Page 11 of Hate Me

But it had developed into much more for Caleb.

Not so much for Asher, though.

No, he had his lover for that in his brother-in-arms, Jonah Keller. And he also had Aurora too, the woman who’d become their world, much like what Skylar Bennett had been on her way to becoming to us until things had fallen apart in such a dramatic and tragic fashion.

And now, there Caleb was helping them fight a war against a dangerous enemy.

He’d become a part of that twisted and depraved fucker, Asher’s, extended inner circle.

I clenched my fingers around one of the surveillance photos that Dante’s ally had taken of Caleb looking absolutely enraptured as he had Asher in a chokehold against the wall of an alley not far from the church the latter had frequented for a time, Asher’s jeans shoved down past his ass as Caleb fingered him. Raw, it looked like, judging by the clenching of Asher’s jaw and the clear pain warring with pleasure that was all over him. I guess that had been a time when the purging of Asher’s demons had gotten away from them both.

I tossed that aside and picked up another much more recent one of them at a safehouse, Caleb smoking with Asher right up in his space, so much sexual tension even through a single photo as Caleb looked at him like he used to look at me, adoration mixed with the ravenous need to devour every inch of him.

Fuck.

On the one hand, I was fortunate that Dante had managed to find a man on the inside to be able to help and get a lock on Caleb to ensure he was actually safe and well, because not knowing had been driving me insane with every day that had gone on by since I’d lost track of him. But on the other hand, there was this. Although I knew that nothing more would come of his relationship with Asher because the latter was devoted to his own foursome, it still stung that he’d gone there with him at all, that he’d found that connection in another, such a similar connection to what we’d had, albeit with the missing element he hadn’t been able to get from me near the end—all that darkness and depravity. Asher had that in spades. But I had been trying to move away from that two years ago.

So much for that idea.

With what I’d had to handle following the shitshow that had arisen after the cataclysm, I’d had little choice but to go back to it all. Murdering those vermin at that apartment complex a couple of days ago had only been a small part of what I’d had to do.

Basically, to keep my power and protect me and mine, I’d had to let the dark swallow me.

I still had my head above water where that was concerned, thanks in part to Dante’s assistance, but the longer things went on in that vein, the more that would be tested and I stood the risk of sinking down all the way.

A light rap on the door of my home office had me jolting.

“Cas?” Bastian’s voice followed.

I pushed out of my chair and went to the door, opening it to find him grinning at me with what appeared to be excitement.

It took me aback for a few seconds because I hadn’t seen that from him in a long time.

Since Skylar, actually.

“You look like a kid on Christmas morning,” I said, looking him over in just a pair of navy lounge pants and a gray tank. “Complete with the pajamas.” I took a look at my watch. “It’s way past your bedtime, Bastian.” He had a strict routine I helped him to adhere to these days and a part of that was ensuring he went to bed at a reasonable hour and got enough sleep each night. It was one of the many parts of his recovery plan.

He waved his hand. “Everything is okay and this is just a one-off. I was trying to wait as long as possible, hoping you would’ve emerged from your office after completing your work, but it never came, so here I am to drag you out—at least for a little while.”

I frowned. “To what end?”

“Just come with me to the kitchen and you’ll see.”

Intrigued, I simply nodded, then closed my office door, and followed him through the mansion toward the kitchen.

As soon as we rounded the corner into the vast space, I pulled up short at the sight before me.

It was dark inside, but the island was illuminated with the soft light of a couple of dozen candles.

Birthday candles.

I walked in further and took in the cupcakes they were nestled in, counting exactly twenty-five of them, each positioned in a circle on the counter.

“Are these—”

“Strawberry cheesecake stuffed cupcakes,” Bastian confirmed with a wide grin. “I used your mom’s exact recipe.”

My mom’s recipe? Fuck me, it was unbelievable that he’d done this.

---