You're Next (Devil's Backbone, #3)

by Tate James

“He doesn’t deal well with change, but believe me when I say that he will come around in time. I wouldn’t say this about many people, Ashes, but Nate’s worth the headaches.”

“Guys, get in here!”

“I have a great idea, and Carter is talking about hiring a hitman. We need a vote. Come on!”

“What are we, then?” Nate asked with his lips against my ear. “Hmm? If we aren’t friends…what are we, Duckling?”

A full-body shiver ran through me, but it wasn’t from fear or revulsion like it should be. Nope, it was pure, concentrated desire that made me weak at the knees and forgetting to breathe.

“Did you just say again as in, you’ve already given in to this electric attraction when your guard was down? Interesting.”

“What the fuck?”

“He already knows, Layne. He’s just toying with us now. Right, Royce?”

“Nate! We agreed to⁠—” “No, Layne, we didn’t agree to shit,” he said, cutting me off with a growl of annoyance. “I wanted to talk about it, and you acted like a fucking child and pretended nothing had happened, even though you could literally see the scratches and bruises that you made.”

“Shit, gorgeous, I didn’t mean to make you feel bad. I’ve made my peace sharing you with Carter and Heath because I love them almost as much as I love you. Nate’s the same. I can tolerate this because I want you both to be happy.”

“The reason I refused to talk about it, Essex, is because you made your feelings perfectly clear the night of your birthday. You’re not willing to share, and I’m never going to choose.”

Royce loved both of us and didn’t question for even a second that this was how it was always meant to be. Nate loved his friend so hard that he didn’t want to fuck up what was clearly the real deal for us.

“No. He

made his feelings very clear. He can watch if he wants, but he can’t touch—not until he’s ready to grovel, apologize, and admit he was wrong.”

“Don’t hold your breath, Layne,” he muttered. “It’ll be a cold day in hell before that happens.”

“Uh-uh,” he corrected. “Put your back to me. Face Nate, so he can see everything he’s turning down.”

“Fuck, Squirrel,” Royce groaned, kissing my throat and wrapping my hair around his fist to hold me firmly in place. “Your pussy was made for me. So tight and greedy.”

“Look how you’re affecting Nate, baby,” he murmured, biting my earlobe and sucking on that sensitive flesh. “Look how close he is to breaking. You’d like that, wouldn’t you? To break him? See him beg?”

“This is cruel…to both of us.”

“Calm down, Essex. She likes a little pain with pleasure. Maybe you’d know a little about that, hmm? I’ve seen those marks on your chest, bro.”

“I’m sorry,”

“Continue,” he taunted. “I think my girl asked for more than just a sorry before you’re allowed to join in.”

“I was wrong, and I apologize for hurting you. I let my selfishness try to dictate the way this would play out between us, and that wasn’t fair to anyone involved.”

“I thought this was an infatuation and nothing more. I thought this was purely jealousy that my friends—my brothers—had found the kind of happiness I could only dream of, and I thought that maybe if I hurt you, then you’d do the hard part and reject me.”

“You stay right where you are, pretty Squirrel. He can make his apologies just fine while you squirm. Can’t you, Nate bro?” “You’re an asshole.”

“I’m sorry, Duckling.”

“I can’t pretend I’ve swallowed the blue pill or drank the Kool-Aid or anything, but I can admit that I was wrong and…and I want to try.

I’m not ready to close this door and walk ...

“Apology accepted!” I announced in a breathless, slightly unhinged voice. “...

“You said last night that my apology was accepted…” Ah. That. “I did…” I agreed slowly.

“But?” he prompted with a heavy edge of dread. “We’re not good, are we?” Damn it. “No,” I confirmed. “We’re not. I was very invested in forgiving you last night, but it’d be a lie to say everything is forgiven and forgotten today.”

“We’re better than we were, though. If that counts for anything?”

“Yeah. That counts. I guess I just have some work to do.”

“I guess you do,”

Maybe a good portion of my shock was due to the fact that that bomb had been meant for me—for me, for Royce, and for Nate. Had Jocelyn seriously just tried to murder her own son?

“We all trusted Royce’s deadbeat dad, and we let our guard down, and I could have lost you and I never even told you that I love you and I really fucking do. I really, really love you, and you nearly died today. We all nearly died today. Heath, what if⁠—” “You love me?”

“You just said that you love me.”

“Yes…because I do.”

“I should have told you sooner. I can’t believe it took a bomb and six dead people to make me find the courage to tell you that

love you, because I really love you, Heathcliff. Like, so much that the idea of losing you again is enough to break me. I can’t go through that again. When those doctors convinced me you were actually dead, that you’d succeeded when you hung yourself…I cried for days. I wanted to die, Heath. The concept of living in a world without you was utterly unfathomable.”

“I’m sorry it took me this long. I love you.”

“He’s been saying for a while that he didn’t fit in with our new dynamic, that he felt like his being there was uncomfortable and all kinds of other utter bull crap to cover for the fact he was falling for you so hard, it was scaring him.”

“You guys are so sappy, I swear to fuck. I thought men were meant to be too insecure to admit they love their friends.”

“Not us, baby. We’re a different breed.”

Hey, I’m worried that you’re beating yourself up about the fact your mom is a

serial killer, but also we haven’t really discussed what’s going on with the two of us and what it means for the rest of the guys, and at the same time, we need to discuss the idea that you were planning on leaving us and that’s not okay because the idea of you being gone from my life makes me physically ill and makes me kind of want to cry…

“Will you lie with me for a bit? Just…just a couple of minutes?”

“Of course I will,”

“You’re still here,”

“Don’t make a big deal of it, Essex,”