Page 107 of The Villain's Beast

I let out a long breath and tucked him into my side on the couch, stretching my legs out and propping them on the coffee table. He mirrored the pose, threading our fingers together and turning our hands a couple of times. I wondered if he wascommitting the sight of our fingers twined together to memory or if that was just me.

“What do you think about the agreement with the Angelini family?” I asked, knocking the side of my head into his. It was comfortable and it was casual to be with Fletcher like this, even if the conversation was anything but. At the end of the day, we’d barely begun to scrape the surface of knowing just how deep the treachery of our fathers ran, but we knew even less about the stretch of Angelini money. Fletcher and I both were under the distinct impression our fathers felt they had wielded far more power and control than they actually did. There wasn’t a string the Angelinis couldn’t pull, not a single tie they couldn’t cut.

So in the end, we’d made it easy for them.

The Sinclair and the North families would no longer run in opposition to one another. They were interwoven now as one with the full financial and political support of Salomon Angelini—Vince’s father. Fletcher and I had both agreed to give the Angelinis anything they wanted, since they were fully capable of taking it anyway. It also gave us a chance to strip rank and bank from Daren’s and Luca’s fathers, as they both deserved. There was a special payback for Michael Marchant, but neither of us had made up our mind yet how that was going to go.

The wonderful thing about it all, though, was…we had time.

There were no races, no more alarms, no deadlines.

There was no one making the decisions except for us. And that was even a stretch. We were merely figureheads for people with a lust for control that stretched much further than ours ever would. Vince had found it laughable at first, how much we’d been willing to walk away from in order to find peace, but it hadn’t taken more than one long look at all of our faces to understand the exhaustion caused by a lifetime of competition none of us had asked for.

“I think it’s flawless.” He closed his eyes and rested against the back of the couch. “But I do think we should torch both houses. I hate what they stand for.”

“And where would you have us live?” I asked.

“A place with bigger beds,” he murmured with a soft smile.

“My bed is not open to your little throuple of fuck toys, Sinclair.”

Fletcher laughed, and I pulled him onto my lap. He was so long and heavy and he was so very much mine. I didn’t think I’d ever seen him laugh, not when we were kids and certainly not now. Reaching up, I tapped my fingers against the corners of his mouth, touching the places that showed the marks of his happiness.

“You like Bellamy,” he teased, licking the tip of my finger. “And you’re fond of the other two.”

The other two, like they were dismissible and replaceable when we both knew they were anything but. Luca, especially, who had fought so hard for his father’s approval when he didn’t even need it, and Daren who never even knew better until Fletcher showed him the way of it.

“I care about all three of them.” I hooked my thumb over the top of his bottom teeth and brought him in closer so I could kiss him. “But it’s you that I love.”

“You’re soft for me,” he whispered.

Lifting my hips off the couch, I wanted him to feel just how much of a lie his words truly were.

“I’m anything but.” I pressed my mouth against his. “But you, Fletcher Sinclair, you are soft for me, aren’t you?”

He hummed, licking a hot stripe across my lower lip that had my blood burning so hot I grabbed him by the throat so he didn’t dare move away.

“I’m whatever you want me to be,” he said, eyes rolling back in his head. “Whatever you see in me, Gideon, I’m certain it’s there.”

“You’re mine,” I said. “That’s the only thing you need to be.”

“I’m so glad you were brave.” He let out a soft moan and my fingers curled tighter around his neck. “So glad you were brave when I couldn’t be.”

“You were almost there,” I reminded him. “But you’re here now.”

“I’m here,” he said, and it was enough.

Chapter 74

Fletcher

I’d lived a hard life, but Gideon had—somehow—always given me a place to be soft.

Even back in high school when we’d been two kids with more hormones than sense, more dreams than we had any right having, he’d seen my rough edges and he’d grabbed them with both hands and ripped them wide open.

Gideon was the only person, the only place, where I was allowed to exist safely.

If I was angry, he would be my defense.

If I was scared, he would fight.

If I loved him, he would yield and he would let me.

I’d made myself the villain in both our lives because it was the only way I knew to save him, and even though it took us years to get there…

He let me do that too.

And now…finally…it was time to be his hero.