Page 67 of Collin: Episodes 13-15
Collin averted his eyes and meekly nodded when offered assistance to shower.
Later that night, with the lights turned low, Mr. Reevesworth spoke quietly from his bed. “Collin.”
“Sir.”
“What I said there—I was never angry with you. It was to get you to protect your eyes.”
“You made the loud noise and the light, didn’t you?”
“I threw a flash-bang grenade, yes. I needed you to protect your eyes so you could fight back when everyone else would be blinded.”
“It worked, sir. I was confused—scared—but it worked.”
Silence floated around the room. Mr. Reevesworth cleared his throat twice and slowly took a sip of water before he managed to speak again. “Émeric and I are never going to choose between you and each other, boy.”
Collin blinked back tears. Whatever meds he was on seemed to make him weepy. Or maybe that was just how tender and raw he was all on his own. “I wanted you two to survive, sir. When I saw you walk in…” He bit off the words. How could he explain the relief and terror that had filled him in warring but equal parts? “I wanted you to choose Émeric. We knew Mikhail was going to make you choose. He’d told us. It was my fault. But Émeric had ordered me to live. And then Mikhail said what he said.”
“Nothing Mikhail did is your fault, boy. And I was never going to play his game. It was a poisoned choice. If I had made it, I would have ceased to be myself, and whoever I chose would not have been who they had been.” He coughed and took a slow breath, hand pressed against the bandage on his chest. “I couldn’t let one of you die unchosen. And I had no way of healing the guilt of the one who might have survived because the other was sacrificed, not when you both love each other like you do, not when I love you both as I do. Any choice but all of us would have been failing the living and the dead.”
The space between them was too far. Collin had to touch. He crawled out of his bed and limped to Richard’s, lying down on his side beside his master. It was tight, but it didn’t matter.
Skin against skin, even with bandages and gowns, was relief. A flicker of the warmth he had lost kneeling on the floor of the abandoned warehouse flared back to life.
They were all alive. They’d survived.
Mikhail had lost.
“Are you sure you’re not hurting yourself?” Richard whispered, petting him.
“Yes, need this more. Are you okay?”
“Touching you is what I need.”
A sobering thought ran through him. “I lost the cock cage, sir. And the butt plug. I’m sorry.”
“I’m not. That plug is the reason we found you. And the only reason my men were able to take out Mikhail’s perimeter. We were tracking the GPS in the plug. Otherwise, none of us would have survived.”
“Really?” Collin raised his head. “You used a sex app to find me?”
“We cracked a sex app, technically the GPS data, to find you.” Richard suppressed a chuckle, hand against his chest.
Collin shook his head. “That means,” he stuttered and paused, blinking quickly with overwhelm, “that means everyone knows that you had a plug in my ass?”
“I didn’t exactly care who knew if it meant finding you. The app didn’t have tracking location, but there was a communication chip. We had to call the manufacturer and pull together a team, but we had you live on a map about ten minutes before Mikhail made the second phone call, which means my men were able to follow you as you were transported and be ready to move in and take down his guards. We weren’t fast enough to stop the exchange attempt, but we were fast enough that I could gamble on them taking out his lookouts if I threw the grenade. Everything after that was a hope, mostly that you and Émeric would successfully fight back or that the police got there in time.”
Collin’s body managed to find enough blood and energy to paint his cheeks red. “I am never, ever, looking at a butt plug the same way again.”
Richard smirked. “Émeric is rather proud of himself, or so Linda says.”
“You’re going to chip me for real after this, aren’t you?” Collin groaned. “And I’m crazy enough to actually let you.”
“Well, that was a short conversation.” Richard’s eyes wrinkled up with amusement. “I’ll let Émeric know.”
Collin settled back down with a groan. He wanted to flop and pout, but everything hurt too much, and there were too many points between him and Richard that weren’t supposed to be jostled.
Richard turned his head carefully and pressed his lips to Collin’s forehead. And that was all it took to settle him and make him soft.
He curled in and rubbed his nose against Richard’s shoulder. “You took a huge risk, sir. I’m grateful. I’m glad you made the choices you did. I’m still scared for you, even though it’s over, like I’m still back there, seeing you coming and terrified. But I’m also glad.”
