early, but the spot beside him was both empty and cold, though he wasn’t surprised. The fact that there was still a faint impression of Emilio in the sheets and on the pillow was proof enough that he’d at least stayed a while. Jude reached out and touched the spot the biker had been laying, and he wondered if he was holding any regrets.
With a breath, Jude pushed himself up to sit, then swung his legs over the side of the bed. He could smell fresh coffee, and he could hear the faint sound of someone moving around. But his chest was feeling tight, and his head wasn’t really in it. It was easier to close his eyes, to breathe, to reach out.
He rarely spoke his own personal prayers aloud, but that morning, his lips and tongue curled over the Hebrew he didn’t get to use enough in his daily life. As much as his faith was part of him, so was his language. It was what always set him and Eliah apart at school—it was what grounded him in who he was.
And now, it offered him some comfort, even as he spoke to a silence that would never answer back.
“I just want guidance. I want to know that I can walk away, and it won’t have to mean that my past was worth nothing.”
His prayer felt selfish, but the hollow feeling in his chest was only growing as each day passed. His injury—and everything that happened the night he got it—was a distraction, but only sometimes. He’d been lost before Eliah called. He’d been searching before he opened his door to one of the most beautiful men he’d ever seen in his life.
He wanted to know where it all fit—he wanted to know that he could fit. That he was in the right shape for the puzzle he belonged to.
His throat felt a little raw when he was finished, but the burden on his shoulders was a little bit lighter. His knee ached, but not as much as he feared it would after a vigorous night, and he only had to lean on his cane a little as he made his way to the guest bedroom he hadn’t yet touched.
His bag was half-open, so he rummaged for clothes. For a second, he considered a shower, but in the end, he pulled a t-shirt on over his sweats, then pinned his kippah on. He hadn’t worn it much since arriving in River Crest, and he hadn’t realized how much he missed it—needed it—until he felt the pins clinging to his hair.
In a way, he was already so different from the bikers. And in a way, he’d been afraid of standing out more. But something about the way Emilio had talked about them the night before made him realize that maybe standing apart from them was what would hold him a little closer—if he really meant to choose this life.
The thought only added to the chaos swirling around his chest, and he pushed it aside as he limped into the kitchen and found Emilio at the sink. He was cupping a mug with both hands, his gaze fixed out the window, but he turned when Jude entered and offered him a smile.
He looked gorgeous—though Jude had yet to see him any other way. He was wearing jeans and a grease-stained t-shirt, and he hadn’t put his prosthetic back in, so his eyelid was drooping low. When Emilio lifted his chin a little, Jude fought down the urge to cross the distance and press his lips to the hollow of his throat, to see if his morning skin tasted anything like the skin he’d devoured the night before.
“There’s coffee if you want,” he said after a beat, his voice a little hoarse.
Jude cleared his throat. “I don’t suppose you have black tea?”
Emilio gave a sort of sheepish laugh. “Put it on the list”—he jabbed his thumb toward a whiteboard on the fridge with two items listed: Oat Milk, Bread. “I gotta head out to the store so I have something to feed the kid when she gets here.”
Jude only just managed to stop himself from choking on his own tongue. “You have a child?”
Emilio’s eye narrowed. “You got a problem with that?”
Jude took a step back at the sound of the man’s tone. “No,” he said slowly, “but I wish you would have said. I’m not sure it’s a good idea—me being here—when you have your child over.”
After a beat, Emilio scoffed