Stopping a murder that happened forty years earlier may be the only way to heal a tortured mind ...<br><br>Six months after Jesse Madding is brutally tortured by Marcus Brooker, he is still experiencing flashbacks, panic attacks, and jumping at his own shadow. His lovers, Gideon Keel and Emma Coolidge, would do anything to help him, but Jesse refuses to be hospitalized for treatment, or even visit a therapist. Desperate for a change, Gideon and Emma suggest a radical solution.<br><br> Jesse wants to fix his life. More than anything, he wants to be normal again. He doesn't want to live in fear. He doesn't want to be ashamed of his scarred and mutilated body. He doesn't want to shy away from Gideon's touch. Certain that the holding pattern will kill him, he agrees to Gideon and Emma's proposed solution: travel to an alternative dimension and save Marcus Brooker from witnessing Mary's grisly murder ... in order to save Brooker's soul.

Chaos and Communion

Time was ticking. With each minute that passed, Gideon felt more and more uneasy, his muscles tense and hot, his nerves frayed. He hadn’t said anything to Jesse yet, but there were moments when he thought he would fly apart, like the dimension recognized him as an outsider and would dissemble him, cell by cell, if he didn’t leave. It was one reason why he’d clung so hard to Jess as they napped. He needed something solid to hold on to.


Gideon did his best to ignore the added sensitivities as he strode purposefully toward Sangre. He ignored the way the bite in the air made his skin crackle, and he tried not to focus on the way colors seemed to blur into a watercolor left out in the rain. He wouldn’t let the dimensional magic win before he had the chance to save Mary and the others, and he couldn’t let Jesse down in returning home when it was all done.


Chapter 74