Total pages in book: 77
Estimated words: 73240 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 366(@200wpm)___ 293(@250wpm)___ 244(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 73240 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 366(@200wpm)___ 293(@250wpm)___ 244(@300wpm)
Only to break off with a hiss as Brand’s kiss sank deeper, and put pressure on a split in his lower lip until it sang with a keen slice of pain.
“Ah—ah, ow—”
Brand retreated immediately. “Apologies, young Master.”
Ash eyed him. “You are not.”
“I am,” Brand promised solemnly. “A small amount.” His gaze darkened. “Mostly, I am angry.”
“Can you yell at people when we go home?” Biting his lip, Ash reached up to tug at Brand, quietly begging him to lie down again. “I’m tired. And I still…” He exhaled a shaky breath. “I’m scared, and not quite sure I’m really here. Please, just…stay here, and then…”
Brand sank down quietly against him, fitting his body more surely to Ash’s until there was no space between them, balancing them together on the small bed. “Of course,” Brand murmured, nuzzling into Ash’s hair. “I shall begin my quest for vengeance in the morning.”
Ash choked on a small laugh. “Did you just make your very first joke?”
“You called me an oversized arsehole, not a humorless one.”
“…yeah.” Ash turned his head, resting his cheek to the pillow; his nose almost touched Brand’s. “Thank you,” he murmured.
Brand blinked quizzically. “For what?”
“For being you.” Ash forced himself to move even though it hurt, and shifted down to tuck his head underneath Brand’s chin. “Don’t question it. Just sleep.”
Brand’s snort stirred Ash’s hair, before subsiding. “As my young Master wishes.”
Ash only closed his eyes with a smile, and let himself start to drift off, giving in to his body’s demands. Yet he couldn’t fall asleep; not even with Brand holding him. Especially with Brand holding him, when suddenly he was full of questions he was afraid to ask.
But also afraid not to, when he’d almost lost the chance in a single flash of light and high-speed impact.
Now or never.
He opened his eyes, gaze fixing on the tic of Brand’s pulse against his throat. “Brand?”
The deeply velvety sound of Brand’s voice said he had been almost asleep. “Yes, young Master?”
“Were…” Ash struggled to figure out what to ask. What to say. “Were you like this with Vic and his parents?”
“No,” Brand answered immediately. “I was always for them; they were never for me.”
“It’s…never been two-way for you?” Ash realized, tilting his head back to look up at Brand. “Ever?”
Brand shook his head, saying nothing, but dark eyes seeming to ask everything. An ache inside Ash crumpled, hurting deep.
“Oh. Brand…”
Rough fingertips, for once devoid of gloves, pressed to his lips gently, skirting around the split in the lower. “I’m not asking that of you, young Master.”
“Why not?” Ash asked.
Brand stilled—yet it was different from his normal stillnesses. A tense thing, sharp with portent. “…what?”
Oh fuck. Fuck, he’d probably just completely stepped in it with a man twice his age who knew ten times more about the things Ash was trying to fumble with. Ash didn’t do relationships. He’d never even met anyone he wanted a relationship with, when everyone who might be considered his peer was just as shallow and pointless as he’d spent twenty-three years pretending to be.
Just as shallow and pointless as Brand probably thought he was.
But he’d started this, so he might as well finish it—instead of leaving it hanging open-ended and waiting to ruin everything when he wasn’t even sure there was a thing to be ruined.
“I mean…I just…why not? Why don’t you want to ask that of me?” he asked. “You…you keep acting like I’m everything to you when you don’t even know me. Why don’t you want me to be the same toward you? Why do you want it to be that one-sided?”
“Young Master,” Brand said, something low and almost dangerous in his voice, “I did not say I wanted it to be one-sided. Only that I am accustomed, in a way. My devotion to the Newcomb family was a different thing. It was only appropriate that such devotion should not be returned. It was part of my job.”
“Am I just that, then?” Ash whispered. “Part of your job?”
Brand’s lips parted, but he hesitated several breaths before he spoke. “Is this really a conversation you wish to have in the hospital?”
“Will it really be any better at home?”
“I suppose not.” Yet there was something odd about Brand, something restrained that Ash could almost see hovering over him, a thing riding him and waiting to be spoken. “No,” Brand said carefully. “You are not simply part of my job. But I am not certain what you are.”
Ash wet his lips nervously, his skin prickling. “What do you want me to be?”
That oddness redoubled into a tight tension. “That is potentially a dangerous question, young Master.”
“Why?”
“Because I am not certain I have the terms to articulate what I want you to be.” That keen gaze sharpened, flicking over Ash’s face, dipping to his mouth before rising to his eyes again. “Nor am I certain you will want to hear them.”