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Levi laughed. It was short and sharp and genuinely amused, nothing like his other laughs, which were either teasing or sardonic. Ben found he liked this laugh the best. Which was ridiculous. He shouldn’t have a favorite of Levi’s laughs; he shouldn’t give a shit about them.

“I hate it too,” Levi admitted. “But I keep trying it. Sometimes it works, and my brain actually shuts up.”

“This will do that better than sitting still listening to Tibetan chanting,” Ben said. It earned him a look that suggested Ben had no clue what meditation was these days, which was fine by him. His therapist tried to make him download an app that would talk him through grounding exercises. He had thought about firing her for that suggestion alone. The app had a cartoon cat that swayed in time with the music during a meditation session. Ben wasn’t going to calm down with the help of a cartoon fucking cat on his phone.

Levi leaned on a nearby tree as Ben stripped another branch off. “Are you sure? Because so far, I’m just tired and sweaty. There’s only one thing that reliably shuts my brain off.”

“What’s that?” Ben asked, too distracted by his work to realize what he was walking into. Then Levi smiled, smug and sultry, and Ben opened his mouth to take the question back.

“I’ll leave that to your own imagination,” Levi said quietly. His expression was so inviting that a dozen images flashed through Ben’s mind against his will. Pushing Levi into the tree and pinning his hands into the bark. Wrestling his pants over his ass and shoving into him, watching him arch into the trunk. His nipples rubbing raw against the rough surface. His moans turning to condensation as Ben pounded into him⁠—

A loud snap echoed through the trees. Ben moved on instinct, all thoughts of fucking Levi forgotten as Ben surged toward him, dropping the ax as he ran. He barely caught the look of panic on Levi’s face before Ben slammed him into the ground. Ben was so preoccupied with making Levi get down that he didn’t notice he was landing on his bad leg until it was too late.

Pain exploded through Ben’s knee. Ben yelled, and Levi jerked against him.

“Oh fuck, what?” Levi hissed. “Are you shot? Don’t be shot!”

“I’m not shot,” Ben gritted out as the familiar pain pulsed through him. “Shut up.”

He reached for the gun strapped to his thigh and looked around, straining to focus on anything over the pain pounding up his leg. There was a soft rustle from a nearby tree. Ben slid his gun out of his holster, a horrible suspicion itching in the back of his head.

A rabbit darted out of the bush, confirming his suspicion. Ben sighed, jamming his gun back in his holster as the rabbit sprinted out of sight. “False alarm.”

Levi sagged against him. “Thank god.”

His breath was hot and shaky against Ben’s cheek. Ben almost wanted to comfort him. But he felt like an idiot, and his knee ached with every heartbeat. He sat up, then hissed in agony as the pain swept over him, overwhelming.

“Whoa,” Levi said, sitting up with him. “What happened? Is it your leg again?”

“I’m fine,” Ben lied. He tried to stand, putting all his weight on his other leg. It folded under him, and he braced himself against a nearby tree.

“Shit,” Levi said. “Let’s get you inside, okay?”

“I’m fine,” Ben repeated, only for his protest to cut off with another agonized groan.

“Totally,” Levi said. “Put your arm around my shoulders, tough guy.”

Ben thought about shoving him. But they were out in the open. And even if the rabbit was a false alarm, that didn’t mean they were safe out here. Ben eyed the discarded ax and the tree he wasn’t even close to being finished with. Then he reluctantly placed an arm around Levi’s shoulders, waiting for him to wobble under Ben’s weight. But Levi surprised him yet again, holding Ben steadily the whole way back to the cabin, even when he started to shake under his weight.

CHAPTER 7

A week later, Ben’s knee was still hurting.

Which was fine. What wasn’t fine was how Levi refused to shut the fuck up about it. Every morning he asked Ben how his leg was doing, telling him about bath salts they could make the supply guy pick up, and carrying firewood to the storage shed as if Ben couldn’t do it himself. That was bad enough on its own. But Levi also wouldn’t stop demanding to massage Ben’s knee.

“You’re being ridiculous,” Levi said as he stood in front of the fireplace, which he kept burning from the second he woke up until the second he went to sleep, and bitched at Ben when he put it out before bed.

Ben glared at him from the armchair that had somehow become his in the past week, across from the couch that Levi had wordlessly claimed. “I’m being ridiculous? I told you I’m fine. You’re making a fuss out of nothing.”

Levi threw up his hands. His nails were painted dark blue and changed every day. He said it was because he had nothing else to do, and Ben mostly believed him. There really wasn’t much to do that wasn’t cooking, chores, or reading. And jerking off, but Ben refused to count that. He hadn’t jerked off since he arrived at the cabin. He’d started refusing himself because he was stubborn, but the more nights that passed, the more his stubbornness turned into spite. Levi wanted him to break. Ben heard him moaning through the wall every night. The fucker even had the gall to say Ben’s name. If Ben let himself give in, who knew where that would take him? Nowhere good. The same terms applied to letting the little shit massage his knee. Ben didn’t want Levi’s hands on him. Okay, that was a lie. Ben wanted to not want Levi’s hands on him. For one, it was embarrassing. And two, something that intimate was bound to lead somewhere unwise. Even if Ben didn’t give in, it was one step closer to giving in. And the longer Levi was around him—washing dishes at his side, cooking surprisingly delicious meals, and making wry comments on the cowboy books he was reading most evenings—the harder it got to ignore his propositions.

The worst thing was that Ben was actually starting to like Levi. Not that he’d ever tell him. Worse, it was becoming clear that Levi gave a shit about him. He was genuinely concerned about Ben, which Ben fucking hated. He was here to protect Levi, not the other way around.

“Making a fuss out of nothing,” Levi repeated mockingly. “Cool, cool, cool. Great! Awesome! Fuck me for trying to make you feel better! Maybe I just want my bodyguard to be fucking useful, huh? You can’t save me from shit if you can’t walk.”

“I can walk,” Ben snarled.

“Oh, yeah? What if some misguided environmentalist with a chip on his shoulder bursts in right now?” Levi went to stand next to the window, tugging the thick curtain like he was going to pull it open. “If he grabs me and runs off, what are you going to do? Because I know you can’t run after him. You can barely limp around to check the perimeter! You’re not even taking hot baths to help the fucking swelling!”