Empty-Handed Heart Read online

  All the nights Niall worked with him to teach him how to black to his particular specifications.

  The sexiness of it.

  How he’d never blacked for anyone except Niall, because with them it was basically sex. Not even foreplay, because it was usually outright sex with them. If Niall had told him he wanted his boots blacked that night, Aden knew he was getting laid. Period. Niall had not just trained him in it, he’d hardwired the reactions into his nervous system and just like all the other countless triggers still lying in wait like vicious emotional landmines, he’d left it alone.

  Niall faced him again, obviously looking him up and down. “So I see. I—”

  A crack of thunder loud enough to rattle the elevator car startled all three of them. The power went off as the car jolted to a stop, making Etsu scream.

  Aden shoved his phone into his back pocket by feel and reached for her, pulling her close.

  “Sir?”

  “It’s okay, honey. Breathe. Just the storm. Building probably took a direct hit from lightning. It’ll come back on in a second.”

  Except…it didn’t. As he held his breath and heard hers coming quick and gasping, even as she trembled against him, he was struck by horror. “Ets, babe, where’s your purse?”

  “I…I left…left it in the room, Sir. Y-you…said you were paying.”

  Fuck.

  Niall sounded serious now and had dropped the thick edge to his brogue. “It’s all right, my dear, there are fail-safes built into the cars. It’s simply an inconvenience. They cannot fall. Once the power’s back on, we’ll get movin’ again, all right?”

  “Sir…”

  Aden felt for her face, pulled her close, his forehead touching hers. “Honey, breathe. Slow and deep for me, okay?” Except his own pulse galloped, nearly out of control.

  “I…I…” She gasped. “Sir!”

  He stomped down his own rising panic. “Ets, stay with me.” Except…he heard it. She was starting to have a panic attack, and the wheezing rattle in her breathing meant an impending asthma attack.

  Fuck!

  He hadn’t even thought to make sure he had her inhaler on him, because this was dinner, not the fucking dungeon. And he didn’t think to make sure she had it with her because she always had her damn purse with her if they went somewhere.

  Her fingers closed around his wrists, squeezing, desperate, even as the wheezing intensified.

  Niall’s voice spoke from Aden’s left, startling him by how close he stood. “What’s wrong?”

  “She’s severely claustrophobic, gets panic attacks, and she has asthma. Honey, close your eyes and pretend the lights are on. You need to stay calm for me.”

  “Telling someone to stay calm has never, in the history of the world, ever worked, Ade,” Niall snarked. Aden knew Niall was defaulting to humor, trying to calm her, but he didn’t know her.

  Aden ignored him and the rising panic threatening to take him out, as well. “Find the fucking emergency phone and call them and tell them we’re in here. Tell them they have to get us out first, and they need to get us out now. This is a serious fucking emergency. That she doesn’t have her inhaler and she’s having an asthma attack. They’d better bring epi with them.”

  “Right.” He heard Niall moving, painfully aware of his presence even in the dark.

  His mind flashed back to standing in the living room, blindfolded, and sensing where Niall was, from which direction the singletail would flick his flesh—

  “Ets, baby, please breathe. Just like you do for me in a scene.”

  “I…I can’t…Sir…”

  He heard Niall find the phone, then the handset crashed back down. “It’s dead.”

  “Call fucking 911!”

  He blinked as a cell phone illuminated Niall’s face, now all serious. “I don’t have a signal.” Darkness fell again. “And I’ve got less than fifteen percent on my battery.”

  “Mine’s in my left rear pocket.” He hoped Ets wasn’t paying close attention as Niall’s hand dipped in and grabbed it, thumbing in a code to unlock it that made Aden’s heart bleed as he realized Niall hadn’t needed to ask it.

  He knew.

  He’d always know.

  Niall’s birthdate.

  “You don’t have a signal, either.” He returned the phone to Aden’s pocket, his touch lingering on Aden’s ass.

  But that brief flash of light had showed him Etsu’s parted lips, her eyes squeezed tightly shut—would this be the last image of her emblazoned in his brain?

  Niall stepped close again in the darkness, but this was the teacher, the kindly, funny instructor who’d wooed his students, including her. “Etsu, keep your eyes closed, darling, and listen to your Sir’s voice. Focus on him and how he makes you feel.”

  Fuck. Fuck fuckfuckfuck! Between his own fear and hers, Aden knew he couldn’t do this. Not on top of everything else. “You need to put her into a trance again, Ni.”

  “What?”

  “You said it yourself, she’s easy to work with. Put her in trance again.”

  “I don’t know how that’ll work in this situation, right? And she can’t see me. I might need her to see me for it to work. Not like she knows me.”

  Aden pulled one of his hands free and grabbed his phone from his pocket, hitting the home button so he could find the flashlight. He pointed it at his face. “Etsu, listen to me, baby. Look at me.”

  She opened her eyes and the panic there unmanned him.

  “I want you to let Niall put you into a trance again, like he did in class. Okay? He won’t hurt you, I promise. Let him touch you and work with you.”

  She nodded. Her wheezing thundered in the dark confines of the elevator car. He made her let go of him and placed her hands in Niall’s, moving so Niall could stand right in front of her. He aimed the flashlight at Niall, not blinding him but so she could see his face.

  Niall’s voice dropped into the tone that made Aiden want to sink to his knees and worship the man’s cock. Deeper than usual, his voice smoothing like fine butter, almost a British accent instead of his normal Irish brogue.

  The tone he used to use on Aden when they were alone and Aden was about to get his brains fucked out.

  Had he thought he was over him?

  Not even fucking close. Not by a goddamned long-shot.

  “Etsu, I want you to close your eyes and listen to me. Are you listening, love?”

  Her eyes fluttered closed and she nodded.

  “You will not open your eyes until I clap three times. Understand? Say yes if you do.”

  “Yes.”

  He pulled her arms around him, hooking her fingers into his belt loops before he reached up and cupped her cheeks in his palms, his thumbs lightly brushing over her cheekbones.

  Of course Niall would do that—that’s how Aden had come to use the trigger on her.

  Because he’d learned it from Niall.

  Aden forced himself to stay quiet and not interrupt. He knew firsthand what this man could do, and if it saved her life, he wouldn’t begrudge it at all, not a bit of it.

  Even if he wanted to be her right now.

  Fuck.

  “I’m going to count, Etsu, and I want you to listen to me count. Every time I say a number, I want you to take as slow and deep a breath as you can and let it out again. And with every number, the elevator is getting larger and brighter. One.”

  She breathed in, but it sounded wheezy, shallow, rattling. Gasping.

  “You can already feel it getting lighter in here, Etsu. Two. As I talk to you, you feel yourself relaxing, relaxing, relaxing, just like you did for me in class, just like you do for your Sir. Three. Everything around you is fading except for the sound of my voice and how light and bright it is in here. Four. As you relax, you know you won’t even need to remember this later, if you don’t wish to. Five…”

  Tricky bastard, going up instead of down, knowing if she wasn’t in a trance by the time he counted down it could have the exact opposite ef
fect and yank her totally out of a good headspace.

  Aden held the phone steady and watched her face, watched her chest, listened. It took a few minutes, but by the time Niall made it to one hundred, her breathing sounded slow and steady and even.

  It took every ounce of willpower he had not to burst into relieved tears.

  Well, not completely relieved.

  There was more than a tiny part of it made up of lust and longing and pain over this man who still owned a huge chunk of his soul.

  Who was he kidding?

  Niall still owned him.

  He always would.

  Niall’s voice had dropped in volume, until he was murmuring to her. Aden hated that his cock was hard, like granite, painfully throbbing and confused and wondering why the fuck he wasn’t naked and getting plowed yet.

  Sonofabitch.

  Niall stopped counting at one-twenty-five. Etsu wore a blissful smile and was so deep he suspected Niall could give her a command to orgasm and she probably would at this point.

  Niall slowly backed her into the far corner. “You feel like you need to rest, love,” he said. “This corner is nice and safe and brightly lit. Nothing we say over there on the other side of the elevator concerns you, does it?”

  “No, Sir.”

  “Of course it doesn’t. You won’t even have to remember what we talked about later, or anything that happened in here today, if you choose not to. All you wish to do is to stand in this corner for me like a good girl, don’t you? You earned this special reward, right?”

  “Yes, Sir.”

  Aden swallowed hard.

  “Your eyes will stay closed because it’s so bright in here, it almost hurts your eyes to open them, right?”

  “Yes, Sir.”

  “That’s my good girl. Who’s your favorite singer? What music makes you feel happy?”

  “Jimmy Buffet.”

  “Right. You’re actually listening to Jimmy Buffet right now and silently singing along with every song. His music is filling your ears. You feel sooo relaxed and happy.”

  “Yes, Sir.”

  He leaned in and whispered a few more things to her that Aden couldn’t hear, getting Yes, Sirs and No, Sirs from her in reply.

  Aden didn’t care. Whatever it took. He slumped against the wall, the far opposite corner of the car, relieved that she wasn’t going to die there because he wasn’t able to pull his shit together to help her.

  All because he’d failed her and forgot to make sure she had her inhaler.

  Niall unhooked her fingers from his belt and turned her around, gently tipping her head forward into the corner and placing her fingers around the handrail that circled the car’s interior.

  “Just like that, my good girl will wait there and enjoy her reward. Every breath you take feels so good, so relaxed. You can breathe slow, and easy, and without any effort at all.”

  “Yes, Sir.”

  Niall stepped away from her, but still watched her for a moment. Then he turned and crossed the car in two strides, pinning Aden in the opposite corner. He grabbed Aden by the shirt with his left hand and hauled him in for a kiss. Then he grabbed the phone from Aden’s hand with his right, thumbed off the light, and slipped it into his own back pocket.

  The fist never left his shirt. Lips closed over his in the dark and Aden couldn’t help it, god help him, he wanted it.

  Needed it.

  Needed Him.

  His hands fumbled for Niall’s belt as Niall worked on his. They moaned into each other’s mouths as hands closed on cocks and Aden wondered how it was possible to hate himself and still love this fucker as much as he did, all at the same time.

  Niall sucked on Aden’s lower lip. “You have no idea how much I’ve missed you, boy.”

  “Didn’t stop you from moving.” Neither of them released the other’s cock, stroking, muscle memory taking over. He remembered how Niall liked strokes at the head of his cock, over the crown, thumb rubbing under the glans. Niall remembered Aden liked long, slow pulls, tugging, nearly painful and so damn sweet.

  “Worst. Decision. Ever.” His lips slanted over Aden’s again. “And I’m moving back for good.”

  That was almost enough to shock Aden into stopping this madness. Except his Mháistir’s hand owned his cock right now, and who the fuck was he actually kidding to think he could say no to this bastard who’d broken his heart?

  Aden’s other hand hooked behind Niall’s neck, fingers raking up into his short hair, fisting, pulling him down.

  It shocked Aden when he went. Aden released his grip on Niall’s cock and had to clamp that hand over his mouth to stifle his moans as Niall’s hot, perfect mouth closed over his cock and deep-throated him. One hand jacked the base while the other fished his balls out and lightly tugged on them.

  He couldn’t help but lick Niall’s pre-cum off his hand, either.

  Fuuuuuuck! He didn’t have time to think about pulling out, or that this was literally cheating on Etsu while she stood right fucking there…

  Or how hot it’d be if she was screaming with passion between them in bed.

  And she had said that was a fantasy of hers. More than once. She’d volunteered Niall to him as his hall-pass fuck.

  He planted his free hand on the back of Niall’s head and drove his cock deep into Niall’s throat in the way he never could with Etsu for fear of choking her. Niall took every inch of his meat, swallowing, quickly sucking the cum right out of his balls, every last damned drop of it.

  Niall didn’t move until Aden slid down the wall, his shaky knees no longer able to hold him. Niall rose in the darkness, and Aden’s mouth was already open, his hands reaching for Niall’s thighs as his cock found its mark.

  The only noise Niall made was a sharp hiss. He cradled Aden’s head in his hands, lovingly, not using him, but the equals they’d been the last night they’d made love before saying good-bye.

  Even knowing it was the last time, Aden hadn’t been able to hate him, and Niall had been…kind.

  Gentle.

  Tender.

  Just like now.

  Aden reached up and grabbed Niall’s hands, pressing them hard against his skull and pushing himself onto that fucking cock he couldn’t get enough of.

  The switch now flipped, Niall took over, the Master fucking his slave, reclaiming what was rightfully his and belonged to him and always had, and the tears streaming from Aden’s eyes weren’t because he was now nearly choking on his cock.

  It was relief, it was a locked door exploding, one he hadn’t acknowledged still meant so much to him.

  Who was he kidding? He loved Etsu, he did.

  But in his heart, he was still and always would be Niall’s boy. Even the memory of Niall tearfully saying “I release you” couldn’t melt that bond.

  It never would.

  Nothing would.

  He knew it wasn’t his imagination that Niall whispered, “Mine,” as he came, and it made his own cock, still hanging out, twitch with renewed interest.

  Niall didn’t pull out and Aden didn’t want him to. He ran his tongue along the slit, trying to coax every last drop out of him, inhaling his sweetly musky scent.

  Finally, Niall reached down, grabbed him, and pulled him back to his feet. More kissing, but Niall worked by feel and got him tucked into his briefs and fastened his jeans for him, even as Aden did the same for him.

  Niall kissed his way up Aden’s jaw to his right ear, where he bit and sucked his earlobe, his teeth tracing up the shell of his ear and then lightly tugging on the niobium captive bead ring still hanging there.

  The day collar he could never bring himself to remove.

  Fuck.

  “Room 1017, boy,” he whispered. “I’ll be waitin’.”

  “For how long?”

  “For as long as it takes ye.”

  Niall stepped back, the sudden departure leaving Aden biting back a call out to him to not leave him, forcing himself not to reach for him and pull him back.

 
; He heard Niall talking to Etsu on the other side of the elevator, reinforcing what he’d already told her, checking on her, whispering more things to her.

  Aden wiped the back of his hand against his mouth. If it wasn’t for the familiar taste of Niall’s cum on his tongue and the way the ring in his ear still tingled, he’d think he imagined the whole encounter.

  He swallowed hard, then startled, blinking as the lights came back on.

  Niall was staring at him, those blue eyes of his, his right hand resting between her shoulder blades, his left forearm braced against the wall and him casually leaning in as if he’d never left her side.

  “Bring her out,” Aden said.

  “Not yet. Not until we’re moving again.” His gaze focused up, on the lights. “I don’t want her to panic again in case we’re not out of the woods.”

  Aden started to reach over to the control panel to hit the button for the first floor.

  “Hit them all,” Niall said before he could.

  “Why?”

  “Because we don’t know where we stopped, right? We want the doors to open on the closest bloody floor to get her out.”

  Of course he was right.

  Goddammit.

  Like an ill-mannered child, Aden swept his hand up and down the buttons between floors nine and one, lighting every last one of them.

  The elevator lurched to life and almost immediately stopped again.

  The doors slid open.

  Aden didn’t have time to reach for Etsu, because Niall had already scooped his arms around her, had her moving, talking to her, stepping out and shoving through the people who’d been milling around and waiting for the power to come back on. He got her over to the opposite wall, leaning her against it.

  “I’m about to wake you up, love. When I clap three times, your eyes will open and you’ll see you’re safely out of the elevator. You won’t remember anything that happened in there except the things I told you to think about, the questions I asked you, the things you wish to recall, beyond that the power went out, and came back again, and I helped stop your panic attack.”