Heart, p.18
Heart, page 18
Nice theory. Seb shook his head and opened his eyes just as Dex slid back into the car, his hair a mess, smelling of grass and hay.
“What are you shaking your head about?”
“Nothing. All present and correct?”
Dex glanced at the horses still milling by the fence. “Tauna has a sore leg. She needs some white willow bark.”
“What’s that?”
“Bark from a white willow tree.” Dex shot Seb a look that made him feel like a fool. “It helps horses move better when they’re old and lame.”
“Where do you get that? From the vet?”
“Maybe, but there are probably a ton of willow trees down by the river. Can we go see?”
Seb suppressed a sigh. The question was innocent enough, but that Dex felt the need to ask got under his skin. Dex had trouble making decisions for himself, and it often didn’t occur to him to try. Seb got out of the car and squinted south where the misfit stream of the River Misbourne lay. “Lead the way.”
A FEW hours later, after far too much tramping through the mud for Seb’s liking, they made their way back to the bustle of London. Dex had an extra shift at the restaurant, and Seb had plenty at home to keep him busy.
They had a quiet lunch together before Dex left for the evening service. Seb watched him disappear into the heady Dalston crowds from the balcony. A pesky amalgamation of worry and pride teased his heart. Dex had come home to him robbed of what little confidence he’d acquired before his old life snatched him back. It was returning, day by day, bolstered by the knowledge the man responsible would end his days in prison, but Seb still fretted.
How could he not, when the police had found the bones of a dozen young boys buried on that farm?
Stop it. Seb came back into himself with a jolt. He’d done that a lot recently—found himself lost in the past, dwelling on what could’ve been. He gave himself a shake and drifted back inside. If Dex could look forward, so could he.
Seb flopped on the sofa. The mischievous gaze of Dex’s pet cat greeted him, and he eyed the scrawny tortoiseshell with suspicion. He loved cats, but the stray Dex had attached himself to was somewhat of a terrorist. Sweet and innocent one minute, then swinging from his neck by its claws the next.
Bloody thing should’ve come with an ASBO.
Seb cautiously petted the antisocial cat—Jeanie—and reached for his laptop. Dex had come back from his search for willow trees with a sweatshirt full of wild watercress, and it had given Seb an idea. Dex muddled along in the city because it didn’t occur to him to do anything else, but his heart lay in the countryside, amongst the trees and the mud and the animals. Seb was a townie and he liked his creature comforts, but there had to be a way to bring the best bits of both together. There had to be, and he was determined to find it.
He figured he’d struck gold when the flat’s buzzer sounded a little while later. He glanced at the clock. It was too early for Dex, and he had a key, anyway. He shut his laptop with a reluctant sigh and got up to investigate.
His sister’s singsong voice greeted him through the intercom. He buzzed her in and wandered into the kitchen to put the kettle on and search out something sweet to keep her quiet. He loved Kelly to death, but she had a tendency to talk his ear off.
Lucky for him, Dex had made a killer Tottenham cake, and it was a while before Kelly got around to winding him up.
“Dex makes a better sponge than you,” she said.
“You don’t have to tell me that. Who do you think taught him?” Seb rolled his eyes, but Kelly’s ribbing was pretty close to the truth. Dex was a good chef, a really good chef. His knife skills were far better than Seb’s, and his lack of classical knowledge and training made his ideas unique. Sticky pear and chili pudding. Who would’ve thought?
Kelly shoved the last bite of pink-iced cake in her mouth. “What are you doing this weekend?”
“What I do every weekend. Working.”
“Don’t be an arse.” Kelly shot him a withering look. “I meant on Sunday. You finish at five on Sundays, don’t you?”
Seb conceded her point with a nod. The early finish on Sundays was new, but since Rick had received an off-the-books warning from the police for letting Dex work without papers, he’d become more stringent about enforcing the rules. To adhere to a forty-eight-hour week, something had to give. For Seb and Dex, that meant Sunday nights and Thursday mornings were now their own.
Declan Sweeney.
Dex’s full name still didn’t quite seem real. Rick had helped Dex get the documents he needed to live and work in London. Without a birth certificate, it was a difficult process, and at times, Seb had worried it would never happen, but with the help of social services, it had all come together in the end. Not that it mattered much to Dex. Things Seb perceived as important often meant little to him.
“Are you even listening to me?”
Seb blinked at Kelly. “What are you wittering on about?”
“I was saying, brother dearest, are you and Dex going to come to Ezra’s for a roast next week? Save you feeding yourselves after a weekend in the kitchen.”
Seb hesitated. Dex got along fine with Kelly. She mothered him to death, and he let her, returning her affection in ways no one else would probably think of. Painstakingly handwriting thank-you notes for the nice things she did for him. Picking her wildflowers from the fields near the horses. It was much like his relationship with Bernie, only better, because Kelly was Seb’s sister, and seeing them together just felt right.
Ezra, on the other hand…. They’d met up before, and Dex had seemed terrified of his forthright older brother.
“I don’t know….”
Kelly raised an eyebrow. “What’s up? You think Dex won’t want to?”
“It’s not that.” And it wasn’t. Dex would go anywhere Seb asked him to, and that was part of his problem—his ingrained instinct to do what he was told. “It’s Ezra. I think he scares him. He seemed a little rattled when we all went to the zoo that time.”
Kelly frowned, her shrewd gaze turning thoughtful. Rick aside, she was the only soul who knew what Dex had been through, and it had brought her and Seb closer together, bonded them around something horrific. “I don’t think it was Ezra that scared Dex.”
She let the statement hang, but her expression left Seb in no doubt that she had more to say. He gestured for her to go on.
“I think it was the cages and the clanging doors,” Kelly said. “Didn’t you notice how he jumped every time a keeper slammed a cage shut and locked it up? He looked like he’d seen a ghost.”
Seb felt sick. The theory had never occurred to him, but it made sense. The police told them Dex had been held captive for most of his life, one way or another, and he’d been as jumpy as a cat the day they’d met his siblings at the London Zoo.
Kelly ruffled his hair. “Don’t feel bad about it, Seb. These things are going to happen. You can’t protect him from what happened, and he’ll wind up hating you if you try. Let him be afraid of something and get over it in his own way. Don’t coddle him.”
Easy for her to say, and she left after that, leaving him with a jumbled pile of wisdom to dwell on.
He was still brooding in the dark when Dex arrived home a little while later. The front door closed with a quiet click. Seb hauled his arse from the sofa and turned on a few lights. Dex was often content to grope around in the dark, but Seb was trying to train him out of it. He flipped on the kettle and met Dex in the hall.
“All right?”
“Yeah. Quiet night.” Dex hung up his coat and lined his shoes up with Seb’s. He looked disheveled and tired, and wonderful.
Seb wanted to wrap his arms around him and never let go. Ever. “Want a cuppa?”
Dex thought for a moment. “After a shower?”
For once, Seb ignored the habitual uncertainty. “Go on. I’ll meet you in bed.”
They parted ways, Dex to the bathroom and him to shut up the rest of the flat before taking himself to bed. He crawled into bed and stared at the ceiling. The shower shut off, but it was a while before Dex crept up the stairs, and Seb knew he’d find the bathroom spotlessly clean come the morning.
Dex ghosted up the spiral staircase in just a pair of clean boxer shorts. It was August. The weather in London was muggy and warm, and even shy Dex had to concede to sleeping near enough nude. Didn’t stop him burrowing under the covers like a cat, though. Dex loved their bed. In colder weather, it was hard to get him out. Not that Seb minded. Huddled in bed with Dex was his favorite place to be.
Dex slithered across the mattress and put his chin on Seb’s chest. He didn’t speak, but his soft smile said a thousand words.
Seb pushed Dex’s coal-dark hair out of his face and felt a pang of longing for the halo of platinum locks he’d sported when they’d first met. He’d never quite understood the story behind them. “Tired?”
Dex nodded and closed his eyes, but he let his hands roam Seb’s chest. His touch was light and lazy and drove Seb insane.
Seb shifted and drew in a shaky breath. “Feels nice.”
“Nice?” Dex chuckled and brushed his thumb over Seb’s nipple. “How about this?”
Seb moaned as the hot, wet heat of Dex’s tongue explored every curve of muscle and flesh on his torso. His dick hardened, and he felt Dex thick and heavy against his leg.
He sat up, rolled them over, and pressed his lips to Dex’s in a sweetly biting kiss. He ran his hands over Dex’s smooth torso, still marveling that, despite his ordeal, Dex didn’t have a single scar on his flawless pale skin. Not a day went by when Seb couldn’t recall the police flatly listing Dex’s injuries from his time held captive on Braden McCulloch’s derelict farm, but Seb tried to save those nightmares for when he was alone.
Dex whimpered and pushed at Seb’s underwear. Seb let him have his way, and it wasn’t long before they were both bare and moving together with a friction that consumed every nerve in Seb’s body. He rolled them again, letting Dex call the shots. Sometimes, it helped his state of mind to know Dex was in control of their encounters. To know Dex was doing it because he wanted to… not because he lacked the ability to say no.
And sometimes, it just wasn’t to be. Sometimes Dex said it all without saying a word. Dex rolled them again and pulled Seb over him, his intent and desire clear. Take me. I’m yours.
Seb slid careful fingers into Dex, ever mindful of his lover’s fragile body. Dex said sex with Seb never hurt, but Seb watched him like a hawk, just to be sure. Two fingers became three. Dex arched his back and widened his legs. Sweat beaded his chest. Seb lubed his sheathed cock and eased inside him, watching and waiting for that magical moment when the discomfort of being filled gave way to all-encompassing pleasure.
“Oh.”
Seb shuddered. Dex’s breathy exclamation always hit him like a train… a train made from feathers and silk, with the bite of a snake. His dick pulsed, putting him right on the edge far too soon. He dropped his head into the crook of Dex’s neck and grounded himself in all that was Dex. “You drive me bloody crazy, you know that?”
Dex shivered and flexed his hips. “You talk too much.”
Seb took the hint and let the natural current between them take over. Their coupling was slow and sweet, belying the crazy desire that sometimes overcame them. Beneath him, Dex writhed and moaned, crying out when release hit him.
Seb watched him through hooded eyes, feeling his own climax sweep over him like a soft summer wave. He loved having sex like this, and he knew, given the chance, that he could watch Dex like this forever.
Twenty-Seven
SEB OBSERVED from the dessert counter as Dex incorporated the tepid water, yeast, and sugar into the mound of seasoned flour and worked it into smooth, elastic dough. He loved watching Dex make bread. The industrial mixer and dough hook were just a few feet away, but kneading the dough by hand was good for Dex’s healed wrist, and he seemed to enjoy it.
Lucky, because the next day was a bank holiday, and Rick had decided the restaurant needed to contribute a stall to the local carnival. Seb had been charged with stocking and manning it, and it hadn’t taken much to rope Dex into helping. Not that Dex knew about the manning part. Seb was saving that bomb for the following morning, hoping Dex would be too shell-shocked by the predawn start to protest too much.
Seb wrapped up his last batch of scones and wandered over to the trays of bread dough Dex had set up to proof overnight. “What are you putting in that one?”
Dex pointed to a muslin-wrapped bundle. “The wild rosemary we found by the stream last week.”
“You found,” Seb said. “I was too busy trying not to fall in.”
Dex laughed. Over the summer, they’d spent most of their free time hiking through the woods near the farm where Dex’s elderly horses lived, and Seb had fast learned Dex had a huge knowledge of the wildlife and countryside. Herbs, berries, poisonous plants. The trees and the creatures that lived among them. It was startling, to Seb at least, and didn’t quite match up with his grimly imagined images of Dex’s childhood.
It also underlined his ongoing worry that maybe an inner-city kitchen wasn’t the best place for Dex. He worked hard, and he’d tackled every section in the kitchen, but he’d yet to find the role that suited him best. Perhaps there wasn’t one. Perhaps it was time for a change.
THE NEXT day dawned warm and bright. Seb dragged Dex out of bed at dawn, and they spent the morning cooking up a storm. By the time midday came around, they had a trestle table overflowing with breads, cakes, and jars of jam made from Dex’s secret stash of wild strawberries.
Seb hustled Dex out of the kitchen to see the fruits of their labor. “What do you think? Looks good, eh?”
Dex nodded, his reactions as muted as ever. “Are we going home now?”
“Nope. Who do you think is going to sell all this?”
“Um, Bernie?”
Seb chuckled. “You wish. Go put a clean jacket on and get your arse back out here.”
Dex’s expression said it all, but it wasn’t his way to protest, and by the time he slunk outside a little while later, Seb was hard at work selling their wares. Years of fronting the family fudge shop meant the patter came easy to him, but it wasn’t long before he realized Dex had hidden himself behind him.
Not today.
Seb handed an elderly woman her change and pulled off his bandana. “Hold the fort, will you? I’ll be back in a minute.”
Dex looked startled. “Where are you going?”
“Inside. I’ll be back.”
“Why?”
“Does it matter?”
Dex opened his mouth and shut it again. Seb punched his shoulder. “You know the prices. The change is in the tin.”
He slipped away without giving Dex a chance to respond, effectively abandoning him on the stall. Cruel? Maybe, maybe not. Dex had worked a hair-braiding stall in Padstow all by himself, handling money and communicating with the outside world. It was all about confidence, and he would never regain it hiding behind Seb.
Seb loitered in the kitchen awhile before he deemed it safe to take a peek. What he saw when he did warmed his bones.
Bernie joined him at the back door. She followed his gaze, watching as Dex sold the last of his rosemary loaves to a burly Afro-Caribbean man, and nodded, needing no explanation. “He’s changing every day,” she said. “I’m so proud of him.”
Seb said nothing, constrained by the lump in his throat, but it was a sentiment he shared with every fiber of his being. Dex was a stone heavier than he’d ever been, and his smile grew every time it appeared on his face.
Yeah. Life was good.
Seb let his experiment run its course and rejoined Dex at the stall a little while later. Dex was less than impressed. “I’m not a mute, you know, and I’m not stupid. I had to take the fares from people at the bumper cars on the fairgrounds.”
Fairgrounds. Seb absorbed the snippet of information and enjoyed the rare moment of assertiveness from Dex. With his unfathomable gray eyes and surly pout, cross Dex was sexy as hell.
IT WAS early evening by the time they called it a day. They walked home in high spirits, helped along by the pints of free cider Rick had passed their way all day.
They stumbled through the front door. Dex tripped over his feet, laughing, his eyes bright, no longer the sullen vagrant Seb had met on the seafront, but not the broken shadow his tormentor had left him either. This was a new Dex. Perhaps the real Dex, the Dex who had his whole life ahead of him, full of hope and promise and all the love he deserved.
Seb pulled him close, enveloping him in a tight hug that seemed to take Dex by surprise. Seb ignored his bemused gaze and kissed him with all he had.
Dex’s response stopped him in his tracks. Often, when they kissed, Dex fell pliant in Seb’s arms, almost melting into him like liquid silver, but, conversely, sometimes he stiffened, as though the thrill of being kissed hit him too hard. He did neither of those things now. Now he responded with a spirit that had Seb stumbling until his back hit the wall.
Seb broke away, breathless. Dex stared back at him, his chest heaving. He looked like he wanted to say something, but nothing came out, and the longer they gazed at each other, the more heated and heavy the air became.
Dex touched Seb’s face, his eyes wide with wonder, like he’d never touched him before. “I feel weird today.”
Seb absorbed the sensation of Dex pressed against the entire length of his body. “Weird?”
Dex shrugged. “Yeah. Like I need… something.”
“Something from me?”
Dex thought on it a moment, then shook his head. “No. More like something for you.”
“For me?” A tremor of anticipation rushed through Seb. He had an idea what Dex was trying to say, even if Dex didn’t know it himself. “Do I need to take my shoes off?”
His shaky attempt at humor seemed to remind Dex they’d barely gotten through the door. Dex blinked and stepped back. He toed off his shoes and laid them deliberately on the rack by the door.
