“Only once. We all ran soon after. Drinking blood was justified in their mind but being forced to eat human flesh to survive—that crossed the line,” Decker said wryly. “Amma and Abba and I made our own way. I tried to settle down and lead a normal, good life. Scraped together enough for a few cattle, and as soon as my life would calm, they’d return.”
Laurie took the bar of soap from Decker and scrubbed it through his curls, lingering before he asked, “Who did it?”
Knowing the taste of fellow human flesh somehow wasn’t the worst part. Decker pulled his hair aside, the smallest strands of grey dripping beside his ear. “This is what killed me. Amma couldn’t bear the thought of her son growing older. I escaped being turned for the first decade, only to be cornered by my own mother. I hated her, and I loved her,” Decker said softly.
The bathwater cooled, and Decker took the soap back and ran his washcloth slowly along his neck. The sting of four fangs imprinted like a brand and the sound of the whispered incantationrang rough in his ears. His chest was hollow again, like his ribs ached for the silent heart inside them.
“I could forgive the killing, the lies, the constant reminder of being surrounded by the unnatural, but I couldn’t forgive immortality. I took a new name so my parents could never find me and stowed away on a ship to the Americas with Willa.” His name was one of many, each changing with every life he lived—drifter, soldier, barkeep. Through them all, Decker had never forgotten his first.
Gift of God.
The bitter irony of what he had become and the meaning of what Amma named him wasn’t lost.
Suddenly Decker no longer wanted it to be only his burden to bear.
“It’s Dev. The name I was given was Devdutt Basu.” His throat tightened at the sound of his name curling from his lips. Once so familiar, now so foreign. “She called meGift of God,” Decker said, forcing an acidic smile. He wanted Laurie to know.
Say it’s a foolish name. Say it’s dead to you, like they are to me. Say my name, Laurie, even if it’s only to tell me how wrong they were.
Laurie softened, brows drawing together in gentle compassion. “There’s truth to your name.”
“Maybe back then.” Decker’s cynicism barely hid his longing.
“Even now.Especiallynow.” Laurie had that look about him again. The pitying kind that should only be directed at a kicked dog or a whipped horse, not a man. “Will you ever use it again?”
His heart thrummed softly in the space between them, drawing Decker in with the promise of blatant, warm sincerity. He could almost hear Laurie murmuring his name in a sleep-fogged voice,whispering it in the dead of night, welcoming him into the chapel with his name.
Lovely. Hazy. Unattainable.
A door slammed down the hall. Laurie blinked, compassion flaring to embarrassment on his cheeks.
Decker shifted in the cool water. “When I’m ready,” he finally said.
When you’re long gone and I’ve forgotten you.
Decker rinsed the soap from his skin.
They would smell like each other in the morning.
Laurie was silent as he steeped in the bath water. Decker had told only half the story to Safine years ago and she still didn’t say anything—only poured herself a strong drink and nursed it for an hour while he waited for questions that never came.
But Laurie wasn’t Safine. Losing family was personal to him.
“Do you ever wish to see them again?” Laurie asked.
Did he want Amma and Abba, or did he want overflowing memories that bloated and split like a corpse in the searing heat of truth? Memories couldn’t sustain a relationship that poisoned him the moment his heart stopped. The times before the lies, when they were a simple family, before fangs in his neck from the person he trusted the most, were over.
“No. I have what I need,” Decker said.
A sad smile creased Laurie’s face like worn paper. “You don’t seem content.”
“You don’t seem to accept your affinity for men, yet here we are.”
Clearing his throat, Laurie stood and twisted, snatching at a towel to fold around his waist before he stepped out of the tub with a stiff back.
Shyness didn’t come naturally to Decker. Not like how it did to Laurie. He moved like a stray dog, fearfully trusting and ready to snap at the nearest raise of a hand.
“It was a man—the reason you left seminary.” Decker accused him gently. There was no reason to keep quiet about it. Not anymore.
