Chapter 18

EIGHTEEN

RYAN

In many Native American cultures, bears are celebrated as spiritual guides that walk with you in your dreams. For tribes like the Lakota Sioux and Ojibwe, bears symbolize strength, wisdom, and healing. Dreaming of a bear? It might mean you’re being offered a bit of bear-level protection or a little nudge to connect with your grizzly inner strength. In short, if a bear strolls through your dreams, embrace him!

—Bear Facts for Insomniacs, Episode 42

Zane never came back out of his room, so I took it as a signal that he wasn’t up for more “practice” that night.

Maybe that was a good thing. Maybe we needed a break from spending so much time naked together.

I busied myself in my room with several sets of crunches and push-ups before moving to lunges and squats. This was a mistake because once I was done with the impromptu workout, my heart rate was up, and I was nowhere near being able to settle down to sleep .

I returned a phone call to my sister about Christmas at her place and shot a text back to the family chain, letting them know that Zane had confirmed his appearance at a music festival in Bozeman next summer, and I’d be able to get them passes to it if they found places to stay.

Violet had sent me a message regarding the email I’d forwarded earlier, but only to tell me she had no additional information yet. She’d also provided some more detail on the alibi information from Noelle she’d relayed earlier. I found it very suspect that Noelle had been out of town during both the LA and San Diego stamping events, but then again, Bodhi hadn’t been at his home in New York, either. Since both of them traveled for their jobs, eliminating them from any suspect pool was damned near impossible.

Boomer reported that Bodhi had “almost definitely” been playing a gig during the San Diego incident, and he was waiting for confirmation. He’d also said Bodhi was “Really nice. Like, really nice . I just don’t like this guy for the Stamper.” Needless to say, this was not the facts-based report I’d expected from serious, stone-faced Boomer, who’d been in the protection business nearly as long as I had.

I wondered what the fuck had gotten into him… and hoped it would get the fuck out of him since I really needed him to focus on this.

One of Zane’s over-the-top super fans had posted all over social media about being at the three stamping locations, so Violet’s team was also looking into her. The only other suspect we’d been able to come up with was Isaiah Harbin, but it was hard to believe an NFL player would go that far for a PR stunt.

The man had also posted about Zane on social media, but it was in response to the various attempts to ship the most famous out gay NFL player and out gay rock star. There were entire forums, chat servers, and social media accounts dedicated to speculation about the two of them and how hot it would be if they got together.

Thankfully, Zane had no interest in the guy, and Harbin himself seemed more interested in chirping at the media about it than actually following up on it.

I tried to avoid looking at the social media sites, but I couldn’t resist it. Zane himself had been warned against posting anything because of our location, but I noticed Micki had posted generic promo graphics on his account to keep it active.

When my scrolling turned into its usual time-suck, I forced myself to put my phone down and try to get some sleep. The house was quiet with the exception of the dishwasher running in the other room. Snowflakes caught the moonlight outside my window since I’d forgotten to close the blinds. I watched them fall lazily and thought back to our time on the trail together.

The memories of Zane’s earnest efforts and his willingness to try new things made me smile. It was a good memory to think back on as I drifted to sleep…

I awoke with a start to the sound of Zane crying out my name.

I was on my feet and flying across the floorboards in seconds.

“Bear!”

“Shh, I’m here.” I quickly moved to the bed and felt around for him in the dark until my eyes adjusted. Unlike in my room, the shades were closed in here, blocking out the moonlight. “Baby, I’m right here.”

I slid onto the bed and pulled him into my arms, making sure he was still well covered by the duvet so he didn’t get cold. He was shaking, and while I was pretty sure it was from fear, I wasn’t taking any chances. The house was chilly, and Zane tended to run cold on his best day.

He heaved in a big, desperate gulp of air. “I got another email. It was bad. About you.”

For a moment, I thought he meant he’d somehow found the Stamper’s message from earlier and cursed myself for leaving it in an email folder where he could find it.

“Or maybe they said something about my mom,” Zane went on. His voice was muffled against my T-shirt, and he sounded groggy. “I don’t remember.”

I realized with a pang that he was probably referring to his bad dream. “Baby, are you awake? Was this in a dream or in real life?”

His breath hitched. “I don’t know. It was… real, I think? They said I missed the deadline. I missed the show. And they were going to make sure my mom wasn’t there, and you weren’t there, either.”

He was definitely still half-asleep, but just to be sure, I reached for his phone on the bedside table and got him to open it for me before scrolling to his email app.

Just like this morning, my conscience warred with my need to protect him. Technically, Zane knew Violet had someone monitoring his email remotely, and he’d already consented for the security team to have access to it, but I still felt a little uncomfortable invading his privacy.

“Can I look at your email, Z?” I murmured.

“’Course. Nothing you can’t see. You can look at all of it. Tell you everything anyway. ’Cept about the money, but I told Landry I was going to tell you. I can’t F-OFF,” he said sadly. “Don’t wanna keep secrets. I’d hate if you got a Peruvian healer just ’cause I had a billion dollars.”

He was making less than zero sense, but his mention of a billion dollars reminded me of his odd question when we were playing the horseradish game. Did he have more money than people speculated? Did it matter? There came a point with obscene wealth where the zeroes no longer seemed to make much difference.

There was nothing new in his email other than the typical work messages, several photos from the trip to Barlo from his gran, and an email from Bodhi about meeting up for lunch before the Amsterdam show.

The email from Bodhi was friendly enough. Definitely nothing in it about his mom. And the email from Gran didn’t mention his mother, either .

I set the phone back down on the nightstand and wrapped my arms around him. “It was just a dream.”

“Thank god you’re here,” he said, sounding relieved. “I’m sorry for being scared.”

My heart lurched. “Never be sorry for being scared. What does that even mean? You can’t help it if you’re scared, Z. Bad dreams are scary.”

He sucked in a shaky breath. “I wish I could tape my mouth closed. Or that you’d sleep with a white noise machine so you couldn’t hear me.”

I brushed his hair back so I could try to see his face. He tucked his chin to keep from looking at me.

“Z,” I said softly. “If I called out for help in the night because of a bad dream, would you expect me to apologize for being scared?”

He shook his head but didn’t say anything.

“And if I felt comforted by your arms, would you think less of me?”

He lifted his face up to glare at me. “Of course not.”

I lifted my eyebrows. “The prosecution rests, Your Honor.”

He settled back down against my chest. “I don’t want to be the guy you have to protect.”

I wanted to laugh, but I sensed that would be the worst possible reaction. “That’s upsetting, considering I enjoy protecting you.”

“I’m not talking about your job. I want you to… to care for me.”

His words hit me with a jolt, filling me with a kind of vulnerable hope I wasn’t prepared for.

“I’m not talking about my job, either, Z,” I confessed to the top of his head. “I do care about you. As a friend. As a good human. As a… as a man.” I swallowed, backing away from any further verbalization of my feelings. “And keeping you safe is something I have a vested interest in. I want you safe because I want you to be happy. And, selfishly, I want you to continue to be in my life for a very long time.”

His arms tightened around me. “That’s… nice.”

I let out a soft laugh. “At least you didn’t say fine this time.”

“I care about you, too.” His words were quiet, but I felt the truth in them, and it warmed me from the inside out.

I pressed a kiss to the top of his head. “Are we going to talk about how the nightmares started after the Stamper showed up?”

“No, thank you,” he said in an attempt to make it sound light and singsongy.

“I think you need to see someone, Zane.”

“Been there.”

I ran my fingers through his hair. “Micki can find you a therapist who’s good and discreet. The legal team can get all the NDAs in place?—”

“It’s not that.”

I waited for him to explain.

“It’ll bring up a bunch of other shit I don’t want to talk about.”

I wanted to push, to convince him it would be a healthy choice, and even if it got worse before it got better, it would get better. But I knew this time of night wasn’t the time for making that argument. I’d give him time to think about it, but I’d bring it up again with him and soon.

“Tell me about the money,” I said instead, hoping to throw him a softball. “You said you were going to tell me about the money.”

“Oh.” His fingers caressed the neck of my shirt. “I’m… I’m rich.”

“You don’t say.”

“You sound like Landry,” he said with a smile before pushing up to sit cross-legged in front of me. Light from the hallway was just enough to illuminate the outline of his head in the dark, but I wanted to see him. I reached over and turned on the light after warning him I was doing it.

“Really rich,” he elaborated. “And not just from music.”

Zane had sponsorships like most celebrities did. That was no surprise. Confusion must have shown on my face.

He hesitated. “I… I earned my first billion before I signed my first recording deal.”

I blinked at him. “How?”

And had he said billion with a B ?

His face lit up. “We did this amazing project at Yale,” he said excitedly. “Me and the brotherhood. That’s how we became so close. We came up with this technology we called the ETC that communicates between emergency vehicles and stoplights to cut down on accidents and assist the response rate. It’s saving lives, Bear. It’s incredible what it’s been able to do. Other students are studying it now. The results, I mean.”

“Holy shit,” I said, shocked at his story. “Ventdestine implemented it while I lived there.”

“Yeah, so that was us. Me and the guys. Bash, Silas, Dev, Landry, and me. We came up with it and then created an incubator company called Sterling Chase to represent ETC in its development and sale. We sort of hid our involvement by having Sterling Chase handle the transaction, and then the five of us agreed to keep the secret because… well, it’s kind of a long story, but Dev’s brother died and?—”

“I know that part,” I cut in. “You told me the other night. He’s the friend who bought his brother a sports car, and the kid wrecked it.”

“Yeah. It made us realize that the money kind of brought with it a lot of pressure to…” His shoulders slumped. “To help others and spend it in certain ways. So we realized it would be easier if no one knew exactly how much we had or where it had come from. Everyone just assumed we were making big money as corporate consultants in the city.”

I couldn’t even imagine him trying to pretend to be a corporate consultant. Zane without his music would be like a painter without a colorful palette.

“But now you’re in that situation anyway,” I said.

“Yeah, but at least the guys aren’t. I can handle it.”

I wanted to roll my eyes at his typical way of looking at things selflessly. Instead, I grasped his chin and met his eyes. “It’s okay to resent it. It’s okay to feel like the money is a burden. It’s okay to get angry when people put pressure on you.” I leaned in and kissed him on the cheek. He was so fucking sweet and kind and selfless. I wanted to burn the world down if it would make it easier for him to live in it. “It’s okay to be selfish sometimes, Z.”

He looked at me out of the corner of his eyes and then looked away. And then his eyes flicked over to me again. “What if I want… what if I want to keep sleeping with you after we leave Norway?”

My chest felt simultaneously too small and too big. The air didn’t know where to go when I inhaled. “You’re not sleeping with me now .”

Where the fuck did that come from?

Zane’s eyes widened. “Because I didn’t want to wake you up with my nightmares! I was embarrassed, and I knew if you shared a bed with me, you’d notice if I had bad dreams. I was trying to… I mean, we said it was practice , right? I don’t want you to think I’m… I’m needier than I already am.”

“Are you kidding? Zane, Jesus fuck. You’re not needy . I care about you. I want to know when you’re having bad dreams! I would never want you to suffer through them on your own. How can you think I’d rather be in my own room if you were having bad dreams?”

“I don’t want you to have to be a nightwatchman! I want you to be in my bed because you want to be there for me, not because you need to keep me safe.”

I grabbed his face and kissed the fuck out of him. How else could I get him to understand how badly I wanted him?

“I want to be in your bed because I want to kiss your fucking face,” I bit out between hungry kisses. “Touch you everywhere. Fuck you. Hold you. Watch you come undone. And, yes. I want to keep you safe, too, damn it. I want to comfort you when you wake up scared. That’s what people do when they lo- like someone.”

I was confessing too much, but I couldn’t hold back. I didn’t want him to second-guess my motivation or doubt for one minute that I truly wanted as much of him as I could get.

Within moments, the conversation was forgotten as we lost ourselves in each other’s kisses and exploring hands. I pulled off his clothes and shucked my own until I was lying half on top of him, rutting against his leg like an animal.

“I want to fuck you,” I confessed, moving my fingers down to his hole to tease it.

“Yes,” he breathed. “I want that, too. So much.”

We’d already made liberal use of the lube in his nightstand drawer, so I leaned over and fumbled for it. We’d already had a conversation about STI protection, but I stopped anyway and asked him if he was comfortable going bare, although I didn’t have a condom, and I had to assume he didn’t, either.

“Yes, god yes.”

My slick fingers sank into his tight heat while I watched his face to make sure he wasn’t uncomfortable.

“You like me,” he said, meeting my eyes. He acted like it was a surprise.

I opened my mouth to tease him, to tell him he was alright, but then I realized he was having a moment of vulnerability and insecurity. I took a breath. “I more than like you, Zane. And I’m not ready for this to end.”

His smile was a mix of relief and happiness. “Same.”

He reached out to caress my face, tracing my eyebrows and cheekbones while I continued to stretch him. “You’re going to tell me if it’s too much,” I warned. “If I need to slow down or stop.”

His eyes narrowed. “I’m not a child.”

“I should fucking hope not,” I growled, pressing farther inside his body and making him gasp. “Do you want me to stop giving a shit about your comfort?”

“No.” His expression softened. “I like that you care about me.”

I brushed the messy hair back from his face and leaned in to kiss him while finally lining myself up with his hole. He pulled his legs back and held himself behind the knees, but his insecurity reared its head again. “Tell me what to do.”

His tight channel strangled my cock as I began to push inside. Instead of answering him, I groaned and closed my eyes as he finally relaxed enough to let me in. “Fuck, Z. Fuck, you feel so good.”

“Bear,” he whimpered, squeezing around me. “Oh god. You’re fucking huge.”

I opened my eyes and watched him while pulling back and pushing forward and encouraging him to relax and keep breathing. “That’s it, baby. Just like that.”

I’d never done this before. Never felt the tight clasp of a hot body around my cock. The fact that it was Zane, that it was the man I loved more than anyone else in the world, overwhelmed me. I clenched my jaw against the onslaught of emotions.

“You’re doing great,” I said, barely hanging on to my self-control. Belatedly, I realized his own cock had wilted a bit with the intrusion. I reached for the lube and managed to slick my hand up again before shuttling my fist over his cock. It hardened in my hand, causing him to gasp. His breathing stuttered. He let go of his legs and wrapped them around my back, reaching down to grip my hand and move it the way he needed.

Heat buffeted the space between us. Sounds of shallow pants and muffled grunts and cries filled the air. Zane’s face was flushed and his eyes glazed. How was it possible he could be even more attractive to me? How was it possible for me to love him more than I already did?

“Want you to come, baby,” I begged. “Need you to come. I can’t…”

His grip jerked over mine, and I felt the warmth of his release on my fingers. The tang of it filled the air and mixed with the scent of our combined sweat.

Being like this with him was intoxicating, overwhelming.

“Baby, fuck.” Now, I was the one whimpering as my orgasm grabbed hold of me and took over, sending pleasure rolling through me as I thrust deep inside him. I groaned and shuddered, trying not to fall on top of him and almost failing.

Zane’s hands moved to my back, my neck, my shoulders as he pressed kisses into my upper chest and throat .

I opened my eyes and stared down at him, only seeing the tangled mess of hair on top of his head and the reddened tip of his nose as he nuzzled into me.

My voice came out scratchy and gruff when I spoke. “Tell me I can stay.”

He looked up at me. “You’re not weirded out by all the things I told you?”

“Maybe I like being weirded out,” I teased, moving off him so I didn’t squash him. “Maybe I want more of it.”

He grinned up at the ceiling before turning his megawatt smile on me. “Maybe that makes you the weird one and not me.”

The lucky one , I thought. I’m the lucky one.

We eventually moved off the bed to clean up. His sheets were a tangled, sweaty mess, so we moved into my room and settled back into a clean bed.

Zane snuggled into me, resting his head on my shoulder and teasing my chest hair with his fingertips.

After a while I confessed to overhearing him talking to Kenji about charitable contributions early in my time with him. “I knew you had lots of money, but I also knew you were generous. Since then, I see it everywhere, even though you try to hide some of it. At the time, I worried because you seemed to be giving it all away.”

“I do give it all away,” he said. “All the ETC money anyway. The Zee Barlo money I’m more selfish about.”

“Selfish,” I said on a laugh. “Yes, that’s you. You give away hundreds of millions of dollars, and you’re selfish. Zane, fuck .”

He flicked my nipple. Hard. “Hush. You know what I mean.”

“No. I don’t. I truly believe you think of yourself as selfish. I can see the way it bothers you to say no to people like JK and your uncle.”

He paused for a moment. “I just… I feel like it’s not fair. Lightning struck twice for me, Bear. How is that possible? It was like winning the lottery twice. And I don’t need all of this money. I could give more of it away, and I don’t. I saw a thing on Instagram about how childhood poverty can make you hold on to wealth. It can ac tually fuck up your money management stuff because you become too risk-averse.”

He glanced at me before looking back at his hand on my chest. His voice was quieter when he spoke. “I stashed fifty million dollars away in a bunch of different cash accounts no one but me has access to. I won’t let my money managers touch it, and it drives them up a wall. They keep telling me I’m losing money every day that cash isn’t invested. I know they’re right, but I just can’t… I can’t let someone else control all of my money. What if something happened? What if I lost everything and couldn’t afford to help Gran anymore?”

I thought about his rich friends, the fact his music would continue to bring in significant royalties for the rest of his life, the reality of his existing talent and determination to make more. But I didn’t say any of those things. He was right. This wasn’t about reality. It was about fear.

I tilted his chin up. “You have enough money to be able to afford to spend some on a security blanket, Z. No one else gets to decide what you do with that money, and there are worse things to do with fifty million dollars.”

“There are better things to do with it, too,” he said with a self-deprecating smile.

“Maybe, but peace of mind is worth something.”

I stroked his hair while I thought about an aspect of this subject that was bothering me. “I want you to consider reframing this in your mind. You talk about lightning striking. I get that there was luck involved. There’s a little bit of that, maybe, especially in terms of being in the right place at the right time. But, Zane… You worked your ass off in both cases. You and your friends came up with an idea and actually followed it up. You researched a need and filled it. You developed it and got it to market. That wasn’t lightning striking. And in your music career, you work incredibly hard. You dedicate all of your time and energy to your music and your fans.”

“I know I work hard. But I wouldn’t have been able to afford to pursue music full-time without having the ETC money. I was lucky. People like Bodhi aren’t. They have to work a full-time job while trying to get traction. It’s different.”

“I get that, I do. But the way you talk about it reminds me of the Ventdestinian superstition. There was a faction in the royal guard that blamed me for Asger’s death. Since fortune had selected me to protect him, I’d messed with fate by leaving. It made me feel guilty. Like his death was, at least a little bit, my fault.”

Zane looked up at me. “That’s not fair. You weren’t even there. It was the fault of the assassin. And maybe the existing security detail or conditions at the naval yard. It sure as hell wasn’t the fault of someone who was thousands of miles away in another country!”

I nodded. “That’s what I’m saying. We all have agency. We’re not at the mercy of the winds. Not completely, anyway. Bodhi has been on the professional circuit for years now. He’s had just as much opportunity in the past few years to make it big as you did in the beginning. He doesn’t have the same skill, the same drive—hell, maybe it’s just the combination of charisma, talent, and looks, who knows? My point is, if lightning struck, Zane, you were there to harness it.”

Zane settled back on my chest with a hmph . “You don’t feel guilty about the king’s death, do you?”

“Not really. Not enough to consider going back. I was ready for a change. And now, here I am, naked in bed with the world’s hottest rock star. So I can honestly say, no regrets. Ten out of ten, would do again.”

He huffed out a laugh, his breath warm on my skin. After a few minutes of comfortable silence, Zane spoke again. “I don’t want our time in Norway to end.”

I kissed the top of his head. “Same.”

He looked up at me with wide, warm eyes. “Tell me things won’t change when we leave here, Bear.”

My stomach tightened with anxiety. We both knew I couldn’t make that false promise, so instead of speaking, I kissed him.

And tried to make real promises without saying a word.