‘Now this,’ he whispers, lowering his voice into something dangerously intimate, ‘is when you’re in the most danger andatyour most dangerous.’
‘Fuck you, you don’t know me.’
‘Becausethis,’ Lachlan goes on, unperturbed, ‘is when your ego starts to feel the bruises and you lash out.Then it’s always fifty-fifty win or lose.’Kade is insanely hard beneath him, there’s no way Lachlan doesn’t feel it.‘Do you remember what I taught you about this?’
‘I’m not who you think I am,so no!’
Kade struggles but trying to leg-wrap him has drained his energy briefly and the helplessness of momentary exhaustion is curling low in his guts, a fever-itch of irritated arousal blooming against his will.It’s the worst and it’s thebest,and if they were alone, something horribly misguided might happen.
‘Dig deep for me,’ Lachlan instructs.‘What did I teach you about pride?’
It’s like a knife to the guts.
Pride goeth.
That’s what he’s waiting for.Heknowsit.
Never once has he said that out-loud.Not one time.
Kade spits in his face.
After a few moments, he expects some violent retaliation because it’s a low thing to do and all the men he’s spat on in the pastreally did nottake it well.One of Kade’s earliest stab wounds is from this exact manoeuvre.But no violence follows it.Lachlan doesn’t even close his eyes, doesn’t wipe it away.
He wears the spit, uncaring, undeterred, leans down, patient as ever, and says, ‘What did I teach you about pride, Jules?’
Somethingfluttersinside.A stirring of delicate, skeletal wings, paper-thin like dead petals, but it’s aticklysensation and Kade can’t help but squirm.
‘Why don’t you remind me,’ he utters, breathless, just needs a few seconds to gather his strength, ‘Daddy?’
It works.
Lachlan blinks, taken aback, hurt, angry.
Spitting in his face did nothing, but that word got him right below the belt.
Kade throws the full weight of his lower body upward to knock Lachlan off.He grapples the former bodyguard, viciously wrestles him down and punches his face over andoveruntil it’s bloody, bruised, broken.
Lachlan puts up no fight at all, he lies there, taking it.
Kade can’t stop.
Pride goeth.
Yourmindwill always think it’s better than yourbody.Your body can’t feel pride, only your mind can.Disconnectthe two.Pride goeth before destruction.Alwaysrememberthat.
Pride goeth.
‘Kade.’
Pride.
Goeth.
He can’t stop hitting him.
A knuckle breaks.
His skin splits.
