“Of course I do. You already know that,” Vaughan argued. He was deliberately not mentioning Miami. He wouldn’t unless he had to.
“I don’t know shit. I thought I did. I thought I knew how you felt. I thought I knew how I felt. I thought I was destined to be alone. I thought I had to have favor with god to be given a second chance at life. I thought I was going to be loved… finally.”
“Duke.” Vaughan sighed, but stopped abruptly when Duke’s hands reached for the top button of his shirt. “Don’t.”
“Don’t you dare try to stop me,” Duke cut in, unhooking the second button from the top of Vaughan’s shirt, those dark chocolate pools boring into his skull.
So Duke knew. How the hell? No one knew but the Doc and Vaughan knew he took his confidentiality oath seriously. His father—of course he’d never betray him. Other than that, no one. Not even his mom knew he was less one kidney. So how the hell? “How?”
Duke’s eyes stayed on Vaughan as he undid another button, slowly and carefully, like Vaughan had C4 strapped to his chest.
“Sweetheart. Who told you?”
Duke ignored his questions and undid the button right above Vaughan’s navel, his eyes still on him. Vaughan was too scared to break the contact. Too scared to look down and see that his three incisions were already visible. Duke’s eyes remained locked on him. He desperately tried to convey his love for the man through his stare. Hopefully now that Duke knew the truth, he wouldn’t think Vaughan was deceptive, he’d think he was a man in love.
“Was it my father?”
Duke unfastened the last button and Vaughan’s shirt was open. He could feel the cool air on his still-tender wounds. Neither one of them looked away but he saw and felt the quickening of Duke’s breathing. Dropping his heavy, casted hand, Duke used the other one to gently push back the sides of Vaughan’s shirt, his hot palm resting on his hip.
“Look,” Vaughan whispered, so gently. “Look at how much you mean to me.” Vaughan’s eyes didn’t drop as he spoke; he kept his gaze fixed on Duke as he watched his love’s sexy dark brown eyes trail down his sparsely haired chest to his abdomen. Duke gasped, his eyes filling with moisture. Vaughan felt hesitant but nimble fingers trail across the tiny incisions, but as Duke got to the larger one over near his pubic bone, where the kidney had actually been removed from his body, his hand began to shake. The skin around his incisions looked raw and irritated because he’d had his staples removed earlier that day, but he hoped his man could handle it. Duke’s face was smooth and even, his expression revealing very little, almost as if he were in shock. A lone, quiet tear fell down Duke’s scruffy cheek, the drop of moisture landing heavily on the floor between them.
“Don’t cry, sweetheart.”
“What have you done?” Duke uttered on a groan, continuing to stare at the incisions like they’d disappear and prove Vaughan really didn’t love him as much as he was claiming.
“I did the only thing that I knew in my heart was right, because sitting back and watching you die just wasn’t an option.”
Duke’s hand tightened on Vaughan’s hip and a surge of lust and attraction ran through him so fast that Vaughan jerked in the hold. Duke winced but Vaughan was quick to reassure him. “I’m not hurting. I’m always affected that way when you touch me.”
Duke was silent as he continued to stare.
“Who told you, Duke?”
Duke looked back into Vaughan’s eyes, his mouth a tight line.
Vaughan was getting a little agitated. “Why aren’t you answering my questions?”
“Because you’re asking the wrong questions,” Duke responded quickly. “The questions you’re asking should be directed at you… not me. You should ask yourself: Why didn’t I tell him? How could I lie to him?”
“I’ve asked myself that plenty of times and the answer is always the same, baby. I didn’t tell you because I couldn’t risk you refusing. Although the risk of mortality is miniscule for live donors, you wouldn’t have allowed me to take it. I was going to tell you, I swear it. But I didn’t want you to feel obligated to me.” Vaughan’s own emotions were barreling to the surface as he continued to plead his case. He was so nervous that Duke would turn on his heels and leave, claiming Vaughan wasn’t trustworthy, regardless of him lying only in the course of saving his life. And isn’t that what Vaughan wanted in the first place? For Duke to decide what their relationship would be solely on his feelings for him, not because he’d saved his life? “I wanted you to love me for me. Not because I gave you a kidney.