The Square Peg (33 page)

thinking?”

The air was thick with smoke. Made it hard to breathe. Fuck, the bar. Shane

twisted, turning, and all he could see was fire.

“It’s gone,” he said, punctuating each word with a cough. “All gone.”

“Don’t talk.”

Shane lost a few minutes then, blacking out, and reviving when he felt the

pressure of an oxygen mask against his face. His world jolted, and he rose, helpless as a

turtle on its back. He struggled, but strong hands held him down. A stretcher. He was

strapped onto a stretcher, strange faces above him.

“They’re taking you to the hospital,” Benedict called out, his face drawn, smudged

with dirt. He looked exhausted. “You and one of the men who started this. I need to

talk to the police, but I’ll be there, Shane. I’ll be there as soon as I can.”

Questions, protests formed in his head, but never reached his lips. He was tidied

out of the way with a brusque efficiency, and the ambulance doors slammed, cutting off

his view of the scene, the wail of the sirens rising to drown everything out.

The Square Peg

219

Chapter Seventeen

Standing and watching the ambulance drive away with Shane inside wasn’t easy,

but Ben had done plenty of hard things in his life, and it was obvious he was going to

have to do more in the near future. He’d do this too.

“Sir, please move away from the building.” One of the police officers gestured at

him, and Ben went over to stand with Shelly and Vincent.

“Is he gonna be okay?” Shelly looked worried, the cloud of dark curls around her

face hanging limply, her blue eyes reddened. She hugged Ben tightly, and he returned

the embrace, grateful for it.

“They think he has a concussion, and he inhaled a lot of smoke. But he’ll be okay.”

Ben glanced in the direction the ambulance had gone.

One of the guys responsible for the fires had ended up splashing some gas on his

pants leg, and it had gone up in flames. He had some pretty serious burns and had been

taken to the hospital too, but the other three were still there and in handcuffs. They’d

hung around too long waiting for their friend to rejoin them, not knowing he was lying

on the pavement on the other side of the building groaning in pain.

“You the employees?” a cop asked, coming over to them.

“Yeah,” Vin said, jerking his thumb at Ben. “And he’s one of the owners.”

The cop sighed. “Any idea why they’d want to do something like this? Did you

have some kind of argument?”

“No,” Ben said. “I don’t even know them, except they’ve been in for a drink a

couple of times.”

“It’s a fucking hate crime,” Vin said hotly. “Bunch of straight guys burning up a

gay bar? They probably wish we’d been in there.”

220

Jane Davitt & Alexa Snow

“They aren’t saying much,” the cop said.

“They’re probably waiting for their lawyer.” Ben rubbed at his eyes, stinging from

the smoke. He could smell it in his hair, his clothes. He should go home to shower and

change before he went to Shane, and spare Shane the reminder of what had happened.

He didn’t want to, though. It might be selfish of him, but he needed to be with Shane, to

see for himself that Shane was okay. The hell with how filthy he was.

He brushed at his shirt and saw ash flake off, white and gray. No hospital would

let him walk in like this. Weariness rose up in him as he struggled to decide what to do.

It wasn’t like him to be mired in indecision.

“Look, I need to go home, change, then get over to the hospital. I’ll come in and

make a statement tomorrow, as early as you want, but there’s nothing else I can tell you

now. Please. I need to see how Shane is.”

The cop nodded. “Okay. Just give me your details so we can contact you.”

“Sure.” Ben reeled them off automatically, cell, home number, work number…

“The work number—it’s not the bar?”

“No. Shane and I inherited the bar from my father, but I’m an accountant at

Mulholland and Barnes. I don’t think I’ll be there tomorrow, but you might need it, I

guess.”

There was a subtle shift in the cop’s expression, as if being an accountant meant

Ben suddenly deserved better treatment or was more credible as a witness. It was

ridiculous and wrong, but Ben had no compunction about using it to his advantage.

He pulled his keys out of his pocket. “Okay, I’m going then. Vin, do you need

a…” His words trailed off as he stared at the keys he held. The keys to a burned-out

piece of scrap metal. “Oh God.”

The cop patted his shoulder, some sympathy showing now. “Yeah, guess you’re

the one needing a ride, huh?”

The Square Peg

221

“I’ll take him home,” Vin said, stepping close to Ben, Shelly moving to Ben’s other

side. He felt their concern and loyalty warm him, but it was a distant heat. He was

shivering, chilled to the bone. Even knowing it was shock didn’t help. He ached for

Shane. The desolation in Shane’s eyes, the loss that was so much worse for him than for

Ben…

“Hurry,” Ben said. “Please. I need to get clean, or they won’t let me see him.”

“They will.” Shelly slid her arm around him, and the three of them walked to

Vin’s van, luckily parked on the street for once. “I’ll see you both at the hospital.”

“You don’t need to come, either of you,” Ben said.

Vin snorted. “Shane might be your boyfriend—and trust me; that wasn’t a big

surprise—but he’s been our friend for longer. We’re going.” He sniffed his sleeve and

grimaced. “Don’t use all the hot water. You’re not the only one who stinks.”

Ben felt as if he was in a daze as they drove home. He was glad beyond belief that

Vin had been living with him, had a key, and knew where everything was. He wouldn’t

have been capable just then of giving directions. Vin kept throwing concerned glances

in his direction, but he didn’t have the brain power to be reassuring. All he wanted was

to get the smoke and ash washed off him and to get himself into some clean clothes.

“Go,” Vin said, propelling him toward the bathroom. “I’ll be ready when you

are.”

The hot water pouring over him made Ben shake; all the adrenaline that had been

coursing through him had fled, leaving him numb. Low blood sugar, he thought. He

could barely manage shampoo and soap, but he concentrated on doing at least a

cursory job, then let it go. He couldn’t worry about any of it now—all that mattered was

that he pass for clean.

There was a scrape on his cheekbone, he noticed when he looked in the mirror.

He’d already let the towel fall to the floor after scrubbing it over his skin, and he walked

out into the hallway, then his bedroom without thinking about the fact that he was

naked. Vin was in the kitchen running water. Ben pulled on some clothes and went out

222

Jane Davitt & Alexa Snow

to find Vin, who had left a couple of wadded dish towels in the sink and had a clean

face and hands and damp hair.

“I just scrubbed up here,” Vin said. “I didn’t think you’d want to wait. Here, take

this.” He pushed a granola bar into Ben’s hand. “Are you ready to go?”

“Yeah.”

The ride to the hospital and the walk from the parking garage felt like some sick

dream. None of this was real, was it? They stopped at the front desk, and Ben was

completely unable to communicate with the woman sitting there; thank goodness for

Vin, who took care of everything and led him upstairs to Shane’s room.

Standing in the doorway, looking at Shane lying pale and motionless but alive on

the hospital bed, Ben could finally breathe. He didn’t know how he got from there to

the bed, but he was sitting in a chair and holding Shane’s hand.

“Shane?” God, he sounded awful even to his own ears, and he should just let

Shane rest. But he needed some kind of acknowledgment.

“Benedict.” His name was a ragged whisper, separated into syllables, but it was

accompanied by a squeeze from Shane’s fingers that was reassuringly strong.

“Can’t…fucking…talk. Hurts.”

“So don’t talk. Jesus.”

“Hey.” Vin walked over to stand at the other side of the bed. “You’re going to be

okay, boss. Guess you’re feeling out of it now, but by tomorrow you’ll be fine.”

Shane turned his head away, managing somehow to convey a world of dejection

in the gesture. His hand slipped free of Ben’s.

“Shane? Listen to Vin. He’s right. They’ve caught the bastards who did this, and

God, I know you must feel like hell, but it could’ve been so much worse, Shane. You

could have died in there and—”

Horrified, he closed his mouth. He could feel the angry words boiling up, born of

fear, not true annoyance, because he’d nearly lost Shane, and they’d only just met, for

The Square Peg

223

God’s sake, and that would have been so fucking unfair… And maybe Shane did need

to know how dreadful Ben felt, but not now.

Vin cleared his throat. “I’m going to let you two just—yeah. I’ll call Shelly, tell her

Shane’s awake.” He slipped out of the room, but Ben didn’t watch him leave. He

couldn’t take his gaze off Shane, who was stubbornly looking the other way now,

averting his face from Ben.

Ben felt helpless. Under normal circumstances, if Shane had acted like this, he’d

have dealt with it easily, and yes, it would probably have been the kind of solution

where they ended up naked. With sex out of the question, he was floundering. God,

was their relationship so shallow they had no way to communicate that didn’t involve

heated—verging on violent—sex?

“I can’t do this.” He didn’t know what he was saying. He didn’t care.

Shane turned his head and looked at Ben, groped for his hand. “What?”

“God, don’t talk. Okay, just…just lie there and listen to me.” Ben laid his head

down on the mattress and left it there. “Please. Please, okay? I don’t know how to do

this, and you aren’t making it any easier.”

Shane’s fingers slipped free of his again, only to touch Ben’s hair tentatively.

“You don’t know how it felt. Seeing you run in there and then… I thought you

were dead. I thought you were dead.” Ben couldn’t manage more than a whisper. “Do

you know how that felt? I couldn’t… Time just stopped. I was so fucking scared.”

He was still scared.

“Please don’t do that to me again. Not ever. I think… I don’t know what I’d do. I

can’t live like that.” Ben finally found the courage to lift his face and look at Shane.

Shane was looking at him with so much warmth and acceptance, and Shane was

beautiful. The lines on his face, the light gray of his eyes, the way his bottom lip always

looked as if he’d been biting it.

Perfect.

224

Jane Davitt & Alexa Snow

“I’m so fucking in love with you it hurts,” Ben breathed.

Shane looked surprised. That hurt somehow. It shouldn’t be a surprise to find out

someone loved you. They should have shown you in a dozen different ways, saying the

words with their hands, their eyes. If Shane didn’t know how quickly and deeply Ben

had fallen in love with him—

“Beat me to it.” Shane’s lips moved, the barest whisper giving their movement

meaning. “Wanted to tell you that. Wasn’t sure you—” He broke off to cough and

couldn’t stop, the paroxysm continuing so long Ben’s heart was thudding by the time

he’d helped Shane sit up, cradling Shane against him.

“You need to rest,” he said. Shane needed a shower. His hands and face had been

wiped clean, though there were traces of grime showing. But his hair reeked of smoke.

Even after his shower, it was all Ben could smell, as if the smoke had crawled inside

him.

“Need you.”

Tears, clean, salty tears, stung Ben’s eyes, but he blinked them away. “Well,

you’ve got me. They’re keeping you in tonight for observation, but you should be able

to come home tomorrow with me. Just rest now, Shane.”

“That an order?”

“Yeah.” He kissed Shane then, not the long kiss he wanted to give him, taking

Shane’s mouth with his, but a kiss all the same. “I’ll be back in the morning, okay? Go to

sleep.”

Shane nodded, his eyelids sliding closed, as if he’d needed Ben’s words to push

him over.

Ben stood, vaguely aware he still felt unsteady, but past caring. He had to find Vin

and reassure Shelly, go home to sleep, then give a statement. Find something for Shane

to wear, set the insurance claim in motion—thank God he’d kept copies of everything

important at his house—call work…

The Square Peg

225

He sat again and dropped his head into his hands, overwhelmed.

A hand touched his shoulder, and he jerked up. Shelly stood beside him. Her

voice lowered, but not whispering, she said, “You need to rest too, boss. Time to go

home. Vin’s waiting outside. The smell was getting to him. He doesn’t like hospitals

much.”

“You’ve never called me that before.” And now, there’s nothing for me to be the

boss of, he thought.

She shrugged. “I take a while to judge people. I like to get to know them first.”