Page 112 of Seth
“I doubt that,” Gustavo smirked, “but you’re welcome.”
Seth stepped out of the car and entered his villa. The mirrored corridor greeted him with multiplied images of his ashen face and bloody-red eyes. His eyelids were inflamed, and red trails colored his cheeks.
He entered the kitchen, then stumbled back, every cell of his body demanded he flee. But it was too late.
Ignaz darted to him, grabbed his hand. Seth turned his face away.
“What’s with your eyes?”
Seth didn’t answer. He couldn’t think of anything he wanted less than talking or listening to excuses. He had heard enough of them in his life to ever find them entertaining.
“Let go.”
“You smell like gasoline.” Ignaz lifted his hand to his nose and sniffed. “You are drenched in it…”
“Let go…” Seth repeated, avoiding looking him in the eye. He wanted to tell him it wasn’t his business, but words stuck in his throat. He yanked his hand away and rushed upstairs. Undressing on his way, he crumpled the clothes and tossed them in a bucket as soon as he entered the bathroom.
“Won’t you even listen?” Ignaz’s voice broke. Seth knew he was crying again, but his tears didn’t touch him anymore.
“No…” he said and undid his jeans.
“This isn’t fair.” Ignaz’s words stopped his fingers. He slowly turned to see indignation on the beautiful face. Ignaz’s chin trembled, but he fought back his tears. “You weren’t here. No one was. I didn’t even know if you were alive. No one told me. I needed something to distract me from thinking, or I was going to… You didn’t call. I was scared. I needed pain. Why didn’t you call?”
He scratched his wrist and lowered his face, hiding behind his hair.
Seth swallowed against the lump in his throat, thinking that he’d always known that Ignaz was hollow and that only in math did a negative multiplied by a negative equal a positive. In real life, it never had. He didn’t know why he had ignored this rule and let Ignaz enter his life.
He lifted his palm and touched Ignaz’s cheek, drawing the boy into his embrace. “It’s okay. Don’t worry, I’m not mad.”
* * *
Black vortexes swirledaround his hooves, licking his calves in silent gratification. Every swirl raised more and more ash into the air, eclipsing the sky. Gloomy and gray, silent and listless, the desert sprawled before him. Every creature disappeared, knowing what was brewing. Only the boy knelt on the sand. A layer of black ash covered his honey-blond hair. He looked like he couldn’t lift his head because of its weight.
Set clenched his fist, and the Was-scepter swirled around his arm and crawled into his palm. It solidified, ready to serve its master. He thrust it in the air and rustled, “Let it storm.”
The desert howled, the boy at his feet shrank, hiding in his hunched shoulders. Set lowered on one knee and wrapped his arms around the subtle body, obsidian skin contrasting sharply with the pale human one.
Hours passed. Set raised one sandstorm after another, slowly cleaning his land of the filth of dead souls. When the vortexes died and the air cleared, Set laid back his ears to shake the ash off. He brushed his muzzle against Ignaz’s honey-blond hair and whispered, “Don’t worry, Little One. No one will ever hurt you again.”
Seth wokeuprobbed of breath. His gaze settled on the slender body, curled up by his side. He filled his lungs with air, closed his eyes, and smiled.Maybe, after all, Ignaz is the one.
During the followingtwo days,the shy smile Seth adored returned to Ignaz’s lips, but not his eyes. The boy had never asked for the cause of Seth’s wounds. Occasionally, when his gaze landed on Seth’s bandage, he averted his face as if trying to block the memories and chase away anything causing him emotional discomfort. Since Seth’s return, he acted as if he feared losing sight of Seth and followed him like an ever-present shadow.
Seth didn’t mind. Moreover, he welcomed it, sharing the same fear. The scene from the BDSM club still haunted him, making him seek reassurance in touch or gaze.
By the third day, when his eye color returned to normal and the obsessive need to keep in constant contact diminished, Seth ran out of excuses to postpone the first meeting with his new construction team.
When the leash of his tie swirled around his neck, a deep, depressing feeling returned with a multiplied need to keep by Ignaz’s side.
“Come with me?” Seth breathed out a plea, looking in the mirror at Ignaz behind him.
The boy sat on the bed, toes barely reaching the floor. He snorted, scrunched up his face, and shook his head. “And how will you explain my presence?”
“I’ll say I didn’t want to part with you even for a moment.”
Another solemn snort sounded like a suppressed sneeze. “They will fire you.”
Seth shrugged. “Whatever. I’m loaded. I don’t need to work.”
