Black Dagger Brotherhood 11 - Lover at Last

thought maybe he should put a new one on.
    Yeah, like a fresh, super-sharp, clean one.
    Qhuinn rolled his eyes at himself. Nothing like having your self-worth wrapped up in three little blades and a moisturizing strip. Real fucking logical, that one.
    Self-administered ass slap aside, he started rummaging through the drawers under the counters, pulling them out, inventorying all manner of bath and beauty crap that he never used, never looked at.
    Pulling out the last drawer, the one closest to the floor, he stopped. Frowned. Bent down.
    There was a little black velvet box in there, the kind of thing you put jewelry in. Except he didn’t own any, and certainly not from Reinhardt’s, that highbrow place downtown. As no one else stayed in his room, he wondered if maybe it had been there since he’d moved in and he’d just never seen it?
    Taking the box out, he flicked the lid and—
    “Son of a bitch.”
    Inside, like they were worth something, were all his gunmetal gray earrings, as well as the hoop he’d always worn in his lower lip.
    Fritz must have collected them when cleaning one night, and put them in the box. Only explanation—because Qhuinn certainly hadn’t bothered with them after he’d taken them out one by one. He’d just tossed them in the back of one of the bathroom cabinets.
    Qhuinn fingered the steel links, thinking back to when he’d bought them and put them in. His father had been mortified; his mother, too—to the point where she’d excused herself from Last Meal and taken to her private quarters for a full twenty-four hours after he’d waltzed into the dining room wearing them.
    The piercing place had told him not to put the hoops in until the studs that had been used to make the holes had had a chance to heal up. But that advice was for humans. Within a couple of hours, everything was good to go and he’d done the swap.
    In Blay’s loo, as a matter of fact.
    Qhuinn frowned, remembering the moment he’d stepped out into the guy’s bedroom. Blay had been over on the bed, nursing a Corona, watching TV. His head had turned, his expression open and relaxed—until he’d taken a look at Qhuinn.
    His face had tightened up ever so subtly. The kind of thing that, unless you knew a person really, really well, you wouldn’t notice. But Qhuinn had.
    At the time, he’d assumed it was because the obvi-Goth shit had been a little much for Mr. Conservative. But now, thinking back on it, he recalled something else. Blay had refocused on the plasma screen…and casually taken a pillow and put it on his lap.
    He must have gotten hard.
    As Qhuinn recast that whole scene in his head, his own sex thickened again.
    Except that was a waste of time, wasn’t it.
    Staring at those goddamned earrings, he thought about his rebellions and his anger and his fucked-up idea of what he had to have to be happy in life.
    A female. If he could find one who’d take him.
    What…a lie…that would have been.
    Funny, cowardice came in many forms, didn’t it. You didn’t have to be shrinking in a corner, shaking like a pussy and sniveling. Hell no. You could be a big, loud noise with a tough attitude and a face full of piercings and a snarl to show the world…and still be nothing but a cocksucking coward. After all, Saxton might wear three-piece suits and cravats and loafers, but the male knew who he was, and he wasn’t afraid of having what he wanted.
    And what do you know, Blay was waking up in the guy’s bed.
    Qhuinn closed the lid and put the piercings back where he’d found them. Then he glanced up into the mirror. What was he doing again? he thought as he looked at his face.
    Oh, yeah. Shaving.
    That was it.

    About twenty minutes later, Qhuinn left his room. Walking down the hall of statues, he passed by the closed doors to Wrath’s study and kept going.
    As he continued onward, it was hard to stare into the second-story sitting room, hard to stay cool as that couch came into view.
    Never going to look at that piece of furniture in the same way. Hell, maybe even all sofas were ruined for him, forever.
    At Layla’s door, he leaned in and put his ear to the panels. When he didn’t hear anything, he wondered exactly what he thought he’d find out that way.
    He knocked quietly. When there was no answer, he was gripped at the throat by an irrational fear, and without conscious thought, he threw open the door.
    Light poured into the darkness.
    His first thought was that she had died; that Havers, the son