“Hello, handsome.”

  Whipping his head to the side, he stared right into Xeno’s brilliant green eyes, but he couldn’t push away the crippling fear to actually speak.

  “Lachlan, it’s going to be okay.” His arm stretched behind Lachlan’s back and wrapped around his waist. “C’mon, we’ll do it together.”

  “I can’t,” Lachlan croaked.

  “Look at me.” Xeno grabbed Lachlan’s chin in his free hand and turned his face until their eyes met once again. “I’m not going to let anything happen to you. Trust me.”

  He wanted to trust the man, but his legs still wouldn’t move. “Xeno, I’m sorry. I can’t do it.”

  “Okay, so what’s the plan? Are you just going to stand here until the sun comes up in the morning?” With a frustrated sigh, he took Lachlan’s bag, draped it over his own shoulder, and moved to stand in front of him, blocking his view of the crosswalk. “Close your eyes.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “C’mon, Lachlan, just trust me. Close your eyes and take my hand.”

  The plan had so many flaws, but Xeno was right. He couldn’t stand on the corner all night like a Vegas prostitute. Lachlan liked the barista, but he’d just met the guy. How did he trust someone he’d known for only an hour? Without another viable option, however, he had no choice but to go along with the idea.

  Gripping his cane in a white-knuckled grip, he lifted his left hand and pressed his palm against Xeno’s, hyperaware of the warmth that spread from his fingertips to his elbow at the contact. “Okay. I can do this.” His head spun, his eyes watered, and his tongue stuck to the roof of his mouth, but he blinked twice, steeled his courage, and closed his eyes.

  “One foot in front of the other,” Xeno encouraged, tugging gently on Lachlan’s hand. “Which of your books is your favorite?”

  “You want to talk about my books?”

  “Why not? C’mon, I’ll tell which one is my favorite.”

  “Tell me first.” Lachlan held tighter to his cane, but his pulse had slowed slightly, and he didn’t feel like he might pass out anymore.

  “Affairs of the Night. Ray and Bryce were perfect for each other, and holy damn, I never saw that ending coming.”

  The third book in his Affairs series had put him through the emotional wringer, but those were the types of stories he loved the most—the ones that left him feeling exhausted at the end. “They’re all special to me, but I have a soft spot for that one as well.”

  “How much research did you have to do for that car chase? Did you do a ride-along with the police?”

  “Nah, nothing as exciting as that. I just watched about a million action movies, mostly police dramas.”

  “You’re right, that’s kind of boring.”

  Lachlan snorted. He’d never professed to lead a glamorous life. “Okay, movie snob, what’s your favorite film?”

  “The Notebook.”

  “Liar.”

  “Fine, I don’t know. I can’t think when you put me on the spot like this. I have pretty eclectic tastes, though. I watch a little bit of everything.”

  Lachlan could relate to that. “Okay, favorite comedy?”

  “Super Troopers.”

  A shudder rippled through him, and Lachlan wrinkled his nose. “Slapstick comedy? I don’t think we can be friends anymore.”

  “Hey, Lachlan?”

  “What?”

  “Open your eyes.”

  Lachlan hadn’t realized they’d come to a stop, but when he opened his eyes, he found Xeno standing in front of him, still holding his hand and grinning from ear to ear. “I did it.”

  “You did it.” Releasing his grip, Xeno coughed once and shoved both hands into his jacket pockets. “Which way from here?”

  “Around the corner and two blocks down on Whistler.” And the quicker they made it there the better. The darkness closed in around him, suffocating him, and he had to get off the street.

  Turning in the direction Lachlan had pointed, Xeno clicked his heels together and offered his elbow. “Shall we?”

  With a regal nod, he linked his arm with Xeno’s and sighed. “Thank you. I’m sorry about this. You probably think I’m a total loser.”

  “Are you kidding me? We all have our issues. I’m scared of spiders.”

  “You’re sweet, but I doubt it’s the same.”

  “Oh, you’d be surprised. I slept on my couch for an entire week once when I found a spider in my bedroom. I paid over a hundred dollars for an exterminator to come and get rid of it.”

  Lachlan didn’t know how much he believed of that story, but he appreciated Xeno’s effort to make him feel better. Arm in arm, they walked along, swapping embarrassing stories of lameness all the way to the front doors of Lachlan’s apartment building. “Thank you.” Taking a step back, he pressed his palm to his stomach and bowed. “And now, I bid you a very fond farewell.”

  Handing over Lachlan’s bag, Xeno mirrored the bow and tipped an imaginary hat. “Put a heating pad on your hip. It’ll help with the pain.” Then he stepped forward and placed a soft kiss on Lachlan’s check. “Goodnight, handsome. I hope I see you again.”

  No heavenly light or singing cherubs accompanied the kiss. No fantasies of happily ever after spun through his overactive imagination. Lachlan didn’t stand in the glow of the lonely streetlamp and watch Xeno walk away.

  As he stepped into the warmth of the lobby, however, he did press his fingertips to his cheek and smile.

  * * * *

  “You look better today.”

  “I’m sweating like a fucking pig,” Lachlan growled.

  Grady laughed and crouched down beside the weight machine. “It looks hot on you, but that’s not what I meant. You’re still a skinny little shit.”

  “We can’t all be muscle-bound idiots.” Squeezing his eyes closed, he gripped the edges of the cushion beneath him and extended his right leg, gritting his teeth against the pain in his hip as the weights rose on the pulley system behind him. “I kind of hate you. You know that, right?”

  “You love me. Who else looks out for you like I do?”

  Thinking back to the previous night, Lachlan might actually have an answer for that, but he wasn’t ready to share yet. “Okay, I give. How do I look better today?”

  “Well, for one, you don’t look like such a morose bastard. Did you get laid?”

  Releasing the weights and returning to the starting position, Lachlan turned in his seat and glared. “Are all physical therapists evil? Or did I just get lucky with you?”

  “See, I knew you couldn’t resist my charms.” Grady winked as he pushed to his feet. “In all seriousness, though, your hip is looking a little stiff today. Have you been alternating the heat and ice like we talked about? Walking at least twenty minutes every day?”

  “I am. I’ve been walking three blocks twice a day.”

  “Okay, well…” Trailing off, Grady picked up a clipboard from the nearby tray table and flipped through the pages of Lachlan’s chart. “Continue alternating the heat and ice and keep doing your stretches. If the pain gets worse, though, I want you to see your doctor.”

  “I will.”

  “Are you still having trouble sleeping?”

  “It’s getting better,” Lachlan lied. He hadn’t slept for more than two hours at a stretch since the accident without being plagued by nightmares. The last he’d heard, no one had developed a pill to fight against bad dreams, so he saw no reason to bring his doctor or even his physical therapist into it.

  “The dark circles under your eyes say differently, and you’re losing too much weight.”

  “I feel fine.”

  Returning the clipboard to the tray table, Grady rested his hands on his hips and sighed. “You’re not going to get better if you don’t take care of yourself. I know you get lost inside your own head and forget the rest of the world, but I need you to try. Set an alarm on your phone, and try to eat at least three times a day.”

  Lachlan echoed the man’s sigh as he climbed off the weight machine and blotted his face with a hand towel. “Yeah, okay, I can do that. C’mon, Grady, you worry too much. What’s next on your schedule of torture today?”

  “Lachlan, this isn’t a game.”

  “Do you think I don’t know that?” Lachlan snapped. Grady hadn’t been hit by that car. Grady hadn’t broken most of the bones on the right side of his body. No one could possibly understand what Lachlan lived with every day, and not a single fucking part of his life was a goddamn game.

  “Whoa, easy. I’m just trying to help.” Grady held his hands up in surrender and shook his head. “I can’t do that if you won’t let me.”

  Lachlan’s anger abated almost as quickly as it had flared. His problems were his alone, and he felt like an ass for taking out his frustration on Grady. “I know my body’s limitations, and I know what I need to do to get better. I’m working on it.”

  “Have you thought about talking to someone?”

  “Like a shrink? Grady, I told you, I’m fine. Let’s just keep going.” The sooner he finished his exercises, the quicker he could retreat to the solitude of his apartment.

  “Lachlan…”

  “I. Am. Fine.” If he wasn’t careful, he might even start believing it.

  * * * *

  Dark clouds churned in the sky, rolling and swirling as lightning flashed across the sky. Lachlan pursed his lips, frowned, and jabbed at the backspace button. “…as lighting slashed through the heavens.” He frowned again and shook his head as he highlighted the entire sentence and deleted it. Dark clouds rolled across the sky, illuminated by the near constant explosions of lightning. Detective Marshall Hamilton ducked his head against the wailing winds and turned up the collar of his trench coat.

  Lachlan sat back in his desk chair and grinned. “Well, it’s not much, but it’s something.” Unfortunately, he didn’t know what significance this storm held for the story. Nor did he know his detective’s destination. Now that he thought about it, maybe he should give his hero a tougher name. Furthermore, did he really want to delve into the clichéd image of a private detective by dressing the guy in a trench coat?”

  With a frustrated groan, Lachlan highlighted the two sentences he’d written and deleted them. Before he could become too depressed about it, though, the alarm on his cell phone beeped, increasing in volume with each repetition. At Grady’s insistence, Lachlan had agreed to setting reminders that alerted him when he needed to eat.

  Other than two bottles of water, a jar of mustard, and a stick of butter, the refrigerator was empty. Closing the door, he turned to his pantry, scouring the shelves for anything edible. All he found, however, was a package of stale saltine crackers and a jar of spaghetti sauce.

  He didn’t have much of an appetite, but he could probably tolerate a cinnamon bun and a steaming cup of coffee. In an attempt to regain some of his writing mojo, Lachlan hadn’t left his apartment all week, hoping the change of scenery would trigger something. Of course, it hadn’t done shit for him, and worse, confining himself to his office meant he hadn’t seen Xeno all week, either.

  That simple, chaste kiss had played through his mind a hundred times, and Lachlan still didn’t know what to make of it. The situation leading up to that romantic goodbye had been humiliating, and he still couldn’t believe he’d needed someone to hold his hand and walk him across the damn street.

  Okay, so maybe he hadn’t been holding up in his apartment in an attempt to force words onto the page. Not that he’d admit it out loud, but perhaps he’d been hiding, afraid of facing Xeno, too worried he’d misinterpreted the man’s attentions. Xeno could simply be a fan, and there was always the possibility that he showed that level of kindness to everyone.

  Closing the cabinet door, Lachlan looked toward the front door, rubbed the back of his neck and sighed. “Well, only one way to find out.”

  Chapter Three

  “Maybe I came on too strong.” Xeno marched back and forth across his living room, moving his hands around in animated gestures as he spoke. “I shouldn’t have kissed him. I mean, it was just a little thing on the cheek, but he’s shy. I probably scared him.”

  “Xe, sit down. You’re making me twitchy.” Propping his socked feet up on the coffee table, Grady popped the cap off his beer and took a long swallow. “I think you’re reading too much into it. Maybe he’s trying to cut back on caffeine.”

  “You are the shittiest best friend on the planet. Can you at least pretend to be supportive?”

  “Who’s not supportive? I’m supportive.” Grady arched one eyebrow and puckered his lips. “I’ll support you so hard.”

  Grabbing the throw pillow from the armchair beside him, Xeno lifted it over his head and threw it at his friend. “You’re a dick, Grady Ryes. I just thought you should know that.”

  Grady caught the pillow and tossed it to the floor with a snicker. “Okay, okay, fine. Does this dream guy have a name?”

  “Lachlan MacAuley.” Flopping down into the overstuffed chair, he slung one leg over the arm and sighed. “He’s brilliant and sweet and when he smiles…Grady, it just—”

  “Lights up the whole room,” Grady finished. Leaning forward, he sat his beer on the coffee table and propped his elbows on his knees. “Yeah, I know him.”

  Xeno might have been jealous of the way Grady smiled when he said that, but he also knew if the guy was any straighter he’d be asexual. “The accident,” he mumbled as he sat up in his chair. “You’re his physical therapist. You’re the appointment he had last Friday.”

  “He told you about the accident?”

  “No,” Xeno confessed. “One of my co-workers did.”

  “Makes sense. He doesn’t talk about it. Ever.” Picking up his bottle by the neck, Grady tipped it to his lips and reclined back against the cushions. “Did he tell you he doesn’t sleep?”

  Xeno bobbed his head. “He mentioned it…briefly. I know he’s afraid of the dark, though, and he doesn’t leave his apartment after sunset.” He also knew Lachlan suffered, not just from his physical pain but from the emotional scars the accident had left behind.

  When he’d found Lachlan standing on that corner like a lost little boy, his heart had nearly shattered. Yes, the man had some baggage, but so did the other seven billion people on the planet. What he had been through would change anyone. Lachlan was hurting right now, but every day, he dragged himself out of bed and did his best to piece his life back together.

  “I guess now I know why he had that look on his face at our last session.”

  “What look?” Xeno’s heart jumped up into his throat and his hands began to shake. “Was he upset? I knew I shouldn’t have kissed his cheek. Crap.”

  “Relax, Romeo.” Grady rolled his eyes as he reached across the couch for the television remote. “Happy, okay? He looked happy. Of course, he shut down when I started talking about his lack of sleep and his poor eating habits.”

  A wave of relief crashed over him, and Xeno released the breath he’d been holding. “Yeah?”

  “Oh, gods, you’re making me nauseous. He’s human, Xe. You know the rules.”

  Xeno ignored him. “Should I go see him?” He popped out of his seat like a jack-in-the-box and started pacing again. “I should go see him. Do you think that would freak him out? I don’t think it would. I should probably take something, though, don’t you think? Yeah, I’ll stop and get his favorite coffee.”

  “You don’t even need me for this conversation, do you?” Grady muted the football game he’d switched on and tilted his head back to look up at Xeno. “He’s not like you and me. This isn’t going to work out, and you know it.”

  “Why not? Why do I have to tell him what I am—what we are—to spend time with him?”

  Xeno knew the rules and he knew the risks. An ancient, immortal breed of werewolves, Lykós had the ability to walk between realms, specifically the waking world and the dream world. While their physical transformation wasn’t as impressive as their cousins’, their ability to prophesize the future through dreams could be more dangerous than any sharp claws or glistening fangs. Scarier still, they didn’t even know they were foreseeing the future until the events came to pass.

  “Let me count the ways,” Grady answered, though the question had clearly been rhetorical. Well, it had been clear to Xeno anyway. “First, what’s going to happen in five years when we have to move again? Do you think he’s going to wait around for a hundred years for us to come back? Are you going to take him with us? And then what? How are you going to explain why you’re not aging?”

  “I could—”

  “Number two.” Grady had a full head of steam now, and he plowed right over Xeno’s attempted argument. “I might have already mentioned this, but you know the rules. Telling him what we are doesn’t just risk our safety, it puts him in danger as well.”

  “I know what I’m doing.” For his entire life—all six hundred years of it—he’d sat on the sidelines and never participated. He’d paid enough for his ancestors’ crimes, and he didn’t feel too selfish for wanting just a moment of happiness for himself.

  “Do you?” Grady questioned. “I hope to hell you do, because if not, you’re going to get us all killed.”

  “No one is going to get hurt.” They’d been best friends for decades, and Xeno had hoped the guy would show a little more faith in him.

  “You better be right.” Snatching his empty beer bottle, Grady shoved himself up from the sofa and stomped toward the kitchen. “Lachlan is a good guy and he’s been through hell. Don’t drag him into your drama just because you have some schoolboy crush.”

  “You really should think about getting laid. Maybe it would help dislodge that enormous stick crammed up your ass.”

  Grady paused at the kitchen entryway and spun around with his arms folded over his chest. “You know what you’re problem is?”

 

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