Lover Mine (Black Dagger Brotherhood #8)(130)

Yeah, he was so choking on that self-actualization Kool-Aid right

now.

He was not okay with her out there by herself. Without him. But she clearly wasn't going to listen to him or anyone else.

And how much you want to bet she was scrambling to get to Lash

before nightfall--when John could finally be in the field. On some level, it shouldn't matter which of them took out the piece of shit--but that was rationality talking. The inner core of him couldn't bear another weakness--

like, oh, say, sitting idly by while his female tried to kill the son of evil and likely got mortally wounded.

His female . . .

Ah, but wait, he told himself. Just because he had her name tattooed

on his back didn't mean he owned her--it was just a lot of black letters in his skin. Fact was, it was more like she owned him. Different. Very different.

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Meant she could walk away quite easily.

Just had, as a matter of fact.

Fuck. Rehv seemed to have summoned up the sitch better than anyone

could: Her end game didn't include anyone else but herself.

Couple hours of good sex wasn't going to change that.

Nor was the fact that, like it or not, she had taken his heart out there into the daylight with her.

Qhuinn went to his bedroom and headed straight for the bath on legs

that were surprisingly steady. He'd been pretty drunk before the emergency meeting had been called, but the idea of John's female out in broad daylight, walking into a shitstorm all by herself, had a way of slapping down the waves of heeeeeey-noooow.

Then again, he was kind of dealing with a twofer along those lines.

Blay was also off in the world all by his little lonesome.

Well, he wasn't alone; he was unprotected.

That text that had come through from an unknown number had settled

the mystery of where he was and then some: I am staying the day with Saxton. I'll be home after dark.

So like Blay. Everyone else in the world would have shortened that

message to: Stayn t day w Sax b hm afta drk

Guy's texts were always grammatically correct, though. Like the idea

of busting out of the King's English made him scratch.

Blay was funny like that. All proper and shit: He changed for meals,

trading leathers and Tshirts for French-cuffed button-downs and pressed slacks. He showered at least twice a day, more if he sparred. Fritz found his room a complete frustration because there was never any mess to clean up.

He had table manners like a count, wrote thank-you letters that could make you tear up, and he never, ever swore in the presence of females.

God . . . Saxton was perfect for him.

Qhuinn sagged in his own skin at that realization, imagining all the

proper English that Blay was calling out at this very moment as the other guy had him.

Merriam-Webster had never been used so well, no doubt.

Feeling like he'd been punched in the head, Qhuinn ran the cold water in the sink and splashed his face with the shit until his cheeks tingled and the tip of his nose started to go numb. As he toweled off, he thought back to that tat shop, to the bump and grind he'd had with the receptionist there.

The curtain that had separated the two of them from the rest of the

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place had been thin enough so that with his mismatched, but highly

functional eyes, he'd been able to see everything that was going on on the far side. Everyone, too. So that when that chick had been on her knees in front of him and he'd turned his head, he'd looked out . . . and seen Blay.

The wet mouth he'd been drilling into abruptly morphed from some

stranger's to his best friend's and that shift had cranked up the sex from servicing a generic need to something incendiary.

Something important.

Something raw and erotic and lose-your-soul right.

Which was why Qhuinn had pulled her up and spun her around and

taken her from behind. Except as he'd pounded into his fantasy, he'd realized that Blay was watching him . . . and that had changed everything. He'd abruptly had to remind himself who he was f*cking--which was why he'd pulled the girl's head up to his and forced himself to stare into her eyes.

He hadn't orgasmed.

As she'd come hard, he'd faked it--the truth was his erection had

started to fade the instant he'd looked into her face. The only saving grace had been that she clearly hadn't known the difference, having been wet enough for the two of them--and besides, he'd fronted like a pro, laying it on thick like he was all satisfied and shit afterward.

But it had been a total lie.

How many people had he f*cked like that in his lifetime, all wham—

bamforget-I-ever-met-ya? Hundreds. Hundreds and hundreds--and this was even though he'd been on the sex ride for only a year and a half. Thing was, though, those late nights at ZeroSum, picking up three and four chicks at a clip, could get you into those big numbers fast.

Of course, a lot of those sessions had been with Blay, he and his

buddy balling the women together. The pair of them hadn't actually been with each other during those bathroom orgies at the club--but there had been a lot of watching. And wondering. And maybe a private hand job from time to time when the remembering got too vivid.

At least on Qhuinn's part.