Page 4

Fucking January.

Gideon isn’t one to have a favorite month, unlike most people. Weather is just weather, and Gideon just gets on with whatever it brings.

Heat in the summer? Yay. Mates in banana-hammocks and Luca with a bare butt outside, getting more and more golden in all the places Gideon likes to lick.

Pouring rain? Fine. Gideon will, conveniently and naturally, be on the front porch to see Jay in a wet T-shirt as he parks the Ducati in the garage after forgetting to read the weather report.

Thunder and lightning in the fall? Damn right. It means pleasurable nights spent in the living room by candlelight, teaching Rowan how to make his mates come over and over until they all fall into a sated and exhausted pile of sweaty, come-soaked skin.

Foggy nights curled up in the library are nice, so he can watch Finn work or read poetry to Grayson while Gideon combs his fingers through his mate’s silky hair.

He even appreciates the dewy early mornings in spring, when Leo will drag him to the Flower Show where they hold hands under the weak sunshine, coffee in hand, and Gideon can listen to his mate’s smooth voice mutter to himself (and to Gideon) about the meaning of flowers.

Even though it’ll be Grayson that Leo takes with him when they buy some for the house, it’s always Gideon he takes in spring.

He hopes that in the coming months there will be something he shares with his kitten, too .

But winter? Gideon fucking hates winter.

He’s reminded of why he hates it as he makes his way through Lupine Park mid-morning on a Friday, when he should be at home curled up with his kittens after a night of reminding them who’s boss.

But no. He’s standing in a brisk breeze, freezing his balls off, and trying to find a specific park bench at the far end of the park.

Finding “the bench facing a cherry tree and not the river at the north end” had been surprisingly easy, all things considered. The plain wooden bench sits facing a small walkway, with its back to the river itself.

This part of the park sees less foot traffic, given its obstructed views, and that suits Gideon just fine. He’s here to meet someone for some information and it would be better if there weren’t as many observers, unintentional or otherwise.

Locating this person had been his sole purpose since they arrived home from the mountains in October.

It’s taken hundreds of hours camped out in bars, meetings in alleyways and coffee shops, and—on one memorable occasion—at a dog show in December (Gideon had been unimpressed; his Tsuki would outshine every single one of those dogs in both beauty and brains).

Now, after months of patience Gideon didn’t feel and couldn’t afford, he’d finally received word: the man he’d been looking for would meet him here, of all places.

Gideon’s relieved it hadn’t been easy to find him. If it had been, he would’ve been suspicious—and so would Patrick Carnell.

Immediately after Nix had put Hayes down, Gideon had gone looking for Carnell. He’d gone to the penthouse only to find it empty—furniture draped in sheets, dust covering the hardwood floors.

He hadn’t expected it to be that easy. Carnell hadn’t survived this long without a keen sense of self-preservation. But the code to the door had still been Gideon’s birthday.

And Gideon recognized it for what it was: the cat-and-mouse game the old devil had meant it to be. I know you’re looking for me, Allistair. Catch me if you can .

Gideon is still unsure if he’s the cat or the mouse in this game of theirs.

Carnell hadn’t been in any of his usual haunts either, so Gideon had been reduced to spending three months skulking in the darkest corners of Nashville for crumbs, hoping one would lead him to where his father might have gone to ground.

Just last night, he’d finally made the connection that has him here, outside in the dead of winter.

Pulling the edge of his coat down, Gideon sits, angling his body toward the river and watching for anyone who might dawdle or stop—anyone who might be overly interested in a dumbass sitting on a park bench in January.

Sure, he’s dressed for winter in his black beanie, a puffer jacket stolen from Jay’s multitudes, and some fingerless gloves, but the early afternoon is still sitting at a frigid 30°F.

Tourists won’t be in this part of the park for months yet, and any locals with a grain of sense are at work or home.

It’s the memory of the intruders that broke in—and that sniper in the mountains before Nix’s combat—that keeps him vigilant despite the freezing weather.

His phone vibrates in his jacket, and a tingle of something zips down his spine. He’s not ready to label it any more than he wants to read what Luca has just sent.

Gideon knows it’s Luca texting because he can feel the dull ache in his chest, in the same way he knows that it’s Luca’s pain he feels.

It’s the fourth time since Gideon crept out of the nest two hours ago without saying goodbye.

1:09 PM — from Luca

Nix and I are going to the cafe

Come with

1:32 PM — from Luca

Where are you

Not at Quest

Are you mad at me

1:33 PM — from Luca

Did I do something really bad

It’s the last one that turns the tingle into a lurch in his gut .

It triggers Gideon’s rage at the situation, at himself for setting down this impossible path, and, as always, at the absent source of dissension: his father.

Fucking fuck.

Gideon wants to be at home with his kittens, and his cats, and his damn mammoth of a dog.

He wants Jay to hold him down and make him remember who he really is, and he wants Grayson to call him pretty when he comes.

He wants his mates warm and rolled in blankets in front of the television while he makes French toast and omelets for lunch.

He wants this over with.

But more than anything, he needs them to be free—and for better or for worse, that’s Gideon’s job to accomplish.

He gives himself a shake, like a dog shaking off the rain, and wonders if he’s picked up some weird habit from Tsuki—or worse, Rowan.

But he can’t be thinking about them when he’s rolling around in the filth that is Patrick Carnell’s life.

He’s already been reminded that he’s been a bad mate lately. Gideon hates most of all that Luca feels like he’s done something wrong—hates that he’s the person who’s supposed to be Luca’s shield against the world but has only brought him pain instead.

Gideon misses him too, like a lost limb.

But this is the contact with the information that Gideon has been waiting on since he had dropped that soul-magic pendant down Hayes’s throat.

This guy was once inside Carnell’s inner circle and has contacts close to the bastard, but is still walking around alive and free, for whatever reason.

He’s the key to Carnell’s hiding place and where, if Gideon has anything to say about it, the slimy bastard will take his last breath.

Then his family will be safe, and maybe Gideon can be free of the constant, agonizing fear that something bad is coming for them at breakneck speed.

An elderly man in a brown tweed coat and suit sits next to him on the bench and opens a paper bag.

His gnarled fingers toss small clumps of birdseed onto the sidewalk in front of them.

As if they’d only been waiting for their cue, the birds flutter to the walk, cooing and chirping so loudly that Gideon almost doesn’t hear the man speak.

“You look just like her,” he says, throwing another handful before offering the bag to Gideon—less out of courtesy to the birds, probably, and more to make it look like two strangers had a reason to be talking in an almost-abandoned park, should anyone be watching.

The man’s words finally sink in, and Gideon freezes, hand mid-toss.

The nearest bird, a fluffy-feathered sparrow, lands gently on his outstretched hand so she can take the seed directly from his palm. Her tiny black eyes are watchful, and Gideon can see her tawny feathers shiver in the breeze.

He’s surprised, but remains perfectly still until she flies away.

It might be a sign of some sort, so Gideon says nothing.

“You look nothing like him, thank the Goddess.” The man chuckles at some memory and throws another handful of seeds.

“Made him so angry at first, but…” He looks at Gideon then, and frowns. “But you took to his ways well enough, anyway. That’s why I didn’t want to meet you at first.”

Gideon takes another handful of seed from the offered bag and throws it to an elderly bird who hasn’t been quick enough to fight for his fair share.

He takes a moment to wonder if he is helping or hindering the natural cycle of life, but the man interrupts his train of thought by shaking the bag in his direction again.

“Then why did you?”

No matter if the man’s words are true, Gideon is resentful of the implication.

He had taken to Carnell’s violent ways as easily as a duck to water. It’s why they were here, after all. He has very graphic plans to use some of those well-learned skills on the bastard very shortly, in fact.

“Why help me if you think I’m just like him?”

“Because you could have been just like him, but you try so hard not to be. I’ve asked around. You try to live a good life, don’t you, Allistair?”

The name he’d been given at birth grates on Gideon’s nerves.

It was not the name he’d assumed when he and his mother had fled Nashville, nor the name he lives with now.

He is Gideon.

“It’s Gideon. And what do you know.” Gideon isn’t asking.

There would be any number of people willing to talk about the Chef and Owner of Quest. The mate to rockstars of Long Road Home . The active—and formerly very popular—member at the kink club, The Black Hole .

Any number of people who are grossly ignorant of the real Gideon.

The man he shows only to his mates.

His Luca.

Gideon feels the burn of shame, because he hasn’t been the real Gideon for months.