Page 46 of Chapel at Ender’s Ridge (Ender’s Calling #1)

I Know You

A week passed before Decker finally caught a moment alone with Laurie.

He’d thrown himself into repairing the town at night and the chapel during the day, taking advantage of his new vitality and cloistering himself there until he needed other supplies.

Ender’s Ridge swung in strange limbo, celebrating and mourning and rebuilding. Each time Decker trekked across the alley, something else required his attention— Decker, we need help repairing the livery fences, Decker, have the mercantile order lumber for new bridge, Decker, Decker, Decker.

Laurie hadn’t any luck either; he’d performed a handful of weddings in the last three days, held at dusk, and didn’t have any time to himself.

Tonight, he still wouldn’t be left to himself.

Decker rapped on the chapel doors at ten o’clock, shifting a small package at his side.

Quick, scattered footsteps sounded from inside before Laurie hauled open the door. He stared, gaze flicking down the length of him before returning to his face. “Decker.” His fingers danced along the edge of the door .

“I know it’s late,” Decker said. Incense clouded the space between them and made his head spin, or maybe it was how Laurie looked at him, like even the chapel wouldn’t be enough to keep them apart.

Laurie gave him a wry smile. “Time doesn’t matter to us anymore.” He hesitated, uncertainty and pain wrinkling his brows before he rushed, “Do you—do you want to come in? Does it—can I do that?”

“Depends.” Decker’s lips twitched at the flash of uncertainty from him. “Are you inviting me in as a neighbor?”

An owl trilled from behind the chapel and the tension in Laurie’s shoulders relaxed. “We are neighbors.”

Decker’s smile grew, teasing. “Maybe more if you let me in.”

Laurie rolled his eyes even as a flush stained his cheeks. He swept his arm. “Come in, Decker.”

Never been so happy to.

The door softly clicked shut behind them, settling Decker in the scent of fresh-cut pine and smoke. He left the small, foil-patterned box to the side of the door.

Reinforced beams arced above them, charred planks smoothed away and spliced with new, pale wood. The full moon blazed through unpatched holes in the ceiling, scattering constellations across Laurie’s face.

Silver illuminated each strand of his curls, framing him in an angelic halo Decker never wanted to be without. Once again, they were back in the alley, on the mountaintop, with unsure hands and hesitant words.

Laurie’s eyes dropped to his lips .

A flame, gentle and insistent, flickered back to life in Decker and he traced the length of Laurie’s spine with a languid touch. His lips brushed against Laurie’s neck, nudging his head back.

A soft noise left him, vibrating against Decker’s mouth, and he smiled against his skin when Laurie leaned into him. The acrid residue of incense and the slight tang of sweat and sandalwood bit at his tongue when he mouthed under his jaw, grazing his lips over his stubble.

“You’re safe with me, preacher,” Decker whispered.

Laurie bumped against the door and he drew in a tight breath, hands laced in Decker’s hair, searching for the knotted leather until it tugged loose and his hair fell around them in an inky curtain. “Would you like to know me, Decker Belmont?”

Drawing back, he searched Laurie’s eyes. They were hopeful and tentative, as if he feared that even now, he wasn’t wanted.

“I know you, Laurie Lane,” Decker said. “I am the one who made you.”

Their lips met as they had, the soft, unsteady ground of a truce, melding together until neither knew who held the white flag. He saw Laurie as he was, years of denial crumbling away in a single, desperate kiss Decker drowned in.

Lips parting, Decker’s touch slipped along the other man’s jaw, drawing him closer, breathing the same air, consuming him. Laurie was sweet, and lovely, hiding sharpness that he needed to uncover.

Laurie pressed into him, eyes gleaming as he broke off the kiss with a nip of his fangs at his lip.

For the first time, Decker saw a mirror of himself .

Beauty wrapped in fangs and dripping with the memory of blood, body rich with power and thrumming with need.

Humanity could never compare to who they were.

Their searing kiss lingered on Decker’s tongue as he worshipped the body of his creation and his creation worshipped him, two pairs of hands taking buttons carefully until the impetuousness of a fledgling overtook Laurie’s caution and fabric ripped.

A laugh suddenly bubbled out of him, shoulders shaking. “Shi— oh —” Laurie fumbled with the buttons as another bounced off the floor and he gave up, kicking his shoes off with a giddy, apologetic look. “I’m sorry, I’ll get you a new one—”

He stopped suddenly, shoe half-off, eyes shuttering, and Decker knew he was back in a seminary dorm, fumbling under covers and then packing up his things the next day when a near-stranger’s shame outweighed common decency.

Laurie bore the brunt of it all. “Is this—is there anything you don’t—”

Decker tossed his ruined shirt to the floor.

“There’s nothing I don’t want from you,” he said, hands grazing along Laurie’s bare shoulders as he pushed his shirt away, pressing kisses at the side of his throat, along relaxing freckle-dusted shoulders, coaxing soft sounds from him.

“I could never not want you,” Decker murmured in the hollow of his neck.

Reaching the buttons of his pants, Decker pressed at them with the pads of his thumbs, his fingertips curling into the waistband.

Decker stopped.

Urged with the heel of his hand, gently.

Waited.

Laurie shoved his hands away .

Shucked off his pants in one motion and kicked them to the side. Looked at him with that hungry, naked expression. Then took Decker’s wrist, pulling him until they were flush, hard, skin-to-cotton and so close he throbbed against Decker’s hip.

“I will tell you if I need a moment,” Laurie whispered, breath hot and sure against his ear. His confidence ebbed, hand trembling, voice thick with need. “Please don’t stop.”

Decker settled into being wanted in the night, not in the dark, by a man he loved. “Alright,” he said.

“Alright,” Laurie repeated, something so soft in the way he spoke, Decker didn’t expect the fangs.

“ Easy , preacher,” he gasped as the side of his throat burned, flared hot, then dissolved into pooling, tingling heat. Laurie wasn’t searching for blood, only toying with him, his sharpness coming out from too many years of repression.

Laurie was not a skilled lover, but starving, and nature always found a way. He wrung out a groan from Decker, smoothing over the tiny holes with his tongue as he guided Decker’s hand between them, breath catching.

Laurie fumbled with the buttons of Decker’s pants, hips staggering against his.

Decker curled his hand around him, the slow drag pulling a whine from Laurie. Taking his hand to his mouth, Decker spit and slicked it over his cock before he had a chance to gape at him, prim and affronted.

He still tried.

“Decker—” Laurie hissed, face flushed, fingers frozen, the smooth glide choking out the rest of his likely improper words .

“Easy,” Decker murmured against his neck, the steady motion of his hand measured, slow, as he crowded Laurie back until he was at the closet pew. “Down,” he said, and Laurie obeyed, sinking onto oiled wood, jolting as Decker’s touch left him, his cock twitching against his stomach.

There was a certain sort of trust only built up with repeated, shared, near-death experiences. Here, there were no pressing matters, no plagues.

Only their need. Pulsing. Hungry.

Decker slipped out of his trousers and tucked them under Laurie’s head before he drew him in for another kiss, the heat of his mouth shredding the self-control he had left.

Laurie’s breath stuttered, a crack through which he glimpsed the man who died in this church not long ago, like he would forever haunt them.

Their bodies lay together as one, naked skin to naked skin, each memorized heave of their ribcages mimicking the other.

Scripture wove into the threads of Decker’s mind, shining with acceptance instead of condemnation, new memories replacing old, adoration mending bitterness.

Bone of my bones.

Linseed oil slicked his palm, the bottle tipping on the floor next to the pew it was intended for. A moan wrung from Laurie’s throat as he touched him again, sweet and swallowed into Decker’s lips as they gleamed under the filtered moonlight.

He arched, hips meeting his own, strangled breath kissed away as Decker’s heavily oiled fingers slid down, grazing over the achingly soft parts of him until he pressed against tense muscle, gentle, waiting. Laurie moved with him, hips rolling, gasping out a barely muffled curse at his first touch .

Flesh of my flesh.

“Laurie. Easy, Laurie—” Decker threaded his other hand through his curls, tugging and baring his neck to him. Gentle, long kisses soothed the strained muscles of his shoulders, drawing him closer.

Pressing, working him open, Decker tended to him and Laurie turned pliant and soft, breath relaxing to pleasure-soft, sweet sounds, until he laughed against his mouth. “Is this how it’s supposed to be?”

Decker stilled, inside him but feeling, just now, he’d touched the deepest part of Laurie. “Haven’t you?”

Laurie shook his head, throat working before he spoke. “We never—he was never slow. He would still stop when I asked, which…was often. I could never let go of my shame.”

Something pulled in Decker’s chest, the same as it did when Safine disappeared into the hills or when Cricket used to tell him about his outlaw adventures always ending in a noose.

Concern.

Ire.

Maybe protectiveness, though it was all in the past.

“Doesn’t make him a good person, Laurie,” he said quietly. “Just makes him not a complete bastard.”