What Matters Most (27 page)

Josh loved him, just as he was. Nick knew that. For the first time in his life, he knew what it meant to be loved, and for that gift alone, Nick’s devotion to his younger lover would never waver. So, if he was good enough—he didn’t think he was, would ever be, but still—

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for Josh to love, then that’s all that mattered. He didn’t need to be some chest-thumping Neanderthal proclaiming his strength for anyone else. Josh loved him. Simple as that.

And knowing it was true made picking up the phone and calling Chance Galloway

almost easy.

“There, that should make you feel better in no time,” Josh said as he patted Mrs Wilford’s weathered hand. He hoped he wasn’t lying; this virus was exceptionally hard on the elderly. Mrs Wilford was still in the early stages of the illness, so hopefully they’d caught it and could prevent her from developing pneumonia. She gave him a weak smile then closed her eyes, carried off to sleep by the drug Josh had administered through her IV. He waited until he was sure she was resting as peacefully as she could be given the circumstances then he left the room, hoping he could take a short break. He almost made it to the lounge when Cynthia, the head nurse, stopped him and thrust a clipboard in his hand.

“Go check on Mr Walton, then you can take a break.”

Josh gripped the clipboard and groaned which earned him a visual reprimand from

Cynthia. He bit his tongue and nodded, turning on his heel to head back down the hall.

Checking in on his sick boss was the last thing Josh wanted to do, and he glanced around hoping to find someone else to pass the case off to, but as short staffed as they were, he knew it was futile. Besides, Cynthia would have his ass on a platter if he didn’t follow her order.

“Why so glum?”

Josh glanced over his shoulder and spied Misty behind him. She looked as exhausted as he felt, and her question was laced with enough sarcasm that he snickered even as his stomach lurched. He stopped and waved the clipboard. “Have to check on Walton.”

Misty’s lips pinched tight and she reached out to thump the clipboard. “I checked on him earlier, the freaking pervert. At least when he wasn’t sick I could avoid being too close to him.” She rubbed at a spot on her hip, anger bringing a flush to her cheeks. “I don’t think he’s that bad. I think he’s just using this as an excuse to get grabby.”

Josh blinked and snapped his mouth shut. He gestured to where her hand still rubbed at the swell of one butt cheek. “Did he…”

“Oh yeah, grabbed a whole frigging handful and tried to keep it, too.”

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“Did you report it?”

Misty snorted. “Right. Because that would do any good. You do know his grandpa

gives huge donations annually to the hospital, and his uncle is on the board?”

“Figures,” Josh muttered. “That explains why the ass is still here. Anywhere else would have fired him in a heartbeat.”

“Well yeah.” Misty hooked her arm through Josh’s and bumped her hip with hers. “So how about I go with you? Protect that very cute ass you have so that wild man who did this doesn’t have a reason to freak out?” She touched a spot just above Josh’s collar bone.

He glanced down and groaned when he saw the edges of a dark hickey high on his

chest. “Damn it.” Josh tugged at his scrub top until the mark was covered. “That’s what sleeping through the alarm gets you, no time to check for stuff like that.”

Misty chuckled and poked him in the ribs as she grinned at him. “Suuurree you slept through the alarm. I bet that wasn’t what woke you up.” She burst into a bright gale of laughter as Josh felt his skin tingling with heat. He be damned if he admitted she was right.

The alarm had went off and he’d heard it—he’d just been too busy enjoying the feeling of Nick’s big cock slamming against his prostate to give a shit.

“Mmhm, that’s what I thought. So this must mean your Nick got in a day early.”

Josh had filled Misty somewhat on what had happened between him and Nick. He

hadn’t wanted her to hate the man he loved, not when he knew she and he could be good friends. Instead of snarking about the man who she once thought had beat him, Misty had been delighted for Josh and only a little embarrassed over her prior actions.

“I’d love to see what he looks like now that he isn’t black and blue and bleeding,”

Misty hinted as they approached Walton’s room. “Maybe we could have lunch with him soon.”

Josh was stopped from answering by Walton’s low whistle. “Well, look here, I get two pretty nurses to wait on me.” He tipped his chin… chins, Josh grimaced as the loose flesh swayed…at Misty and leered in such a way that it made Josh feel dirty. “Didn’t get enough earlier, Ms Malone?”

Days of exhaustion and stress made Josh less tolerant than normal. He set a hand to Misty’s hip, holding her still when her body tensed with a sharply inhaled breath.

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“You know,” Josh said as he squeezed Misty’s hip then took a couple of steps towards the bed and swept Walton with a contemptuous gaze. “I have to wonder if your grandfather and your uncle know how you’re taking advantage of their generosity and authority.”

Walton flinched and his pasty skin seemed to go even pastier. Josh nodded and walked the last few steps towards his boss. “That’s what I thought.”

Walton’s fear fled under a rush of indignation. His beady eyes hardened as he shook a finger at Josh. “You wouldn’t dare. They wouldn’t believe you anyway, if I told them you were just a vindictive queer—”

“But I’m not,” Misty spat out joining Josh at the bedside. “And I bet there’s plenty of other employees, past and present, who would be willing to vouch for what a pervert you are.”

“You bitch,” Walton snarled, spittle flying as he sputtered. “Both of you are stupid bitches! You wouldn’t dare!”

Josh wiped his forearm on Walton’s blanket, making a note to scrub his skin until it was cootie free. “We would. The worst that would happen is we would lose our jobs, then we’d sue and we would win. There’s no way we’re the only people you’ve sexually harassed.

Just think of the publicity…hmm.”

“Yeah, bet your family would be
so
proud,” Misty chimed in.

Walton gave them a belligerent look but flopped back on the bed without another

word. Josh didn’t fool himself into thinking for a minute the man had changed. Walton had got away with his bad behaviour for too long, but at least now he knew there were people who would stand up to him. Misty checked the IV’s while Josh carefully drew up the dosages for his boss. After seeing the man’s eyes droop he left with Misty, pausing right outside Walton’s door. His skin tingled and his pulse sped up as he turned his head and glanced towards the nurse’s station. Josh grinned and clamped a hand around Misty’s wrist.

“Hey Misty?”

Misty turned back towards him then let out a low whistle of her own. “Damn.”

Josh nodded as Nick started towards him. “Yeah, damn. Let’s go to lunch.”

“This day is suddenly looking a lot better.”

His heart feeling light enough to float right out of his chest, Josh agreed. This day was suddenly looking much, much better.

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“It’ll be fine,” Nick said, amused by the fact that Josh was clearly more stressed about this than he was. He parked the truck behind one that, in his opinion, was nowhere near as cool as his.

“I know, I know, I’m just nervous.”

Nick cut his eyes towards Josh and had to grin as the younger man twisted his fingers nervously in his lap. Josh was all tensed muscles and agitation. A closer look made Nick think Josh didn’t seem nervous so much as ready to spring should anyone even look at Nick wrong. That thought had Nick’s grin ratcheting up a notch. Who’d have thought having a protective lover could make you feel all warm and fuzzy?

“Quit smirking,” Josh sniped, but his eyes lit with the smile that stretched his pink lips. He unbuckled and slid across the seat then Nick found himself with an armful of strong, sexy man as Josh turned his face up for a kiss. Like Nick could ever resist that. Why would he even want to?

“Mmm,” Josh hummed into the kiss, sending chill bumps over Nick’s skin. Josh had made that same noise less than an hour earlier, except he’d done it with those lush lips wrapped around Nick’s cock and had damned near shorted Nick’s brain out.

“God.” Nick ended the kiss with a suckle and nip to Josh’s plump bottom lip. “How can I possibly be hard again?”

Josh’s delighted laughter only made him more so. “’Cause I am just
that
good.” Nick noted that some of the tension seemed to have left his lover—and transferred straight to Nick’s prick.
Great. That will make a good impression.
It only took the thought of Annabelle seeing him with a whopping erection to make it start to dwindle. There were just some things family didn’t need to see, ever. He cupped Josh’s chin and pulled him forward for one more kiss then Nick unsnapped both their seatbelts, freeing his lover first. “Come on, they aren’t going to kill me. The worst that can happen is they’ll tell me they don’t want anything to do with me.”

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“Well, Chance might be irritated, but that’s his tough luck,” Josh huffed as he moved towards the passenger door. “I have half a mind to tell him just what I think of his attempt to get you alone.”

Josh was referring to the phone call Nick had made earlier to Chance. The man had been insistent on them meeting, alone, before Nick tried to contact Rory or Annabelle. Nick’s newfound belief that he didn’t need to pretend to be someone he wasn’t just to make a good impression gave him the strength to override Chance’s suggestion. Which had really been an order, but Nick wasn’t answerable to Chance Galloway and told him as much. Chance hadn’t been happy with that reply, and was even less thrilled when Nick suggested Chance run that idea by Rory and get back to Nick with his half-brother’s feelings on the matter.

Nick opened the truck door but turned his head, locking gazes with Josh’s. “Yeah, well, listen to the other half of your mind then. He was only trying to keep his partner safe.”

“Whatever,” Josh said sulkily, and even that pouty tone made Nick smile. “He

shouldn’t have tried to keep me out of it.”

Nick kept quiet. He understood Chance’s motivation, but that didn’t mean he liked what the man had tried to do. Rory wasn’t a child, and Annabelle was a woman not to be trifled with. Nick shut the door and took a step before he stopped, his feet frozen in place. A man stepped from the shadows of the wide porch. How long had those he been standing on the porch? How much had he seen? Did it matter?

He quit thinking when his eyes met those of a big blond with curly pale blond hair.

The angelic face should have seemed out of place on a man that size, but it wasn’t. And Nick knew, suddenly and clearly as he stared into those midnight blue eyes, just why Chance had wanted to protect Rory. The man didn’t just wear his heart on his sleeve, he held it in the palms of both hands and offered it up, trusting those around him not to hurt him. How could Rory be so open, so…trusting, after everything he’d been through?

And all the internal pep talks he’d given himself, his bright and shiny knowledge that he needn’t be anyone other than himself, failed Nick utterly. He couldn’t hope to live up to what he saw reflected in Rory’s eyes, didn’t deserve the open affection and admiration so easily read in those depths. What did he know about being a brother, or really, for that matter, being part of a family? One where he was loved and accepted not used and manipulated?

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Nothing, and as much as Nick wanted to make a connection with his siblings, he also wanted to flee.

“Come on, baby,” Josh whispered from beside him. Nick shuddered and, gaze still on Rory’s, he reached for Josh, pulling him into his arms and praying he could absorb some of his lover’s strength.

“I don’t want to fuck this up.” Nick finally looked away from the man on the porch.

He cradled Josh’s cheek with one hand. “I thought I knew how big this was before, but I didn’t, not really, until…”

Josh’s smile was so loving, his expression filled with the faith in Nick he still wasn’t sure he’d earned. “It’ll be okay, you’ll see. Now let’s go meet your family.”

And with Josh looking at him like, the certainty in his smooth tenor wrapping around Nick like a warm blanket on a brisk winter morning, how could Nick do anything other than believe in his man? Nick nodded and lowered their now joined hand to his side as they turned to make their way to the house.

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Josh squeezed Nick’s hand as it trembled in his own. He ached to comfort the man, hated seeing the doubt and the crumbling of the normal self-assurance Nick cloaked himself in. Although, and Josh’s lips tipped up with the thought, Nick’s world had been tilted and rocked in the past few weeks, his perception of himself altered. The man really was something special, once he gave up fighting the inevitable, and didn’t that make Josh inevitable, or if not him, the love that proved too strong for either of them to resist?

So maybe he wasn’t inevitable—that kind of sounded crappy anyway, like a natural disaster or something—but he
was
irresistible.

They came to a halt a few feet away from the porch. Nick’s hand tightened in his, nearly grinding the bones together. Josh’s musings came to a halt as he hissed a soft warning.

Nick’s apologetic glance was followed immediately by him loosening his hold. Josh hoped the look he gave his lover conveyed his absolute faith in the man. Maybe it did, because Nick smiled slightly and nodded before turning to face Rory.

There was an awkward moment where both Nick and Rory stood rooted to the spot