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Lucas spotted them as soon as they were no more than a dozen paces from the entrance and quickly ushered them over to Snow’s makeshift care center.
“Ash!” Lucas shouted but there was no missing the tremble in his voice.
Snow gave quick instructions to Jude, who was treating a woman with a long cut on her arm and then he pulled Andrei in front of the headlights of his Lexus.
“I’m fine,” Andrei rasped, coughing harshly. It was a little hard to believe him when his face was streaked with soot and sweat. Little burns pockmarked his black shirt. “Got everyone out.”
“Shut up,” Snow snapped. He placed the earpieces of his stethoscope in his ears and placed the metal disc to Andrei’s chest. “Breathe deep.”
A hand landed against Rowe’s neck and he looked up into Lucas’s worried eyes, now more gray than green in the harsh streetlights.
“Are you okay? Jude is finished—”
“I’m good.” Rowe cut him off. “Sweaty and smoky, but good.”
“You got him out.”
Rowe looked at his friend, unsure if it was a statement or a question. “We got each other out.”
“Good.” Lucas’s hand tightened on the back of his neck and he pulled Rowe a little closer. “I need you both.”
Snow stepped back as he finished his inspection of the bodyguard. “Some smoke inhalation. I’ll put him on oxygen as soon as the ambulance is here and we’ll need to keep an eye on him for a day or so. For now, it’s probably best if he doesn’t talk to give his throat and vocal cords a rest.”
“That’s fine,” Lucas declared as he released Rowe and stepped in front of Andrei. “I need you to listen and not speak.”
Andrei straightened, lifting one eyebrow. The man looked like hell between his sweat-matted hair, puffy red eyes, and soot-streaked face, but Rowe was pretty sure Andrei could still take Lucas in a fight.
“I love you.” Lucas murmured the words, voice low, though the crowds of people weren’t paying attention to them.
Rowe thought about stepping away to give them more privacy, but Snow turned to him and held his chin, tilting his face toward the light. He jerked his head out of Snow’s hands, frowning, then caught the look on Andrei’s face. His eyes widened, making Snow look as well.
Lucas cupped Andrei’s cheeks, his thumbs moving over his face, smearing the soot. “I love you so fucking much. I should have told you that every day for the past year. God knows I’ve thought it a hundred times each and every one of those days, but I was too much of a coward to say it. Not anymore. You will never doubt how important you are to me.”
Andrei opened his mouth to speak.
“Ahh!” Snow interrupted with a wicked grin. “No talking.”
Andrei smiled back at Snow before flipping him off. The surgeon chuckled and walked back to Jude, who was checking on Geoffrey.
“I love you too, baby,” Andrei uttered huskily, pulling Lucas into his arms.
“Get rid of that damn apartment.”
Rowe shook his head at Lucas’s uttered order and stepped closer to them. “Don’t you realize you’re supposed to do all that heartfelt stuff in private?”
“Get out of our fucking bubble, Ward.” He looked back at Andrei like the man was all he saw.
“I’m sorry about our place,” Andrei said softly.
“I only care that you’re okay.”
Giving them what relative privacy he could with the crowds around them, Rowe turned to find Ian standing a couple of feet away, a smile on his lips.
“It’s about time,” Ian muttered when Rowe was standing beside him.
Rowe heaved a fake sigh. “Another one bites the dust.”
Ian shrugged. “It was bound to happen.” He snorted. “Besides, that dust was bitten a long time ago. It was just lodged behind a wall of stubborn.”
“Are we talking about the same Lucas Vallois?”
Ian wrapped an arm around Rowe’s waist and leaned against him. Despite the fire and chaos, the young man still looked his usual handsome self. Rowe hesitated for only a second before wrapping an arm around his shoulder and pulling him in tighter. Fuck the soot. He needed this as much as Ian.
“Yes, even grumpy Lucas Vallois can find love,” Ian teased.
“I guess it’s your turn.”
The young man snorted again and Rowe couldn’t blame him for his skepticism. He’d shown interest in someone, a cop who had haunted Ian’s every move for a time, one who’d been conspicuously absent from their lives for months. Rowe was reluctant to ask what happened with Hollis. Lucas wasn’t a fan, but Rowe had always thought the cop was okay. Even Snow had come around some.
“Was this an accident?” Ian asked after they’d stood there in companionable silence, watching the police and fire department descend upon the crowd and building.
“Don’t know yet.”
“But…”
Rowe tensed, weighing his words before speaking. “Probably not.”
“Was it him?”
Rowe’s gut twisted at Ian’s question. He could feel the young man balling his shirt in his fist as tension hummed in his slender frame.
