Page 27 of Imperfect Skin

Mouse followed me out to the car, moving slowly. I’d checked the welts that Doc hadn’t covered in bandages this morning when we’d woken up. The smaller ones were already starting to scab over, but the deep bruising was starting to come out. I could tell Mouse was feeling it today as we got in the car.

“You doing okay?” I asked as I buckled my seat belt. Mouse did the same, but slower.

“Just peachy,” he huffed out, sitting forwards in his seat. It was only a fifteen-minute drive to Tewsbury, but I had a feeling it was going to feel a damn sight longer for Mouse.

For the first few miles Mouse was quiet, and I thought he’d fallen asleep until he spoke.

“Are we going to talk about last night?”

“We are, but I wasn’t going to push you about it. It’s your story to tell,” I answered, not taking my eyes off the road.

Mouse let out a frustrated growl. “Not about the Ziggy shit. I know I fucked up there. I mean about us.”

I tried not to smile. “What do you mean, little Mouse?”

“Argh, that—that’s what I mean. Since when have I been little Mouse? Since when did you talk to me like I was more than just Simon’s annoying kid brother, or the guy who worked in the studio with you? You punched Ziggy! You did that for me! You kissed my head and held me all fucking night. I can’t pretend this doesn’t mean something to me. I can’t go back to hiding how I feel.” Mouse spoke quickly, as if he was afraid he wouldn’t get the words out.

“Slow down and breathe for me.” I took my hand from the wheel and reached out for Mouse’s, giving it a quick, reassuring squeeze before I placed my hand back on the wheel. “I punched Ziggy and I’d do it again in a heartbeat. You are worth more than that scumbag or those assholes at The Pit. The thought of you going there, letting those fucking lowlifes touch you…” I couldn’t keep the anger from my voice. I wasn’t angry at Mouse, I was angry at the circumstances and the people who’d made him feel like he wasn’t worth common decency or respect, or love.

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Mouse wipe his eyes roughly with the sleeve of his hoodie. I wanted to pull the car over and drag him into my lap, but I couldn’t. For one thing we needed to talk about things, and for another there was nowhere on this damn stretch of road for me to do it.

“I need it though—the pain, the stuff I did there.” Mouse’s voice was quiet and with a quick glance I could see him curling in on himself, throwing that damn wall up between us again.

Not on my fucking watch. No way.

The turn-off to Tewsbury Manor was coming up, the wide tree-lined lane devoid of any traffic this early on a Saturday morning. I turned the car quickly up the lane, pulling off to the side and killing the engine.

“Mouse, look at me please.” I unstrapped my seat belt and turned in the seat to face him, waiting for him to turn away from the window. “I was going to wait until we got back home to have this conversation, but I reckon we need to have it now, before you get stuck in that head of yours.”

I saw some of the tension drop from Mouse’s shoulders as he turned from the view of manicured parkland to look at me.

“What do you think is going to scare me off? The fact you like pain, or that you nearly called me Daddy a couple of times last night?”

Mouse ducked his head, the grey hood of his hoodie slipping over his head. “Don’t just need pain. I like it, and calling you, you know, that name, can’t be held against me. I was fucked up last night,” he said, his long fingers tugging at the cord of his hoodie nervously, pulling the hood forwards trying to hide himself.

“Hmm. But what if I wanted you to call me that again? What if I wanted to give you what those fuckers at The Pit couldn’t, but do it proper? There’d be rules and safe words and aftercare. You’d get what you needed.”

Mouse looked up, and I could see the idea shocked him. “What would you get out of it?”

“Everything. I’ve not had a proper sub of my own for years. Well, not since Alice was born.”

Mouse tilted his head, assessing me as if he was seeing me—the real me—for the first time. “What about everyone else? Work, Alice, my brother? Would this just be a friends with beatings kind of thing?”

I had to stifle a snort. Friends with beatings was a rather apt description. “It’s not Simon or Rhys’s business. It’s up to you if you choose to tell them. I’m not ashamed of how I feel about you. I’ve just been a bit thick-headed myself, wondering why you’d want a grey-haired, old grump like me in the first place.”

I stretched my arm out over the gap between us, not expecting Mouse to take it and happily surprised when he linked his slim fingers through mine.

He sat up, his brow furrowed and those kissable lips of his fixed in a pout. “You’re joking, right? Don’t you know you have half the town wanting to shag you?”

“Well, I can’t say I’m aware of that. When we get back home, we’re going to sit down and have a real talk—nothing hidden, cards-on-the-table kind of thing. But for now, just know I’m not doing this out of pity or some hero complex.” I gave Mouse’s hand another squeeze, which he returned.

“Do we have to go to Doc’s?”

“Yes. I don’t want to catch hell from the grumpy bastard for not getting you there. Be a good boy for me and talk to him, let him check your back over, and reassure himself you’re not going to hop the twig anytime soon.”

Mouse snickered. “Who says hop the twig?”

I put the car in drive and pulled back onto the main road with Mouse still snickering. “I do, thank you very much! Careful now, you don’t want another tally mark to your name.”

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