“Just cut them off.”
Blake jerked his hands back, holding them to his chest like they’d act on their own. They trembled, and he tried to press them into his stomach to stop, but his whole body was shaking. His breaths were wheezing in and out from between numb lips.
…the thick grain under his fingernails as he hefted the axe for the first time. It was heavier than he thought. Rust flaking off the blade except for the edge. That was shiny, sharp. Phin had sharpened it for this. It smelled like metal and bark. Someone poured alcohol over it, and Blake wanted to laugh. Why couldn’t it have been a finger?
Blake’s limbs were filled with static, his vision tunneling. What—oh. He wasn’t breathing. He couldn’t breathe. He was staring at the corner of the room, the one taken up by that starched white coat. It fluttered on the hook, even though there was no breeze. Haunting him. Mocking him.
Ten. He would have to do it ten times. It would bleed, too. There was still blood in those digits, and it would hurt. Richard was strong. He’d seen his family over hundreds of miles; he wouldn’t pass out. He wouldn’t?—
Then there was sunshine. Two big, doe eyes staring at him. Tommy’s lashes were long. Thick. Pretty. Tommy once said he thought his eyes were plain, Blake had scoffed at him. Barely even glanced over.
Now they were pulling him back. Like the first breath of fall air after a sweltering summer. Blake inhaled deeply.
“Blake? Are you okay? You—we don’t have to amputate. Let’s try treating them first, yeah?”
Tommy had to say it a few times before the words sank in. Before Blake could comprehend anything. His fingers unclenched, and the tingling in his limbs abated. The knot in his chest loosened, and he took another breath, this time of the damp air in the infirmary.
“Yes. Let’s do that. I’ll need a bowl of warm water and some bandages.”
CHAPTER
SEVEN
Blake was not a morning person.
When he was a toddler, his mom said she used to have to pry him out of his crib. As a teenager, he missed the bus so frequently his dad started setting his alarm so he could physically drag Blake out of his messy, twin bed where the sheets kept popping off the corners every time he moved. Even as an adult, he had to set close to six different alarms, two on the other side of the room, just so he could skid into work at the last second.
So, it wasn’t his fault when he didn’t want to get up now. The blankets were piled high and weighed just right, tucking around him like a fluffy second skin. His toes curled against the crisp bottom sheet, knees and hips cradled by the mattress in a way that feltsoright it was nearly criminal. But best of all was the expanse of warm skin he was pressed against.
Blake’s face was smushed against Gabriel’s chest, his gentle snores the only white noise he would ever need. Gabriel’s skin was tacky with sleep, maybe a hair too warm, but it was such a nice contrast to freezing all day that Blake was happy to soak it up. To metaphorically bottle it up so he could hold it close when he was later stamping his feet and praying for summer.
Without opening his eyes, he let his fingertips wander over Gabriel’s chest. The dips and sprinkling of hair were familiar to him now. Gabriel had admitted that as he got older, his chest hair was getting thicker, and Blake nearly passed out with how the blood shot straight to his groin. Who knew it was possible to discover a hairy chest kink at almost thirty years old?
He never thought he’d see an alien, either.
Shifting, he pressed his nose into Gabriel’s skin. He smelled like Gabriel. An impossibility to fully describe, masculine scent that wasskinwith a hint of gunpowder and leather from his gloves. His hands always seemed to smell like them, no matter how many times he washed. Last night, he’d done a quick rinse off from the bucket in their shower, but it was too cold to linger. The smell of soap had been replaced by sex and Blake and sleep.
It was a smell he would forever associate with peace. With that half-awake, satiated, feeling of comfort in a room too dark to tell what time of day it was, so it didn’t matter. Time didn’t matter when your eyes were closed. At least that’s what Blake told himself as he tried to stay in that safe place. That syrupy, sweet place where his mind hadn’t fully come on board, and everything was delightfully lagging. Nothing was important enough to get him to move, except maybe the press of his bladder.
Gabriel shifted, and Blake could tell by his breathing he was awake. His long fingers buried themselves in Blake’s hair and began lazily scratching, working on the knots that persisted now that it was longer. Gabriel wrapped some of the more defined curls around his finger, a habit he’d picked up when he thought Blake was too deep asleep to notice.
“I should just cut it all off,” Blake said, words slurring against Gabriel’s chest.
Gabriel whined. “I like it.” He pulled on Blake’s curls a little. “It’s the perfect length to grab.”
Blake hummed, letting his neck arch as he followed Gabriel’s pull. “And the tangles?”
“I’ll be your personal tangle tamer,” Gabriel said as he slid down the bed to press kisses on Blake’s forehead, temple, down his cheek to nip just behind his ear in that spot that always made his dick jump. Gabriel laughed and did it again just to be a jerk.
“I’ll follow you around all day, combing through your luxurious tresses. I’ll get a bunch of little combs so I can perfectly coif?—”
“Oh, big word.”
“I read,” he said into Blake’s hairline, taking an exaggerated sniff of his hair.
“I didn’t know the manual for an AK-47 had haircare in it.”
“You know, just for that, I’m not going to offer to suck your dick this morning.”