Chapter 9

Flix was always telling him to make an effort with people. That manners were important, and everyone should be treated the way Berga treated him and their mutual friend Bay Delmar. Personally, Berga thought that was an epic waste of time.

Which was why it was a bit confusing that he’d caved so easily and allowed the Mad King to follow him all the way up to his apartment on the twenty-seventh floor. He blamed the orgasm. It’d momentarily muddled his brain.

“This is…” Madden glanced around the open floorplan of the front area as soon as they entered, “not at all what I expected.”

The palette was pale blues, whites, and light grays, a sharp contrast to Berga’s usual all black look, sure. The kitchen and dining room areas were to the left, the living room with a large L shaped couch set in front of a floor to ceiling window to the right. The hall was dead center.

“I’ve never really thought much about it,” Berga said. “Flix designed it.”

Madden frowned. “Flix?”

If he hadn’t, Berga would have slept on the floor on a pile of blankets, no problem. But he didn’t bother explaining.

“Don’t touch anything.” He left Madden in the foyer and moved across the tiled floor toward the hall, peeling the ruined shirt off as he went. There was literally no reason for Madden to be here, but also no good reason he could think of to make him leave, so retreating to collect himself was the best course of action.

Berga kept his apartment spotless, mostly because he didn’t spend much time there. He’d selected a floor that wasn’t the highest level, but not the lowest either, to help prevent himself from conducting any sort of experimentation on the premises. His lab at the Bunker and at school served his purposes well enough, and he’d hoped separating work from his home life would help.

It hadn’t, but maybe it would eventually .

His room was the last one on the left, and he let out the breath he hadn’t been aware he’d been holding as soon as he was safely beneath the threshold. How odd. His reaction to Madden’s presence was…concerning, but more than that, there was the way he’d acted in the car.

And at the Academy.

Berga stripped out of his pants and boxers and tossed them into the hamper, wandering across the thin gray carpet toward his closet, completely naked.

He’d need to schedule a meeting with Bay. It’d been at least a month since the last episode he’d had, but this was the first time in years that he’d lost himself in public because of it. He expected a call from Baikal or one of the others any minute to chide him for attacking Academy cadets, and rightly so. The whole event was a blur, but he doubted he’d been provoked. It had to have been his fault.

Although…Madden had acted rather cavalier about the whole thing. Shouldn’t he have been angry? Those were his classmates on his campus in Retinue territory, after all. He should have punched Berga in the face, not offered him a ride home with a side of epic blow job.

He ran a hand through his hair in mild frustration, only recognizing the emotion after the fact. Berga was currently irritable and confused and he did not like it. Dealing with the aftereffects of the delusion was already bad enough, but at least he had an excuse .

What was the excuse for these feelings revolving around Madden?

“I didn’t know you could look like that.”

At the sound of his voice, Berga spun toward the door, growling when he found Madden standing in the open doorway. Nudity wasn’t anything to him, and it wasn’t like the guy hadn’t already seen all there was to see anyway, so he didn’t bother covering up.

“This.” Madden waved a hand in front of his own face. “You look pensive, Butcher.”

Berga didn’t bother responding, fixing his features into an annoyed glare instead, but that didn’t deter the Mad King.

“Is it because of what happened at the Academy,” he asked, tipping his head, “or is it because of me?”

“Don’t flatter yourself.”

“There,” Madden said, “that. You keep doing that, too.”

“What?”

“Speaking to me like that. With inflection. You only ever speak plainly—unless you’re working. Then you’ve got this scary maniacal grin and speak excitedly. Is that it? Planning on conducting an experiment on me, Butcher?”

“I’m not going to poison you,” he stated, exasperated.

“Why not? You already drugged me.”

“Accidentally.”

Madden snorted. “No, you drugged yourself accidentally. You dosed me on purpose.”

Oh. Right.

He rolled his eyes. “Is there a reason you’re standing in my bedroom, Madden? Because if not, I’d appreciate it if you could leave so I can—”

“Put some clothes on?” Madden took a pointed step closer so that he could fully enter the room. “That’s okay. I like you better this way.”

Berga’s traitorous heart leaped in his chest, but he was confident he didn’t let as much on. “Skin can stain just as easily as clothes can.”

Madden made a face. “What? Butcher, what does that even mean?”

“How long are you going to call me by title? You’re literally in my bedroom right now staring at me naked.”

“Too formal for you?” Madden took another step closer. “How about…Baby?”

He sighed. “Get out.”

“No can do.”

“I no longer have the energy for you.”

“That’s half the reason I can’t leave,” Madden said, then he dramatically collapsed onto Berga’s king-sized bed. “Managing you has exhausted me. The least you can do is let me stay the night to recover.”

“In what ways have you been managing me, exactly?”

“Seriously? No, thank you for pulling you out of your episode at the Academy. No thank you for giving you what had to be the most phenomenal blowjob of your life—”

“You flatter yourself too much.”

Madden sat up. “Why? Who gave better head than me? Was it Flix?”

“Why do you sound jealous every time you say his name?” It was an observation, one he shouldn’t have spoken aloud, but Berga was used to voicing his thoughts with little to no care what others thought about him, and didn’t think to censor himself until it was too late.

“Probably because I am,” Madden said. He pressed a hand over his heart. “It feels very uncomfortable here whenever I think about the two of you fucking behind my back.”

Berga stared, waiting for the punchline that never came. “I can’t screw someone behind your back. You and are I aren’t together.”

“We’re together right now,” he corrected. “And we were together in the car. At the Docks. We can be together in the shower in the next five minutes if you want.”

“I do not want.” He sort of did. Good Light, what was wrong with him? Abstain. That was his plan.

The blowjob didn’t count.

For…reasons.

It just didn’t.

Not only would getting involved with one of the Retinue members be a bad idea, getting together with Royal Madden Odell, of all people, would be idiotic. Madden either took everything too seriously or not seriously enough. He was like a coin with both sides, and could flip to either on a whim.

Sporadic and unpredictable.

Berga didn’t like anything he couldn’t carefully contain. Even his experiments had some level of predictability to them.

“I have no idea what you want from me,” he admitted. “And that’s a problem.”

“I’ll simplify it for you then,” Madden offered. “For now, I just want to spend the night here with you. In this bed.”

“You want sex?” He weighed what was most important. It was too late to continue his abstinence plan, so…Berga could do that. If it meant making him leave, why not. “Fine. Let’s fuck and then—”

“You look like you’re about to fall over,” he held up a hand, stopping Berga’s approach. “I want to sleep with you, Butcher. But I’ll count that as an offer to fuck whenever I feel like the timing is right.”

He huffed. “It was not, and no you won’t.”

“Stop me,” he dared. “If you can.”

“Madden.” The man was absolutely infuriating. “You do realize I could melt your insides, right? You wouldn’t even know it was happening until it was too late.”

“Yeah,” he grinned, “that’s kind of hot.”

“What is wrong with you?”

“Cute, coming from the guy who just threatened to turn me to goo.”

So they were both fucked up. Shocker.

Madden was right about one thing though, Berga was about to fall over. Those episodes of his struck hard, and he was feeling the mental drain of it all. If not for the Mad King, Berga would have bathed and been passed out on his comfortable bed already.

“You can’t stay here,” he said. “No one ever spends the night here.”

“Have you ever asked anyone to?”

“No, and I don’t recall asking you either.”

“Has anyone ever asked to stay?” Judging by Madden’s cocky expression, he already knew the answer to that question.

It wasn’t like Berga didn’t have friends. He had Flix and he had Bay. And the other guys in the Satellite were okay, too. He didn’t dislike any of them, and as far as he knew, none of them disliked him.

Just because they weren’t having sleepovers and braiding each other's hair didn’t mean Berga was a friendless loser or anything of the sort.

“Flix has slept on the couch before,” he remembered suddenly, uncertain when all that did was cause Madden to boldly laugh at him.

“On the couch? Not in the bed with you?”

“Why would he sleep in bed with me?” Did friends…do that? “Do you share a bed with Kelevra sometimes?” Berga pictured it.

And didn’t like it.

At all.

“Whatever.” He gave in only because it was easier than continuing this useless argument. As it were, if things got physical between them, Berga wasn’t entirely confident he’d be able to forcefully remove Madden in his current state. Better just to roll with the punches and plot his revenge tomorrow once he was recovered and had his wits about him. “Stay or don’t. I’m going to shower.”

“I’ll join you.”

“You will not.” Berga still needed that moment to think, and it seemed whenever Madden was around, that was next to impossible.

“Come on,” Madden insisted. “You aren’t going to be comfortable with me sleeping in your bed dirty, are you?”

“I don’t have mysophobia,” he stated, and that seemed to catch Madden’s attention, some of the playfulness taken over by curiosity as he watched Berga collect his things for the shower.

“Spit is okay, come is iffy—depending on your mood, and general germs aren’t a fear. So it’s just blood then? Blood makes you uncomfortable?”

“Blood doesn’t bother me at all,” Berga said. “I’m training to become the official Brumal medical head, and for a couple of months now, I’ve already been the Butcher. Blood comes with the job description.”

“It only bothers you if it’s on you,” Madden figured. “Why is that?”

Berga’s gaze dropped to the shoes the other man was still wearing, eyeing that one affronting speck of dried red on the toe. “Take those off.”

Instead of arguing, Madden got right to it, removing the shoes and even going so far as to stand and walk them to the door. He set them carefully out in the hall, out of sight, before returning. “Better?”

Not really.

That was another problem.

If they hadn’t been talking about this topic, he might not have even recalled the blood stain at all and that…was severely out of character.

“It doesn’t affect me if it’s on someone else.” Not entirely a lie. Berga didn’t care if other people got blood on them. It only really mattered if it was on him. “My idea of worth in regards to others goes beyond appearance.”

Madden lifted a dark brow. “Odd way of phrasing it. You’re saying you think people will judge you if you’ve got blood on you? I mean, sure, I can see some people being freaked out if they spotted you out on the streets covered in it, but otherwise…You said it yourself. Blood comes with our type of lifestyle.”

“You wouldn’t understand.” Why did he even want to? Berga stepped toward the door to the attached bathroom without another word, done with this conversation as much as he was with the man who’d started it.

“Hurry back or I’ll be lonely!”

He slammed the door shut to cut off any other nonsense Madden might want to say, and flicked the lock for good measure. Then he just…stood there.

Berga couldn’t recall the last time he was this drained, and yet…He felt…He shifted on his feet and rolled his shoulders, testing his body out. He’d developed psychosis at a young age, shortly after losing the girl in the pink dress, and there hadn’t been a single occasion since where he hadn’t felt like absolute shit afterward. His muscles were usually sore and the damage done was typically tenfold—mostly because the episodes could last anywhere from a day to three.

Only, this one hadn’t. He’d lost himself for less than an hour. The skin on his chest was raw from all the rubbing he’d done, but he hadn’t even broken skin. There was no loathing of his own body, or needing to avoid his reflection in the mirror because of the scabbing and dried blood making him want to vomit.

Stepping over to the large mirror hanging over the sink, Berga tentatively trailed his fingers down the defined line between his abs. He was a little red, nothing more, it didn’t even hurt to the touch.

Had it been because that idiot cadet had stepped into his delusion and scattered the girl in the dress? It seemed unlikely, considering it wasn’t the first time he’d been caught outside experiencing an episode.

Then what?

The only explanation was Madden. He was the only new factor to the equation. Berga had heard him through the ringing in his ears and the panic. Why? What was so special about the Mad King that Berga’s subconscious was willing to listen, even in the midst of hysteria? No one had ever been able to pull him from that abyss before, not even Flix.

And Flix had known her. Had played with them in the yard and come over for family dinners before she’d—

There was a flash of pink just over his shoulder, and Berga sucked in a sharp breath. He didn’t dare turn around, eyes locked on that spot in the corner by the toilet where the beginnings of pink tulle was starting to take shape.

Faster than he could blink, he twisted the lock and yanked the door open, the beginnings of that familiar anxiety creeping over him, causing him to break out in goosebumps.

Madden’s eyes widened from where he was now standing by the end table, flipping through one of Berga’s medical magazines.

“Get in here,” he hardly recognized his own voice. It was too deep, too desperate, and his hand tightened on the handle of the door, afraid he’d be rejected. Flix always told him he needed to be nicer to people if he expected them to do him favors. Had he been rude to Madden earlier? Would the Mad King refuse now?

Madden tossed the magazine carelessly onto the bed and headed toward him, tugging his shirt up over his head in the process. He dropped that with little care as well, then started on the button of his military-issue pants.

Which were sexy, now that Berga was thinking about it. That whole “man in uniform” thing kind of made sense for the first time ever.

He was naked by the time he reached him, and Madden pressed a gentle palm against Berga’s stomach, easing him backward into the room. He followed after, shutting the door behind him so they were sealed into the bathroom alone. But then he stopped as though waiting for Berga to make the next move.

Berga didn’t want that. If he was left to his own devices, the girl in pink would return and he’d—

“Do something,” he demanded, hands tightening into fists at his sides. This was pathetic.

“What do you want me to do?” Madden asked.

“Anything.” Yeah, super pathetic. But he could still make out a speck of pink from the corner of his eye and he was more afraid of that than anything the Mad King could potentially do.

“How much can you feel, exactly?”

He frowned. “What?”

“Your emotional range,” Madden reiterated. “What is it? Because I’ve got to be honest, I’ve never seen you like this before, and it’s sort of turning me on.”

“You’re getting horny over the fact I’m panicking?” He’d judge him for that, but Berga didn’t really have the right to, all things considered.

He spent his free time thinking up new ways to take people apart, after all.

“It’s not that,” Madden corrected. “I was aroused when you were angry earlier, too. And when you were close to tears…Yeah, that was also hot. It’s sexy that you’re frantic right now, baby—”

“ Baby ?!” Absolutely not.

“—but it’s not that specific emotion that’s doing it for me. It’s the fact you’re emoting at all. Guess you really aren’t a robot, huh?”