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Jamie placed his hand over Chris’s. “It’s just from Afghanistan…” he began, but Chris’s hand had already slid out from under his as he straightened in the bed, sheets pooling around his waist as his frown deepened and he saw Jamie’s body properly in the light.
“My God, you’re covered in them,” Chris breathed, his voice hinting at horror.
Jamie squirmed under his touch and grasped both of his hands to keep them still, lacing their fingers together.
“Yeah,” he said. “A souvenir from the Taliban.”
Chris looked at him with an unreadable expression, flexing his fingers. “From the beatings?” Chris immediately looked like he regretted asking when Jamie inhaled deeply through his nose. “I’m sorry, forget I asked…”
“No, it’s fine,” Jamie replied with a short smile, shifting on the pillow. “Some of them are from when my skin split from the force of a blow, like this one here.” He moved Chris’s hand back to the inch-wide scar above his rib. “Those ones got treated, glued up so they didn’t get infected. They didn’t want me dying of blood poisoning. But then there are ones like….these…” He moved Chris’s hand again, across his belly to his other side, where a myriad of tiny pale marks spotted his skin. “Caused by the sand. It was fine enough when it was dry, a little hard but nothing too bad. But when it was wet, when they pinned me down on it and I fought against them, it was like broken glass. It got embedded in my skin, cut it open and never got cleaned out.”
“I had no idea,” Chris murmured with a frown.
Jamie smiled again and brought up Chris’s hand, kissing the knuckles that sat snugly between his. He didn’t mind telling Chris. Really, he didn’t. Chris already knew the more intimate details of what had gone on in the interrogating room in Afghanistan; he knew about the tortures that haunted Jamie’s dreams, knew that his mind wasn’t quite healed.
But this was the first time Chris had really seen him naked. The previous times didn’t count—half covered with water in the pool, in the dim light of the living room on the couch, in the darkness of the bedroom. His hands had roamed all over Jamie’s body, his mouth had traced hard lines, but this was the first time that he got to see.
“I just hope I’m not a disappointment in the light,” he mumbled with a rueful grin.
Chris’s eyebrows quirked up. “Are you kidding me? Knowing that just makes you even more beautiful than you already were.” Chris placed his forehead against Jamie’s. “Which, by the way, was pretty much perfect in the first place.”
Jamie bit his lip to hide the genuine smile that followed the warmth of affection flooding through him. “How do you always know the right thing to say?”
“I don’t,” Chris murmured, brushing his lips over Jamie’s. “I’m just always honest.”
Jamie kissed him then, wrapping his arms around those smooth, muscular shoulders and pulling his body flush against his. It wasn’t the same kind of kissing as the night before or even the night before that—not heated or passionate nor curious and exploratory, but gentle, sweet. Jamie could probably even go as far as to say it was loving—it set every part of him aglow. They stayed there for a while, kissing softly, Jamie’s fingers running over the short hair at the back of Chris’s head, and Chris’s hands stroking down his sides with a firm pressure.
“Oh, my God,” Jamie groaned as Chris pulled back finally, running the tip of his nose up the side of Jamie’s cheek. “We are so screwed, you know that, right?”
Chris rolled onto his side, gathering up Jamie to lie facing him. “Yeah, I should probably start job hunting now.”
“No, you won’t,” Jamie said seriously. “Nobody is going to find out. Outside of this house, we’re going to put on the masks and we’re going to act all professional and nobody is going to figure this out.”
“No?” Chris pulled Jamie close. “We’re just going to hide?”
Jamie sighed and took Chris’s face between his hands. “If anyone finds out, then you get taken away from me. You get taken away immediately and I never see you again, and I can’t cope with that, Chris. I get somebody else—some goon in dark shades who doesn’t know me, who doesn’t understand me and who I don’t trust. I go back to square one, not being able to trust the person protecting me. I trust you with my life, Chris. I don’t want to lose that, lose you and end up with another Reiss…”
Jamie bit his lip, frightened that he’d said too much as he saw something flicker in Chris’s eyes.
Chris looked away for a second, then a smile ghosted on his lips. “You trust me with your life?”
Jamie exhaled in relief and rolled his eyes, the corner of his mouth twitching. “One hundred percent,” he replied. It was the truth.
“That’s a lot of pressure to put on a person.”
“What, you think you can’t handle it?”
“Oh, I can handle it.”
“Handle the pressure, or handle me?”
“Both.”
“Are you sure?”
Jamie’s grin was wide as Chris moved fast, grabbing his wrists and pinning them by Jamie’s head, rolling on top of him, knee between his thighs. Jamie gasped and fell still as Chris looked at him, mouth just an inch away.
“Am I okay to do this?” Chris whispered. He was testing Jamie’s truth.
