Ellis Parker is a lucky man: he escaped his persecuting family, survived his tour of duty, and met Maxwell Clark in the city of New Amsterdam. Clark showed Ellis more than the ropes: Clark helped Ellis figure out who he is -- a gay submissive with a massive fixation on a beautiful, mysterious ballet dancer named Bryn Rothe. Ellis knows a Good Man when he sees one, and he wants nothing more than to score a first date with Bryn.<br><br>Little does Ellis know that Bryn has a violent past that is crawling out of shallow graves to haunt him. Even his hectic schedule and beloved stage aren’t enough to distract him. It’s impossible for Bryn to figure out how he feels about Ellis with his demons between them, but when Ellis saves Bryn not once but twice, Bryn is forced to admit that there’s something about Ellis that Bryn might not merely want but need.<br><br>Together, they journey to the scene of Bryn’s original crime -- Charles Towne, South Carolina. There they will dig up secrets that might explain Bryn’s tortured life but might also be his -- and Ellis’s -- undoing.

Earthquakes

“Sarge…Sar, I’m…” Ellis didn’t know what in the hell he was trying to say, but Clark understood anyway.


Clark’s warm hand petted Ellis’s flank and thigh. “Got you, soldier. You’re safe. Here. With me.”


Ellis nodded mutely, his head braced against the smooth wood.


“Now say what I want to hear, soldier.” Clark’s teeth nipped Ellis’s ass cheek and lube smeared his hole.


Ellis gasped. “Green. Go. Please. God, want it, Sarge, I—” The words dissolved into muffled whimpers when the first bead found its way into Ellis’s body. When he shut his eyes, he envisioned Bryn easing the toy inside him. Ellis cried out, clenching and shaking, and Clark waited patiently before he resumed the slow, steady invasion.


“Good, good. Nice and slow, right, soldier?” Clark murmured as the next bead and the next inched inside Ellis, and Clark’s voice melded with Bryn’s, growing deeper and more wicked. “Oh yeah, you can take it, can’t you? This and a whole lot more. C’mon, soldier.”


Chapter 22