Chapter 13

 

Sven ached. But it was the best kind of ache. Muscles burned and there was a small twinge in his lower back, but there was also this incredible loose, sated feeling throughout his whole body that came with ridiculous amounts of sex. He felt as if he should be sated within an inch of his life and yet as he lay there, images of the night before flashing through his head, he could already feel the craving starting to stir for Geoffrey. He would never get enough, and there was a growing part of him that was hoping Geoffrey would feel the same way.

The previous day after the shower and sex, they’d foraged for food and talked before Sven spread Geoffrey out on the dining room table and made a meal out of him then buried himself deep in Geoffrey’s tight body again. They’d started a movie but Sven couldn’t remember past the opening credits. Geoffrey had been curled up against him on the couch and his wonderfully long fingers had started wandering along Sven’s body, leaving them instantly engrossed in each other rather than what was flickering on the massive TV. Dinner ended up being them seated on the floor in the kitchen in front of the open fridge, picking through leftovers and talking about their favorite meals as children. Then Geoffrey had drawn him back to the master bedroom where they took their time, worshiping each other’s bodies, drawing out the moment for as long as possible.

Sven loved every second of it. It wasn’t just the sex. It was listening to Geoffrey talk. No matter what the topic, he put so much enthusiasm and passion into it. His hands danced through the air like agile birds as he spoke and his wide eyes shone with his own inner light. Sven was happy to just let him talk, getting swept up in his excitement and energy. But Geoffrey was an equally attentive listener. The way he watched Sven, it was as if he focused all that massive energy just on Sven—like Sven was the center of the entire universe.

He wasn’t sure where this was going. Geoffrey had flirted with him for months and Sven had been sure that he was simply an itch Geoffrey needed to scratch. It was just fucking. And normally, that wasn’t a problem. Sven had enjoyed his share of random hookups and they were fine for when he needed to get off. But with Geoffrey, it wasn’t about sex. There were so many other little things that kept drawing him back in. He wanted Geoffrey safe, but he’d begun to fear that when Geoffrey was finally safe, he’d have to walk away. The job would be over and Geoffrey would be done with him.

Stretching his legs, Sven started to roll out of the bed when Geoffrey rolled right into him, pressing his face into Sven’s chest while wrapping his arm around his waist. He’d woken several times through the night—the job made him a notoriously light sleeper—and each time he found Geoffrey plastered up against his body.

“Where are you going?” Geoffrey mumbled against him. His hand tightened in the waistband of the briefs he’d pulled on the last time he’d gone to the bathroom.

“To make coffee.”

“Oh God,” Geoffrey groaned. His leg slid over Sven’s, rubbing his foot along his hairy calf. “Coffee sounds so good. I’ll be your sex slave forever if you make me some coffee.”

“I think yesterday proved your willingness even without the coffee.”

Geoffrey tilted his head up to look at Sven. His platinum blond hair was wild, sticking up in every direction and there was still a hint of red beard-burn on his cheeks from the amount of kissing they’d done, but the wicked, beautiful grin that was spreading across his full lips was absolutely stunning.

“Yeah, but I mean the really kinky kind of sex slave. Tie me up, tie me down, toys, and role-playing—”

“Enough,” Sven growled. He rolled Geoffrey onto his back and kissed him to silence the words that were sending blood back down to his cock after he swore that he’d leave Geoffrey alone. The man had to be sore. Beneath him, Geoffrey relaxed completely, his slender body loose and open as if he were happy to just let Sven has his way with him.

“How can I still want more sex after all of yesterday and last night and early this morning?” Sven murmured between kisses.

“Because it will never be enough,” Geoffrey replied. Sven pulled back so that he could look at the man beneath him. His lips were swollen and cheeks flushed, but his sapphire eyes were serious. “I don’t want this to be a fling. I want…maybe…just something…you know where we go out and do things like Frisbee golf and dinner. Or movies at home. And I get to call you mine.”

“And you’re mine,” Sven replied, his heart pounding so hard he was sure that Geoffrey could feel it. He kissed him slow and deep, wanting to devour Geoffrey completely but also savor him. Stretch the moment so that every sense was filled with just Geoffrey.

But a moment later, Geoffrey wiggled beneath him, breaking off the kiss.

“I would love to do this all day,” Geoffrey said, brushing his lips across Sven’s as he spoke. “But I’ve got to fucking pee and you promised me coffee.”

 Sven pressed one last kiss to Geoffrey’s lips, ending it with a loud smack before rolling back to his side of the bed.

“Shit.”

Sven looked over his shoulder to find Geoffrey sitting on the edge of the bed, his phone in his hand. “What’s wrong?”

“I totally forgot to plug in my phone last night. The battery is completely dead.”

“Where’s your charging cable?”

“There’s one on my desk.”

“I’ll grab it on my way to the kitchen.”

“Thanks,” Geoffrey said, flashing him a wide grin before scurrying off to the bathroom.

As soon as Sven could bring himself to stop watching Geoffrey’s ass, he cursed himself. He hadn’t plugged in his phone either. Last place he’d even seen it had been the kitchen counter. If he missed an important call from work about Geoffrey’s case, he’d never forgive himself. He needed to focus on his job while Geoffrey was still in danger. When this bastard was finally caught, he could lose himself in daydreams about Geoffrey’s blue eyes and the sweetness of his smile.

Pausing in the office, he grabbed the charging cable but the cord scattered some of the papers. As he reached to put them back as they were, his eye snagged on the name of a local children’s foundation that helped kids who had been abused. Sven was familiar with the group because it had been one of the beneficiaries of Lucas Vallois’s Christmas gala in December. He had worked it along with all the other available Ward Security employees. While it had not been a great night, Sven had enjoyed seeing Geoffrey in his tuxedo.

Now he found himself staring at an effusive note from the director of the charity, thanking Geoffrey for his donation of $500,000 and promising to keep the donation anonymous. Sven hesitated, wanting to march straight into the bathroom and kiss Geoffrey, tell him that he was appreciated for his amazing generosity. But he put the papers back as they were and continued to the kitchen with the cable. Smart, sexy, funny, and generous…oh yeah, he was fucking screwed. He was sinking fast for Geoffrey and there was little to stop him.

He picked up his own phone as he walked to the coffeemaker, but stopped after a couple of steps as he spotted the flurry of texts that had already poured in from Quinn and Gidget over the past hour. Something had blown up in the early morning hours. Something about a video. The texts didn’t make much sense. What wasn’t pure cursing from Quinn was pure gibberish from Gidget about the video being scrubbed of tags and other useful markers.

Using Geoffrey’s cable, Sven plugged his phone in before the battery gave out and then pulled up a social media app. There was no need to do any searches for Geoffrey’s account or any of Geoffrey’s friends’ accounts. The video in question immediately popped up at the top of his feed because the damn thing already had more than ten thousand views and hundreds of comments.

Dread filled Sven’s stomach, turning the joy he’d felt just minutes ago into a lead weight. He pushed play on the screen and a second later Geoffrey’s slurred voice cut through the silence of the house.

“No. Please. Don’t. I just wanna sleep,” Geoffrey pleaded on the video. Those soft, pained words cut through Sven, leaving behind a massive swell of rage. His hands tightened on the phone until the plastic creaked under his fingers in protest. He was watching a video taken by Geoffrey’s stalker.

Geoffrey lay in his bed naked except for a pair of loose silk boxers. His eyes were barely open as if he was fighting to stay awake. A hand reached into the view of the video, but the person had manipulated the image so that the hand was pixelated so badly there were no identifying marks. He couldn’t even guess the skin color or gender.

The hand touched Geoffrey’s stomach, dragging fingers down his skin. Sven wanted to smash his phone against the wall, but he forced himself to watch as Geoffrey ineffectively swatted at the hand, trying to get the person to stop touching him.

“No. Leave me alone,” he said, the words running together so that it was barely understandable, but the “no” was damn clear. So was Geoffrey’s growing distress.

“What the fuck is that?” Geoffrey demanded.

Sven’s head snapped up to find Geoffrey standing in the middle of the living room, his face incredibly pale and every muscle in his body painfully stiff.

His heart screamed to shut down the video, break all the phones and computers in the house. He never wanted Geoffrey to see this, to know that he’d been exposed in such an ugly, vulnerable moment to the world. But he had to.

“The stalker hacked your social media account and posted a video…a video of you…from that night.”

As the Geoffrey on the video said “no” again, Geoffrey lurched into motion, entering the kitchen. Sven reluctantly set his phone on the island and stepped back so that Geoffrey could approach. His hands shook as he picked up the phone and watched. Sven carefully placed his hands on Geoffrey’s shoulders and gently squeezed, trying to reassure him that he was not alone.

The stalker spoke a few times, but the voice and words were altered, but somehow the mocking tone still came through. The hand came back twice more, touching Geoffrey, and each time Geoffrey batted it and tried to squirm away. Sven wanted to break that hand. He didn’t care who it was—man or woman—he wanted to snap each one of those fingers as the person screamed for Geoffrey’s forgiveness.

“I don’t remember this.” Geoffrey’s voice was low and hollow.

The hand came back again and the camera angle shifted a little lower to reveal the person tugging at his boxers, revealing sharp hipbones and then the thickening patch of darker blond pubic hair around his soft cock. The Geoffrey on the video whimpered and tried to roll away, but the hand clamped down hard on his hip, forcing him to roll onto his back again.

“No,” Geoffrey whispered, his voice cracking. The phone shook in his hands and the stalker reached over and stroked his soft cock on the screen several times before the video cut off, leaving them to wonder if the bastard had gone even further and Geoffrey didn’t know it.

He’d been molested by someone he didn’t want touching him.

Sven closed his eyes, trying desperately to swallow back the pain and rage. Whether Geoffrey could remember what happened that night or not, the two-minute video had been shared with the world and there was no snatching it back. They could rip it down, but thousands of people had already seen it.

“What the fuck…”

Sven’s eyes returned to the little phone screen to find Geoffrey scrolling through hundreds of comments…and they seemed almost worse than the video. They called him horrible, disgusting names, blaming him or mocking his behavior. Others posted older pictures of Geoffrey, depicting times he’d been out at clubs, partying with friends. Some of them were pictures of him obviously drunk, but so were all the other people in the pictures. It didn’t matter. The pictures, which had been taken in innocent fun at the time, were now twisted into horrid “proof” that he’d asked for it.

“How…how can they think I deserve this?” he whispered, his voice fractured.

“You don’t.” Sven slid his arms around Geoffrey’s chest and waist, pulling him backward. He wanted to pull the smaller man into his chest, tucking him next to his heart to protect him from this pain.

“I said no. I heard it. I said no.”

“You did,” Sven agreed.

Geoffrey flipped back up through the comments, pausing over a couple with names attached that Sven recognized. People who had been at the brunch just a couple of days ago. Their comments had the mask of joking, but there was an underlying sharpness to them. A cruelty that shouldn’t come from someone that Geoffrey had one time called friend.

“I don’t understand. How can they be…be so mean?”

Sven finally snatched the phone out of Geoffrey’s hand and closed the social media app. Geoffrey was just torturing himself, reading their comments over and over again. Sven unplugged his phone and grabbed Geoffrey’s off the counter, plugging it in. Carefully, he turned Geoffrey around and bent down so that he could look him directly in the eye. “Those people are cruel and jealous. They are not your friends. They aren’t worth a fucking tenth of you, do you understand me? What happened is not your fault.”

“But maybe it is.” He gave a little shake of his head. His eyes were unfocused as he stared at some spot that wasn’t even in the kitchen, as if he were trying to relive that night in his mind. “I shouldn’t have drunk so much and I was being reckless. I shouldn’t have…”

Sven’s hands tightened on Geoffrey’s arms and he fought the urge to shake him. “Stop it! This isn’t your fault. You trusted people you thought were your friends and they abandoned you. They betrayed you. One of these fucks hurt you. You’re not to blame. You said no!”

Bright, tear-filled eyes lifted to Sven’s and stared at him for several seconds. Geoffrey’s handsome face was clouded with pain and confusion. “I don’t know. I—”

Whatever he was going to say was cut off by a strange ring from Geoffrey’s phone, different from the one he’d heard other times since moving into his house.

“Finn,” Geoffrey gasped. He jerked out of Sven’s hands and snatched up his phone, but he couldn’t go far. The battery probably just had a tiny bit of juice, just enough to kick on for the call. Sven swallowed back a curse. Of course, Finn followed his brother’s social media accounts. He would have seen the video and all the comments by now.

“No. Finn.…No.…Don’t! There’s no reason.…No, I’m fine. I…” Geoffrey’s broken answers were punctuated by a small, angry voice that Sven could hear in the quiet room. Geoffrey rubbed his forehead and shifted from one foot to the other as he listened to his brother. His shoulders slumped under their weight of his worries. Geoffrey didn’t need to worry about his brother or anything else in that moment.

Reaching over, Sven plucked the phone from Geoffrey’s hand and hit the speaker button before putting it down on the counter. Finn’s voice suddenly blasted out of the phone, filling the kitchen.

“You’re not fucking fine! Who the hell was that with you?”

“I don’t know,” Geoffrey replied. He leaned into Sven, both his hands tightly grasping the arm that Sven draped across his chest. “I was drugged one night at a club. I thought it was a friend who helped me home…but…it wasn’t. I’ve…I’ve got a stalker.”

“What? When? Why didn’t you fucking tell me?”

“I didn’t want you to worry. I’ve got this.”

“You don’t! I’m coming home.”

“No!” Geoffrey barked, lurching partially out of Sven’s arms to lean closer to the phone. Geoffrey’s heart beat frantically and the hand still holding him was trembling. “This is your last summer of freedom. You enjoy—”

“You’re my brother. I’m not fucking staying here. I need to be there.”

“No!”

“Finn,” Sven said evenly, cutting off Geoffrey’s next argument. “This is Sven Larsen. I’m the bodyguard your brother hired to protect him.”

The line went silent except for Finn’s ragged breathing for a few seconds. When he finally spoke, he’d stopped shouting, but anger still threaded his every word. “What are you doing to protect my brother?”

“A new security system has been installed at the house and I’m with him twenty-four hours a day. A technical team has been assigned to his case and is scouring through all his contacts to try to discover the identity of his stalker.”

Finn muttered something low about that taking an eternity, proving that Finn wasn’t at all blind to his brother’s Internet fame.

“I’m sorry about the pain Geoffrey has suffered as a result of the video,” Sven added softly. “We didn’t know about it. Didn’t expect him to hack his social media accounts. We won’t make that mistake again.”

“I’m still coming home.” Finn’s voice was softer and almost petulant.

Sven shifted so that he could look directly at Geoffrey’s face. The smaller man frowned, his lips pressed into a hard, thin line as he shook his head.

“It would be better if you didn’t,” Sven said. “The stalker has not become violent, but if you return to the States, we would need to put you with a bodyguard as well for both your and your brother’s protection. It’s better if we can keep our entire focus on your brother so we can stop this person.”

Finn swore for several seconds. “Fine. Geoff, you swear you’re okay?”

“I’ve got Sven. I’m safe.”

“I want his number.”

“I’ll send it to you along with my boss’s number,” Sven easily agreed. “We’ll send you an update anytime you want.”

“Okay. Call me later, Geoff. I love you.”

“Love you too,” Geoffrey murmured and then ended the call. He stared at the phone in his hands. Notifications continued to pop up again and again as more people commented on the video, but Geoffrey didn’t open any of the social media apps. He just stared silently at his phone as if he wasn’t really seeing it.

Sven’s heart broke to see him like this. He didn’t know what to say, didn’t know what to do to take this pain away. He didn’t deserve this. Why the stalker had gone to such lengths, had lashed out in such a way just to hurt Geoffrey didn’t make sense to him. If he was threatened by the presence of Sven, then he should have attacked Sven. Hurting Geoffrey didn’t bring him closer to the focus of his obsession. But he didn’t have any answers and even if he did, they wouldn’t ease Geoffrey’s suffering.

“Geoffrey…I’m so sorry. I—”

“It’s fine,” he said stiffly. His usually expressive voice was monotone as he spoke. Not short or angry. Or even hurt. Just dead to Sven’s ears.

“It’s not.”

Geoffrey unplugged the charging cable from the end of the counter and carefully wrapped it around the phone. “I’m going to my office.”

“Do you want me—”

“I want to be alone.”

That short sentence was like Geoffrey sliced through the tender bond they had been forming over the past few days, threatening to sever it completely. There were no flailing hands or shouted words. The same monotone voice as if all the life had been drained completely out of him. Sven knew he was hurting, but he would have felt better if Geoffrey were shouting or screaming at the world, threatening to rally lawyers and cops. This nothingness was suffocating. It wasn’t his Geoffrey and Sven refused to accept that Geoffrey had simply given up.

Geoffrey slowly crossed the living room, his phone loosely held in his hand, and disappeared into his office. The door closed behind him and Sven frowned. It couldn’t stay that way, not if he was going to keep Geoffrey safe. He’d allow him a few minutes of privacy and then he’d have to open the door just a crack so that he’d be able to easily check on him during his rounds.

Swearing under his breath, he jogged to the guest room where his own things were stored and grabbed his charging cable before returning to the kitchen to plug in his phone. As soon as it was plugged in, a call from Quinn’s cell phone rang through.

“What do you have?” he demanded as a greeting.

“Not fucking much,” Quinn said with a heavy sigh.

“That’s not helping me.”

“I’m sorry, Sven,” Gidget’s sweet voice chimed in, proving that Quinn was likely making the call from their joint office back at Ward Security. “Geoffrey is too wonderful a person to have this happening to him. He doesn’t deserve this at all.”

“When did the video go up?” Sven asked, determined to keep his thoughts focused on the job. And right now, Geoffrey had to be just a job. If he was more, if he let himself get emotionally tangled up in Geoffrey and his pain, he wouldn’t be able to think clearly. He wouldn’t be able to protect Geoffrey and he’d have to ask Rowe to find someone to replace him. And there was no way he was letting anyone else into that house until Geoffrey was better.

“About 5 a.m. I noticed it about 6:30,” Quinn admitted.

“Then why the hell wasn’t it taken down? Why is it still up? I thought you had all the login information for his accounts.”

The silence stretched for several seconds, growing more uncomfortable with every beat of his heart. His patience grew thinner until he was sure he was going to snap and he never lost his temper. Not since that horrible day as a child.

“What?” he growled.

“The stalker uploaded the video, Sven,” Gidget said gently as if she were trying to soothe his anger. “We’ve been trying to trace where he logged in from or any other kind of identifying data.”

“We’ve also been collecting data on the people who’ve watched the video and the comments that are being left,” Quinn added. A chair squeaked in the background as if Quinn had shifted closer to the phone. “There’s a good chance that one of the commenters is also the stalker. We’re trying to see if there’s anyone in particular who is egging on the negative comments, trying to hurt Geoffrey more.”

“That behavioral analysis stuff you’ve told me about?”

“Yeah. We’re sorting all the data that we’ve collected from the video interactions and Geoffrey’s social media posts as well as the texts he’s gotten.”

“We’re trying to build a criminal profile,” Gidget said and then sighed heavily. “But this isn’t our area of expertise. It’s just so much data and we’re not sure what we’re looking for.”

“Rowe’s calling Hollis and that P.I. he works for, Shane something or other,” Quinn said.

Sven nodded, not caring that they couldn’t see him. Hollis Banner was a former cop from Atlanta who’d recently started working for a private investigator. Hollis was a good guy who loved to give Rowe shit and was incredibly protective of his boyfriend, Ian Pierce. After serving as Ian’s bodyguard twice, Sven was glad to see that he’d finally found a perfect match in Hollis.

“Does Hollis or Shane have experience making a criminal profile?”

“No idea,” Quinn admitted.

Gidget groaned in frustration. “If they don’t, there’s a good chance they might know someone who does. We’re going to get the right person for this.”

“And if we don’t, we have to kick this out to the cops and you know how the boss hates trusting anything to the cops.”

Sven swallowed back his own groan. Rowe did hate involving the police in anything. His boss was his own one-man wrecking crew. He liked to take care of things himself or let his team take care of it. Andrei was attempting to curb some of Rowe’s impulses, but it was still a struggle.

And in this instance, Sven sided with Rowe. The cops hadn’t taken Geoffrey’s complaint seriously from the beginning and only showed a modicum of effort after his vehicle was vandalized. He suspected that if Geoffrey reported the hacking and video to the cops, that same prick who’d blamed Geoffrey before would try to shame him again. No, Sven didn’t want the fucking cops involved any longer. He wanted to handle this personally.

“Do you have enough data yet?” Sven glanced up at the clock on the wall and frowned. “The video has been up for more than five hours. Can you take it down now?”

There was a pause and Sven could imagine Quinn and Gidget silently signaling to each other, arguing over whether to take the video down or who got to do it. He couldn’t imagine how they worked together some days. When they both weren’t under headphones and glued to their monitors, they were bickering about everything under the sun. Dominic teased that they were actually siblings but had been separated at birth. Rowe had offered to shuffle offices around so they could both have their own space to cut down on the arguing, but they said that they worked better in the same room.

“Yeah, we can take it down,” Quinn murmured. He didn’t sound thrilled about it, as if he wanted more data still. “I’m doing it now.”

In the background, he could hear the clatter of keys as Quinn worked. Sven turned and started to pace, but stopped after one step when the charging cable nearly tugged the phone from his hands. Tamping down his frustration, he turned back to the counter and leaned forward so he could put both his elbows on the granite. He wanted to poke his head into Geoffrey’s office and check on him, but he couldn’t unplug his phone yet. The battery had been nearly dead when Quinn called.

“What about the video itself?” he asked. “I know he fucked with it so you couldn’t see his hand clearly.” Sven stopped and swallowed hard against the knot that grew in his throat. Just remembering that fucking hand that reached out and touched Geoffrey, that anyone had touched Geoffrey against his will, made him want to rip this person apart. “He altered his voice,” he continued, ignoring the roughness in his own words. “Can you get anything from the video?”

There was another long pause and Sven’s patience shredded. “How? How can you have nothing?”

“It’s wiped,” Gidget said defensively.

“What do you mean wiped?”

“This…this…meanie stripped everything out.”

“Can you please just call him a bastard or an evil fuck?” Quinn groaned. Sven rolled his eyes. Gidget didn’t swear. She didn’t use strong language. She talked like a grade school teacher and at times, she even looked like one. She was easily the nicest person he had ever met, but in this instance, Sven had to agree with Quinn.

“No,” she snapped then continued. “Most people don’t know that the videos shot on your phone have all kinds of identifying data like when and where it was shot. It’s even got info that links it to your phone.”

“But?”

“It’s all gone.”

“What about the hand and the voice?” Sven pressed.

“I’m working on the audio, trying to fill in some blanks,” Quinn offered.

“I’ve got the visual, trying to piece back together the data he took from the frames,” Gidget explained. “I’m also walking through each frame to see if there’s any reflections that I can use to piece together this person’s image. It’ll take time, but we’re still trying.”

“Okay,” Sven murmured. It wasn’t the useful information that he’d been hoping for. Certainly not enough to go to Geoffrey with and lift his spirits.

“There’s one good thing that can come out of this, Sven,” Gidget said.

“What?”

“This is a very specialized skill set.”

Sven straightened, moving the phone from one ear to the other as a cramp set into his shoulder. “I don’t understand.”

“This is more than just a little video editing,” Quinn said and Sven’s heartbeat sped up to hear the excitement returning to Quinn’s voice. “The fucking with the audio and the video is impressive, but knowing to strip all the data out of the video plus knowing how to do it without leaving other indicators behind. That’s high-level shit.”

“He also hacked into three of Geoffrey’s largest social media accounts,” Gidget added.

“This is a very tech-savvy motherfucker,” Quinn said. “He knows software, computers, and code. I’d bet a year’s salary on it. This is an IT specialist or computer programmer or software developer at least.”

“I agree,” Gidget said, excitement threading her voice.

“And how many of those people are among Geoffrey’s friends?”

“It will narrow the field,” Gidget noted with an air of satisfaction.

“Good. Keep me posted. I need to do rounds.”

Sven hung up, still frustrated but clinging to the hope that Gidget and Quinn at least had something to work with. He didn’t want to think that Geoffrey had suffered for nothing. That somehow they could use this information to track down this bastard.

He flipped the phone’s ringer on and left it to charge in the kitchen before heading directly to Geoffrey’s office. He knocked lightly on the door and then opened it a crack to peer inside. Geoffrey sat back in his chair, the heels of his bare feet dug into the edge of the chair and his thin arms wrapped around his knees. His blue eyes slowly shifted up to Sven’s face and stared as if simply waiting for him to explain why he’d stopped in his office. But there were no tears. No angry rants. Just silence.

“Doing rounds,” Sven said.

Geoffrey gave a tiny nod but said nothing.

Sven watched him, debating whether to tell him what he’d learned from Gidget and Quinn, but the news wasn’t exactly uplifting. Some speculation on who might be behind this attack and a whole lot of nothing. Not reassuring in the least.

“I’ll make coffee before I finish my rounds outside,” Sven offered, wishing that Geoffrey would just say something…anything. He didn’t know what to do with this silence. But still he didn’t speak.

As he turned to walk back toward the kitchen, he stopped in the doorway. “You didn’t do anything to deserve this. This isn’t your fault. If you only believe one thing I tell you for the rest of your life, believe that. It’s not your fault.”

He took his first step into the hall when he heard Geoffrey whisper, “Thank you.”

It was a start.

 

 

 

###

The sun was trying to melt him straight into the concrete. Sven squinted at the long driveway that curved toward the street, trying to ignore the sweat that was trickling down the back of his neck and into his shirt. He’d just completed his second round outside after trying to convince Geoffrey to eat something for lunch, but it hadn’t worked. Geoffrey had skipped breakfast, coffee, and now lunch. He had shifted in his chair a couple of times while his phone sat untouched on the desk in front of him. The computer was asleep and untouched. He wouldn’t talk, wouldn’t eat. Sven was tempted to simply pick him up and carry him back to bed so that he could wrap his larger body around him. But after that damn video, he didn’t want to touch Geoffrey unless he was sure he would welcome it.

Cops had stopped by earlier in the day and asked Geoffrey a series of questions, but Geoffrey had said no more than he’d had to. Just sinking deeper and deeper into his own misery. Sven had been only too glad to usher them back out of the house.

Tires scraped along the concrete and a silver sedan finally pulled into view as it turned up the driveway. The sun glinted off the windshield making it impossible to see who was inside the car. Sven stepped into the shade of the front porch and crossed his arms over his chest. He was back in his Ward Security polo shirt but he didn’t give a damn if they all knew that he was protecting Geoffrey. No one was getting near Geoffrey without his approval first.

The driver turned off the engine, but it was nearly a minute before both the front doors opened to reveal Patrick and Kody as they stepped out. Tall, thin Patrick looked uneasy as he stared at Sven. Kody raised a hand in greeting, his smile hesitant. His buttery blond hair ruffled in the breeze.

“Hey, Sven, right?” Kody said in friendly tones. “What are you doing here?”

Sven kept his arms folded over his chest, silently watching them as they came up the walk. Both men became more nervous as they approached, their steps growing shorter and slower. A quick glance revealed that neither appeared to be armed. They wore light-weight shirts and shorts that didn’t hang heavy with the weight of a weapon. Patrick was gangly and awkward with every movement as if he’d never quite settled into his tall frame. Kody was just a bit shorter than Patrick, but his frame was a little thicker. As he got close, Sven noticed that there were more lines in his face, putting him in his late thirties to early forties rather than a twentysomething like most of Geoffrey’s friends.

“Geoffrey is not having guests today,” Sven declared evenly. “Please leave.”

Both men stopped suddenly and stared at Sven in a mix of shock and confusion.

“Have you talked to him?” Kody asked.

“Were you just leaving?” Patrick added. “Did he send you away?”

Sven continued to block their path to the front door, saying nothing.

Patrick glanced over at Kody and then made a dismissive noise in the back of his throat. “I’ve known Geoffrey forever. He’ll see me.” He started to take a step around Sven, but Sven shifted farther into his path.

“No. He’s not seeing anyone.”

“Of course he is!” Kody argued. “After that damn video.”

“Everyone saw that fucking video,” Patrick said with disgust under his breath. “He needs to see us.”

“No one gets in to see him. Now leave.”

“Who the hell do you think you are?” Patrick exploded. “You can’t tell us to leave. How do we know you haven’t hurt Geoffrey?” Patrick tried to take another step around Sven, but this time Sven placed one hand on the man’s shoulder and pushed him steadily back for every step Sven took forward.

Patrick gasped and flailed, but Sven kept his eye on Kody as the man glared daggers at him. His pale face had flushed with anger.

“I’m calling the police,” Kody declared while taking a step back with Patrick.

“Do it,” Sven barked. Still holding Patrick’s shoulder, he looked down on Kody, wishing he had more than just three inches of height on this man. “Call them. Call them right now.”

Kody met his glare for several breathless seconds before finally turning away. “Fuck you. And fuck him,” he snarled, marching back toward Patrick’s car.

Patrick jerked his shoulder free of Sven’s hold and hurried after Kody, muttering, but Sven couldn’t quite catch what he’d said. He stayed on the front porch, watching as they disappeared back down the driveway. They weren’t the first gawkers to show up. Geoffrey’s ex, Brendon, had appeared just before noon, demanding to see Geoffrey and had shouted far more obscenities at Sven before storming off. He knew others would stop by. Some probably did want to offer true sympathy, but he knew too many of them would only make Geoffrey feel worse.

For now, he was the wall protecting Geoffrey from all of them. And until Geoffrey said otherwise, he wasn’t moving.