by A. P. Moraez
And then everything was applause.
ASH’S CHEEKS WERE hurting from smiling so much. Every face, every little phrase of support and admiration he’d heard during the last two hours or so of meeting and greeting the people that had come to see him… he couldn’t remember ever having felt so special. Of course, Logan made his best to make him feel special every day, and he tried to do the same for him, but this… this had been different.
It was different receiving so much love from people you hadn’t even known existed until the very moment they’d expressed the feeling. It just was.
The result was that he was still smiling like a freak, all alone backstage as his family and friends, Wicked Wish’s crew and security were gathered somewhere outside, discussing logistics for their trips back home. Ash chuckled to himself. Throughout the whole show, people had thrown things at him. Teddy bears, flowers, letters. The fact that he was openly gay and taken hadn’t kept some crazy women from throwing underwear at him, too. Kinda gross, but if he said it wasn’t kinda exciting, he’d be lying. That aside, Duke, Ian, and the two other teams he’d brought to assist Ash and his family today had to finish off last details for their return home.
They’d all left a few minutes ago, just after Arthur had finished crushing his bones with his hugs and Logan had made Ash become tomato-red with the hot kiss he’d surprised him with as soon as Ash entered the room.
Now he was munching on an apple and chugging a bottle of water, guitar already safely put away, staring his own image in the mirror in front of him, back to the door, when someone entered the room.
A man. He was wearing the standard uniform of the Wicked Wish staff, black hat included, so Ash didn’t think much of it. They’d been coming and going around him all day. No biggie.
“Hello,” Ash said, throwing the man a smile. When the tall guy didn’t answer and, instead, locked the door, Ash’s stomach tightened. No one had permission to lock this room but him and Logan. Arthur had told him so.
“Hey,” Ash started, voice stern, “You can’t l—”
The words died in his mouth as soon as the man turned around and Ash’s eyes landed on his face.
A face that he’d seen every day, for years. A face that he’d considered a friend for a good portion of those years, until the truth of the reality surrounding him was revealed to him in the most brutal of ways. A face that had once filled him with relief in a night where he thought everything was lost, under a bridge, with his hands bloody.
“Nate?” His legs and knees had turned weak.
It looked like time had stopped for Nathaniel Lazarus. He should be close to his mid-thirties now, but his fair skin was still as unmarred as it’d been the last time Ash had seen him, when the man had still been twenty-six or twenty-seven.
Back then, one of Nate’s trademarks had been the lopsided, tight smile he always had ready. Now? Now there was no sign of that. His skin looked perfect and unmarked by the passage of time, but the same couldn’t be said about his cold, light-gray eyes. They were sharper than Ash remembered. More calculating. More… cruel. He was looking intently at Ash, as if assessing the changes himself. Ash, on the contrary, had changed a lot during the years, and Nate seemed to be taking stock of all of that.
Ash tried to take a step back, but he instantaneously hit the tall mirror behind him.
Nate, finishing his once-over, met his eyes with a faint smirk.
“Afraid you don’t get to run away this time, Ash.”
His voice hadn’t changed at all. Still deep; cold, similar to his father’s.
“How’d you get in here?” Ash replied, trying to buy time. His phone was on the other side of the room. He’d been stupid and left it over the guitar case. “How’d you pass through security?”
Nate snorted as he took two steps forward and pulled a gun out of his back. “The guys you hired are good, but this place is a little too big to cover entirely.”
The button, he only had to press the button under his sleeve. Doing so with Nate analyzing his every move this close would be a very suspect move, though. He’d have to find an opportunity to alert Duke about what was happening.
“You killed someone just to get at me?” Ash asked, disgusted as he caught the few drops of blood, near the collar of Wicked Wish’s issued overall, that Nate apparently hadn’t been able to clean in time to get on with his agenda.
Nate rolled his eyes and cut the distance between them even more. Now he was standing barely four or five feet away from him. He still smelled expensive and dangerous, exactly as he’d smelled all those years ago. “I’ve killed for far less, Ash, and you know that.” He tilted his head slightly to the side, eyes narrowing. “You even helped in a lot of instances, remember?”
Ash’s heart was drumming at his ears. He needed to act. He could practically feel his time running out like sand between his fingers. If he didn’t do something, soon it’d be his blood staining a dead man’s uniform.
“What do you want?” Ash asked, even though the question sounded stupid to his ears. He just needed to buy time.
Nate got rid of the hat and raked a hand over the blond strands. His hair was longer now than it’d been then, but still the same shade of light blond; same entitled glint to it.
“Long story short,” Nate said, seeming bored out of his mind, as he used the muzzle of the gun to scratch his temple, “dad wants to play with you a little more, and I don’t. He’s been… having fun, but the whole scaring you thing and killing your stupid friends is just so… boring, you know?” Ash paused, as if expecting him to agree with his callous, cold speech. As if the loss of Morgan truly didn’t mean anything. It made Ash’s blood boil.
“Your dad isn’t gonna like this. You know how he likes his games.”
Nate tsked. “I know, but I really don’t have time for this. It’s been over a month of living in those stupid fucking mountains. Watching, planning… It gets old real fast.”
Ash’s old training and instincts were kicking in. He crossed his arms, taking advantage of the seemingly normal move to press the button under his sleeve. He only had to bring Nate closer. The closer he got, the better his chances.
“That’s a first,” Ash taunted, keeping his cool at the same time that he started to pray for Duke to get there soon. He’d only have a few seconds after he got to Nate’s temper, which had never been agreeable.
“What?” Nate said, gun now pointing directly to Ash’s chest as he took a step closer. It wasn’t enough, though. Ash needed him to be just a little bit closer.
“You’ve always been daddy’s golden boy, Nate,” Ash said, voice low, daring to shuffle just half an inch closer, his eyes never wavering from the other man’s. “Never complaining, never disagreeing. Practically licking his boots… like a dog.”
In his obvious outrage, jaw ticking, Nate committed the mistake of shuffling just a bit forward. Now he was exactly where Ash needed him.
“Things change,” Nate growled. “I have a family now.” He lifted the gun until it was leveled with Ash’s heart. “A daughter.”
The thought gave Ash pause. He couldn’t picture what Nathaniel Lazarus would be like as a father. He’d never seemed the fatherly type.
“ASH!” came Duke’s shout through the door, at the same time a bang echoed through the sparse room. They were trying to stomp the door down.
“Well, time’s up,” Nate said, finger on the trigger. “Any last words?”
Ash nodded, struggling to keep his facade of calmness, well aware that if this failed, he’d never see his family again. Never see his friends. Never see Logan’s beautiful eyes again.
“Yeah,” he said, readying his muscles and clearing his mind, letting years of training in the dark dungeons of the Lazarus mansion kick in and take over his system.
Nate lifted an eyebrow as more pounding and shouting came from the wall far behind him.
“You shouldn’t get a gun this close to the guy you want to kill.”
Ash leaped for
ward, swinging his body and head to the side at the same time he grabbed Nate’s arm and twisted it to the side. The first shot echoed right on his ear, it was so close.
“ASH!”
It was Logan’s voice now. He was right outside, and all Ash wanted was to get to touch him again; to see him again.
Nate grunted when Ash hit his balls with his knee, taking advantage of being smaller and quicker than the other man. It was a pussy move, but if they went head-to-head, in a fair fight, he’d be dead on the floor in seconds.
As the man cried in pain and leaned forward in a reflexive move, Ash grabbed the hand he had clasped around the gun and clawed it open, pressing his pulse point with everything he had, like he’d learned to do. At the same time, he took advantage of Nate’s move to smash his knee against Nate’s face. The hand around the gun relented and Ash took it from his hand.
Ash was about to shout at the door that he was okay, when Nate screamed and swirled in his direction, a new gun in hand.
Ash should’ve known he wouldn’t be foolish enough to attempt to murder him in a public place and bring just one weapon. He didn’t give time for the man to land a shot; he shot first.
Nate’s dead body hit the floor at the same time the door gave and Duke and Logan burst into the room, pale and sweating.
The shot had hit Nate in the side of the head as he turned and aimed toward him. The bullet dug right through, and now there were splashes of blood and rain on the far wall, but nothing compared to the amount pooling on the white marble underfoot.
More men flooded into the room, probably members of Duke’s other teams.
Ash was shaking and, when he let his eyes trail down to his hand and registered the weapon still there, shaking with him, he flung it to the side.
Logan thundered across the room, barely avoiding stepping onto the pool of blood. “Ash!” he cried. Then Ash was wrapped by his strong arms and pressed against his body, and everything started to get better.
“Did he hurt you? Are you okay?”
“I’m alright,” he replied, voice shaking even though he was trying to control it.
Duke was shouting instructions to the men around him, fuming. He came to stand next to Ash. “Do you know him?” He asked firmly but gently. “Is he one of them?”
Ash leaned back from Logan and shifted his gaze to Duke, “Yeah. It’s his son. Lazarus’ son.”
“Son of a bitch,” Logan muttered, hugging him to his side again. He was breathing heavily, sweating, like he’d run for miles.
Duke’s expression was pissed-off to say the least. “I’m sorry I let this happen,” he said, gazing directly into Ash’s eyes, “It’s my job to protect you and I fucked up. I’m sorry.”
Ash lifted a hand to placate him. “It’s okay. Just… we have to get rid of him.”
Duke nodded, well aware that this was a problem they had to deal with themselves. The police couldn’t get involved in this. Ash’s own freedom was at stake. “Stay here. We’re just gonna check the perimeter and I’ll come back to lead you guys to the car.”
Duke turned around and started barking more orders to the other guys. Soon, there were a man and a woman bagging Nate’s body and carrying him away in the shadows. Ash had no idea how they’d manage to get him out of the place without being seen, but he trusted Duke.
“Did anybody else hear what happened? The gunshots were loud, did anybody he—”
“I don’t think so,” Logan tried to calm him, “The sound system probably didn’t let it be heard upstairs, and Duke, the guys and I were the last ones downstairs. The guys already headed to the jet on the other cars.”
Ash gulped, exhaling heavily in relief. “Great.”
“You’re sure this is his son?” Logan asked, glaring at the spot where three other of Duke’s guys now wiped and scrubbed the blood off the floor. Thanks God it was expensive and easy to clean, not just pure cement, which would certainly have soaked some of the blood right in and left stains behind.
“Yeah. It was him.”
“Good riddance,” Logan said. “Now there’s only the father left.”
Ash bit the inside of his cheek, still a little bit shaky. He grabbed Logan’s hand for support. Logan was looking at him intensely, eyes roaming his face as if to check he actually was okay.
“We don’t know that. There could be more. Leo has never liked getting too many people surrounding him and sticking their noses up in his business, but we never know. He could have more people involved in this.”
Logan pressed a kiss to his forehead. “I don’t care,” he murmured. “Let them come. We’ll deal with all of them.”
A moment passed in silence. A silence that Ash took advantage of to drag Logan to the couch in the corner and press his face against the column of Logan’s neck. The scent of him alone started to calm him down.
A moment passed in silence, until Logan’s voice broke it. “How did you do it?”
“What?”
“How didn’t he just kill you? He was way bigger than you.”
“Size doesn’t mean anything.”
Logan’s lips trailed down his cheek and he bit the edge of Ash’s ear, “Yeah, it does.”
Ash chuckled against his chest. “I can’t believe your head’s right back to sex just a few minutes after all this.”
Logan’s chest rumbled with laughter. The guys still cleaning the floor looked at them with expressions that let it very clear they thought the both of them were completely cuckoo.
“Seriously, how did you do that?”
Ash sighed. “I don’t know. I just fell back on my training, I guess. He got too close, so I hit him in the balls and then smashed my knee on his face. I took the gun from him, but he had another one. I ended up shooting him before he could shoot me.”
Logan’s arms tightened around him. “Just like that?”
Ash shrugged, not knowing how to answer that. Sure, for someone watching the scene unfold, it could be described by just like that. Only Ash knew how many nights he’d had to train, how many people he’d had to kill to master that just like that moment. A moment where even a millisecond of hesitation or a blow delivered an inch to the side of the correct point could have ended in his death.
“That’s the last time I’ve ever left your side.”
“Logan—”
“I’m serious. Those moments after I heard the shot… not knowing if you were okay… it took ten years out of me.”
Ash leaned back from their embrace, so that he could look Logan in the eyes. “I’m sorry.” He brought a hand up to caress Logan’s face, marveling as his fingers sank in his soft beard. “I’m sorry you’re having to go through all of this. I’m sorry I’m putting you and the other in danger.” A new wave of anger rolled through him. “I should’ve made sure that sick son of a bitch was dead before I ever left that house, Logan. I should’ve put a bullet through his head when I had the chance. If I had done just that, none of this would be happening. Morgan would still be alive. I should’ve ended him there and then.”
Logan didn’t answer him for a moment, then the corners of his lips lifted. “Damn,” he said, hands traveling to Ash’s waist and squeezing. “This badass side of you… won’t deny; it turns me so on.”
Ash was about to protest, but Logan stopped him with a firm squeeze to his waist. “It’s scary, but for some reason I get hard every time you show me more of this side of you.”
“Logan, don’t,” throat suddenly dry, Ash cleared it and tried again. “Please, don’t be scared of me. That’s the last thing I want.”
Logan’s expression sobered, all playfulness gone. “I’m not. I swear.” He leaned forward and slid on hand from Ash’s waist to his head and brought their mouths together for a slow, deep kiss. It didn’t last, but took Ash’s breath away all the same. “They should, though,” Logan said, jutting his chin at the floor, where the guys were finishing getting rid of the blood.
Ash grabbed Logan’s head, cupping both his cheeks, and le
aned in so the others wouldn’t hear when he whispered against his lips, “Don’t you ever underestimate them, okay? Promise me.” When Logan didn’t answer immediately, eyes widened at Ash’s emotional reaction to his words, Ash spoke in a firmer voice, “Nate’s mistake today was to come here thinking he’d catch me by surprise. Thinking I’d forgotten my past and the things I learned. He underestimated me and he paid the price, but it could’ve just as well been the other way around.” Ash paused to let his words sink in. “They are psychos, Logan. They’re men out of their minds driven by nothing but revenge against me. They have fun killing and torturing. You get that? They’re insane.” Ash scoffed out a hollow laugh. “God, Leo was already mad because I killed his daughter and ran away from him, and that was almost a decade ago. How do you think he’s going to react when he finds out now he’s precious golden boy is gone, and I’m also to blame for that?” He paused, checking again to see if the guys from Duke’s other team weren’t in listening range. They were in the other corner of the ample room, busy sterilizing their hands. “We can’t ever get complacent, Logan. You can never think you have the upper hand against someone like that man. You have to promise me that you’re gonna take care of yourself always, and that you ain’t gonna put yourself in danger because of me. Promise me!”
“That last part, I can’t promise.”
“Logan…”
“I can’t, Ash. I can’t promise that in the heat of the moment I’ll never jump in to try to get you out of harm’s way. Are you crazy?” Logan’s voice shook in those last words. “You’re my heart; my whole life. Of course I can’t promise that.”
Logan’s eyes were shining with determination and all of it had Ash’s throat tightening. It frustrated him, but how could he maintain his emotions in check when the man came up with stuff like that.
“The other part, though,” Logan continued, “I can promise.
“I promise I’ll take care of myself. I promise I won’t get cocky and put us and our friends in danger.” Logan pressed their lips together in a soft kiss, and whispered against Ash’s, “I promise.”
