They heard a car in the drive. Nikolas ran out. Philipa climbed out of her Range Rover. “Bloody hell, Nikolas. You look—” She obviously realised there was no point in finishing this. He looked like he’d already died a few times more than Ben. Nikolas came up, suddenly seized her with his good hand and kissed her. “It wasn’t Ben in the fire. Where’s Camilla?”
Philipa shook her head, bemused. “I know. The police called Camilla. But, darling, they’re back searching the house. Ben is still—” Nikolas saw Squeezy shaking his head urgently at her for some reason and she just finished lamely, “Camilla wouldn’t have had anything to do with any of this, I’m sure.”
“Philipa. Please. Do you know where she is?”
“Yes, actually I do. I was worried about her after we heard the news about John. She seemed beside herself. So I followed her, but it’s all right…she just went to the chapel. Poor thing. That awful funeral with no—Where are you—?”
Jackson drove. Squeezy couldn’t and neither could Nikolas, and Tim was an old woman behind the wheel, according to Squeezy, so they had to rely on the lawyer. He was okay. He was an American living in London without a car, so he’d never driven on the left, never used a manual, and didn’t know any of the speed limits, or care. He slammed it into 5th and kept up the necessary speed for that gear.
They could hear the screaming before they stopped the car. Nikolas was out first and running, Squeezy just behind him. They barrelled into the chapel and saw the hole in the aisle. The terrible screaming was coming from below.
For one awful moment as Nikolas came through the door he thought a gateway to hell had been opened. There was an unearthly glow of flames and awful, hideous screaming.
He jumped into the hole. It felt like coming home.
§ § §
Nikolas couldn’t make out what he was seeing at first. A burning devil, whirling around, dementedly screaming beside a coffin—blackened and scorched, but not alight.
Nikolas ignored the old woman. She didn’t have much time left; he could see that. He dodged her and kicked the coffin off the trestle. It fell to the ground, and the clasps burst, the lid opening a little, something spilling out. Nikolas pulled the thing out and swore to himself it was the last time he’d forget he had a broken wrist.
But what was pain now?
He had Ben again and he was alive.
Just.
§ § §
For all the technology and money at their disposal, it was the simplest thing that saved Ben’s life. Jackson was a gym bunny and always carried a water bottle, sipping at it irritatingly. But two litres of water, given to Ben in tiny amounts as they drove him to the hospital, probably prevented the things Nikolas heard being discussed for the first few hours after Ben was admitted: cardiovascular collapse, permanent brain damage, possible death. Ben was put immediately on intravenous fluid replacement and monitored every fifteen minutes by the medical staff. Nikolas refused to leave his side and monitored him constantly. If force of will could make someone live, then Ben Rider-Mikkelsen was a pretty sure bet to recover. Even the doctors were impressed by the speed of the recovery though. Ben was exceptionally fit, and his fitness saved him. That and the fact he’d been put in a coffin made of solid English oak, and solid English oak didn’t catch fire from just being doused in petrol. It hadn’t absorbed the accelerant, and the burning fumes had just scorched the wood. The ball of fire built up in the tiny crypt, however, had caught Camilla’s scarf, which had flared up, and that had caught her other clothes alight, so she’d burnt very well indeed.
Nikolas was very glad he had to relate these facts to Ben second hand, that clearly Ben didn’t remember much from his ordeal other than impressions. He hadn’t lain in his coffin listening to Camilla screaming and believing he was going to roast to death. Or so he told Nikolas. Nikolas chose to believe him. They were going for the same level of self-delusion when Ben asked why the guys looked as if they’d been in a scrum with the All Blacks. Nikolas maintained he didn’t know why, and Ben apparently chose to believe him. When he saw the car and the huge dent, he chose to ignore that completely. He managed to walk away from the hospital three days later; and, much to his apparent amusement, he had to drive, for Nikolas’s wrist had finally had to be pinned, and he was wearing a full cast which immobilized pretty much his entire arm, wrist and hand. His doctor had been concerned how he’d manage, being single.
Nikolas told him he wasn’t single. He had Ben.
§ § §
He’d only meant it in his own inimitable way of course—having Ben. The double meaning amusing him, if not the doctor to whom he’d said it. But that night, after they’d booked into a local B&B to recover before the drive home, Nikolas realised just how true it was and how important having Ben was to him.
It began when he tried to sign the register and couldn’t because of his cast, and had to swap the pen to his right hand. That small gesture had shaken loose something he’d bottled up for many years, which had perhaps been rattled so hard over the last few days that one final quiver had freed it. Nika was right-handed. Had been.
Ben took over, signing them in, ordering some food.
Then he’d led Nikolas to the room, and when they were alone held him while he cried. For his little brother, for Ben, but most of all for himself, and the glimpse he’d been given of a life without Ben. Then he cried for guilt, because Ben was the one who’d been nailed alive into a coffin and should be the one suffering now. When he realised he had descended to self-pity, he came back to himself and pulled out of Ben’s arms, swearing and claiming it was only nicotine-induced stress he was suffering from, and that it had occurred to him, when he’d thought Ben was dead, that at least he’d be able to smoke again.
He knew Ben wasn’t fooled for a minute.
Nikolas then informed Ben he wouldn’t have missed that derisory snort either. Or all the nagging—now about his wrist…did it hurt…did he need any help…how was he going to…?
He told Ben he’d been enjoying the thought of playing opera at full volume in the car—given that Ben would be dead and not in the car with him—and eating what he liked when he liked, which was nothing and never. Drinking—anything and frequently. All these things he declared to Ben while Ben was laying out some food, calling their friends to tell them where he was and reassuring them he’d see them later.
But then Ben ruffled his hair and laughed at him, and that set Nikolas off again, because, of course, Ben was the only one who got to do that—ever thought to do that.
Finally, Nikolas’s distress broke some of the reserves of strength Ben had obviously been showing for his sake, because Nikolas felt a bone-deep shudder from the lean body holding him, and knew something had cracked open.
That was fine though. It was what Nikolas needed. Looking after Ben, holding him while the horror of the last three days washed through him, the truth of what he’d told the doctor finally became apparent. He wasn’t single.
He had Ben.
§ § §
Ben didn’t sleep that night. He hadn’t expected to and didn’t stress at lying awake in the semi-dark, watching shadows cast by branches blowing around a streetlight. He’d lain awake in the dark a lot recently, but this was so different that he relished the contrast, using its calm familiarity to fight and banish the horror of that other wakefulness.
For the first time, Ben saw how stupid he had been at John’s funeral, thinking that death was the easy option for separating two people—that it was clean and neat and final. It hadn’t been any of those for Nikolas. Ben instinctively tightened his arms around the sleeping figure as this thought came to him. He’d never really doubted Nikolas’s commitment to him, more teased himself with the notion that the love they had for each other was unequal, that he loved Nikolas to a level of intensity Nikolas could never be expected to match.
He was wrong.
Tonight he’d witnessed the power of Nikolas’s love for him—passion that had awed him with its raw he
lplessness. If he died, Nikolas would be entirely lost. There was nothing clean or neat or final about it.
Another hour clicked past by the clock on the bedside table.
The heat between them was intense, an almost bone-melting scorch of naked flesh to naked flesh, wrapped, twisted and pressed together.
Ben sensed a lightening in Nikolas’s sleep, a shift in his breathing, and dark eyes opened, regarding him.
Nikolas didn’t seem surprised to find Ben awake, but he didn’t speak, only winced slightly and then frowned.
Ben brushed the hair off Nikolas’s forehead. “You okay?”
Nikolas shifted onto his back with another wince and glanced at the clock.
“Does it hurt?” It was a fairly stupid question, Ben knew. Of course Nik’s wrist hurt. He watched the stoic expression across the pillow from him for a moment before murmuring, “You can admit to pain, Nik. It’s allowed.”
Nikolas pursed his lips. “I’d have thought I’d done enough of that tonight, even for you.”
Ben propped himself up on one hand, playing with the tips of Nikolas’s fingers poking out of the cast. With a shrug, Nikolas finally conceded, “It’s throbbing. Badly.”
Ben chuckled, and at Nikolas’s slightly hurt look—he didn’t confess to pain often and hated being laughed at under any circumstances—Ben added quickly, “That makes two things in this bed doing that then.”
Nikolas was slow on the uptake. Ben forgave him. It’d been a stressful few days. Finally Nik made a small sound that could have meant anything and corrected, “Three,” which couldn’t be misconstrued at all.
Ben slid his hand across Nikolas’s prominent hipbone to investigate, something he always enjoyed doing a great deal. The feel of the hard, heaviness that greeted him was so familiar and so welcome that his own cock twitched higher and drew tighter.
He gave Nikolas’s cock a light tug and pressed his own into Nik’s lean thigh.
The heat between them increased exponentially.
They were limited in their options. Nikolas couldn’t turn onto his belly and be fucked; he couldn’t be restrained; he couldn’t rise powerful and hungry above Ben and penetrate him to his core.
Ben took the obvious solution. He straddled the slim waist and eased himself down upon Nikolas’s rigid, leaking cock until he could grind against wiry hair and feel prominent hipbones digging into his arse. Nikolas lay supine in the low light with his bad arm outstretched. At one point, he put his right hand to Ben’s cock but some fleeting shadow of pain flicked across his face, and he withdrew it with a pout of apology. Ben didn’t mind. He took his own cock in his hand as he rose and lowered on the rigid shaft, pulling and twisting, forcing his own pleasure.
They kept their gazes locked as the need between them swelled.
Ben was about to come.
He removed his hand, slowed the fucking, and bent low over Nikolas, biting his lower lip gently, easing his tongue into the warm mouth for a kiss.
Nikolas grasped him around the neck with his good arm and groaned with frustration at not being able to turn them, dislodge Ben, rise over his lean, hot body and fuck him. Ben smiled into the kissing, hearing this frustration as loud as if Nikolas had spoken. Nikolas was ever swift and decisive and furious with need in bed, but now he was broken.
Ben put his hands on Nik’s strong shoulders, stroking his thumbs through the soft hair in Nikolas’s armpits. He could feel Nikolas’s cock twitch with thwarted need inside him. His own prick lay swollen and urgent, crushed between their hard, flat bellies.
Ben was about to ask Nikolas to tell him he loved him, force some endearment from him before Nik got what he wanted, when Nikolas suddenly put his good arm over his eyes and groaned, “Fuck, not again,” in a despairing voice.
Ben removed the arm and licked the salty cheekbones then kissed into Nikolas’s damp eyes before returning to Nik’s mouth and opening his own wide upon it, grinding their lips together as he started to rise and lower himself once more.
“You could watch your weird Russian porn again.”
Nikolas blinked, clearly confused at Ben’s sudden, odd words in the silence of their lovemaking.
“If I was dead, I mean—another thing you could enjoy.”
Nikolas closed his eyes for a moment. “Absolutely. I had forgotten that.” He twitched a smile. “I could maybe treat myself to a small present now and again, instead of spending all my money on you.”
Ben sat more upright, getting fully into the fucking. “No more motorcycle oil on your expensive kitchen tiles.”
“No more tea offered to me in chipped mugs with the teabag still in.”
“No more having to pretend to watch movies.”
“No one reading my newspaper before me and wrinkling it.”
Ben snorted. “I don’t read it. I just like messing it up before I bring it to you.”
“Ah, no more being brought tea and my paper in bed. You might have to stay alive then.”
“You could always train your new boyfriend.”
“Yes. Your training has been quite—fuck!”
Ben released Nikolas’s balls, which he’d twisted, and sped up. He was too close now to coming to concentrate on the game anymore, so when Nikolas said softly, the edge of orgasm catching his voice, “If you were dead, I would not have this exquisite pain of loving you too much,” the words almost didn’t sink in. It was all rush of pleasure then as he climaxed, shots of milky cum filling him and shooting from him, as if Nikolas fuelled him and sustained him, which Ben reckoned was just about right. He collapsed into his own spill, feeling Nikolas’s leaking out of him, and stretched boneless and meek on the heated body beneath him.
Ben stretched out his hand and placed it over Nikolas’s encased wrist, a silent acknowledgment of the pain he knew Nikolas would still be feeling. The other pain Nikolas had confessed in that rush of orgasm he could do nothing about.
Why would he want to?
EPILOGUE
One Year Later
Ben wanted to know what they were doing for Christmas. Christmas had always been a tricky time for them. Nikolas purported to dislike it, and Ben had to admit they’d had some unlucky ones: recovering from injuries, separations, even the occasional terrorist trying to kill them. But this Christmas seemed different. Nothing particularly bad had happened to them for a whole year. Ben had recovered from being buried and almost burnt alive. Nikolas had entirely recovered from a severe fracture of his wrist and subsequent tearing of all his ligaments. As Ben pointed out, though, Nikolas got lots of exercise of his wrist, so it had been pretty strong to start with.
So, with one week to go before Christmas, Ben felt it was time to have a proper celebration for once. Nikolas had been putting him off, claiming pressure of work—which never ceased to be funny; or general dislike of the commercialism—something else that always seemed vaguely amusing coming from a billionaire who’d never stinted himself once when buying anything he wanted. So it was with something like trepidation Ben heard Nikolas confess, when he brought the subject up yet again, “I think I’ve done something…rash. I think you’re going to be very angry.”
§ § §
Entwined on the sofa, Ben lying in Nikolas’s arms, one leg hooked over and around Nikolas, Nikolas felt Ben stiffen. He sighed. He’d had this plaguing him all year, and he was genuinely anxious about Ben’s reaction to the news. Ben, he knew, had repressed almost all of his ordeal at Horse Tor. Whether this was his way of coping with the fact the only family he had left in the world had individually tried to cheat him, drug him and kill him, he didn’t know. He only knew Ben wouldn’t talk about it, and when Jackson tried to explain some of the things that had emerged during the inquest and police investigations into the three deaths of Camilla and John Redvers and Natasha Diaz, he didn’t want to know. He never asked to go and see the destroyed house, and he never spoke about his previous identity. He was Benjamin Rider-Mikkelsen, and that was enough for him. So, when Nikolas felt Ben stiffen
, he was unsure whether to proceed with his news, but he knew Ben very well by now and knew if he didn’t say something he’d be nagged almost to death until his secret was out. He had almost no secrets left with Ben Rider-Mikkelsen these days.
Finally, he pushed Ben to sitting and slid his legs out, sitting up himself. He rubbed his face with his hands, contemplating the scarring on his wrist. His other wrist was scarred as well, but that matched Ben’s scar and was their bond. This focused him. They’d get through this as well. He glanced quickly at Ben. “Do you trust me?”
Ben narrowed his eyes. “I’ve been saying yes to that for eight years. Should I say no maybe, just for a change?”
Nikolas smiled. “Say yes and mean it, and don’t ask me any more questions until tomorrow?” Ben held his gaze, nodded, and they lay back down.
§ § §
Next morning, Ben wasn’t in the mood to be woken at four a.m. He’d been asleep, he reckoned, for about two hours. He couldn’t believe Nikolas was taking their fitness regime to this extreme. But it appeared he wasn’t. Nikolas was dressed in jeans, had a bag packed and Radulf at his side. “Get dressed, Ben. This confession isn’t easy.”
Ben showered, dressed and came downstairs to find Nikolas impatiently tossing keys in his hand and saying something to Radulf in Russian. He usually switched to Russian for Radulf so no one else could understand their private conversations about Ben and his various inadequacies. Radulf thumped his tail. He always liked a trip. Now the car was dented, Ben was pretty sure the dog didn’t even feel guilty about slobbering all over it. Ben couldn’t believe Nikolas wouldn’t tell him what this was all about or why they were heading out of London on a freezing, frosty morning at five a.m.
Nikolas told him to take the M4. They were going west.
Ben pursed his lips, but he’d promised, so didn’t ask. He didn’t really need to. He assumed they weren’t going to Barton Combe, so there was really only one other place west they could be going.
The Bridge of Silver Wings Page 27
