Kas buckled over, seemingly unaware I spoke to someone else, drowning beneath his headache.
Jareth eyed me lazily before skating his appraisal over Kas, his cigarette dangling off his bottom lip. He slow clapped with sarcasm. “Well, I must say, I’ve seen better sex from virgins.”
Kas snapped upright, his arms falling to his sides. He blinked at Jareth as if he couldn’t understand. Then awareness flooded his face, and he glanced down at his naked cock. His hands flew to cover himself, cupping his length and touching a part of his body that always seemed to trigger his worst memories.
I sucked in a breath.
Jareth cocked his head.
And Kas howled as if his hands caught on fire. He ripped his touch away, yanked up his shorts, and gasped as if a panic attack had crawled its way through his chest.
Jareth sniffed. “Interesting. Still have that phobia, huh?”
Kas bared his teeth. “It’s not a phobia, you bastard.”
“Definitely something you should’ve gotten over by now.”
“Shut it.” Wiping his palms on his shorts, Kas turned and stalked back toward me. Planting himself in front of me, he turned to face Jareth as if preparing to protect me all over again. “What the hell are you doing here anyway?” His face etched with darkness. “Just so we’re clear, I don’t and will never share.”
Jareth chuckled. “Oh, don’t worry, brother. I wasn’t watching her.” His eyes narrowed. “I was watching you.” He glanced at me, giving me a slight nod. “And you passed. Gemma knows what I mean.” Turning on his heel, he added, “I’m going back to the house. I’m still sore from the ass-kicking you gave me yesterday. I either need a drink or drugs. Preferably both.”
Kas said coldly, “There are no more painkillers, and I drank Storymaker’s stock.”
Jareth cracked a grin over his shoulder. “You drank everything? Every bottle in the cellar?” Whistling under his breath, he shook his head. “Impressive. I’m surprised you’re still alive. Your liver should’ve given out.”
“It was over the course of a year.”
Jareth’s attention turned sharp. “A year-long party for one, huh? Tried to kill yourself through alcohol?”
Kas didn’t flinch beside me. “Something like that.”
They held the stare for a while, unsaid things flying between them. Finally, Jareth nodded. “I saw a few bottles in the games room. They’ll do.”
“I was saving those.” Kas took my hand, leading me away from the grave, his solid and strong fingers wrapped around mine.
“What for?” Jareth asked slyly. “To celebrate love? To drown your sorrows when you kill her?”
I flinched. “No one is killing anyone.”
“Not while I’m here at least.” Jareth threw me a pointed stare, stomping out his cigarette. “However, I’m not sticking around. So I suggest that you, Gemma, give up and go home and you—” He arched his chin at Kas. “Figure out how to touch your own cock without getting PTSD.”
He left before Kas could hit him, jogging into the trees and vanishing into the dappling light.
* * * * *
Jareth looked up from pouring an incredibly generous amount of amber liquor into three glasses, his eyes narrowing as Kas and I stepped into the games room. “Took you long enough.”
Kas didn’t say anything.
He’d been quiet on the walk back, holding my hand as if he’d never let me go. Occasionally, he’d glance at me as if he couldn’t quite follow the sequence of events since Jareth had strolled into his valley. When we stepped over the threshold back into Fables, he’d raised our interlinked hands and kissed the back of my knuckles, sending butterflies dancing through my belly.
The way he’d looked at me? God, it’d stolen my breath.
His dark eyes...changed.
As we stood barely inside the doorway, a decision seemed to manifest in his gaze.
I couldn’t move, couldn’t look away. Not because his eyes were clouded with demons and etched with pain like usual, but because they were...clear. So clear they almost sparkled with resolution, as if whatever had happened on the walk back had given him some light, some hope, some power to change things he hadn’t been able to change before.
It’d sent my heart hiccupping with questions.
I’d wanted to stop and talk without Jareth’s presence.
I wanted to know what’d happened to change his shadowy stare into one blazing with conviction.
I wanted to check his head was okay, that his memories weren’t too crippling, that he was still him. We needed to talk—to finally have a conversation about all the things we’d either ignored or not been brave enough to broach, but he’d just shook his head, pressed a final kiss to my skin, and guided me into the ivy-covered mansion where so much badness had happened.
The strange thing was...walking through the foyer to join Jareth in the games room had felt different. The house wasn’t as heavy. The walls not as cloying. There were cracks appearing. Cracks brought about by a cold-hearted brother who’d returned, somehow reminding the trapped brother to breathe. To step out of his prison and see that he could survive, after all.
Jareth grabbed two of the heavy glass tumblers and came toward us. “Here. Seeing as there are no drugs, this will have to do.” He peered at the redness on Kas’s temple from where he punched him. “That hurt?”
Kas shrugged. “My head hasn’t exactly felt the best for a while.”
“In that case, have a drink. Alcohol makes most things better.”
Kas cracked a smile. “If that was the case, I would’ve stayed drunk.”
Jareth turned serious, their bond sharing things I wasn’t privy to. “Not gonna lie, I came close to drinking myself into oblivion too.” His head tilted a little, the cords in his neck stark with a fine line of ink creeping out of his collar. “I know the reasons I stopped. But why did you?” He handed the glass to Kas, his jaw clenched with his own past.
Kas took the heavy tumbler, swirling the generous pour inside.
I waited for him to either deflect, refuse to reply, or plain just shut down. The Kas I’d grown to know didn’t do well talking about the past. I’d accepted he might never be ready to—
“I stopped because it was either death by liquor or death by starvation.” Inhaling roughly, Kas shocked me stiff as he continued, “It was year three, I think? Three years I lasted on my own, not knowing who I was or why I was alone, eating my way through a house filled with food. But then...the food was almost gone. I was forced to make a choice—leave or figure out a way to make more.” He kept staring into the alcohol in his hand. “I didn’t know the first thing about gathering or growing. So...I ignored it for as long as I could. Each time I’d finish a packet or empty the last can, I’d be faced with a decision I couldn’t make. I didn’t know why I couldn’t leave, but if I couldn’t leave, then how could I stay? How could I stay if I didn’t know how to replenish everything that I’d eaten?”
He sighed and raised the glass to his lips, taking a small sip. “The night I took my first drink was the first night I was able to relax and not worry about a future I didn’t even know if I wanted. I drank myself into a stupor, woke up the next morning, and did it all over again. I grew addicted to the numbness, the peace from horrors I couldn’t even remember. All spring and summer, I kept drinking, ignoring the fact that my diet had become stale crackers and copious amounts of vodka. I didn’t care I lost weight and grew weak because I had plenty of alcohol. So many more bottles than packets and cans.”