Larkin didn’t blink, didn’t look away. “My parents find my HSAM embarrassing. Dr. Myers finds it fascinating. Noah finds it exasperating. And none of them have wanted to hear me talk about Patrick. I know that everyone gets over their first love—like a rite of passage. But I can’t. I won’t. I wish I could, but my brain isn’t….” A tear ran along the contour of Larkin’s jaw and dripped off the tip of his chin. “In eighteen years, you were the first person who asked if I was okay. You were the first person to tell me I could talk about it, if I wanted—who didn’t tell me to shut up. I know I’m not very good at expressing myself, so I don’t think you have any idea what that meant to me.”

Doyle swallowed, his Adam’s apple working painfully. He took Larkin’s hand, his own completely enveloping it. Doyle squeezed so hard that Larkin’s knuckles popped. “Thank you for sharing that—for trusting me. And I know I said I could talk about her.” Doyle’s voice broke and he had to whisper the second part. “But I don’t think I can right now.”

“It wasn’t meant to be a quid pro quo situation.”

Doyle wiped his face with the heel of his hand, nodded, and leaned into Larkin for a hug. It lasted a long time—just the two of them, the cool concrete, the smell of motor oil, exhaust, and an urban summer. When Doyle finally pulled back, he said, “All these murdered kids… any one of them could’ve been me. It was dumb luck that kept me out of the hands of someone like Gary Reynold.”

Larkin nodded.

“None of them deserved that.”

Larkin answered, “Neither did you.”

Doyle looked away, staring at the concrete as he struggled to collect himself.

But Larkin gently took his face between his hands, forcing Doyle to meet his own gaze, and those pyrite eyes, with a luster that shone right through the mourning veil, they touched the smoldering embers deep inside Larkin, stoking the single flame that had refused to snuff out. And this touch—this intimacy—between them, nothing compared, not even the pleasure and sensuality of sex.

“Mourning used to be a public ritual.” Larkin drew his fingertips along Doyle’s brow ridge, tracing the contours. “No one was ever alone. I care for you, Ira. And when you’re ready—I’ll listen.”