Page 19 of The Mourning Throne
At least Morgan wasn’t screwing with him anymore. The teasing fingers and whispers had stopped. Now it was just the steady, soft press of Morgan’s leather jacket against Lex’s back, and the smell of that nighttime cologne; wood and pine. Cold. Like last December.
Why was this takingforever?
The music was low and muted, swallowed by conversation, and Lex was about ready to fucking snap. He had to physically unclench his jaw.
It was a last-ditch effort when he tilted his head.
He didn’t even know what he was hoping to find at this point. Let Morgan be pissed. Call off the lesson. Lex could deal. He didn’t care. Not really.
Notanymore.
“What about him?” Lex muttered.
The guy was easy to spot.
Badly dyed pink hair and big eyes that caught every flicker of movement. He sat at the far end of the bar, turned inward, holding his drink like it might shatter if he let go.
At first glance, even Lex had to admit he was pretty. Not attractive. NotMorgan. Pretty in the way a painting would be. But the longer Lex watched him, the more he seemed off.
Maybe it was how out of place the plain, almost preppy outfit, looked, or maybe it was the way his eyes tracked every movement around him. Not casual. Not curious. Just… wary of the entire fucking world.
Lex knew the feeling.
The ones who didn’t belong but came anyway—chasing something invisible. A feeling. A fix. A fuckingreason. He’d been that kid. Once. Long ago. Drowning all of himself in alcohol, praying for shit to get better even if he never put in the effort.
But this guy? He wasn’t some drunk on the hunt for a hookup.
He was waiting for something. Or someone.
“Tell me why,” Morgan murmured, low and amused.
“He looks… lost.”
Maybelostwasn’t the right word, but it was the best Lex could come up with on the spot.
The guy looked like someone without a home.
Morgan purred, and the sound was so close it felt like touch. “Good boy. Let’s go say hello.”
They didn’t pounce.
That was important.
Lex concentrated on the music he could hear, going through the possible one-liners in his head, but Morgan moved through the crowd like nothing wasgood enoughto touch him.
Slow. Measured. Wearing that blank, disinterested expression that made people lean in without knowing why—desperate to be the exception. To be noticed.
As bad as Lexwantedthat same kind of style, it wasn’t his. He couldn’t mimic that shit when he was brimming with energy, bouncing on his heels as he leaned on the bar.
Flirting was the easy part. He’d done it a million times in New York.
He’d also seen Morgan’s approach too many times to count—had watched how his sharpness cut deeper than the knife, how he went too hard too fast and left people breathless or screaming.
That wasn’t going to work here.
Not with the one Lex had chosen.
The guyradiatedsoftness.
