He quickly downloaded it. "Thky."

Bastien's eyes widened at his use of the Kirovarian term for thanks. It'd been way too long since he'd spoken his own language. Even with that Andarion accent, it was a welcomed treat. "Glad I could help."

Jullien jerked his head toward the door. "Want to see about that shower?"

Sadly, he got an actual hard-on at the thought of being clean again from the use of a real shower, with hot running water. "You know I do."

"We can also drop you somewhere else. Really, I don't mind."

How he wished, but Bastien shook his head. "As much as I would, I better stay put. This place plays havoc with League tracking equipment and most electronics. Not sure why Aksel's s.h.i.t works. But this is the safest place I've found to bed down. While it's not much, it gives me peace of mind at night. I know I don't have to tell you what that's worth."

Having been on the run from a League warrant himself, Jullien was the one person who would fully understand the nightmare that was Bastien's life.

Thrix glanced around Bastien's run-down home. "You want me to make the place a little more hospitable?"

Bastien frowned at the offer, not sure what he meant by it. "How do you mean?"

"I have some skills that can clean this place up and make it more solid and habitable ... if you want."

Bastien couldn't stop himself from smiling at some of the things he'd kill for. "A solid roof that doesn't leak during the rare rains we have would be incredible. But don't make it too inviting. I don't want it to attract any undue attention. Only things I want crawling in here are the spiders and insects."

"Got it."

With that, Jullien gestured for Bastien and the woman with them to follow him out toward their ship.

As soon as they neared it, Bastien bit back a laugh at the name of Jullien's ship. "Pet Hate?"

Jullien grinned as he lowered the ramp. "Seemed fitting for me."

Yeah, given that Jullien had been everyone's pet hate at home, it made sense.

At least he'd managed to keep his sense of humor over it.

Shaking his head, Bastien laughed. "d.a.m.n, Julie, you look so different from the last time I saw you."

"Yeah, I'm surprised you recognized me."

"I would always know my favorite cousin."

He arched a brow at that. "Not how I remember our relationship."

Bastien grinned as old memories played through his mind. Memories he hadn't thought about in a long, long time. And it was nice to think about something other than the horror that was the last couple of years and basic daily survival. "I will admit that you intimidated me."

Jullien gaped. "What?"

He didn't know why it surprised his cousin so. "Honor to the G.o.ds. Yeah. You were ma.s.sively tall and huge. Twice my size, and you always wore a frowning expression that said you were contemplating the death and dismemberment of the next person who made the mistake of speaking to you."

The woman pa.s.sed a curious look at Jullien. "Did you?"

"No. Honestly, the frown came from my confusion as I tried to understand what they were saying to me. Triosans speak fast, and their accents are incredibly thick and unlike the language files we were given in school. The court dialect was completely different from what I'd been taught."

Ah, that explained it. And made a lot of sense. "He's right. It took me a few minutes to reacclimate every time I visited. But man, Julie, that's not what it looked like on your face." He laughed at the memory of their childhood. "Your expression was one of perpetual p.i.s.sed off. Not that I blame you for it.... Yet even so, I always looked forward to seeing you."

"Why? You mostly ignored me."

"I always sat by you, if you remember.... I just always thought you had some kind of secret knowledge the rest of us lacked. And I wanted to know more about Andarions and if they were as different from us as everyone claimed. Because honestly, you didn't seem like you were all that strange to me."

"Thanks ... I think."

Bastien winked as the woman laughed before she headed down the hallway that led toward the bridge. Sobering, Bastien narrowed his gaze on Jullien. "In all seriousness, though, you look really good now, and not just more fit and trim. You look happy. Like there's a weight missing from your shoulders. I don't know what happened to you, but I hope it's as good as it seems. You deserve to have some peace from the h.e.l.l they gave you."

Jullien pulled the gla.s.ses down past his eyes so that Bastien could see that they were no longer the hazel green they'd been. Now his eyes were a vibrant red.

A rare color for Andarions, and one Bastien remembered hearing stories about.

"What's the Andarion term for that?"

"Stralen."

"Means you're married, right?"

Jullien nodded as he replaced his gla.s.ses. "To an amazing female. Like your Alura."

The mere mention of her name made him fume and pierced his heart with a pain so profound that for a moment, he could barely draw a single breath. Jullien had no idea of the nerve he'd just stomped.

Bastien curled his lip. "For your sake, I pray she's nothing like Alura. That faithless b.i.t.c.h is one of the reasons I'm here."

"I'm sorry, Bas. I didn't know."

"Yeah. Neither did I. Until it was too late." And he cursed himself every day of this wretched existence for being an a.s.s and falling for her lies. Lil had been right. He should have divorced her that day in the hospital and never looked back.

So many regrets. So many things he'd do differently if he could only go back in time.

His gaze filled with sympathy, Jullien took him to his room and showed him where the shower was. He pulled out some of his own clothes for him. "Take whatever you need."

More grateful than mere words could express, Bastien stepped into the bathroom and closed the door so that he could finally have a decent bath again.

The moment the hot, fresh water touched his skin, he wanted to weep. This was what he missed most on his makeshift home.

Well, this and someone to talk to. But the water pumps had burned out completely a long time ago so all he had now was what he'd managed to dig out of the ground as a well for himself. Though he'd tried everything, he had yet to get full running water back in the base.

Closing his eyes, Bastien let the miraculous wetness cascade over him and ease the soreness in his muscles.

And for reasons he couldn't even begin to explain, an image of Ember popped into his head. She'd always loved to share showers. He hadn't thought about that in a long time, either.

Alura had despised it. She thought it was intrusive and gross.

But Ember ...

She'd lived to corner him right after he'd rinsed the soap off and then give him a whole 'nother reason to have to bathe again. His body went rock hard at the thought of her mouth sliding over his skin until he begged her for mercy.

Desire hit him like an Andarion Ring fighter and left him breathless. Squeezing his eyes shut, he savored the memories of Ember and the way she used to hold him. The way she'd laugh and tease. No one had ever loved him the way she did.

No one had ever hurt him the way she had either.

And that was the double-edged axe that slit him to the core of his soul every time he allowed himself to think about her or to remember his past.

While he wanted to cut the throat of his now ex-wife-Alura had filed for divorce and been granted it by the Trigon Court two weeks after his arrest-he couldn't bring himself to hate Ember.

Even now. Even though he really wanted to at times. Even though a part of him wanted to lay all of this at her feet and blame her.

He couldn't. And for that, he hated himself.

"I just hope you're happy."

Though it killed him to think about it, he prayed that whatever man she'd found to replace him gave her the love she deserved. That the lucky dog treasured her the way he should.

And that thought made his gut tighten. Worse, it churned up bitter emotions and memories.

You faithless, worthless b.a.s.t.a.r.d!

He flinched as a memory of one of Alura's more stellar tantrums intruded. She'd been so angry when she found out that he'd been arrested for a.s.saulting Ember's rebound boyfriend. He hadn't meant to.

But there he'd been, back from patrol, when he overheard her sister Cin talking about how upset Ember was that her new guy had stood her up after they'd been dating for a couple of months.

Worse, he'd heard Ember's voice over the link as she cried to her sister. "Why can't anyone love me, Cin? What is so wrong with me?"

Next thing he'd known, he'd tracked the b.a.s.t.a.r.d down and had beaten the utter s.h.i.t out of him.

Yeah, that had bent Alura into all kinds of p.i.s.sed off.

But he didn't want to think about her right now. He needed to find some way to get free of this death sentence so that he could hand-carry one back to Barnabas.

Finishing up his shower, he left the room just as Jullien returned.

Jullien wore a peculiar expression before he gestured toward the towel Bastien had been molesting on his arrival. Not in a s.e.xual way. But because it'd been so long since he'd last touched anything so soft and good-smelling. "You can have some of the towels, if you want."

Embarra.s.sed that Julie had caught him in a moment of sad weakness, Bastien actually blushed. "Pathetic, right?"

"Not about to judge. You don't want to know how sorry my state was when my wife found me." He handed a tray of food to Bastien.

At first, he tried to eat like a human, but this was real food. It was warm and delicious. Before he knew it, he was attacking it like a savage and shoving it into his mouth by the handfuls.

Then he made the mistake of glancing to Jullien and realizing that his gluttony, like his towel molestation, had a witness to it.

I am an animal.

Horrified, Bastien wiped his hands off. "Sorry."

"Again, no apologies. Ever. I get it."

Sighing over what a pathetic mess he was, Bastien set the napkin aside. "Who would have ever thought this would be our lives, huh? As a boy, I thought by now I'd be ruling, in complete bliss." That was what his parents had planned for his future. A nice heiress in another empire.

But he'd wrecked that design the moment he met Ember.

"I never thought I'd live long enough to rule. G.o.ds' truth to that. Every day I woke alive in that palace, I counted it a miracle."

Shocked by Jullien's confession, Bastien set the tray aside. "Seriously?"

He nodded. "Once Nykyrian was gone, I figured it was just a matter of time until one of my cousins grew brazen enough to take the fatal shot."

"That's why you wanted to live with your father?"

"Why else?"

Bastien let out a bitter laugh. "Your father thought it was a ruse of your grandmother's so that you could take his throne."

Jullien rolled his eyes. "Of course he did. All he had to do was marry and screw another wh.o.r.e for a son. I wouldn't have cared. I just wanted away from Andaria."

Scowling, Bastien gaped at him. "You know why he never did, right?"

"No idea whatsoever."

"Jullien ... he loves your mother. I mean, loves her. They were supposed to marry. Everything had been arranged, in spite of our grandfather. Uncle Aros was willing to give up his throne for her, then Nykyrian was killed and she went into an inst.i.tution. After that, his father and the Triosan senate absolutely forbade it. They'd have imprisoned him as a traitor had he married her then."

He gaped as if that was news to him. "What? When was this?"

"Before I was born. But I heard my mother and your father and our grandfather fight about this most of my life. Aros categorically refused to ever take another bride-that was his FU to his father and his people over what they did to him by banning his marriage to Cairistiona. He has been loyal to your mother all these years. Your mother is his heart and soul."

Jullien scowled at him as if he couldn't believe it. "Then why did he allow them to banish me and replace me as heir?"

"Truthfully? Aros thinks you hate him. He says that the first time he picked you up when you were an infant, you screamed like you were being murdered and didn't stop until he put you down. That anytime he tried to touch you, you cringed and recoiled, or ran away to hide. So he learned to leave you alone and focused on Nyk. After Nyk was gone, he didn't know what to do with you." Judgments that had always seemed harsh.

But Bastien also remembered how things were during his childhood. "Every time you visited, you and Aros always ended up in a bitter fight. So he thought it would be best if you stayed on Andaria. It's why he didn't fight them when they removed you from the line of succession. He thought you'd be happier on Andaria. That it would be best for everyone."

Jullien scoffed bitterly. "My father never bothered to get to know me at all."

Fair enough. He'd witnessed enough of their interactions to know that as truth. "I'm sorry, Julie."

"It doesn't matter. My parents orphaned me the day I was born. I never expected much from them, and sadly, they never failed to meet my low expectations." Jullien jerked his chin toward his closet. "Take whatever you need, brother. I'll make sure and bring supplies here whenever I pa.s.s through."

Jullien's unexpected charity brought a lump to his throat. G.o.d knew that it'd been so seldom given to the man in front of him that Bastien had no idea when or how Jullien would have learned it.

More than that, it'd been so long since anyone had thrown anything other than pain and misery his way that he was finding it difficult to not be suspicious. "Why are you being so kind to me?"

"Because I know what it's like to be left out in the cold. I don't want to do that to you. If I can find a surgeon who can remove your tag, I'll come back with him, too."

Those words almost broke him. Tears welled in Bastien's eyes before he pulled Jullien against him and hugged him. "Even if you leave and never think of me again, the fact that you offered ... I love you, my cousin."