CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE #2
He’s instantly hungry for more, wants more Lachlan, more violence, more blood, more spit, wants to suck on Lachlan’s tongue and run greedy hands freely over warm, immortal skin and make mess he won’t have to clean up, make contact, forge a connection, make whatever passes for love in Varrow City and keep it inside him when Lachlan gives it, oh God he wants Lachlan to fuck him, fuck him up and fuck him deep, keep going even after he comes, he’s so empty, oh he’s so empty, what the fuck, why has it never felt this way before?
Like he lived his whole life without gravity and dreamed of falling and now… now he’s in a dead drop.
It’s bliss, ugly and thrilling and addictively sweet.
He’ll die without it, needs him, wants him, bodyguard.
‘Bodyguard,’ he moans, pulling him closer and it’s been maybe two seconds, two whole seconds since he kissed him, but it feels like weeks, months, years, seven fucking years and he forgot how it felt to live, to live this hard and bright and beautiful.
Two seconds and Lachlan isn’t kissing him back.
Three seconds and Lachlan seems to realise what’s happening.
The same rough hands circle Kade’s wrists, he didn’t even realise he had his own on Lachlan’s shoulders, but they’re pulled down now, removed. Lachlan tries to step back but Kade growls low in his throat, pursues with a sense of ownership that has no right to exist, yet it does.
‘Don’t,’ he begs, familiarity painting his insides with neon light, he’s said this before in just this way, wants to scream, beg, cry for Lachlan not to stop it, he always stops it, and Jules loves him so fucking much, why, why, why won’t he love him back even if it was pretend, just pretend, he’d take that, he’d treasure it and never ask for more, he’s so down bad it hurts, and no amount of one night stands can compare to the thirty seconds when Lachlan first comes to collect him and they look at one another and Lachlan knows he wants him, they both know it, but Jules is trying so hard to get over it because Lachlan doesn’t want him the same way but he’s bound to him, so these thirty seconds are electric and Jules thinks maybe he only even has these one night stands just so Lachlan can look at him like that afterwards, when the earth stops turning, and the skies sing his name, and the moon promises to keep all their secrets because she’s the only mother he ever had, and Jules lets himself admit how desperately, woefully, monstrously in love he is with Lachlan fucking Tann—
NO.
STOP.
S T O P.
?
He wakes in the Tower.
Kade would know home anywhere.
The smell of laundry detergent.
The feel of the walls, the hum of electronics.
The Tower is his home.
Iron Star is his family.
Riley is his best friend and the boss.
Kade is their best.
He sits up in his own bed.
It’s morning.
‘Shit,’ he says, blinking to soften the glare of the sunlight streaming through his window. ‘Fuck.’ Kade checks his watch but finds it dead. ‘Oh, perfect.’
His knees are wobbly when he gets out of bed. Someone put him in a clean tee and boxers (he’d bet that’s Luca), but he can walk fine so he wastes no time heading into the Watch. Cole and Finn are arguing with…
Oh, right. Him.
‘You,’ Kade says.
He’d almost forgotten about the immortal motherfucker who killed eighteen of their people. Lachlan is already looking at Kade, expression unreadable.
‘Kade,’ Cole greets, tone pleasant now he’s not speaking with Lachlan. Both he and Finn come closer. ‘Are you feeling all right? Any problems?’
‘I’m fine.’ Kade can’t spare more than a moment without looking at Lachlan. ‘What’s happening?’ he asks rather than what happened because his instincts are telling him to focus on what’s ahead, not behind. ‘Where’s the boss?’
Lachlan steps forward. ‘Kade.’
‘No, where is he?’
‘He’s in his room,’ Finn explains, ‘resting.’
His throat tightens as panic rises. ‘What the fuck does that mean?’ Kade demands, already striding past Lachlan and through Riley’s heavy-duty doors, both currently open. Kade takes the spiral staircase two steps at a time, practically running until he’s in Riley’s room.
He finds him on the bed inside, but sitting up, awake, alive.
Kade throws a hand over his heart. ‘That scared the shit out of me!’
Riley makes a face, gingerly slipping his legs out of bed. ‘Yeah, same.’
Lachlan hangs back, looks between Kade and Riley, says nothing. ‘What the fuck happened? Why are you hurt? Why are you—?’
‘Please shut up,’ Riley requests, throat dry. ‘My head kills.’
Kade remembers something Lachlan told him.
Tied together.
Shirtless, Riley’s torso shows the scar that almost killed him, the bullet that grazed his heart. Kade still remembers the story Riley told about how he almost died. Kade always thought it sat a little too close to be considered a graze, but he never questioned it.
He’s never really questioned… anything.
Riley was the one who took care of him.
Kade has trusted him implicitly from the start.
He never asked how he got here, where he came from.
Even now, it seems strange to want to ask such things. Wrong.
Riley looks away first, rises to stand and pulls on a shirt with his back to them both. ‘Tanner, I need to meet with your friend.’
‘Blaire? Absolutely not.’
‘I wasn’t asking.’
‘Lee said her sister was for her to deal with,’ Kade points out.
Riley takes a slow deep breath.
Kade knows he doesn’t want to upset Lee.
No one wants to upset Lee.
But there’s a degree of determination in Riley that Kade’s not seen before.
It manifests like a veil. Some new degree of glossy disconnection.
‘I know.’ His knuckles are red like he’s been fighting and when he finally looks at Kade again, buttoning his shirt, he’s flatline confident when he says, ‘Kade, tell Tanner to bring his friend here.’
It’s a cold, expectant tone.
Kade wants to demand why, wants to ask why Riley seems hurt, why he was resting, but some part of him is starting to understand it.
So he looks at Lachlan and says, ‘Bring her here, please.’
Lachlan sighs. ‘For fuck’s sake.’
?
Riley calls a general meeting on the ground floor.
Everyone in Iron Star attends, Kade included.
Eighteen deaths aren’t just losses, but positions that need filling.
Three Captains. Fourteen Enforcers. Gage, the Quartermaster General.
Before Lachlan stormed in, there were ninety-six members of Iron Star, including Tower Crew. Now there are seventy-eight. The loss of their QG and three Captains means reshuffling is necessary.
Riley always handles that himself.
Luca and Hiru wait with Kade in the operations room.
‘So, where’s the weirdo?’ Luca asks him.
‘Lurking outside somewhere.’ Kade’s gaze keeps flitting back to Seth. ‘Do you think he’ll move Seth sideways to replace Gage?’
‘Overseer and QG are nothing alike,’ Hiru points out rightly.
QG manage logistics, infrastructure and operational continuity within the Tower, controlling everything from supply chains and reserve stores to fuel, maintenance and payroll.
Head of the household, essentially.
Overseer runs Iron Star’s external crews and operations across Varrow City, managing territory, fronts, and outside relations while maintaining the syndicate’s political and criminal influence, typically dealing with the cops.
Head of the streets.
Kade has sometimes envied Seth’s job as it means a lot of time away from here. Seth has four teams on the outside that Kade’s only met for basic training. They live outside the Tower and only come in for anything less than an emergency. They’re currently across the room from him right now.
The chatter dies the second Riley walks in.
‘Thank you for gathering on short notice.’ He goes to lean on the nearby windowsill, deceptively unassuming as always but everyone is staring at him, waiting. No one speaks. No one moves. ‘All right. Listen carefully.’
Kade is practically holding his breath, curious how he’ll handle this.
‘Two nights ago we were attacked by an unknown subject who stormed the Tower and killed eighteen of our people. His name is Lachlan Tanner. I know some of you are wondering why he’s not dead.
I’m sure rumours are flying around,’ Riley adds, looking in Seth’s direction but not directly at him.
‘I want to make it clear how serious this is and remind you all that strange activity must be handled carefully. We’re dealing with something uniquely dangerous and until we fully understand the scope of this, the Tower will remain in lockdown protocol, and Tanner will be staying here.
Not in holding, not confined. You’ll see him walking around cooperating with us. ’
Faint, unhappy murmurs brush through the gathered crews.
From beside Kade, Luca whispers, ‘Seth’s gonna flip.’
Riley goes on.
‘Tanner’s providing actionable intelligence.
He’s useful to us and if there’s one thing I expect you all to understand by now, it’s that I don’t waste useful things.
We work with what we’re given. There’s a larger threat emerging that Tanner was only the tip of.
Anyone else would bury him and not think twice, but we’re not anyone else, we’re Iron Star.
We are the exception to the rule and the only reason Varrow doesn’t tear itself apart.
Before I move on, does anyone have any questions specifically about Tanner? ’
People are hesitant to ask, especially at first. Kade sometimes forgets that they don’t know Riley the way he does. They don’t get to spend time with him in private, they don’t know the real him. Riley can seem intimidating.
Unsurprisingly, it’s Seth who raises his hand first.
Riley nods. ‘Go ahead.’
‘Boss, I get extracting intelligence from him, but why does he need to walk around for that?’
Kade expects a vague answer, but Riley is surprisingly direct.
‘He can’t be killed or contained, Seth. That’s why.’
‘So, he’s using us then? We’re basically his guest house.’
Riley’s gaze never falters.
He doesn’t even blink as he stares Seth down.
‘Gage was your twin brother,’ he says softly, ‘but this is the life we chose. Risk is a part of it.’