Neither of them spoke after that. He had questions but couldn’t voice them. Instead he just let Dante hold him.

CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT

Through the bushes, Ben saw red and immediately followed it.

“Wait!” He called out but it kept moving faster. He started to run, picking up speed. Branches hit him in the face, cut and sliced at his skin, but he didn’t care. He needed to catch up with the girl in the red coat.

“I just want to help!” he shouted as he got closer to her.

“You can’t. You can’t help. You don’t love me. You’ll make it worse.”

Ben stumbled at that, almost stopped. Making it worse was the last thing he wanted. He couldn’t screw this up. He felt it in his chest. If he did, he would lose himself forever.

He pushed harder, determination bringing him to life. She made it through the brush and out into the open. Just as she did, Ben reached out, his fingers grasping the edge of her red coat.

It was as if someone hit a pause button and they suddenly weren’t moving anymore. The girl turned, and Ben’s heart dropped. He almost let go of her jacket but he knew if he did, she would disappear.

“Bonnie?” His voice shook as he said his sister’s name.

“You can’t help. Not anymore, Benny.”

And then she was gone, her coat hanging in Ben’s grip as she ran toward the tunnel. Ben’s heart sped, exploded as he saw a man with a needle in his arm standing in the mouth of it, waiting.

Ben’s eyes jerked open. The room was dark. His lungs hurt he breathed so heavy. Rapidly, his eyes scanned the room, the body sleeping beside him.

He was still here. In Dante’s bed. Painfully hard.

Christ, why the fuck was he hard right now?

His eyes still saw almost as if he was in the dream, fuzz around the edges of the picture. No matter how hard he tried, Ben couldn’t slow his breathing. Couldn’t make his heart stop running through the park with his dead sister toward his lover’s dead ex.

Though Dante wasn’t really his lover anymore, was he? He’d told Ben he wouldn’t fuck him. Wouldn’t take him. Wouldn’t cure his ache.

But that wasn’t what had Ben tied in knots. He felt them now, the binds around his wrists that he couldn’t see. They were there. Always there, only tighter now because he’d done it again.

He’d fallen in love with someone who would never want him. Not truly. Dante wanted Abel, the same way Tristan wanted Josiah and Mateo. He’d let Tristan use him in a way, and then did the same with Dante.

Ben was only here because Abel was dead, and Dante felt guilty about it.

“I’m here. I want you to know that I’m here, even when I know I can’t be your savoir.”

Dante’s words wrestled with Ben’s thoughts, fighting to see which one could take control but it only made his head hurt worse. There was already so much in there, so many thoughts and fears that he couldn’t handle anymore.

Ben closed his eyes, trying to make it all stop but it didn’t. It wouldn’t fucking stop. He was spinning again, faster, deeper, gone...

Ben slipped out of bed and grabbed his clothes. He dressed in the living room.

Dante was right. Even if he wanted to save Ben, he couldn’t. Ben would only ruin him in the process. He wouldn’t let Dante feel anymore of the guilt that he felt for Abel.

He stumbled out of the apartment, fighting to make his vision clear. When it didn’t work, Ben ran anyway.

CHAPTER FORTY-NINE

Ben looked around the hotel room, trying to remember how long he’d been there. He hadn’t gone home. Couldn’t. His phone was already filled with missed calls from his parents and Dante.

Dante.

His gut ached at the thought of the man. At what he’d been through...and what he meant to Ben. Ben loved him. He fucking loved Dante when he would always be second best to Abel.

Ben’s stomach growled yet he didn’t call for room service. There was no evidence of food in the room either. He did what he’d always done and quieted the voices in his head with one of the bottles of bourbon beside him.

He drank one glass down in quick swallows before filling another. It was the only way to clear his head. To make him feel any sort of peace.

Because she was always there now...Bonnie, in his head even more than before. Like she wanted to tell Ben something. Like she needed him but it was long past the time that he could do anything to help his sister.

He’d failed her in life, and it looked like now he was failing her in death.

So, he drank more. It was the only thing that kept him semi-level. Kept him from spinning out of control.