“Dieu,” Julien said, and when he raised his hand, Priest didn’t miss the way it trembled. “I want that too.”
“Yes?”
“Oui. Je t’aime, Joel Priestley. I have since the moment you caught me in an alley, much like this.”
Finally, Priest brushed his lips over the top of Julien’s. “That was the day my life truly began.”
Julien moved into him until Priest was up against the car door, and then put his hands on his chest to steady himself. “Mine too. It was the day you restarted my heart.”
Priest shook at Julien’s words, knowing just how reckless he had once been with his life, then he took Julien’s lips in a kiss full of love and devotion, and knew not a day would go by where he wouldn’t do everything in his power to keep that heart, and this man, forever safe and by his side.
* * *
AS PRIEST’S WORDS drifted off, he turned to see Robbie’s eyes shimmering with tears. No words were needed to express the emotion; it was written all over Robbie’s face—heartbreak.
Their hearts were broken because half of them was gone. Stolen from their lives in the blink of an eye, and Priest knew if he didn’t play his hand exactly right, Jimmy could end this in a way that none of them would ever come back from.
Priest slid a little way down the bed, and then tugged on Robbie’s arm, pulling him down until his head rested across Priest’s lap.
As Robbie settled in, Priest caught the way he shuddered. Priest reached up to wipe away the tears from Robbie’s eyes. The day and the story had finally brought forth the onslaught of feelings Robbie had been keeping at bay, and Priest felt his pain alongside his own.
“Shh,” Priest said, as he ran a hand through Robbie’s hair, trying his best to soothe him, even though nothing could dull the painful ache they were experiencing.
As the minutes ticked by and turned into hours, they didn’t move from that position. The only thing that changed was that Robbie’s tears finally abated and he drifted off to sleep. But Priest’s just wouldn’t stop, as he sat there in the dark, sleep nowhere in sight, and pictured the thief he’d never been able to get off his mind.
Chapter Twenty-Five
CONFESSION
You are never alone.
Not as long as I’m alive.
“I WAS WONDERING when you’d finally wake up.”
The unfamiliar voice that seeped through Julien’s foggy subconscious set off warning bells. A light began to flicker behind his eyelids, making him squint against the intrusion. As he did, a shooting pain ricocheted through his skull, and the warning bells turned into full-on blaring alarms.
“That’s right. It’s time to wake up, Mr. Thornton.”
As Julien tried to open his eyes, he found one easier than the other—his left—as the eyelid pulled back but then shut in response to the glare from the flashlight being shined in his face.
“I must’ve hit you harder than I thought. You’ve been out for a while now, boy. I was starting to wonder if you’d ever come back around.”
Julien tried to make sense of the words he was hearing, and as his jumbled mind began to recall what had happened, his heart skipped and almost stopped, and he forced himself to open his eye.
This time there was no flashlight blinding him, and as he focused on the man standing in front of him, Julien’s pulse began to race. The man was no one he had ever met before—at least not in person—but he was instantly recognizable by the steel color of his eyes, and the lifeless expression within them.
“Your name is Mr. Thornton, I know that much. Julien Thornton. So are you concussed?” Jimmy Donovan asked, clicking his fingers in Julien’s face. “Or just…slow?”
Julien swallowed as he tried to comprehend what was going on, but all he could seem to do was focus on the man’s face. How could Jimmy be standing in front of him? And how did he know his name?
As those questions raced through Julien’s mind, Jimmy took a step forward, and Julien automatically tried to move but found that he couldn’t. He was tied down, his arms and legs bound to a chair, and that was when the cold tendrils of fear crept up the back of his neck, making him shudder.
Maybe this was some kind of dream, some kind of nightmare brought on by anxiety, and it wasn’t really happening. But when Julien shook his head and blinked, trying to clear his mind, he knew this was no dream, because the terror he was feeling was too real—and the man inflicting it knew that.
Jimmy’s lips turned up in a sneer. “Yes. There we go. You’ve caught up. Now, back to introductions. You’re Mr. Thornton, and I’m—
“Jimmy Donovan,” Julien said. Priest’s father, convicted murderer.
“Very good, and if you know that, then you should know why we’re having this conversation.”