Page 62 of Dragon’s Ending

“That’s a bit dramatic,” I said.

“Says the man who’s visibly shaking,” Dominic retorted.

I could have hugged him for that attempt at humour. He was still Dominic, even if I was only now beginning to understand why he was the way he was. Because if showing pain was what got a frightened little boy sent away, no wonder the man he'd become hid it behind swagger and attitude.

We headed for the shower, shedding our sodden clothing and leaving it in a heap on the bathroom floor. The shower turned out to be every bit as impractical for two grown men as it had the first time we’d tried. We ended up elbowing one another, and having to stand far too close to make soaping up easy. But there was no way I was leaving him alone in here.

He washed me gently in blissfully hot water as steam curled through the bathroom. I returned the favour as carefully as I could, fingers sliding through dark hair while he stood uncharacteristically still beneath my hands.

We eventually made it back to his room, wrapped in towels and finally warm. Dominic climbed into bed beside me, and we lay there for a moment, watching one another in the low light from the bedside lamp.

Then, quietly, he asked, “You really think they were wrong?”

I moved closer immediately and wrapped my arms around him beneath the covers, pulling him tightly against me.

“Yes,” I said fiercely into damp hair. “I really fucking do.”

For a second he stayed tense against me. Then, slowly, he folded in close, arms sliding around me.

The last thing I felt before sleep finally dragged me under was Dominic pressing his face into the hollow of my throat, as though reassuring himself I was still there.

Chapter Twenty-five

DOMINIC

I woke up cold. For one disorientating second I thought I was still outside on the hillside, rain soaking through me and mud beneath my bare feet. Then I registered the duvet that’d slipped off my shoulders, and Ben’s scent everywhere.

Except Ben himself wasn’t there. The space beside me was cold.

“Ben?”

Nothing. I shoved myself upright too fast, dizziness rolling unpleasantly through me. I reached for the bedside lamp and switched it on. The room beyond the bed lay dim and quiet, shadows pooled heavily in the corners. Opening the door, I saw the landing light was off, with no line of brightness under the bathroom door. But the records room…

I pushed open the door to find Ben sitting cross-legged in the middle of the floor surrounded by loose files and folders, hair sticking up in several directions like he’d repeatedly shoved frustrated hands through it. And in his hands—

My stomach dropped. That fucking piece of paper.

For one awful moment I couldn’t breathe properly. Shame hit first, sharp and instinctive. Then anger right behind it. Of course he was reading it again. Of course he was, now that he knew. Gold flickered in my vision.

Ben looked up as he became aware of me in the doorway, and his expression changed to one I couldn’t read. “Dominic.”

I folded my arms across my chest before I could stop myself. “Bit of late-night reading?”

His eyes widened slightly, and then I recognised his expression. He looked guilty.

“I couldn’t sleep,” he admitted.

I laughed once under my breath. “And revisiting my deeply humiliating childhood was the obvious solution?”

Anger flashed across his face, and when he met my eyes, he was red-hot with fury.

“Dominic,” he said, very carefully, “I was trying to decide whether to burn it.”

Everything inside me stopped. Even the constant restless hum beneath my skin that never entirely disappeared. I stared at him.

Ben looked back down at the paper in his hands, expression tightening. “I know I shouldn’t,” he said quietly. “They’re records. They matter. But I keep reading this bloody thing, trying to understand how anyone thought this was acceptable, and I can’t do it.”

His fingers tightened slightly on the page.