Black Dagger Brotherhood 11 - Lover at Last

Blay couldn’t really handle. Breaking eye contact, he wandered around his room.
    “You saved the pregnancy,” Qhuinn announced, the tone in his voice too close to awe for comfort.
    “So she’s still okay?”
    “You saved the—”
    “Payne did.”
    “V’s sister said it never would have dawned on her to try—until you went and talked with her.”
    “Payne’s got some serious talent—”
    Qhuinn was suddenly right in his way, a solid wall of muscle thatthere was no going through. Especially as the male reached up and brushed Blay’s cheek. “You saved my daughter.”
    In the silence that followed, Blay knew he had something he was supposed to say. Yeah…it was right on his tongue. It was…
    Shit. With Qhuinn looking at him like that, he couldn’t remember his own name. Blaysox? Blacklock? Blabberfox? Who the fuck knew…
    “You saved my daughter,” Qhuinn whispered.
    The words that came out of Blay’s mouth were ones he would later regret—because it was especially important, in light of the sex that seemed to be happening from time to time, to keep a distance.
    But linked as they were, stare-to-stare, he was powerless to stop the truth. “How could I not try…it was killing you. I couldn’t not try something. Anything.”
    Qhuinn’s lids closed briefly. And then he gathered Blay in an embrace that connected them from head to foot. “You’re always there for me, aren’t you.”
    Talk about bittersweet: The reality that the male was going to form a family with someone else, with a female, with Layla, bit into the center of Blay’s chest.
    It was his curse, in so many ways.
    He released his arms from Qhuinn’s back and stepped off. “Well, I hope it—”
    Before he could finish, Qhuinn was in front of him yet again, and those blue and green eyes were burning.
    “What,” Blay said.
    “I owe you…everything.”
    For some reason, that hurt. Maybe because after years of trying to give himself to the guy, the gratitude was finally earned by helping him have a kid with someone else.
    “Whatever, you’d have done the same for me,” he said roughly.
    And yet even as he put that out there, he wasn’t sure. If someone attacked him? Well, sure, of course Qhuinn would back him up. But then again, the tough-edged SOB loved to fight and was a natural hero—that wasn’t anything about Blay.
    Perhaps that was the point of this emptiness. Everything had always been on Qhuinn’s terms. The friendship. The distance. Even the sex.
    “Why are you looking at me like that?” Qhuinn asked.
    “Like how.”
    “As if I’m a stranger.”
    Blay rubbed his face. “Sorry. Just been a long night.”
    There was a long, tense moment, during which all he could feel was Qhuinn’s stare.
    “I’ll go,” the fighter said after a pause. “I guess I just wanted…yeah. Anyhow.”
    The sounds of shitkickers headed for the exit had Blay cursing—
    The knock on the door was a single one and very loud: a Brother.
    Rhage’s voice cut easily through the panels. “Blay? Tohr’s called a meeting to go over tomorrow night’s territory. You know where Qhuinn is?”
    Blay looked across his room at the guy. “No, I don’t.”

    Oh, for fuck’s sake, Qhuinn thought at the interruption. Although in reality, the conversation was over, wasn’t it.
    The good news was that at least Rhage didn’t come in. No doubt Blay would prefer the pair of them not got caught hanging in his room.
    Hollywood wrapped things up with, “If you see him, let him know if he wants to attend we’re convening in five. Totally understand if he’d rather stay with Layla.”
    “Roger that,” Blay said in a dead voice.
    As Rhage went next door and knocked on Z’s door, Qhuinn rubbed his face. He had no idea what had gone through Blay’s mind just now, but the way those blue eyes had stared at him had made him feel as if a ghost had passed over his grave.
    Then again, what did he expect? He barged into the room that the guy shared with Saxton, pulled a major liplock, and then got all mushy over the Payne thing….This was Saxton space. Not Qhuinn space.
    He had a habit of taking things over, though, didn’t he.
    “I won’t come in here again,” Qhuinn said, trying to make some kind of amends. “I just wanted you to know that…I owe you so much.”
    Qhuinn went over to the door and leaned in, listening for Rhage’s voice, closing his eyes, waiting for the hall of statues to be clear.
    Jesus, he could be a selfish prick