Sex & Mayhem 04 No Matter What (22 page)

Zara:
Talk to
me.

Ghost:
It’s
nothing. I’m nervous because there’s been some trouble at work.
Some drunk guy knocked the male nurse unconscious, and since I was
there, they are looking into it.

Zara:
Oh, no!
Will you be okay? (I’m so relieved. I was worried that you were
tired of me)

Ghost:
Don’t
worry too much. I’ll be fine. And no, I could never get tired of
you ;) :*

Chapter 12

Luca was hard
at work. He’d been doing odd programming and cover design jobs,
which paid to Ghost’s bank account since Luca had no work permit.
He didn’t want to be a parasite, even though Ghost made it clear
that he was fine with supporting Luca for as long as it took.
Fortunately, Luca had enough skills to start earning pretty
quickly. It wasn’t big money yet, but he figured that the more odd
jobs he’d take, the more people would know him, and the bigger his
portfolio would become. It was bound to work for him eventually,
and since this kind of work was fundamentally skill-based, no one
cared his formal education didn’t go past a high school
diploma.

And with Ghost
hardly spending any time at home, Luca needed something to do with
his time anyway. Despite Luca being at the clubhouse every other
day, he still often didn’t have any contact with Ghost for hours,
and he ended up missing him more each day. Ghost prospecting felt
like having him disappear into a black hole. When he’d come back,
they would relax, play games, have sex if it was a good day, or
Ghost would need ‘some time alone’, as he would say in a grumbly
voice that put Luca on edge.

Luca
consciously desensitized himself to Ghost’s moods, and even printed
out some charts for assertive behavior that he kept for
emergencies―when he was getting so anxious he couldn’t even be in
the same room with Ghost. His mind was playing tricks on him, that
he knew. Ghost was nothing like Frederico, and Luca needed to
remind himself that before he turned fifteen, life had been
different for him. He’d had friends with whom he argued and
bantered, and it had been fine. No one had hated him for having an
opinion or fucking up on occasion. Ghost was a normal man, not some
psycho.

But no matter
how much Luca tried to convince himself of that, no matter how
frequently he reread their past conversations, and no matter how
good he felt just holding Ghost’s hand, the constant tension in his
lover’s body was something he couldn’t ignore. Ghost wasn’t happy,
and by this point Luca knew better than to think it was his fault.
When they were together, Ghost was always more at ease, slowly
relaxing into Luca’s arms. It was the jobs he needed to do for the
club that seemed to wreck his nerves. Luca had hoped being close to
the club would allow him some insight, but no one wanted him to
know anything about stuff that he was not directly involved in. He
was trying to push, and even got Priest to acknowledge him, promise
more responsibility, but he just wasn’t there yet. On the upside,
he already got his test results back, and it seemed he hadn’t
contracted anything from Antonio. He’d have to repeat the tests in
a few weeks to be absolutely certain. At least that was temporarily
off Luca’s mind.

“Oh my God! You
know who’s coming?” Lucky’s excited voice pulled Luca out of his
thoughts. Lucky sat on the backrest of the sofa, but then slid down
to the seat, with his legs up, and his head hanging off the couch
between Luca’s knees and Nomad, who raised his head, awoken from
his nap.

Luca blinked,
and he couldn’t help but smile. “Is Ghost coming home early?”

Lucky’s face
fell. “Why would I be pissing my pants about that?”

“Er― I don’t
know, because he’s hardly home?” muttered Luca, closing his
laptop.

“Oh. I get it…”
Lucky gave him a big grin. “It’s the honeymoon period, isn’t it?
When I got together with Tooth, we fucked, like, three times a
day.”

Luca stopped
breathing and looked down at the smiling face. “I― what?” He and
Ghost had been pretty discreet. Silent. Unlike Tooth and Lucky.

“Come on… you
can tell me. You are obvious, but I’ve never seen Ghost hang out
with a guy the way he does with you.” Lucky wiggled his
eyebrows.

“I’m...
obvious?” whispered Luca. Was he? He didn’t think he was, or
Frederico wouldn’t have taken him anywhere.

“Not like,
obviously gay, but obviously trailing those puppy eyes after
him.”

Luca glanced
down at the polished cover of his laptop, unsure what to do. “Did
Tooth tell you?”

“No, I figured
it out myself,” Lucky stated with a wide grin, batting his
eyelashes.
Tooth told him.

Luca exhaled
and chose to let this go. Maybe he could actually benefit from this
conversation somehow? “How do you deal with Tooth being away?”

Lucky pulled
his legs down from the backrest to sit normally, and his face got
more serious. “I’ve got my own stuff to do. The barber shop, taking
care of the house. But when your man does time, you really learn to
deal with your own shit so you don’t go crazy. He got stabbed in
prison. I was so scared,” he finished in a whisper.

Luca’s lungs
emptied, and he slouched against the backrest. “Prison? Is what
they do that bad?” What
was
it that they did, exactly? Luca
had no idea, and no one was willing to inform him. Including
Ghost.

Lucky got up
and pulled up his T-shirt, presenting a wide red scar beneath his
navel. “Tooth was helping Ghost sew me up, and then he kind of hit
a cop. Any judge should understand why he lost it, but there was
some other stuff from his past, and so he ended up doing full time
so that they wouldn’t have anything on him next time. Tooth told me
he could see my guts and all.”

Luca already
knew the story of Lucky being the target of a gang of organ
snatchers, but it was still making him cringe. “But like... how
illegal is what the club does? Should I be worried?”

“I mean…
anything can happen, right?” Lucky shrugged and pulled his T-shirt
down. “You can go out into the street and get hit by a bus.”

“Don’t give me
that.”

Lucky rolled
his eyes and plopped back down on the sofa. “Who’s to say what’s
right and wrong? Laws are made by people, it’s not like they’re set
in stone.”

Okay, that was
a new side of Lucky he didn’t know. “Just tell me, how much I
should be worried that something happens to him, or that I won’t
see him in person for a long time?” asked Luca.

“He’s a
prospect, he has shit jobs to do, but they’re not gonna push him
too far. The Nails want him to stay as a doctor.”

Luca exhaled.
“Then why is he so upset when he gets back home? I’m no expert, but
maybe Tooth’s not giving him assignments he can handle.”

Lucky pulled
his knees up to his chin. “There’s all sorts of stuff that can put
him under strain. First of all, he’s living here instead of being
at his parents’, then as a prospect he’s probably doing shitty
chores. But shitty doesn’t mean ‘dangerous’. You have to talk to
him yourself I guess.”

Luca hugged his
laptop, staring at the dark television screen in front of the sofa.
“Do you and Tooth argue sometimes?”

“Are you
kidding me?” Lucky snorted. “Of course we do. Tooth always thinks
he knows best. But just because he’s older doesn’t mean he knows
everything about everything.”

Luca dragged
his hand down his face. As much as he’d always believed Ghost and
him knew one another, being together in real life proved to be much
different than being together online. They’d gone to the bathroom
without excusing themselves. They’d looked scruffy and still found
each other charming if they talked right. And while he still loved
Ghost as much as ever, there were things he had a hard time getting
used to. “You’ve known Ghost in person for a long time, right? Is
he the type to hold a grudge?”

Lucky didn’t
just dismiss the question with a quick ‘nah’ but took his time to
think about it. “Only against himself. After he lost his medical
licence he didn’t talk much to anyone and shut himself off for
months.”

Luca chewed on
his lip, and the warmth growing in his heart was enough to make him
smile. “He was talking to me.”

“Right. He’d
just sit in front of the computer for days. His dad was so pissed
off about that. So I’m guessing he was talking to you back then? If
you could get through to him then, I’m sure you’ll work out this
bump in the road. Come on, if he’s just being moody, he needs a
kick up the ass.”

Luca nodded. “I
just... don’t think he’s happy. That’s all.”

“Run him a
bath, give him a massage, feed him something nice, and fuck him
long
and
hard
. What else does a guy need?”

The rush of
blood to Luca’s face actually made him a little bit light-headed.
“Oh God. Too much information,” muttered Luca, briefly wondering
whether Ghost and he would even go past touching and blowjobs with
the stress Ghost was constantly under. “I mean… unhappy in the
club.”

“But that’s
exactly what I mean. You can’t control what happens there. The last
thing he needs after a hard day is his boyfriend walking around him
on eggshells and stressing him out.”

It was like a
blow to the stomach. “You think I’m stressing him out?”

Lucky frowned
and gave him a skeptical look. “I’m not a mind reader, but from
what I can see, he’s bending over backward for you to settle in and
be happy. I’m sure it worries him if it seems like you’re upset all
the time. You’ve got this… tense face. No offense.”

“Oh God,”
muttered Luca, grasping the front of his shirt. “I’m making it even
worse? What should I do?”

“Food, massage,
fuck. In that order. Just sayin’.” Lucky grinned.

A conversation
Luca’d had with Ghost some time ago rushed through his mind with
the speed at which he grasped Lucky’s hand. “I need a certain
food.”

Ghost:
I wish we
could talk face to face. It’s ridiculous I found someone like you
over the Internet when I live in such a big city.

Zara:
At least
we have the Internet :)

Zara:
I live out
of town, so I mostly spend time with BF and his family. But I’d
rather talk to you, even if just through the chat.

Zara:
You
understand me.

Ghost:
Everything would be better if you were here. I’d treat you like a
queen ;)

Chapter 13

Ghost arrived
at Tooth’s house around midnight. He could have been there half an
hour sooner, but he took the longer route after he was free to go,
just to think of something he could tell Luca. Every day, the guy
looked at him with so much worry and anxiety in his eyes that Ghost
didn’t know what to do anymore to make him feel safe. The fact that
Luca hung out at the club, and even got a job improving the Coffin
Nails website was bad enough, Ghost didn’t need Luca to prod him
for stuff he didn’t want to know about anyway. It would break
Luca’s heart if he found out that Ghost was tied to the club
because of a debt he took out for him.

Ghost inhaled
the cool September air once he took off his helmet. Nomad was
outside, playing in the garden, which was yet another excuse for
Ghost to stay outside for a bit longer. He gave the dog a treat,
rubbed its belly, and finally went into the house. Tooth had gone
home ages ago, and he was probably sound asleep with Lucky curled
up against him and without any questions to answer.

Ghost closed
the door behind him and slowly removed his boots, his jacket,
warily watching the soft light coming from the living room. It was
a strange thing to have to explain himself all the time. When they
chatted online, he could always get time off when he needed and
they would both go about their day, whereas now, any time Ghost was
away seemed to suck the life out of Luca. Ghost loved having him
around, sleeping together, being close, but sometimes it was too
overwhelming. Not that Ghost could actually blame Luca. The guy was
in a new place, around people he didn’t know. Not to mention the
years of abuse, the fact that he was still nursing his hand, and
had to deal with the aftermath of the emotional and psychological
trauma Frederico and Antonio had inflicted on him the night that
should have never happened.

Ghost came out
of the corridor in just his jeans and a T-shirt, happy to be in a
warm home and hungry like hell. Luca looked out from behind the
backrest of the sofa and waved at him.

“Hope you
haven’t eaten yet,” he whispered.

“Are they
asleep?” Ghost lowered his voice as well. “I’m starving.”

Luca slid off
the sofa and walked over in Ghost’s college hoodie and the tight
jeans Ghost loved so much. Most of all, he was wearing a smile for
once. “They’re gone for the night, so I thought we could have
dinner together?” he asked, rocking on the balls of his feet.

“We don’t need
to whisper then.” Ghost smiled back and pulled Luca closer for a
kiss. There was nothing better than seeing Luca’s lovely face after
a shit day. He used to have the same feeling even back when he
could only chat to him. He’d turn on the computer, and everything
was okay again the moment Zara spoke to him.

Luca’s forearms
rested on Ghost’s hips, and he opened up for the sweet kiss. “I’m
not much of a cook, but I put a pizza into the oven when I heard
the bike outside. Hawaiian, just as you like it.”

Ghost smiled
into the kiss, even though at the back of his mind, he was worried
that this was just some new scheme to butter him up before ‘the
talk’. That being the quit-the-club-or-I-leave talk. “That’s so
sweet of you.”