire the vision Jack made with the sun hitting him just right, showcasing his muscles and that
gorgeous naked body.
Dark bruises dotted the right side of his neck and along both of his hips where Ashe had gripped
him last night while fucking him on his hands and knees. It was such a visceral thing, those marks, the
tangible proof of his claim, that pride swelled up in his chest, and the stupidest smile stretched his
face until it hurt.
He walked around from his side of the bed to meet Jack and, standing in front of him, he touched
his fingertips to the hickey on Jack’s neck. The spots on his hips. Jack watched him with hooded eyes.
“I like this,” Ashe confessed in a breathy tone. It choked him then, all the things he felt for the man
watching him with those pretty blue eyes. “I like my marks on you.”
Jack’s tongue slid along his bottom lip, wetting it and rousing Ashe’s lust. “I like it too.” The
words rumbled from him, like gravel kicking up under a spinning tire, and Ashe didn’t know who
moved first but they were in each other’s mouths.
Shit.
Tongues sliding.
Hands gripping.
Tripping and falling back into bed. Lost in each other.
Damn. Silas would have to wait.
 40

“THANK YOU FOR THIS .” Jack met the gaze of the man who sank into the chair on the other side of the
table. The coffee shop was curiously empty at just around midday, but he didn’t mention it.
“It’s good to see you, Jack.” Shane smiled at him then glanced over his shoulder when his husband
sat at a table with Ashe. “J.P. didn’t think I should come, but I think you and I both needed this
conversation.”
Jack gritted his teeth. He didn’t like Ashe being so close to Pablo Castillo, but Ashe had simply
smiled and kissed him when they entered before going right over to where Castillo sat, staring
daggers at Jack. Guess he couldn’t blame the man.
He hadn’t expected Shane to agree to meet with him. Ashe had been the one to encourage Jack to
reach out, to take the necessary steps to close that chapter of his life. And he wanted to do it, for
himself, yes. But also because Shane deserved a real and heartfelt apology from him.
So here they were.
“I made some terrible choices in my life,” he got straight to the point. What use was beating
around the bush when they both knew why he’d asked to meet? “But what I did to you when you were
undercover, the way I played with your life…” He shook his head. “That was my lowest and I’m so
fucking sorry.” It’d been all about ego, he’d come to realize. He’d started seeing a therapist and he’d
had to face some hard truths. His ego had been bruised. He’d taken Shane falling in love with
Castillo, a man he’d viewed as undeserving, as a statement of his own worthiness and he’d lashed
out. It hadn't been out of love for Shane, because he’d stopped viewing Shane as someone he loved,
and more as a possession to hold on to.
To win.
How fucked up was that?
It was humbling to come to the realization. Shane didn’t need to know all the intricacies of his
thoughts. He just deserved to know how sorry Jack was.
Shane’s expression was soft, his gaze understanding. “I didn’t mean to hurt you but I know I did,
even though we weren’t a couple when J.P. and I got together. I wish I could have made it easier for
you somehow—”
Jack shook his head. “No, that was not your job. I’m an adult.” He cracked a crooked smile. “At
least, I thought I was at the time.” But he’d been unable to properly handle his emotions. “I regret
what I did and I’m so fucking happy you’re okay.” He glanced over Shane’s shoulder to where Ashe
and Castillo were in his direct line of sight. Ashe was talking, but Castillo wasn’t. He just sat,
expression brooding. He would always set Jack on edge, but only because he knew just how
dangerous the guy was.
Ashe didn’t seem to fear him. But his Ashe was like that nowadays. He’d grown into himself, into
his strength, and with nothing holding him back Ashe was all fearless determination. Every day Jack
loved him more. Their life together was everything he didn’t know he needed. Full of purpose and
companionship and love.
“I know if anybody had done to Ashe what I did to you…” his voice cracked just thinking about it.
“I would fucking kill them.”
Shane smiled and patted his hand—
“Don’t you touch him, pretty boy!” Castillo didn’t yell, but his voice carried across the room loud
and clear.
Shane shook his head with a chuckle, ignoring his man as he told Jack, “I see the way you and
Ashe are together. You love him.”
“I do.” It was overwhelming sometimes to wake up in their bed in their cabin and see Ashe across
from him on the pillow. So full of peace. So gorgeous.
“Cherish him, Jack,” Shane said softly. “Take care of each other. Family is everything. It’s
everything.”
Jack couldn’t argue with that because it was the truth. “You look happy,” he observed. He didn’t
know what it took to love someone with a reputation as dark and extensive as Castillo’s, but clearly,
Shane had more than met the challenge. He did look happy and Jack knew what happiness felt like
now so he couldn’t bring himself to begrudge anyone that anymore.
“I am happy, Jack. I’m where I’m supposed to be and I already know you feel the same way.”
Jack nodded, gaze automatically going to Ashe. Their eyes met, Ashe winked, and Jack’s chest
just exploded with the force of all he felt. “Yes.” He thought of all the things that had to go right for
him to be where he was; starting when he’d pulled that young woman from the shallow grave to Ashe
showing up at the cabin that stormy night. “I am where I’m supposed to be.”
“Then nothing else matters, does it?”
Jack smiled as Ashe got up from the table and headed over to him. “Absolutely nothing else
matters.”

FIVE YEARS later

“F AWN , I told you he’s not thinking about you.” Ashe held his phone to his ear as he entered the
bedroom. Glancing around, he grabbed the overnight bag that sat on the bed as he listened to his
friend.
“Oh yeah. Then why does he refuse to look at me whenever I come over there?” Fawn asked.
“Why every time I come over there he’s always acting like he wasn’t putting work between my
thighs? Huh, Ashe? Riddle me that.”
Between Fawn and Silas, Ashe was more than ready to return to the little cabin he shared with
Jack. His best friend and the head of his security were all about drama and Ashe was caught in the
middle. Where he did not want to be.
He left the bedroom after giving it a once-over to ensure he hadn’t forgotten anything else. He and
Jack had spent a full week in LA on this trip and now it was time to head back home.
His parents had tried to sue him for ownership of the company, but Ashe’s lawyers had stopped
them in their fucking tracks. They’d slunk off into obscurity, and all he had to say was good riddance.
He kept in touch with Tsa and she’d even taken a trip to visit him in Atlanta. They also had a weekly
check-in phone call. His sister had become one of his closest friends next to Fawn. Ashe couldn’t say
the same about his relationship with his brother, unfortunately. They’d tried, but their communication
just fizzled out over time. He and L.J. had nothing in common and other than a text at birthdays and
holidays, they weren’t in contact.
Tsa kept him up-to-date on any major changes happening and that was fine by Ashe.
He blew out a breath and refocused on Fawn. “I think you’re forgetting you were the one who
walked out on Silas. You hurt his feelings.” Not that Silas would ever admit to that, but Ashe could
read between the lines. He and Fawn had an on-and-off thing going that gave Ashe whiplash. They
were two stubborn individuals who didn’t know how to just admit they wanted more than sex from
each other. Until they did, Ashe would be having the same conversation with Fawn every damn time.
“Feelings?” Fawn’s voice rose. “I hurt his feelings? Did he tell you that? Because let me tell you
something, Mr. Silas is not innocent. How is he going—”
“Hello, Ashe.”
Ashe spun, the bag slipping from his fingers and dropping to the floor. “D-Daniel Nieto?” He was
like a fucking apparition, dressed in a black knee-length coat over a dark suit.
“Ah, you remember me.” Daniel Nieto’s lips twitched. “I am pleased.”
What?
“Ashe?” Fawn called through the phone. “Are you there?”
“F-Fawn, let me—I’ll call you back.” He hung up before she could speak, shoving the phone into
the front pocket of his jeans as he blinked at Daniel. “What—How—?” How was he just casually
standing in the hallway outside Ashe’s bedroom as if he had a personal key to the penthouse place?
“The bodyguards—How did you get in?”
Daniel smiled. “I have my ways.” His gaze dropped to the floor where Ashe’s bag sat.
“What do you want?” Ashe swallowed, trying to act as if he wasn’t about to wet himself. “Jack is
—”
“Downstairs. Sí, I know.” Daniel picked up Ashe’s overnight bag and held on to it with his right
hand as he motioned for Ashe to continue walking to the elevator. “After you.”
“Please answer me.” Ashe didn’t budge. “Why are you here?” It’d been years since Nieto showed
up at the cabin. Why would he… “Are you here to call in your favor?”
A flash of teeth as Nieto grinned. Was it Ashe or was the former cartel boss’s appearance a bit…
different? He couldn’t pinpoint what could have possibly changed, but he felt it just the same.
“It is not yet time for me to cash in my favor, but I will. Never doubt that.” Daniel motioned again
and the light glinted off a ring on the fourth finger of his left hand. Was that a wedding band? “Let us
go. We do not want your Jack to come searching for you. Or do we?”
“No!” That was a threat, right? Ashe wasn’t just hearing shit? He blew out a breath. “Are you
here to hurt me? Or Jack?”
“I’ve been watching you over the years,” Daniel told him in his jacked-up voice. “Why would I
hurt you?”
“Why—” Ashe licked his lips as he began making his way to the elevator that would take him
downstairs where Jack and Silas waited at the car. Jack had opted to drive them to the private airport
instead of taking the helicopter and now Ashe was seriously regretting that spur-of-the-moment
decision. He’d forgotten his overnight bag and had returned to retrieve it with only one personal
guard, but the penthouse always had at least five security guys roaming around on a regular day. Now,
there were none. Where was everyone?
“Did you kill the guards?” He forced out the question, dread settling over his shoulders. Daniel
Nieto showing up out of the blue was not a good sign, he knew that much.
Next to him, keeping stride, Daniel chuckled. “Nobody is dead. Yet.”
Jeez. As if that would make Ashe feel better? “Why have you been watching me?”
He didn’t think Daniel would answer him but he did, once they were on the elevator and Ashe
pressed the button to take them to their destination. “You remind me of someone I love very much,” he
sounded almost tender. “I see some of him in you.”
Ashe couldn’t help the hesitant smile that touched his lips. “That’s a good thing right?” It had to
be. Please let it be.
Daniel met his gaze. “For you? Yes.”
What the hell did that mean? “I love Jack. Please don’t do anything to hurt him. Please?”
“Your Jack is safe from me.” Daniel dismissed his concerns. “As long as he treats you right.”
Was he appointing himself as Ashe’s protector or something? Ashe didn’t get to ask because the
elevator stopped and the doors opened to reveal Jack standing next to their car along with the others.
Jack’s eyes widened and he grabbed for the gun Ashe knew he kept at his waist as he rushed forward.
Silas and the rest of the men advanced as well, all of them pointing their guns at Daniel.
“No! Wait.” Ashe yelled, holding up a hand. “I’m fine.” He went to Jack, touching his chest, his
face. “I’m fine,” he repeated. “Guns down, please? Daniel was just, um, saying hi?”
Jack looked at him as if he’d lost his mind. Yeah.
Daniel was no help; he just strode over, expression serene, and stopped when he stood in front of
Jack. “Ashe will always be safe from me.” He dropped Ashe’s bag at Jack’s feet and grinned and
fuck, that in itself was a threat. “Your safety, on the other hand, Agent Wellington, depends on Ashe’s
happiness.”
“What the fuck?” Jack gaped.
But Daniel walked away, confidently striding past Silas and the other guards as if he didn’t have a
care in the world. And he probably didn’t.
“Are you okay?” Jack grabbed Ashe’s shoulders, searching his face.
“I’m fine. I mean it. He just showed up and rode with me down the elevator.”
“How the hell did he get up to the penthouse in the first place? I—”
“Jack.” Ashe caught his man’s face in his hands, forcing Jack to look at him. “Jack. I’m fine. He
won’t hurt me, trust me. And he won’t hurt you either.”
Jack shook his head. “We don’t know that, Ashe.”
“We do. We do.” Ashe kissed. “You heard him, your safety depends on you making me happy and
Jack, I’ve never been happier. Never.”
Jack stared at him for a long time then he sagged, wrapping both arms around Ashe, holding tight.
“Fuck, baby. Fuck. Just seeing him standing next to you—”
“I know. I get it.” He did. “But I think Daniel has appointed himself my shadow protector or
something and you know what?” He leaned back, meeting Jack’s eyes. “I’m fucking good with that.
He won’t hurt us. I know it. I feel it.” Daniel Nieto struck him as a man of his word. Yes, he was the
fucking boogie man and Ashe would probably never truly be comfortable in his presence, but he
believed Daniel.
“Shit.” Jack blew out a breath. “Okay, I’m ready to get the hell out of LA.” He held out a hand.
“Let’s go home.”
“Yes, let’s go home.”

THANK YOU FOR READING !

CURIOUS ABOUT S HANE and Pablo Castillo? Their love story begins in Sinner, Savior.
There’s only man that can handle Dutch. Varun Patel. Scars and Ruin is their story.
Even ex Mexican cartel bosses bent on revenge need love, too. So what if Daniel has to
kidnap and torture a man to get it? Prepare yourself for the ultimate dark enemies-to-lovers in
Call the Coroner.
 AUTHOR NOTE

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 BOOKS BY AV

Brooklyn Sinners series (M/M)

Love the Sinner - Angel and Gabe
Sinner, Savior - Pablo and Shane
A Sinner Born- Syren and Kane
Sinner’s Fall - Mateo and Tommy

Dread+Terrible series (M/M)

Dirty Desire - Dax and Deacon (TABOO)
Remember Me - Eddie and Bishop
Craving You - Preacher and Kannon

Staniel Duet (M/M)

Call the Coroner
Dig Your Grave

Loose Ends series (M/M)

Hidden Scars – Sullivan and Carter
Scars and Secrets – Levi and Donovan
Scars and Ruin – Dutch and Patel
Kiss Your Scars – Renzo and Low
Syren and Renzo (A love story, not a romance)
 Run This Town series (M/M)
(Watch Me) Break You – Dima and X
(Watch Me) Body You – Reggie and Israel
(Watch Me) Unmask You – Elias and Lucky
(Watch Me) Save You – Tek and Quinn
RUSH: an X and Dima novella
Full Circle: an Israel and Reggie novella

Freelancers series (M/M)

Temple
Roman
Demming

Paranormal Security Council series

Voltaire’s Abandon (M/F)
Saint’s Surrender (M/M)
Prez’s Mercy (M/M)
Remi’s Betrayal (M/M/F)

The Make Me series

Make Me Blaze (M/M)
Make Me Burn (M/M)
Make Me Sweat (M/F)

Fantasies: Thr33 series

When Morning Comes (M/M/M)
Until the Sunset (M/M/M)
As Night Falls (M/M/F)

Standalone
Want It (M/M) (TABOO)
So Far Gone (M/M)
In Dreams…A Forbidden MM Romance Short (M/M)
Author Website
 PAYHIP

As Night Falls (MMF novella)

Dirty Desire: M/M Taboo Romance
Want It: M/M Age Gap, Taboo Romance

Buy from Smashwords

 AUDIO

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Love the Sinner – Angel and Gabe

Sinner, Savior – Pablo and Shane
A Sinner Born – Syren and Kane
Sinner’s Fall – Mateo and Tommy

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 PATREON

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 ABOUT THE AUTHOR

A Grenadian transplant, Avril now lives in Tucker, GA, with a madly tolerant husband. Together they raise an eccentric daughter who’s
pretty meh about reading and school. Avril’s earliest memories of reading revolve around discussing the plot points of Nancy Drew and
the Hardy Boys with an equally book-minded mother.
Always in love with the written word, Avril finally decided to do the writing in August of ’09 and never looked back. She’s been
nominated for numerous awards, including Best Author, Best series (Brooklyn Sinners), and Favorite All-Time Author. In 2013 Avril won
Evernight Publishing’s Reader’s Choice Award for the LGBT (Male/Male) category. Recently she took home the Golden Ankh award
for best Male/Male romance for her bestselling novel, Sinner’s Fall.
Addicted to cake, the ID Channel and the UFC, Avril writes Gay and Erotic Romance with happy endings; she remains a believer of love
in all its forms.

Visit her website: http://www.avrilashton.com

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