If you could save someone's life, would you? Anyone's? Ali's older brother has a swastika tattooed on his knuckles, a prison ID number for nearly beating an immigrant to death, and spent his teenage years ruthlessly persecuting Ali for being gay. Blood may be thicker than water, but Ali has spent most of his life desperate to prove he is nothing like Tony. A committed vegetarian, charity-supporter, and blood donor, Ali would do anything for anyone. Ali may share parentage with Tony, but he’s determined not to share anything else if he can help it. So when Tony contracts leukaemia, and Ali is the only match for the urgently-needed bone marrow transplant, Ali is caught between two equally awful choices: to refuse and condemn a man to death, or to donate. And in donating, save the life of the man who nearly murdered Ali's Iraqi boyfriend?

Thicker Than Bone

“And this,” Yazid added, picking up the vibrator. “No.”


“Um. Okay? I’m not arguing,” Ali added quickly. “If you don’t want it, then fine. But…do you want to tell me why?”


“If you’re going to use me to relieve your stress,” Yazid said slowly, never taking his eyes from Ali’s, “then it’s going to be youNot your toys.”


Ali plucked the vibrator from him and tossed it back in the sink before cupping Yazid’s face in both hands and kissing him—open-mouthed, languid, slow. “Okay,” he whispered against Yazid’s tongue. “No toys. Just the wrist restraints. You and me, all shut in our room together. And all five rules.”


The five rules they had set out when Yazid had first—very hesitantly—agreed to playing with Ali at all. The five rules that were so sacred, any infraction meant playing was permanently over.


Chapter 74